The Bagezan group looms large in Central Air, but even its general features are unknown. The mountains have neither been reconnoitred nor mapped. The area they occupy figures as a blank on the Cortier map. I travelled around Bagezan and climbed up into one broad valley in the heart of the massif, but my own additions to the cartography hereabouts are confined to a few details along the towering sides. Buchanan in 1919-20 crossed the western side, from Towar to a valley which runs into the Anu Maqaran basin, where it is called Abarakan. A detachment of Jean’s first patrol to Air visited the southern valleys. But no European has ever entered the eastern or north-eastern part of the group. The reason for this apparent lack of enterprise is due to few of the mountain tracks being fit for camels; many of them are not even suitable for donkeys, and the complications of travelling in this sort of country, where none of the inhabitants will act as porters, thus become considerable.
The massif rises some 2000 feet above the general level of the central plateau, except in the north-east, where the latter at 3500 feet above the sea is itself over 500 feet higher than in the north and west. The principal peaks must be well over 6000 feet, the bottoms of the upland valleys perhaps 3500 to 4000 feet above the sea. Many of the latter contain perennial streams, and rumours reached me of a small lake somewhere in the unexplored north-eastern part; but this may only be a fairy tale. The southern sides of Bagezan fall almost vertically on to the central plain between Towar and Arakieta on the upper Beughqot valley. Several small villages are hidden in the folds of the mountains above, wherever there is a permanent supply of water. In some cases the streams are sufficient to irrigate a few gardens; at one or two points there are some date palms and the only lime trees in Air. The climate is cooler and everything ripens some four to six weeks later than on the plateau below. Frost is common in the winter.
A few of the villages, notably those like Tasessat and Tadesa, near the southern edge of the massif, have been visited by French patrols. In addition settlements known as Atkaki, Emululi, Owari, Agaragar and Ighelablaban have been reported to exist, but generally speaking, owing to the difficulties of intercommunication, the villages are almost unknown. They are said to consist of stone houses apparently of the earliest period associated with the Itesan tribes, in whose country the mountains lay. Some of the houses, however, differ from any of those encountered in other districts of Air.
In order to see the type of country and visit some of the people of the mountains I climbed from Towar up to the Telezu valley, where there were some Kel Bagezan, to-day a composite tribe made up of portions of Kel Tadek imghad and various Kel Owi elements. They are under the chief Minéru or El Minir, who owes allegiance to the Añastafidet. My way from Towar led past the ruined town of Agejir to the Tokede valley, which soon turned east and disappeared into the mountain. I subsequently found that the Tokede was the same valley as the one called Telesu higher up and Towar further down. The path turned west along the foot of Bagezan, past a scree of enormous boulders, ranging from five to twenty-five feet across, on which numerous families of red monkeys were playing. There we turned, T’ekhmedin, Atagoom and myself, and wound up the side of the mountain by a path so steep and rough that a self-respecting mule would have walked warily. The camels went up and up over loose stones. The left side dropped away precipitately into the deep valley which divides massifs of Bagezan and Todra. A stream roared in a gorge hundreds of feet below at the foot of a cliff of gleaming rock. Still we climbed over stones and boulders by a two-foot path gradually turning north and then north-east and then east. We followed up a narrowing tributary bed of the stream in the gorge until we came to a pass between bare earth-coloured hills, the tops of which were only a few hundred feet above us, and at last dropped gently down the other side past some grazing camels which seemed interested in our arrival and followed us inquisitively into Telezu. An enclosed plain opened out full of big green trees and grass with wonderful pasture and plenty of water in the sand. It ran from west to east before turning and narrowing southwards to fall over the edge into the Tokede below. The valley was shut in all round by low peaks and rough crags along the sky-line. One had no impression of being so far above the plateau of Air on a higher table-land. The great summits of Bagezan had become small hills.
There was no other way out of Telesu except on foot, either over the hills or down the ravine made by the stream falling towards Tokede, so we returned as we had come, after drinking milk with the Kel Bagezan who were living there. The descent was terrific; the camels had to be led and we only made Towar by nightfall. After reaching the bottom of the scree we cut off a corner instead of going by Agejir, and marched towards the standing rock of Takazuzat (or Takazanzat), which looks like the spire of a cathedral, on the edge of the Ara valley near the isolated peak of In Bodinam.
All the ways up to the Bagezan villages are similar, if not harder. The agility of the camels that have to negotiate these paths is unbelievable until it has been experienced.
The only account which I can give of the houses of Bagezan is second-hand, and this is the more unfortunate, because Jean’s description[216] of them as the first houses in Air does not correspond with the character of the earliest ones I saw. I will quote his exact words, as the point is important: “Les premières constructions édifiées furent Afassaz et Elnoulli; maisons à dôme central recouvrant une grande pièce sombre entourée de nombreuses dépendances; l’étage aujourd’hui effondré avait été solidement étayé par des piliers de maçonnerie à large et forte structure.” To Afassaz, a large group of villages in a valley east of Bagezan, we will turn later; Barth erroneously supposed it lay near Towar, having apparently confused it with Agejir. “Elnoulli” I was entirely unable to trace under this name, and concluded that Emululi, which is one of the Bagezan villages, was intended.
PLATE 27
HOUSE TYPES.
