1. A man of the noble Kel Tadek marries a woman of the noble Kel Ferwan. The children are Kel Ferwan, but will live with the father until his death or the divorce of the mother, when they return with her to her own tribe.
2. A man of the noble Kel Tadek married a woman of the Imghad of the Kel Ferwan. The children will normally be Imghad of the Kel Ferwan.
3. If a man marries a slave woman of another tribe, this woman has become the property of the husband’s tribe by his purchase or payment of the marriage portion, and the children belong to the father. This occurred in Ahodu’s case. One day the Kel Gharus came over and stole eight slaves belonging to the Kel Tadek, who proceeded to retake them. The slaves in question were Kanuri people of Damagerim. The Kel Gharus appealed to the religious court at Agades, which awarded four slaves to each tribe. Later two of those allotted to the Kel Gharus ran away to the Kel Tadek, who were allowed to keep them on the ground that they had been ill-treated by their former masters. One of these two women Ahodu married, and his son is considered to belong to his own clan and not to his wife’s former tribe. In this case Ahodu nevertheless had to pay some compensation to the former masters of his wife.
The derivation of tribal allegiance through the female line has carried in its train the consequence that a man or woman’s social status is always determined by that of the mother. But the restricted number of noble women, the deference and respect paid to them, and the impossibility of taking them as concubines have combined to diminish the numbers of Imajeghan as compared with the Imghad. The hard-and-fast rule among all the Tuareg, that nobles can only be born of a noble mother irrespective of the caste of the father, has done much to preserve the type and characteristics of the race. In recent years the custom has tended to break down, for where a noble father, who has taken unto himself a servile wife, is sufficiently powerful to assert himself he will often succeed in passing off his sons and daughters as Imajeghan. Ahodu has done so with his boy; but had this been impossible the child would have been accounted of the Irejanaten or mixed people. The old laws of succession are said by von Bary to have become especially slack among the Kel Owi, but even here the status of noble women has remained so unassailable that it would still be impossible to-day for them to marry outside their own class.
The laws of inheritance and succession also show the strength of the matriarchal tradition. Although hereditary office is rare among the Tuareg nowadays, it seems to have been more frequent in the past.[139] Ibn Batutah states that the heir of the Sultan of Tekadda was the son of the ruler’s sister.[140] Similarly of the Mesufa who were Tuareg, he records that descent is traced through the maternal uncle, while inherited property passes from a deceased man to the children of his sister to the exclusion of his own family.[141] The traveller adds that nowhere except among the infidel Indians of Malabar did he observe a similar state of things.[142] Bates thinks that Egyptian records tend to show that the succession of the chieftainship of the Meshwesh Libyans passed in the female line. The genealogy of many of the kings of Agades is recorded by their female parentage. The Tuareg of Ghat not only treat their women-folk in much the same way as their brethren further south, but Richardson specifically states that the succession of the chiefs and Sultans of those parts is similar to the practice of the Tekadda house and at Agades. It is the son of the sister of the Sultan who succeeds.[143] It seems clear that before the advent of Islam, which has tended to modify the system, the Tuareg had a completely matriarchal organisation. In this earlier state of society may perhaps be found the explanation of the reputed Amazons of the west of North Africa, recorded by Diodorus Siculus in a grossly exaggerated version of some story which he had probably heard concerning the status of certain Libyan women.[144]
I know of no reason to suppose that these matriarchal customs were derived from association with the negro people; the reverse is quite as likely to have occurred, as the culture contacts of North Africa, following the trend of migration, seem to have taken a course from north to south and not the opposite direction.[145] The matter is one of great interest,[146] for the matriarchate is found in a highly developed state in Ashanti, and it would be of interest in connection with the origin of this people to learn if the system can be traced to a common origin.[147] I cannot agree with Barth’s[148] conclusion that the descent of the Sultan of Tekadda “is certain proof that it was not a pure Berber State, but rather a Berber dominion ingrafted upon a negro population, exactly as was the case in Walata,” where he cites the case of the Mesufa. Moreover, this remark is in contradiction with his previous assumption,[149] to wit: “With respect to the custom that the hereditary power does not descend from the father to the son but to the sister’s son . . . it may be supposed to have belonged originally to the Berber race; for the Askar (Azger), who have preserved their original manners tolerably pure, have the same custom. . . . It may therefore seem doubtful whether . . . this custom belonged to the black native,” with which statement I am decidedly inclined to agree. The problem, however, is one which I prefer on the whole to leave to qualified anthropologists.
[107]Not to be confused with Tanut in Damergu. The word “tanut” means a shallow well; there are consequently many places of this name.
[108]Just north of Auderas.
[109]Barth, op. cit., Vol. I. p. 385.
[110]Jean, op. cit., pp. 148-9.