|
Azer Dialect
Azer or Azayr is a mostly or entirely extinct dialect of the Soninke language, heavily mixed with Berber and Hassaniya Arabic, formerly spoken in Mauritania and northern Mali. History and distribution Azer arose as a lingua franca for trade across the Sahel, a mixture between Soninke and Berber, widely spoken in the salt-trading centres of Ouadane, Tinigi, Chinguetti, Tichit, Oualata, and Aoudaghost. The name is supposedly derived from the Berber term 'El Answar', their name for the Guiriganke or related Soninke group who founded these oasis towns. Azer's usage progressively declined beginning in the 16th century as it was replaced by Berber and Hassaniya. Elements of the language were collected and studied by Heinrich Barth in the 19th century, Diego Brosset in 1930–1931 and Théodore Monod in 1934. Some Berber and Nemadi communities in the Adrar Plateau, Araouane, Oualata, Néma and Taoudenni spoke Azer well into the 20th century. The language survives today mostly in p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mali
Mali, officially the Republic of Mali, is a landlocked country in West Africa. It is the List of African countries by area, eighth-largest country in Africa, with an area of over . The country is bordered to the north by Algeria, to the east by Niger, to the northwest by Mauritania, to the south by Burkina Faso and Ivory Coast, and to the west by Guinea and Senegal. The population of Mali is about 23.29 million, 47.19% of which are estimated to be under the age of 15 in 2024. Its Capital city, capital and largest city is Bamako. The country has 13 official languages, of which Bambara language, Bambara is the most commonly spoken. The sovereign state's northern borders reach deep into the middle of the Sahara, Sahara Desert. The country's southern part, where the majority of inhabitants live, is in the Sudanian savanna and has the Niger River, Niger and Senegal River, Senegal rivers running through it. The country's economy centres on agriculture and mining with its most promine ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tichit
Tichit, or Tichitt (, ), is a village at the foot of the Tagant Plateau in central southern Mauritania that is known for its vernacular architecture and proximity to the Dhar Tichitt archaeological sites. The main agriculture in Tichit is date farming, and the village is also home to a small museum. Tichitt Airport has two unpaved runways designated in a barren area southeast of the village. History Neolithic This region includes a long sandstone cliff formation that defines the northern limit of the Hodh depression, near the former lake of Aoukar. The Neolithic sites of Dhar Tichitt were settled around 2000 BC by agropastoral communities known as the Tichitt culture. Archaeologists including P.J. Munson, Augustin F.C. Holl, and S. Amblard have found some evidence that millet was farmed there from the date of the communities' foundation. The settlements were generally situated on the cliffs and included stone buildings. They are the oldest surviving archaeological settle ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Languages Of Mauritania
The languages of Mauritania include the official language, Arabic, three national languages, Pulaar, Soninke and Wolof, and French, a former official language which is still the language of working, education and administration. The languages fall into two families: Afroasiatic languages, namely Zenaga-Berber, Tamasheq-Berber, Hassaaniya Arabic and Standard written Arabic; and Niger-Congo languages, principally Pulaar, Soninke and Wolof. Afro-Asiatic languages * Arabic ** Modern Standard Arabic is the official language of the government of Mauritania. ** Hassaniyya Arabic (70%-80% of the population) is the colloquial spoken variety of Arabic. Its name is derived from the tribe of the Bänū Ḥassān. The language serves as a lingua franca in the country. It is also the language of the Imraguen who also use elements of Soninke. * Berber ** Zenaga is a Berber language that was more widely spoken in the past, but is still used in the south of the country, close to t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Languages Of Mali
Mali is a multilingual country of about 21.9 million people. The languages spoken there reflect ancient settlement patterns, migrations, and its long history. ''Ethnologue'' counts more than 80 languages. Of these, Bambara, Bobo, Bozo, Dogon, Fula, Arabic, Kassonke, Maninke, Minyanka, Senufo, Songhay languages, Soninke and Tamasheq are official languages. French is the working language. In 2024, the Francophone population of Mali represents 20%, which is approximately 4,884,000 people. Among them, 6.4% (around 1,491,000 individuals) speak French as their first language. Additionally, approximately 3,329,144 people, or 13.6% of the total population of 24,479,000, use French as a second language. Language usage French was retained as the official language at independence until 2023. As a working language, it is used in government and formal education. Estimates of the number of Malians who actually speak French are low, and almost all of them speak French as a se ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Taoudenni
Taoudenni (also Taoudeni, Taoudénit, Taudeni, , ) is a remote salt mining center in the desert region of northern Mali, north of Timbuktu. It is the capital of Taoudénit Region. The salt is dug by hand from the bed of an ancient salt lake, cut into slabs, and transported either by truck or by camel to Timbuktu. The camel caravans ( azalai) from Taoudenni are some of the last that still operate in the Sahara Desert. In the late 1960s, during the regime of Moussa Traoré, a prison was built at the site and the inmates were forced to work in the mines. The prison was closed in 1988. Salt mining The earliest mention of Taoudenni is by al-Sadi, in his '' Tarikh al-Sudan'', who wrote that in 1586 when Moroccan forces attacked the salt mining center of Taghaza (150 km north west of Taoudenni) some of the miners moved to 'Tawdani'. In 1906, the French soldier Édouard Cortier visited Taoudenni with a unit of the camel corps ( méharistes) and published the first description o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Néma
Néma () is a town in southeastern Mauritania, close to the border with Mali. It is located at around at the eastern end of the Aoukar. It is the capital of Hodh Ech Chargui Region and of the Néma (department), Néma Department. While the urban population of Nema is approximately 20,000, the surrounding rural sites served by the city make it closer to 100,000 in the whole Department. Mauritanians value ''brousse'', or country living, as a throwback to their nomadic roots. "The Road of Hope (Mauritania), The Road of Hope", which stretches from the capital, Nouakchott, ends in Nema near the market quartier. There are ten quartiers, sections, of the city, the oldest being Edelibu Quartier, northeast of the road, Shovia Quartier, dating from the 1950s, is the only section south of the road. Climate Néma has a hot arid climate (Köppen climate classification ''BWh''). Although there is a clearly defined rainy season from July to September during which of the an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Araouane
Araouane or Arawan is a small village in the Malian part of the Sahara Desert, lying north of Timbuktu on the caravan route to the salt-mining centre of Taoudenni. The village once served as an entrepôt in the trans-Saharan trade. History Between the 16th and the 19th centuries, Araouane acted as an entrepôt in the important trans-Sahara trade. In particular, the town of Araouane served as a storage depot for the merchants of Timbuktu to store their goods as they were in the process of preparation to resell to northern Saharan towns like Tuat and Ghadames. Under the Songhai Empire and Pashalik of Timbuktu, Araouane was governed similarly to Timbuktu; under a system of "Judgeship" held by erudite scholars with sweeping judicial, legislative, and executive powers. The French explorer René Caillié passed through Araouane in 1828 on his journey from Timbuktu across the Sahara Desert to Morocco. He travelled in May, the hottest month of the year when the average maximum temper ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Adrar Plateau
The Adrar (, Berber languages, Berber for "mountain") is a highland natural region, natural and historical region of the Sahara, Sahara Desert in northern Mauritania. The Adrar Region, an administrative division of Mauritania, is named after the traditional region. It is sometimes called Adrar Tamar to distinguish it from other areas called Adrar in the Sahara. Geography The Adrar is an arid plateau, known for its Canyon, gorges, Desert pavement, regs (stony deserts) and Dune, sand dunes. Structurally the Adrar is a low central massif which rises to over above sea level just east of Atar, Mauritania, Atar near the Amojjar Pass on the track to Chinguetti, then loses elevation and becomes subsumed by dunes to the south and east. Limited cultivation is only possible in the gorges at lower elevations such like oued Seguellil, where the water table is high enough to support large palm groves. Features include the Oued el Abiod or 'White Valley', a dune-filled fault line along which ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nemadi Dialect
Nemadi is a language spoken by a small hunting tribe of eastern Mauritania known as the Nemadi people. It is, according to some sources, a dialect of Hassaniyya, according to others, a mixture of Zenaga, Azer and Hassaniyya. The name "Nemadi" itself appears to come from Soninke, where it means "master of dogs". Accounts of the language According to Robert Arnaud (1906), "around Tichit the Nemadi employ a dialect called Azeïr which is close to Soninke." Chudeau (1913), perhaps following him, adds that "We have little information on their language, which M. Delafosse classifies provisionally with Soninké." However, Brosset (1932) says that they speak Hassaniyya, and that "their special vocabulary does not consist of vocables different from Hassaniyya, but of technical terms which need has forced them to create, which are forged from Arabic, Zenaga, and maybe Azer." Chinguetti's ''Kitab El Wasit'' says that "The Nmadi speak the dialect common to all the Moors (i.e. Hassa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Théodore Monod
Théodore André Monod (9 April 1902 – 22 November 2000) was a French naturalist, humanist, scholar and explorer. Exploration Monod was educated at École alsacienne and obtained a doctorate in science from Sorbonne University in 1922."Theodore Monod, Sahara-Loving Naturalist, Dies at 98" nytimes.com. Retrieved 24 February 2023. Early in his career, Monod was made professor at the '''' and founded the '' [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Heinrich Barth
Johann Heinrich Barth (; ; 16 February 1821 – 25 November 1865) was a German explorer of Africa and scholar. Barth is thought to be one of the greatest of the European explorers of Africa, as his scholarly preparation, ability to speak and write Arabic, learning African languages, and character meant that he carefully documented the details of the cultures he visited. He was among the first to comprehend the uses of oral history of peoples, and collected many. He established friendships with African rulers and scholars during his five years of travel (1850–1855). After the deaths of two European companions, he completed his travels with the aid of Africans. Afterwards, he wrote and published a five-volume account of his travels in both English and German. It has been invaluable for scholars of his time and since. Early life and education. Heinrich Barth was born in Hamburg on 16 February 1821. He was the third child of Johann Christoph Heinrich Barth and his wife Charlotte ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aoudaghost
Aoudaghost also transliterated as Awadaghust, Awdughast, Awdaghusht, Awdaghost, and Awdhaghurst () is a former Berber town in Hodh El Gharbi, Mauritania. It was an important oasis town at the southern end of a trans-Saharan caravan route that is mentioned in a number of early Arabic manuscripts. The archaeological ruins at Tegdaoust in southern Mauritania are thought to be the remains of the medieval town. History The earliest mention of Aoudaghost is by al-Yaqubi in his ''Kitab al-Buldan'' completed in 889-890 in which he described the town as being controlled by a tribe of the Sanhaja and situated 50 stages south of Sijilmasa across the Sahara Desert. "It is the residence of their king who has no religion or law. He raids the land of the Sudan who have many kingdoms." In 962, the city conquered Awgham with an army of 100,000 camel cavalry. Over 20 kings of the Sudan paid Awdaghost tribute. From Ibn Hawqal writing in around 977 we learn that the distance from Aoudaghost to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
