Tuareg

The Tuareg, an ethnic group of present-day Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso, Algeria, and Libya, participated in the slave trade, controlled the trans-Saharan trade route in the 15th century, and dominated much of the territory south of the Sahara, including the cities of Gao and Timbuktu.

Known as the “blue people” because of the color the indigo dye of their clothes left on their skin, the Tuareg were a seminomadic people in the western and southwestern regions of the Sahara and of the Sahel (Arabic for “shore,” used to denote the transition zone along the southern edge of the Sahara). They claimed descent from the Berbers of North Africa who migrated south during the Arab invasions of their traditional homeland in the seventh century. The Tuareg formed political confederations, called kels, defined by caste hierarchies and clan membership and connected by adherence to Islam and their shared Tamacheq language.

The Kel Eway and Kel Gress, among other Tuareg confederations, migrated to the savanna zone of the Sahel, combining pastoralist traditions with trans-Saharan trade and sedentary agricultural practices in efforts to protect themselves from drought. Beginning in the 11th century, the Tuareg raided communities to the south, taking slaves and exacting tribute. Slaves in Tuareg society served the important purpose of maintaining adequate levels of agricultural labor while Tuareg nobles were absent on long trading journeys. By the 15th century Tuareg society consisted of numerous status and caste categories: iklan, or slaves; irewelen, the descendants of iklan; imrad, who payed tribute to the Tuareg, and, finally, the imageren, Arabic for “the proud and free,” who were fair-skinned nomads of noble descent.

The Tuareg traded most of those captured in slaving raids in order to reduce the captives’ chances of escape, but they kept some captives and assimilated them into Tuareg communities. The process of assimilation allowed the slaves to participate not only in agricultural tasks but also to accompany trade caravans. Through marriage and by demonstrating loyalty, slaves could and did achieve social mobility within Tuareg society. Those slaves not kept by the Tuareg became part of the human trade on the trans-Saharan trade routes, which the Tuareg controlled in the 15th century.

The largely nomadic Tuareg faced pressure from more sedentary groups such as the Hausa as well as from other nomads like the Fulani and attempted to establish a more centralized kingdom during the 15th century. Several Tuareg kels united to establish a sultanate in Agadez (in present-day Niger), but no enduring centralized authority structures overcame the long tradition of nomadic life.

Further reading: Elizabeth Heath, “Tuareg,” in Africana: The Encyclopedia of the African and African American Experience, eds. Kwame Anthony Appiah and Henry Louis Gates, Jr. (New York: Basic Civitas Books, 1999), 1,891; “The Peoples,” in Cambridge Encyclopedia of Africa, eds.

Roland Oliver and Michael Crowder (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981), 57-86.

—Lisa M. Brady

Tula See ToLTECS.