Note.—The scheme is largely theoretical, as the Amenokal has rarely had much authority over any tribes except the People of the King. His authority over a part of the Aulimmiden has been even more nominal and has varied considerably from time to time.
In addition to the social distinctions between nobles and serfs, the Tuareg attach great importance to tribal classification. Among the inhabitants of the mountains a man will describe himself as, say, “Mokhammad of the Kel Such-and-such of the Kel Owi,” or of the other category, which is called the “People of the King,” as the case might be. These two great tribal divisions (there were three before the departure of the Kel Geres for the Southland) will be referred to in detail when the history of the migrations of the Air Tuareg is considered. The divisions are absolute; a tribe either is of the Kel Owi or is not of the Kel Owi. There is usually never any doubt; the erroneous attribution of a man’s tribe to the Kel Owi confederation would provoke the indignant rejoinder that his clan were “People of the King” and did not “belong (sic) to the Añastafidet.” The distinction means all that the difference between an ancient landed nobility and a parvenu commercial aristocracy denotes. Many of the older men of the “People of the King” go so far as to say that there are no nobles among the Kel Owi at all.[134] Apart from their slightly different ethnic origin, the principal reason why the Kel Owi have stood apart from the other tribes is that they possess an administrative leader of their own who represents the whole confederation; as they say, “he speaks for them to the Amenokal at Agades.” He is called the Añastafidet, the Child of Tafidet. The non-Kel Owi tribes, on the other hand, have no single leader other than the king; in their case each tribal chieftain transacts the business of his own tribe with the former independently of the other chiefs. For them the Amenokal of Air assumes the dual function of nominal ruler of the whole country and of direct overlord of certain tribes.
In accordance with the democratic traditions of the Tuareg, the Añastafidet,[135] like the Sultan, is elected. He must be a noble, but need not always be chosen from the same family. He is elected for a period of three years, but his tenure of office is really dependent upon a yearly revision by the Kel Owi tribes when they concentrate in the autumn to go with the salt caravan to Bilma. The tribal groups mainly responsible for the choice are the Kel Tafidet and Kel Azañieres; the Ikazkazan, being the junior group of the confederation, have little voice. The Añastafidet’s badge of office[136] is a drum; he retains no authority on leaving office, though it entitles him to a certain degree of respect, and leads to his being consulted on State matters. In practice if the Añastafidet is reasonably capable he is confirmed in power for a succession of three-year periods. During the last fifty years there have been in all about six Añastafidets; one, I think the last holder of the office, is at present living at Zawzawa in Damergu. The Añastafidet’s official place of residence was at Assode in Central Air, but since the evacuation of the north he has been living at Agades in direct touch with the Amenokal. His principal duties are to represent the confederation at the Court of the Sultan and maintain the freedom of transit through Air and Damergu for caravans, on which the prosperity of the tribes depends. Trade with the north and the position of the Kel Owi in Air astride the great caravan road which passes from north to south, east of the Central massifs, have in effect combined to place the foreign relations of all the Air people with Ghat and the Fezzan in the hands of the Añastafidet, business with the potentates of the south, on the other hand, being, as has already been stated, in the hands of the Amenokal at Agades. The breakdown of the trans-desert traffic during the war deprived the Kel Owi of most of their prosperity and the Añastafidet of his work.
The Añastafidet was assisted in his duties by four agents, two of whom dealt with local business, while the other two lived in the Southland to assist the Kel Owi tribes in their transactions there. Neither the Añastafidet nor his agents ever seem to have received a salary, and the former at least was expected to give munificent presents, but no doubt their official positions brought perquisites which compensated for any outlay. As in the case of the Sultan, the importance of the Añastafidet’s office depends entirely on the personality of the holder. When von Bary visited the country, Belkho, chief of the Igermaden tribe, living at Ajiru in Eastern Air, thanks to his military prowess and political wisdom, was the de facto ruler of the whole country. His relations with the Amenokal were strained, even though he had him more or less under his influence; the Añastafidet had become of so little moment that he is only once mentioned by this traveller.[137] In Barth’s day, when Air was under the domination of Annur, another Kel Owi chief of the same type, the Añastafidet was a mere shadow in the land.
The Añastafidet doubtless represents the surviving functions of a Kel Owi Amenokal. The restriction of his duties was probably the result of a compromise arrived at when the Kel Owi entered Air and found an Amenokal already established in the country, supported by the Kel Geres and the various tribes known as the “People of the King.” The more intimate inter-tribal relations between the various units of the Kel Owi confederation and the organisation of the “People of the King” will be referred to hereafter in detail.
The system by which the Kel Owi have an administrative leader who seems to have practically no warlike or judicial functions has in no way modified the tribal or social organisation of the confederation. As in the case of all the Tuareg tribes, other than those which have become entirely sedentary, the government of each unit, large and small, is patriarchal and similar to that of Bedawin tribes. The chief of a noble tribe is the leader in war and the dispenser of justice in peace. The functions are not necessarily hereditary. In council with the heads of families he exercises authority over the Imghad tribes associated with his clan, through the chiefs of these servile groups in the manner already described. The council of the heads of families is of great importance, but plays an advisory rather than an executive part. The heads of families rule their own households, including their slaves.
Within ill-defined limits, certain tribes are grouped together under a common leader known as the “agoalla” or “agwalla.” This usually occurs in the case of tribes which are nearly related to each other. Three groups in the Kel Owi division have already been mentioned; in two of these, the Kel Tafidet and Kel Azañieres, the office of “agoalla” is said[138] to be hereditary, but I have been unable to find any confirmation of this except in so far as the son of a man who, by his personal ascendancy, has secured control over more than one tribe, would probably more easily step into his father’s shoes than another person. The grouping of tribes may also occur for military reasons, but in such cases it has a tendency to be of a temporary character. It is best to assume that the tribe is the unit of Tuareg society and that the tribal chiefs are the elements of which their Government is constructed. “Agoallas” are an exotic form principally due to individual personality or temporary conditions prevailing over long-standing customs.
Tribes sometimes group themselves into temporary or permanent alliances. The former probably spring from military exigencies, the latter may be due to common origins in the recent past. Such aggregations as the Kel Azañieres and Kel Tafidet in the Kel Owi tribes are so obviously due to common tribal origins that they require no further examination. But the Kel Owi confederation in Air plays a far larger rôle than do mere tribal alliances. Here is no mere question of relationship or community of origin, but a more strict bond, which, however, cannot be defined. Such groups as these have been termed confederations, though the term is a little misleading, as no unity of government is implied. The origin of the confederation, which carries with it more moral than material obligations, is to be explained by the entry of the Kel Owi tribes into Air as a mass of people confronted by an already established hostile or at least jealous population of the same race as themselves. It followed that the new arrivals would tend to hold together and act with one another. The conditions of the confederation nevertheless have been such that the representative is only an administrative head and not a ruler. He is there to embody a common policy and to dictate one. Loose as these bonds have been they have served the Kel Owi in good stead, for their commerce has gained by co-operation at the expense of their rivals, the “People of the King,” who in the absence of any organisation have been forced to rely on the fickle ties of common jealousy. How far there are groups or confederations like the Kel Owi within the larger northern division of Azger or Ahaggar I cannot say, but the former are a confederation as the people of Air generally never have been.
Much has already been said of the status of the Tuareg men and their tribal organisation, but before it is possible to consider their family life, the method they follow in tracing their descent must be described. A man’s status, in Air, as elsewhere among the Tuareg, is determined by the caste and allegiance of his mother. Survivals of a matriarchal state of society are numerous among the People of the Veil. They colour the whole life of the race. A woman, they say, carries her children before they are born, and so they belong to her and not to the father. “After all,” as one of them said to me when we had been discussing this question for some time, “when you buy a cow camel in calf, the calf is yours and not the property of the man who sold the camel to you. It is the same with women,” he added; and he seemed to me to have some show of logic. Our medieval (and perhaps modern) lawyers would have said instead, “partus sequitur ventrem,” but he would have meant the same as my Tuareg friend. If a woman marries a man in her own tribe the children, of course, belong to that tribe, but if she marries away from her people they belong to her own, and not to her husband’s clan. In this case, were the husband to predecease his wife, the children and their mother would return to live with her tribe. If the father survives, the children usually go on living with him for a time, but as they belong to their mother’s tribe in any event, they eventually return there. Should inter-tribal hostilities break out they must leave their father and fight for their mother’s tribe, even against their own parent if need so be. Until this is understood the relationships of the Tuareg appear very puzzling to the traveller. When I first met Ahodu he informed me that he was of the Kel Tadek people, who are Kel Amenokal, but he had a half-brother and a paternal cousin who belonged to the Añastafidet. It appears that the fathers of Ahodu and Efale, the famous eastern guide, were brothers of a man in the noble Kel Fares of the Kel Owi confederation. Ahodu’s father took a wife from the Kel Tadek, so the son became a member of the latter tribe, whereas Efale’s father married within the confederation. The maternal allegiance is so strong that, though proud of his father’s repute as a holy man and representative of the fifth generation of keepers of the mosque of Tefgun near Iferuan, Ahodu used to speak of the Kel Owi in disparaging terms when comparing their recent origin with the antiquity of the Kel Tadek and the other “People of the Amenokal.”
The following examples of definite cases may assist in understanding the position: