Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara: Islam, Spiritual Mediation, and Social Change 1009224611, 9781009224611

Citation preview

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

In this innovative new history, Erin Pettigrew utilizes invisible forces and entities esoteric knowledge and spirits to show how these forms of knowledge and unseen forces have shaped social structures, religious norms, and political power in the Saharan West. Situating this ethno graphic history in what became la Mauritanie under French colonial rule and later the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, Pettigrew traces the changing roles of Muslim spiritual mediators and their Islamic esoteric sciences known locally as l’hjāb over the long term history of the _ of the immaterial in the material world region. By exploring the impact and demonstrating the importance of Islamic esoteric sciences in Saharan societies, she illuminates peoples’ enduring reliance upon these sciences in their daily lives and argues for a new approach to historical research that takes the immaterial seriously. Erin Pettigrew is Assistant Professor of History and Arab Crossroads Studies at New York University Abu Dhabi. She is a cultural historian of colonial and postcolonial West Africa, with a focus on the history of Islam, slavery, race, gender, and nationhood.

African Studies Series The African Studies series, founded in 1968, is a prestigious series of monographs, general surveys, and textbooks on Africa covering history, political science, anthropology, economics, and ecological and environmental issues. The series seeks to publish work by senior scholars as well as the best new research.

Editorial Board: David Anderson, The University of Warwick Carolyn Brown, Rutgers University, New Jersey Christopher Clapham, University of Cambridge Richard Roberts, Stanford University, California Leonardo A. Villalón, University of Florida Other titles in the series are listed at the back of the book.

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara Islam, Spiritual Mediation, and Social Change Erin Pettigrew New York University Abu Dhabi

Shaftesbury Road, Cambridge CB2 8EA, United Kingdom One Liberty Plaza, 20th Floor, New York, NY 10006, USA 477 Williamstown Road, Port Melbourne, VIC 3207, Australia 314 321, 3rd Floor, Plot 3, Splendor Forum, Jasola District Centre, New Delhi 110025, India 103 Penang Road, #05 06/07, Visioncrest Commercial, Singapore 238467 Cambridge University Press is part of Cambridge University Press & Assessment, a department of the University of Cambridge. We share the University’s mission to contribute to society through the pursuit of education, learning and research at the highest international levels of excellence. www.cambridge.org Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9781009224611 DOI: 10.1017/9781009224581 © Erin Pettigrew 2023 This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press & Assessment. First published 2023 A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Names: Pettigrew, Erin, author. Title: Invoking the invisible in the Sahara : Islam, spiritual mediation, and social change / Erin Pettigrew. Description: 1. | New York : Cambridge University Press, 2022. | Series: ASS African studies | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2022033921 (print) | LCCN 2022033922 (ebook) | ISBN 9781009224611 (hardback) | ISBN 9781009224567 (paperback) | ISBN 9781009224581 (epub) Subjects: LCSH: Islamic occultism Mauritania. | Islamic occultism Western Sahara. | Western Sahara History, Local. | Mauritania History, Local. | Supernatural Religious aspects Islam. | BISAC: HISTORY / Africa / General Classification: LCC BF1773.2.M38 P48 2022 (print) | LCC BF1773.2.M38 (ebook) | DDC 133.309648 dc23/eng/20220824 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022033921 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022033922 ISBN 978 1 009 22461 1 Hardback Cambridge University Press & Assessment has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third party internet websites referred to in this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

In this innovative new history, Erin Pettigrew utilizes invisible forces and entities esoteric knowledge and spirits to show how these forms of knowledge and unseen forces have shaped social structures, religious norms, and political power in the Saharan West. Situating this ethno graphic history in what became la Mauritanie under French colonial rule and later the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, Pettigrew traces the changing roles of Muslim spiritual mediators and their Islamic esoteric sciences known locally as l’hjāb over the long term history of the _ of the immaterial in the material world region. By exploring the impact and demonstrating the importance of Islamic esoteric sciences in Saharan societies, she illuminates peoples’ enduring reliance upon these sciences in their daily lives and argues for a new approach to historical research that takes the immaterial seriously. Erin Pettigrew is Assistant Professor of History and Arab Crossroads Studies at New York University Abu Dhabi. She is a cultural historian of colonial and postcolonial West Africa, with a focus on the history of Islam, slavery, race, gender, and nationhood.

African Studies Series The African Studies series, founded in 1968, is a prestigious series of monographs, general surveys, and textbooks on Africa covering history, political science, anthropology, economics, and ecological and environmental issues. The series seeks to publish work by senior scholars as well as the best new research.

Editorial Board: David Anderson, The University of Warwick Carolyn Brown, Rutgers University, New Jersey Christopher Clapham, University of Cambridge Richard Roberts, Stanford University, California Leonardo A. Villalón, University of Florida Other titles in the series are listed at the back of the book.

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara Islam, Spiritual Mediation, and Social Change Erin Pettigrew New York University Abu Dhabi

Shaftesbury Road, Cambridge CB2 8EA, United Kingdom One Liberty Plaza, 20th Floor, New York, NY 10006, USA 477 Williamstown Road, Port Melbourne, VIC 3207, Australia 314 321, 3rd Floor, Plot 3, Splendor Forum, Jasola District Centre, New Delhi 110025, India 103 Penang Road, #05 06/07, Visioncrest Commercial, Singapore 238467 Cambridge University Press is part of Cambridge University Press & Assessment, a department of the University of Cambridge. We share the University’s mission to contribute to society through the pursuit of education, learning and research at the highest international levels of excellence. www.cambridge.org Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9781009224611 DOI: 10.1017/9781009224581 © Erin Pettigrew 2023 This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press & Assessment. First published 2023 A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Names: Pettigrew, Erin, author. Title: Invoking the invisible in the Sahara : Islam, spiritual mediation, and social change / Erin Pettigrew. Description: 1. | New York : Cambridge University Press, 2022. | Series: ASS African studies | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2022033921 (print) | LCCN 2022033922 (ebook) | ISBN 9781009224611 (hardback) | ISBN 9781009224567 (paperback) | ISBN 9781009224581 (epub) Subjects: LCSH: Islamic occultism Mauritania. | Islamic occultism Western Sahara. | Western Sahara History, Local. | Mauritania History, Local. | Supernatural Religious aspects Islam. | BISAC: HISTORY / Africa / General Classification: LCC BF1773.2.M38 P48 2022 (print) | LCC BF1773.2.M38 (ebook) | DDC 133.309648 dc23/eng/20220824 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022033921 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022033922 ISBN 978 1 009 22461 1 Hardback Cambridge University Press & Assessment has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third party internet websites referred to in this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

In this innovative new history, Erin Pettigrew utilizes invisible forces and entities esoteric knowledge and spirits to show how these forms of knowledge and unseen forces have shaped social structures, religious norms, and political power in the Saharan West. Situating this ethno graphic history in what became la Mauritanie under French colonial rule and later the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, Pettigrew traces the changing roles of Muslim spiritual mediators and their Islamic esoteric sciences known locally as l’hjāb over the long term history of the _ of the immaterial in the material world region. By exploring the impact and demonstrating the importance of Islamic esoteric sciences in Saharan societies, she illuminates peoples’ enduring reliance upon these sciences in their daily lives and argues for a new approach to historical research that takes the immaterial seriously. Erin Pettigrew is Assistant Professor of History and Arab Crossroads Studies at New York University Abu Dhabi. She is a cultural historian of colonial and postcolonial West Africa, with a focus on the history of Islam, slavery, race, gender, and nationhood.

African Studies Series The African Studies series, founded in 1968, is a prestigious series of monographs, general surveys, and textbooks on Africa covering history, political science, anthropology, economics, and ecological and environmental issues. The series seeks to publish work by senior scholars as well as the best new research.

Editorial Board: David Anderson, The University of Warwick Carolyn Brown, Rutgers University, New Jersey Christopher Clapham, University of Cambridge Richard Roberts, Stanford University, California Leonardo A. Villalón, University of Florida Other titles in the series are listed at the back of the book.

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara Islam, Spiritual Mediation, and Social Change Erin Pettigrew New York University Abu Dhabi

Shaftesbury Road, Cambridge CB2 8EA, United Kingdom One Liberty Plaza, 20th Floor, New York, NY 10006, USA 477 Williamstown Road, Port Melbourne, VIC 3207, Australia 314 321, 3rd Floor, Plot 3, Splendor Forum, Jasola District Centre, New Delhi 110025, India 103 Penang Road, #05 06/07, Visioncrest Commercial, Singapore 238467 Cambridge University Press is part of Cambridge University Press & Assessment, a department of the University of Cambridge. We share the University’s mission to contribute to society through the pursuit of education, learning and research at the highest international levels of excellence. www.cambridge.org Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9781009224611 DOI: 10.1017/9781009224581 © Erin Pettigrew 2023 This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press & Assessment. First published 2023 A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Names: Pettigrew, Erin, author. Title: Invoking the invisible in the Sahara : Islam, spiritual mediation, and social change / Erin Pettigrew. Description: 1. | New York : Cambridge University Press, 2022. | Series: ASS African studies | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2022033921 (print) | LCCN 2022033922 (ebook) | ISBN 9781009224611 (hardback) | ISBN 9781009224567 (paperback) | ISBN 9781009224581 (epub) Subjects: LCSH: Islamic occultism Mauritania. | Islamic occultism Western Sahara. | Western Sahara History, Local. | Mauritania History, Local. | Supernatural Religious aspects Islam. | BISAC: HISTORY / Africa / General Classification: LCC BF1773.2.M38 P48 2022 (print) | LCC BF1773.2.M38 (ebook) | DDC 133.309648 dc23/eng/20220824 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022033921 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022033922 ISBN 978 1 009 22461 1 Hardback Cambridge University Press & Assessment has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third party internet websites referred to in this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

In this innovative new history, Erin Pettigrew utilizes invisible forces and entities esoteric knowledge and spirits to show how these forms of knowledge and unseen forces have shaped social structures, religious norms, and political power in the Saharan West. Situating this ethno graphic history in what became la Mauritanie under French colonial rule and later the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, Pettigrew traces the changing roles of Muslim spiritual mediators and their Islamic esoteric sciences known locally as l’hjāb over the long term history of the _ of the immaterial in the material world region. By exploring the impact and demonstrating the importance of Islamic esoteric sciences in Saharan societies, she illuminates peoples’ enduring reliance upon these sciences in their daily lives and argues for a new approach to historical research that takes the immaterial seriously. Erin Pettigrew is Assistant Professor of History and Arab Crossroads Studies at New York University Abu Dhabi. She is a cultural historian of colonial and postcolonial West Africa, with a focus on the history of Islam, slavery, race, gender, and nationhood.

African Studies Series The African Studies series, founded in 1968, is a prestigious series of monographs, general surveys, and textbooks on Africa covering history, political science, anthropology, economics, and ecological and environmental issues. The series seeks to publish work by senior scholars as well as the best new research.

Editorial Board: David Anderson, The University of Warwick Carolyn Brown, Rutgers University, New Jersey Christopher Clapham, University of Cambridge Richard Roberts, Stanford University, California Leonardo A. Villalón, University of Florida Other titles in the series are listed at the back of the book.

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara Islam, Spiritual Mediation, and Social Change Erin Pettigrew New York University Abu Dhabi

Shaftesbury Road, Cambridge CB2 8EA, United Kingdom One Liberty Plaza, 20th Floor, New York, NY 10006, USA 477 Williamstown Road, Port Melbourne, VIC 3207, Australia 314 321, 3rd Floor, Plot 3, Splendor Forum, Jasola District Centre, New Delhi 110025, India 103 Penang Road, #05 06/07, Visioncrest Commercial, Singapore 238467 Cambridge University Press is part of Cambridge University Press & Assessment, a department of the University of Cambridge. We share the University’s mission to contribute to society through the pursuit of education, learning and research at the highest international levels of excellence. www.cambridge.org Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9781009224611 DOI: 10.1017/9781009224581 © Erin Pettigrew 2023 This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press & Assessment. First published 2023 A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Names: Pettigrew, Erin, author. Title: Invoking the invisible in the Sahara : Islam, spiritual mediation, and social change / Erin Pettigrew. Description: 1. | New York : Cambridge University Press, 2022. | Series: ASS African studies | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2022033921 (print) | LCCN 2022033922 (ebook) | ISBN 9781009224611 (hardback) | ISBN 9781009224567 (paperback) | ISBN 9781009224581 (epub) Subjects: LCSH: Islamic occultism Mauritania. | Islamic occultism Western Sahara. | Western Sahara History, Local. | Mauritania History, Local. | Supernatural Religious aspects Islam. | BISAC: HISTORY / Africa / General Classification: LCC BF1773.2.M38 P48 2022 (print) | LCC BF1773.2.M38 (ebook) | DDC 133.309648 dc23/eng/20220824 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022033921 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022033922 ISBN 978 1 009 22461 1 Hardback Cambridge University Press & Assessment has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third party internet websites referred to in this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.

Western scholars learned, professionally at least, to suspend moral judgement on spirit beliefs and witchcraft (even in their bloody manifestations) by learning to grasp their rationality all the while believing the beliefs to be false. Karen E. Fields and Barbara J. Fields, Racecraft: The Soul of Inequality in American Life (London: Verson, 2014), 220

In memory of Biri N’Diaye and Aissatou Thiam

Contents

List of Illustrations Acknowledgments Notes on Orthography and Translation List of Abbreviations

page xi xii xvii xviii

Introduction: A Saharan Ontology of the Invisible Part I

Knowledge and Authority in Precolonial Contexts

1 Principles of Provenance: Origins, Debates, and Social Structures of l’hjāb in the Saharan West _ 2 Local Wisdom: Contestations over l’hjāb in the Eighteenth–Nineteenth Centuries _ Part II Rupture, Consonance, and Innovation in Colonial and Postcolonial Mauritania 3 Colonial Logics of Islam: Managing the Threat of l’hjāb _ 4 Postcolonial Transfigurations: Contesting l’hjāb in the Era _ of Social Media

1 39 41 74

107 109 156

Part III Articulating Race, Gender, and Social Difference through the Esoteric Sciences

185

5 Desert Panic: Bloodsucking Accusations and the Terror of Social Change

187

ix

x

6

Contents

Sui Generis: Genealogical Claims to the Past and the Transmission of l’hjāb _ Epilogue

222

Glossary Bibliography Index

281 287 325

268

Illustrations

MAPS

I.1 The Saharan West in the eleventh century 1.1 Medieval empires, eighth–seventeenth centuries 2.1 Polities and Emirates in the western Sahel and Saharan West from the seventeenth–nineteenth centuries 3.1 Colonial French West Africa (1899–1960) 4.1 Political map of contemporary Mauritania 6.1 Ahl Guennar towns and precolonial polities in the Senegalese-Mauritanian zone

page 27 56 90 124 163 224

PHOT OGRA PH S

3.1 3.2 4.1 4.2 5.1 6.1

“Femme Maure” Photograph of Trārza emir Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba ould Sayār _ _ hammad ould Abuwāh Shaykh Mu _ “Fête des haratin (esclaves affranchis), 1934” Sayār Fāll _

page 146 152 157 158 210 257

xi

Acknowledgments

Finishing this book would not have been possible without the support of multiple institutions, foundations, fellow scholars, students, friends, and family. I thank the people of Mauritania for allowing me to come and go over what amounts to almost two decades of visits. I would not be who I am today if it were not for the immense generosity and sociability of the people I met and spent time with in Shinqīt, Atar, Kaédi, and Nouakchott. ʿAishetū mint Samorī and Sīdī ould _Shighālī are so much a part of my conception of family that I cannot imagine life without them; indeed life in Mauritania would have been impossible if they had not folded me so quickly and smoothly into their home. Nicolas Kotoko, Amenita Kane, Mariem mint Molūd, Bushera mint Meyine, Bābacar ould Muhammad Bābā, Haby Ly, Farmata Fāll, Brahīm Bilāl Ramadān _ _ and his family, Ahmed ould SīdAhmed, Yaba (Mammy) Barry, and _ _ Dimé N’Diaye and Pap Thiam have all been wonderful friends who housed me and shared in conversation over meals too numerous to count. In Rosso, Meimouna Fāll and Amadou Barry hosted me, while Alioune Diop and inhabitants of neighboring Garak and Toungen humored my questions. I thank the people of Awjeft and Maʿaden elErvān for the same patience and openness. Thanks go to Shaykhānī ould Sidīna for helping me with interviews in his hometown of Maʿaden elErvān, and to Senī ʿAbdāwa in Awjeft and Tungād. In Tigumatīn and Nouakchott, Sayār Fāll’s family members, notably Shaykh A_hmadū _ _ over Bamba, Amenitū, Roqaya, and ʿAmī, hosted and took care of me multiple visits before and after their father passed away. I could not have navigated scholarly networks in Nouakchott or the challenges of research without my second set of kin, Muhammadū ould Meyine and Fātimatū mint ʿAbd al-Wahhāb – formidable _academics and _ the most generous couple I know. Muhammad al-Mukhtār ould Sīdī _ Nationales de la République Muhammad and the staff of the Archives _ Islamique de Mauritanie were helpful and friendly over my months of work in their institution. Sīdī Dieng amazed me with his depth of knowledge and learning, but also his humor and kindness. Muhammadū ould _ xii

Acknowledgments

xiii

Slāhī, Muhammad Saʿīd ould Hammodī (Allah yarhamu), Ahmad Molūd _ _ Eidda, _ Mariem mint Bābā Ahmad, Elemine ould _ Muhammad _ ould Bābā, _ _ Muhameden ould Ahmad Salem, Ferdaous Bouhlel, Bābā Adū, Yahyā _ ould_ al-Barā, Ahmad_ Mahmūd ould Muhammad (dit Gemal), ʿAbdel _ _ _ Qāder ould Muhammad, Muhammad Fāll ould Oumayr, Boubacar _ _ Bah, Alassane Diakité, Cheikh Saʿad Messaʿūd, Muhammad Fāll ould _ Bouh Camara (Allah yarhamu), Yensarha mint Muhammad Mahmūd, _ Hamden ould _ al-Tāh, and _ Sīdī Muhammad _ Mohammadū ould Ihazānā, _ _ _ _ _ ould Jiyīd all contributed to my understanding of local history and the dynamics of my topic. I am also grateful for the friendship of Habib Gueye and Hanān Sūriān, and to Melanie Thurber, Alassane Ba, _ Tamikka Forbes, and the Vergnol family who hosted me over various periods of dissertation fieldwork. In Dakar, Mariem Bodiane, Carolina Bonache, and Lindsey Gish made my time there memorable and productive. I thank the staff at the Archives Nationales du Sénégal for their service to the many scholars who seek information about West Africa’s colonial past. In between Mauritania, Senegal, and France, Ameth Gueye, Kemāl Jelīl ould Meyine, Ghallat mint Muhammad, Anne Laure Gueret, and Robin _ Monroig have been the most supportive of friends. In Paris, the “Abeliens,” made up of Benjamin Acloque, Camille Evrard, Hadrien Collet, Ismail Warscheid, Ariel Planeix, Rachid Agrour, Guillaume Denglos, Alexis Trouillot, and Zinep Tazi, shared conversations about research, Mauritania, and politics on Avenue de Saint-Ouen. I especially thank Benjamin and Camille for their friendship and continued intellectual collaboration. Additionally, Remy Bazenguissa, Camille Lefebvre, Jean Schmitz, Ismaël Moya, Kadya Tall, Jean-Claude Penrad, Carole Craz, Elisabeth Dubois, Delphine Manetti, Amalia Dragani, Anne Regourd, Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh, Jean-Charles Coulon, and Sébastien Boulay have constituted meaningful institutional and intellectual connections when I am in Paris. Most of this book was written when I was a Fulbright scholar at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (EHESS) in Paris in 2018–19, and I thank the Franco-American Fulbright Commission, the EHESS, and my home institution, New York University Abu Dhabi (NYUAD), for the valuable time away from teaching and service work to focus on writing and research. NYUAD has provided consistent research funding for me to make regular trips to both Mauritania and France, as well as to attend conferences and present my work. This book comes out of a dissertation that was supported by multiple institutions that provide vital funding for graduate student research. I thank the

xiv

Acknowledgments

Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Department of Education’s Foreign Language and Area Studies Program, the Fulbright-Hays, and the American Institute of Maghrib Studies. I also thank colleagues at the University of Indiana, Northwestern University, the EHESS, Stanford University, the Centre em Rede de Investagaçao em antropologia (CRIA) in Lisbon, University College London in London and Qatar, New York University (New York), Bayreuth University, Columbia University, the City University of New York, the University of Strasbourg, the Bayt al-H ikma and Maltaqī Nouakchott in Nouakchott for inviting me to present_ this research in its various stages. I also thank Scott Reese and Teren Sevea for our three-year collaboration on all things invisible, culminating in a two-part workshop between NYU in New York and NYUAD and funded by the NYU Abu Dhabi Institute in 2016 and 2017. At NYUAD, a remarkable community of scholars provided friendship and guidance. Awam Ampka, Laure Assaf, Nora Barakat, Martín Bowen-Silva, Nelida Fuccaro, Martin Klimke, Taneli Kukkoken, Matt Maclean, Judith Miller, Pedro Monaville, Henrietta Müller, Melina Platas Izama, Gabriel Rabin, Matthew Silverstein, Catherine Stimpson, Mark Swislocki, Deborah Williams, Katherine Schaap Williams, and Robert Young, as well as Nisrin Abdulkhadir, Tina Galanopoulos, Caitlin Newsom, and Jesusita Santillan made coming to work a pleasure. Toral Gajarawala, Maya Kesrouany, Masha Kirasirova, Nathalie Peutz, Maurice Pomerantz, Justin Stearns, and Corinne Stokes were critical interlocutors and, more importantly, friends. The Women’s Writing Group initiated by Kirsten Edepli proved a vital mode of accountability for my writing. Students at NYUAD reminded me of the more immediate rewards of the academic profession. Michael Gomez and Fred Cooper provided valuable mentorship from NYU in New York. At Stanford University, Richard Roberts, Joel Beinin, and Sean Hanretta were my primary intellectual guides, and I still rely especially on Richard’s counsel and check-ins years later. The support in various forms from Shahzad Bashir, Karen Fung, Laura Hubbard, Burçak Keskin-Kozat, and Art Palmon ensured that I completed this research in dissertation form. At UCLA, Ghislaine Lydon, Andrew Apter, Sheila Breeding, Sondra Hale, Paul Von Blum, and Ned Alpers encouraged me to pursue my PhD and provided an introduction to academic life. At Hollins University, Annette Sampon-Nicolas remains one of the most sophisticated examples of the professor I want to be. In Oakland, Lauren Adrover, Damien Droney, Mark Gardiner, Marissa Mika, and Elly Power made up a dissertation group that

Acknowledgments

xv

provided community and a productive space for sharing early drafts of this project. Zekeria ould Ahmed Salem, Sam Anderson, Jon Cole, Francesco Correale, Brandon County, Jeremy Dell, Mark Drury, Francisco Freire, Tiffany Gleason, Laure Guirguis, Stephanie Hassell, Christopher Hemmig, Rachael Hill, Larissa Kopytoff, Ann McDougall, Will McPherson, Adrian O’Connor, Caitlyn Olson, David Owen, Uğur Z. Peçe, Sina Rahmani, Marie Rodet, Elias Saba, Jennifer Wacek, Constanze Weise, Keren Weitzberg, Katherine Wiley, Zachary Wright, and Sarah Zimmerman all contributed through discussion, sharing their expertise, or reading parts of this book in manuscript form. Amy Bailey, Rekha Balu, Cathy Callahan, Jay Davidson, Miriam Edwards, Christopher Fraga, Megan Gerlach, Lillian Gould, Laëtitia Grall, Caroline Handschuh, Emma Nesper Holm, Margaret Irving, Josefina Raña Johnston, Janine Kossen, Céline Lemarchand, Nadia Makouar, Mary Pat McGuire, Kara McMullen, Alison Mickey, Amélie Mouton, Doug Norwood, Virginia Picchi, Mary Pat and Bonnie Rowan, Kasey Skeen, Joy Sparrowhawk, and Daungyewa Utarasint encouraged me in their own ways at various stages. I have to thank the fabulous editor, Julia Boss, for her crucial help with editing and pushing this book to be better through extensive revisions. Lina Jammal provided her transliteration services at an early stage. Madelon Nanninga expertly managed the index. Tom Abi Samra worked diligently on creating the maps for this book while teaching me how to think in new ways about the visuals of historical space. Mauritanian artist Saleh Lo painted a cover image that we both felt reflected the contents of this book in abstract form, and I cannot thank him enough for his vision. Shamoon Zamir kindly took a high-quality photograph of Saleh’s painting. Jonathan Burr generously provided the same service for the photograph used in Chapter 5. The editorial team at Cambridge University Press, especially Atifa Jiwa, Rachel Imrie, Danial Brown, and Maria Marsh, as well as two anonymous readers of my manuscript, ensured the publication of this book. I thank the Journal of African History and Éditions de l’Étrave for permission to reproduce material from “The Heart of the Matter: Interpreting Bloodsucking Accusations in Mauritania” (Journal of African History 57, no. 3, November 2016) and “Politics and Affiliations of Enchantment among the Ahl Guennar of Southern Mauritania,” (in Politiques de la culture et cultures du politique dans l’ouest saharien, eds. Sébastien Boulay and Francisco Freire (2017). To my parents Rodney and Karen Pettigrew; my sister Jessica Pettigrew and her family, Jake Sanchez and Julius Pettigrew Sanchez; my grandmother Grace Pettigrew; and aunt Roxine Pettigrew, I simply

xvi

Acknowledgments

cannot thank you enough for your endless support. To my parents-in-law, Mada Koı¨ta and Bocar Diagana, as well as Ousmane, Salatou, Ami, Fati, and Fatou Diagana and Pierre Nicolle, I thank you for welcoming me so warmly into your family. And, finally, to Youssouf Diagana, who jumped head first into a life in motion, and to our daughter, Colombe, who was born just as I received final copy-edits, you have made a post-book life the most perfect future I can imagine.

Notes on Orthography and Translation

For most terms in Arabic, I rely on Brill’s simple Arabic transliteration system for spelling and diacritics in the Latin alphabet. As place names were often translated into the Latin alphabet through French, I maintain well-known names of places, such as Nouakchott and Rosso, found in most current maps in English or French. I otherwise rely on diacritics to guide pronunciation of less well-known places. For known authors or figures, I maintain the most public spelling in French. Terms in Hassāniyya, the Arabic dialect of Mauritania, are written in the closest _ approximation in the Latin alphabet with diacritics. Terms in either form of Arabic, Hassānīya or fusha, are written in italics. Terms in Soninké, _ written in Latin letters and in italics. Place Pulaar, Wolof, or French are names from among these language groups follow French convention, which is the local convention. I retain original sources’ spellings. The glossary includes both singular and plural forms of terms, though only those used in the plural in the book itself are included as such. Unless otherwise noted, terms in the glossary are from the formal Arabic. Translations from interviews and texts, except where otherwise indicated, are my own. In most Arabic-speaking countries, men’s first names are usually followed by ibn or bin (b.), meaning “son of,” followed by their father’s first name. In Mauritania, the convention is to use ould or wuld, terms that also mean “son of.” The same convention is followed for women’s names, though here the term bint, meaning “daughter of,” is replaced with mint. Some sources, especially those written in Arabic, will also use the ibn/bin/bint structure, in which case I followed my sources in their practice.

xvii

Abbreviations

AHR ANRIM ANS AOF APC Ar. ARA ASR BCAFCM BCEHSAOF BIFAN BNF BSOAS CEA CHEAM CNRS Fr. FRANOM IFAN IJAHS JAH JNAS ONS

xviii

American Historical Review Archives nationales de la République Islamique de Mauritanie Archives nationales du Sénégal Afrique-Occidentale française Archives provinciales de Chinguetti Arabic Archives régionales d’Atar African Studies Review Bulletin mensuel du comité de l’Afrique française et du comité du Maroc Bulletin du Comité d’Études Historiques et Scientifiques de l’Afrique Occidentale Française Bulletin de l’Institut Français d’Afrique Noire Bibliothèque nationale de France Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies Cahiers d’Études Africaines Centre des Hautes Études sur l’Afrique et l’Asie Moderne Centre national des recherches scientifiques French Archives nationales d’Outre-Mer L’Institut français d’Afrique Noire / L’Institut fondamental d’Afrique Noire International Journal of African Historical Studies Journal of African History Journal of North African Studies Office national de la statistique

Introduction A Saharan Ontology of the Invisible

The desert has been the home of saints and prophets … because it is the barzakh between freedom and existence, between death and life. Ibrahim al Koni1

In the 1950s in the French colonial West African Saharan territory of what is now Mauritania, the Sufi saint (or walī) Eʿli Shieykh ould Momma (1929–2013) set up his tent at a water source called Amdayr with his young family.2 No one else dared to stop at dakhlat al-af‘ā (“the serpents’ entry”) because of the snakes who lent their name to the location, but, apparently, this reputation did not give Eʿli Shieykh pause as he put up the tent for his wife and infant daughter. A later hagiographical text records that while Eʿli Shieykh prayed at dawn outside the family encampment, an old woman appeared and hurried into the tent, leaning over the sleeping wife and girl. She quickly put the thumb, pinkie, and index fingers of her right hand together and placed them on the temple of Eʿli Shieykh’s daughter. The “wretch” then lifted her claw-like hand to her mouth and made a sucking sound before turning to the saint’s wife to repeat the same eerie process.3 Eʿli Shieykh stood up to intercede but, being in the middle of prayer, could only silently signal the old woman to stop. Taking her cue from the snakes, she slithered away in the early morning light. When the saint, prayers completed, finally pursued the woman who attacked his family using the extractive and nefarious art of sell, she fell to the ground and asked for forgiveness, which he granted. 1

2

3

Ibrahim al Koni, “Ibrahim al Koni: In the Desert We Visit Death,” Vimeo, Louisiana Channel, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, 2014, Online, accessed June 26, 2022, https://vimeo.com/92607891. One of the saint’s later disciples composed the hagiographical text. See Ahmad b. _ Muhammad b. Hamayn min Āl Bārikallāh fīhi Fādilī, al Wusūl wa l tarsīkh bimanāqib _ _ _ _ al jalāl (Nouakchott: al shaykh eʿli al shaykh, aw, hādī al rijāl ilā hadrat dhī Imprimerie, _ _ n.d.). The Mauritanian jurisconsult and Sufi_ shaykh Hamden ould Tāh gave 1927 as his birthdate. Hamden ould Tāh, interview, Nouakchott,_ April 20, 2012. _ fīhi Fādilī, al Wusūl wa l tarsīkh, 192. Āl Bārikallāh _ _

1

2

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Eʿli Shieykh would eventually become a powerful central figure in the Mauritanian prayer economy.4 But it was vivid and often haunting descriptions of sell (“bloodsucking” in the local Arabic dialect of Hassāniyya) like the one above that initially led me to study the ways _ Sufi saints and spiritual mediators, or shuyūkh (sing. shaykh), in the Sahara have managed invisible forces, spirit agents, and divine blessings and miracles to ensure the well-being of their communities and to render justice when wronged.5 Like Eʿli Shieykh, these Muslim spiritual mediators domesticated the intangible spirits who inhabited desolate stretches of desert and preyed on the vulnerable, occasionally adopting the form of snakes or other (in)animate objects for this purpose. The mediators’ expertise in what Mauritanians today call l’hjāb, or what I translate as the “Islamic esoteric sciences,” granted these_ Muslim spiritual mediators the authority to access the invisible spiritual world in order to act upon the visible material world. Invoking the Invisible considers how these often-unseen forces and entities have shaped social structure, religious norms, and political power in West Africa over the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Situating this ethnographic history in what became la Mauritanie under French colonial rule and, later the postcolonial nation of the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, the book traces the changing roles of Muslim spiritual mediators and their Islamic esoteric sciences, with a focus on the colonial and postcolonial eras. These sciences and their experts have been part of a framework of therapeutic and protective practice attending to physical insecurity, social anxiety, and personal desires. Unwed women sought out the expertise of these Muslim spiritual mediators to ensure a timely marriage. Once married, they asked these same specialists for numerological squares filled with references to and verses from the Qur’ān that would guarantee fertility and their husbands’ loyalty. Warriors and emirs rewarded these specialists in secret knowledge with herds of animals and promises of exemption from taxes usually paid for protection from raids. Families with a suddenly ill child summoned these 4

5

For more on the concept of prayer economy, see Benjamin Soares, who defines it as “an economy of religious practice in which people give gifts to certain religious leaders on a large scale in exchange for prayers and blessings.” Benjamin F. Soares, Islam and the Prayer Economy: History and Authority in a Malian Town (Ann Arbor: Michigan University Press, 2005), 153. Archives nationales du Sénégal (ANS) 9G86/107 “Affaire de sorcellerie” and Archives nationales de la République Islamique de Mauritanie (ANRIM) E1/75. Benjamin Acloque, “Accusations of Remote Vampirism: The Colonial Administration in Mauritania Investigates the Execution of Three Slaves: 1928 1929,” in African Voices on Slavery and the Slave Trade, eds. Alice Bellagamba, Sandra Greene, and Martin Klein (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 282 304.

Introduction

3

spiritual mediators to diagnose and heal illnesses caused by malevolent spirits or jealous neighbors understood to harm through the evil eye (ʿayn) or bloodsucking. These powerful sciences constituted a system of knowledge in response to the needs of its consumers, most often ensuring the health and welfare of local populations. Spiritual mediators also, albeit less frequently, invoked these divine forces and entities in retribution for social wrongs. L’hjāb could then be used both product_ ively and destructively as circumstances required. In the region I broadly call the Saharan West (as opposed to the disputed territory of the Western Sahara) and at least since the mid-nineteenth century, the term l’hjāb has been used to identify _ containing slips of paper with the knowledge required to make amulets inscriptions, to work for and with spirits, and to serve clients as a spiritual mediator. As a system of knowledge with restricted access and fundamentally abstruse methods, l’hjāb is intrinsically difficult to pin down and _ define. The term can be something of a blank slate on which people list meanings and techniques they admire or fear. While the bodies of knowledge constituting l’hjāb have shifted over time – as is true for any _ science – what has remained constant is l’hjāb as a locus of concern for Muslim clerics, practitioners, and clients, _and for political and military agents. And, yet, despite – or perhaps as a result of – centuries of contest over its permissibility and efficacy, l’hjāb endures as an effective means of _ confronting and understanding the shifting conditions of everyday life in the Saharan West. In studying the social and cultural history of l’hjāb, the book favors an ethnographic approach to its written and oral_ sources. A historical genealogy of texts on this topic runs throughout as chapters follow the ways that Saharan scholars referenced and cross-referenced texts and debates in their own attacks on or defenses of the esoteric sciences. Not only do these texts provide evidence of an awareness of and participation in polemics just as salient elsewhere in the Muslim world but they also indicate shifts in the kinds of anxieties and challenges facing inhabitants in the region. More recent materials make use of these principles and reveal the existence of certain practices specific to the region, such as sell, which provide insight onto social tensions, environmental crises, and conceptions of racial and gendered differences. Finally, the ethnographic history upon which this book relies provides an account of the changing visible and invisible worlds with which Muslims of the Saharan West interacted. The lived realities of these practices may or may not have textual iterations but they reflect shifts in understanding about wellbeing, religious practice, political structures, social hierarchy, and racial identity. Invoking invisible forces constituted a means for Saharan men

4

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

and women to exert control over and, ideally, to transform political, cultural, and social relations. By accepting as part of the narrative the forces often denied a place in academic history writing – the “unbelieved,” the “unseen,” the “unknown,” the “supernatural” – and dismissed as irrational, exoticizing, or unverifiable, we can better understand how the people of the Saharan West understood their past, their immediate challenges, and their future possibilities.6 Defining the Invisible For the purposes of this book, I use the expression the “Islamic esoteric sciences” to refer to a range of systematic knowledge and techniques elaborated on and restricted to initiated Muslims to get closer to God and to invoke the capacity of the divine to enact change in the material world by activating the spiritual realm. Terms in Arabic used to identify these sciences – asrār (secrets), ʿulūm al-bātin (esoteric sciences), al-ʿulūm _ al-khafiyya (hidden sciences), al-ʿulūm al-gharība (wonderous sciences) or sirr al-hurūf/al-harf (secrets of letters) – point to the restricted nature of _ access to_ this knowledge. While some scholars have used the term “occult sciences” to describe these various forms of secret knowledge, I have found that the English word, “occult” carries negative connotations from a European historical context and thus avoid using it.7 While I am sensitive to calls to interrogate the labeling of anything as “Islamic” because of the diversity of meanings and debates about what this category actually means and includes, I am following historian Louis Brenner’s lead when he interchangeably applies the terms “Muslim” or “Islamic” to these esoteric sciences as learned, accessed, and practiced by Muslims as part of their spiritual study and service to a community of co-religionists.8 I use the “Islamic esoteric sciences” to refer to a field of knowledge that was considered not only a normative but a central part of the 6

7

8

See a three part series of articles co written and edited by Luke Clossey, Kyle Jackson, Brandon Marriot, Andrew Redden, Karin Vélez, David M. Gordon, Arlen Wiesenthal, Taymiya R. Zaman, and Simon Ditchfield, “The Unbelieved and Historians,” History Compass 14, no. 1 and 2; 15, no. 1 and no. 12 (December 2016, January 2017 and December 2017), doi: 10.111/hic3.12360; 10.111/hic3.12370; 10.111/hic3.12430. See Liana Saif and Francesca Leoni, “Introduction,” in Islamicate Occult Sciences in Theory and Practice, eds. Liana Saif, Francesca Leoni, Matthew Melvin Koushki, and Farouk Yahya (Leiden: Brill, 2020), 1 40, 2. Shahab Ahmed, What Is Islam? The Importance of Being Islamic (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2016), 6 and 545; Louis Brenner, “The Esoteric Sciences in Islam,” in African Healing Strategies, eds. Brian Du Toit and Ismail Abdalla (Owerri, Nigeria: Trado Medic Books, 1985), 20 28; Brenner, “Sufism in Africa,” in African Spirituality: Forms, Meanings and Expressions, ed. Jacob K. Olupona (New York: A Herder and Herder Book, 2011), 324 49.

Introduction

5

intellectual history of elite Islamic, philosophical, and scientific thinking shared across time and space within the larger Muslim world until at least the nineteenth century when modernist and reformist condemnation made public engagement with these sciences undesirable.9 The discipline of the Islamic esoteric sciences relied on the Qur’ān as the foundational knowledge for attaining both metaphysical and material goals. The Qur’ān itself contained the elements necessary for a practitioner or client to become closer to the divine and to access the spiritual realm, for when its verses were recited, written, or ingested, its protective and healing properties were accessible to the body. As Michael Muhammad Knight has emphasized, “[t]he words mean things, but they also do,” making the words of God written in the Qur’ān “a technology of protection.”10 Written (jedāwil) and voiced (ruqā) supplications most frequently relied on sections of the Qur’ān traditionally associated with healing and protection: the āyat al-kursī, the sūrat al-fātiha, and especially _ two protective the last two chapters, known as al-muʿawwidhatān, or “the 11 [ones].” These two final chapters of the Qur’ān signal assumptions within Islam about the evil forces that threaten Muslims and how believers should cope with these threats. Sihr (which I translate as “sorcery”), as a manifestation of evil originating_ in Satan’s desires to weaken and turn people away from God, is rejected as purposefully harmful. In these concluding verses, sorcery is associated with knots, breath, whispers, women, and non-Muslims.12 As the Qur’ān’s message and words provide both healing and mercy for those who believe, invoking Qur’ānic

9

10 11

12

Liana Saif, “What Is Islamic Esotericism?” Correspondence 7, no. 1 (2019): 1 59 and the special issue of Arabica 64 (2017); Matthew Melvin Koushki, “Introduction: De orienting the Study of Islamicate Occultism,” Arabica 64, no. 3 4 (2017): 287 95; Jean Charles Coulon, La Magie en terre d’islam au Moyen Âge (Paris: Éditions du CTHS Histoire, 2017); Noah Gardiner, “Esotericist Reading Communities and the Early Circulation of the Sufi Occultist Ahmad al Būnī’s Works,” Arabica 64, no. 3 4 (2017): 405 41; Nala Aloudat and Hanna_Boughanim, eds., Trésors de l’Islam en Afrique de Tombouctou à Zanzibar (Paris: Institut du Monde Arabe, 2017); and Dahlia El Tayeb M. Gubara, “Al Azhar and the Orders of Knowledge” (PhD diss., Columbia University, 2014). Michael Muhammad Knight, Magic in Islam (New York: Tarcher Perigee, 2016), 57 59. Qur’ān, 2:255, 1, 113 and 114. See Shawkat M. Toorawa, “Seeking Refuge from Evil: The Power and Portent of the Closing Chapters of the Qur’an,” Journal of Qur’anic Studies 4, no. 2 (October 2002): 54 60. Ibn Khaldūn cited an example from the sūrat al falaq (Qur’ān 113), which lists “those who blow on knots” as evidence of sorcery. Ibn Khaldun, trans. William MacGuckin Baron de Slane, Histoire des Berbères et des dynasties musulmanes de l’Afrique de l’Afrique septentrionale v. 1 (Algiers : Imprimerie du Gouvernement, 1852), 393. Qur’ān, 113 and 114 and Toufic Fahd, “Sihr,” in Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, _ eds. P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C. E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, W. P. Heinrichs, accessed April 4, 2021, doi: 10.1163/1573 3912 islam SIM 7023.

6

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

verses through the esoteric sciences provides an efficacious means of dealing with threats of evil and misfortune.13 In contemporary Mauritania, the Hassāniyya term l’hjāb specifically _ _ refers to leather pouches made by local artisans to hold the written demand (matlūb) and numerological and Qur’ānic formula (jedwal) solicited by a_ client (tālib), which become amulets (tamā’im) when _ of the invisible, the written talismans paired together.14 As technologies inside the leather pouch rely on a sophisticated science of geomancy and lettrism where the right combination of numerological patterns, Qur’ānic verses, and astrological alignments in time serve as a manifestation of the divine powers of God and his agents – angels (malā’ika) and other spiritual beings (rūhāniyyāt, jnūn, ʿafārīt).15 The pouch pro_ tects and conceals the inscription, ensuring the secrecy of the formula and the potency of its powers. The amulet thus serves as a medium to activate divine forces through its written letters and symbols, mediating between the visible, temporal world of humans and the invisible and otherwise immaterial world of spirits and divine forces.16 Saharan men and women wore these amulets openly hanging from their necks or tied around their arms and waists as a kind of public manifestation of divine blessings (baraka) and a defense system that protected the wearer from any number of dangers. After the desired goal was attained, or when the amulet’s strings wore through, the client would be expected to throw away or bury the amulet without having pried it open – doing so, they were told, would threaten the efficacy of the spell and could endanger its user.17

13 14

15

16

17

“We send down the Qur’ān as healing and mercy to those who believe.” Translated by Abdel Haleem, The Qur’ān 17:82, 180. See Geert Mommersteeg, “‘He has smitten her to the heart with love’: The Fabrication of an Islamic Love Amulet in West Africa,” Anthropos 83 (1988), 501 10; Geert Mommersteeg, “Allah’s Words as Amulet,” Etnofoor 3, no. 1 (1990): 63 76. See Jean Charles Coulon, “Histoire du Shams al maʿârif,” in Talismans: le soleil des connaissances, trans. Pierre Lorry and Jean Charles Coulon (Paris: Orients, 2013), 6 7, 6. For more on lettrism, see Noah Gardiner, “Stars and Saints: The Esotericist Astrology of the Sufi Occultist Ahmad al Būnī,” Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft (Spring 2017): _ 39 65, 40; Matthew Melvin Koushki, “Of Islamic Grammatology: Ibn Turka’s Lettrist Metaphysics of Light,” Al ʿUsūr al Wustā 24 (2016): 42 113 and Liana Saif, “From _ _ Gāyat al hakīm to Šams al maʿārif wa latāʾif al ʿawārif: Ways of Knowing and Paths of _ _ Power in _Medieval Islam,” Arabica 64 (2017): 297 345. Venetia Porter, Liana Saif, and Emilie Savage Smith, “Medieval Islamic Amulets, Talismans, and Magic,” in A Companion to Islamic Art and Architecture, eds. Finbarr Barry Flood and Gülru Necipoglu (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley Blackwell, 2017), 521 57. Alain Epelboin, Constant Hamès, Johana Larco Laurent and Jean Louis Durand, eds. Un art secret: les écritures talismaniques de l’Afrique de l’Ouest, Exposition du 14 février au 28 juillet 2013 au Musée de l’Institut du Monde Arabe (Paris: IMA, 2013).

Introduction

7

The term l’hjāb itself comes from the Arabic root h-j-b, which connotes _ protecting or veiling, hiding,_ or concealing.18 The word can also intimate intervening, the primary reasons that clients seek out l’hjāb. In contemporary Mauritania, l’hjāb functions as an umbrella term for_all the above as well _ as a range of techniques applied to communicate with and manage unseen spiritual agents. Arabic terms for the techniques of spiritual mediation encompass a wide range of practices including numerology, geomancy, and lettrism, orʿilm al-hurūf w-l-asmā’.19 But there also exists a distinct _ range of very local practices that are referenced only in Hassāniyya: these _ of the evil eye include the use of a string to diagnose exposure to the effects (nazra); divination relying on sand, cowry shells, or camel excrement _ (ligzāna); and the summoning of spirits to find lost things (invīl). The term l’hjāb also covers therapeutic techniques such as wiping one’s face with a _ saint’s saliva or ingesting water in which ink used to write the Qur’ān Sufi has been washed or soaked.20 L’hjāb, as the term is used today, takes place _ in private spaces where clients explain their needs and problems in face-toface meetings with experts skilled in these sciences, known in the singular as hajjāb (sometimes used interchangeably with the terms shaykh and walī), to _heal family members, fulfil personal desires, and protect others from harm. Experts in l’hjāb have safeguarded these sciences from competitors and the uninitiated,_ only sharing with those deemed deserving and capable of handling such potent wisdom responsibly. L’hjāb is distinct from what is today known in Mauritania as “trad_ medicine” (al-tibb al-taqlīdī), which relies primarily on the use of itional _ 18

19

20

The word has the same root as the word for a woman’s veil or head covering, al hijāb. In _ Wolof, the term most often used is xamxam, meaning “knowledge” or “sciences” according to Jean Léopold Diouf, Dictionnaire wolof français et français wolof (Paris: Karthala, 2003), 379. In Pulaar, mbillejo, and in Soninké, móodì, were most often identified as terms used to refer to a specialist in the esoteric sciences. See Ousmane Moussa Diagana, Dictionnaire soninké français (Mauritanie) (Paris: Karthala, 2013), 142. While neighboring Arabic speaking countries (Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya) might use the term l’hjāb for an amulet, outside Mauritania the word is not typically used to _ encompass a broader set of Islamic esoteric practices. Matthew Melvin Koushki, “Persianate Geomancy from Tūsī to the Millennium: _ A Preliminary Survey,” in The Occult Sciences in premodern Islamic Cultures, ed. Nader El Bizri (Würzburg, Germany: Ergon Verlag, 2018), 151 199; Denis Gril, “La science des lettres” in Ibn ʿArabi, Les Illuminations de la Mecque, ed. Michel Chodkiewicz (Paris : Albin Michel and Sindbad, 1988), 165 282; Melvin Koushki, “In Defence of Geomancy: Šaraf al Dīn Yazdī Rebuts Ibn Khaldūn’s Critique of the Occult Sciences,” Arabica 64 (2017): 346 403. For similar practices in Sudan, see ʿAbdellahi Osman El Tom, “Drinking the Koran: The Meaning of Koranic Verses in Berti Erasure,” Africa: Journal of the International Africa Institute 55, no. 4, Popular Islam (1985): 414 31 and in Senegal, see Rudolph T. Ware III, The Walking Qur’an: Islamic Education, Embodied Knowledge, and History in West Africa (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2014).

8

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

plants and mineral-based substances to treat problems related to physical health. The methods and materials used for traditional medical treatment are not shrouded in secrecy, nor is access to such knowledge limited by gender, religion, or long years of study under a Sufi guide.21 This kind of expertise is further differentiated from l’hjāb in its reliance on earthly and _ illness. A woman would not tangible materials as remedies for physical seek out the help of a traditional medical expert when suffering in her marriage or anxious about raids on her camp; she would go to a hajjāb. That said, healers of all kinds might combine a knowledge of_ both traditional medicine and l’hjāb to treat their clients’ diverse health-related _ of healing and protection based on herbal problems.22 Various methods remedies, dietary changes, Qur’ānic recitation, spirit intervention, Greek humoral medicine, scorpion sting extraction, bone-setting, and ad hoc surgery have often coexisted as clients sought help from a variety of experts, some of whom might be experts in multiple, yet separate, categories of systematized knowledge and method. A written contract from the early twentieth century shows us where and how l’hjāb would be sought out as a solution. The contract between a client and _an expert in the esoteric sciences was written in the Saharan oasis town of Shinqīt, known for its long tradition of Islamic learning and _ trans-Saharan trade. its involvement in the Praise be to Allāh alone, may Allāh bless Muhammad and his soul. I bear witness _ 100 male camels to my lord ʿAlī that al Nājim bin Ahmad Būd al Sāʿdī promised bin al Mukhtār bin _al Aʿmash on the condition that he rid his nephew Ambārak bin ʿAbd All of spirits and this is witnessed by Muhammad al Mahdī bin al Hājj al Bashīr bin ʿAbd and all the above was witnessed_ by Muhammad al Bashīr _bin _ Ahmad Mahmūd bin al Seyyed bin Hāmen. Amen.23 _ _ _ 21

22

23

See Michel Thourzery and Abdellahi Ould Muhammad Vall, Plantes Médicinales de Mauritanie: Remèdes traditionnels et guérisseurs du Sahara au fleuve Sénégal (Toulouse: L’association Plantes et Nomades, 2011). For recommendations of care from Awfa Ould Abū Bakr, see the translation of his poem in Paul Dubié, “‘El ʿOmda’. Poème sur la médicine maure,” trans. Muhammad ould Ebnou Aden, Bulletin de L’Institut Français d’Afrique Noire (BIFAN) 5, no. 5 (1943): 38 66. See also Bertrand Graz, Vincent Barras, Anne Marie Mouin, and Corinne Fortier, eds. Maqari, le Receuil des vertus de la médecine ancienne. La médecine gréco arabe en Mauritanie contemporaine (Paris: Éditions BHMS, 2017) and Sīdī Ahmad b. Amīn al Shinqītī, al wasīt fī tarājim shinqīt wa kalām ʿalā tilk al _ Shinqīt) (Cairo: _ Al Jumalia, 1911), bilād (The Best of_ the Biographies of the _Literati of _ 507 09 and 537 39. Steven Feierman, Peasant Intellectuals: Anthropology and History in Tanzania (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1990), 101; John M. Janzen, The Quest for Therapy: Medical Pluralism in Lower Zaire (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978). Document posted on Facebook April 6, 2014, by Med Lemin Bellamech, “al hamdulillāh,” attributed to the Ahl Bilʿamesh Library, Shinqīt, accessed June 29, _ www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=649367418463973&set=a.124268254307228. _ 2021,

Introduction

9

Here, Muslim scholar ʿAlī b. al-Mukhtār b. al-Aʿmash is promised a hefty payment in camels if he successfully casts out the mischievous spirits that have taken hold of another man’s body. This agreement was witnessed by two other prominent Shinqīt scholars, Muhammad _ _ Muhammad al-Mahdī al-Bashīr b. Ahmad Mahmūd (d. 1916–7) and _ _ _ 24 b. al-Hājj al-Bashīr. The transaction’s payment of camels for therapeutic_ work illustrates the l’hjāb economy at work – camels formed the _ basis of many families’ capital – and clients’ trust that such a heavy investment would ensure the restoration of health to the spirit-possessed. We can also see local Muslim scholars condoning the knowledge required to diagnose and cast out spirits, entities described in the Qur’ān as created out of smokeless flame, living in a parallel universe to that of humans, and as potential Muslim converts and practitioners.25 Within Islamic epistemology, these spirits – known broadly as jinn – live in the in-between, moving between the human and spirit worlds. Some narratives recount that jinn descend from Iblīs, an ambiguous entity described alternately as fallen angel or devil who defied God by refusing to bow in deference before the first human, Adam. As punishment for his disobedience and subsequent attempts to trick Adam and Eve, Iblīs and his progeny were proscribed to live where humans refuse to tread – abandoned buildings, abattoirs, trash heaps, and cemeteries – and in their own spiritual world that mirrors that of humans.26 Specific jinn could be beckoned from the spiritual world by experts that I call “Muslim spiritual mediators” who knew their names and how to mobilize them through their knowledge of the esoteric sciences.27 Saharans have historically inhabited a harsh physical environment where malevolent and benign spirits dwelled alongside humans. Known to haunt deserted or dirty places, these spirits (jinn) are also known as ahl al-lighla, or “people of the empty dunes,” and they have sometimes appeared to humans who walked alone at night through cemeteries, across moonlit sand, or in spaces reserved for the slaughter of animals. Invoked to help find lost things – or, alternatively to wreak vengeance – these ethereal entities could collaborate with or work against 24

25 26

27

ʿAli b. al Mukhtār b. al Aʿmash’s famous ʿAlawī ancestor, Muhammad b. al Mukhtār _ b. al Aʿmash, appears in Chapter 1. Muhammad al Bashīr b. Ahmad Mahmūd was from _ _ the Aghlāl, a tribal confederation known_ for their Islamic learning. See Qur’ān 1:2; 2:47; 15:18; and 72:1. Arent Van Wensinck and Louis Gardet, “Iblīs,” in Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C. E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, and W. P. Heinrichs, eds. Online, 2012, doi: 10.1163/1573 3912 islam SIM 3021. Joseph Chelhod, “ʿIfrīt,” in Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, eds. P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C. E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, and W.P. Heinrichs, Online, 2012, doi: 10.1163/1573 3912 islam SIM 3502.

10

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

their human counterparts.28 Their existence, immaterial as it was, has had real effects on people’s decisions about how to deal with misfortune, hopes, and dreams. Experts use their familiarity with the realm of otherworldly entities to act as intermediaries between clients, spirits, and God, the ultimate administrator of this invisible world.29 The term l’hjāb itself reflects the epistemological and ontological _ nature of the sciences. Not only are the techniques themselves used to communicate with divine forces hidden within amulets or obscured by complicated mathematical and astrological calculations, but those who master these sciences have historically situated their work within that of tasawwuf, or Sufi knowledge. As an approach to Islam that focuses on _ moving through various stages of disciplined and ethical behaviors to reach personal and direct knowledge of God and his truths, Sufism encourages the cultivation of knowledge of the ʿulūm al-bātin. These _ foundahidden, unseen realities of the world are understood to be the 30 tion of the outward, manifest expressions of the Divine. Thus, a strong grasp of the Islamic esoteric sciences that depend on familiarity and mastery of these otherwise invisible realities allows the Sufi expert to position themselves as a mediator between the temporal and spiritual realms that constitute what Scott Reese has called the “Islamic multiverse.”31 Jinn and other spiritual agents that, under normal circumstances, remain invisible to ordinary Muslims, are drawn out from their parallel world and made to effect change in the human universe through Sufi knowledge that makes the previously unseen tangible and apparent. One of the highest stages of spiritual connection with God comes when the Sufi can “lift the veil of the senses” (al-mukāshafa) that prevents true union of the self with God.32 When the people of contemporary Mauritania refer to Muslim spiritual mediators of the Saharan West as hajjāba, they evoke the mediators’ liminal positionality between the _ material and the spiritual forces shaping their co-religionists’ lives – it 28

29

30 31 32

Muhammad Muhammadū Ahzānā, Mʿaqūl al lāma‘qūl fī al waʿy al jamʿī al ʿarabī: surat _ _ shaʿbiyya al morītāniyya “namūdhajan” (The rationality _ al mughayyab fī al_ mukhayyila_ al of the irrational in the Arab collective consciousness: An image of the occult in the Mauritanian popular imagination), n.p., 2002. I rely here on Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh’s dexterity in translating local concepts into the French language. Ould Cheikh, “Nomadisme, Islam et pouvoir politique dans la société maure précoloniale (XIème siècle XIXème siècle): Essaie sur quelques aspects du tribalisme” (PhD diss., Paris V, René Descartes, 1985), 917 23. Reynold A. Nicholson, Sufism: The Mysticism of Islam (Los Angeles: Indo European Publishing, 2009), 27. Scott Reese, Imperial Muslims: Islam, Community and Authority in the Indian Ocean, 1839 1937 (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2018), 10. See Michael A. Sells, Early Islamic Mysticism Sufi, Qur’an, Mi`raj, Poetic and Theological Writings (New York: Paulist Press, 1996), 129 34.

Introduction

11

is these men and women who lift and serve as the veil between the seen and the unseen.

Historicizing the Invisible Dipesh Chakrabarty famously observed that “historians will grant the supernatural a place in somebody else’s belief system, but ascribing any real agency is against the rules of evidence.”33 Indeed, academically trained historians, as opposed to anthropologists or scholars of religion, have tended to shy away from including invisible entities or forces as actors of change in their narratives, a decision based on a fundamental ontological claim that such agents – be they ancestor spirits, astral forces, ghosts, or magic – did not really exist. At most, these “unbelieved” forces appeared as part of belonging to a past already completed, allowing the modern researcher and her reader to position themselves at a distance from the unscientific and unmodern worlds of their historical interlocutors.34 Even when historians recognize that it is impossible to write a comprehensive social history of their period without taking into account the spirits who haunted, say, the olive groves of Palestine – since managing them was, as James Grehan writes about the Ottoman Levant, “a major preoccupation” of the people in his study – they tend to depict this “religious culture” of their subjects as belonging to an earlier period now concluded.35 In the historian’s fundamental work of understanding why things happened as well as when and how they did – a work enabled by reconstructing a sequence of verified events – the reconstruction process gets “snagged,” as Stephane Palmié puts it, on what might be categorized as “superstitions” whose claims to effect cannot be corroborated through 33 34

35

Dipesh Chakrabarty, Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical Difference (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2000), 104. For the use of the “unbelieved” and on Chakrabarty in this context, see Clossey et al. “The Unbelieved and Historians.” See also Wouter Hanegraaff and Roelof van den Broek, eds. Gnosis and Hermeticism from Antiquity to Modern Times (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1998); Michael Bailey, Magic and Superstition in Europe: A Concise History from Antiquity to the Present (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2007); Keith Thomas, Religion and the Decline of Magic: Studies in Popular Beliefs in Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century England (New York: Penguin, 2003); Wolfgang Behringer, Witches and Witch Hunts: A Global History (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2004); and Laura Stokes, Demons of Urban Reform: Early European Witch Trials and Criminal Justice, 1430 1530 (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2001); Carol F. Karlsen, The Devil in the Shape of a Woman: Witchcraft in Colonial New England (New York: Vintage Book, 1987); and Fritz Graf, “Theories of Magic in Antiquity,” Magic and Ritual in the Ancient World, eds. Paul Mirecki and Marvin Meyer (Leiden: Brill, 2002), 93 104. James Grehan, Twilight of the Saints: Everyday Religion in Ottoman Syria and Palestine (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 141, 114 15.

12

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

the usual material evidence.36 The underlying assumption is that once people had access to formal education, literacy, biomedical science, law, and the state, these spiritual and magical forces are explained away as metaphor and symbol of the larger and “real” economic, environmental, or political forces defining their options and shaping their lives. And yet the “administration of the invisible,” as Mauritanian scholar Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh has translated l’hjāb, has historically been a _ people’s daily lives in the crucial means of attending to the problems of 37 Sahara. While the contours, veracity, and permissibility of what lay beyond the metaphysical veil did not go uncontested, nor were they hegemonic – accusations of bloodsucking and sorcery were especially challenged – dismissing this other realm of action and agency, ignoring it, or explaining it away has the effect of erasing events themselves and writing over them with discourse and metaphor. One of the primary questions thus considered in this book is what it means to take this alternate universe of spirits seriously along with my Saharan interlocutors – to not say, “these people tell me about a different reality” that I do not know but rather, as Webb Keane has posited, to say “these people inhabit a different reality” which has now been made visible to me.38 What would it change, as Amiria Henare, Martin Holbraad, and Sari Wastell have asked, to “take things encountered in the field as they present themselves, rather than immediately assuming that they signify, represent or stand for something else,” as has long been the dominant mode of historical analysis when it comes to spirits, gods, magic, and any number of supernatural beings and forces?39 Anthropologists have been asking questions about what we know and how we can know it under the rubric of the “ontological turn,” a methodological means of taking the magical, the nonhuman, and the 36

37

38 39

See William H. Sewell, Jr. Logics of History: Social Theory and Social Transformation (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005), 7; Stephan Palmié, “Historicist knowledge and Its Conditions of Impossibility,” The Social Life of Spirits, eds. Ruy Blanes and Diana Espírito Santo (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2014), 218 39, 223 24. Ould Cheikh calls l’hjāb “the administration of the invisible” based partly on the contents _ Shaykh Ahmad b. Mukhtār b. Zwayn al Tinwājīw (d. 1885/6), a of a letter written by _ scholar Shaykh Sīdiyya al Kabīr (d. 1868), to a group former student of the Saharan Sufi of jinn, in which the shaykh asserts his authority over their worlds. Ould Cheikh, “Nomadisme, Islam et pouvoir politique,” 922. For more on the letter and its context, see Ahzānā, Mʿaqūl al lāma‘qūl fī al waʿy al jamʿī al ʿarabī, 557 77. Webb_ _Keane, “Ontologies, Anthropologists, and Ethical Life,” HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory 3, no. 1 (2013): 186 91, 188. Amiria Henare, Martin Holbraad, and Sari Wastell, “Introduction: Thinking through Things,” Thinking through Things: Theorising Artefacts Ethnographically, eds. Amiria Henare, Martin Holbraad, and Sari Wastell (London: Routledge, 2007), 1 31, 2.

Introduction

13

ephemeral seriously instead of explaining them away with functionalist or materialist analyses.40 In part, this book is responding to questions asked by such anthropologists regarding the “work” spirits do, what spirits become “true and evident,” and to what effect or value in any given community.41 Considering the “work” that spirits do allows historians to more accurately reflect on how people have managed quotidian and existential challenges in the Saharan and West African contexts of this book by taking into account the power of these invisible forces in people’s daily lives. The chapters that follow do not set out to answer the question of what is really real but instead to accept at face value that men and women could call upon spiritual, divine, and celestial forces to further their own objectives – be they spiritual, material, or social. I am suggesting an appropriation of the theoretical orientation of anthropology’s ontological turn to accept the limits of one’s own knowledge about what is by asking if it is possible to be an ontological historian and what a practice of ontological history would look like. One compelling and perhaps deceptively simple technique to do so is to adopt what Morten Axel Pederson has called a “technology of description” to make the formerly invisible visible in the academic histories we tell.42 Here, I take Pederson’s technology of description to mean that I not only mention the events related to spiritual mediation that I find in my sources, but I also write about them within a grammar of possibility. Instead of writing that Saharans claimed that spirits had only four fingers, instead of ten, I choose to write that spirits had only four fingers. Rather than reporting that women 40

41

42

Martin Holbraad and Morton Axel Pederson, eds., The Ontological Turn: An Anthropological Exposition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017); Ruy Blanes and Espírito Santo, The Social Life of Spirits; Michael Dylan Foster, Pandemonium and Parade: Japanese Monsters and the Culture of Yokai (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2009); Marisol de la Cadena, Earth Beings: Ecologies of Practice across Andean Worlds (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2015); Sylvia J. Martin, Haunted: An Ethnography of the Hollywood and Hong Kong Media Industries (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017); Paul Christopher Johnson, ed., Spirited Things: The World of “Possession” in Afro Atlantic Religions (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2014); and Eduardo Kohn, How Forests Think: Toward an Anthropology beyond the Human (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2013). Diana Espírito Santo and Ruy Blanes, “Introduction: On the Agency of Intangibles,” The Social Life of Spirits, eds. Ruy Blanes and Espírito Santo, 1 32. Scholars asking in the course of their historical research “what spirits do” include Chakrabarty, Provincializing Europe; Greg Anderson, “Retrieving the Lost Worlds of the Past: The Case for an Ontological Turn,” American Historical Review (AHR) 120, no. 3 (2015): 787 810; Fields, “Witchcraft and Racecraft.” Morten Axel Pederson, “Common Nonsense: A Review of Certain Recent Reviews of the ‘Ontological Turn,’” Anthropology of This Century 5 (2012), Online, http://aotcpress .com/articles/common nonsense/.

14

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

believed wearing an amulet would ensure a healthy pregnancy, I purposely write that women sought out amulets to ensure healthy pregnancy. These “technologies of description” can actually work miracles (pun intended) in pushing us closer to understanding the construction of social order, acts of political defiance, and the kind of anxieties and problems that Saharan inhabitants faced over time. A further complicating factor for historians of Africa is what Steven Feierman has called a “crisis of representation” in the documents of the colonial archive, when events involving seemingly fantastic and less physically tangible details are dismissed as irrational both by the European colonial officers who originally related them and again by the academic historians who rely on these archives. The result is that historical narratives involving the “spiritual” – in Feierman’s case public healing in eastern Africa – are left out of long-term histories.43 As Feierman puts it, “[t]he European sources hang like a veil between the historian and the African actors of the period,” an unavoidable methodological issue, especially in the records of colonized societies where much local knowledge was produced and preserved in languages other than the colonizer’s: in Mauritania, that meant knowledge recorded in Arabic script, or knowledge relayed by oral sources that did and still do accord attention to events and details involving spiritual agents.44 This book is following Feierman’s call to use narratives that engage the spiritual to write an alternative long-term history of the region that avoids both the Euro- and Arab-centric to make a local and regional history of “traditions of power and knowledge” apparent.45 One historical approach to a kind of ontological mukāshafa, or “lifting of the veil” between these multiple life worlds, has been pursued by intellectual historians of the Islamic past, whose scholarship on periods much earlier than the colonial and postcolonial periods that are the focus of this book is based on the written Arabic, Persian, and Ottoman sources that reveal how Muslims debated the place of, understood, and accessed the esoteric sciences. Scholarship on “Islamic esotericism” or “Islamicate occultism” has largely focused on the intellectual history of elite philosophical and scientific thinking within the premodern

43

44 45

Steven Feierman, “Colonizers, Scholars, and the Creation of Invisible Histories,” in Beyond the Cultural Turn: New Directions in the Study of Society, eds. Victoria E. Bonnell, Lynn Avery Hunt, and Richard Biernacki (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999), 182 216, 187. Feierman, “Colonizers, Scholars, and the Creation of Invisible Histories,” 183. Feierman, “Colonizers, Scholars, and the Creation of Invisible Histories,” 209.

Introduction

15

Mediterranean world.46 Asserting the centrality of Islamic esotericism not only in the Islamic heartland but especially in the courts of rulers and centers of Islamic learning in the Mamluk (1250–1517) and Timurid (1370–1507) periods, as these scholars have done, has shown that lettrism, geomancy, and Sufism were very much part of how urban elites maintained power, triumphed in war, and attended to the needs of early modern communities in Egypt and the Levant, parts of Central Asia, and Iran.47 Despite aggressive attacks from prominent scholars (ʿulamā’), lettrism would remain popular and respected as a universal science until at least the seventeenth century in the Islamic East – if not all the way into the nineteenth century.48 Until the nineteenth century, the unequivocal condemnations by these ʿulamā’ of the Islamic esoteric sciences’ biggest experts resonated little with most ordinary and elite Muslims in the Islamic East who depended on the occult sciences to address spiritual, material, and psychological needs.49 This research has clearly shown that these sciences and their experts are limited neither to a completed past nor to the ethnographic present of Mauritania or West Africa. The practices of l’hjāb are not a sign of what Terence Ranger calls “Africa’s _ special involvement with the occult.”50 Rather, the techniques of 46

47

48

49

50

Matthew Melvin Koushki, “The Quest for a Universal Science: The Occult Philosophy of Sa’in al Din Turka Isfahani (1369 1432) and Intellectual Millenarianism in Early Timurid Iran” (PhD diss., Yale University, 2012); Noah Gardiner, “Esotericism in a Manuscript Culture: Ahmad al Buni and His Readers through the Mamluk Period” (PhD diss., University of Pennsylvania, 2014); and Coulon, La Magie en terre d’islam au Moyen Âge. One eminent researcher of the intellectual history of the Sahara told me the esoteric sciences lacked a “scholarly bent,” reflecting older assumptions about this knowledge and its experts. Gubara, “Al Azhar and the Orders of Knowledge” and Justin Stearns, “The Place of Sorcery in the Thought of a Seventeenth Century Moroccan Astronomer and Alchemist,” Magic, Ritual and Witchcraft, 16, no. 2 (Fall 2021): 139 72 and Stearns, Revealed Sciences: The Natural Sciences in Islam in Seventeenth Century Morocco (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021). Melvin Koushki, “In Defense of Geomancy”; “(De)colonizing Early Modern Occult Philosophy,” Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft 12, no. 1 (Spring 2017): 98 112, 108; and “Mobilizing Magic.” See also Azfar Moin, The Millennial Sovereign: Sacred Kingship and Sainthood in Islam (New York: Columbia University Press, 2012) and Pierre Lory, “Divination and Religion in Islamic Medieval Culture,” Power and Protection: Islamic Art and the Supernatural, ed. Francesca Leoni (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016): 13 31. Terence Ranger, “Scotland Yard in the Bush: Medicine Murders, Child Witches and the Construction of the Occult: A Literature Review,” Africa 77, no. 2 (2007): 272 82, 276. See also Ranger, Gerrie Ter Haar and Stephen Ellis, “The Occult Does Not Exist: A Response to Terence Ranger,” Africa 79, no. 3 (2009): 399 412; Birgit Meyer, “Response to ter Haar and Ellis,” Africa 79, no. 3 (2009): 413 15; Luise White, Speaking with Vampires: Rumor and History in Colonial Africa (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000).

16

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

geomancy, sand divination, communicating with spirits, and Qur’ānic recitation have often been shared across time and space through the larger Muslim world, from the Sahara to the Malacca Straits.51

Interpreting the Invisible The project of this book, then, is to build on the scholarship outlined above showing that the esoteric sciences have historically belonged to Islamic intellectual, scientific, and religious knowledge production and have been linked to the exercise of political power in the Muslim world – while also recognizing the essential need to draw on ethnographic approaches to investigate a topic where so much local knowledge and meaning was produced and transmitted outside of written sources. To understand what l’hjāb meant in the history of nineteenth- and twentieth_ we can adapt some anthropologists’ methods of century Mauritania, engaging and representing sources that report the operations of the invisible. But doing so also forces us to confront the classical anthropological interpretations of “witchcraft” and “magic,” interpretations that treat claims to the existence of invisible entities and evil forces as idiomatic, psychological, or gendered expressions of how interlocutors understand misfortune, the violence of everyday life, the unequal experiences of modernity, and social marginalization.52 Some of these studies can be 51

52

Teren Sevea, Miracles and Material Life: Rice, Ore, Traps and Guns in Islamic Malaya (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020) and Constant Hamès, ed., Coran et talismans: Textes et pratiques magiques en milieu musulman (Paris: Karthala, 2007). E. E. Evans Pritchard, Witchcraft, Oracles and Magic among the Azande (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1937); Audrey Richards, “A Modern Movement of Witch Finders,” Africa viii, no. 4 (1935): 448 61; Victor Turner, Schism and Continuity in an African Society: A Study of Ndembu Village Life (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1957); Max Gluckman, ‘The Logic of African Science and Witchcraft,” Human Problems in Central Africa 1 (1944): 61 71. For good reviews of this literature, see Mary Douglas, “Introduction: Thirty Years after Witchcraft, Oracles, and Magic,” in Witchcraft, Confessions and Accusations, ed. Mary Douglas (London: Tavistock, 1970), xi xxxviii; Henrietta L. Moore and Todd Sanders, “Magical Interpretations and Material Realities: An Introduction,” in Magical Interpretations, Material Realities: Modernity, Witchcraft and the Occult in Postcolonial Africa, eds. Henrietta L. Moore and Todd Sanders (London: Routledge, 2001), 1 27; Michael Taussig, The Devil and Commodity Fetishism in South America (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1980); Michael Taussig, Shamanism, Colonialism, and the Wild Man: A Study in Terror and Healing (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987); Vincent Crapanzano, The Hamadsha: A Study in Moroccan Ethnopsychiatry (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973); Mohammad Maarouf, Jinn Eviction as a Discourse of Power: A Multidisciplinary Approach to Moroccan Magical Beliefs and Practices (Leiden: Brill, 2007); Ahmed Rahel, La communauté noire de Tunis: thérapie initiatique et rite de possession (Paris: l’Harmattan, 2000); and Laurent Vidal, Rituels de possession dans le sahel (Paris: l’Harmattan, 1990).

Introduction

17

critiqued as functionalist, with analyses that reject the explanations given by their ethnographic subjects in favor of the anthropologist’s interpretation of their explanations. But they furnish models of how to approach spirit possession, ritual, and harmful magic as important indications of the health of the encountered societies. These approaches clearly reject historians’ proclivity to relegate invisible entities and spiritual agency to a former time insomuch as they deal with the ethnographic present.53 In particular, an ontological approach allows for the study of different subjects but also different actors. I found that drawing on these sources helped me to pay closer attention to how the esoteric sciences operate in relation to gendered spheres of activity, and how marginalized communities specifically participated in the production, application, and soliciting of expertise in spiritual mediation.54 Anthropological scholarship has also shown that some of the work spirits do is to preserve what might be considered, as Andrew Apter has argued, a “ritual archive” that historians can use to “unlock the past” from the historical consciousness of their interlocutors.55 Apter sees the shifting narratives about and the festivals that pay homage to a spirit and 53

54

55

Adam Ashforth, Witchcraft, Violence, and Democracy in South Africa (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005); Jean Comaroff and John L. Comaroff, “Occult Economies and the Violence of Abstraction: Notes from the South African Postcolony,” American Ethnologist 26, no. 2 (1999): 279 303; Peter Geschiere, The Modernity of Witchcraft: Politics and the Occult in Postcolonial Africa (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 1997); Ralph A. Austen “The Moral Economy of Witchcraft: An Essay in Comparative History,” in Modernity and its Malcontents, eds. Jean Comaroff and John Comaroff (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993), 90 110; Birgit Meyer, Translating the Devil: Religion and Modernity among the Ewe in Ghana (Trenton: Africa World Press, Inc., 1999); and Andrew Apter, “Atinga Revisited: Yoruba Witchcraft and the Cocoa Economy, 1950 51,” in Modernity and Its Malcontents, eds. Comaroff and Comaroff, 111 28; Rosalind Shaw, “Cannibal transformations: Colonialism and commodification in the Sierra Leone hinterland,” in Magical Interpretations, eds. Moore and Saunders, 50 70. Susan M. O’Brien, “Power and Paradox in Hausa Bori: Discourses of Gender, Healing, and Islamic Tradition in Northern Nigeria” (PhD diss., University of Wisconsin Madison, History, 2000); Adeline Masquelier, “Narratives of Power, Images of Wealth: The Ritual Economy of Bori in the Market,” in Modernity and Its Malcontents, eds. Comaroff and Comaroff, 3 33; Michael Lambek, Knowledge and Practice in Mayotte: Local Discourses of Islam, Sorcery, and Spirit Possession (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1993); G. P. Makris, Changing Masters: Spirit Possession and Identity Construction among Slave Descendants and Other Subordinates in the Sudan (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 2000); and Janice Boddy, Wombs and Alien Spirits: Women, Men and the Zar Cult in Northern Sudan (Madison: University of Wisconsin, 1989). Andrew Apter, “History in the Dungeon: Atlantic Slavery and the Spirit of Capitalism in Cape Coast Castle, Ghana,” AHR 122, no. 1 (2017): 2 54, 25. Susan M. Kenyon echoes this, arguing that spirit possession serves as “mnemonic versions of past events and memories” in Spirits and Slaves in Central Sudan (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012), 9. See also Sandra E. Greene, Sacred Sites and the Colonial Encounter: A History of Meaning and Memory in Ghana (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2002).

18

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

its shrine in a slaving castle in Ghana as a form of embodied knowledge of Afro-European interaction starting with the trans-Atlantic slave trade. Anand Vivek Taneja’s anthropology of the written solicitation of jinn at a religious site in northern India, through small letters left in the walls of a sultan’s abandoned palace, reinforces this sense of the historical potential of spirits. Taneja sees jinn as sources of a collective memory while simultaneously “bearing witness to the postcolonial condition of everyday life in Delhi.”56 When the oral and written sources of the Saharan West evoke past extraordinary events, the names of jinn, or rituals meant to appeal to invisible entities or elicit blessings from a saint’s buried corpse, these sources revisit and maintain local memories of political and physical precarity. When, in the southwestern region of the Trārza in Mauritania, the owners of a new house pronounce the names of four well-known historical figures – all women – before moving in, that practice recalls matrilineal norms before the Arabization, and thus masculinization, of names, descent, and spiritual expertise.57 When someone in contemporary Mauritania utters the name of the male Shamharūsh or female ʿĀ’isha Qandīsha, those names evoke memories, in the first instance, of a jinn leader whose exploits are written into the chronicles of the region and, in the second, of a spirit connected to the trans-Saharan slave trade.58 Further south along the Senegal River and along the Atlantic coast in the Senegambia region, spirits are remembered as the original inhabitants and as having defended human populations from outside invasion.59 The

56 57

58

59

Anand Vivek Taneja, Jinnealogy: Time, Islam and Ecological Thought in the Medieval Ruins of Delhi (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2018), 10, 25. When an inhabitant of the Trārza wants to protect a new house from the evil intentions of jinn, they might say one or all of the women’s names Hanānin, Heyniya, Vadhlimān, and Tenaghūs four times, evoking protective characteristics. Husayn Ould Mahand, interview, Nouakchott, July 17, 2012. Octave Houdas and Maurice Delafosse, trans., Tārīkh al fettāsh fi Akhbâr El Bouldân Oua L Djouyouch Oua Akâbir En Nâs, ou Chronique du chercheur pour servir à l’histoire des villes, des armées et des principaux personnages du Tekrour (Paris: E. Leroux, 1913), 15, 126 27. Crapanzano, The Hamadsha, 143; Viviana Pâques, “L’arbre cosmique dans la pensée populaire et dans la vie quotidienne du nord ouest africain” (PhD diss., Université de Paris, 1964), 9 and 610; Zakaria Rhani, “Le chérif et la possédée: Sainteté, rituel et pouvoir au Maroc,” L’Homme. Revue française d’anthropologie 190 (2009): 27 50; Bertrand Hell, “L’esclave et le Saint: les Gnawa et la baraka de Moulay Abdallah Ben Hsein (Maroc),” Des hommes de devoir: les compagnons du tour de France (XVIIIe XXe siècles) 30 (2008), 149 74. Assan Sarr, Islam, Power, and Dependency in the Gambia River Basin: The Politics of Land Control, 1790 1940 (Rochester: University of Rochester Press, 2016) and Ibrahima Sow, Divination Marabout Destin: aux sources de l’imaginaire (Dakar: IFAN Ch. A. Diop, 2009), fn. 128, 210 and Omar Ndoye, Le N’Dôep: transe thérapeutique chez les Lébous du Sénégal (Paris: l’Harmattan, 2010), 98.

Introduction

19

spirits’ ongoing presence in these contexts could substantiate claims to authority, explain a breach in social norms, and prevent unwanted human invasion into spaces they or others already inhabited. Spirits, typically unseen, made – and make – themselves visible in texts and oral sources as actors in and instigators of history. Fundamentally, I agree with Greg Anderson that the historian’s task is to represent the social worlds of the historical subjects under study, not necessarily to provide rationales, motivations, or causes that the subjects did not themselves articulate or experience.60 Establishing what kind of cultural, religious, and social logics determined the outlines of these social worlds necessitates an interdisciplinary approach of reading historical sources ethnographically to better analyze the meaning and consequences of events involving miraculous acts, magical utterances, and invisible agents within their local and temporal context. When historians consider such moments from a Western academic perspective – what some have called the “dogmatic secularism of mainstream scholarship”– we are less able to admit the substance of spirit ontologies, and our narratives end up, as Reese has observed, only discussing “the significance of the unseen in terms of societal authority and its relationship to power” and overlooking the other purposes and implications of the invisible.61 When Muslims visited saints’ tombs in the Yemeni port city of ʿAden and expelled nefarious spirits from fallow land and sacred forests along the Gambia River, they sought not only spiritual benefits in the afterlife but also a sense of social belonging and more land for cultivation and inhabitation for those still living.62 Muslim miracle workers in the Malaya Peninsula used the Islamic esoteric sciences to serve their communities’ spiritual and therapeutic needs and also identify sources of tin and gold to be extracted, arable land for rice cultivation, and animals to be caught.63 By approaching episodes like these receptive to the explanations sources give, historians can broaden their analyses to include the spiritual intentions and material effects that might not always speak to questions of power and authority.

60

61 62 63

Anderson, “Retrieving the Lost Worlds of the Past,” 798. In a similar vein, David Gordon has been critical of Luise White for seeing stories of bloodsucking in East Africa as an idiomatic expression of anxieties about colonial extraction, power, and technologies. See Gordon in “The Unbelieved and Historians III,” in History Compass; White, Speaking with Vampires; and David M. Gordon, Invisible Agents: Spirits in Central African History (Athens: Ohio University Press, 2012). “The Unbelieved and Historians I,” History Compass; Reese, Imperial Muslims, 11. Reese specifically concludes this in reference to Feierman, Peasant Intellectuals. Reese, Imperial Muslims and Sarr, Islam, Power, and Dependency. Sevea, Miracles and Material Life.

20

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Paying attention to how the spirit world is engaged leads historians to write more accurate depictions of the material and practical realities of everyday life for their subjects and, importantly, to a more representative explanation of local and temporal “imaginaries,” or epistemological and ontological understandings of how the world functioned.64 The presence of spirits to be expelled, invoked, or contested has real effects on the material, biological, emotional, economic, and social worlds of our historical subjects. The environmental consequences of leaving haunted land fallow and the economic results of identifying sources of precious minerals are undeniable as are the changes that occurred when people expelled the spirits from the land and extracted the finite resources.65 In the Saharan West, the knowledge that spirits lurked in the desert landscape and lived parallel lives of study, work, and play could determine the decisions of living humans who might seek out or avoid contact with spiritual entities to ensure their own livelihoods. Because the Qur’ān itself authenticated the existence of divine forces and invisible agents, Muslims inhabited the same ontological world. Skepticism emerged not around whether these jinn, demons, or God’s omnipotent agency existed but, rather, around how to engage them and to what ends. Such insights might only be possible for historians, like Reese and Sevea whom I have referenced here, who focus on the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and work by combining oral history and ethnographic interviews with documentary sources produced both by European colonial agents and local Muslim scholars. Historical methodology allows for certain understandings of causality made evident through the physical, the written, and the visual. However, the presence of spiritual entities and concomitant knowledge for how to engage them had substantive repercussions on what options were understood to exist when deciding the shape of one’s life. Inspired by scholars who have argued that the only way to include spirits, divine forces, and inexplicable miracles in academic analysis is for the researcher herself to inhabit the barzakh – a barrier or partition that, in Sufi tradition, becomes a space of spiritual insight where the metaphysical and worldly realms meet – I venture into that liminal space by including alternative worlds and agents in this historical narrative.66 64 65 66

Florence Bernault, Colonial Transactions: Imaginaries, Bodies, and Histories in Gabon (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2019). See also Hélène Artaud, Poı¨étique des flots: Une anthropologie sensible de la mer dans le banc d’Arguin (Mauritanie) (Paris : Éditions PETRA, 2018). Paul Stoller, The Power of the Between: An Anthropological Odyssey (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2009) and Vincent Crapanzano, Imaginative Horizons: An Essay in Literary Philosophical Anthropology (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004).

Introduction

21

In the Qur’ān, the barzakh appears as an obstacle between Hell and Paradise, forming the threshold between death and God’s final judgment.67 However, in Sufi theories of the theological concept, this “quiescent state” becomes an active space where the human and spirit, Sufi disciples and their teachers, and the believer and God coalesce.68 In the Saharan West, the barzakh has been used by Sufi figures and contemporary writers to describe their own juridical, environmental, and cultural space. Sufi scholar and jurisprudent Muhammad al-Māmī _ the political and (1788–1865) used the vocabulary of barzakh to describe juridical situation of the Saharan society of his era, that is to say a people living in between spheres of political and religious authority – the clerical leadership of the Fouta Tooro and the monarchy of Morocco – and, because of the absence of an overarching state in their region, at the boundaries between correct religious practice and disorder (fitna).69 In his characterization, the Saharan West and its people served as a kind of transitional zone or “isthmus” (al-mankib al-barzakhī) connecting two other political spaces of juridical authority.70 Mauritanian writer, Moussa ould Ebnou, has also published a novel under the same name and used the term to refer to the Saharan West as a hybrid and sometimes marginal cultural zone.71 This concept of the barzakh thus resonates with and is informed by both Islamic and Saharan epistemologies of religion, jurisprudence, politics, and culture. I use it as an interpretive framework for localizing the theoretical concepts of “liminality” and “hybridity” developed initially by the postcolonial thinker Homi Bhabha who argued for the productive nature of the in-between.72 For Bhabha, the inherent ambiguity of the liminal and the hybrid – neither squarely one of something or the other – creates the potential for subversion of any number of social, cultural, or 67

68 69

70 71 72

Tommaso Tesei, “The barzakh and the Intermediate State of the Dead in the Qur’an,” in Locating Hell in Islamic Traditions, ed. Christian Lange (Leiden: Brill, 2016), 31 55; Salman Bashier, “Barzakh, Sūfī understanding,” Encyclopaedia of Islam, Third Edition, _ eds. Kate Fleet, Gudrun Krämer, Denis Matringe, John Nawas, and Everett Rowson, accessed August 14, 2021, doi: 10.1163/1573 3912 ei3 COM 25238; Abdullah Yusuf Ali, trans., The Qur’an: Text, Translation and Commentary (Elhurst, NY: Tahrike Tarsile Qur’an, Inc., 2008), 23:100; 55:19 20; and 25:53. Ali, The Qur’an, 891, fn. 2940. Charles Stewart writes that the Sufi scholar used the terminology of barzakh in Charles C. Stewart and Sidi Ahmed Wuld Ahmed Salem, The Writings of Mauritania and the Western Sahara of the Arabic Literature of Africa, vol. 5, part 1 (Leiden: Brill, 2016), 6 8. Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh, “Théologie du désordre. Islam, ordre et désordre au Sahara,” L’Année du Maghreb VII (2011): 61 77. Moussa Ould Ebnou, Barzakh (Paris: L’Harmattan, 1994). Homi K. Bhabha, The Location of Culture, Second Edition (London: Taylor & Francis, 2014).

22

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

political norms. Liminal spaces are places of transformation where relationships and social status can be negotiated and where novel discursive forms and meanings are produced.73 The metaphor of the barzakh, as a threshold where new insights can be generated between two other more determinative spaces, serves as a useful shorthand for the analytic and methodological tools and arguments I make in this book. The Islamic esoteric sciences as expressed in their local iteration of l’hjāb as the _ (hajjaba) movable veil separating two “worlds” or realms and the experts _ who lift this veil through the practical application of their deep knowledge of the Qur’ān and proximity to God are positioned squarely at the frontier between the contested and the accepted religious practice and knowledge. I see the doctrinal ambiguity of exoteric and esoteric practice, the cultural and social hybridity of the Sahara, and the indeterminacy of taking multiple ontologies seriously as intellectually productive. It is here where meanings can be intentionally explored, contested, or subverted. This project thus examines the flows of religious ideas throughout the greater Islamic world and looks at the highly specific techniques of and reasons for engaging the spiritual realm that emerged along the desert edge. When so many histories originate with, and so many material traces point to, the existence of these invisible agents, how can we, as researchers, hold back from that “in between” space, where we will be required to lift our own veils of skeptical secularism, to connect to that spiritual realm? Spirits were at the center of Saharan social and religious life. Their immaterial existence had a real effect on people’s decisions and discourses. Inhabitants of a desert oasis avoided climbing up the village’s mountain because non-Muslim jinn lived on its rocky escarpment. Saharan trading families asserted authority over certain salt mines because they had a centuries-old relationship with the jinn circulating in the surrounding area. People’s illnesses were cured by appealing to the power of jinn and, conversely, others went mad when they violated spaces that belonged to spirits or agreements that controlled how desert people interacted with them. The French colonial endeavor, emerging just as the trans-Saharan trade began to wither in the nineteenth-century due to the predominance of maritime trade but also the European abolition of the slave trade, renewed the isolation of the Sahara from regional connections.74 The French thought of the Sahara as an extension of Algeria and, thus, 73 74

Bhaba, The Location of Culture, 265, 208, 213, 295 96. Camille Lefebvre, Frontières de sable, frontières de papier: histoire de territoires et de frontières du jihad de Sokoto à la colonisation française du Niger, XIXe XXe siècles (Paris: la

Introduction

23

a logical addition to the French empire that would connect its lucrative northern protectorates in the Maghrib and southern territories in West Africa. They hoped the Sahara’s vast and relatively unpopulated distances would contain the spread of certain dangerous political ideologies and religion-based movements. French fears that pan-Islamic ideas might foment resistance among Africans (whom colonial administrators considered non- or only marginally Muslim) combined with typical administrative policies intended to control cyclical nomadic transience meant that the colonial regime sought to physically demarcate borders in the desert and, by doing so, to separate and stabilize Saharans and populations south of the desert.75 Colonialism imposed restrictions on daily life, and villagers mobilized their most powerful weapons – the metaphysical – to fight against its agents. Dismissing this divine world also dismisses the basis on which individuals and families transform social relations while providing or relying on therapeutic and spiritual services.

The Saharan Invisible Saharans have long insisted that the original inhabitants of their region were people known as the Bafūr (or Bavūr), a mysterious pre-Islamic group identified racially as either “white” or “black” agriculturalists, depending on the source.76 The Bafūr seem to have been the dominant population in the region until, as explained by the collective memory, the Lamtūna and Guddala branches of the Znāga-speaking Sanhāja (Berber) _ Arabic sources confederation displaced or enslaved the earlier inhabitants. from North Africa refer to the Sanhāja as mulaththamūn, or “wearers of the _ face veil,” referencing a gendered practice that Arab observers saw as peculiar to the region of Sanhāja men covering their faces with a veil _

75 76

Sorbonne, 2015); Benjamin Claude Brower, A Desert Named Peace: The Violence of France’s Empire in the Algerian Sahara, 1844 1902 (New York: Columbia University Press, 2013); and Baz Lecocq, “Distant Shores: A Historiographic View on Trans Saharan Space,” The Journal of African History (JAH) 56, no. 1 (March 2015): 23 36; E. Ann McDougall, “Research in Saharan History,” JAH 39, no. 3 (1998): 467 80. Christopher Harrison, France and Islam in West Africa, 1860 1960 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988). A. J. Lucas, “Considérations sur l’ethnique maure et en particulier sur une race ancienne: les Bafours,” Journal de la Société des Africanistes 1, no. 2 (1931): 151 94; T. Lewicki, “The Role of the Sahara and Saharians in Relationships between North and South,” in UNESCO General History of Africa: Africa from the Seventh to the Eleventh Century, eds. M. Elfasi and Ivan Hrbek (Paris: UNESCO, 1988), 277 313, 312 13; Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh, “Vie(s) et mort(s) de al Imām al Hadrāmī: Autour de la _ _ 37, no. 1 (1987): postérité saharienne du mouvement almoravide (11e 17e),” Arabica 48 79, 61 63.

24

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

(lithām).77 These sources also indicate that the Sanhāja claimed authority over Anbiya, a large expanse of the Sahara that_ extended from modern southern Morocco to the confines of the then powerful Ghana empire in the southwestern Sahara and northern Sahel.78 The first Muslims to reach this region travelled along caravan routes, and historians have generally come to the consensus that Islam as a set of religious traditions and practices moved along with these Muslim merchants, camel drivers, and clerics. Arab or Berber Muslims married women local to the Saharan and Sahel regions or settled and spent extended time in trading centers. West Africans came to embrace the new religious tradition as a result of this close contact and exchange.79 A study of the Islamic esoteric sciences in the Saharan West necessarily situates us in a multiplicity of barāzikh (pl. of barzakh), from the geographical to the social to the religious. The earliest written descriptions of the desert in the compendiums of Arab geographers and notes from Arab merchants depict the desert just as such an in-between space bifurcating the continent both racially and religiously between the Muslim dār alislām of Arab and Amazigh (Berber) inhabitants and the non-Muslim dār al-kufr inhabitants. The long-standing image of bilād al-sūdān, black Africa, as being inhabited by non-Muslims who were thus legally able to be enslaved within Islamic jurisprudence explains, in part, the movement of the trans-Saharan trade from South to North and the importance of some of the major commercial cities that served as holding points for enslaved West Africans and the material commodities sought within and across the desert.80 Despite evidence to the contrary, most Arab descriptions of West Africa equated skin color with religious practice so that “land of the 77

78

79 80

Al Yaʿqūbī, Ibn al Faqīh, and Ibn Hawqal in Corpus of Early Arabic Sources for West _ and JFP Hopkins (Princeton: Markus Weiner African History, eds. Nehemia Levtzion Publishers, 2000), 22, 27, and 49. Al Bakri, Description de l’Afrique septentrionale, trans. Mac Guckin de Slane (Imprimerie impériale: Paris, 1857), 361; T. Lewicki, “Lamtūna,” in Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, eds. P. Bearman, et al., Publication 2012, accessed September 20, 2018, doi: 10.1163/1573 3912 islam COM 0798. Timothy Insoll, The Archaeology of Islam (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 1999), 159 62. See especially Bruce Hall, who examines race making in the Saharan West and Western Sahel in A History of Race in Muslim West Africa, 1600 1960 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011). See also Harrison France and Islam in West Africa; Rüdiger Seesemann, “The Shurafa’ and the ‘Blacksmith’: The Role of the Idaw ʿAli of Mauritania in the career of the Senegalese Shaykh Ibrahim Niasse (1900 75),” in The Transmission of Learning in Islamic Africa, ed. Scott S. Reese (Leiden: Brill, 2004), 72 98; John O. Hunwick, Sharia in Songhay: The Replies of al Maghili to the Questions of Askia al Hajj Muhammad (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985); and Timothy Cleaveland, “Ahmad _ Baba al Timbukti and his Islamic critique of racial slavery in the Maghrib,” Journal of North African Studies (JNAS) 20, no. 1 (2015): 42 64.

Introduction

25

blacks” was synonymous with a non-Muslim or pagan Africa south of the Sahara.81 North African observers in the medieval period portrayed Saharan populations as nomads circulating in this transitional space between the “land of the blacks and that of Muslims,” as resilient in the face of harsh environmental realities, and as spreading Islam through a recently declared “ holy war against blacks,” most likely referring to the Almoravid movement of the eleventh century.82 These Arabic sources reveal a direct correlation in some writers’ minds between skin color and adherence, or lack thereof, to Islam.83 By the end of the eleventh century, the Almoravid (murābitūn) educa_ tional mission and military expedition had united large expanses of the Saharan West and al-Andalus under one Islamic legal school, the Mālikī. Led initially by a chief of the Guddala tribe, Yahyā b. Ibrahīm (d. 1040s), _ the Almoravid movement additionally ensured _Sanhāja dominance in the 84 _ region’s religion, politics, and economics. The leaders of the movement embarked on a reeducation campaign, a process that included harsh physical punishment and targeted for religious realignment not just other Sanhāja tribes but eventually adversarial tribes, such as the Zenāta, and_ non-Muslim Berbers and West Africans.85 Despite internal tensions around issues of succession and the ultimate objectives of the campaigns, the federation eventually known as the Almoravid succeeded in conquering both nodes of the western trans-Saharan caravan routes – Sijilmāsa in 1054–55 and Ghana c. 1076 – toppling Zenāta and Soninké monopolies on trade, and establishing a new city, Marrakesh, by 1070.86 Ruling initially with the crucial help of a local Berber woman called Zaynab who maintained a working relationship with spirits, the Almoravids eventually controlled the entire southwestern Sahara through Morocco to al-Andalus by 1091.87 81 83 84

85

86

87

82 Al Bakri, Description de l’Afrique, 384. Al Bakri, Description de l’Afrique, 361 62. Hall, A History of Race in Muslim West Africa. See Amira K. Bennison, The Almoravid and Almohad Empires (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2016), 26; H. T. Norris, “New Evidence on the Life of ʿAbdullah B. Yasin and the Origins of the Almoravid Movement,” JAH 12, no. 2 (1971): 255 68, 261. Al Bakri, Description de l’Afrique, 371 72, 362. Bennison argues that environmental and economic factors likely also motivated continued expansion north into wealthier regions and toward al Andalus, as the desert’s difficult conditions pushed the Sanhāja to seek access _ Empires, 30. to vital resources such as water. Bennison, The Almoravid and Almohad Bennison, The Almoravid and Almohad Empires, 28 31. Ibn Hawqal, Description de _ l’Afrique, 84. Gomez and Ba suggest that the Takrūr attacks contributed to the decline of the Ghana empire. Michael Gomez, African Dominion: A New History of Empire in Early and Medieval West Africa (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2018), 37 and Ba, “Le Takrur historique,” 103. Bennison, The Almoravid and Almohad Empires, 33.

26

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

The Sanhāja, by forcibly and irrevocably reeducating and converting _ inhabitants to a specific form of Islam, consolidated power in this inbetween space and affirmed themselves as religious authorities in a now thoroughly Muslim space. In the southern Sahara, the Almoravids established their presence primarily in what had been known as Madīnat al-kilāb (Town of the Dogs), identified with the original Bafūr inhabitants known for their use of dogs in war.88 Occupying the town and claiming it as entirely Muslim, the Almoravids called their base Azūgī, a date oasis that subsequently prospered under the guidance of the Mālikī jurist al-Murādī al-Hadrāmī (d. 1095–96).89 When he probed _ the collective memory of local_ regional inhabitants in the early 1980s, Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh observed that the qādī had become a shaykh, or Sufi figure, whose best-remembered miracle_ initiated the historical process of local conversion to Mālikī Sunnī Islam.90 Al-Hadrāmī used _ _ mission his divine knowledge to protect himself and continue his reformist in a hostile region. The Almoravid empire survived approximately one hundred years until another reformist military campaign, the Almohad, emerged from and captured Marrakesh in 1147. The Almohad empire eventually appropriated what had been Almoravid cities in North Africa and al-Andalus, taking over Seville in 1147 and Granada in 1155. The death of the last Almohad caliph in 1269 effectively marked the end of the dynasty, which the Spanish completely overturned by 1275. The Almoravid and Almohad reformist movements, begun by nomadic Berber tribes who emerged from the desert declaring their superior religious credentials and military strength, succeeded in uniting under the banner of Sunni Mālikī Islam regions and people distanced by the Mediterranean, Atlas Mountains, and desert. But, in contrast to most of Morocco and al-Andalus, the desert region extending from the Senegal River to the northern Saharan region of the Sāqīyat al-Hamrā’ never fell under one overarching political authority _ (Map I.1). While Sanhāja-dominated towns such as Wādān, Shinqīt, _ serve as centers of regional trade and scholarship, _ Tīshīt, and Walāta did these commercial hubs were separated by hundreds of kilometers of hazardous terrain and operated independently of any centralized state.

88

89

90

Catherine Taine Cheikh, “Des ethnies chimériques aux langues fantômes: L’exemple des Imraguen et Nemâdi de Mauritanie,” In and Out of Africa: Languages in Question, vol. 1, ed. C. de Féral (Louvain: Bibliothèque des Cahiers de l’Institut de Linguistique de Louvain, 2013), 137 64, 11. Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh and Bernard Saison, “Vie(s) et mort(s) de al Imām al Hadrāmī: Autour de la postérité saharienne du mouvement almoravide (11e 17e),” _ _ 37, no. 1 (1987): 48 79 and Ould Cheikh, “Nomadisme, Islam et pouvoir Arabica politique,” 155. Ould Cheikh and Saison, “Vie(s) et mort(s),” 60.

Introduction

27

Map I.1 The Saharan West in the eleventh century. Map created by Tom Abi Samra. Based partly on Fig. 41 “Extent of the Almoravid Emirate” in Alisa LaGamma, Sahel: Art and Empires on the Shores of the Sahara (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2020), 117.

The Saharan West would become a meeting place for distinct cultural and language groups who moved into the region during the fourteenth century. Nomadic Arabic-speakers known as the Banū Hassān migrated _ south from the northern desert following receding pastures for their

28

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

herds. This pressure from the north pushed agricultural communities toward the river valleys which not only meant a tightening of competition for water resources but also a greater mixing of linguistic and ethnic populations. Over the course of three or four centuries, locally spoken languages such as Azer and Znāga gave way to Hassāniyya, the Arabic spoken by these nomadic warriors, a change that_ reflected the gradual domination of its speakers over preexisting communities.91 Regional insecurity seems to have prevented preservation of any corpus of texts produced locally prior to the fifteenth century, even in the commercial cities where Muslims (Arab and non-Arab alike) had established centers of Islamic learning.92 Manuscripts that did survive from the fifteenth century attest to connections among merchants and communities and reveal the Sahara as a connective space, rather than a barrier, on the continent.93 The use of Arabic in these commercial records and religious texts reinforces an interpretation that Islam facilitated trade, introducing a shared written script and legal code.94 The Arabic language and Islam were constituent elements of the bridge connecting different linguistic and racial communities in and across the Sahara.

91

92

93

94

Timothy Cleaveland, Becoming Walāta: A History of Saharan Social Formations and Transformations (Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 2002); H. T. Norris, The Arab Conquest of the Western Sahara: Studies of the Historical Events, Religious Beliefs and Social Customs Which Made the Remotest Sahara a Part of the Arab World (Beirut: Librarie du Liban, 1986); and Raymond Michael Taylor, “Of Disciples and Sultans: Power, Authority, and Society in the Nineteenth Century Mauritanian Gebla” (PhD diss., University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, 1996), 25. H. T. Norris, “Muslim Sanhaja Scholars of Mauritania,” in Studies in West African Islamic History, vol. 1: The Cultivators of Islam, ed. J. R. Willis (London: Taylor & Francis, 1979), 147 59, 152. See Ghislaine Lydon, On Trans Saharan Trails: Islamic Law, Trade Networks, and Cross Cultural Exchange in Nineteenth Century Western Africa (Cambridge: Cambridge, University Press, 2009); Judith Scheele, Smugglers and Saints of the Sahara: Regional Connectivity in the Twentieth Century (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012); and E. Ann McDougall’s forty years of research from her dissertation on the importance of the salt trade “The Ijil Salt Industry: Its Role in the Precolonial Economy of the Western Sudan” (PhD diss., University of Birmingham, UK, 1980) through a more recent article “On being Saharan,” in Saharan Frontiers, eds. McDougall and Scheele, 39 57. See also the collection of legal opinions (pl. fatāwā) compiled by Mauritanian anthropologist and legal scholar Yahyā ould al Barā, al majmūʿa al kubrā _ wa janūb gharb al sahrā’, vol. 1 12 al shāmila li fatāwā wa nawāzil wa ahkām ahl gharb _ b. al Hasan Mawlāy al Sharīf, 2010) _ _ and Jeremy (Nouakchott: al Hasan b. al Mukhtār _ Berndt’s excellent_ dissertation for more on library culture in West Africa, “Closer than Your Jugular Vein: Muslim Intellectuals in a Malian Village, 1900 to the 1960s” (PhD diss., Northwestern University, 2008). See Lydon, On Trans Saharan Trails; Ralph A. Austen, Trans Saharan Africa in World History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010) and E. Ann McDougall, “Conceptualising the Sahara: The World of Nineteenth Century Beyrouk Commerce,” JNAS 10, no. 3 4 (2005): 369 86.

Introduction

29

From the sixteenth century on, the Saharan barzakh expanded: climate change extended the Sahara as a geographic environment and, within its boundaries, contributed to an ongoing process of social differentiation between populations in the Saharan West and western Sahel.95 A structure of social hierarchy based on inherited occupational status was forged among all racial and linguistic communities in the region from the twelfth to sixteenth centuries.96 In the Saharan West, a sense of cultural unity emerged among primarily nomadic, Hassāniya-speaking populations _ who practiced Sunnī Islam in the Malīkī juridical and ʿAshʿarī theological schools. These populations shared a general division of labor among occupational groups, a custom of male and female veiling, a common musical and poetic tradition, and the presence of a scholar cohort who depended on enslaved labor, and the trans-Saharan trade to sustain their intellectual production.97 Even if social divisions were not always immutable, the Hassāniya linguistic community deployed language that marked skin color _between those racially considered “white” Arabophones (bīdān) and “black” (sūdān), and occupational status between those born free_and noble (the zwāya scholars and the hassān warriors), those of lower social _ status considered dependent, tributary populations (the lahma or znāga _ and those who might fulfill roles as herders, craftspeople, musicians), 98 considered unfree (the enslaved, or ʿabīd). 95

96

97

98

James L. A. Webb, Jr., Desert Frontier: Ecological and Economic Change along the Western Sahel, 1600 1850 (Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1995) and James McDougall, “Frontiers, Borderlands, and Saharan/World History,” in Saharan Frontiers: Space and Mobility in Northwest Africa, eds. James McDougall and Judith Scheele (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2012) 73 90, 83. Tamari Tal in Les castes de l’Afrique Occidentale: Artisans et Musiciens Endogames (Nanterre: Société d’Ethnologie, 1997) argues that hierarchical occupational groups had formed by the thirteenth century among Mandé speakers in the Mali empire. She sees praise singers, leatherworkers, and goldsmiths originating in Soninké, Wolof, and Mandigue communities and spreading out from there as “casted” groups. E. Ann McDougall “Snapshots from the Sahara: ‘Salt’, the Essence of Being,” Journal of Libyan Studies, special issue, The Libyan Desert: Natural Resources and Cultural Heritage, eds. David Mattingly, Sue McLaren, Elizabeth Savage, Yahya al Fasatwi, and Khaled Gadgood (2003): 295 303; Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh, “Introduction: Vous avez dit ‘histoire’?,” Histoire de la Mauritanie. Essais et synthèses (Nouakchott : Imprimerie Nouvelle, 1999), 1 35; and Pierre Bonte and Mohamedou ould Mohameden Meyine, “La Mauritanie au passé (re)composé,” The Maghreb Review 35, no. 1 2 (2010): 27 63. Ould Cheikh, “Nomadisme, Islam et pouvoir politique”; Pierre Bonte, “L’émirat de l’Adrar: histoire et anthropologie d’une société tribale du sahara occcidental” (PhD diss., L’école des hautes études en sciences sociales, Paris, 1998); Muhammad Lahbib Nouhi, _ Power in the Zwāya “Religion and Society in a Saharan Tribal Setting: Authority and Religious Culture” (PhD diss., University of Alberta, 2009); Chouki El Hamel, La vie intellectuelle islamique dans le Sahel Ouest Africain (XVIe XIXe siècles): Une étude sociale de l’enseignement islamique en Mauritanie et au Nord du Mali (XVIe XIXe siècles) et traduction annotée de Fath ash shakur d’al Bartili al Walati (mort en 1805) (Paris: l’Harmattan, 2002); Cleaveland, Becoming Walāta; Charles Stewart, “Southern Saharan Scholarship

30

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

The Saharan West was, by the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, characterized by a particular “Saharan Islamic culture.” Scholars have noted the interlacing of Sufi thought and practice, the importance of invisible spiritual entities, the preponderance of nomadic and fixed qur’anic schools, commercial networks linked through the transSaharan caravan trade, and religious knowledge being attributed primarily to those zwāya who could claim the inherited status of scholar.99 This zwāya monopoly on Islamic knowledge will be further elaborated in subsequent chapters. While these many particularities comprise a distinct Sahara, which appears in this book as a cultural region in its own right, the Sahara was also a barzakh between two zones imagined until fairly recently in Western scholarship as geographically, culturally, and racially distinct and isolated from each other.100 The structures that organized social relationships in this precarious desert environment determined who had access to Islamic knowledge and its associated esoteric sciences, and who might be accused of abusing that knowledge or of mobilizing illicit sorcery to harm others. These distinctions, debates, and their consequences are the subject of the following chapters. Looking for the Invisible I have drawn on a wide range of oral and written sources to better understand the presence of the Islamic esoteric sciences and their

99

100

and the Bilad Al Sudan,” JAH 17, no. 1 (1976): 73 93; and Mariella Villasainte de Beauvais, “Genèse de la hiérarchie sociale et du pouvoir politique ‘bidân’,” Cahiers d’Études Africaines (CEA) 37, no. 147 (1997): 587 633 ; Jean Schmitz, “Le souffle de la parenté : Mariage et transmission de la baraka chez des clercs musulmans de la Vallée du Sénégal,” L’homme, Le corps en parentage 151 (2000): 241 77; Shaykh Muusa Kamara, Florilège au jardin de l’histoire des noirs: zuhur al basatin, vol. 1, ed. Jean Schmitz (Paris: CNRS Éditions, 1998); Riccardo Ciavolella, Les Peuls et l’état en Mauritanie: une anthropologie des marges (Paris: Karthala Éditions, 2010); and Olivier Leservoisier, “Ethnicity and Interdependence: Moors and Haalpulaaren in the Senegal Valley,” in Saharan Frontiers: Space and Mobility in Northwest Africa, eds. James McDougall and Judith Scheele (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2012), 146 64. Ghislaine Lydon, “Saharan Oceans and Bridges, Barriers and Divides in Africa’s Historiographical Landscape,” JAH 56, no. 1 (March 2015): 3 22; James McDougall and Judith Scheele, eds. Saharan Frontiers: Space and Mobility in Northwest Africa (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2012); McDougall, “Snapshots from the Sahara”; Ismail Warscheid, Droit musulman et société au Sahara prémoderne: La justice islamique dans les oasis du Grand Touat (Algérie) aux XVIIe XIXe siècles (Leiden: Brill, 2017); and Roman Loimeier, Muslim Societies in Africa: A Historical Anthropology (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2013), 54 76; Élise Voguet, “Le peuplement du Touat au xive xvie siècle : mémoire locale de lignages au sein d’un espace socioculturel connecté,” Une histoire sociale et culturelle du politique en Algérie et au Maghreb. Études offertes à Omar Carlier, eds. M. Corriou and M. Oualdi (Paris: Éditions de la Sorbonne, 2018), 39 55. Harrison, France and Islam in West Africa.

Introduction

31

experts, and how the substance and practice of those sciences has changed over the longue durée in the Saharan West. The project’s main focus is on the twentieth century and beyond – thus reaching into a timeframe where living interlocutors’ recall of personal experiences can be essential to constructing a narrative – and the barzakh has served as a useful metaphor for the methodology of study that must stretch between two disciplines to encompass an ethnographic history of l’hjāb. I concur _ goals is to with Lynn Hunt’s assertion that one of the historian’s primary understand “what people in the past thought about what they were doing.”101 Consequently, for a project that analyzes the recent past, the methods of anthropology – its approach to interviews, participant observation, and analysis for the meaning of events and knowledge – have been essential to my own investigation of the invisible and its practitioners. Over four years of research, I conducted more than ninety interviews with Mauritanian scholars, practitioners, inhabitants, and clients. In these interviews I asked questions about life histories. I asked my interlocutors to explain how l’hjāb functioned. I asked about the region’s major Sufi figures. I tried to_ reconstruct, with the help of their participation, the chronologies and meanings of local events, and to understand changes over time in healing and protective practices. My decision to study the history of the Ahl Guennar, an extended family known for their expertise in l’hjāb whose history is the focus of Chapter 6, is partly an _ to an imbalance when it comes to sources and populaeffort to attend tions in Mauritania. I do not understand the Islamic Republic of Mauritania to be only an Arabic-speaking country, nor do I see it as cut off culturally or historically from the rest of West Africa. Studying the Ahl Guennar, a Wolof-speaking and racially “black” confederation situated in the southeastern part of the country, allowed me to examine the ways that race is understood to determine who has access to Islamic knowledge. I also made a conscious decision to use this family as an example of “grassroots Islamic spaces,” or as an example of the more accessible and more widely dispersed hajjāba.102 While some modern _ Momma, are hard to access as experts in l’hjāb, such as Eʿli Shieykh ould _ they live in walled compounds where access is mitigated by multiple gatekeepers, the current spiritual leader of the Ahl Guennar is comparatively approachable and is an active participant in public discourse on l’hjāb. The story of the Ahl Geunnar is valuable for many reasons, but not _ 101

102

Lynn Hunt in conversation with Marty Lasden, “The Future of History Up Next: Perspectives on the Future of Everything,” YouTube, Online, April 12, 2016, https:// youtu.be/amkZ5TkxwY8. Berndt, “Closer than Your Jugular Vein,” 45.

32

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

least among those is how effectively it illustrates how the majority of Saharan and West African populations still approach and use l’hjāb. _ While esoteric knowledge itself has been limited to its specialists, those specialists have inhabited every village and town in the country. I thus engaged in valuable participant observations with these hajjāba, some of _ while others whom allowed me to sit in a corner as clients came to visit, asked me to wait outside their small rooms where I would talk with those in line to enter. I have complemented these interactions with insights gained in informal conversations with friends and acquaintances to help me better understand the quotidian role of the Islamic esoteric sciences in contemporary Mauritania. In addition to French, inherited from the colonial era and still used (though with decreasing frequency) as a lingua franca between speakers of different primary languages, I also conducted my research in the local Arabic dialect of Hassāniyya. Scholars who speak Soninké, Wolof, or Pulaar would have_ additional insights into practices I learned at a linguistic remove, and it is my hope the interpretations I advance here will in time be further elaborated by their work. All of my interviews took place in the contemporary northern and southeastern administrative regions of the Adrār and Trārza, where I had formed scholarly and personal relationships during my first years in the country. These regions were also deemed safe for travel during the period of my fieldwork (2010–2014), when events in Mali made the eastern parts of Mauritania high risk for travel. Most of my interviews were conducted alone with an interlocutor, though I sometimes found myself in need of a translator, when I interviewed Wolof speakers, or in the company of other Mauritanians who might choose to join in the conversation. The presence of others always shifted the ways my interlocutors told their stories, whether they censored material for reasons of social hierarchy, tribal affiliation, or religious sensitivity or whether they elaborated on material, assuming those present would understand the details I might not. Expanding research into other language communities and geographic regions might demonstrate limits in the use of specific terminology, differences in techniques and practices, alternative networks of knowledge outside of those in Arabic, and new accounts of events involving unseen forces that could prove consequential for the interpretations and explanations I provide. It is, of course, impossible to write about the history and status of the Ahl Guennar and other experts in l’hjāb without also reflecting on the productive capabilities of secrecy and_ the ways that specialists in the Islamic esoteric sciences have used protected access to knowledge to claim for themselves certain various identities and positions of status in

Introduction

33

the region’s history. The perceived efficacy of the therapeutic and esoteric practices is at least partly rooted in the restricted nature of access to these textual, pronounced, and ritual sources. Only through close and extended tutelage, sometimes paired with the added benefit of prophetic descent, could a dedicated student begin to understand – and hope someday to apply – the techniques used by hajjāba. It was easy to understand the basic elements of inserting the_ name of a client, her request, and the Qur’ānic verses or corresponding numeric values that would form the basis for the expert’s intervention. However, asking how a hajjāb might deal with a specific problem was the equivalent of asking a _ for the secret ingredient that makes their dish especially savory. cook Here, the scholarship I have cited above on the intellectual history and anthropology of the Islamic esoteric sciences, work that connects the Saharan West to North Africa and the Middle East and India and Malaysia, was useful in supplementing my own research and resolving my discomfort at the thought of exposing or trying to dissect the elements of talismanic squares understood to contain dangerous potential if opened and seen by the uninitiated. The Qur’ān itself contained the necessary material to heal, for when its verses were ingested as ink-soaked liquid or worn in an amulet, its protective and healing properties were accessible to the body. I primarily paid attention to the materiality of l’hjāb through ethnographic observation, watching as spiritual mediators_ wrote numerological squares and Qur’ānic verses on sheets of paper, handing them to clients with instructions to place folded talismans in their chignon under their veil or soak it in a bottle of water that the client would dowse over herself in the shower at an indicated time of day. As I will discuss in Chapter 4, for clients living abroad, these experts now also send their instructions electronically through email or text message to be printed with colored ink as prescribed and then applied like their handwritten counterparts. Other spiritual mediators used sand taken from the surface of Sufi saints’ tombs in much the same way – to imbibe water for sipping or to douse one’s body in the shower. Amulets themselves have traditionally been fabricated from leather, fabric, or metals used to hold the folded jedwal and, when worn openly, they attested to the existence of unseen forces evoked through their contents. Increasingly, however, amulets are hidden beneath clothing and in hair or even abandoned altogether in favor of the more ephemeral techniques as described above. Thus, attending to the material manifestations of l’hjāb also meant attending to their absence in contemporary Mauritania. _ To better understand the discursive tradition of the Islamic esoteric sciences and other systems of harming and healing in the region, I have

34

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

relied on locally produced written sources in Arabic, especially coming from fatāwā, or nonbinding legal opinions, in which Muslim legal scholars respond to questions asked about the permissibility of certain practices within Islam.103 I draw heavily from these fatāwā written by Saharan scholars as well as individual pedagogical and hagiographical texts written by or about prominent Sufi scholars in the region. I also rely on translations of regional chronologies and treatises where spirit agents and miracles play a role. For later chapters, my sources expand to include print journalism, social media, online videos, television programs, and communications shared via text message in Arabic and French; this wider range of sources has been invaluable as I have sought to understand how Mauritanians today discuss, contest, and historicize the esoteric and the miraculous and their related events. Despite an intellectual and ideological commitment to sidestepping colonial history in favor of African knowledge production and cultural history, this book relies on written materials produced by French colonial administrators and military offices held in national and regional archives in France, Senegal, and Mauritania. Whether European merchants, travelers, officers, and administrators – often without speaking local languages and with considerable geographical and personal distances between them and their West African subjects – were able to analyze objectively and understand the events in the region remains an unavoidable question. Were European outsiders able to comprehend what motivated local conflict, holy wars against the hassān, and calls to establish Islamic states in the region? Were they _ able to think critically about why divine messages delivered by Sufi shuyūkh might appeal to Saharan populations without resorting to simplistic claims about the manipulation of desperate naivety?104 Were they able to separate their need for fragmented political authority from an analysis of events on the ground? I can conclude that European observers were unable to do any of these things, and yet their observations and reports permit an identification of events provoked by and managed with l’hjāb. _ 103

104

Yahyā ould al Barā. Al Majmūʿa al kubrā; The al Shaykh Sīdiyya, Boutilimit _ Collection, C. C. Stewart Papers, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, microfilm. The Portuguese Jesuit missionary Baltasar Barreira (1531 1612) described amulets in West Africa as “sacs of relics made of worked metal and copper, in which they put writing full of lies and insuring those who wear these sacs that they will find themselves protecting from all misfortune, during war and peace” as cited in Mamadou Ndiaye, L’enseignement arabo Islamique au Sénégal (Istanbul: Centre de recherches sur l’histoire, l’art et la culture islamique, 1985), 24.

Introduction

35

In Mauritania, the 1920s and 1930s saw an increase in ethnographic studies about the colony’s inhabitants and local customs. Monographs, articles, theses, and reports written during this period provide some essential details about events, biographical information on influential and active experts in the Islamic esoteric sciences, and the names of famous jinn. Some colonial administrators gathered from local interlocutors information on l’hjāb and its purveyors, described the mechanics _ involved in preparing jedāwil, or talismanic squares, and explained what Saharan people used these talismans for. More rigidly than earlier Arab Muslims, French administrators codified racial, cultural, and religious identities using the Sahara as a fault line. As I will discuss in Chapter 3, French analyses of the region partitioned the Sahara and its people off from l’Afrique Noire, basing this division and later policies on earlier experiences in North Africa, especially Algeria, from whence Islam was understood by the French to have spread to West Africa. Colonial officers divided local Islamic practice into categories they labeled l’Islam maure and l’Islam noir, reflecting their own framing of the region’s religious history in racialized and evolutionary terms. The undeniable obstacles to effectively governing sparsely inhabited desert zones with mobile populations meant that the French limited their political and bureaucratic investment in the Sahara. As a result of this administrative disengagement, Saharan populations generally had little contact with French officers, schools, and infrastructure – a reality reflected in most colonial knowledge production of the region. Colonial reports, circulars, and correspondence pay great attention to individuals thought to be a threat to or a collaborator in the effective occupation and administration of the Mauritanian territory. In spaces like the Sahara, French administrators were also simply present – and consequently less aware of the incidents involving nefarious spirits, bloodsucking, sorcery, or ritual poisoning that are of greatest interest for this study. I primarily use French colonial era sources to identify events, to corroborate information my oral sources narrate, and to provide a background on the social and political changes precipitated by colonial rule. To Invoke the Invisible The book situates Saharan populations in a global history of Islam and its esoteric sciences while arguing that these populations have mobilized spiritual forces to respond to local concerns about the reproduction of social norms and systems of hierarchy, physical and political security, occupational livelihoods, and physical and psychological health. I divide the book into three parts. Parts I and II move chronologically to

36

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

disaggregate the “Islamic esoteric sciences” by historicizing this knowledge and these practices as they appear in the broader history of the Saharan West from the arrival of Islam to contemporary postcolonial Mauritania. Chapters 1 and 2 observe heightened contestations in responses from Muslim scholars to questions over this esoteric knowledge posed by their communities in the Saharan West and introduce the theme of contested authority. Who could claim the authority and the ability to invoke spiritual agents and divine blessings? And who had the authority to challenge those claims, once made? In a region that had no overarching state until French colonial rule was established in 1899, ordinary people depended on these Muslim spiritual mediators to ensure security in a harsh environment and to intercede in worldly affairs. In Chapter 3, the French presence destabilized social, political, and economic norms in the Sahara, which generated further needs of support from esoteric practitioners. Colonial administrators and military officers also cultivated allegiances with zwāya confederations in opposition to hassān warriors which only gave more authority to clerical groups and _ further life to their esoteric practices. Chapter 4 considers how l’hjāb _ appears in Mauritanian media platforms, from situational sketch comedies to televised talk shows to news reports and videos shared via social media. Evidence on these new media platforms demonstrates intense concern about what defines the permitted when it comes to the Islamic esoteric sciences even if l’hjāb remains an effective means of contesting _ and managing the precarity of daily life in the Islamic Republic of Mauritania. Part III includes two longue durée case studies that break completely with the chronological order of the other chapters. These chapters make an argument about an engagement with the unseen along racial lines where bīdān-dominated discourses of the Sahara about the unseen is bound to_ understandings of who is capable of illegally practicing sihr. _ In Chapter 5, I examine how anxieties about social hierarchy and difference are connected since at least the fifteenth century to accusations of bloodsucking where marginalized members of desert communities – primarily enslaved men and women – are understood as capable of sucking the life forces out of their victims. Incidents involving bloodsucking accusations reveal much about local conceptions of race and related fears about shifts in the social hierarchy during the colonial period, dangerous women, old hostilities between lineages, and understandings of the nature of health and illness and their implications for social cohesion. The last chapter focuses on a single family whose members have long claimed expertise in the Islamic esoteric sciences and who have selfconsciously generated a counter discourse to racial thinking. They are

Introduction

37

now, as Wolof-speaking experts in the Islamic esoteric sciences, accepted broadly as hajjāba. This is a_study of the abiding reliance on and contestation over invisible agents and esoteric sciences in a region sometimes described as a “hyphen” between Africa north and south of the Sahara.105 Just as the chapters in this book engage the Sahara desert itself, it also situates the subjects of the book itself – the Islamic esoteric sciences and their experts – firmly in an interstitial space between the spiritual and material worlds, the licit and the illicit, notions of the traditional and the modern, the biomedical and the therapeutic, the seen and the unseen. L’hjāb, as the literal “veil” between these worlds for its practitioners and _clients, serves this book as an ontological tool of exploration and of methodology. Local ontologies might be at odds with the kind of descriptions of the esoteric sciences found herein as the emphasis on the importance of secrecy points to this, while the “secular” ontologies of an academic historian might be at odds with taking local interlocutors at their word. The related concept of barzakh, or bridge between two worlds, is useful for the ontological claims of this book arguing that the in-between, the liminal, can be a productive space to inhabit and to connect the two.

105

The first president of Mauritania, Mokhtar ould Daddah, called his newly independent nation a “hyphen” between the two regions of Africa. See his autobiography La Mauritanie: contre vents et marées (Paris: Karthala, 2003), 5, 14, 166, 357, and 438 for more on these rhetorical choices.

Part I

Knowledge and Authority in Precolonial Contexts

1

Principles of Provenance Origins, Debates, and Social Structures of l’hjāb _ in the Saharan West

In knowledge, nothing is forbidden, but its uses can be forbidden.

Hamden ould Tāh1 _

In June 2016, Mauritanian news outlets reported that the grave of seventeenth-century saint Ahmad Bezeid al-Yaʿqūbī (d. 1630–31) had _ been desecrated by individuals described as salafī jihādī, or Salafi 2 Jihadists. The despoilers broke the headstone identifying the saint’s burial place; they cut down the tree that had provided shade to its visitors; and they removed pieces of wood that had been placed on top to demarcate where his corpse lay. This vandalism occurred roughly eight years after another group had sermonized over the grave, declaring Ahmad Bezeid an imposter and denouncing as mere inventions his _ claims to miraculous abilities.3 Part religious guide, part healer, Ahmad Bezeid represented a cadre of experts in the Islamic esoteric _ sciences who built reputations as effective advocates for their communities of disciples and relatives. When threatened by raids or undesired interventions, they could unleash retributive action. When warrior hassān _ pillaged animals from scholarly zwāya communities, these shuyūkh were known to furnish amulets with the objective of killing the thieves or at least preventing them from escaping with the stolen herds.4 Among other miraculous acts, Ahmad Bezeid himself is known to have _ 1 2

3

4

Hamden ould Tāh, interview. See his entry no. 408 in Stewart and Wuld Ahmed Salem, _ Writings of Mauritania and the Western Sahara, 440 42. The See “Hal al muʿtadūn ʿala drīh al walī al sālih Ahmad Bezeid fī al Trārza hum min al _ _ _June 15, 2016, _ _https://tinyurl.com/3abh5cax, jihādīn?,” al Khabar al sākhin, and “tahiʾna ʿāma wa ihtifā’ wāsiʿa bi injāz bi’r tamghart,” Hourriya Media, November 24, 2016, _ https://hourriyamedia.com/node/2053. According to Benjamin Acloque’s interlocutors, the person who leveled these accusations at Ahmad Bezeid in 2008 suddenly disappeared a punishment the saint effected from his _ Acloque, “De la constitution d’un territoire à sa division: l’adaptation des Ahl grave. Bârikallah aux évolutions sociopolitiques de l’Ouest saharien (XVIIe XXIe siècles),” Canadian Journal of African Studies 48, no. 12 (2014): 119 43, 138, fn. 7. Al Mukhtār ould Hāmidūn, H ayāt Morītānyā. al juz’ al thānī: al hayāt al thaqāfiyya _ _ _ (Tūnus: al Dār al ʿarabiyya lil kitāb, 1990), 84.

41

42

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

provided a jedwal (talismanic square) to Ahmad b. Damān, the first emir _ for help in destroying his of the Trārza region, when the latter asked 5 enemy’s camp. Ahmad Bezeid’s own daughter, Maryam, was known to _ father’s mighty protective powers by reciting a poem have summoned her to guard her daughters against thieves while they traveled through the Saharan desert. She did so by pronouncing verses still mobilized in contemporary Mauritania by those wanting protection (tahsīn) from _ _ accessed physical violence.6 The saint’s baraka could be activated and by reciting this poem as a kind of talismanic text directly invoking God’s protection against real or perceived dangers.7 We can thus see in this moment both an instance of poetry working as a kind of aural amulet and evidence of l’hjāb’s essential function in providing protection from _ life’s uncertainties. In 2016, Mauritanians drew parallels between the events at the saint’s grave near the well of Tamghart and those in neighboring Mali where, in 2012, members of an Islamist group known as Ansār ad-Dīn (Defenders _ of the Faith) had destroyed the tombs and graves of Sufi saints in Timbuktu with AK-47s and pickaxes, declaring tomb demarcation and visitation prohibited based on their readings of Islamic texts.8 Such practices of remembrance and worship have long been criticized by Islamic reformists, and early twenty-first-century Mauritanians recognized that some of their own sites and common practices of worship and saint veneration fell into the categories of practice condemned by those Islamist groups in Mali.9

5 6

7 8

9

Ould Hāmidūn, H ayāt Morītānyā. al juz’ al thānī, 84. _ written down in Arabic by Yensarha mint Muhammad Mahmūd, From _an oral poem _ Ahmad Bezeid _ interview, Nouakchott, July 11, 2012. See a version in “Qissat bint _ waibnatihā al muthīra,” Shebeka īnshīrī al iʿalāmiya, January 15, 2019, http://inchiri.net/ node/2156. Hélène Artaud writes that at the time of her research in the 2010s, residents of villages on the Atlantic coast attributed miracles to Bezeid. See Artaud, Poı¨étique des flots, 156. Not to be confused with Ansar Dine, a popular religious movement also in Mali, but led by Chérif Ousmane Madani Haı¨dara. See Gilles Holder, “Chérif Ousmane Madani Haidara and the Islamic Movement Ansar Dine. A Popular Malian Reformism in Search of Autonomy,” CEA 206 207, no. 2 (2012): 389 425. See “Hal al muʿtadūn,” al Khabar al sākhin, and Emily J. O’Dell, “Waging War on the Dead: The Necropolitics of Sufi Shrine Destruction in Mali,” Archaeologies 9, no. 3 (2013): 506 25. Tamghart, in the Znāga and Tamashek languages, means “old woman” and is associated with spirits. Susan Rasmussen, “An Ambiguous Spirit Dream and Tuareg Kunta Relationships in Rural Northern Mali,” Anthropological Quarterly 88, no. 3 (Summer 2015): 635 63, 640. For more on the role of tomb visitation for Sufi Muslims, see Shahab, What Is Islam?, 20. For a list of practices often targeted by Salafis as reprehensible in Islam, see Alexander Knysh, Sufism: A New History of Islamic Mysticism (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2017), 184 85.

Principles of Provenance

43

In 2017, disciples of Ahmad Bezeid and members of his tribal fraction _ (the Idayaʿqūb), the prominent splinter group (the Ahl Bārik Allāh), and the larger zwāya confederation (the Tashumsha) replaced the headstone and wood at the grave, renovated the Tamghart well, and built a library.10 In doing so, they forcefully reinscribed a memory of this wellknown miracle worker and Sufi saint into the physical and religious landscape of the southwestern region of Mauritania known as the Gebla, defying the efforts of those who sought to prevent visitation to his burial place. In May 2017, men gathered under a tent and read praises for Ahmad Bezeid. They reminded those present that the saint had lived and_ died at a transformational moment in the history of the Saharan West, one in which the role of l’hjāb was defined as central to _ and physical health. constructing authority and maintaining social By the end of the seventeenth century, the Islamic esoteric sciences – as a body of knowledge and set of practices – would be largely controlled by experts among the scholarly zwāya confederations. By and large, in the precolonial period, Saharan scholars did not call into question the existence of powerful and invisible spiritual and cosmological forces. Instead, they questioned the techniques used to access those forces and the social uses to which they were put. In doing so, these scholars often made epistemological distinctions that marked some methods as illicit sihr, or sorcery, and others as part of religiously sanctioned knowledge. _ distinctions between Islamic knowledge and sihr comprised (then, as The _ now) the central points of contention in debates about l’hjāb. Religious _ authority could be tied to the ability to effectively wield therapeutic and protective powers, or to convincingly argue against those powers, classifying some as permitted within Islam, and others as forbidden as sihr. Who contested this knowledge and had the authority to do so, as well _as the consequences of these critiques, will give shape to this and the next chapters. The far west of the Sahara combined a difficult physical environment of periodic droughts and famine with a political context where no centralized state existed. Desert populations depended on the protective and punitive powers of l’hjāb to sustain food supplies, maintain their camel _ herds, and avenge theft and violence. By the time of Ahmad Bezeid’s death early in the seventeenth century, the Saharan region_had witnessed

10

“Bi daʿūa min al shaykh ould Babā: tazāhira l ilaʿāda iʿamār tamghart,” YouTube, _ May 11, 2017, www.youtube.com/watch?v=VpG9Svs6S9E&t=100s&ab channel= MohamedElyDendou. For more on the Tashumsha, see H. T. Norris, “Znāga Islam during the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries,” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies (BSOAS) 32, no. 3 (1969): 496 526, 496.

44

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

the circulation of scholars, merchants, and herders between multiple major trade and educational hubs: these hubs were separated by sandy stretches of open space, rarely settled and barely regulated. From the Atlantic Ocean to the central Sahara, there developed a shared system of social organization defined by inherited occupational status and an existing tradition of matrilineality incorporated into Islamic patrilineal norms; a culture of Islamic learning; a regional economy that depended on nomadism, herding, and enslaved labor; and the absence of an overarching, dominant state. A tradition of desert learning in the Saharan mahadra, or institution of advanced Islamic education, flour_ _seventeenth through the nineteenth centuries.11 Nomadic ished from the and seminomadic students pursued high levels of understanding of the esoteric and exoteric Islamic sciences, which were both understood as central to religious worship and practice, social order, and power in a politically decentralized and segmented space. While modern scholars have often framed Timbuktu as the Saharan city most relevant to an early history of regional and global commercial and intellectual exchange, in fact the region’s center of Islamic scholarship shifted significantly to the west during the seventeenth century as the Songhay empire declined and the growing European presence on the Atlantic coast irrevocably transformed the trans-Saharan trade and its economic bases.12 Commercial routes swerved toward the coasts, where the European demand for gold and enslaved labor reshaped markets and intensified competition for commodities. Newly emergent political entities, such as the loosely defined emirates just north of the Senegal River, sought to control the terms of trade and access to the merchants arriving at the mouths of rivers and on the ocean’s shores. Over a long precolonial period, social categories demarcated by inherited occupational status rigidified as European commercial and political pressures intensified. These parallel factors together help contextualize a war in the second half of the seventeenth century, Shur Būbba, as well as the militarized revivalist state-building movements that would emerge in the two centuries that followed. At the center of these movements was the call to establish a state following Islamic principles that their leaders felt had been neglected. Reformers argued in some cases that certain

11

12

Corinne Fortier, “Une pédagogie coranique: Modes de transmission des savoirs islamiques (Mauritanie),” CEA 169 170 (2003): 235 60; El Ghassem ould Ahmedou, Enseignement traditionnel en Mauritanie: La mahadra ou l’école à dos de chameau (Paris: l’Harmattan, 1997). Elias N. Saad, Social History of Timbuktu: The Role of Muslim Scholars and Notables 1400 1900 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982).

Principles of Provenance

45

practices associated with l’hjāb – such as the fabrication of jedāwil, or a _ reliance on astral forces – were a mark of weak Islamic observance and thus signaled the need for a religious reawakening. Alternatively, some argued that the miraculous acts of these religious leaders were evidence of Muslim sainthood and even legitimized a call to arms. In either case, these movements centered on the presence and management of invisible forces in the lives of Saharans. The esoteric sciences and their material signs (amulets, sand, stars) appear in sources from the region that men and women relied upon to help claim justice and ensure stability in precarious times. What happened in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries around Ahmad Bezeid’s grave is not just a projection of contemporary reli_ gious debates back into the past. While this book will be centered on the story of l’hjāb over the long twentieth century and up to the _ chapter will show that contestations of l’hjāb’s role present day, this reach back into the centuries before Ahmad Bezeid and were_ a crucial _ part of the war between hassān and zwāya in the century that followed _ his death. This is the period when the concepts and practices of the Islamic esoteric sciences can be firmly documented in local practices and were recognized as a source of both political and religious power in the region, and when early reform movements coalesced around the function of the Islamic esoteric sciences in managing the invisible. I will thus begin with the historical context that allows me to fix in situ the existence of esoteric practices in this region in the early modern period. I will then look back at the history of how those concepts were introduced into the region, arguing that traditional intellectual history has misled us to focus on key figures of Arab origin instead of understanding this process as more organic and produced via many points of contact, with practices appropriated in the region via merchants and scholars of non-Arab origin. I examine the early modern history of debates that engaged local political leaders and religious figures – debates whose participants often sought to distinguish between permitted and illicit spiritual practices – and then focus on the Gebla, a region that occupies a central position in the formation of political and social structures in Mauritania, and will thus be at the geographic heart of the chapters that follow. On Origins Previous scholarship most often traces divinatory and healing practices to non-Muslim traditions in ancient Persia and Greece, where priests sustained their royal patrons’ privileges and power through the arts of what

46

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

was labeled magus in Persian and magike in ancient Greek.13 The Qur’ān also provides an origin narrative pointing to ancient Persia (specifically, the city of Babylon) as the site where sihr, or sorcery, first emerged as an evil force used for malevolent ends by_ two fallen angels.14 The Qur’ān clearly condemns sihr as a practice, and some passages show a pre_ soothsayers or diviners with liars or sorcerers. Islamic association of Yet, what methods or actual arts constituted the discipline were left undefined.15 Collections of reports of the Prophet Muhammad’s sayings _ exemplary and and actions, the hadīth, provide indications of what were _ permitted ways of protecting and healing and, thus, how Muslims might have understood what did or did not constitute sihr in the early history of Islam.16 Importantly, no one debated whether or _not sihr, jinn, angels, or _ devils existed because the Qur’ān attested to their ubiquity. Demonic magic was real. Muslim jurists engaged in polemical exchanges about what exactly constituted the illicit even as their communities sought out the expertise of Muslim spiritual mediators to cope with any number of health, emotional, or security-related concerns. In the court of the Abbasid caliphate in Baghdad, Muslim scholars in the ninth century mobilized knowledge in astrology to produce efficacious talismans that influenced the actions of humans and the outcomes of natural phenomena; they helped women in childbirth, bolstered the power of kings, fended off snakes, and quelled storms.17 These sciences as practiced in Baghdad during the ninth century were, as Liana Saif shows, deeply “star centric,” with astrology preferred as a central means of accessing

13

14

15 16

17

Graf, “Theories of Magic in Antiquity,” 93. Knight, Magic in Islam, 5 20; Emilie Savage Smith, “Introduction: Magic and Divination in Early Islam,” in Magic and Divination in Early Islam, ed. Savage Smith (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2014): xiii xlviii. Qur’ān 2:102, 21:81, 27:16 17, 34:12 13, 38:36 37. Constant Hamès, “La notion de magie dans le Coran,” in Coran et talismans, ed. Hamès, 17 47, 24, 33, 36, and Francesco Zappa, “La magie vue par un exégète du Coran: le commentaire du verset de Hârût et Mârût (s2v102) par al Qurtubî (XIIIs),” in Coran et talismans, ed. Hamès, 49 74. Listen also to Jean Charles Coulon, “Qui sont Hârût et Mârût?” on Questions d’islam, France Culture, aired January 28, 2018, www.franceculture.fr/emissions/ questions dislam/qui sont harut et marut. Qur’ān 74:24, 5:120, 6:8, 46:8, 51:52, 52:29, 69:42, 23:71. Lory, “Divination and Religion in Islamic Medieval Culture.” Al Bukhārī’s hadīth collection listed certain actions and substances as therapeutic or _ protective options for Muslims, including cupping, gulping honey, or ingesting black cumin, ʿawja dates, urine, or camel milk. These are grouped under the field of “prophetic medicine” (al tibb al nabawī) because the Prophet counseled or modeled _ permitted. Sahīh al Bukhārī, vol. 7, Book 71, Hadith their use as efficacious and _ _ _ 582 673, Kitāb al tibb. Coulon, “Qui sont_ Hârût et Mârût?”; Saif, “What Is Islamic Esotericism?”; Matthew Melvin Koushki, “Review Essay on Liana Saif, The Arabic Influences on Early Modern Occult Philosophy,” Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft 12, no. 1 (2017): 98 112.

Principles of Provenance

47

powerful forces that could be harnessed through talismans and rings to effect the desired change.18 As Muslims brought their religion from the east to Imazighen “Berbers” in North Africa beginning in the seventh century, trading towns on the northern edge of the western desert, such as Sijilmāsa and Tāhart, served as important bases for trans-Saharan trade networks along which merchants and clerics moved as they looked for sources of gold and other commodities.19 Early Muslims, most likely Ibādī in affiliation, _ introduced their religious traditions to Saharan inhabitants, who had their own preexisting methods of protecting their communities from physical and existential threats.20 As Muslims from the medieval Islamic East (mashriq) moved to and through North Africa and Jews and early Muslim converts from the Islamic West (maghrib) encountered new ideas and texts through intellectual, religious, and commercial exchange, it is not difficult to imagine that methods of effectively engaging the spirit worlds were also shared.21 From the end of the eleventh century until 1275, two centuries of unified Muslim rule over vast distances and heterogeneous populations from the Saharan West to the southern half of Spain led to a greater adherence to the Mālikī school of jurisprudence (madhhab) within Sunnī Islam, with its specific forms of Islamic practice, and also facilitated a

18 19

20

21

Saif, “Gāyat al hakīm,” 313. _ _ The English term “Berber” originates from the Latin barbarus, or someone whose language was not understood (Ar. ʿajamī); it eventually came to identify the autochthonous inhabitants of North Africa. The people now identified as “Berber” did not think of themselves as one people before the colonial period and, depending on region and language, might now refer to themselves as Imazighen, Kabyles, Znāga, Tamashek, or Touareg. See Ramzi Rouighi, Inventing the Berbers: History and Ideology in the Maghreb (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2019). For more on this early trade, see Austen, Trans Saharan Africa in World History; Lydon, On Trans Saharan Trails; Peregrine Horden, “Situations Both Alike? Connectivity, the Mediterranean, the Sahara,” in Saharan Frontiers, eds. McDougall and Scheele, 25 38. For more on Ibādī Islam, see Adam Gaiser, Muslims, Scholars, and Soldiers: The Origin and Elaboration of_ the Ibādī Imāmate Traditions (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010); _ Paul M. Love, Jr., Ibadi Muslims of North Africa: Manuscripts, Mobilization and the Making of a Written Tradition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018); Tadeusz Lewicki, “The Ibadites in Arabia and Africa,” Journal of World History 13, no. 1 (1971): 51 130; Emilie Savage, “Berbers and Blacks: Ibādī Slave Traffic in Eighth _ Century North Africa,” JAH 33, no. 3 (1992): 351 68. Insoll, The Archaeology of Islam, 159 62; Jean Charles Coulon, “Sorcellerie berbère, antiques talismans et saints protecteurs au Maghreb médiéval,” in Dynamiques religieuses et territoires du sacré au Maghreb médiéval: éléments d’enquête, eds. Cyrille Aillet and Bulle Tuil Leonetti (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 2015), 103 47; H. R. Idris, “Examen des sources attestant la survivance d’un culte du bélier au magrib vers le xe siècle,” Arabica 12 (1965): 297 305; Pâques, “L’arbre cosmique.”

48

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

flourishing intellectual environment as scholars moved to and from the centers of Islamic learning established and strengthened under the Almoravid and Almohad empires.22 Historians of the Islamic esoteric sciences have described this period as a time of a vibrant exchange of ideas: scholars in the Mediterranean translated texts to and from Arabic and Latin, mutually contributing to European and Arab scientific and intellectual production.23 Included in this burst of intellectual activity in the Muslim world was the development and progressive consolidation of two bodies of knowledge fundamental to the history of l’hjāb – those of _ West, it was Sufism and the Islamic esoteric sciences.24 In the Saharan during the Almoravid period that individual Sufi figures were first documented in writing.25 However, in Morocco, Sufism did not develop institutionally and theologically into a tradition characterized by hierarchical lineages, or “paths” (turuq; sing. tarīqa), and an acknowledged spiritual and scholarly lineage,_ or “chain”_(silsila), until at least the fourteenth century.26 It is not until the early seventeenth century that members of specific Sufi turuq – the Shādhiliyya and the Nāsiriyya – were observed _ of Walāta.27 Sufism further south_and as far as the Saharan caravan town represented a significant form of devotional practice and increasingly institutionalized spiritual education in the region, articulated by a set of philosophical and applied practices, as well as a corpus of written texts. The Islamic esoteric sciences were frequently included among the public acts of devotion and piety that would bring Sufi experts, or shuyūkh, and saints, or awliyā’, closer to God – a closeness that could outwardly

22 23 24

25

26

27

Bennison, The Almoravid and Almohad Empires; Norris, “New Evidence on the Life of ʿAbdullah B. Yasin.” See Melvin Koushki, “(De)colonizing Early Modern Occult Philosophy.” For the history of Sufism in Morocco, see Vincent J. Cornell, Realm of the Saint: Power and Authority in Moroccan Sufism (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1998), 44; Ruggero Vimercati Sanseverino, Fès et sainteté, de la fondation à l’avènement du Protectorat (808 1912): Hagiographie, tradition spirituelle et héritage prophétique dans la ville de Mawlāy Idrīs (Rabat: Centre Jacques Berque, 2014); Sahar Bazzaz, Forgotten Saints: History, Power, and Politics in the Making of Modern Morocco (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Center for Middle Eastern Studies, 2010). Matthew Conaway Schumann, “A Path of Reverent Love: The Nāsiriyya Brotherhood _ across Muslim Africa (11 12th/17th 18th Centuries)” (PhD diss., Princeton University, 2020), 6. Cornell, Realm of the Saint, 131; Schumann, “A Path of Reverent Love,” 358; and Constant Hamès, “La Shâdhiliyya dans l’Ouest saharien et africain: nouvelles perspectives,” in Une voie soufie dans le monde: la Shâdhiliyya, ed. Éric Geoffroy (Paris: Maisonneuve et Larose, 2005), 355 75, 358. Schumann, “A Path of Reverent Love,” 276; Hamès, “La Shâdhiliyya dans l’Ouest saharien,” in Une voie soufie dans le monde, ed. Éric Geoffroy, 356; Louis Brenner, “Sufism in Africa in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries,” Islam et sociétés au Sud du Sahara 2 (1988): 80 93.

Principles of Provenance

49

manifest itself through miraculous acts such as the uncanny ability to read people’s thoughts, see into the future, or provide food and water during times of famine.28 These shuyūkh garnered enough knowledge of both the exoteric (zāhir) and esoteric (bātin) Islamic sciences to be sought out as _ intermediaries between ordinary_ Muslims and God. Sufi masters intervened in the temporal world of their communities by harnessing the forces of the spiritual and cosmic world through the Islamic esoteric sciences. These sciences are considered “esoteric” when compared with the “outward” or “manifest” sciences (ʿulūm al-zāhir) such as studies in the hadīth literature, Arabic grammar, logic,_ law, _ to understand the more overt or straightforexegesis, and theology used ward messages of the Qur’ān. For some Muslims, the Qur’ān contains additional, inner layers of meaning hidden from the uninitiated and only revealed to those who pursue knowledge of the divine down to its knotted core.29 These concealed truths are only revealed through intense study leading to a higher level of spiritual consciousness and, ultimately, unity with God, which empowers those “friends of God” (awliyā’) to serve as conduits of unseen forces and miraculous events. The object of the talisman or amulet can serve as a medium to activate astral and divine forces through its contents – here written letters and symbols meant to evoke the invisible forces of the spiritual and celestial worlds.30 The Qur’ān provided an Islamic blueprint for mapping evil and invisible forces. Muslim and non-Muslim jinn circulated, passing angels and devils, each categorized with specific terms and serving different kinds of spiritual mediators. For Muslims, the existence of these various entities moving back and forth between the spiritual and material worlds was proven by the references to them in the Qur’ān. The key distinction in Islamic jurisprudence was that those who employed demons in their 28 29

30

Cornell, Realm of the Saint, 114. For more on zāhir and bātin, see Daniel De Smet, “Esotericism and Exotericism,” in _ Encylopaedia of_ Islam THREE, eds. Kate Fleet, Gudrun Krämer, Denis Matringe, John Nawas, Everett Rowson. 2015, accessed October 9, 2018, doi: 10.1163/1573 3912 ei3 COM 26230. See also Maria Dakake, “Hiding in Plain Sight: The Practical and Doctrinal Significance of Secrecy in Shiʿite Islam,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 74, no. 2 (June 2006): 324 55. Gardiner, “Esotericist Reading Communities,” 407; Ahmad b. ʿAli al Būnī, Shams al _ maʿārif al kubrā wa latā’if al ʿawārif (Beirut: The People’s Library, 1975); Constant Hamès, “Entre recette_ magique d’Al Bûnî et prière islamique d’Al Ghazâlî: textes talismaniques d’Afrique occidentale,” Fétiches II: Puissances des objets, charme des mots, systèmes de pensée en Afrique noire 12 (1993): 187 224. Qur’ān 17:82 and 41:44 are often used to justify this claim. The verses read: “And we send down in the Qur’ān that which is healing and mercy to those who believe, to the unjust it causes nothing but loss after loss” and “And declare that [the Qur’ān] is guiding and healing for believers,” trans. Yusuf Ali, www.quranexplorer.com/quran/.

50

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

work, who relied on sihr, were understood to be guilty of the greatest sin _ were to be put to death.31 With death as the of kufr, or unbelief, and punishment for sihr, the stakes were high whenever a Muslim cleric _ labeled certain techniques as sorcery. Arguments about the permissibility and legitimacy of the esoteric sciences within Islam that began early on in Islamic history would later be used as supporting evidence by scholars on both sides.32 What we can know, however, from twelfth-century sources like the Andalusian Arab geographer al-Idrīsī (d. circa 1165) is that Saharans engaged directly with invisible forces, and they were unaware (or simply uninterested when informed) that this work incited controversy in urban centers of Islamic knowledge production. Al-Idrīsī noted, in what he identified as the Wangara town of Kuga, that “[w]itchcraft is attributed to the women of that town and they are said to be expert, famous and proficient in it,” while the Lamtūna Berbers were well known for their ability to manipulate rocks for magical ends.33 Identifying an expertise more overtly linked to lettrism, he also mentioned that people among the Azqar in the Libyan desert were recognized for their writing attributed to the Prophet Daniel. [N]o other tribe is known to be better acquainted with this script than the people of Azqar. Indeed, any man among them, whether young or old, when he loses a straying animal or when he misses something belonging to him, delineates for that purpose a sign on the sand, by means of which he knows the whereabouts of the lost object. Then he proceeds to find his property, according to what he has seen in the script. […] It is an amazing thing that they have skill in this art, despite their stupendous ignorance and uncouth nature.34

This Saharan community used a form of writing associated with a prophetic figure – Daniel – to trace lines in the sand (ʿilm al-raml) for the purpose of finding lost things. Al-Idrīsī himself linked such a practice to an elite knowledge of literacy, expressing surprise that rural nomads claimed these powerful skills. At the same time, in North Africa, inhabitants were reportedly using the esoteric sciences to protect cities from invaders, to recuperate pillaged property, to mediate conflict between 31 32

33 34

Fahd, “Sihr.” _ Gril, “La science des lettres”; Kenneth Garden, The First Islamic Reviver: Abu Hamid al Ghazali and His Revival of the Religious Sciences (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014); Alexander Trieger, “Al Ghazālī’s Classifications of the Sciences and Descriptions of the Highest Theoretical Science,” Dîvân: Disiplinlerarası Çalışmalar Dergisi 16, no. 1 (2011): 1 32; Yahya J. Michot, “Ibn Taymiyya on Astrology: Annotated Translation of Three Fatwas,” Journal of Islamic Studies 11, no. 2 (2000): 147 208; Melvin Koushki, “In Defence of Geomancy.” Levtzion and Hopkins, eds., Corpus of Early Arabic Sources, 112, and Coulon, “Sorcellerie berbère,” 105. Translated by Levtzion and Hopkins, eds., Corpus of Early Arabic Sources, 121 22.

Principles of Provenance

51

tribes, to bring rainfall, and to heal.35 By the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, across the broader Muslim world, the Islamic esoteric sciences had reached a kind of zenith. Even though some prominent religious scholars challenged the techniques of divination and protection, individuals throughout the Muslim world were seeking out the expertise of these spiritual intermediaries for material and devotional needs.36 The origin story for the esoteric sciences in the Maghreb and Sahara is typically recounted over a long six hundred years, with the narrative focused on three primary figures: Khalāf al-Barbarī, Tumtum al-Hindī, and Abū ʿAbd Allah Muhammad al-Zenātī. Generally identified geographically by their nisba,_ or relative adjective, these three men have been linked to North African Amazigh (Berber) and to India (al-hind), people and regions that acquired reputations as rich in the divinatory sciences, whether Islamic or not.37 On the Islamic esoteric sciences of divination, traditional narratives point to Khalāf al-Barbarī (d. 634), who reportedly learned these sciences from the Prophet Muhammad, then travelled to India to study the works of the fabled Tumtum_ al-Hindī, who had received his own divinatory knowledge under the tutelage of the Prophet Idrīs.38 Al-Barbarī returned to North Africa carrying the works of al-Hindī, parts of which appear in the region’s first conserved Arabic treatise of geomancy, which is attributed to Abū ʿAbd Allah Muhammad _ three al-Zenātī (d. 1230–32).39 The drawback with the focus on these men is that this intellectual genealogy assumes a north-to-south dissemination of knowledge from individuals who are prioritized because they are the known authors of surviving texts in Arabic. Such an approach 35 36

37

38 39

Coulon, “Sorcellerie berbère.” Porter et al., “Medieval Islamic Amulets,” 528, and Matthew Melvin Koushki, “Persianate Geomancy from Tūsī to the Millennium: A Preliminary Survey,” in The _ Occult Sciences in Premodern Islamic Cultures, ed. Nader El Bizri (Leiden: Brill, 2018), 151 99; Matthew Melvin Koushki, “Mobilizing Magic: Occultism and the Continuity of High Persianate Culture under Russian Rule,” Studia Islamica 111 (2016): 231 83; Ibn Khaldūn, The Muqaddimah: An Introduction to History, trans. F. Rosenthal (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1967, 2005), 391 95. A well known example is that of the prophetess al kāhina Dihya, who used her divinatory expertise to fight against the invading Arab armies in what is now Algeria. Abdelmajid Hannoum, “Historiography, Mythology and Memory in Modern North Africa: The Story of the Kahina,” Studia Islamica no. 85 (1997): 85 130; Fiorenza Ferretti, “Regine del Sahara,” Africa: Rivista Trimestrale di Studi e Documentazione dell’Istituto Italiano per L’Africa e L’Oriente 63, no. 4 (2008): 658 67; Ibn Khaldun, trans. William MacGuckin baron de Slane, 198 and 340. Thérèse Charmasson, Recherches sur une technique divinatoire, vol. 44 Hautes études médiévales et modernes (Paris: Librairie Droz, 1980), 15. Anne Regourd, “Au sujet des sources manuscrits de l’ouvrage imprimé au Caire sous le titre d’Al fasl fī usūl ʿilm al raml d’Al Zanātī,” Annales islamologiques 35 (2001): _ 393 407. _

52

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

erases the possibility of multiple and independent points of contact where practical information on how to manage problems might have been transmitted or knowledge of medicinal plants exchanged. And yet the Malian anthropologist Bréhima Kassibo has questioned this cultural genealogy, arguing against claims that the first “vulgarization of classical geomancy” in West Africa occurred in the thirteenth century through al-Zenātī.40 Instead, Kassibo posits that West African Mandé narratives about spirits revealing the esoteric sciences and geomancy to legendary Soninké and Fulbe figures demonstrate that the nature of contact between Arab Muslims and West Africans during the pre-Islamic era must have been more extensive and earlier than is acknowledged by textual sources.41 Aside from the desert pastoral Sanhāja confederations whose _ the Almoravid religious repeople seem to have converted en masse during education campaign, it is also probable that the Ghana empire’s Soninké or Malinké-speaking merchants (Son. wangara) had become, by the tenth century, among the first West Africans to enter into Islam.42 Over the next hundred years, Islam continued to spread through trade networks, leading modern scholars to describe the Ghana empire and southern Sahara as Muslim by the eleventh century.43 Kassibo suggests that non-Muslim spiritual mediators might have learned divination and protective spiritual techniques from Muslims who travelled across the Sahara seeking gold known to exist south of the Ghana empire.44 Bambuk and Buré, sites south of the Senegal River and on the Upper Niger, were the primary sources of gold which was smelted and then sold 40

41

42 43 44

Bréhima Kassibo and Darya Ogordnikova show how Islam might have been transmitted through the Soninké language even before the people who would later consider themselves “Arab” converted to or disseminated Islam. See Bréhima Kassibo, “La géomancie ouest africaine. Formes endogènes et emprunts extérieurs,” CEA 32, no. 128 (1992): 541 96, 543; Darya Ogorodnikova, “ʿAjamī Annotations in Multilingual Manuscripts from Mande Speaking Areas: Visual and Linguistic Features,” Islamic Africa 8, no. 1 2 (2017): 111 43. Soninké refers to the people from Sonna, an early town established in the region formerly known as Wagadu (later part of the Ghana Empire). Native speakers refer to themselves as Soninko, while the Wolof use the more common Serrakolé, and most research in English or French uses Soninké. Kassim Kone, “The Soninke in Ancient West African History,” in Oxford Research Encyclopedia of African History. Online. March 2018, doi: 10 .1093/acrefore/9780190277734.013.160. Al Bakrī in Levtzion and Hopkins, Corpus, 79 and Idrissa Ba, “Mythes et cultes du serpent chez les Soninkés et les Peuls: étude comparative,” Oràfrica, revista de oralidad alriana 8 (April 2012): 159 69. Kassibo, “La géomancie ouest africaine” and Ogorodnikova, “ʿAjamī Annotations.” Gomez, African Dominion, 25. The first known textual identification of the empire of Ghana is attributed to al Fazarī (d. 746/806), who mentioned its distance from the northern Saharan town of Sijilmāsa, the terminus for caravans then actively trading salt, horses, cloth, and copper with the wealthy empire in exchange for gold and enslaved persons. Nehemia Levtzion, “Ancient Ghana: A Reassessment of Some Arabic Sources,” Revue française d’histoire d’outre mer 66, no. 242 43 (1979): 139 47.

Principles of Provenance

53

north through a site identified as Kumbī Sālih. Most likely one of the first _ h was eventually linked to major cities of the Ghana empire, Kumbī_ Sāli _ the oasis town of Awdāghost when the king of_ Ghana incorporated the latter into his empire at the_ end of the tenth century.45 Early Arabic sources identify the inhabitants of the Ghana empire as “black” (sūdān) and primarily non-Muslim, describing Ghana as a city as well as a kingdom.46 Awdāghost became a prosperous city inhabited by Arabs _ and Zenāta Berbers who frequented the town’s twelve mosques and sought out the advice of skilled Muslim educators and judges working there.47 Members of the smaller but increasingly prosperous Fulbespeaking Takrūr kingdom established further south along the Senegal River also converted early to Islam, during the eleventh century, under its ruler Warjābī b. Rābīs; these conversions, combined with a simultaneous increase in attacks as the Sanhāja attempted to dominate the gold _ trade, ended up severely weakening the Ghana empire.48 Kassibo draws attention to early conversion by the leaders of Ghana and Takrūr, hypothesizing an accompanying shift from Soninké or Fulbe orality to writing, as learning the Arabic script accompanied the spread of Islam – at least among an educated elite – a shift which would have allowed for an early and autonomous development of the Islamic esoteric sciences in West Africa, earlier than in other parts of the Sahara. Kassibo’s claim that this linguistically and ethnically pluralistic region witnessed some of Islam’s earliest conversions by members of Soninké-speaking communities should also be read as a supporting argument that expertise in the Islamic esoteric sciences could belong to West Africans who did not possess or necessarily claim Arab descent. These sciences were adopted and elaborated early in the western Saharan and Sahelian space, and that elaboration is integral to the larger intellectual and social history of Islam. 45

46

47

48

“Ghana” probably also referred to a major trading town located ten to fifteen days’ journey from Awdāghost. Ibn Hawqal, Description de l’Afrique, 67. Gomez also doubts whether _ ever considered a kind of capital for the empire. Gomez, African Kumbī Sālih was _ 32_ 33. See also Lewicki, “Lamtūna” and al Bakrī, Description de l’Afrique, 369. Dominion, See also entries from Al Khuwārizmī, Ibn ʿAbd al Hakam, Al Yʿaqūbī, Ibn al Faqīh, Al Hamdānī, and Al Masʿūdī in Levtzion and _Hopkins, Corpus and Levtzion, “Ancient Ghana.” Al Bakrī, Description de l’Afrique, 248. See also Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh, La société maure: Éléments d’anthropologie historique (Rabat: Centre des Études Sahariennes, 2017), 303 06. For more on Takrūr, see Al Bakrī, Description de l’Afrique, 377; Abdourahmane Ba, “Le Takrur historique et l’héritage du Fuuta Tooro: L’histoire politique ancienne du fleuve Sénégal,” in Histoire et politique dans la vallée du fleuve Sénégal: Mauritanie, eds. Mariella Villasante Cervello and Raymond Taylor (Paris: L’Harmattan, 2017), 95 162; John Hunwick, “Takrūr,” in Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, eds. P. Bearman, et al., Publication 2012, doi: 10.1163/1573 3912 islam SIM 7348. Ba, “Mythes et cultes,” 162.

54

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

By the time North African explorer Ibn Battūta (d. 1368–69) accom_ _ of_ the most famous transpanied a caravan from Sijilmāsa to Walāta, some Saharan trading towns had been long established – Wādān (1141), Shinqīt (1262), Tīshīt (c. 1100 revived from eighth-century Soninké origins),_ Walāta (c. 1200 reestablished as a regional market town from the sixthcentury Soninké market village of Bīru), and Timbuktu (c. 1100 and surpassing Walāta in size and importance c. 1500). These Saharan towns attracted a diverse set of commercial agents, merchants, scholars, clerics, and caravan employees, from Saharan Jews to wangara, from Arab traders to Amazigh camel guides.49 As Saharans and West Africans entered into Islam, they increasingly traveled east undertaking the hājj (Ar. pilgrimage) to Mecca and stopping along the way in major cities_ where the travelers sought to expand their trade networks and their knowledge of the Islamic sciences.50 By the time there is definitive textual evidence from the fifteenth century, one can posit that the Islamic esoteric sciences had been practiced and introduced via these multiple points of contact. Some of these pilgrims and traders can reasonably be assumed to have returned to their Saharan communities carrying with them new methods of healing, protection, and divination: medieval Saharan merchants traded in medicinal plants, responding to demand in the Sahara and Sahel, while Muslim scholars sought to deepen their familiarity with a variety of Islamic esoteric sciences to better serve communities in their places of origin.51 Saharans in these medieval periods presumably sought relief from the kind of health, environmental, and social problems that appear in later periods – infertility, difficult births, communicable diseases, scorpion stings and snake bites, infidelity, jealousy, physical insecurity, drought – and Muslim religious scholars and spiritual mediators can reasonably be understood to have provided solutions to some of those problems using the esoteric sciences documented as popular in the Islamicate world at the time.52 49 50

51 52

Lydon, On Trans Saharan Trails, 63 90. This is not to imply, of course, that the transfer only went from east to west. In the infamous case of Mansa Musa in the fourteenth century, we see a West African king moving through Egypt to the Arabian Peninsula, bringing impressive quantities of gold and people with him. See Ibn al Dawādārī, Levtzion and Hopkins, Corpus, 250. Further research is needed on Saharans’ and West Africans’ intellectual and cultural contributions to the Middle East over time. See Chanfi Ahmed, West Africa ᶜulama’ and Salafism in Mecca and Medina: Jawab al Ifriqi the Response of the African (Leiden: Brill, 2015) and Hadrien Collet, “Échos d’Arabie. Le Pèlerinage à La Mecque de Mansa Musa (724 25/1324 25) d’après des Nouvelles Sources,” History in Africa 46, no. 1 (2019): 105 35. Lydon, On Trans Saharan Trails, 78. See Marie Laure Derat, “Du lexique aux talismans: occurrences de la peste dans la Corne de l’Afrique du xiiie au xve siècle,” Afriques 9 (2018). doi: 10.4000/afriques.2090.

Principles of Provenance

55

Timbuktu Iterations What seems to be the earliest extant manuscript from Timbuktu, recently examined by historians Rudolph Ware and Zachary Wright, demonstrates that the Islamic esoteric sciences were part of the religious culture of this region in the fifteenth century – as well as what it looked like in practice, and what kinds of problems led local people to turn to these sciences. Scholars have attributed later copies of this manuscript, known as Bustān al-fawā’id wa-l-manāfiʿ (“The Garden of Excellences and Benefits”), to fifteenth-century scholar Muhammad al-Kābarī (c. 1450). _ The manuscript furnishes evidence of the central role that early modern Muslim spiritual mediators and saints assumed in ensuring the well-being of their communities by providing pedagogical, legal, and esoteric services.53 Bustān al-fawā’id indicates how to use the Islamic esoteric sciences to heal physical illness, encourage successful population reproduction, and protect oneself or a community from misfortune. The author – whom Wright calls “Timbuktu’s most significant scholar” and who most likely originated in Kābara (hence the moniker al-Kābarī), a village of Islamic learning not far from the town of Dia on the Niger floodplain – was wellknown during his lifetime as a jurist and divinely aided miracle worker.54 Taking up residence in Timbuktu in the middle of the fifteenth-century as a scholar, judicial authority, and teacher, al-Kābarī continued a longer tradition of significant and early Soninké and Mandé participation in the production of Islamic knowledge in the region (Map 1.1).55 Bustān al-fawā’id includes discussions on theology, Qur’ānic exegesis, and litanies of prayers, but the most significant portions are reserved for 53

54

55

Few details on the life of al Kābarī (fl. ca. 1450) are known. The mid fifteenth century dating is from Hunwick and O’Fahey, while Elias Saad briefly mentions him as one of Timbuktu’s early important qadis who lived sometime after 1325 or 1397. John O. Hunwick and R. S. O’Fahey, Arabic Literature of Africa, Volume 4: The Writings of Western Sudanic Africa (Leiden: Brill, 2003), 12; Saad, Social History of Timbuktu, 38 39; “Muhammad al Kābarī Abū ʿAbd Allāh,” Arabic Literature of Africa Online, eds. _ Hunwick and O’Fahey. Consulted November 5, 2018, doi: 10.1163/2405 4453 alao COM ALA 40001 1 2; and Rudolph Ware, personal email communication, October 10, 2018. Copies of this manuscript have been identified in Timbuktu, Niamey and at Northwestern University. Zachary Wright, “The Islamic Intellectual Traditions of Sudanic Africa with Analysis of a Fifteenth Century Timbuktu Manuscript,” in The Palgrave Handbook of Islam in Africa, eds. Fallou Ngom, Mustapha H. Kurfi, and Toyin Falola (Cham, SZ: Springer Nature and Palgrave Macmillan, 2020), 55 76. See also Gomez, African Dominion, 156 57. ʿAbd al Rahmān b. ʿAbd Allah al Saʿdī and John O. Hunwick, Timbuktu and the Songhay Empire: Al _Saʻdī’s Ta’rīkh Al Sūdān Down to 1613 and Other Contemporary Documents (Leiden: Brill, 1999), 68 70. Al Bartalī al Walātī associates al Kābarī with several other scholars listed in El Hamel, La vie intellectuelle islamique dans le Sahel Ouest, 274.

56

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Map 1.1 Medieval empires, eighth seventeenth centuries. Map created by Tom Abi Samra. Based on LaGamma, Sahel, 110 and 10 11; Cleaveland, Becoming Walāta, 44; Lydon, On Trans Saharan Trails, xxv; Austin, Trans Saharan Africa in World History, 28 29.

the science of lettrism (ʿulūm al-asrār) and secret beneficial prayers (al-fawā’id). The manuscript provides instructions on how to evoke God through prayer and numerological squares, or jedāwil, to be worn as a talisman or soaked in water then used for bathing or drinking.

Principles of Provenance

57

It guides the user on marshaling these same forces to help women conceive children and generate breast milk, to encourage men’s virility, and to cure blindness or calm headaches.56 Ware has indicated that this manuscript circulated in the Niger Bend region during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, before its documented appearance in a collection by nineteenth-century West African Muslim scholars.57 If that history of circulation is accurate, it means the only manuscript of pre-sixteenth-century origin that can be definitively associated with the southern Saharan region in the precolonial period is one that focused primarily on the secrets of letters. The existence of this manuscript testifies to the importance of its contents, as does the history of its circulation for almost six hundred years.58 The preservation of this manuscript and the reputation of its author as a respected and knowledgeable Muslim scholar further confirm that in the Muslim world, from the medieval to the modern periods, Islamic esoteric practices were deeply entwined with other scientific and systematic modes of intellectual inquiry.59 By the time al-Kābarī compiled his collection of beneficial directions and prayers around 1450, the city of Timbuktu was attracting scholars from other regional centers of education, so that there was a nearconstant circulation of erudition to and from the city.60 These learners came to study Qur’ānic exegesis and hadīth, Islamic jurisprudence, rhet_ oric, grammar, astronomy, history, mathematics, and medicine, all subjects valued as vital in the education of pious Muslims who would guide their communities in religious practice. If the manuscript attributed to Muhammad al-Kābarī realistically represents the place of the Islamic _ esoteric sciences in Timbuktu by the fifteenth century, the manuscript would seem to indicate not only that these sciences constituted an important part of one prominent scholar’s knowledge repertoire, but also

56 57 58 59

60

Rudolph Ware, personal email communication, October 11, 2018. Ware cites nineteenth century scholar Muhammad Tukur. Ware, email, October 10, 2018. _ Ware, email, October 10, 2018. Saif and Leoni, “Introduction,” 7; Gubara, “Al Azhar and the Orders of Knowledge,” 305; Pierre Bonte, Récits d’origine: Contribution à la connaissance du passé ouest saharien (Mauritanie, Maroc, Sahara occidental, Algérie et Mali) (Paris: Karthala, 2018), 232; Zachary V. Wright, Realizing Islam: The Tijaniyya in North Africa and the Eighteenth Century Muslim World (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2020); Melvin Koushki, “(De)colonizing Early Modern Occult Philosophy”; and Melvin Koushki, “Mobilizing Magic.” Élise Voguet, “Tlemcen Touat Tombouctou: Un réseau transsaharien de diffusion du malikisme (fin VIII/XIVe XI/XVIIe siècle),” Revue des mondes musulmans et de la Méditerranée 141 (Juin 2017), http://journals.openedition.org/remmm/9963 and Bruce Hall “Rethinking the Place of Timbuktu in the Intellectual History of Muslim West Africa,” in Landscapes, Sources and Intellectual Projects of the West African Past: Essays in Honour of Paulo Fernando de Moraes Farias, eds. Toby Green and Benedetta Rossie (Leiden: Brill, 2018), 238 58.

58

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

that elite Muslim scholars of the early modern period more broadly considered lettrism and the fawā’id essential sciences.61 An exchange of letters dated 1493 both demonstrates the geographic back-and-forth of information on esoteric practices and that even before 1500 these practices were controversial. In 1493, the Egyptian religious scholar Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suyūtī (1445–1505) received a set of questions in a _ letter from someone who self-identified as Muhammad bin Muhammad _ _ 62 Alb. ʿAlī al-Lamtūnī, writing from a location described as al-Takrūr. Lamtūnī listed the ways he claimed his home community was failing to follow the basic rules of Islamic governance.63 Primarily seeking permission to declare as immoral a leader or political system, the letter’s author accused local authorities of enslaving Muslims, taxing unfairly, and engaging in corrupt behavior.64 Al-Lamtūnī especially criticized the occupational group of musicians and storytellers, the griots, and the local custom of allowing women to play instruments in mixed company.65 The letter thus suggests not only that a basic hierarchical division of labor (warriors, scholars, musicians) was already well established by the end of the fifteenth century, it reveals a desert curmudgeon who criticizes behaviors he sees as un-Islamic among rulers, their clerics, warriors, and rural subjects. On the topic of esoteric spiritual practice, AlLamtūnī condemns the business of selling for profit the talismans and amulets used for protection in times of war, for success in love and commerce, for the healing of health problems, and for accessing political power.66 Grouping these practices – from public singing by women to the 61

62 63

64 65

66

Saad omits the science of letters from the section on “academic pursuits of scholars” in his social history of scholarship in Timbuktu. See Saad, Social History of Timbuktu, 74 81. E. Geoffroy, “Al Suyūtī” in Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, eds. P. Bearman et al., _ 2012, doi: 10.1163/1573/3912 islam COM 1130. The letter, Risāla ila mulūk at takrūr, held at the Egyptian National Library, is translated by Hunwick in “Notes on a Late Fifteenth Century Document Concerning al Takrūr,” in African Perspectives: Papers in the History, Politics and Economics of Africa Presented to Thomas Hodgkins, eds. Christopher Allen and R. W. Johnson (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970), 7 33. See E. M. Sartain, “Jalal al Din al Suyuti’s Relations with the People of Takrur,” Journal of Semitic Studies 16, no. 2 (October 1971), 193 98; Ould Cheikh, “Nomadisme, Islam et pouvoir politique,” 163 80; and H. T. Norris, The Tuaregs: Their Islamic Legacy and Its Diffusion in the Sahel (Wilts: Avis and Phillips, 1975). See also Al Lamtūnī in Hunwick, “Notes,” 13 and Ould Cheikh, “Nomadisme, Islam, et pouvoir politique,” 171. Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh, “Revisiting a Hunwick translation on the Southern Sanhaja Society in the XVth Century,” unpublished paper from the Sacred Word: The Changing Meanings in Textual Cultures of Islamic Africa. A Symposium Dedicated to the Memory of Professor John O. Hunwick, Northwestern University, April 21 22, 2016, paper shared by author, 3 and al Lamtūnī in Hunwick, “Notes,” 15. Al Lamtūnī in Hunwick, “Notes,” 16, 19, 20.

Principles of Provenance

59

sale of amulets – as evidence of a superficially converted society in need of religious reeducation, the letter asks what pious Muslims should do to withstand such moral corruption. Al-Suyūtī, who had long corresponded with rulers from West Africa, responded_ that he did not see anything especially sacrilegious in the use of amulets, as long as they contained the Qur’ān; this reply reflected his generally tolerant position on beneficial prayers and the use of devotional texts, such as Moroccan scholar Muhammad al-Jazūlī’s (d. 1465) Dalā’il _ properties.67 The great Cairene al-Khayrāt, known for its thaumaturgic scholar’s legal opinions and Qur’ānic exegesis were remarkably widespread in West Africa and likely influenced the positions of generations of Muslim scholars in the Sahara toward the application of the Islamic esoteric sciences – sciences that, in the Saharan West and by the end of the fifteenth century, ordinary people typically saw embodied in the form of amulets and to have been used for a variety of social, political, and medical needs.68 In other words, at work here is not only general evidence of cultural exchange between north and south that facilitated multiple points of entry for information about esoteric practices, but also evidence that the practice of and attitudes surrounding the Islamic esoteric sciences in the Saharan West were specifically guided by teachings that were tolerant of their application. In the Saharan West of the fifteenth century, evidence can be seen of the esoteric religious arts at work and evidence that successful practitioners were translating their mastery into spiritual and political power. The Timbuktu saint al-Kābarī, for example, was said to have punished a scholar from Marrakesh who had insulted him by inflicting his attacker with leprosy.69 Al-Kābarī was also known to have demonstrated his spiritual connection to God by walking on water. After his death, disciples visited the cemetery where his body lay buried to absorb the blessings emanating from his grave.70 Although in the era of al-Kābarī and alLamtūnī, Timbuktu was hardly the region’s only location of advanced Islamic learning, generations of the city’s Muslim scholars had benefitted, since the time of the founder of the Mali empire, Mansa Musa, from

67

68

69 70

See Sartain, “Jalal al Din al Suyuti’s Relations with the People of Takrur” and Hunwick, “Notes,” 25; and Ousmane Kane, Beyond Timbuktu: An Intellectual History of Muslim West Africa (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2016), 79. A sultan who had studied in Cairo with al Suyūtī brought the jurist’s works to West _ Africa around 1477/8. Sartain, “Jalal al Din al Suyuti’s Relations,” 194; Norris, The Tuaregs, 41; and Geoffroy, “Al Suyūtī.” _ As reported by ʿAbd al Rahman al Saʿdī (1594 c. 1655), the author of the Tārīkh _ and the Songhay Empire, 70. al Sūdān. Hunwick, Timbuktu Hunwick, Timbuktu and the Songhay Empire, 70 and 73.

60

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

funding to advance religious studies, build mosques, and publicly celebrate Muslim holidays. The blessings of Muslim saints buried in the city’s cemeteries protected the city as its affluence grew and the city did indeed become a major commercial and educational center for the region.71 Here, Muslim holy men were also known to exert influence over state representatives and other scholars through their ability to muster God’s divine forces to enact miracles and to punish misdeeds. The century that followed demonstrated that their perceived spiritual power could work to the religious experts’ detriment as well as to their benefit. Sonni ʿAlī Ber’s (d. 1492) 27-year rule as the founder of the Songhay Empire (1464–1591) profoundly destabilized what had been the comfortable position of Muslim scholars in Timbuktu: some were imprisoned or executed; others fled. Inhabitants and rulers of Songhay later understood that abused and displaced Muslim scholars had accelerated the death of the widely reviled Sonni ʿAlī, enacting a kind of divine retributive justice through the science of letters.72 Muslim scholars returned to Timbuktu as the city flourished under the reign of Sonni ʿAlī’s successor Askiya Muhammad (d. 1538). Muslim scholars also maintained their influence in_ Songhay by providing protective amulets to ensure success in war, healing illness, and maintaining the health of a community. In return for the spiritual protection and even bureaucratic service that only those literate in Arabic could perform, the Songhay rulers offered exemptions from taxes and gave gifts of land, enslaved persons, and commodities.73 Even though he welcomed the return of Islamic scholars, Askiya Muhammad was a reformer who challenged his predecessor, not least, _ according to a distinction between allowed and forbidden practices that resonated over the next 500 years. His inquiries demonstrate that the aforementioned openness advanced by Al-Suyūtī did not go unchal_ of responses to the lenged, even at this early date. A now-famous set askiya’s legal questions by the fifteenth-century Saharan jurist Muhammad b. ʿAbd al-Karīm al-Maghīlī (d. 1505) provides additional _ information about what therapeutic and spiritual mediation practices might have been like in this mid-imperial state in the southern Sahara.74 71 73 74

72 Gomez, African Dominion, 288 97. Gomez, African Dominion, lv and 100. Hunwick, Secular Power and Religious Authority in Muslim Society: the Case of Songhay,” JAH 37, no. 2 (1996): 175 94, 179 and 192. Al Maghīlī was criticized for his attacks against Jewish inhabitants of the oasis of Tuāt, especially because his writings incited the violent destruction of the Jewish community there. See Hunwick, Shari’a in Songhay; Warscheid, Droit musulman; and Abd al Aziz Abdallah Batran, “A Contribution to the Biography of Shaikh Muhammad b. ʿAbd al _ Karīm b. Muhammad (ʿUmar) al Maghīlī,” JAH 14 (1973): 381 94. _

Principles of Provenance

61

The Songhay leader’s correspondence with the reformist scholar reveals a desire to portray his predecessor, Sonni ʿAlī, in an especially bad light. Emphasizing practices he describes as syncretic and reflecting pre-Islamic animism, the askiya showed concern about whether existing local rituals were consistent with Islamic jurisprudence.75 Askiya Muhammad asked _ through sand about the legality of claiming “some knowledge of the future divining and the like, or through the disposition of the stars, information gathered from jinns or the sounds and movements of birds” and of relying on talismans “to bring good fortune, such as material prosperity or love, and to ward off ill fortune by defeating enemies, preventing steel from cutting or poison from taking its effect.”76 Al-Maghīlī responded categorically that anyone who claims to be able to predict the future using the methods listed “is a liar and an unbeliever and whoever gives him credit is an unbeliever.” More radically than Egyptian scholar al-Suyūtī, al-Maghīlī reproached those who _ used talismans or amulets. Extending this assessment to punishment for such apostasy, al-Maghīlī then condemned to death anyone who relied on methods he identified as sorcery.77 Those convicted of sihr or _ a fortune-telling were to be given the opportunity to repent through public denunciation of such practices; however, if they continued to practice either in secret or after such public atonement, they would then be killed as non-believers.78 The severity of these rulings seems, as Hunwick notes, to “have generally been ignored,” at least if we take the continued widespread reliance on amulets and jedāwil as any indication.79 These methods al-Maghīlī strongly opposed – sand divination, astrology, communicating with birds and jinn, using talismans – as well as the problems to be solved, like poverty in money and love, war, and poisoning, were consistent with the methods and goals of the esoteric sciences as practiced in the Sahara. And these methods do seem to have withstood calls from some Muslims, including al-Maghīlī, for their suppression. First, al-Maghīlī wrote his responses as fatāwā, or non-binding legal opinions that would have shaped behavior only if enforced. While Askiya Muhammad had initially posed the questions to al-Maghīlī, it is not evident _that the Songhay ruler necessarily then mobilized the state to implement laws backing the expert’s conclusions. More likely, he used these fatāwā to discredit his predecessor Sonni ʿAlī – who had publicly 75 77 78 79

76 Hunwick, Shari’a in Songhay, 70 and 118. Hunwick, Shari’a in Songhay, 89. Translation by Hunwick, Shari’a in Songhay, 91. Hunwick, Shari’a in Songhay, 91, fn. 3 and 124. Hunwick, Shari’a in Songhay, 124.

62

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

relied on lettrism and amulets – to legitimize his own appropriation of power through claims of religious superiority. Having overthrown Sonni ʿAlī’s son, the askiya needed to convince his subjects, especially those living in newly acquired regions, that his was a righteous sovereignty while his precursor’s had been illegitimate. Askiya Muhammad sought to prove that Sonni ʿAlī was also guilty of takfīr, or unbelief, to justify seizing his and his supporters’ property and goods. In this line of argument, Sonni ʿAlī had been a cruel and violent emperor – but he had also permitted his own subjects to disregard the basic precepts of Islam. It was the latter failing that allowed for the askiya’s takeover of power and the appropriation of property. Askiya Muhammad’s questions, like those of al-Lamtūnī a decade earlier, were _ at eliciting from al-Maghīlī a strong condemnation of local aimed religious traditions and social practices.80 Hunwick argues that alMaghīlī’s responses to Askiya Muhammad sought to validate the _ it as a jihād against an infidel Askiya’s coup d’état “by representing 81 rule.” And, while Askiya Muhammad was likely sincere in his wish to _ see a broader reform of religious and ritual practice in the territory under his control, he was more concerned with expanding his power than with expending the resources to regulate local spiritual mediation and the trade in amulets, an action that might have generated resistance among his new subjects. Here, at the turn of the sixteenth century, the esoteric sciences appear in a formal denunciation and illustrate the shifting ground of tensions around their application: when and as politically expedient, knowledge of the Islamic esoteric sciences could be used either to support or to discredit a political rival.82 The new emperor invested in Timbuktu’s Islamic credentials, financing educational institutions and mosques. Nevertheless, the city’s fall to the Moroccan army two generations later, in 1591, led to a steep decline in intellectual production. Political instability and violence during a period of drought at the beginning of the seventeenth century caused disruptions in agricultural production and subsequent famines while the disintegration of what had been a well-regulated empire meant that trade 80 82

81 Gomez, African Dominion, 201 19. Hunwick, Shari’a in Songhay, 25. Mauro Nobili has examined this phenomenon at length in his study of a nineteenth century forgery of the chronicle the Tārīkh al fettāsh. The forgery claims that the askiya consulted with al Suyūtī, al Maghīlī, a well known jinn named Shamharūsh, and the fictional Hassanid sharif_ Mūlay al ʿAbbas who declared him the true leader. We know now that the chronicle was written by both Timbuktu scholar Mahmūd Kaʿtī (d. 1593) and later (around 1664) edited by his descendants, with revisions_ made by Nūh b. al Tāhir al Fulānī (d. 1857). Nobili, Sultan, Caliph and the Renewer of the Faith: _Ahmad _ Lobbo, the Tarikh al fattash, and the Making of Islamic State in West Africa (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020). Mahmoûd Kâti, Tārīkh al fettāsh.

Principles of Provenance

63

diverted in other directions away from the risky region.83 Serious scholarship and the provision of Islamic education subsequently shifted to the Saharan West to cities such as Wādān, Walāta, Tīshīt, and Shinqīt. The _ for tombs of important saints and teachers remained sites of visitation those in need of beneficial and curative blessings in the form of baraka, but Timbuktu itself was no longer the intellectual or commercial center of West Africa.

Zwāya Values The Gebla today comprises the southwest administrative region of the Trārza, which in turn sits bordered by the Atlantic Ocean and the Senegal River Valley. Historically, the Gebla exemplifies the environmental and cultural changes that took place from the fourteenth to the seventeenth centuries, changes that determined the place of the Islamic esoteric sciences in modern Mauritania. Increasing dryness in the region prompted changes in settlement patterns, an escalation in violence and an expansion of the trade in enslaved people.84 While the nomadic Banū Hassān increasingly migrated south from the northern desert following _receding pastures for their herds, agricultural communities also moved progressively toward the river valleys, both migratory trends meant a tightening of competition for water resources but also a greater mixing of linguistic and ethnic communities. The grafting of Hassāniyya, the Arabic dialect of the Banū Hassān confederations, over _ Amazigh Znāga language followed, albeit _ the at a slower speed, the gradual domination of its speakers over preexisting communities.85 By the sixteenth century, arid lands had shifted 200 to 300 kilometers to the south. Cultural and linguistic norms identified with the hassān, or _ Arab warriors – such as the use of the Arabic language and patrilineal systems of descent – were now increasingly appropriated by Amazigh and riverine populations.86 83

84 85

86

Michel Abitol, “The End of the Songhay Empire,” in UNESCO General History of Africa, vol. 5 Africa from the Sixteenth to the Eighteenth Century, ed. Bethwell A. Ogot (Oxford: James Curry, 1999), 153 65. See also Abitol, “Une élite soudanaise des XVII XVIIIe siècles: les Arma de Tombouctou,” La Revue française d’histoire d’outre mer 64, no. 237 (1977): 445 55. Webb, Desert Frontier. As Raymond Taylor points out, this shift in language use and cultural dominance took place over the span of at least five centuries and could not have been as rigid in its categories of status and ethnicity as older narratives of “an Arab invasion” seem to suggest. Taylor, “Of Disciples and Sultans,” 25. Taylor, “Of Disciples and Sultans”; Webb, Desert Frontier, xv; and H.T. Norris, Shinqītī _ Folk Literature and Song (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1968), 16.

64

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

An additional critical development during this period was an intensification in the trade in enslaved people in both the long-standing trans-Saharan and the developing trans-Atlantic trade networks. By the mid-seventeenth century, European traders were probing the coasts and river estuaries and paying their first levy customs to the hassān tribal _ access to representatives who served as points of contact for pricing and the most desired commodities – enslaved people, gum arabic, and gold.87 The luxury goods given as gifts to regional hassān leaders in return for their assistance in securing commodities _for the European market enriched these men and also served as the basis of new local and regional relationships as the tribal representatives distributed the luxury items to ensure support among their dependents. Horses and weapons procured through customs levy also became the means to attack and pillage militarily weaker groups for captives, animals, and foodstuffs. Access to trade and the weapons of war on the Atlantic coast – especially combined with the demographic shift south, continued efforts of Morocco to interfere in local politics, and unrest in the polities south of the Senegal River – meant that the Gebla was at the heart of the region’s various political, environmental, and economic pressures.88 The Tashumsha tribal confederation of the saintly Ahmad Bezeid had itself migrated from southern Morocco _ century, invoking God through the esoteric sciences to in the fourteenth defeat antagonistic hassān. Ahmad Bezeid was also, as we have already _ seen, known for having used_ his knowledge of the esoteric sciences to protect leaders of the embryonic hassān emirate of the Trārza. The definitive subjugation of _the Sanhāja zwāya by the ʿarab Banū _ Hassān in a civil war known as Shur Būbba (1673–77) is largely under_ stood to have determined how power would be shared in the region between these two dominant occupational groups, the hassān and the _ zwāya followed by tributary herders, craftspeople, and enslaved persons, 89 in descending order of status. In 1644, in a declaration of armed

87

88 89

The first emir to establish trade and contact with Europeans was the hassān leader Haddi ould Ahmad b. Damān (d. circa 1684 87). Most scholars see _ this leader as the _ etymological origin of the coastal trading point that came to be known as Portendick from the Portuguese Porto d’Addi, to Portendie to Portendick. See Geneviève Désiré Vuillemin, “Aperçu historique de la Mauritanie du XIXe siècle à l’indépendance” in Introduction à la Mauritanie, eds. Centre de recherches et d’études sur les sociétés méditerranéennes et Centre d’étude d’Afrique noire (Aix en Provence: Institut de recherches et d’études sur les mondes arabes et musulmanes, 1979), 67 100; and Ould Cheikh, “Nomadisme, Islam et pouvoir politique,” 265. Christiane Vanacker, “La Mauritanie jusqu’au XXe siècle,” in Introduction à la Mauritanie, 45 65. Scholars have downplayed the war’s function in determining current social structures, arguing that these occupational divisions were earlier to emerge and historically more

Principles of Provenance

65

struggle, the zwāya religious leader Nāsir al-Dīn (d. 1674) called for the _ establishment of a state framed around Islamic principles.90 Accusing the hassān, specifically the Trārza emir, of un-Islamic behavior, the holy _ man – who came from the same Tashumsha confederation as Ahmad _ Bezeid – claimed that the warriors preyed on other Saharan populations through illegal taxation, raiding, and enslavement during a period of drought and famine.91 Nāsir al-Dīn and the zwāya lost the war, but its _ aftershocks were far-reaching. Neighboring Wolof and Halpulaaren states to the south experienced their own clerical revolutions while the zwāya loss in Shur Būbba solidified the pre-existing social divisions between warriors and scholars: the hassān claimed political power and _ the right to extract tributary taxes, drink, and lodging when demanded. The zwāya, however, affirmed their religious authority and established themselves as the guardians and interpreters of Islamic law, an indispensable role in a desert that was routinely crossed by cosmopolitan

90

91

fluid than later local and colonial narratives of the war have acknowledged. Some sources seemed to indicate the war itself lasted over thirty years, from 1644 74, but the scholarly consensus now considers that these thirty years most likely correspond to the length of Nāsir al Din’s educational and reformist activities in the region, while the battles of the war_ itself lasted from 1673 77. Ould Cheikh, “Nomadisme, Islam et pouvoir”; Bonte, “L’émirat de l’Adrar”; Timothy Cleaveland, Becoming Walāta. Stewart, “Southern Saharan Scholarship”; and Mariella Villasainte de Beauvais, “Genèse de la hiérarchie sociale et du pouvoir politique ‘bidân’,” CEA 37, no. 147 (1997): 587 633. See also Tal, Les castes de l’Afrique. Some historians have used the term jihād to categorize the zwāya scholar’s movement, while others have preferred “religious revolution” to describe what inspired a series of later reformist movements that took place in West Africa from the end of the seventeenth to mid nineteenth centuries in West Africa. Philip Curtin, “Jihad in West Africa: Early Phases and Inter relations in Mauritania and Senegal,” JAH 12, no. 1 (1971): 11 24; Jean Schmitz, “Jihād, soufis et salafistes, ou les flux et reflux de l’émancipation islamique (XVIIe XXe siècle),” Le Sahel musulman entre soufisme et salafisme. Subalternité, luttes de classement et transnationalisme, eds. Jean Schmitz, Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh, and Cédric Jourde (Paris: Karthala, 2022), 31 77. Notably, Michael Gomez and Amir Syed reject the argument that Shur Būbba necessarily served as a model for later revolutions in the region. Gomez, “The Problem with Malik Sy and the Foundation of Bundu (La Question de Malik Sy et la Fondation du Bundu),” CEA 25, no. 100 (1985): 537 53 and Amir Syed, “Re conceptualizing the Islamic Revolutionary Movements of West Africa,” in Handbook of Islam in Africa, eds. Fallou Ngom, Mustapha Kurfi, Toyin Falola (Cham, SZ: Palgrave Press), 93 116. Historians of the region still debate what motivated Nāsir al Dīn to declare war against _ the hassān as the pressures on his Saharan community were multifaceted and reflected a mix_ of material and spiritual concerns. Webb, Desert frontier; Boubacar Barry, La Sénégambie du XVe au XIXe siècle: Traite négrière, Islam et conquête coloniale (Paris: L’Harmattan, 1988), 82 95; Pierre Bonte, L’émirat de l’Adrar mauritanien: harîm, compétition et protection dans une société tribale saharienne (Paris: Karthala, 2008), 200 81; Ould Cheikh, “Nomadisme, Islam et pouvoir,” 880; Ould Cheikh, La société maure, 122; Syed, “Between Jihād and History”; Ware, The Walking Qur’an.

66

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

merchants and caravans but lacked a centralized state with power to determine the terms of trade and movement.92 To understand how Nāsir al-Dīn was able to mobilize members of his own Saharan community _and people living in and south of the Senegal River Valley to rise up and overthrow their political leaders, this chapter turns to the broader role of the Islamic esoteric sciences in the Gebla and Nāsir al-Dīn’s specific role as spiritual mediator. Nāsir al-Dīn was known _ with God and a to _have manifested signs of an intimate connection serious command of divine knowledge. The strength of his baraka was revealed when he made the dead speak, accurately predicted future events, and recounted dreams in which sacred figures visited him. His followers ingested his spit to imbibe his blessings and spiritual righteousness.93 Nāsir al-Dīn claimed that he could put an end to the arbitrary _ violence of the hassān by applying Islamic law more strinexactions and gently in a Muslim theocratic _ state. He signaled his ability to overcome hassān power by performing miracles and exhibiting extraordinary _ powers of divination.94 A French nobleman working in the region at the time saw the talismanic arts as a fundamental aspect of the war’s appeal, explaining that the Muslim reformists and “jihadistes” promised that their amulets and prayers would miraculously ensure generous millet crop harvests without anyone having to lift a finger.95 The Frenchman also described Nāsir al-Dīn’s region as “without a king,” meaning without a centralized_ state, but he added that the warriors showed great respect for Muslim holy men and Islamic law. This respect, he concluded, resulted from a fear of the divine formulas written and folded into amulets by these experts in Islamic knowledge.96 These Muslim authorities provided protective and healing services but their capacity to seek vengeance and to punish via the same knowledge equally explained the deference shown them. In the wake of the region’s late seventeenth-century political instability, inhabitants of the Senegal River Valley openly attached what French observers described as gris-gris – or leather-encapsulated written prayers – to their bodies and hair to ensure fertility and marriage and

92 93

94 95 96

Lydon, On Trans Saharan Trails. Ould Cheikh, “Nomadisme, Islam et pouvoir politique,” 897 and Al Yadālī, trans. by Ismail Hamet in Chronique de la Mauritanie Sénégalaise. Nacer Eddine (Paris: Ernest Leroux, 1911), 167 73. Ould Cheikh, La société maure, 121. Michel Jajolet de la Courbe, Premier Voyage du Sieur de la Courbe Fait à la Coste d’Afrique en 1685 (Paris: Édouard Champion, 1913), 133. de la Courbe, Premier Voyage du Sieur, 147.

Principles of Provenance

67

productive harvests, or to facilitate escape from enslavement.97 A French commercial agent wrote that purveyors of these gris-gris, whom he called “witches and diviners,” had generated an atmosphere of fear: these poor people don’t feel safe if they haven’t weighed their bodies and clothes down, and there are some more weighed down than adorned especially when they go to war, they also put on their animals and goat necks, even putting in their fields believing this will prevent their grains from being damaged by birds and grasshoppers.98

Other French travelers observed that villagers sought out the protective services of Muslim holy men in their communities, exchanging cattle, horses, or human captives for powerful prayers to ensure invincibility in war.99 This heavy reliance on esoteric practice existed as part and parcel of what these non-Muslim Europeans identified more easily with Islamic practice – regular prayers throughout the day, shaved heads, and a command of the Arabic language.100 Those European observations that portray Sufi Muslim figures as manipulating the desperate naivety of their followers need to be interrogated: Chapters 3 and 5 will consider the persistent incapacity of European observers and, eventually, French colonial authorities to comprehend the Islamic esoteric sciences other than within this limited framework of manipulation and ignorance, and the implications this incapacity would have on colonial policy. And yet prominent zwāya themselves contested the veracity of narratives circulating about Nāsir al-Dīn’s miraculous feats and his claims to being the mahdī (renewer _of Islam) whose war was legitimated by his visions of mystical Muslim figures. Not long after Shur Būbba, a Shinqītī qadī (jurisconsult), _ Muhammad ould al-Mukhtār ould Bilʿamesh (1626–95/96), and the _ 97

98 99 100

Louis Moreau de Chambonneau in Carson I. A. Ritchie, “Deux Textes sur le Sénégal (1673 1677),” Bulletin de l’Institut Français d’Afrique Noire (BIFAN) XXX B, no. 1 (1968): 289 353, 313 and Jacques Joseph le Maire, Les voyages du Sieur le Maire: aux îles Canaries, Cap Vert, Sénégal et Gambie (Paris: J. Collombet, 1695), 146 48. On the origins of the French usage of the term gris gris, Constant Hamès writes that the Petit Robert mentions 1637 57 as the years when the term was first explained as having an unknown origin but can be found written in the preceding century. He speculates that the term comes from the French guérir, meaning to heal or protect, as in “guéris guéris (moi)” heal, heal (me). Constant Hamès, “L’art talismanique en Islam d’Afrique Occidentale. Personnes. Supports. Procède. Transmission. Analyse Anthropologique et Islamologique d’un Corpus de Talismans à Écritures” (PhD diss., École Pratique des Hautes Études, Sorbonne, 1996 97), 72 73. De Chambonneau cited in French by Ndiaye, L’enseignement Arabo Islamique au Sénégal, 17 and 25. De la Courbe, Premier Voyage, 178 and 36 and le Maire, Les voyages du Sieur le Maire, 147 49. Ritchie, “Deux Textes sur le Sénégal,” 314.

68

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Atār walī (saint), Muhammad ould Ahmad ould Husayn ould Bū Shaq _ “the Illuminated”) _ _ _ Ahmad ould Shams ould al-Dīn (dit ould Majdhūb, _ (d. 1687), debated whether or not Nāsir al-Dīn was theologically permit_ ted to declare a jihād at all. For Bilʿamesh, whose descendant appeared as a spiritual mediator in this book’s Introduction, such declarations could only be made about a prophet, and as Muhammad was the last and most righteous prophet, _ Nāsir al-Dīn was illegitimately asserting his ability to serve as a spiritual _ intermediary for God.101 Ould Majdhūb, on the other hand, defended the possibility of such extraordinary events and capacities. A descendant of the sharīf Shams al-Dīn through the well-known Sharīf Bubazūl – who had himself experienced miraculous events to be detailed in Chapter 6 – this saint made the amazing discovery of the long-lost tomb of the Mālikī jurist al-Murādī al-Hadramī, mentioned in the previous chapter.102 Ould Majdhūb identified _the_ location of the Almoravid-era saint’s remains by the mysterious rocks and tree that sat atop his burial ground. Calling for a sheep to be slaughtered in sacrifice over the tomb, the Smāsīd saint watched as the blood shed by the slain sheep rose up into the sky and the tree shook on its own without apparent explanation.103 Taking these as signs that he had rightly identified the spot as the burial site of al-Hadramī, Ould Majdhūb then experienced two additional miraculous _ _ Not only did al-Hadramī visit Ould Majdhūb in his sleep but the events. _ _ Ould Majdhūb to suffer an intense fever that Almoravid saint also caused in turn sparked a tremendous swelling of his right hand. This massive inflammation only diminished as the illiterate Ould Majdhūb wrote out what would become a three-volume set of prayers and religious knowledge.104 Because he had himself been chosen as a conduit for God’s miracles, and because his Smāsīd tribal identity affiliated him with related groups who fought alongside Nāsir al-Dīn in the war, Ould Majdhūb defended the legitimacy of Nāsir _al-Dīn’s struggle. _ 101

102 103

104

Ould Cheikh and Saison, “Vie(s) Et Mort(s) de al Imām al Hadrāmi,” 70; Ismail _ Legal _ Warscheid, “The West African Jihād Movements and the Islamic Literature of the Southwestern Sahara (1650 1850),” Journal of West African History 6, no. 2 (2020): 33 60 and Norris, The Arab Conquest, 41 43. Ould Cheikh characterizes Ould Bilʿamesh as one of the first Ash‘arī scholars and as “proto salafi” in part because of this aversion to attributing miracles to anyone but the Prophet Muhammad. Ould Cheikh, “La lettre et/ou l’esprit? Soufisme et proto salafisme _ dans l’espace mauritanien (XVIIe XXe s.),” in Le Sahel musulman entre soufisme et salafisme, eds. Schmitz, Ould Cheikh and Jourde, 81 105. Ould Cheikh and Saison, “Vie(s) et mort(s),” 60. Ould Cheikh and Saison, “Vie(s) et mort(s),” 65. Sacred trees and serpents are often understood as spiritual holdovers from a pre Islamic period. See Norris, “Znāga Islam,” 498. Ould Cheikh and Saison, “Vie(s) et mort(s),” 66.

Principles of Provenance

69

A treatise entitled Shiyam al-zwāya (“Zwāya values”) written in the decades after Shur Būbba reflects on what the loss of this war meant to the scholarly occupational group, the zwāya, as a defeat that simultaneously cemented their claims of privileged access to the Islamic esoteric sciences through their near-monopoly on religious knowledge. Written by Muhammad b. al-Mukhtār b. Maham Saʿīd al-Daymānī (1685–1753), _ known by his gentilic al-Yadālī, whose father had also fought better alongside Nāsir al-Dīn in the war, the treatise was meant to outline the _ authors’ zwāya ancestors.105 Al-Yadālī was himself an “morals” of the expert in the Islamic sciences, both exoteric and esoteric, and had written some thirty works on fiqh (jurisprudence), history, astrology and philosophy, and lettrism.106 Stories circulated about al-Yadālī’s command over unseen forces and demonstrated his deep knowledge of the sources of Islam as well as the Sufi sciences transmitted through the Shādhiliyya Sufi network, to which he claimed affiliation.107 His recorded extraordinary acts included killing a ferocious dog simply by pointing a finger at the animal, transporting people a week’s distance in the span of an hour, finding lost things, and providing water during times of drought in the desert.108 He was also known to have healed illnesses and to have protected his wife from unsavory men through miraculous means.109 Shiyam al-zwāya reads as a defense, following its defeat in the war, of the larger Tashumsha confederation’s zwāya cultural values and social norms. Al-Yadālī saw authoritative knowledge of the sunna as central to the zwāya way of being. The zwāya were known for their hospitality, providing water and pastures to warriors and passing strangers, and they also saw themselves as noble defenders of justice in a hostile environment.110 The Tashumsha confederation’s history is peppered 105 106

107

108 110

Al Yadālī’s tribe, the Idaw Da, was affiliated with the Tashumsha confederation. Al Yadālī, trans. by Hamet in Chronique de la Mauritanie Sénégalaise, 219. Al Yadālī’s farāʾid al fawāʾid fī sharh qawāʿid al ʿaqāʾid specifically addresses the esoteric sciences. See F. Leconte, _“al Yadālī,” in Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, eds. P. Bearman et al., 2012, accessed March 27, 2019, doi: 10.1163/1573 3912 islam SIM 7936. Abubakar Sadiq Abdulkadir has presented on the links al Yadālī sought to establish between the esoteric and exoteric sciences. See his 2018 African Studies Association of the United Kingdom paper. Abstract online, March 27, 2019, https://coms.events/ASAUK2018/data/abstracts/en/abstract 0130 .html. For more on the Shādheliyya, see Constant Hamès, “ La Shâdhiliyya ou l’origine des confréries islamiques en Mauritanie,” in Islam et sociétés au sud du Sahara 3, ed. Jean Louis Triaud (Paris: Les Indes savantes, 2013), 73 89 and Hamès, “La Shâdhiliyya dans l’Ouest saharien,” in Une voie soufie dans le monde, ed. Éric Geoffroy. 109 Norris, “Znāga Islam,” 503 and 510. Norris, “Znāga Islam,” 505. Al Yadālī’s mother, together with other zwāya women, had been taken hostage in the war. Al Yadālī would plausibly have grown up hearing about his father’s efforts to free the women and about the seemingly erratic physical and material violence enacted by

70

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

with examples of the group’s inherited and acquired miraculous powers.111 The Tashumsha and the tribal groups that made up their coalition were God’s conduits in difficult times, conjuring rain during droughts, summoning meteors to strike adversaries, and transporting Saharans remarkable distances in the blink of an eye.112 In one narration, the Tashumsha specifically used the Islamic esoteric sciences to protect their community in the desert’s precarious political landscape. Hearing that the Awlād Rizg, a warrior group, planned to attack and pillage their encampment, they recited the sūrat T āhā from the Qur’ān over a piece of _ 113 When the Awlād Rizg camel excrement, which they then_ buried. warriors arrived, their leader unknowingly dug the heel of his foot into the sand-covered turd, an act which ensured his death – and thus justice – the following morning.114 Such techniques for enacting punitive vengeance or prevention by marshaling divine and unseen forces were known by the Znāga term tazzuba, a method of protection the zwāya used to protect their communities’ interests. The zwāya were the only group in the region able to activate tazzuba, as a kind of “immanent justice” that hinged upon deep spiritual knowledge, and they did so when they felt threatened or cheated.115 Summoning invisible armies of jinn or God’s divine powers, a Muslim holy person could use tazzuba to protect an encampment from a hassān raid and to kill the thieves who rode off with camels and other _ property. Al-Yadālī saw tazzuba as the last weapon left for the zwāya after losing the Shur Būbba war and agreeing with the hassān victors they would surrender the right to defend themselves with_ swords and guns. The terms of surrender dictated that zwāya were thereafter obliged to house and provide water and animals to passing warriors, to wash their dead, to provide prayers, and to formally renounce any claim to temporal

111

112 114 115

the hassān who demanded heavy payments in return for protection from other pillaging _ warriors. Al Yadālī, Chronique de la Mauritanie Sénégalaise, 220 25. One Tashumsha confederation member was remembered to have moved his books and family south from Shinqīt, at some point between the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, _ obliging elephant. Saharans in the early seventeenth century on the back of a docile and also healed skin ailments by applying the multi colored leaves of a wondrous tree that grew out of a Tashumsha descendant’s tomb; the leaves could be obtained only by bypassing, with the confederation’s permission, the snake that guarded the tree’s saintly roots. Norris, “Znāga Islam,” 497 98. 113 Norris, “Znāga Islam,” 498. The twentieth chapter of the Qur’ān. Al Yadālī in Hamet, Chronique de la Mauritanie Sénégalaise, 222. Bonte, L’émirat de l’Adrar, 271. Ould Cheikh provided this translation in “Nomadisme, Islam et pouvoir politique,” 924 37 and Muhammad Mahmūd ould Ahmad Sīdī ould Sīdī Yahyā, al mujtamaʿ al _ sūsyū naqdiyya _ _ _ fadfād: Mulāhazāt hawl al mar’a wa l sulta wa l thaqāfa fī al mujtamaʿ _ _ thiqa lil mʿalūmātiyya, _ _ 2002), 103 04. _ sir (Muʾassasat al al _morītānī al_ muʿā _

Principles of Provenance

71

power.116 Thus while the hassān warriors theoretically claimed a monopoly on physical violence –_ a privilege they exploited in asserting dominance over tributary and subordinate lahma groups – the zwāya could _ defend themselves against hassān profiteering through a kind of spiritual _ violence, tazzuba, that could likewise cause serious physical harm.117 When zwāya tax obligations were enforced rather than suspended, or when zwāya communities were subjected to hassān pillaging, these fail_ its immediately tangible ures or deference were met with tazzuba and effects, often extending to the unexpected deaths or illnesses of assailants. For the zwāya who fought in Shur Būbba, the war was the moment they claimed the Islamic sciences, both esoteric and exoteric, as the weapons they would use to maintain a form of political and cultural authority in the Sahara.118 Conclusion Forty years after he passed away, the dead al-Yadālī visited the Fouta Tooro Halpulaar Muslim leader ʿAbd al-Qādir Kane (1726–1806/07) in a dream.119 Kane had helped to overthrow the Denyanke dynasty in 1776 alongside Souleyman Baal (d. 1775–76); he had established an Islamic state in the Fouta Tooro, a region just southwest of the Gebla, and was now the almāmī, or Muslim ruler, of a state threatened by the Kajoor damel (Wolof: king) Amary Ngoné Ndella.120 Both Baal and Kane were products of Shur Būbba in that they had been students in 116 117

118

119

120

Bonte, L’émirat de l’Adrar, 280 81. Roughly a century later, the spiritual leader of the Kunta confederation, Shaykh Sīdī Muhammad ould Sīdī al Mukhtār al Kuntī (1769 1826), wrote the emir of Tagānt, _ Muhammad ould Muhammad Shayn (d. 1822), to warn him against Idaw’ish hassān _ _ The Sufi leader threatened the Tagānt emir with tazzuba _ pillaging his community. as punishment if he failed to respect their previous agreement, which protected the Kunta from hassān raids. Ould Cheikh, “Nomadisme, Islam et pouvoir politique,” 929 30 and _ Abdallah ould Khalifa, La région du Tagant en Mauritanie: L’oasis de Tijigja entre 1660 et 1960 (Paris: Karthala, 1998), 243. See Ismail Warscheid’s body of work where he argues that Islamic jurisprudence was the primary vehicle through which the zwāya developed a discourse and politics of authority. Warscheid, Droit musulman et société. Norris, “Zenāga Islam,” 506. For more on Abdel Kader Kane and Souleyman Baal, see Oumar Kane, La première hégémonie peule: le Fuuta Tooro de Koli Tenella à Almaami Abdul (Paris: Karthala, 2004); David Robinson, “Abdul Qadir and Shaykh Umar: A Continuing Tradition of Islamic Leadership in Futa Toro,” International Journal of African Historical Studies (IJAHS) 6, no. 2 (1973): 286 303; and Roy Dilley, Islamic and Caste Knowledge Practices among Haalpulaar’en in Senegal: Between Mosque and Termite Mound (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2004). See David Robinson, Philip Curtin and James Johnson, “A Tentative Chronology of Futa Toro from the Sixteenth through the Nineteenth Centuries” CEA 12, no. 48 (1972): 555 92.

72

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

villages that were founded as part of the religious revivals that swept the region subsequent to the war. These villages, Pīr and Kokkī, were important sites of Islamic education in the Kajoor and had strong intellectual links to the Gebla region through teachers from confederations, who make up Chapter 6 – the Awlād Daymān, Idaw al-Hajj, and Ahl Guennar – who, like al-Yadālī, had familial and tribal links_to those who fought in the war on the side of the zwāya.121 In 1796, al-Yadālī appeared to Kane in a dream to provide him with a talismanic square as a safeguard against anticipated attacks from the Kajoor kingdom. Even though the damel’s forces would go on to capture Kane and detain him for months, the ephemeral apparition of one of the Saharan West’s earlier religious scholars is remembered as a signal of Kane’s religious authority.122 In the almost two centuries separating the death of Ahmad Bezeid from the political activities endorsed from beyond the _grave by alYadālī, then, the center of Islamic knowledge shifted west away from Timbuktu and the esoteric sciences associated with l’hjāb emerged as a _ key factor in the region’s power dynamics. This chapter examined contestation over what constituted Islamic orthodoxy writ large, but it also argued that the miracles and talismans of l’hjāb more specifically were driving factors in the major regional conflict_ that was Shur Būbba, which hardened the power boundaries between the occupational groups of hassān and zwāya. _ a war of religious renewal, an attempt to establish a theocratic state As that would oversee Islamic re-education on both sides of the Senegal River, Shur Būbba ultimately failed. In the Gebla, the embryotic Trārza emirate led by Haddi b. Ahmad Damān defeated the saintly scholar Nāsir _ al-Dīn. From then on, the_ hassān warriors loosely governed eponymous _ emirates in the southwestern Sahara, the first two of which – the Trārza and Brākna – took shape in the seventeenth century and the second two – the Adrār and Tagānt – in the century that followed. The hassān subju_ long been gation of the zwāya completed a division of power that had evolving between the former, who dominated through military strength, and the latter, who enforced justice through their mastery of jurisprudence and their knowledge of the Islamic esoteric sciences. Modern scholars have demonstrated that in regions of the Saharan West outside the Gebla, these occupational roles were less rigid. But here, historians have described the war’s effects on social hierarchy and political 121

122

Jean Boulègue, Les royaumes wolof dans l’espace sénégambien (XIII XVIIIe siècle) (Paris: Karthala, 2013), 282 85, 432 37 and Kamara, Florilège au jardin de l’histoire des noirs, 314 15. Kamara, Florilège au jardin, 467.

Principles of Provenance

73

configurations as far-reaching and determinative of social patterns observed in later periods.123 In the Gebla, starting in the eighteenth century, the emirs claimed the war drum as a symbol of their military authority, something they pounded when going into battle and at moments of communal ritual.124 By this period, the amulet became the image most identified with zwāya religious experts who also mobilized their pens and paper to compose protective and punitive formulae as well as legal opinions and directives in the interest of their communities. The esoteric sciences became a crucial instrument, if not weapon, of zwāya authority to be used against the militarily powerful hassān. _ 123

124

I would also caution against assuming that the Gebla’s bifurcation of power between the hassān and zwāya extended in the same way to other regions. The Kunta, Laʿrūssīn, _ Awlād Bū Sbaʿ, and Ragāybāt are among the prominent examples of tribal confederations whose members identified interchangeably as warriors and scholars. Cleaveland, Becoming Walāta; Mariella Villasante de Beauvais, Parenté et Politique en Mauritanie: Essai d’Anthropologie historique (Paris: L’Harmattan, 1998); Hall, A History of Race in Muslim West Africa; Philippe Marchesin, Tribus, ethnies et pouvoir en Mauritanie (Paris: Karthala, 2010), 237; Alberto López Bargados, Arenas Coloniales: los Awlad Dalím ante la colonización franco española del Sáhara (Castellano: Bellaterra, 2003), 242; Rahal Boubrik, Saints et Société en Islam: La confrérie ouest saharienne Fâdiliyya (Paris: Centre National de Recherches Scientifiques, 1999), 37; and Sophie Caratini, Les Rgaybat: 1610 1934, 2 vols. (Paris: l’Harmattan, 1984). Ould Cheikh, Éléments d’histoire de la Mauritanie. (Nouakchott: Institut Mauritanien de Recherche Scientifique, 1991), 79.

2

Local Wisdom Contestations over l’hjāb in the _ Centuries Eighteenth Nineteenth

He who becomes a faqīh and doesn’t adhere to Sufism is someone who doesn’t follow Islamic principles. Abba ould Ahmad Mahmūd ould Sebtī1 _ _

When I was researching this book in Mauritania in the late 2010s, people frequently invoked the phrase “al-hikma kuntiyya aw fūtiyya,” or “[esoteric] wisdom is from the Kunta _or the Fouta,” when talking about l’hjāb. This vernacular expression in the Hassāniyya Arabic dialect _ reveals how questions of history and authority_ in relation to the Islamic esoteric sciences, here al-hikma, were understood by people living in the _ Sahara at the time of my research for this southwestern region of the book. These two social groups – the Kunta, a zwāya confederation known for its trans-Saharan Sufi educational and trading networks, and the Fouta, referring primarily to Pulaar/Fulbe-speaking people from the regions of the Fouta Tooro along the Senegal River Valley and the Fouta Jallon in contemporary Guinea – maintain reputations as the most powerful experts in the secret wisdom that has been known in the Saharan West, from at least the end of the eighteenth century, as l’hjāb. The two most widely promulgated Sufi paths (turuq) in West Africa,_ the _ centers of learning that Qādiriyya and the Tijāniyya, emanated from the developed, respectively, around Kunta scholars in the Sahara and the imamates of the Fulbe-speaking valleys of West Africa that were forged after the Shur Būbba war. “Al-hikma kuntiyya aw fūtiyya” not only links the transmission of the esoteric_ sciences specifically to Sufism through these social groups. It also speaks to the question of the historicity of l’hjāb in local, Mauritanian _ narratives that place its consolidation and localization in the eighteenth century when the Kunta emerged as the most powerful scholarly and commercial network. The second part of the expression “aw fūtiyya” moreover continues to associate these sciences as solely embedded in 1

Abba ould Ahmad Mahmūd ould Sebtī, interview, Shinqīt, March 22, 2012. _ _ _

74

Local Wisdom

75

networks linked genealogically to Arab identity by attributing them to a West African Fulbe scholarly community – the torodbe – whose claims to Arab origins, however contested, legitimized their mastery of Islamic knowledge.2 This oft-repeated phrase explicitly acknowledges the multiple and independent nodes of Islamic learning in the region and that expertise in the Islamic esoteric sciences was not necessarily limited to those who claimed zwāya identity. The Saharan West has long been one of linguistic and ethnic pluralism with some of Islam’s earliest converts originating, as we saw in the previous chapter, in Soninké and Pulaarspeaking communities along the Senegal River. It is perhaps, then, unremarkable that Mauritanians today attribute expertise in l’hjāb not _ solely to those, such as the Kunta, who claim Arab descent and responsibility for introducing Sufi Islam to the region, but also to the Fulbe, who established theocratic states in the Fouta Tooro and Fouta Jallon of West Africa. This colloquial expression shows how Mauritanians today conceive of this esoteric religious wisdom as deployed at the very local level, spread through two regionally important religious communities, yet simultaneously connected to the longer history of Islam in the Muslim world, and circulating at the global level of Sufi networks. The two social groups identified in “kuntiyya aw fūtiyya” emerged as important nodes of Muslim political and religious authority in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and their leaders drew upon their Islamic knowledge, which included the esoteric sciences, to assert their power. By the end of the nineteenth century, differences in interpretation and practice of the Islamic esoteric sciences had amplified: questions regarding which esoteric and medical techniques were permitted within Islam and which were not were intensely debated, as – on the eve of European colonial conquest – scholars from the Saharan West elaborated their own intellectual positions and political objectives in the ways they classified these sciences.

Kunta Wisdom Historians of the Saharan West have suggested that a particular “Saharan Islamic culture” developed in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. 2

Several terms are applied to the Fulbe/Pulaar language and its speakers in West Africa. In contemporary Mauritania, speakers of the Pulaar language are Halpulaaren. From Senegal to Gambia to Guinea to Mali to Burkina Faso to Niger to Cameroun to Chad, Fula, Fulfulde, Fulbe, Fulani are used, interchangeably, to refer to the language and its speakers.

76

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

This Saharan Islam interlaced Sufi training and devotional practice with a reliance on invisible spiritual entities to enact change in the material world. It flourished in the context of nomadic and fixed Qur’ānic schools, and the extension of commercial networks through the transSaharan caravan trade.3 One of the groups seen as exemplifying these intra-Saharan religious and commercial connections is the powerful Kunta confederation, whose members were spread between the caravan town of Wādān in the west in today’s Mauritania, to Azawād in contemporary Mali, to the oasis trading town of Tuāt in central Algeria. The Kunta have been long studied for the political and commercial dominance they achieved, in part, through their claims to holy lineages and their assertions of having introduced the Qādiriyya Sufi tarīqa to the _ region. Their mastery of Islamic knowledge, both the esoteric and the exoteric, established them as respected figures of jurisprudence, education, and political mediation. And the Kunta established commercial networks through alliances that linked them to the extraction of and trade in salt, a valuable desert resource, as well as other commodities such as tobacco and dates.4 Claiming to have introduced the Qādiriyya Sufi tarīqa in the sixteenth century to the Sahara, where the Shādhiliyya path_ had previously dominated as we saw in the previous chapter, members of the Kunta acted as political and spiritual mediators for both nomadic and semi-settled

3

4

McDougall, “Snapshots from the Sahara”; Warscheid, Droit musulman; Lydon, On Trans Saharan Trails; Loimeier, Muslim Societies in Africa, 54 76; Élise Voguet, “Le peuplement du Touat.” See Nouhi, “Religion and Society in a Saharan Tribal Setting”; Yahya ould al Bara, “The Life of Shaykh Sidi al Mukhtar al Kunti in The Meanings of Timbuktu, eds. Shamil Jeppie and Souleymane Bachir Diagne (Cape Town: HSRC Press, 2008), 193 211; Mahamane Mahamoudou, “The Works of Shaykh Sidi al Mukhtar al Kunti,” in The Meanings of Timbuktu, eds. Jappie and Bachir Diagne; 213 30; Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh, “A Man of Letters in Timbuktu; al Shaykh Sidi Muhammad al Kunti,” in The Meanings of Timbuktu, eds. Jappie and Bachir Diagne, 231 _48; Aziz A. Batran, “The Kunta, Sidi al Mukhtar al Kunti, and the office of shaykh al Tariqa’l Qadiriyya” in Studies in West African History 1 (1979): 113 46; E. Ann McDougall, “The Economics of Islam in the Southern Sahara: The Rise of the Kunta Clan,” Asian and African Studies 20, no. 1 (1986): 45 60; Thomas Whitcomb, “New Evidence on the Origins of the Kunta I,” BSOAS 38, no. 1 (1975); 103 23 and “New Evidence on the Origins of the Kunta II,” BSOAS (1975): 403 17; Fatima Bibed, “Les Kunta à travers quelques extraits de l’ouvrage al tara’if wa l’tala’id de 1756 à 1826” (PhD diss., Université d’Aix Marseille, 1997); Charles C. Stewart, “Frontier Disputes and Problems of Legitimation: Sokoto Masina Relations 1817 1837,” JAH 17, no. 4 (1976): 497 514, 500; also Ariela Marcus Sells on the Kunta claims to miracle working and knowledge of the Islamic esoteric sciences in Marcus Sells, Sorcery or Science? Contesting Knowledge and Practice in West African Sufi Texts (University Park: Penn State University Press, 2022).

Local Wisdom

77

Saharan populations.5 The Kunta, as zwāya, claimed a role as socioeconomic intermediaries in a region that lacked an overarching state; they made these claims after having developed their reputations as a community of powerful religious authorities who transmitted and interpreted the sharī‘a. The Kunta were themselves especially well known for practicing the esoteric sciences and they were also said to have a particular and enduring relationship with the jinn who lived in the Kedjia Ijīl, the source of salt in the Adrār north of Wādān. The Kunta had signed an agreement with the spirits who dwelled in the mountain and thus gained a monopoly over the rights of access to the mine – a monopoly that allowed them to exploit the salt as a profitable commodity for export in the trans-Saharan caravan trade.6 Oral history recounts that Kunta living in the caravan oasis town of Wādān inscribed three jedāwil to drive the jinn out from the subkha, or salt mine. One jedwal was intended to protect those who mined the precious commodity from the jinn then inhabiting the mine. The other two jedāwil were buried in the Kedjia Ijīl itself to chase the jinn away.7 Anyone wanting to mine the salt was required to ask permission from the Wādān Kunta before digging into the sand, and would otherwise risk retribution in the form of tazzuba.8 The Kunta connection to spiritual entities made possible in part through their Sufi devotional practices, thus translated into commercial activity and political authority. As scholars have shown, Kunta treatises on the Islamic esoteric sciences, which they called the “sciences of the unseen” (ʿulūm al-ghayb), employ Sufi terminology and reference genealogies of Sufi thought to situate these sciences along a path toward

5

6

7

8

Internal Kunta sources credit an ancestor, Ahmad al Bekkai (d. 1514), with introducing _ the Qādiriyya to the region through al Maghīlī, though Vikør argues that evidence to support this claim is lacking. He says the Kunta rose to prominence as members of the Qādiriyya only in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. See Knut Vikør, “Sufi Brotherhoods in Africa,” History of Islam in Africa, eds. Levtzion and Pouwels, 441 76, 444. For more on the history of the Shādhiliyya in the region, see Nouhi, “Religion and Society in a Saharan Tribal Setting,” 193 99 and Geoffroy, Une voie soufie dans le monde. Legend had it that sometime at the end of the eighteenth century, a giant lizard led a Kunta herder to Ijīl where salt was then discovered. Portuguese accounts and Kunta oral history differ by approximately 300 years in their dating of the first salt exploitation at Kedjia Ijīl, but McDougall dates to the 1770s the Kunta rights over extraction and commercial exploitation of the salt mine. McDougall, “Snapshots from the Sahara.” Pierre Laforgue, “Les Djenoun de la Mauritanie Saharienne: rites magiques et djedoual,” Bulletin du Comité d’Études Historiques et Scientifiques de l’Afrique Occidental Française (BCEHSAOF) XVIII, no. 1 (1935): 2 35, 21. Laforgue even includes the jedāwil themselves. Nouhi, “Religion and Society in a Saharan Tribal Setting,” 291.

78

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

spiritual unification with God.9 The Kunta had a vested interest in situating these sciences squarely within devotional practice since they relied heavily on their ability to invoke God’s divine power to mobilize jinn for their own economic and political needs. The Kunta categorized sciences relying on jinn and cosmic entities activated through jedāwil doctrinally in a third place between condemned sihr and permitted miracles (karamāt), thus defending their own reliance _on these spiritual and cosmological agents as not only a religiously permitted practice but also a desired devotional objective.10 Shrewd commercial deals also allowed the Kunta to acquire control over the resources of vast regions of the desert. The subkha Ijīl sat close to numerous wells that the Kunta had secretly purchased from the Ahl Bārik Allāh, descendants of Ahmad Bezeid. After the saint’s death and the fallout from Shur Būbba, the_ Ahl Bārik Allāh migrated north from the Gebla toward the region of Inchīrī and further east into the desert. This purchase of wells facilitated the growth of Kunta wealth as they could now manage the sources of both water and salt in what is now north and central Mauritania.11 More broadly, Kunta power was based on this combination of access to and control over spiritual forces, successful engagement with the caravan trade, and expertise in Islamic jurisprudence, the last of which they used to justify military and legal action against competing parties.12 The Kunta, because they were known as exceptionally powerful, serve as a useful illustration of the different roles played by Sufi shuyūkh in desert communities outside of the Gebla. Their knowledge of both the esoteric and exoteric sciences, as well as their use of combat weapons, permitted these religious figures to assume responsibility for multiple functions within Saharan society.13 With their deep knowledge of the Qur’ān, they guided students through memorizing and understanding religious and juridical texts. They dispensed legal opinions. They mediated between conflicting parties. They blessed the dead with their prayers and witnessed marriages. Women wanting to conceive children, shepherds who lost animals from their herds, families seeking help for

9 10 11 12

13

Marcus Sells, Sorcery or Science? and Nouhi, “Religion and Society in a Saharan Tribal Setting.” Ariela Marcus Sells, “Science, Sorcery, and Secrets: in the Fawāʾid Nūrāniyya of Sīdi Muhammad Al Kuntī," History of Religions 58, no. 4 (2019): 432 64, 454 55. _ McDougall, “Snapshots from the Sahara”; Acloque, “De la constitution d’un territoire.” Abdel Kader Zebadia, “The Career of Ahmad al Bekkay in the Oral Evidence and Recorded Documents,” Revue d’histoire maghrébine 3 (1975): 75 83; Nouhi, “Religion and Society in a Saharan Tribal Setting,” 165. Boubrik, Saints et société en Islam, 53 54.

Local Wisdom

79

children stung by scorpions, and people suffering from illness all sought help from these powerful mediators.14 During the eighteenth century, Saharan jurists developed and applied legal thinking to establish order in an otherwise precarious space without a centralized state, in a space where political and social relationships were determined by occupational status and tribal affiliation.15 They combined their training in the Mālikī legal school with their Ashʿarī theological understanding and their insights from Sufi devotional practice to serve as fuqahā’, or legal experts, for their communities.16 They functioned as important nodes of transmission for religious knowledge but also for nonbinding legal opinions, or fatāwā, offering judgments on social behavior, issues of inheritance, marital disputes, property rights, and commercial transactions.17 Following the institutionalization in North Africa of Sufi lineages and the spread of the Mālikī legal school, which took place from the eleventh to the thirteenth century, such a symbiotic relationship between Islamic jurisprudence and Sufism was the norm in the Saharan West.18 At the end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth centuries, the Kunta were likely the most renowned Sufi figures in the broader Saharan region, due to their status as respected guides in religious knowledge and practice.19 By the close of the eighteenth century, scholarship in the Saharan West began to develop into something more widespread, sophisticated, and locally specific.20 No longer were most of the manuscripts in private libraries copies of major exegesis, grammar, logic, or legal texts produced outside of the region, with their content then narrowly applied or used for pedagogic purposes in the Sahara. By the late eighteenth century, scholars such as the Kunta and those trained in Shinqīt, Wādān, and the Gebla were composing their own interventions _ 14 15

16 17 18 19

20

Nouhi, “Religion and Society in a Saharan Tribal Setting,” 165. Charles C. Stewart, Islam and Social Order in Mauritania: A Case Study from the Nineteenth Century (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1973); Lydon, On Trans Saharan Trails; Chouki el Hamel, “The Transmission of Islamic Knowledge”; and Warscheid, Droit musulman. Warscheid, Droit musulman. Charles Stewart, “Calibrating the Scholarship of Timbuktu,” in Landscapes, Sources, eds. Green and Rossi, 220 38. Stewart, Islam and Social Order in Mauritania, 2 3. The Shādhiliyya Sufi path, present in the major trading towns such as Wādān and Walāta by the end of the seventeenth century, had moved from Sijilmāsa along commercial routes but adherence had primarily remained restricted to a commercial and scholarly elite. Stewart, “Calibrating the Scholarship of Timbuktu” and Nouhi, “Sufism in Pre colonial Southwestern Sahara,” in Islam et sociétés au sud du Sahara 3, ed. Jean Louis Triaud (Paris: Les Indes savantes, 2013), 89 134, 128.

80

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

in the same fields, it is clear that the study of Islam had been fully incorporated into and appropriated by Muslims in the Sahara. The first major doctrinal innovations in the Sahara, as Muhammad Lahbīb Nouhi _ and the argues, can be seen in Kunta texts from the end of_ the eighteenth 21 beginning of the nineteenth centuries. Kunta scholars were at the center of Islamic learning in the region, drawing students, propagating the Qādiriyya Sufi tarīqa, and attracting requests for moral, legal, and religious guidance._ Some of the most famous zwāya figures in the nineteenth century from outside the Kunta confederation, such as Shaykh Sīdiyya al-Kabīr b. al-Mukhtār b. Hāyba al-Abīrī (1774–1868), studied under the Kunta shuyūkh and would likewise go on to acquire reputations as extremely competent jurisconsults – and as Sufi saints with effective skills in the Islamic esoteric sciences.22 The fatāwā of the era’s most prolific Kunta scholars, Sīdī al-Mukhtār al-Kuntī (d. 1811) and his son, Sīdī Muhammad (known as al-Khalīfa) _ region’s Islamic knowledge. (d. 1826), occupy an important place in the These texts allow us to see that the esoteric sciences were a locus of concern for Muslims in West Africa who turned toward their local legal scholars for guidance on how to determine the religious legality of specific esoteric practices. Zachary Wright has examined juridical responses to questions about the use of amulets and the boundaries around permitted uses of unseen forces, observing that some Sufi scholars in eighteenth-century West Africa, like many of their contemporaries elsewhere in the Muslim world, saw lettrism as entirely consistent with Islamic knowledge.23 During a period of famine and drought, of political insecurity, and of shifting economic fortunes, elite Muslim scholars shared powerful prayers and secret techniques of accessing divine forces through their worship alongside their study of jurisprudence and hadīth.24 For the Kunta and their disciples, spiritual authority was _ constructed on a foundation that comprised both knowledge of Islamic law and mastery of esoteric sciences. Saintly miracles and sound legal advice were the signs of a true friendship with God and a deep understanding of his message.

21 22

23 24

Nouhi, “Sufism in Pre colonial Southwestern Sahara.” For more on Shaykh Sīdiyya al Kabīr, see Stewart, Islam and Social Order in Mauritania. Boubrik contests claims found in Fādililyya texts that their founder, Muhammad al Fādil _ _ _ al Qalqamī (d. 1869), studied under Sīdī al Mukhtār al Kuntī, pointing out that Muhammad al Fādil would only have been fourteen years old at the time. Boubrik, _ et Société, 107 _ 09. Saints Zachary Wright, “Secrets on the Muhammadan Way: Transmission of the Esoteric Sciences in 18th Century Scholarly Networks,” Islamic Africa 9 (2018): 77 105. Lydon, On Trans Saharan Trails, 97 and Wright, “Secrets,” 80.

Local Wisdom

81

Legal questions (nawāzil) posed to the Kunta about the use of amulets can provide a sense of how these Saharan scholars continued to understand the esoteric sciences as inextricably linked to Islamic knowledge. One such question reached Sīdī Muhammad al-Kuntī who was asked _ about “the use of the words whose meaning is not understood in the ruqā and amulets; are these permitted along with the use of the basmala and prayer to the Prophet or not?”25 The Saharan Sufi shaykh responded: [W]hat is in the Qur’ān and the names of God and amulets and prayers [with] good words in Arabic are permitted in Islam. The proof of this is in the Qur’ān and the Sunna. The Qur’ān says the following: “From the Qur’ān descended that which heals and the mercy of believers.” “Say it is for the believers a guide and a cure.” Then it says, “The book came to you blessed.” The Almighty announced his baraka and the permissibility of reciting it.26

This early nineteenth-century written response to a question about the permissibility of using amulets and vocal recitation with non-Arabic words provides insight into the kinds of questions raised about methods of spiritual intercession and shows us how a prominent Sufi scholar categorized these practices. The scholar’s role was to guide questioners in recognizing proper resources and practices available to them while also demarcating the constraints on what constituted acceptable practice for Muslims. In the Kunta legal responses, we see Saharan religious scholars asserting the permissibility of esoteric practices that relied on the Qur’ān and methods the Prophet applied that were found in the hadīth. Their _ writings demonstrate a determination to find Qur’ānic support for practices that were most likely typical at the time in the Saharan West. While the Kunta were not the sum total or the only authoritative voices on these distinctions, their legal and pedagogical positions were spread through their many students who either taught or copied their treatises in their own nomadic schools. Sīdī Muhammad al-Kuntī responds with the Qur’ānic verses cited _ above, beginning his argument with Islam’s foundational text and using this to reiterate that Muslims may recite the Qur’ān as a healing or protective measure. They may also insert names of the divine and prayers written in Arabic in amulets to evoke God’s help. The Kunta shaykh then continues with a story from the Prophet Muhammad’s life in which a _ for two suffering boys. nursemaid came to the Prophet seeking his help Seeing the boys in pain, the Prophet then asked her what was the matter.

25 26

al Shaykh Sīdī Muhammad b. al Shaykh Sīdī al Mukhtār in Ould al Barā, al majmū‘a al _ 6589, 6585 86. kubrā, Vol. 12, Fatwā Sīdī Muhammad b. al Shaykh Sīdī al Mukhtār in Ould al Barā, al majmū‘a al kubrā _

82

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

She responded, “Messenger of God, they were struck by the evil eye and the only reason why we have not done ruqya for them is that we did not know what would be the appropriate one, according to you.” The Prophet said, “Do the ruqya for them.” […] “There is no disagreement about the permissibility of ruqya if it is using the names of God and his book.”27

Here, the presence of jealousy and especially its harmful effects upon children, who were often the victims of the evil eye (ʿayn), necessitated divine intervention. Muhammad condoned the use of recitation as a protective and curative _measure, as long as it relied upon the holy names of God or words from the Qur’ān. Having related the incident, Sīdī Muhammad al-Kuntī then explains how one should use recitation _ of the Qur’ān: “The prescription of ruqya is that you state what you are using it [for] and that you wipe yourself with it.” Citing a hadīth from the Andalusian scholar al-Qurtubī (d. 1273), he writes that _the proced_ Qur’ān to put their hand on the sick ure is for the person reciting the person “and wipe [the person] with saliva and repeat the basmala three times and the taʿawwudh seven times […] You should use the right hand. Wiping is a way of hoping that the illness is only on the exterior and that you can simply wipe your hand and it disappears.”28 The Sufi shaykh argues that amulets, Qur’ānic recitation and wiping a sick person with Qur’ān-laden saliva are all permitted techniques of healing and protection. Sīdī Muhammad al-Kuntī’s fatwā points to the frequent use of _ “spitting” (al-nafth) saliva out of one’s mouth into the air after having recited Qur’ānic verses. As ʿĀ’isha, the Prophet Muhammad’s favorite _ wife, is said to have described, the Prophet performed this healing gesture of al-nafth “like someone eating a grape,” indicating a comparison to someone who eats a grape and then spits out its seeds.29 When a person recites the Qur’ān as protective and healing therapy, that individual’s saliva is understood to then contain the power of the sacred words. In this story of the Prophet, the basmala and the two last verses of the Qur’ān are understood to be especially potent. The shaykh then explains that “this spitting could also be an example of pretending that the healer is spitting out the pain from the patient … some ʿulamā’ said that ruqya is permitted against all lesions and pain and the evil eye and stings and other sicknesses if it is made up of what is understood.”30 What marks therapeutic methods as permissible is their reliance on the 27 28 29 30

Ould al Ould al “‫ﻳﻨﻔﺚ ﺁﻛﻞ‬ Ould al

Barā, al majmū‘a al kubrā, 6585 89. Barā, al majmū‘a al kubrā, 6585 89. ‫ﺍﻟﺰﺑﻴﺐ ﻛﻤﺎ‬.” in Ould al Barā, al majmuaʿ al kabīr, Fatwā 6589, 6586. Barā, al majmū‘a al kubrā, 6589, 6586.

Local Wisdom

83

Qur’ān and on their application via processes mentioned in the hadīth, _ namely, their transformation from written verses, to recited verses, to bodily fluid, for example, the saliva that has absorbed the potency of the sacred words. Anxieties about incomprehensible words emphasized that spiritual mediation should rely upon the Qur’ān, should only be written in Arabic, and should rest on transparent knowledge that could be understood by other Muslims. Unintelligible formulae might mask sorcery (sihr) or occult knowledge that depended on forces other than God. The _ tensions in debates around the validity of certain methods of healing and protection coalesce around this effort to distinguish between illicit sihr and permitted techniques of using Qur’ānic recitation, saliva, and _ spirit mediation. In another fatwā, Sīdī Muhammad al-Kuntī explains at length how he defines sihr. After being _ asked about sorcery and _ bloodsucking – a phenomenon I will more closely discuss in Chapter 5 – the Sufi shaykh then defines both as illegal in Islam, grounding his argument with references to events described in the Qur’ān, “There is true and false magic … and the pharaonic magicians came with both. They used false magic to prepare their audience for true magic. And this is pointed to when the Almighty said, ‘They enchanted people’s eyes.’”31 This moment of “enchantment” (saharū), a story well known to _ Muslims, occurred when the prophet Moses entered the Egyptian pharaoh’s court. He challenged the court’s magicians to a contest to prove that he was indeed a prophet and, thus, armed with stronger powers and greater authority. The court’s magicians “enchanted people’s eyes,” meaning they tricked the court’s audiences with sihr, magical trickery – _ 32 Moses then only seemingly turning their wooden staffs into snakes. used his prophetic powers to turn his wooden staff into a serpent which, in turn, devoured the other snakes. Rather than rely upon optical illusions or forbidden magic, Moses mustered up a miracle (muʿjiza) much stronger than that the pharaoh’s magicians had achieved, and thus proved his status as “prophet.” The story is repeated again in sūrat T āhā and sūrat al-Shuʿarā’. The latter of these versions ends with the _ _ pharaoh impressed, exclaiming, “This is indeed a well-versed sorcerer.”33 The story of Moses at the pharaoh’s court is used to distinguish between the forces that come with devotion to God and sihr. Both can produce seemingly miraculous events. But divine forces,_ as used by Moses, are more efficient and powerful because they emanate from 31 33

Ould al Barā, al majmū‘a al kubrā, Fatwā 6590, 6591. Qu’rān 20:66 and Qur’ān 26:34.

32

Qur’ān 7:116.

84

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

God, while sihr originates in evil and is possible only with the help of demons or the_ sorcerer’s malevolent desires.34 Responding to questions about how to identify what is unacceptable esoteric practice, Sīdī Muhammad al-Kuntī mentions people who _ blow on knots and who worship the planets, criticizing the Greeks 35 for doing so. He points to India and Nabatea as places where ignorant inhabitants rely on material things, such as statues and books, to intercede between them and God. And, most importantly, he defines sihr as “the general term used to refer to vegetal or mineral substances_ used to transmit harmful or useful powers for the one who used it. […] ‘Most ʿulamā’ attest to sihr.”36 Sorcery, or sihr, was illicit _ primarily because its experts deployed_ it with the goal of causing harm but also if it relied on specific techniques – like blowing on knots or planet worship. This long response to questions about how to distinguish between acceptable and illicit protective and therapeutic practices draws on images, histories, and explanations of esoteric sciences well known to Muslims in and outside of the Sahara, underlining that the role of the jurisconsult was to respond to the specific needs of local communities while drawing from established opinions and texts found from within the larger Islamic world. Sīdī Muhammad al-Kuntī did approve of some questionable esoteric techniques _as long as they were only used for beneficial purposes.37 In one nineteenth-century fatwā the Kunta shaykh related that “some ‘ulamā’ permit the teaching of sorcery in one of two cases – to distinguish between kuffār [nonbelievers] from those who aren’t, or to heal someone who has been the victim of sihr. … If your faith in that which is not sihr _ sihr is not necessarily problematic.”_38 [i.e., Islam] is strong, knowing _ writing that learning sihr is permitHere, the Kunta shaykh responds in _ to be able ted, though only in three cases – to know how to combat sihr, _ 34

35

36 37 38

In the Qur’ān, the sources of evil originate in wicked spirits, usually called “devils” (shayātīn), that were first mobilized against the reign of Souleyman by Bilqīs, or the Queen_ of Sheba. For the story in its entirety, see Qur’ān 27:16 44. Sections of the Qur’ān that appeared frequently in talismans and voiced supplications were the āyat al kursī, al fātiha, and especially the last two chapters, known as al _ muʿawwidhatan, or the two protective [ones]. The first, sūrat al falaq, asks God for protection from “the evil of sorceresses, spitting on knots, and from the evil of the envier when he plots.” Qur’ān, 113. Translation from Toorawa, “Seeking Refuge from Evil,” 55. Ibn Khaldūn cited the example from the sūrat al falaq, in which those who blow on knots appear as proof of the existence of sihr. Ibn Khaldūn, 393. _ Al Shaykh Sīdī Muhammad b. al Shaykh Sīdī al Mukhtār in Ould al Barā, al majmū‘a _ al kubrā, vol. 12, Fatwā 6590, 6592. Shaykh Sīdī Muhammad b. al Shaykh Sīdī al Mukhtār al Kuntī in Ould al Barā, al majmū‘a al kubrā,_ Fatwā 6590, 6591. Ould al Barā, al majmū‘a al kubrā, Fatwā 6590, 6596, 6600.

Local Wisdom

85

to differentiate between the Islamic esoteric sciences and sihr itself, and _ clerics in out of pure intellectual curiosity. As Chapter 5 details, Muslim the Saharan West were known to have studied techniques of bloodsucking to better understand its functioning and to more effectively neutralize its experts and their attacks. While the Kunta themselves applied the terms ʿulūm al-asrār (“the sciences of secrets”) and ʿulūm al-ghayb (“the sciences of the unseen”) in their texts to cover the systematic use of lettrism, talismans, sand divination, voiced supplications, and astrology to ask for God’s intercession in worldly affairs, it may be during this nineteenth-century period that the term l’hjāb was widely adopted in the Saharan West to refer to _ the Islamic esoteric sciences.39 I have been hesitant to use the term l’hjāb _ when writing about these sciences in the periods before the nineteenth century, not having evidence of its use in written or oral sources. However, manuscripts attributed to one of the Kunta’s most prominent students, Sīdiyya al-Kabīr, show his use of the term in the early nineteenth century when the Sufi scholar was asked by someone “to write a hjāb” for protection against sihr, feared for its capacity to harm. In this _ _ one of the Kunta’s students delineated document, we see that at least clearly between l’hjāb, legitimately used to prevent bad things from _ defined as nefarious sorcery.40 Sīdiyya al-Kabīr, happening, and sihr, _ following the Kunta, gave instructions on how to ensure one’s safety by drawing a three-part numerological square (al-muthallath) with one’s finger in the sand, while reciting the āyat al-kursī twelve times, a verse in the Qur’ān that was often pronounced to ward off evil spirits.41 39

40

41

The two most cited Kunta texts still undergoing significant study are the al Risāla al ghallāwiyya (Letter to the Aghlal) and al T arāʾif wa’l talāʾid min karamāt al shaykhayn al wālida wa’l wālid (Original and inherited_ knowledge regarding the miracles of the two shaykhs, my mother and my father). See Mahamoudou, “The works of Shaykh Sidi al Mukhtar al Kunti,” in The Meanings of Timbuktu; Ebrahim Moosa, “The Literary Works of Shaykh Sīdī Al Mukhtār Al Kuntī (d. 1811): A Study of the Concept and Role of “Miracles” in al Minna fī i’tiqād ahl al sunna” (MA thesis, University of Cape Town, 2011); and Marcus Sells, Sorcery or Science?. See Collection 1538/101/13, The al Shaykh Sīdiyya, Boutilimit (Mauritania) Library of Arabic Documents and Manuscripts, University of Illinois Urbana Champaign, microfilm. Thanks to Charles Stewart and Laila Hussein Moustafa for sharing and Muhammadin ould Ahmad Sālim for reading through this microfilm with me. _ found in Qur’ān 2: 255. Collection 1538/101/13, The al Shaykh The_ayat al kursī can be Sīdiyya, Boutilimit, 103/11 and in the West African Arabic Manuscript Database (WAAMD), https://waamd.lib.berkeley.edu/home. The twelfth century Persian theologian, Abū Hāmid Muhammad b. Muhammad al Tūsī, known as al Ghazālī _ an example _ _ (d. 1111), included of lettrism _ as a three part square that originally appeared in his autobiographical work, Al munqidh min al dalāl (The Deliverance from _ Errors), for use by women in difficult labor. Hamès, “Entre recette magique d’Al Bûnî et prière islamique d’Al Ghazâlî,” Fétiches II, 190.

86

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

The Sufi scholar also provided directions on how to use the sciences of secrets to find lost animals.42 Shaykh Sīdiyya further endorsed combining traditional medicine relying on the Greek humors with the science of the secrets of letters. To get rid of a client’s pesky cough, he recommended using the books of the ahl al-tibb (physicians or medical doctors) as well as writing fourteen specific _ letters on the sides of a clean, untarnished bowl. Washing the bowl secret out with unadulterated water, the client should then drink the water for seven days or more.43 Another faqīh of the period, Muhammaden Fāll _ b. Mutālī al-Tendghāy (d. 1870) allowed for the use of ruqya to combat poison: “If it is tried and is proven to work, then it is permitted.”44 For many Mauritanian fuqahā’, therapeutic methods with questionable origins could be justified by their effectiveness. When asked whether using incomprehensible incantations to treat a client was allowed, Sīdī al-Mukhtār al-Kuntī responded that incantations with positive results are allowed, supporting his position with a hadīth that said, “Do not hesitate _ 45 He also referenced hadīth to come to the aid of your brother in Islam.” _ an recounting that the angel Gabriel taught the Prophet Muhammad _ incantation to be used to heal snakebites. “The phrase goes, ‘Praise be to God. Shajjatun, qarniyatun, matīyyatun, bahr qafla’, and then the healer blows seven times on a wooden knife which he sticks into the sand.”46 The incomprehensible terms and the technique of shoving a knife into the earth would, for most Muslims, fall under the category of sihr, but _ here the Kunta shaykh condones their use as an effective remedy against snake poison because of their efficacy. Some Saharan jurists consciously issued legal opinions that might diverge from what was considered a normative application of Islamic jurisprudence elsewhere in Muslim lands where centralized states were thought to be capable of imposing such juridical norms on settled and urban populations. In the Saharan West, where populations were

42 43 44

45 46

Boutilimit Collection, C. C. Stewart Papers, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, 101/13, WAAMD record 1538. Shaykh Sīdīyya b. al Mukhtār b. Hayba al Abīrī in ould al Barā, al majmūʿa al kubrā, Fatwā 6593, 6607. Muhammeden Fāll b. Mutālī al Tendghāy in ould al Barā, al majmūʿa al kubrā, Fatwā _ 6609. This same faqīh differentiated between ruqya and a widely used technique to 6595, diagnose whether or not someone had been the victim of the evil eye. This method of gauging the strength of jealousy’s hold on someone, called al nazra in Hassāniyya, _ _ consisted of taking a string and striking it against the person supposedly victim of the evil eye. The string would then magically extend or shorten indicating the level of affliction. Ould al Barā, al majmūʿa al kubrā, Fatwā 6596, 6609. Cited in Ould al Barā, “The Life of Shaykh Sidi al Mukhtar al Kunti” in Jeppie, 204. Ould al Barā, “The Life of Shaykh Sidi al Mukhtar al Kunti” 206.

Local Wisdom

87

primarily nomadic and where no overarching state existed to impose sharīʿa, Muslim clerics sometimes adapted Islamic juridical norms to local needs.47 The well-known descendent of Ahmad Bezeid, _ Muhammad al-Māmī who circulated between the northern Saharan _ West of Tīris and the Gebla, especially advocated this flexible approach to the application of sharīʿa in the region since an Islamic state had not yet been established to impose such legal norms.48 Some of the specific procedures used to communicate with or manipulate the world of spirits reflect these local realities that deviate from normative Islamic esoteric practice. Al-sellāla, or the form of invisible bloodsucking from a distance which is the subject of Chapter 5, and l’hjāb, both as a word in _ Hassāniyya and a set of protective and divinatory techniques such as _ nazra, ligzāna, and invīl, provide examples of terminology and method _ exist only in this western Saharan zone.49 that How the Kunta specifically relied on their religious learning and their intimate knowledge of God to perform miraculous acts that legitimized their claims to religious authority, allowing them to push forward their own political and commercial agenda, is beyond the scope of this book.50 Here, my focus is instead on explaining the contemporary narrative about the origins and centers of the Islamic esoteric sciences as they became known as l’hjāb by the early nineteenth century in the Saharan West. This evolving _expertise that Saharan populations sought out was, by this time, entwined with and defended by the Kunta as an essential aspect of Sufi knowledge. As some of the most well-respected religious authorities in the Sahara from the end of the eighteenth through the nineteenth centuries, their legal opinions and writings were shared throughout regional libraries as authoritative references on a variety of

47

48 49

50

Ismail Warscheid, “Le Livre du désert: La vision du monde d’un lettré musulman de l’Ouest Saharien au XIXe siècle,” Annales. Histoire et Sciences Sociales, 73, no. 2 (2018): 359 84. Warscheid, “Le Livre du désert.” The Hassāniyya terms invīl, al nazra, ligzāna are used to describe how hajjāba summon _ see into the future and through_ nontransparent jinn to help them find lost things, surfaces, and practice divination. Al Māmī addresses both al sell and ligzāna in his treatise on the need to adapt Islamic jurisprudence to local needs. See Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh, “De quoi le Sahara est il le nom? Images du Sahara et des Sahariens dans Kitâb al bâdiyya d’al Shaykh Muhamd al Mâmi,” unpublished paper presented in Guelmim, Morocco for the conference Le Sahara Lieux d’histoire … Espaces d’échanges, May 26 28, 2016. Shared on the author’s Academia.edu. See Nouhi, “Religion and Society in a Saharan Tribal Setting”; Yahya ould al Bara, “The Life of Shaykh Sidi al Mukhtar al Kunti”; McDougall, “The Economics of Islam in the Southern Sahara”; Marcus Sells, Sorcery or Science?; Nobili, Sultan, Caliph and the Renewer of the Faith; Warscheid, “The West African Jihād Movements.”

88

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

topics. Their teaching and scholarship influenced many other important religious scholars in the region who referred to the Kunta positions on what constituted permitted sciences of protection, healing, and harming. Likewise, Kunta explanations of how to understand what constituted the illicit were transmitted through their wide network of students in West Africa. Their juridical positions carried significant weight and represent a dominant, though not all-encompassing, understanding of the place of the Islamic esoteric sciences in the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Saharan West. Here among the Kunta and in the West African Sahel or, in the case of this chapter, among those that contemporary Mauritanians identify as Fūtī, it is clear that the sciences of lettrism, recitation, geomancy, and astrology to evoke God’s protective forces were considered not only beneficial and useful but also a part of the corpus of general Islamic knowledge.

Fouta Wisdom While Kuntī as a marker of identity refers to a large confederation sharing genealogical descent from one family, Fūtī refers instead to a linguistic community whose members live dispersed throughout the West African Sahel. Members of the scholarly elite (torodbe) from these Fulbe-speaking populations have alternatively claimed and contested Arab origins to the effect of claiming racial superiority over their “black” Wolof or Bambaraspeaking neighbors and legitimizing their privileged access to Islamic knowledge.51 Similar to the zwāya in the Gebla and among the Kunta, access to and mobilization of esoteric knowledge was also crucial to the emergence of the Fulbe, whether torodbe or not, who inspired and led revolutionary movements in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.52 However, it has been documented from early travel descriptions and, for the purposes of this chapter, in nineteenth-century questions posed by and to Arabophone bīdān, the Fulbe have often been characterized _ 51

52

For the origins of Fulbe speaking populations, see Paul Naylor, “Abdullahi dan Fodio and Muhammad Bello’s Debate over the Torobbe Fulani: Case Study for a New Methodology for Arabic Primary Source Material from West Africa,” Islamic Africa 9, no. 1 (2018): 34 54; Jean Schmitz in His Introduction to Kamara, Florilège au jardin, 141 42; Oumar Kane, La première hégémonie peule: le Fuuta Tooro de Koli Tenella à Almaami Abdul (Dakar: Karthala, 2004), 84 85; John Ralph Willis, “The Torodbe Clerics: A Social View,” JAH 19, no. 2 (1978): 195 212. Ahmad Lobbo was notably not of torodbe lineage but he fought against and defeated an _ army of jinn under the leadership of their spirit commander, Suturaare. Amadou Hampaté Bâ and Jacques Daget, L’empire peul du Macina (1818 1853) (Paris: Les Nouvelles Éditions Africaines, 1975), 10 11, 39 and Chapter 1, fn. 83 of this book.

Local Wisdom

89

racially as “black” by others who consider themselves Arab.53 In contemporary Mauritania, the Fulbe are primarily thought of as pastoral and identified as having originated in the ancient polity of Takrūr mentioned in the previous chapter as one of the first “black” (sūdān) kingdoms of the western Sahel to have converted to Islam.54 Ultimately, the adjective Fūtī refers to those who largely clustered in two Fouta, or valleys – the Fouta Jallon in contemporary Guinea and the Fouta Tooro along the Senegal River Valley between contemporary Mauritania and Senegal (Map 2.1).55 Pastoral Fulbe speakers, however, long inhabited areas further east such as what is now northern Nigeria. When contemporary Mauritanians refer to the fūtīyya as one of the local sources of the Islamic esoteric sciences, they reference a people imagined to be tied together linguistically and culturally by variations on the Fulbe language and members of a scholarly elite who led a number of reformist projects, often labeled as jihāds, in either the Fouta Tooro or Fouta Jallon in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries to implement religiously informed social and political objectives that would overthrow the political structures in place.56 Among eighteenth-century West African religious authorities who have been identified as part of the larger Fulbe-speaking religious elite in the Western Sahel, particular attention should be paid to the scholar Muhammad al-Katsinawī al-Fulānī (d. 1741–42). As his name indicates, _ he hailed from the city of Katsina in what is now northern Nigeria and his linguistic and cultural heritage was connected to the Fulbe-dominant regions of West Africa where, at the end of the seventeenth century and in the wake of Shur Būbba, Fulbe-led reformist movements established 53

54 55

56

See Nobili, “A propaganda document in support of the 19th century Caliphate of Hamdallāhi: Nūh b. al Tāhir al Fulānī’s ‘Letter on the appearance of the twelfth _ caliph’ (Risāla fī_ zuhūr _ al khalīfa al thānī ʻashar),” Afriques 7 (2016): 10.4000/ afriques.1870; Hall,_ A History of Race in Muslim West Africa, 98 101; Lydon, On Trans Saharan Trails, 309 10; Dilley, Islamic and caste knowledge practices, 95. ʿUmar al Naqar, “Takrūr: The History of a Name,” JAH 10, no. 3 (1969): 365 74. This understanding in contemporary Mauritania was confirmed in several informal conversations but also by Sīdī Dieng, an active and working expert in the Islamic esoteric sciences. According to Dieng, Fūtī ishāra ilā kul fūtā siwā toro aw jālūn, or “Fūtī refers to all of the Fouta, be it Tooro or Jallon.” Personal communication with Dieng via WhatsApp, August 13, 2021. At the very end of the seventeenth century, a Muslim cleric known for his skills in fashioning useful and protective amulets, Malik Sy (d. 1699), established a religious community in Bundu south of the Senegal River that threatened the political authority in place. Thirty years later, the Fulbe cleric Karamokho Ba (d. 1751) established an Islamic state in 1725 in Timbo in the Fouta Jallon. These new religious communities served as models, even if local contexts differed in their contingent factors, for the Fouta Tooro revolutions of Souleyman Baal and ʿAbd al Qādir Kane in 1775 76, the 1804 Fulbe led jihād in Hausaland in what is now northern Nigeria by Uthman don Fodio (d. 1817), and the jihāds of Ahmad Lobbo (d. 1845) and al Hājj ʿUmar Tāll (d. 1864). _ _

90

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Map 2.1 Polities and emirates in the western Sahel and Saharan West from the seventeenth nineteenth centuries. Map created by Tom Abi Samra. Based on Lydon, On Trans Saharan Trails, xxiii; Austin, Trans Saharan Africa in World History, 52 53; Ould Cheikh, Éléments d’histoire de la Mauritanie, 60; and David Robinson, Paths of Accommodation: Muslim Societies and French Colonial Authorities in Senegal and Mauritania, 1880 1920 (Athens: Ohio University Press, 2000), 12.

Muslim theocratic states in place of those they criticized as corrupt and unjust.57 Historians have attributed the militant state-building 57

Michael Gomez argues that previous claims of Sy’s religious activities including a declaration of jihād inspired by Shur Būbba and, thus, to influencing subsequent Fulani led jihads cannot be proven in “The Problem with Malik Sy.” Al Katsinawī himself was most likely the descendant of Fulbe who left the Fouta Tooro in the sixteenth century, moving southeast toward the Muslim regions of Bornu and Katsina.

Local Wisdom

91

movements among Fula-speaking communities to several historical factors.58 Peasants and pastoralists from outside the urban centers of learning had progressively entered into Islam, following the teaching of urban-based Muslim scholars who had reached out to these rural populations with the goal of expanding the Muslim community. These Muslim teachers, now in closer contact with rural populations, came to understand and sympathize with the grievances of those who felt exploited by political rulers who had proven unwilling to protect their rural subjects from the ravenous appetite of the trans-Atlantic and transSaharan slave trades, from raids, and from unjust taxation.59 Levtzion and Voll additionally argue that Muslim religious authorities in West Africa had, until Shur Būbba, made a concerted effort to maintain a distance from politics: That distance closed during and after the war. Clerics and scholars took up arms against their political rulers who had betrayed their subjects by selling them into the trans-Atlantic slave trade. These scholar revolutionaries also called for a renewal and deepening of religious adherence and practice and followed what Levtzion and Voll see as a pattern of relying on nomadic and semi-settled pastoralists to make up the bulk of the forces fighting for the political and religious revolution.60 Crucial intellectual transformations were most likely shaped by the pedagogical networks that connected West African and Saharan scholars to centers of learning and knowledge production in Cairo, Medina, and Mecca where West African scholars might be exposed to models used to advocate for reform in religious practice and governing structures in their home communities.61

58

59 60 61

John Edwards Philips, “Causes of the Jihad of Usman dan Fodio: A Historiographical Review,” Journal for Islamic Studies 36 (2017): 18 58; Nehemia Levtzion, “The Eighteenth Century: Background to the Islamic Revolutions in West Africa,” in Eighteenth Century Renewal and Reform in Islam, eds. Levtzion and John Voll (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1981), 21 38; Louis Brenner, “Muslim Thought in Eighteenth Century West Africa: The Case of Uthman bin Fudi,” in Eighteenth Century Renewal, eds. Levtzion and Voll, 39 67; Syed, “Between Jihād and History.” Ware, The Walking Qur’an, 110 62 and Syed, “Between Jihād and History.” Levtzion, “The Eighteenth Century,” 21 24. Some earlier studies analyzed the revolutions of the Western Sahel as connected to the emergence of the Wahhābiya, a political and religious revolution in the Arabian Peninsula introduced by Muhammad b. ʿAbd al Wahhāb (1703 92) who was especially active from the 1740s_ on. See Philips, “Causes of the Jihad of Usman don Fodio,” 37. For more on the Wahhābiyya and its origins, see Natana J. DeLong Bas, Wahhabi Islam: From Revival and Reform to Global Jihad (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008). For the influence of the Wahhābiyya in West Africa primarily post World War II, see Lansiné Kaba, The Wahhabīyya: Islamic Reform and Politics in French West Africa (Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1974).

92

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Al-Katsinawī’s personal history and reputation – as a Muslim scholar who travelled to Mecca before 1730 and then settled and died in Cairo in the following decade, but especially as an expert in the Islamic esoteric sciences – provide additional evidence of what Dahlia Gubara has described as “tenuous and ethereal” disciplinary boundaries in the Muslim world before the nineteenth century between the esoteric sciences and other scientific fields.62 Fulani scholar al-Katsinawī was well respected in Cairo for his religious learning and also for his knowledge connected to the esoteric sciences of numerology and lettrism, which he had garnered initially in Katsina and then supplemented in the course of subsequent travels to Mecca and Cairo.63 He wrote on the subject of talismans and astrology in his Al-durr al-manzūm wa khulāsat al-sirr al_ _ maktūm fī al-sihr wa al-talāsim wa-l-nujūm, or “The Row of Pearls and the _ _ Quintessential Essences of the Protected Secret in Magic and Talisman and Stars,” completed roughly a decade before his death. Scholars have used the case of al-Katsinawī to argue that the esoteric sciences were viewed, in this period, as an integral part of Islamic knowledge, an acceptance that persisted in what might have been considered the peripheries of the Muslim World, such as Katsina or Azawād, and the centers, like Mecca and Cairo.64 Challenging the notion of center and periphery as well as “orthodoxy” and “heterodoxy” when it comes to the production and nature of Islamic knowledge, al-Katsinawī’s Al-durr al-manzūm also _ substantiates some of the primary uses of the Islamic esoteric sciences, at least in the eighteenth century, uses which show remarkable similarity to their application in contemporary Mauritania.65 No direct link has been identified between al-Katsinawī and his scholarship and the militant reform movements that emerged among Fulbe pastoral populations in West Africa during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Yet, his writings and reputation attest to the high level of intellectual activity, of which the esoteric sciences were a part, among Fulbe-speaking scholars

62 63

64 65

Gubara, “Al Azhar and the Orders of Knowledge,” 303. Gubara, “Al Azhar and the Orders of Knowledge,” 293 96; Wright, Realizing Islam, 41; David Owusu Ansah, Islamic Talismanic Tradition in Nineteenth century Asante (Lewiston: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1991), 35; Yahya ould al Bara, “Morsures de serpents: thérapeutique et magie chez les Bidân de Mauritanie,” in Coran et talismans, ed. Hamès, 175 208, 186; Zappa, “La magie vue par un exégète du Coran”; Hamès, “L’art talismanique en Islam d’Afrique Occidentale,” 90. Gubara, “Al Azhar and the Orders of Knowledge,” 330. According to al Katsinawī, the five basic applications of these sciences concerned treating disease, divination, conquering one’s enemies, restoring just rule, and seeing and controlling things from afar. See Gubara, “Al Azhar and the Orders of Knowledge,” 330.

Local Wisdom

93

in the period and demonstrate that the esoteric sciences were embraced as a field of inquiry in the Western Sahel. In West Africa, the revolutionary events initiated by Fulbe-speaking Muslim scholars were articulated in dialogue with Saharan scholars. Fulbe religious leaders elaborated pedagogical techniques in their language and expounded their militant positions but they did so referencing scholarly works penned by regionally important clerics such as the fifteenth-century Saharan jurist al-Maghīlī and religious leaders such as the Kunta scholars.66 Centers of Islamic learning in Shinqīt, Wādān, the _ Gebla, Pīr, Kokkī, and Azawād linked scholars from West Africa and the Sahara through shared pedagogical genealogies as well as to broader networks of knowledge transmission in Cairo, the Arabian Peninsula and even India.67 The Gebla, the Fouta Tooro, and the Fouta Jallon, regions situated along and below the Sahara’s desert edge, show intellectual dynamism at the turn of the eighteenth to nineteenth centuries through these networks of scholars who shared pedagogical genealogies. We saw earlier that ascendant leaders sometimes accused their predecessors of takfīr (unbelief ) in an effort to discredit rulers they sought to displace. The late fifteenth-century and early sixteenth-century Songhay ruler Askiya Muhammad’s exchanges with al-Maghīlī provide one of the first examples in_West Africa of such a political use of religious slander. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, articulations of what constituted acceptable religious worship and declarations of takfīr (unbelief ) were used to discredit political and economic competitors. The Qādiriyya Kunta attacked their economic competitors, the Shādhiliyya Idaw al-Hajj in Wādān, by disparaging the latter’s form of dhikr performances in _remembrance of the Prophet and God.68 In Qādiriyya criticism of Shādhiliyya religious worship and militant Fulbe-led movements in the Fouta Jallon, Fouta Tooro, and Hausaland, we can see increasing competition between schools of Islamic knowledge in the region.69 Instigators of militant reformist movements also legitimized war by pronouncing on what constituted acceptable religious worship and declaring that those who did otherwise were guilty of takfīr. The religious revivals taking place in Cairo and the Hijāz in the _ eighteenth and nineteenth centuries likely had some impact on the patterns of reform in West Africa that sought to enforce norms of 66 67 68 69

See Brenner, “Muslim Thought in Eighteenth Century West Africa,” 45 46 and Nobili, Sultan, Caliph, and the Renewer of the Faith. See Gubara, “Al Azhar and the Orders of Knowledge,” 208. For more on these tensions, see Erin Pettigrew, “The Heart of the Matter: Interpreting Bloodsucking Accusations in Mauritania,” JAH 57, no. 3 (November 2016): 417 35. Constant Hamès, “La Shâdhiliyya ou l’origine,” 85.

94

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Islamic practice imagined as closer to those of the original Muslim community in Medina – a point Knut Vikør has made, emphasizing the large number of West African scholars who pursued religious study in these two centers of Islamic learning.70 Some scholars, especially those connected with the great Fulbe-led jihāds of the nineteenth century – including Jibrīl b. ʿUmar (d. 1787–88), Ahmad Lobbo, and al-Hājj _ ʿUmar Tāll – undertook their pilgrimages to _Mecca, and there is some indication these men returned to West Africa newly motivated to reform local religious practice to bring it more in line with forms they had admired in the Hijāz. Nonetheless, as several historians have noted, the _ each revolution were highly particular to their specific specific reasons for historical and social context.71

Powerful Discourses of Condemnation In 1740, the year before Muhammad al-Katsinawī, the Fulani scholar _ celebrated for his esoteric knowledge, died in Cairo, the central Arabian religious scholar, Muhammad b. ʿAbd al-Wahhāb (1703–92), began to _ proclaim a reformist message in the Arabian Peninsula. ʿAbd al-Wahhāb, in seeking to promote what he considered a purer form of Islam, denounced local religious practices that he identified as illicit innovation (bidaʿ) or as a sign of idolatry (shirk). According to ʿAbd al-Wahhāb, spiritual intercession through an intermediary, especially at the tombs of deceased saints – a practice often identified with Sufism – affiliation with Shīʿism, treating illnesses with magic, or attempts to determine the fate of the world all fell under condemned practices.72 Practices that were often considered a part of Islamic esoteric and Sufi devotional practice in the Saharan West such as seeking the baraka of dead saints, sand 70

71

72

Knut Vikør, “Jihad in West Africa: A Global Theme in a Regional Setting,” in Muslim Diversity: Local Islam in Global Contexts, ed. Leif Manger (New York: Routledge, 1999), 80 101, 84. John Ralph Willis, “Jihad fi Sabil Allah Its Doctrinal Basis in Islam and Some Aspects of Its Evolution in Nineteenth Century West Africa,” JAH 8, no. 3 (1967): 395 415. See also Ahmed, West Africa ʿulamā’. See especially Amir Syed who has criticized what he sees as a tendency to portray these reformist projects as covered in “a veneer of coherency and connections” in Syed, “Between Jihād and History,” 99. See also Ware, The Walking Qur’an, and Nobili, Sultan, Caliph, and Renewer of the Faith. For more on ʿAbd al Wahhāb and his criticism of Sufi practices and grave visitation, see David Commins, The Mission and the Kingdom: Wahhabi Power Behind the Saudi Throne (London: I. B. Tauris & Company, 2016); Delong Bas, Wahhabi Islam; and Alexander Knysh, Sufism. ʿAbd al Wahhāb condemned the making and use of amulets. Saif and Leoni, “Introduction,” 5. See also Muhammad b. Abdul Wahhab, Kitab At Tauhid, trans. Abdul Malik Mujahid (Dar us Salam Publications, www.islamicbasics.com, n.d.), https://epdf.pub/kitaab at tawhid the book of the unity of god.html.

Local Wisdom

95

divination, and the wearing of amulets were all decried as signs of unbelief. The destruction of saints’ tombs and the felling of sacred trees in the manner of Ahmad Bezeid’s grave in Chapter 1 became the hall_ mark of Wahhābī activism. Local ʿulamā contested this reformist message and ʿAbd al-Wahhāb’s own hometown threw him out, arguing that the preacher’s proclamations only led to violence and discord. The extent to which ʿAbd al-Wahhāb and the Wahhābiyya exerted any dominant influence in the Arabian Peninsula at the time has been shown to be marginal.73 Yet, the claim that believers should only worship God and reject any human or spirit spiritual intercession was reinforced by him and by his movement. John Voll has suggested that the reformist trends that were undeniably present in the Saharan West and Western Sahel in the nineteenth century in fact derived from Sufi activism in the Arabian Peninsula in the eighteenth century rather than from a later anti-Sufi and anti-esoteric Wahhābī ideology.74 In this reading, Sufi scholars of the nineteenth century engaged in a new kind of relationship with the sacred. Instead of conceptualizing their spiritual path as one leading toward a union with God, these “activist” Sufi scholars aimed for a union with the Prophet Muhammad by following his model for Islamic practice.75 This attention _ tarīqa muhammadiyya following the Prophet’s example, as Zachary to the _ Wright_ has shown similarly occurred among Sufi Tijāniyya reading circles in the Muslim West of Morocco and West Africa, included the sharing of powerful prayers and knowledge of the Islamic esoteric sciences.76 The founder of the Tijāniyya Sufi path, Ahmad al-Tījānī _ (1735–1815) and his disciples, importantly for this chapter the Fulbe reformist al-Hājj ʿUmar Tāll, were all known for their command of the _ Islamic esoteric sciences.77 Here again, we have evidence that these 73 74

75 76 77

Ahmad Dallal, “The Origins and Objectives of Islamic Revivalist Thought, 1750 1850,” The Journal of the American Oriental Society 113, no. 3 (1993): 341 59. John Voll, “Hadith Scholars and Tariqahs: An Ulama Group in the 18th Century Haramayn in Their Impact in the Islamic World,” Journal of Asian and African Studies 15, no. 3 4 (1980): 264 73; Ahmed, West Africa ʿulamā’, 101 02. Voll, “Hadith Scholars and Tariqahs,” 267 and 271 and Ahmed, West Africa ʿulamā’, 102. Wright, Realizing Islam, 41. Wright, Realizing Islam, 70 and Cheikh el Hadj Omar, Les Rimâh: un traité de sciences religieuses musulmanes, trans. Maurice Puech (Paris: Éditions al Bouraq, 2017). Al Hājj _ ʿUmar Tāll received the Tijāniyya wird through the Fouta Jallon scholar ʿAbd al Karīm b. Ahmad al Naqīl who studied under the Trārza Tashumsha qādī Mawlud Fāll _ hammadhen Fāll who studied in Fez just after al Tījānī’s death. _ Tāll was also b. Mu known _to have recruited an army of 100,000 jinn from non Muslim areas of Senegal. Dilley, Islamic and caste knowledge practices, 107; Dedoud ould Abdallah, “Le passage au Sud: Muhammad al Hafiz et son héritage,” in La Tijâniyya: Une Confrérie Musulmane à

96

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

sciences were a central part of knowledge exchange and production among Muslims in West Africa in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. With intellectual genealogies tied to the great Islamic educational centers of the Oulād Daymān in the Gebla, the Kajoor centers of Pīr and Kokkī, the Fouta Jallon, Egypt, and the Hijāz, the Fulbe reformists were influenced by their spiritual guides and_ travels but also by their local contexts. The Fulbe reformist Uthman don Fodio (d. 1817), for example, never journeyed from northern Nigeria to the Muslim East of Cairo or Arabia; however, his principal religious guide, Jibrīl b. ʿUmar, returned to the region from his own pilgrimage to Mecca in the last third of the eighteenth century advocating a reform of local ritual practices, an approach that appealed to the young Uthman don Fodio.78 Don Fodio also found inspiration in the texts of the al-Maghīlī, using them to justify his jihād against the Hausa rulers in Kano who he claimed failed to adhere to Islamic principles.79 Don Fodio criticized the rulers of Hausaland of un-Islamic behavior and wrongful rule, characterized by practices he argued were unlawful: unjust taxes, the enslavement of Fulbe Muslims, and Hausa efforts to prevent him from attracting new followers in his community in the citystate of Gobir in Hausaland. Echoing the ways that al-Lamtūnī and Askiya Muhammad had, in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, sought to discredit_ political figures by critiquing their religious practice, Don Fodio also said Hausa rulers failed to enforce the sharī‘a, allowing the coexistence of Muslim and pagan practices, some of which fell under the purview of the esoteric sciences.80 The Fulbe scholar stipulated that while numerological squares and written prayers were permitted, they must be inscribed on pure materials and could not contain foreign words or obscure symbols. The perceived efficacy of the esoteric sciences in healing and protecting had drawn West Africans to Islam as a religion

78 79

80

la Conquête de l’Afrique, eds. Jean Louis Triaud and David Robinson (Paris: Karthala, 2000), 69 100, 92. Jibrīl b. ʿUmar was from the city of Agadez and was known to have been a significant influence on Uthman don Fodio’s intellectual development. Ousman Murzik Kobo, Unveiling Modernity in Twentieth Century West African Islamic Reforms (Brill: Leiden, 2012), 40. See also F. H. El Masri, “The Life of Shehu Usuman dan Fodio before the Jihad,” Journal of the Historical Society of Nigeria 2, no. 4 (1963): 435 48. For more on Uthman don Fodio, see Murray Last, The Sokoto Caliphate (New York: The Humanities Press, 1967); David Robinson, Muslim Societies in African History (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 139 52; Paul Naylor, From Rebels to Rulers: Writing Legitimacy in the Early Sokoto State (London: James Curry, 2021). The Fulani leader’s daughter, Nana Asma’u, wrote publicly against borī practices of spirit possession and healing. See Beverly B. Mack and Jean Boyd, One Woman’s Jihad: Nana Asma’u, Scholar and Scribe (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2000).

Local Wisdom

97

that could respond to their daily and existential needs. Susan O’Brien has also argued that “popular perceptions of the Shehu’s magical powers surely contributed to his own success as a religious and political leader.”81 Nonetheless, Uthman don Fodio recommended that the practices he deemed objectionable, such as spirit possession (Hausa: borī), be eliminated gradually, as he calculated that forcing local populations to immediately abandon their therapeutic rituals might backfire.82 Significantly, the religious reformists and state builders of nineteenthcentury West Africa did not reject Sufism. Uthman don Fodio received advice in the form of a letter from the premier Qādiriyya Sufi figure, Sīdī Muhammad al-Kuntī, and he considered himself part of the shaykh’s _ educational lineage.83 Al-Hājj ʿUmar Tāll adhered to the Tijāniyya Sufi _ Ahmad al-Tījānī, passed away. Initiated by a path shortly after its founder, disciple of the Saharan Tījānī_ shaykh, Muhammad al-Hāfiz ould al_ _ from the Mukhtār ould al-Habīb (d. 1830), the Fulbe_ religious scholar _ Fouta Tooro, carried the Tijāniyya wird (litany of prayers) and its teachings through Hausaland, then the Fouta Jallon, all the way to the Fouta Tooro and Bambara states.84 As the appointed khalīfa, or head representative, of the Tijāniyya for West Africa, ʿUmar Tāll certainly did not agree with Wahhābī opposition to the veneration of saints, the learning of esoteric sciences, and their application for protection and healing – all identified with Sufism. Likewise, Sīdī al-Mukhtār al-Kuntī disagreed with the Wahhābī anti-Sufi stance, arguing that those who followed Wahhābī teachings were khawārij, or kharijites from the first century of Islam who were known for easily accusing others of takfīr.85 Both ʿUmar Tāll and Uthman don Fodio were reformists who called for the overthrow of regimes which they claimed were guilty of an abuse of power and of perpetuating unbelief in their polities; however, neither saw Sufism as such as a sign of this unbelief. Instead, Sufi knowledge and networks were a part of their own practice of worship and expansion. Al-Hājj ʿUmar Tāll had political designs from the very beginning of his call for_ jihād. He purposely attacked non-Muslim communities in the Fouta Tooro in the name of extending the frontiers of Islam and converting pagan West Africans to Islam. He also challenged other Muslims, 81 83

84 85

82 O’Brien, “Power and Paradox,” 64 65. O’Brien, “Power and Paradox,” 64 65. Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh, “Les sciences au(x) miroir(s) du prince. Savoir et pouvoir dans l’espace arabo musulman d’hier et d’aujourd’hui,” Revue des mondes musulmans et de la Méditerranée, Sciences, savoirs modernes et pouvoir dans le monde musulman contemporain, no. 101 102 (juillet 2003): 129 55. Deddoud ould Abdallah notes that Muhammad al Hāfiz studied under Sīdī ʿAbd Allāh _ Sud,” _ passage au _ ould al Hājj Ibrāhīm. Ould Abdallah, “Le 81. _ Philips, “Causes of the Jihad of Usman don Fodio,” 34.

98

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

especially the Kunta and Ahmad Lobbo at Masina, thus contributing to a _ bifurcation in the region between followers of the Qadirīyya and the 86 Tijāniyya. The Kunta served as a center of knowledge for subsequent major figures in the region, especially the Qādiriyya Sīdiyya family in the Brākna emirate and the Fādiliyya Sufi lineage in the eastern Hawd _ _ lineages roughly align with the vernacular _ region.87 These dominant Sufi expression attributing expertise in l’hjāb to the Kunta or the Fouta at the _ two clerical groups – the bīdān beginning of this chapter, identifying _ zwāya Kunta and the Fulbe-speaking torodbe from the Fouta – with mastery of the esoteric sciences. Even if there seem to have been divergent public opinions in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries about the racial status of Fulbe-speaking populations, their own claims to Arab descent reaffirm that religious knowledge and especially the Islamic esoteric sciences were claimed as belonging primarily to those who could convincingly claim Arab genealogies. Provincializing Reformist Discourse Fulbe and Hassāniyya-speaking scholars did not simply import reformist _ Sahel from the Sahara and the Islamic East. Not only did ideas into the they contribute to reformist discourse in Arabia and Egypt but they also developed their own criticisms of existing Sufi devotional practice and methods of protection and healing in conversation with each other.88 A well-known example is that of the bīdān scholar Ahmad ould _ Dāymān Muhammad ould al-ʿAqil (d. 1828), from _the zwāya Oulād _ tribe in the Gebla, who travelled to the Fouta Jallon, probably in the late eighteenth century, to study the secrets of letters over six years under another respected Fulbe shaykh, Alfā Ibrāhīm.89 Little is known about 86 87 88 89

See Zebadia, “The Career of Ahmed al Bekkay” for more on Ahmed al Bekkay al Kunti’s (d. 1866) conflicts with Ahmad Lobbo and ʿUmar Tāll. _ Stewart, Islam and Social Order. For more on the For more on the Sīdiyya, see Charles Fādiliyya, see Boubrik, Saints et société. _ Ahmed, West Africa ʿulamā’. See Rüdiger Seesemann, “The Shurafa’ and the ‘Blacksmith’.” The BNF has conserved a manuscript, “qasīda bā’iya mihdā’” authored by an Alfā Ibrāhīm. See BNF, Richelieu, _ manuscrits orientaux, Arabe 6851, ff 284 85V. Ulrich Rebstock mentions Alfā Ibrāhīm al Fūtī as the teacher of Ahmad b. Muhammad al ʿAqil b. Muhand. See Ulrich Rebstock, _ _ Maurische Literaturgeschichte, v. III (Wurzberg: Ergon Verlag, _ 2001), 712. Hamden ould al Tāh first brought my attention to the Fulani shaykh Alfā Ibrāhīm. Hamden_ ould al Tāh, interview. See also Muhammad Lemjad ould Muhammad al Amīn _al Sālim, “Awl bahth _ _ hawl al kitāba al talasmiyya fī al morītānīa aw sirr _al hurf,” shared by author but can also _ found Online,_ El Meda.net, June 10, 2014, www.elmeda.net/spip.php?article721 _ be and M’hammed ould Ahmed Yara, “Le livre des lettrés renseignés sur l’histoire des puits,” trans. Paul Marty, BCEHSAOF (1920): 311 45, 320 where Ould al ‘Aqil is said to have studied the esoteric sciences with the shaykh for six to seven years.

Local Wisdom

99

this Fulbe teacher; and, yet, Mauritanian intellectuals remember him because his student, Ahmad al-ʿAqil, became a prominent religious scholar on his return to_ the Gebla region. Al-ʿAqil first studied under his own sister, Khadīja mint Muhammad ould al-ʿAqil (d. 1834), an _ as one of the primary religious exceptional woman who also acted instructors for three major Muslim figures in the region: the Fouta Tooro almāmī ʿAbd al-Qādir Kane (after whom Muhammad al-Māmī _ was named), the Idawʿalī religious scholar Sīdī ʿAbd Allāh ould al-Hājj _ Ibrāhīm (d. 1816–17) and Tajakānet grammarian al-Mukhtār ould Būna 90 al-Jakānī (d. 1805–06). The last two, Ould al-Hājj Ibrāhīm and Ould _ their time and were Būna, are among the most-cited bīdān scholars of _ considered advocates of ʿulūm al-zāhir, or the exoteric sciences, and _ critics of l’hjāb. Both are known to_ have articulated doctrinal positions _ in opposition to other major religious figures in the region, especially those of the Kunta on the topic of l’hjāb and the role of its experts.91 Deeply rooted in the educational_ traditions of the southern Sahara, Ould al-Hājj Ibrāhīm was born in the Tagānt region and studied with _ bīdān scholars from his tribal confederation, the Idawʿalī, and prominent _ in Shinqīt before journeying through North Africa toward Egypt and the _ Arabian Peninsula.92 He is also known to have provided extended counsel to the emir of the Tagānt, a relationship that demonstrates the influence that religious scholars exerted as guides for political figures in the region. Though he was reputedly a virulent reformist, the bīdān scholar also, oral _ histories relate, learned sihr as the only feasible method to rescue a _ companion who had been transformed into a donkey by a sorcerer in Egypt.93 An elderly self-identified hajjāb in Mauritania told me that Ould _ – the three-part square attributed to al-Hājj Ibrāhīm prepared a muthallath _ 90

91

92 93

For more on Khadīja mint Muhammad ould al ʿAqil, see her entry no. 421 in Stewart _ of Mauritania and Western Sahara, vol. 5, part 1, 451. and Wuld Ahmed Salem, Writings For more on al Mukhtār ould Būna al Jakānī, see entry no. 1015 in Stewart and Wuld Ahmed Salem, Writings of Mauritania, vol. 5, part 2, 973 78 and Sīdī ʿAbd Allāh ould al Hājj Ibrāhīm, see entry 192, Stewart and Wuld Ahmed Salem, Writings of Mauritania, _ 5, part 1, 246 54. vol. Ould Būna wrote disapprovingly of the extreme violence he witnessed when he visited the Fouta Tooro during the tenure of his former learning companion, ʿAbd al Qādir Kane, and he condemned Kane’s overextension of power in Bundu. See David Robinson, “Revolutions in the Western Sudan,” in The History of Islam in Africa, eds. Levtzion and Pouwels, 131 52, 135 36 and Robinson, “The Islamic Revolution of Fuuta Tooro,” IJAHS 8 (1975): 185 221, 212. H. T. Norris, “The History of Shinqīt: According to the Idaw ʿAlī Tradition,” BIFAN _ 26, no. 3 4 (1962): 393 413. Sīdī Ahmad ould Arbī ould Sīdī Mawlāy Zāyn, interview, M’heirith, July 15, 2012. Sīdī Ahmad_ is the grandson of Sīdī Mawlāy Zāyn, notorious for having assassinated French _ military officer Xavier Coppolani in 1905.

100

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

al-Ghazālī and referenced by Shaykh Sidīyya – to be used against incidents of sellāla, or bloodsucking, in the region.94 Ould al-Hājj Ibrāhīm is also known to have written a seven-part square (musabbaʿ)_ for the same purpose, in this instance a square made up of the seven letters not included in the opening chapter of the Qur’ān, the fātiha. This sevenpart talisman is referenced by a later scholar, Muhammad al-Habīballāh ould Māyaba (d. 1945), in the following poem: _ This seven [part square] for harmful sihr is of the beneficial kind And it is proven because I experienced_ it and I found use in it It uses divine words and the ‘ulamā’ who borrowed it liked it In it are the names of our God to obtain positive results for [the person] who uses it. And the words of God are added to five verses recited […] Use these against any evil, especially against sihr […]95 _

Here Ould Māyaba shows that, even into the twentieth century, talismanic squares would be used in the Saharan West and specifically to protect against sorcery. Despite indicating that lettrism could be effectively used against forms of sorcery, such as bloodsucking, Ould al-Hājj Ibrāhīm is better known _ As we have already seen, for disapproving of many local l’hjāb practices. _ the esoteric sciences were far from universally accepted, even in earlier periods, and their application was contested by scholars in the Sahara and in the greater Muslim world alike. In his 1805 treatise Rushd al-ghāfil wa nasīhat al-jāhil (“Guide for the lost one and advice for the ignorant _ _ to be consulted when confronted with Muslims who have [one]”), strayed from correct religious practice, Ould al-Hājj Ibrāhīm dedicates _ sorcery and to prosignificant energy to identifying what he considered viding evidence of the immorality of those who mobilize it. The scholar distinguishes between what is illicit and permitted in the customs he observed among populations from his region, identified as Shinqīt.96 _ 94

95

96

Muhammad ʿAbdallāhi ould Ahmad ‘Abdī, interview, Awjeft, July 13, 14, 2012; July 5, _ Muhammad ʿAbdallāhi told _ me this muthallath is found in Ould al Hājj Ibrāhīm’s 2013. _ _ book, al Mughnī. Ould Māyaba ended his scholarly career in Cairo where he taught at al Azhar. His most famous work on l’hjāb is al Mujaribāt cited in Ould Muhammad al Amīn Salem. See _ “al Fuqahā’ wa ʿulūm al sirr wa l sharr _ Yahyā ould al Barā, (al ma‘ārif al khafiyya).” _ Unpublished article shared with permission by author. Ould al Hājj Ibrāhīm is said to _ have placed a Sufi poem on his head as a sign of protection against a fever he was suffering and to have written a book on lettrism, entitled T ard al dawāll wa l haml ‘an al _ _ islamique dans le Sahel kurū’ fī hiyād masā’il al amal. See El Hamel, La vie intellectuel _ _ 368 69. Ouest Africain, See West African Arabic Manuscript Database, “‫ﺭﺵﺩﺍﻝﻍﺍﻑﻝ‬,” AMMS ID # 781, Boutilimit 79, by Ould al Hājj Ibrāhīm. Online. https://bit.ly/2IVfy7g. _

Local Wisdom

101

Recognizing that many of these practices of the “sciences of the unseen” that he found condemnable stemmed from people’s need for security in a space without stability or protection, Ould al-Hājj Ibrāhīm sympathized _ with those who experimented with various prophylactic and therapeutic 97 techniques. To differentiate between permitted and forbidden practices, Ould al-Hājj Ibrāhīm described the region’s esoteric techniques, thus attesting to_ the existence of well-known methods such as ligzāna, nazra, lettrism, and the use of sand or camel feces for divination. He _ condemned ecstatic Sufi rituals, such as dhikr, chanting or singing in praise of God, and was even more critical of l’hjāb. He wrote that Islamic _ sorcery, talismans, and jurisprudence “does not distinguish between illusionism: it puts them all in the same category of forbidden objects. These sciences are forbidden because they turn the [believer] toward the stars or other objects rather than towards the Creator.”98 Like Wahhābī activists, this Saharan reformist rejected techniques that relied on anything but God, such as jinn or other invisible entities. He also condemned commonly referenced texts such as Shams al-maʿārif of the fourteenthcentury North African esotericist Ahmad al-Būnī.99 Ould al-Hājj Ibrāhīm composed a _poem to demarcate which divination _ and intervention practices were sanctioned by Islamic doctrine: If the astrologer believes in God And he does not link his acts to God. Or says that something other than God makes the signs of stars He is a criminal Something is wrong with him until he repents. It is not permissible for him to imitate those with this science. If it [the science]is visible and it appears openly Something in it [the hadīth] points to it being permitted.100 _

While Ould al-Hājj Ibrāhīm referred specifically to the figure and prac_ tices of the “astrologer” (tanjīm, astrology) in his poem, the critiques he leveled against such specialists in the celestial sphere reverberate with the writings of other Muslim scholars also differentiated between local 97

98

99 100

Muhammad b. Ahmad al Amsamī, “Al ʿalawī al Shinqītī (sāhib murāqī al saʿūd) wa _ fī naqd ʿulūm _ al bātl min khilāl kitābihi rushd al ghāfil _ sihr w an nāwaʿihi wa _ _ (al minhaji _ tawābʿihi),” al majla al ʿilmiyya l kuliyya asūl al dīn w al daʿua bil_ zaqāzīq jāmiʿa al Azhar 28, no. 2 (2016): 1523 92. See also_ analyses by Ould al Barā, “al fuqahā’ wa ʿulūm al sihr” and Ahzānā, “rushd al ghāfil wa nasīhat al Jāhil: li Sīdī ‘Abd Allāh ould __ _ _ al Hājj Ibrāhīm muqārabāt wa mulāhazat fī fahm al_ _siyāq min khilāl al mawdū’.” _ and translated in Yahya ould _al_ Bara, “The Life of Shaykh Sidi al Mukhtar _ Cited al Kunti,” 204 and B. Ahmad al Amsamī, “Al ʿalawī al Shinqītī, “Al ʿalawī al Shinqītī,” _ _ _ 1571. See fn. 14 in this book’s Introduction. Fatwā 6587, Ould al Barā. Al Majmūʿa al kubrā, 6584.

102

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

methods of spiritual intervention, divination, and healing. Ould al-Hājj _ Ibrāhīm did not deny astrology as a field of knowledge or its power as a cosmological force, but he critiqued what he understood as a denial of God’s supreme agency over all things in the astrologer’s claims of responsible causality. This assessment reflected the long tradition of Ashʿarī kalām study of Islamic doctrine in the Sahara – a tradition solidified during the Almoravid period when Ashʿarism and Malīkī jurisprudence became the regional norm – one that saw God as the universe’s only actor.101 Humans, spirits, and celestial forces only moved because of God’s will, not because of any volition of their own. Ould al-Hājj _ Ibrāhīm’s condemnation focused on two aspects of the astrologist’s science: namely, that the astrologist should acknowledge that the source of his ability to interpret the movements of the planets and stars originates in God, and that the methods used to read the heavenly bodies should be transparent, or appearing openly. If the astrologer claimed that his powers of perception came from something other than God or if he used opaque means to interpret the celestial signs, then his work would be categorized as illicit within Ould al-Hājj Ibrāhīm’s reading of _ Islamic jurisprudence. Ould al-Hājj Ibrāhīm condemned the use of any techniques that did not rely on_ the Qur’ān – such as the recitation of incomprehensible words, healing and protecting with the intent of financial gain, using one’s knowledge to harm someone else, and sooth-saying. Experts in the visible, exoteric sciences, or zāhir, reasoned that, while practices such as _ hikma al-kahla), and divination by cowry astrology, black magic (sihr or _ _ _ shells existed as forms of knowledge, their methods and goals were, from an Islamic perspective, legally invalid. Techniques for healing and protection were legitimized solely by their presence in the foundational sources of Islam – the Qur’ān and the hadīth – and relied only on God’s intervention instead of human or _ spirit intervention. Muslim scholars calling for a renewal in correct religious practice in both West Africa and Arabia were especially critical of those who claimed abilities and sciences autonomous from those conferred and enacted by God. Muslim spiritual mediators were to merely channel divine directives from God, not operate in a separate realm of independent, self-promoting expertise. Saharan reformists of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries thus condemned prophylactic or interventionist methods that depended 101

Ould Cheikh, La Société Maure, 307 32. For Ashʿarī kalām, see Daniel Gimaret, La doctrine d’al Ashʿari (Paris: Cerf, 1990) and Ulrich Rudolph, “Occasionalism,” in The Oxford Handbook of Islamic Theology, ed. Sabine Schmidtke (Oxford: Oxford University, 2016), doi: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199696703.013.39.

Local Wisdom

103

on impenetrable language or cryptic systems of knowledge. They insisted that therapeutic practices must remain transparent, even as practitioners themselves managed invisible entities and intangible divine power. Those who failed to adhere to these guidelines were vulnerable to attacks from detractors who called into question the validity of their practices. And, yet, the nineteenth-century Saharan reformists lived in a world of miraculous occurrences. Local history remembers Ould al-Hājj Ibrāhīm’s _ knowledge fellow reformist Mukhtār ould Būna’s own access to Islamic as facilitated by the visitation of a mysterious figure who exhaled into the sleeping Ould Būna’s mouth, inflating his belly. The visitor granted Ould Būna a burning desire to learn, and he began to study logic under Khadīja mint Muhammad ould al-ʿAqil.102 As a member of the Tajakānet, a _ confederation that specialized in the ʿulum al-zāhir curriculum of logic, _ _ Islamic grammar, and rhetoric (rather than the esoteric sciences), Ould Būna also positioned himself as a detractor of l’hjāb. His criticisms of saint veneration and tomb visitation prompted_ a written response, around 1810, from Shaykh Sīdī Muhammad al-Kuntī, though Ould _ 103 As in the earlier exchange of Būna had passed away five years earlier. polemics between Ould Bilʿamesh and Ould Majdhūb – contesting claims about Nāsir al-Dīn’s miraculous acts, especially whether these _ demonstrated sainthood and therefore authority to proclaim jihad – Ould Būna disputed whether belief in the power of awliyāʾ, friends of God, was valid, arguing such a view amounted to takfir, or unbelief.104 The Kunta, as some of the most prominent awliyāʾ themselves, had reason to challenge this opinion, and did so. They counter-accused Ould Būna and his ilk of embracing sciences – such as Greek logic and theology – the Kunta argued were working only to distance Muslims from God.105 Subsequent rationalist critics of Sufism, such as the Tajakānet scholar Muhammad al-Khadir ould Mayāba (d. 1935), cited Ould Būna _ ājj Ibrāhīm as _ references for their positions against the and Ould al-H _ permissibility of the esoteric sciences.106 102

103

104 105 106

Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh rightly draws attention to the perhaps unexpected reverence paid to a younger woman logician. Ould Cheikh, “La lettre et/ou l’esprit.” See also Ould Ahmed Yara, “Le livre des Lettrés,” 319 20. Ould Cheikh, “La lettre et/ou l’esprit?” See also Deddoud ʿAbdellahī, interivew, Nouakchott, July 29, 2013; Boubrik, Saints et société, 59; and Kamara, Florilège au jardin, 329, fn. 54. Ould Cheikh translates his words as “Absolute faith in the so called saints is disbelief/ The exact opposite of faith according to the prophets,” in “La lettre et/ou l’esprit?” 11. See Ould Cheikh, “La lettre et/ou l’esprit?” 11 and Boubrik, Saints et société, 59. Ould Cheikh, “La lettre et/ou l’esprit?” 15 and Ould Cheikh, “Les perles et le soufre: Une polémique mauritanienne autour de la Tijânīyya (1830 1935),” in La Tijâniyya, eds. Triaud and Robinson, 125 63; Nouhi, “Sufism in pre colonial southwestern Sahara,” 113 14 and Boubrik, Saints et société, 75.

104

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Conclusion During the nineteenth century, the critics of Islamic esoteric sciences in the southwestern Sahara limited themselves to dispensing legal opinions, writing treatises on the subject, and preaching orally against the practices they found problematic. While Sīdī ʿAbd Allāh ould al-Hājj Ibrāhīm is _ known to have come into conflict with hassān emirs over correct Islamic _ practice, he never had the military capabilities to declare jihād to force a change in religious worship and ritual. In contrast with the Fulbe reformists, who either militarily attacked existing political rulers, Ould al-Hājj _ Ibrāhīm and al-Mukhtār ould Būna advocated reform in a very different political and spiritual environment. By and large, at the beginning of the nineteenth century, inhabitants of the Saharan West were practicing Muslims. The occupational divide between hassān and zwāya meant that _ in the region. While these the hassān monopolized the means of violence _ warrior confederations formed loose political entities in the shape of emirates, through which they imposed taxes over zwāya and zenāga groups, these hassān-led emirates never professed to guarantee correct _ of sharī‘a nor to expand Islam in the region. The hassān implementation represented political power rather than religious authority, with the_ latter role reserved primarily for zwāya, who claimed to represent and preserve correct religious practice. While Ould al-Hājj Ibrāhīm and Ould Būna were known as partisans of ʿulūm al-zāhir_ (the exoteric sciences) and _ _ to have encouraged their hassān counterparts in the Trārza and Tagānt _ regions to reconsider their reliance on l’hjāb, the two scholars did not _ as had their Fulbe counterseek to overturn the political balance in place parts in the Sahel. Ould al-Hājj Ibrāhīm and Ould Būna did, however, encourage their _ fellow Muslims to revisit the foundational texts and teachings of Islam at a moment of shifting Sufi affiliations. Not long after Muhammad al-Hāfiz ould al-Mukhtār ould al-Habīb carried the Tījiāniyya _Sufi lineage _ into_ _ path to spiritual illumination and religious West Africa in 1789, this new practice attracted significant numbers of followers.107 Perhaps Ould alHājj Ibrāhīm and Ould Būna were responding to the emerging signifi_ cance and popularity of this new Sufi lineage that shifted the balance of spirituality of a region that had largely been divided between the Qādiriyya and the Shādhiliyya. With its emphasis on tarbiya, or spiritual training transmitted from spiritual master to student, requiring the Sufi shaykh as a mediator of access to knowledge of the divine, the Tijāniyya

107

See Wright, Realizing Islam.

Local Wisdom

105

constituted one more spiritual avenue in the competitive religious marketplace.108 As we have seen, criticism of the esoteric sciences often reminded Muslims not to venerate anything other than God. For those who negatively evaluated Sufism in general, the kind of respect and devotion Tijāniyya disciples reserved for their spiritual masters was especially reprehensible. In this opposing view, Muslims who aspired to follow the correct path of Islam would directly access God’s truths, without spiritual mediators, without jinn, without recourse to celestial movements and mystical interpretations of hidden truths in the foundational texts. Scholars like Ould al-Hājj Ibrāhīm and Ould Būna might have also initiated the beginnings of_ a divide between clerics and Sufis, between the faqīh and the mutasawwif. This chapter’s epigraph would in _ outmoded understanding of Islamic that case reflect an increasingly knowledge even if it was repeated to me in 2012 by a then active faqīh. New lines were being drawn according to emerging complexities in Sufi affiliation, competition in commercial interests, and pressures from the coasts where European interests encroached upon political sovereignty.109 The expressions used to describe the political landscape of this region before the colonial period – bilād al-sayba, or land of disorder or, the al-mankib al-barzakhī as Muhammad al-Māmī characterized it, an isthmus or transition between the_ Moroccan kingdom in the North, the Songhay empire to the East, and the Wolof and Fulbe kingdoms to the South – also highlight a major difference between the Saharan West and surrounding regions in the West African Sahel.110 While hassān emirs in the Sahara might claim the authority to extract tribute_ in return for protection from raids, they never actually administered the regions they dominated.111 In several instances, hassān leaders went so far as to seek _ 108 109

110

111

For debates about the Tijāniyya during this period, see Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh, “Les perles et le soufre.” Robert Launay and Benjamin Soares see the emergence of an “Islamic sphere” linked to shifts during the colonial and postcolonial periods when West Africans debated the legitimacy of religious authority with increasing intensity. See Launay and Soares, “The Formation of an ‘Islamic Sphere’ in French Colonial West Africa,” Economy and Society 28, no. 4 (1999): 497 519. The first term was primarily used by Moroccans who saw anything outside of the makhzen, or administrative purview of their state, as such. Abderrahmane Ngaı¨dé, “Du Bilad el Makhzen au Bilad es Siba. Continuité historique ou revitalisation ?” in Les relations transsahariennes à l’époque contemporaine, eds. Laurence Marfaing and Steffen Wippel (Paris: Karthala, 2003), 321 36. See Stewart, Writings of Mauritania and the Western Sahara, 6 8 and Ould Cheikh, “Théologie du désordre,” L’Année du Maghreb for more on al Māmī’s use of barzakh. Mohamed al Mukhtar ould as Saʿd, “Émirats et espace émiral maure: le cas du Trârza aux XVIIIe XIXe siècles,” Revue du monde musulman et de la méditerranée 54 (1989): 53 82. From 1805 60 in the Trārza, the political situation was acutely volatile as sons, brothers, and cousins killed each other over for the position of emir.

106

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

the support of the Moroccan sovereign in local battles for power.112 In the Saharan West there was, quite simply, no “state” for reformistminded scholars to threaten; the only possible impact of their efforts might be to stabilize a profoundly unpredictable status quo. Muslim legal scholars and experts in the esoteric sciences were sought out for their ability to enact justice and protect their communities in precarious times. In neighboring regions in the Sahel – Bundu, the Fouta Tooro, the Fouta Jallon, Masina, and Hausaland – where states did in fact exist, local rulers felt politically threatened by the expanding communities drawn to reformist Muslim scholars who sharply criticized the political leaders. Seeing these Muslim scholars as a menace to their economic interests and political sovereignty, rulers persecuted these religious communities and tried to limit their influence. But in the Saharan West, or what would become Mauritania, it was not until the start of the colonial period, in 1899, that Muslim religious authorities would call for holy war, this time against a non-Muslim foreign imperial state. Following Shur Būbba, a mastery of religious knowledge that included the esoteric sciences was critical to the rise of groups of religious scholars who self-identified as racially “white” and who used this genealogical narrative and intellectual pursuits to defend their claims to commercial, political, and military activity in the Saharan West and Western Sahel. This chapter situated these local discourses about social difference, religious knowledge, and authority against political and religious rupture in the Islamic East, echoes of which made their way to West Africa and increased the intensity of preexisting debates about the permissibility of the Islamic esoteric sciences.

112

ʿAlī Shanzūra (the Superb) (d. 1727) went to the Moroccan sultan Mūlay Ismaʿīl for _ the Brākna emir. help against

Part II

Rupture, Consonance, and Innovation in Colonial and Postcolonial Mauritania

3

Colonial Logics of Islam Managing the Threat of l’hjāb _

The subject is a bit “taboo” and the native’s distrust is awoken as soon as a conversation on the topic begins. “Mā naʿriv shī” [“I don’t know anything”] is the quick response.

Pierre Laforgue1

On September 7, 1931, Muhammad al-Mamūn ould Shaykh _ Muhammad Fādil ould ʿAbīdī (c. 1872/3–1966) attacked a local unit of _ _ camel-mounted colonial troops near the well of Tūjunīn, known to the French as Chaı¨man.2 A distant cousin of the more notorious Shaykh Mā’ al-ʿAynayn (1831–1910) and belonging to the same Qādiriyya Fādiliyya _ the Sufi network, al-Mamūn attracted devotees primarily among nomadic Ragāybāt confederation who circulated between the northern regions of the Saharan West claimed by the French and Spanish.3 Al-Mamūn led an estimated 135 men in an assault against the colonial nomadic surveillance team (Groupes nomades, or GN) about 100 km north of the regional capital, Atār, in a desert expanse the French had yet to confidently control as part_ of their empire. The incident left thirtytwo local riflemen, two guards, and three French officers dead; fourteen riflemen, nine guards and one French officer wounded; and fifty camels 1 2

3

Laforgue, “Les Djenoûn de la Mauritanie Saharienne : rites magiques et djedoual,” BCEHSAOF (1935): 2 35, 2. This Muhammad al Mamūn should be not be confused with Muhammad al Mamūn ould _ Ely al Shaykh (d. 1927), also identified as an anti colonial shahīd _(martyr) in Mauritanian popular memory. See “Nebda ‘an al mujāhid al Shaykh Muhammad al Mamūn,” Mojibu _ Jake blog, October 2, 2012, http://ifhamni.blogspot.com/2012/10/blog post 2.html; “En Mauritanie: Muhammad Mamoun,” Bulletin mensuel du comité de l’Afrique française et du _ comité du Maroc (BCAFCM) (Janvier 1932): 672 77, 673; Otton Loyewski, “Rezzous sur l’Adrar,” in Pages d’Histoire Africaine (Rufisque, Senegal: Imprimerie du Gouvernement Général, 1942), 35 44; and Benjamin Acloque and Camille Evrard, “Modalidades, fuentes y narraciones del ghazzi Mutunsi (18 de agosto de 1932),” in Rebelarse en el desierto : Movilizaciones populares en el Oeste sahariano, eds. Alberto Lopez Bargados and Francesco Correale (Madrid: Bellaterra, 2022), 47 80. Pierre Bonte, La Montagne de Fer: la SNIM (Mauritanie): Une entreprise minière saharienne à l’heure de la mondialisation (Paris: Karthala, 2001), 28 30 and Sophie Caratini, Les Rgaybat (1610 1934), tome 2 Territoire et société (Paris: L’Harmattan, 1989), 194.

109

110

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

killed among the GN. Al-Mamūn’s remaining 110 men fled after having lost 25 in the attack.4 The failed raid and armed combat ended with al-Mamūn scrambling back toward the Spanish-claimed Río de Oro just north of the battle site to nurse the wounded. A French commanding officer reporting the incident described the shaykh as having “a reputation as a dangerous spell-caster” and described how, some months earlier, al-Mamūn had called on his disciples to combat the French colonial presence and to follow him toward the oasis of Guelta Zemmour, where he waited for more men to join his planned assault.5 With only thirty fighters responding to his call for armed struggle against the non-Muslim colonial power, he summoned his most powerful knowledge to produce a miraculous event that mobilized new support. One day, following afternoon prayer, there fell from the sky a triangular white rock covered on both sides with inscriptions declaring al-Mamūn commander of the faithful. At least one hundred more men heeded the declaration, bowing down to the Sufi shaykh to show their willingness to fight behind him.6 Al-Mamūn and his men then peregrinated south, asking herders and encamped nomads where they might find GN troops. Ten days into their wandering, nomads guided the shaykh’s contingent to the Atār GN unit outside the Tūjunīn well, and at three in the morning they _raided the sleeping colonial forces.7 French commander Tranchant wrote a month later that al-Mamūn was able to “exploit the gullibility of the ignorant populations of the Sahel with the help of pseudo-miracles.”8 In other words, while the curious incident of the falling rock seems, for the transhumant Ragāybāt, to have reaffirmed the shaykh’s religious and political authority – but did not create their underlying discontent – we see in reports of Tranchant and other colonial officers an emphasis on what the French labeled irrational superstition as a simple explanation for unrest – an interpretation that dismissed anti-colonial sentiment, the actual grievances of a Muslim 4

5 6 7

8

Archives nationales du Sénégal (ANS) 1D 4 81, n. 1347, Letter on the Chaı¨man affair from General Freydenberg, commandant supérieur des troupes, to Gouverneur Général Brevié in Dakar, September 16, 1931. ANS 1D 4 81 9 Renseignements sur le razzi de Mohandel Mamoun ould Cheikh Muhammad Fadhel. ANS 1D 4 81 9 and Loyewski, “Rezzous sur l’Adrar,” 36 and J. Perrigault, On se bat dans le désert (Paris: L. Fournier, 1933), 121. A French military officer reported that such raids often took place near wells since attackers knew that military contingents would need to stop for water. Assailants might also plug the well to prevent their intended victims from drawing water, thus weakening their opponents ahead of an attack. Capitaine de la Chapelle, Le Sahara avant la conquête, Archives Nationales Pierrefitte sur Seine (ANPS) Côte 20000002/8, Centre de hautes études d’administration musulmane (CHEAM), n. 148, 4 mai 1937. ANS 1 D 4 81 no. 129C, Letter from Colonel Tranchant, October 5, 1931.

Colonial Logics of Islam

111

population under non-Muslim occupation, by conflating those motives with superstition. Those who heeded al-Mamūn’s call for armed resistance are thus presented as mindless followers misled by a manipulative mastermind instead of rational men opposed to a foreign occupation and foreign administrative control of their land and livelihoods. Describing Saharan populations as exhibiting a “superstitious mind,” the Colonel Tranchant further suggests that the subsequent arrival of much-needed rain in the region had left local communities wondering if the French themselves did not embody stronger baraka than the Sufi saint alMamūn whose ill-fated aspirations now seemed to lack divine support.9 In a widely distributed biographical sketch of the anti-colonial religious leader published three months later, colonial officials further described him as “one of the most active” “agitators” in the Saharan West and again stressed that this leadership was sustained by the “magical sciences” he reputedly relied on to dupe his followers into believing that colonial troops’ bullets could not penetrate the protective shield created by his amulets.10 Al-Mamūn’s raid – together with the French colonial reports that followed it – exposes central characteristics of the colonial period in Mauritania. It is possible to see the perspective of French officers and administrators on l’hjāb and related practices, and how local populations _ responded to an outside non-Muslim power. Colonial officers’ reports on the raid also reveal how difficult it was to establish a colonial territory in the Saharan desert. Colonial administrators did not fully claim Mauritania as a French territory until 1934, after nearly thirty-five years of tenuous French military presence in its desert regions, where the colonial project had been slowed by the practical challenges of landscape and environment (the challenges of passing safely through stretches of sand) and population (the further challenges of patrolling nomadic populations). In the Mauritanian desert, French and African units under colonial officers defended themselves against surprise raids by nomadic populations in a Sahara often described as a “hinterland,” where hassān _ that groups saw their own livelihoods threatened by a colonial project depended heavily on alliances with zwāya fractions and on preventing nomadic groups from circulating freely so as to better monitor them. As French administrators imposed new controls on the flow of arms, formally abolished the slave trade, and ended customary taxes paid to the hassān to ensure protection from raids – and with trans-Saharan trade _ 9 10

ANS 1 D 4 81 no. 129C. “En Mauritanie: Muhammad Mamoun,” in the Bulletin mensuel, 672 and 674 and Loyewski, “Rezzous sur l’Adrar,” 37.

112

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

effectively ended after the fall of Timbuktu in 1893 to the French – hassān groups especially felt that colonial rule was dismantling their _ way of life.11 Some Muslim scholars and religious leaders, such as alMamūn, were opposed to the idea that a non-Muslim state (France) could rule over an entirely Muslim population. These religious figures argued that such an aggression left Muslims obliged to defend the community by fighting or emigrating, following the Prophetic model. This chapter will examine how people in Mauritania marshalled l’hjāb _ in their opposition to colonization and how French perceptions of l’hjāb _ shaped their response to that opposition. It covers the first half of the colonial period from c. 1900 when the French formally declared Mauritania a colonial military territory into the 1930s when France considered itself in military and administrative control of the colony. I focus on this period when colonizers first deployed a strategy of collaboration with certain religious leaders and then rapidly shifted to a strategy that restricted the physical movements of the men they called marabouts, a loanword from the Arabic murābit (garrisoned militarized religious _ tūn) and employed in French to fighters, like the Almoravid or murābi _ refer to the figure of a pious Muslim venerated as a saint, a usage that often veered into the derogatory to refer to a charlatan peddling dubious cures. These new restrictions on the movement and activity of purveyors of Islamic learning and its sciences targeted l’hjāb as a Mauritania_ specific factor in broader colonial anxiety over Islam. It is during this period from 1900 to 1935 that the French established the policies that would directly shape their engagement with l’hjāb and, via socioeco_ indirectly shape how nomic changes that resulted from those policies, people of Mauritania relied on l’hjāb and its practitioners. _ When constructing or explaining the region’s varying sources of authority, especially as these related to the history and role of Islam, colonial military and administrative officers notoriously struggled to fully understand the complexities of power and the meanings of religious affiliation.12 The French colonial attempts to gather facts and generate useful analysis, what Edmund Burke has called “scientific imperialism,” 11

12

“Peace has destroyed the warriors’ wealth. The era of raids, of lucrative excursions, is over and the warrior has lost his raison d’être, his fortune in animals and captives, since only war could replenish it.” Commandant Trancart, Base et structure de la société maure, ANPS, Côte 20000002/3, CHEAM, n. 1024, 10 avril 1947. Harrison, France and Islam in West Africa; Donal Cruise O’Brien, “Towards an Islamic Policy in French West Africa, 1854 1914,” JAH 8, no. 2 (1967): 303 16; Sean Hanretta, Islam and Social Change in French West Africa: History of an Emancipatory Community (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009); David Robinson, “French ‘Islamic’ Policy and Practice in Late Nineteenth Century Senegal,” JAH 29, no. 3 (1988): 415 35.

Colonial Logics of Islam

113

stemmed in part from the geography and chronology of contact. Colonial analysis in Mauritania was shaped by a pattern of earlier engagement with Muslim populations in Algeria and Morocco as well as contact with populations in Mauritania’s southern territory, people who lived along or moved through the Senegal River Valley.13 Just as the French generated a set of assumptions about what constituted l’islam marocain, berbère, or noir, they also created a category of religious norms they identified as belonging to l’islam maure specific to the Saharan West, which was defined primarily by the “influence of [Sufi] brotherhoods” and “animist superstitions,” which included miracles.14 Colonial officers struggled, not least, to understand l’hjāb – and especially to understand the central function of l’hjāb as a _source and _ demonstration of power and authority. When colonial officers reported on events (a murder, the illnesses of poisoned officers, the presence of a “foreign” itinerant Muslim preacher) that involved recourse to invisible forces, they acknowledged they had little idea how to proceed in circumstances involving seemingly intangible forces.15 As reflected in the descriptions of al-Mamūn and his leadership, the French understood that l’hjāb and its purveyors were central to Islamic practice in the region._ But most colonial representatives chose to portray l’hjāb as a collection of naı¨ve superstitions and focused on individual _religious personalities, not the nature of the sciences themselves. Projecting their own understandings of literacy and books onto West African libraries, written formulas, and secret texts, colonial officers sometimes narrowed in on the materiality of esoteric practices as the source of the power and authority the French were endeavoring to destroy. In other words, the French sought to restrict the activities of Muslim spiritual mediators by physically damaging or confiscating their libraries or amulets. The military administrator, Pierre Laforgue, himself acknowledged how inaccessible l’hjāb was to colonial observers, admitting “[w]e so poorly _ elements to be able to study and analyze them in a understand the rational way … we don’t see [them] in the same intellectual and ethical

13

14 15

Edmund Burke III, The Ethnographic State: France and the Invention of Moroccan Islam (Oakland: University of California Press, 2014), 6 and George R. Trumbull IV, An Empire of Facts: Colonial Power, Cultural Knowledge, and Islam in Algeria, 1870 1914 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009). For an example of a southern focus on the period, see Ibrahima Abou Sall, Mauritanie du Sud: conquêtes et administration coloniales françaises (1890 1945) (Paris: Karthala, 2007). Commandant Ch. Voisin “L’islam maure” in Questions Sahariennes, ANPS, Côte 20000002/3, CHEAM, n. 1009, 1946. For example, ANS Dossier pas classé sur ‘Magie sorcellerie Fétichisme; ANS 17G50 (17) and “Affaire de sorcellerie en Mauritanie” in ANS 9G 86 (107).

114

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

light.”16 French officers were conditioned to dismiss as illogical and superstitious any miraculous event or unseen force, and were thus confounded by the reality that the purveyors of those miracles and managers of those forces were unequivocally sources of authority and influence that existed in opposition to colonial power. To dismiss as folklore, to deny or to ignore the power of l’hjāb carried risk that _ opponents would use its power against the colonizers, but to confront l’hjāb directly as a source of power undermined the basis of the _ Europeans’ own claims of rational superiority. As a result, when French administrators in Mauritania reported at all on local healing or extraordinary phenomena, they portrayed these ritualized practices in two conflicting ways. On the one hand, belief in the transformative or protective potential of talismans and spirit connections was depicted as naı¨ve and, on an evolutionary scale, primitive.17 On the other, administrators perceived l’hjāb as a potentially dangerous _ bridge to Islam and complained about itinerant bīdān Muslim figures _ who moved around West Africa preying on guileless black Africans, seducing them with amulets as a way to proselytize Islam.18 Magic, amulets, and talismans were paradoxically viewed as “animist” preIslamic fetishes and also as an essential feature of Islam in Africa, with the purveyors of these amulets and talismans garnering authority through their manipulation of these spiritually or magically associated materials that they might then use to exert political influence over African Muslims. French administrators saw these traders in amulets and prayers as charlatans – but as charlatans who might have the capacity to foment local resistance against the French. Thus, administrators tried to limit the itinerant hajjāba ability to move around the region. _ Administrator ethnologist Maurice Delafosse saw Mauritania at the geographic center of a new kind of influence that could potentially spread to other French-controlled colonies in West Africa: “For some time, a wind of mysticism – coming maybe from Mauritania – has blown over the Muslim lands of lower Senegal….”19 Mauritania, peripheral as it was to the French empire as a whole, was thus imagined as the central

16 17

18 19

Laforgue, “Rites magiques et djedoual,” 8. See Edmond Doutté, Magie et Religion dans l’Afrique du Nord (Alger : Adolphe Jourdan, 1908 and Paris: Librairie d’Amérique et de l’Orient, 1983); Paul Marty, L’émirat des Trarzas (Paris: Ernest Leroux, 1919); and Maurice Delafosse, Haut Sénégal Niger (Soudan Français): Tome III, les civilisations (Paris: Émile Larose, 1912). See ANS Dossier pas classé sur ‘Magie sorcellerie fétichisme; ANS 17G50 (17). Maurice Delafosse, Haut Sénégal Niger (Soudan Français): Tome I, Le pays, les peuples, les langues, l’histoire, les civilisations (Paris: Émile Larose, 1912), 208.

Colonial Logics of Islam

115

point of diffusion for what the colonial state deemed problematic as politicized and anti-colonial in nature. Steven Feierman explains in an oft-cited passage that the colonial gaps in attention to such phenomena, combined with the secret nature of esoteric knowledge, hinders scholars’ efforts to collect data on the social history of the spiritual: “The particular domains of African life which the conquerors saw as irrational are precisely the ones most difficult for the historian to interpret. The European sources hang like a veil between the historian and the African actors of that period.”20 If French administrators and officers had been more numerous in Mauritania and had spent multiple years at their posts, l’hjāb might _ have been more apparent even to their disinterested, “modern,” and “rational” gaze. Reading colonial reports from the region instead often reveals just how distant the officers were from their colonial subjects, in terms of both physical geography and of actual in-person contact. Nevertheless, the historian can still glimpse a cultural history of l’hjāb through the obscuring veil of colonial perspectives if we read _ the period’s reports and monographs against the longer intellectual history of Islam and knowledge production in the region discussed in Chapters 1 and 2 and then keep those documents in mind as I move forward through the historical ethnographic interviews that shape the second half of the book. In this chapter, French colonial administrative reports and short ethnographic essays document occasions when underlying tensions and discontentment burst into view. Though the elderly Mauritanians whose interviews were essential to later chapters would only rarely describe significant memories of contact, the colonial-era sources indicate that the colonizing process led to the (re)drawing of new boundaries – geographic and political boundaries in the case of administrative territory, social boundaries as related to traditional hierarchies and particularly to the status of enslaved people, and economic boundaries as existing trade networks were reshaped to meet colonial needs. The colonial period, especially after the late 1920s, coincided with increasingly severe famines, with inhabitants thus facing simultaneously increasing administrative and environmental pressures as they sought to sustain their livelihoods. Religious figures in the region often positioned themselves against these changes, using l’hjāb among other tools to mobilize resistance, to _ support their communities in times of illness and anxiety, and to strengthen their followers’ relationship with God.

20

Feierman, “Colonizers, Scholars, and the Creation of Invisible Histories,” 186.

116

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Healers de passage Even prior to the strictly colonial period, we can see l’hjāb at work in the _ writings of European travelers. When Scottish explorer Mungo Park (d. 1805) travelled through the West African Sahara between 1795 and 1797, he was overwhelmed by demands for talismans. Staying among people he described as “bambarran” and coming into contact with “Moors,” Park recorded frequent desperate requests for amulets and protective recipes, which he called “saphies,” a term likely originating in the Arabic shifā’ (a cure or remedy).21 The West Africans he encountered sought out these “saphies” to heal what Park observed were the most common illnesses afflicting Saharan and West African populations – fever, dysentery, and smallpox.22 In the salt-trade market town of Koulikoro, in what is now western Mali, Park was hosted by a formerly enslaved man who had converted to Islam before obtaining freedom from his bīdān master. As Park observed: _ His knowledge of the world has not lessened that superstitious confidence in saphies and charms, which he had imbibed in his earlier years; for when he heard I was a Christian, he immediately thought of procuring a saphie; and for this purpose brought out his walha,23 or writing board; assuring me that he would dress me a supper of rice, if I would write him a saphie to protect him from wicked men. The proposal was of too great consequence to me to be refused; I therefore wrote the board full, from top to bottom, on both sides; and my landlord, to be certain of having the whole force of the charm, washed the writing from the board into a calabash with a little water, and having said a few prayers over it, drank this powerful draught; after which, lest a single word should escape he licked the board until it was quite dry. A saphie writer was a man of too great consequence to be long concealed: the important information was carried to Dooty, who sent his son with half a sheet of writing paper, desiring me to write him a naphula saphie (a charm to procure wealth). He brought me, as a present,

21

22

23

Academic scholars have long debated the ethnolinguistic category of “Bambara” to describe a people in West Africa. B. Marie Perinbam has dated this image of the “pagan Bambara” to before the nineteenth century when various Muslim communities in the middle and upper Niger classified the Bamana speakers as unbelievers. She argues that the French absorbed this association of “Bambara” with non Muslim from their Mandé and Fulbe speaking intermediaries. See Perinbam, “Animist’/Islamized Imagining in the Western Sudan: the Fulbe’s ‘Bambara’ in the Bamako region, c. 1700 c. 1900,” in Peuls et Mandingues: Dialectique des constructions identitaires, eds. Mirjam de Bruijn and Han van Djik (Paris: Karthala, 1997), 101 28. See page 199, fn. 35 for further discussion in the colonial era. Mungo Park, Travels to the Interior Districts of Africa: Performed under the direction and patronage of the African Association in the Years 1795 1796 (London: W. Bulmer and Company, 1807), 168, 248. walha, or lawh in Arabic. _ _

Colonial Logics of Islam

117

some meal and milk: and when I had finished the saphie, and read it to him with an audible voice, he seemed highly satisfied with his bargain.24

Later, a similar incident occurred with another host in Sansading, near Segou along the Niger River, when Park ended up writing the Lord’s prayer on a wooden board.25 Park’s experience provides important information about the place of esoteric sciences in the broader Western Sahel at the close of the eighteenth century. For one, there was an existing heavy commerce in protective amulets, especially those constructed via the written word. As soon as Park’s host in Koulikoro and the town’s chief understood that their European guest was Christian and literate, they offered food in exchange for his services. Park’s supplicants directed him according to Islamic models they knew, asking him to write on surfaces they provided (a wooden board and a partial piece of paper) and, then, both aurally and physically, consumed his words.26 Second, the operative framework was broadly Islamic, relying heavily on written texts and prayers. Finally, as Park indicates, a practitioner who provided these magically protective services gained respect – in his case, the respect of his hosts and political authorities. In addition to information about method and materiality, and the kind of recompense a practitioner might expect, European accounts like Park’s can also help us see the kinds of desires that might be expressed to a marabout, as the French called Sufi religious figures. After witnessing a brawl between two men over sheep horns used as protective tubes for their talismans, Park notes (in dated language) what the talismans were used for: These saphies are prayers or rather sentences, from the Koran, which the Mahomedan priests write on scraps of paper, and sell to the simple natives, who consider them to possess very extraordinary virtues. Some of the Negroes wear them to guard themselves against the bite of snakes or alligators; and on this occasion the saphie is commonly [e]nclosed in a snake’s or alligator’s skin, and tied round the ankle. Others have recourse to them in time of war, to protect their persons against hostile weapons; but the common use to which these amulets are applied is to prevent or cure bodily diseases; to preserve from hunger and thirst; and generally to conciliate the favor of superior powers under all the circumstances and occurrences of life.27

24 25 26

27

Park, Travels to the Interior Districts of Africa, 351. Park, Travels to the Interior Districts of Africa, 307 08. Paper was an extremely valuable commodity in West Africa, limited in supply by the costs of production and transport. Jonathan M. Bloom, “Paper in Sudanic Africa,” in The Meanings of Timbuktu, eds. Jeppie and Diagne, 45 57. See also Lydon, On Trans Saharan Trails, 99 104. Park, Travels to the Interior Districts of Africa, 92.

118

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

For these communities mostly, according to Park, not yet Muslim, writing itself carried magical properties of healing and protecting: “The truth is, that all the natives of this part of Africa consider the art of writing as bordering on magic; and it is not in the doctrines of the Prophet, but in the arts of the magician that their confidence is placed.”28 Where very few acquired the ability to read and write, the skills connected to literacy were highly prized. The ability to decipher and produce signs and symbols incomprehensible to most was recognized as a powerful secret science.29 Also evident through Park’s observations is that reliance on the sciences of amulets and geomancy had real effects on people’s decisions and actions. On one occasion, just as the explorer sets off on a day’s travels, his assistants insist that they stop to activate forces that would ensure them a safe journey. The assistants pray aloud and spit sacred words onto a stone they throw ahead in the path. Park says that the men then advance on their travels confident that they are well protected.30 Park elsewhere reports that, coming back to a village at the end of the day, he is approached by what he identifies as “an old Moorish shereeff” who asks the explorer for the paper he needs to write prayers and geomantic instructions. After Park gives the elderly bīdān religious figure some sheets of paper, the man begs for more from_ the village blacksmith.31 Paper, at the time a precious commodity in the region, was also an essential tool for the technology of talisman-making for the exercise of the Islamic esoteric sciences. During his own travels in West Africa between 1824 and 1828, French explorer René Caillié (d. 1838), in his long-suffering manner, also described how knowledge of talisman-making could translate into economic and cultural capital. The French traveler describes himself as perpetually ill-treated by his bīdān hosts in a desert camp in the southern Brākna emirate, tortured and_ malnourished by his caretakers, until rumors establish his reputation as a successful healer and amuletmaker.32 After he produces a “charm” for a young woman who sought a husband, women from surrounding camps begin to seek out his expertise and offer payment in the form of currency or food. These nomadic 28 29

30 31 32

Park, Travels to the Interior Districts of Africa, 92. Jack Goody has emphasized that religious scholars established a monopoly over writing in an otherwise illiterate population. Jack Goody, The Logic of Writing and the Organization of Society (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), 16 18. Park, Travels to the Interior Districts of Africa, 95. Park, Travels to the Interior Districts of Africa, 101. René Caillié, Travels through Central Africa to Timbuctoo, vol. II, trans. M. Jomard (London: Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley, 1830), 145 52.

Colonial Logics of Islam

119

populations also treated him more humanely once his reputation as a purveyor of l’hjāb was established.33 _ Caillié’s presumed knowledge of powerful esoteric sciences attracted attention from his host community, especially from women desperate to find husbands for their daughters.34 In another case, a frantic mother insisted that the French traveler produce a husband for her daughter – a task that, according to Caillié’s description of the girl, would require truly miraculous powers as he perceived the daughter to be: A girl about twenty years of age, repulsively ugly, clothed in rags, the filthiness of which would only be equaled by that of her person. Her left cheek was covered by a scar, and she had sore eyes. Her whole figure presented the most revolting appearance imaginable; and I perceived at a glance the cause of her mother’s anxiety to get her married by means of a charm. […] I was anxious to withdraw, but could not effect my escape until I had written the amulet required; this done, I fled with all the expedition, invoking for the maiden a man courageous enough to take her to wife.35

To some extent, Caillié’s disgust when facing this young woman shows us the white, European male gaze at work – reflecting that Saharan men and women had different norms of beauty. But his description, dismissive as it is, likely also attests to the harsh conditions of desert life. Because marriage provided women in desert communities the only means of social and material survival, families were often desperate to find husbands for their daughters – and Caillié’s narrative demonstrates that they turned to the esoteric sciences as resources to assist their daughters in this crucial endeavor. They paid Caillié in precious dried meat and scarce milk for his apparent skill in magically procuring husbands for single women. While European observers were often most interested in reporting on how their own mastery of writing transformed them into respected spiritual or magical practitioners, they also documented the status of Muslim holy men in the region. Caillié commented that “marabouts are priests, they aren’t armed and they don’t go to war.”36 Marabouts were immune from some of the insecurities of the Sahara as “the only people not victims of random shooting,” presumably due to the respect they earned by providing their valuable social and religious services, but 33 34 35

36

Caillié, Travels through Central Africa to Timbuctoo, 147. Caillié, Travels through Central Africa to Timbuctoo, 150 52. As translated by M. Jomard. Inhabitants also came to Caillié asking for help recovering stolen camels, avoiding disease, and healing blindness. Caillié, Travels through Central Africa to Timbuctoo, 152 53, 325, and 195. René Caillié as cited in French in Lillian Kuczynski, Les marabouts africains à Paris (Paris: CNRS Éditions, 2002), 15.

120

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

also because they could use l’hjāb to protect themselves.37 Describing a _ shaykh and Muslim spiritual mediator, visit to the camp of a well-known Caillié is skeptical of the expert’s methods (“a number of Moors come to consult him on diverse maladies” and the shaykh responded by laying “his hand gravely upon the part affected, and rubbing it gently, to pronounce a prayer. This important person was the public writer and the instructor of children”).38 And yet the explorer’s observations confirm that a hajjāb could earn a regionally important status because his _ the Qur’ān allowed him to function as teacher, notary, and knowledge of healer: “In Africa, this knowledge is worth an estate.”39 Likewise, British doctor John Davidson (d. 1836) described how people from nomadic desert communities sought him out for “charms” as he travelled through the Sahara. Before Davidson was robbed and murdered on his way to Timbuktu, he reported that a man asked for a charm that would not only bring back a runaway wife but would make her love her husband again.40 Later, four “black ladies” approached him in the desert, each with separate needs. One asked for a charm “to make everyone love her.” Another wanted to ensure that her children would survive and lead healthy lives. The third woman wanted to know who had gossiped about her while the last woman wanted “to be made happy.”41 These requests underscore the recurrent sentimental reasons that desert inhabitants relied on l’hjāb – emotional abandonment, shame, safeguard_ ing the safety of children, personal contentment – and how they understood one might be able to fulfill these needs through the fabrication and wearing of amulets. Davidson’s narrative also emphasizes that Saharan populations sought out multiple kinds of services from spiritual mediators. One woman travelled ten days across the dunes to seek treatment from the British traveler while a boy was sent by his family to seek out camphor for a bullet injury in someone’s foot.42 Davidson denied carrying any of the strongsmelling medicinal substance and told the boy to ask Masʿūd, a Jewish convert to Islam known for his therapeutic knowledge, who retorted that he “had seen a great many Jinns about at this place, and one or two big ones at Agader … and he was sure they had come for [Davidson’s] camphor …”43 With the truth revealed – that spiritual entities attracted 37 38 39 40 41 43

John Davidson, Notes Taken during Travels in Africa (London, J. L. Cox, 1839), 106. Caillié, Travels through Central Africa to Timbuctoo, 149. Caillié, Travels through Central Africa to Timbuctoo, 150. Davidson, Notes, 103. This demand is repeated by another man wanting “to make his wife like him.” Davidson, Notes, 141. 42 Davidson, Notes, 110. Davidson, Notes, 107 and 136. Davidson, Notes, 136.

Colonial Logics of Islam

121

by pungent oil were apparently lingering about the camp – Davidson reluctantly gave the boy some of the remaining camphor to take back to the ailing person. Now cognizant of the jinns’ presence, Davidson’s traveling companion, Abū, fabricated an amulet to keep the spirits away from the boy as he travelled back to his camp. Davidson also mentions the presence of a “book of magic” that he was able to examine after having paid a mithqal and two amulets for the privilege of opening it, though he gives no indication of its contents.44 In the decades leading up to the Berlin Conference of 1884–85 when European leaders would draft rules for the occupation and colonization of Africa, the power of skin color and origin still inflected these encounters and interactions between European explorers and their hosts. Yet, compared to the representatives of the colonial state who would later work in Mauritania, these early European travelers were vulnerable, and their ability to engage effectively with local inhabitants determined access to protection, food, and peaceful passage through a harsh and often dangerous environment. The explorers consequently made themselves accessible to nomads who sought their help for any number of health and existential problems. Davidson highlighted the precarious existence in the desert, writing that the Tuareg people were starving in the wake of famine, while enslaved people transported across the desert arrived haggard and hungry.45 These European men’s own desperate need to guarantee access to food and security encouraged them to take seriously requests for help. That they were consulted much as local religious and medical experts might be – one on one, hearing the expression of complaint regarding a health or social issue, with the expectation that they could provide an effective solution through familiar techniques of prayer-writing and prayer-absorption – partly speaks to the desperate needs of Saharan and Sahelian people to guarantee social and economic stability, political authority, and health in a harsh geographic environment. What these lived experiences of European travelers in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries indicate is that Saharans and West Africans were willing to engage in a variety of methods and with a range of experts to cope with their emotional crises, and ethical or romantic dilemmas. Muslims and non-Muslims alike approached Mungo Park assuming that his literacy skills could act as powerful magic when ingested or absorbed through recitation. Muslim Saharans asked John Davidson to use his Western medical training to heal their illnesses and

44

Davidson, Notes, 137.

45

Davidson, Notes, 100.

122

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

his foreign knowledge as a Christian European to fabricate amulets for love and protection. These accounts highlight the multireligious nature of the Saharan West at the time, where Jews, Muslims, and animists routinely encountered each other.46 If the locally available therapeutic options proved ineffective or expensive, desperate people turned to other available options, hoping that they just might find a solution. The European travelers were accessible. They stayed in the camps of Saharan nomads and in huts provided by Sahelian agriculturalists. And in exchange for food and shelter, they were willing to consider prescribing a solution to the various conundrums afflicting men and women of all social stations in life. Muslim scholars might have distinguished between the permissibility of specific therapeutic knowledge and methods – for example, allowing for the use of amulets only if they contained Qur’anic verses written on papers slipped inside – but these accounts show that ordinary people were more focused on finding a practical remedy for what ailed them, no matter the religious identity or knowledge of the purveyor. These accounts, dating to the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries before formal colonization, are useful in offering descriptions outside of administrative or military contexts. Contrary to the official colonial documentation produced later by French military and administrators, these accounts offer glimpses of the technology and practices of the esoteric sciences – from lettrism to spitting to the ingestion of ink infused with the magic of literacy to amulets – and a sense of what the region’s people hoped to achieve by turning to these methods – from finding lost things to achieving love to ensuring the safety of children. The solitary European travelers were open to entertaining the requests of Saharan men and women in a way that later colonial military officers and administrative officials would not be. In part, the difference was one of actual power – the explorer’s vulnerability against the administrators’ comparative support and resources as representatives of the state. And in part it was a difference emerging from the colonizing representatives’ wish to sustain power. As imperial agents, French colonial officials had an interest in portraying l’hjāb as superstition, evidence of the “backwardness” in the people they_ hoped to keep under French administrative control. The Saharan and Sahelian people’s belief in l’hjāb – perceived or _ reconstructed by the French as irrationality – justified the colonial endeavor and its supposed civilizing mission.

46

Davidson especially includes reference to Jewish communities and individuals he met in the Sahara. Davidson, Notes.

Colonial Logics of Islam

123

Colonialism on the Margins of Empire The decades of the 1870s, 1880s, and 1890s were a period of aggressive French colonial conquest (Map 3.1). The colonizing project culminated in 1895 when the French formalized their military occupation of West Africa under the administrative rubric of the Afrique-Occidentale française (AOF) territories, controlled by the office of a colonial governor (gouverneur général). When the colonial regime designated the territory north of the Senegal River “Mauritanie occidentale” in 1899, this naming revealed who the colonizers understood to be the predominant social group in the region – les Maures – or, as one colonial officer wrote, the “unstable, restless, vagabond, independent, disorderly camp where chiefs rule through force and follow the powerless marabouts and the waves of tributary [groups] and oppressed slaves.”47 Mauritania is unique among former AOF territories in that parts of its population successfully resisted French control until the 1930s, when the territory ultimately did become a colony. The French administrative presence was limited in the region for two primary reasons. First, intense local opposition to foreign occupation – expressed by groups of warriors who led camel-mounted armed attacks and charismatic spiritual practitioners who manifested their power and authority through miraculous acts and successful invocation of the esoteric sciences – made the French wary of insisting on direct administration of the territory and, second, the region offered little of economic interest to the métropole. This contingent commitment to the colonizing project in Mauritania, and the related geographic concentration of French administration in the southern part of the territory, shaped a colonial policy in which Islam – and especially the charismatic practices and practitioners of l’hjāb – was treated as a threat to be managed. _ Early administrative reports outlined the primary objectives of the colonial project in Mauritania as “putting an end to the internal quarrels, bringing peace back, permitting the development of trade relations, and putting an end to pillaging.”48 French officers, then, understood their initial goals as merely military: they would serve as protectors and the bearers of peace to a region they understood as lawless and anarchic, with establishing law and order as the first step in effective occupation and administration. Once these military operations, euphemistically described as “pacification campaigns,” had brought major tribal confederations formally under French authority through signed declarations of 47 48

Georges Poulet, Les Maures de l’Afrique Occidentale française (Paris: Augustin Challamel, 1904), 3. ANS 2G6 5, “Document no. 4,” Mauritanie rapports politiques trimestriels, 1906.

124

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Map 3.1 Colonial French West Africa (1899 1960). Map created by Tom Abi Samra. Based on “Carte de l’Afrique occidentale française,” L’Illustration, February 29, 1936 and General Gouraud, Mauritanie : Adrar, souvenirs d’un africain (Paris: Pilon, 1945).

submission, officers optimistically hoped for a more subdued Sahara that, while not necessarily profitable, would at least be governable. France claimed Mauritania without investing itself in this ownership as it had in other colonies, where the mission civilisatrice and mise en

Colonial Logics of Islam

125

valeur campaigns encouraged heavy investment in infrastructure building, education, and a centralized bureaucratic system.49 The fact that Saint-Louis in Senegal, situated south of the Senegal River and far from the majority of Saharan nomads, remained the administrative capital of Mauritania until 1957 underlined the French reluctance to invest in its Mauritanian territory.50 Maintaining the administrative capital in Saint-Louis also meant that the majority sedentary populations who lived in proximity to the Senegal River (and, thus, the seat of colonial administrative power) were initially in more significant contact with colonial officers and policy than were the nomadic bīdān and hrātīn _ populations, who generally lived further to the north and_ east and_ thus outside of the immediate purview of colonial officers. Colonial military and administrative posts were established earlier and more permanently in the region that became southern Mauritania, permitting a degree of state surveillance and investment in institutional structures there that remained impossible in the desert, where the population was more sparse and also more mobile.51 In Mauritania, Islam was perceived as a complicating factor at best, and at worst, a spreading virus. The French viewed the region as one of transition between what they saw as the Islamic north and the more superficially converted south that they hoped to preserve, contained and isolated from pan-Islamic, nationalist, and anti-French discourse.52 Identifying Islam as a “plague,” an officer reflected in 1904, [W]e’ve written about the lands that separate Senegal and Algeria and about the nomads circulating there. […] [For some] the Moors and Tuaregs are the pirates of a prehistoric ocean that everyone wants to see in the Sahara’s immensity with its formidable fanatics [and] savage bandits capable of any crime; we have had to fight this daunting plague as it encroaches on the Niger and Senegal rivers to make contact with the carefree blacks.53

49

50

51

52

53

For more information on the mission civilisatrice and mise en valeur campaigns, see Alice L. Conklin, A Mission to Civilize: The Republican Idea of Empire in France and West Africa, 1895 1930 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997), 2, 41. The French had settled the coastal peninsula of Saint Louis (Wolof: Ndar) in Senegal in 1659 as a trade base, and from there had then expanded their realm of commercial and political influence. See Erin Pettigrew, “Colonizing the Mahadra: Language, Identity, and Power in Mauritania under French Control,” Ufahamu: A Journal of African Studies 33, no. 3 (Spring 2007): 60 88. See M. Merlin, “Afrique Occidentale Française : La situation générale,” BCAFCM 8, no. 1 (1907): 26 28, 26 and “L’action française en Mauritanie,” BCAFCM 9, no. 11 (1908): 360 64. For more on French views on Islam as a political threat, see Harrison, France and Islam in West Africa; Robinson, “French ‘Islamic’ Policy” and Kaba, The Wahhabiyya. FRANOM 1704 Col I, “Rapport présenté à la commission interministérielle du Nord ouest africain,” Mauritanie IV 1 (1901 04).

126

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Desert inhabitants appear in documents of the early twentieth-century colonial period as marauding and wild bandits, with the French as a protective force and the untainted and docile West Africans sheltering behind the barrier the French provide. The vast stretches of sand between colonial Morocco and colonial Senegal sheltered little-known geographic expanses and disparate communities, whom the French imagined either as aggressive pillagers or as peaceful agricultural, herding, or trade communities (with the latter often victim to the former). While French colonial agents considered Islam a religion capable of unifying Muslims all around the world against European imperialism, they suspected l’hjāb of triggering anti-colonial action in the Saharan West and Western_ Sahel.

The Saharan Nostradamus Xavier Coppolani, who spent considerable time in Algeria and came to the West African administration already speaking and writing fluent Arabic, is the colonial officer perhaps most responsible for shaping French policies toward Islam in its colonies, and the officer usually credited with naming the territory, la Mauritanie. Before Coppolani arrived in colonial Mauritania in 1899, the French had primarily focused on subduing hassān warrior groups, with the idea that they could be _ “tamed” (apprivoisés) into working with the French to secure access to commodities. This approach changed, however, once Coppolani was charged with ensuring the colonization of la Mauritanie. Having previously served as a military officer in Algeria where he wrote Les confréries religieuses musulmanes (1897), Coppolani understood the political and economic roles of Sufi practitioners in North Africa, and saw the potential to use Sufi religious guides and teachers as intermediaries between France and its colonial Muslim subjects.54 If these Sufi figures, or marabouts, were to become “agents of the state,” allowed to collect alms and to manage their religious communities, Coppolani thought the Muslim leaders would be more likely to persuade disciples to accept colonial projects.55 As an administrator noted, “The maraboutic tribes who, after our [military] operations, will see our troops bring back herds stolen by pillagers, will be more and more tied to our cause and led to

54

55

See Xavier Coppolani, Octave Dupont, and M. Jules Cambon, Les confréries religieuses musulmanes (Algiers: Adolphe Jourdan, 1897); Harrison, France and Islam in West Africa, 19 37; and Trumbull, An Empire of Facts, 26 30. See also Robinson, Paths of Accommodation, 89.

Colonial Logics of Islam

127

help us in their own way.”56 Colonial policy, then, was to ensure submission to military rule by force (in relation to the hassān) or treaty (in relation to the marabouts or zwāya) with officers _and administrators fanning out from strategically sited military forts to broadcast the power of the colonial state. Reports written during these first years of military rule in Mauritania by French officers focus on bīdān groups deemed problematic after they _ attacked French forces and sedentary populations on both sides of the Senegal River. In 1903, one officer noted that “Moorish tribes along the Senegal river engaged in several attacks. They attacked the village of AliGury … killed five men, kidnapped women and burned the village. On the other side, a French military operation on the right bank was attacked and had a non-commissioned European officer and three soldiers wounded.”57 In the same year, the colonial administrator of Matam sent news to Dakar of several attacks by bīdān on Halpulaaren populations _ south of the river, specifying that one night raid on a settlement left five men dead and the raiders had kidnapped thirty-four women and children and stolen a herd of animals.58 Another officer decried nomadic hassān _ groups as “thieves, liars, deceitful traitors and beggars.”59 Characterizing nomadic, armed bīdān groups as hostile not only to “our new situation,” _ meaning French colonialism, but also to peaceful, sedentary populations helped to legitimize the military incursion and pacification campaigns.60 Of course, there was some truth in these reports of bīdān raids on black, _ hoping to seize sedentary villages that were frequent targets for raiders captives and already enslaved people (who could be sold further into the desert caravan trades or transported further north to be put to work) and agricultural goods to be sold or consumed. Yet, these incidents would also form part of the basis of later portrayals of black populations as innocent, victimized, peaceful, apolitical, and untainted by a politicized 56 57 58

59 60

ANS 2G6/5, “Rapport du premier trimestre 1906,” Mauritanie : rapports politiques trimestriels, 1906. “Afrique occidentale française: en pays maure,” BCAFCM 4, no. 7 (1903), 224. ANS 9G/21, Dossier Situation politique et administrative 1904, Rapport no. 144, July 4, 1903, Matam and Rapport no. 89. See also the folder “Actions des maures sur le Sénégal, 1903,” ANS 13G/64, full of telegrams tracking the pillaging and killing of black, sedentary populations by bīdān groups along the left bank of the Senegal River. _ “La mission Théveniaut dans l’Adrar,” BCAFCM 4, no. 10 (1903), 311. “Afrique Occidentale Française: En pays maure,” BCAFCM, 224. As Pierre Boilley expands, “resistance to the conquest … gave an image of the nomads as turbulent groups, difficult to conquer, always ready to rebel against the colonial presence,” in “Les sociétés nomades aux franges de l’AOF: intégration ou marginalisation?” in AOF: réalités et héritages: Sociétés ouest africaines et ordre colonial, 1895 1960, eds. Charles Becker, Saliou Mbaye, and Ibrahima Thioub (Dakar: Direction des Archives du Sénégal, 2007): 900 06, 901.

128

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

and resistant Islam, compared to the bīdān and Arabs imagined as dangerous, manipulative, and motivated by_ an Islam hostile to the colonial presence.61 The French response to the perceived “Arab” threat embodied in the bīdān raiders was, perhaps paradoxically, focused on building alliances _ the most powerful Muslim spiritual leaders on the model Coppolani with had evolved in Algeria. H assān power, rooted in claims to a monopoly on _ physical violence, was easily co-opted by the colonial army.62 But Sufi teachers and leaders from among the zwāya established their authority by deploying their religious learning through Islamic jurisprudence, teaching, and in miraculous acts (including those of l’hjāb); this was power _ that French colonial officers and administrators could not appropriate. In the context of an increasing French colonial presence and a policy orientation toward cooperation enlisting the allegiance of religious leaders, the power balance between hassān and zwāya, in a region already _ 1860s, began to shift rapidly. destabilized by a severe famine in the From 1901 to 1905, Coppolani led a “peaceful penetration” (pénétration pacifique) north of the Senegal River, focused on implementing his strategy of alliance with religious leaders. Beginning with riverine Kaédi in 1902, Coppolani and his army progressively claimed for the French empire towns and regions previously under emirate or almamate jurisdiction.63 The military commander put into action the politics of collaboration he hoped to pursue and established alliances with Shaykh Sīdiyya Bābā (1862–1924) as well as with Shaykh Saʿd Būh (c. 1850–1917), who made the case for submission to the foreign, nonMuslim occupation of the Saharan West.64 In exchange for the freedom 61 62

63

64

ANS 2G5/6, “Rapport du premier trimestre,” Mauritanie: rapports politiques trimestriels, 1906. Taylor, “Les frontières coloniales et leur imposition dans la vallée du fleuve Sénégal, 1855 1871,” in Histoire et politique dans la vallée du fleuve Sénégal: Mauritanie. Hiérarchies, échanges, colonisation et violences politiques, VIIIe XXIe siècle, eds. Mariella Villasante Cervello, Raymond Taylor, and Christophe de Beauvais (Paris: L’Harmattan, 2017), 295 320, 302. Boubrik cites the French governor general in 1907 to this effect: “The warrior groups will still be longtime enemies because they understand clearly that our domination will be the ruin of their two means of existence: pillaging sedentary groups and the trade in slaves,” in Boubrik, Saints et société, 149. Coppolani’s forces brought the Trārza and Brākna regions under effective military control between 1902 and 1903 and the region of M’Būt from 1903 to 1904, and he claimed Mauritania as an administrative unit distinct from Senegal in 1904. After Coppolani’s death, the Tagānt (1905), Kīffa (1906), the Adrār (1908), and Tīshīt (1912) all fell under the jurisdiction of the AOF. Yahya ould al Bara, “Les théologiens mauritaniens face au colonialisme français: Étude de fatwa s de jurisprudence musulmane,” in Le temps des marabouts: Itinéraires et stratégies islamiques en Afrique occidentale française v. 1880 1960, eds. David Robinson and Jean Louis Triaud (Paris: Karthala, 1997), 85 117, 110 12.

Colonial Logics of Islam

129

to travel openly to satellite communities of followers and to collect revenue from their followers’ agricultural production, Shaykh Sīdiyya Bābā and Shaykh Saʿad Būh argued that the colonial military state could provide protection for zwāya and tributary communities from raids conducted by hassān warriors. They agreed to cooperate, in part, because _ rule as unavoidable as long as the Muslim community of they saw French the Sahara remained fragmented and militarily weak.65 Moreover, because their specific communities were located in the southern regions of the territory (where the French were more active prior to their push north toward the Adrār), these Sufi leaders had more frequent contact with colonial military and administrators than did their northern counterparts. During this time of great instability, religious leaders negotiated geographic proximity and established positions of accommodation or opposition in relation to the French (and in relation to other spiritual leaders). And, in doing so, they wielded the vocabulary of l’hjāb: claiming esoteric _ spiritual power under the umbrella of Islam, or making counter-claims 66 and accusations of sihr against other Sufi leaders. When Shaykh Saʿd _ himself as a purveyor of Islamic knowledge in the Būh moved to establish Trārza, his arrival in the village of Nimjāt sparked hostility from the _ existing religious figures in the village’s environs, some of whom accused this Sufi shaykh of sihr. Some went so far as to urge the Trārza emir, Sīdī _ hbīb (d. 1871), to murder Shaykh Saʿd Būh. As Muhammad ould La _ _ Rahal Boubrik rationalizes, “the term of sorcerer attributed to Saʿd Būh by scholars is an attempt to situate him in a profane symbolic field and therefore to exclude him from religious legitimacy.”67 After learning that Saʿd Būh was the son of Muhammad al-Fādil al-Qalqamī (d. 1869), a _ own branch _of the Qādiriyya Sufi path, scholar who had established his known as the Fādiliyya, the emir acquiesced to the newly arrived Sufi _ settle in the Trārza region. scholar’s request to Prominent religious leaders based further to the north but who shared ancestry with Shaykh Saʿd Būh were notoriously some of the most hostile to accommodating the colonization of their lands. As his name indicates, 65

66 67

For more on Shyūkh Sīdiyya Bābā (of Būtilimīt) and Saʿd Būh (of Nimjāt), see Robinson, _ gestion d’une Paths of Accommodation, 161 93; Boubrik, “Fondateur et héritiers: la succession confrérique (Mauritanie),” CEA 159 (2000): 433 65 and Deddould ould Abdellah, “Guerre sainte ou sédition blâmable? Nasiha de shaikh Sa’d Bu contre le jihad de son frère shaikh Ma al Ainin,” in Temps des Marabouts, eds. Robinson and Triaud, 119 53. Ould Abdallah, “Guerre sainte ou sédition blâmable?” and Ould al Bara, “Les théologiens mauritaniens.” The emir refused to kill Saʿd Būh, citing his respect for Muhammad Fādil as the reason. _ _ Ould Abdallah, “Guerre sainte,” 124.

130

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Muhammad al-Mamūn ould Shaykh Muhammed Fadil ould ʿAbīdī _ attack against the French opened this _ chapter, was _ a part of the whose larger Fādiliyya network of spiritual mediators. As descendants of _ Fādil, these teachers and scholars inherited his dedication Muhammad _ _ as well as his propensity for miraculous acts and a to religious study mystical insight that allowed them to “read” people’s thoughts and to see through hard surfaces.68 Saʿd Būh’s older brother, Shaykh Mā’ alʿAynayn (1838–1910) was reputed to be the most well-versed of the brothers in the Islamic esoteric sciences. Mā’ al-ʿAynayn had studied in his father’s mahādra, known for its rituals of dance, trance, and dhikr.69 _ _pilgrimage to Mecca twice, this shaykh “of tears” (mā’ Undertaking the al-ʿaynayn translates to “water of the two eyes” and “water of the two wells” and hints at a reputation for miracles that sustained his followers’ access to key desert resources) established his own community of disciples and followers in the largely uninhabited desert space of Sāqiya al-Hamrā’ in the very northern tip of what would become Mauritania, at the _southern edge of the Western Sahara. Just before 1900, Mā’ al-ʿAynayn began construction on a town of Islamic learning, Smāra, which would eventually be home to his library and a rumored 10,000 disciples.70 Known for his deep knowledge of l’hjāb, this Sufi master wrapped _ head and around his body so himself in yards of fabric piled high on his that only his eyes peered out at the many people who came seeking his baraka and skills of healing and protecting.71 A sartorial norm passed down from his father, these turbans were said to make their wearer invisible when paired with an amulet whose contents were protected by secrecy. Mā’ al-ʿAynayn engaged with the esoteric for the good of his community of disciples – providing them the means to kill enemies, solving a conflict arising over the death of a camel, protecting his camp from flash floods, and punishing theft through tazzuba.72 In poetry 68

69 70 71

72

The primary reference for Muhammad Fādil is Boubrik’s Saints et société. Fādil’s mother _ to perform _ _ was known for her own ability miracles. Reputations for extraordinary spiritual capabilities were understood to travel through the bloodline. See Boubrik, Saints et société, 68. A great great grand daughter of Fādil performed this miraculous act of “sight” (al nazra) in the village of Tungād in 2011._ _ Boubrik, Saints et société, 82. H.T. Norris, “Shaykh Ma’ al ʿAynayn al Qalqami in the Folk Literature of the Spanish Sahara I,” BSOAS 31, no. 1 (1968): 113 36, 117. ANRIM E1/102, Correspondances des agents du Maroc en Mauritanie, and FRANOM 75 APOM 7 Randau, “Rapport à Gouverneur Général sur la situation présente de l’Islam dans nos possessions de l’ouest Africain,” 1 juillet 1907. Camille Douls, “Voyage d’exploration à travers le Sahara occidental et le sud marocain,” Bulletin de la Société de Géographie IV (1888): 437 80 and Douls, Cinq mois chez les maures nomades du Sahara occidental (Paris: Hachette, 1887), 142. Mā’ al ʿAynayn punished a hassān chief after his warriors stole camels from the shaykh’s camp by magically making _

Colonial Logics of Islam

131

recited in his honor, the scholar was remembered to have set a party of camel thieves on fire, and he punished one man by shriveling half of his body until he died, while another expired when his stomach simply swelled to the point of bursting as retribution for his impertinence to the desert shaykh.73 As French ethnographer-administrator Paul Marty (1882–1938) described, They say that he was an expert in the practices of sorcery probably learned in the Hawd [in southeast Mauritania] in contact with the blacks; and that he even _ _ a treatise on this subject whose copies his contemporary descendants want wrote to destroy. They credit him with supernatural powers, like releasing at will voracious locusts on the plains of the Hawd and Gharb (Morocco).74 _ _

Marty’s description is typical of colonial-era French explanations of l’hjāb, categorizing this knowledge as “sorcery” and identifying it racially _ non-Arab inhabitants of West Africa. Puzzling here is the claim that with the shaykh’s descendants sought to dispose of one of his texts for contents related purportedly to sorcery, since as a son of Muhammed Fadil _ _ he would have been well-trained in l’hjāb and not sihr. A possible explan_ _ ation might be that Mā’ al-ʿAynayn’s disciples sought to protect his reputation from accusations of sihr by rival Sufi communities who sought _ to discredit the saint and his legacy. According to French administrators, the shaykh’s library contained religious texts dealing with both the exoteric and esoteric sciences of Islam. Mā’ al-ʿAynayn openly provided instructions on l’hjāb in the manuals where he prescribed correct behavior for both Sufi _shaykh and murid (seeker or disciple); in these instructional writings, he outlined how lettrism, Sufi knowledge, and discipline, and prayer might be combined in an ideal comportment for one who hoped to move through the stages of Sufism and thus access knowledge of the divine.75 According to the

73

74

75

the chief’s head and stomach explode, prompting the warriors to return the camels. Boubrik, Saints et société, 133, fn 15 and 134. Likewise, Marc Botzung retells a story of stolen camels in which the shaykh sets the thieves’ hair on fire as punishment. Marc Botzung, “L’autre médecine : santé, magie et esprits,” Unpublished article at the Bibliothèque al Fajr, Nouakchott, May 2007. See Norris, “Shaykh Ma’ al ʿAynayn al Qalqami,” and Norris, “Shaykh Ma’ al ʿAynayn al Qalqami in the Folk Literature of the Spanish Sahara II,” in BSOAS 31, no. 2 (1968): 347 76. Marty also notes that the Fādilīyya order was popular with black Africans because of the _ perceived reliance on or acceptance of the use of amulets for protection. ANS 1G346, “Notice de Paul Marty sur les Fadels,” 1914, 33. _ See his chapter the science of letters, the advantages of certain Qur’ānic verses, and jedāwil, “The beneficial sayings and deeds,” Shaykh Sīdī Muhammad Fādil b. Mamī, _ _ Naʿt al bidāyāt wa tawsīf al nihāyāt (Casablanca: Dar al Rashaad al hadītha, 2006), 194 383 and al Shaykh Mā’ al ʿAynayn al Shaykh Muhammad Fā_dil b. Māmīn _ _

132

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

French, after his death, important works of “sorcery” were allegedly discovered among Mā’ al-ʿAynayn’s manuscripts, but these were destroyed or carried off for safekeeping by his disciples.76 As in the case of his younger brother, Shaykh Saʿd Būh, the definition of illicit “sorcery” versus licit Islamic geomancy and lettrism could depend on the observer’s (and the observed’s) position at the time in the constellation of spiritual and economic competition.77 From Mā’ al-ʿAynayn’s base in Smāra, the “Saharan Nostradamus” was understood to have “stimulated hatred against Christians, stirring up latent anger, and prepared holy war” and was thus considered a foe of European imperialism.78 Unlike the previous chapter’s Fulbe-led jihāds in the Western Sahel calling for religious reform and revivalism – or the Saharan scholars Ould al-Hājj Ibrāhīm and Ould Būna who called on _ their fellow Muslims to abandon practices that relied on relationships with jinn, the fabrication of amulets, and spiritual mediators for therapeutic and protective needs – Mā’ al-ʿAynayn was more narrowly focused on the indignity of living under a non-Muslim power. The Sufi shaykh articulated jihād as opposition to French and Spanish incursions into the Sahara. His objective was not to reform local Islamic practice or to establish an Islamic state but, instead simply, to avoid the massive changes in how his people made their lives. He anticipated social and economic changes that would make life more precarious for nomadic scholars and warriors. Mā’ al-ʿAynayn is memorialized in colonial archives as the figure who most worried the French during their early years of incursion into the southern Sahara.79 Locally, the Sufi shaykh is celebrated as the great resistor to French colonialism. He is also remembered as an incredibly effective and powerful expert of l’hjāb. _

76

77

78

79

al Shinqitī, Kitāb madhhab al makhūf ʿalā daʿawāt al hurūf (Beirut, al maktaba al _ shaʿbiyya,_ 1951). There is some disagreement about what exactly happened to these fabled texts, with other French reports from 1913 appearing to indicate the library was abandoned along with Smāra by most of the shaykh’s disciples. ANRIM E1/102 and Boubrik, Saints et société, 160 fn. 52. Hostility between the Kunta and Fādiliyya Qādiriyya branches was well known, with the _ of the Fādiliyya rituals of dhikr and jadhb. The Kunta specifically condemning many _ Sīdiyya, as part of the Kunta spiritual lineage, extended these tensions with Fādiliyya as _ well as with the commercial confederation, the Oulād Bu Sbaʿ, who threatened the Sīdiyya trade activities in the Brākna and along the River. Robinson, Paths of Accommodation, 182. FRANOM 75 APROM 7 Randau, “Rapport à Gouverneur Général sur la situation présente de l’Islam dans nos possession de l’ouest africain,” Papiers Randau, 1 juillet 1907 ; ANS 2G6/5, “Rapport du troisième trimestre, 1906”; and “N. 6, Quatrième trimestre rapport,” Mauritanie : rapports politiques trimestriels, 1906. Francesco Correale, “Mā’ al ʿAynayn, il Marocco e la Resistenza alla Penetrazione Coloniale (1905 1910),”Oriente Moderno 78, no. 1 (1998): 277 78.

Colonial Logics of Islam

133

Le Allah Naagande In 1906 and 1907, French administrators in the southern administrative region of Guidimakha noted among the local Soninké-speaking people growing resentment toward the colonial presence in this southeastern administrative circle. While the local acrimony revolved around social and economic issues, events there at the time allow us to see the function of l’hjāb as a means for residents of the region to express their opposition _ to colonization. In the town of Sélibaby, where colonial personnel had recently reinforced an administrative and military post, officers reported that some inhabitants wanted to move to Ndiao, an abandoned village 50 km away where they could farm the now-fallow lands away from new restrictions imposed by the colonial administration.80 French officials explained, “This population … is bothered by our residents’ presence in their space”81 and added that the noble families objected to the colonial policy on slavery: they saw their participation in trading enslaved people and weapons with “dissident Moors,” and their own reliance on enslaved labor, threatened by the 1903 colonial refusal to recognize slave status as a legal category and the 1905 ban on transacting sales of enslaved people.82 Noble families felt further constrained by new taxes, new limits on the carrying of arms, and new restrictions on mobility that required travel passes issued by the colonial government.83 A Soninké interpreter working for the colonial administration in Sélibaby said that inhabitants of the region were complaining that “whites in their village” were hampering the sale of stolen animals bought cheaply from bīdān and _ had of having to work the land themselves because their enslaved laborers left the region or had been told by colonial authorities they were no

80

81 82

83

French military officers established an initial post in Sélibaby in 1893, only to abandon it for roughly a decade before returning once the territory became part of the new civil territory of Mauritania in 1905. ANRIM E1/49, Journal du poste, Rapport du mois de mars 1906; N. 137 Rapport du mois de mai 1907, Sélibaby, 1 Juin 1907, Guidimaka, 1906 1914. ANS 2G7 (2) Rapport politique annuel, 1906 and ANRIM E1/49, “Journal du poste, Sélibaby, mars 1906,” Guidimaka, 1906 1914. Two measures in May and November of 1903 aimed to restrict the carrying of weapons and the new administrator also enforced new rules intended to curtail movement and trade within the territory. FRANOM 75 APOM 9 Randau, Situation troublée, le Colonel Gouraud, 30 décembre 1907, Guidimaka, “hostilités des indigènes.” See also Richard Roberts, Litigants and Households: African Disputes and Colonial Courts in the French Soudan, 1895 1912 (Portsmouth: Heinemann, Social History of Africa Series, 2005), 5. An officer noted that the former enslaved “don’t want to have a relationship with the families they lived with before” in ANRIM E1/49, n. 240, “Rapport du mois de mai 1908,” Guidimaka, 1906 1914, le 8 juin 1908. Abou Sall, Mauritanie du Sud, 410 12.

134

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

longer required to work for those who had formerly controlled them.84 Residents had already physically attacked a French lieutenant and his successor in 1905; the lieutenant had drawn his revolver in self-defense when the village chief grabbed his throat in a show of frustration with colonial rule.85 These tensions finally culminated in May 1907. Sélibaby’s villagers went to an elderly “Bambara,” who would later claim they had threatened him with violence or expulsion if he refused to fabricate amulets and poison to rid the village of its colonial representatives.86 The man asked for two days to prepare the concoction. He used the delay to warn the French of the villagers’ plans, while in the meantime the disgruntled nobles clandestinely brought a Soninké marabout from neighboring colonial Senegal to accomplish the task.87 The villagers worked secretly away from the village to fabricate gris-gris, or charms, as directed by the visiting marabout.88 The gris-gris were buried in different parts of the town, and a hyena’s skull (carved with the names of the two French administrators and their Soninké interpreter) was dumped into the colonial post’s well along with the hyena’s carcass and some poison.89 When the two colonial officers, local African military personnel, and animals fell ill, the French resident met with force these attempts to eliminate the colonial presence in Sélibaby. He sent African colonial employees to brutally beat the nobles accused of instigating the poisoning and sentence the Senegalese marabout to ten years of forced labor.90 The resident then commanded that all books, texts, and written formulae owned by local marabouts and used for the fabrication of Islamic talismans be confiscated, burned, or sent to the colonial headquarters.91 He announced that gris-gris and the secretive knowledge aimed at driving out the colonial 84 85 86

87 88 89 90

91

ANRIM, E1 49, n. 125, Rapport du mois d’Avril, 1 Mai 1907, Guidimaka, 1906 14. For more details, see Abou Sall, Mauritanie du Sud. As explained in fn. 21 of this chapter and the following chapter, the French and local populations used the term bambara indiscriminately to refer to an ethnic or linguistic category of people generally thought to live in what was then the French Soudan, now Mali. Whether or not this term was used in specific contexts to actually refer to someone who spoke Bamanan or who considered themselves as bambara is often difficult to discern. See also Launay and Soares, “‘The formation of an ‘Islamic sphere’,” 503. At least, this is what this elderly man told French officers. ANRIM, E1 49, Dans la copie du journal du poste de Sélibaby, mai 1907, Guidimaka, 1906 14. ANRIM, E 49. See Pierre Laforgue, “Les Djenoun de la Mauritanie saharienne : magiciens, croyances, et légendes,” BCEHSAOF XV, no. 2 3 (1932), 400 24, 407. After being physically attacked by the African military personnel, the nobles allegedly confessed in writing to poisoning the wells. The Senegalese marabout, Fodié Diaguité, was convicted by a provincial court. FRANOM 75 APOM 9 Randau, le 18 mai 1907 and le 23 septembre 1907. FRANOM 75 APOM 9 Randau.

Colonial Logics of Islam

135

presence would have no effect on colonial policies.92 However, neither the announcement nor the displacement and burning of texts or the formulas understood to be ritually powerful would deter the unhappy village inhabitants from trying again. Six months later, amulets were again buried around the post, the well water was again poisoned, and the new colonial resident and seventeen of his African military officers suffered major stomach ailments and headaches.93 This second dose of poison and protective amulets did not discourage the colonial administration’s resolve to remain in the region but the second attempt demonstrates Sélibaby residents’ conviction that l’hjāb was among the weapons they could deploy against colonizing forces _– and the tension underlying the French position as they simultaneously declared the irrelevance of gris-gris and insisted on the destruction of instructional literature on the practice of l’hjāb. _ the one in the Guidimakha highlight the gaps in colonial Moments like knowledge about the politics of power and religion. French officers knew about Le Allah Naagande, the esoteric methods Soninké residents used to invoke divine intervention to expel the French from their area, even though, in the words of Steven Feierman “they could not make their own independent judgments about ritual efficiency.”94 French colonial officers were still trying to articulate a distinction between religion and politics as they responded to this incident, attempting to suppress an ostensibly superstitious religious practice while claiming that these religious practices had no impact on colonial policy. Even if French officers did not believe in the power of amulets and lettrism, they saw the materials and knowledge that sustained these esoteric practices as motivating local residents’ behavior, including resistance. Though they could never understand why or how the workings of lettrism and other abilities of Muslim experts could be a source of power, they knew that the trust in the practices and practitioners was real, as was the practitioners’ social and political power. And although French colonial officers never once called these Islamic esoteric sciences by their local names, l’hjāb or sèfèè _ (Soninké: “heal”), instead referring to the material objects signifying the 92

93 94

ANRIM E1/49, Journal du poste du mois d’avril 1906: One French officer writes, “I made the chief of the village of Sélibaby come and told him to announce that gris gris do not influence the decisions of the French government in Guidimakha.” FRANOM 75 APOM 9 Randau and ANRIM E1/49. As Ibrahima Abou Sall explains, Le Allah Naagande is “asking God’s help to grant a wish, to call a marabout who will conjure up a curse […]. For example, if one wants to make someone leave a spot forever, never to return. It’s enough for a targeted person to drink water in which the curse’s symbol had been placed.” Abou Sall, Mauritanie du Sud, 408, fn. 17 and Feierman, “Colonizers, Scholars, and the Creation of Invisible Histories,” 204.

136

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

practice of these sciences (gris-gris, amulette, talisman, formulaire), they knew they were trying to govern something that was central to the practice of Islam in the region.95 More than this, they were acutely aware that they were trying to control knowledge that was essentially unknowable to them as non-Muslim outsiders. L’islam maure The first decade of the 1900s was marked not only by the violent death of Coppolani at the hands of a Saharan anti-colonial martyr, but also an important turn in French approaches to its majority-Muslim colonies.96 Seeing Coppolani killed by Sufi disciple Sīdī Mawlāy Zāyn in 1905 confirmed French suspicions of the role of religion in fomenting political resistance – and thus led colonial officials to reevaluate Coppolani’s strategy of enlisting the cooperation of charismatic and powerful Sufi leaders. Sīdī Mawlāy Zāyn claimed an affiliation to the until-then relatively obscure Ghuzfiyya Sufi order, whose followers lived primarily in _ of Awjeft and M’heireth, adhering to the order’s the Adrār date oases unusual prescriptions for clothing style, labor practices, and isolation.97 Because Mawlāy Zāyn self-identified with the Ghuzfiyya, and because he declared before the murder that the Prophet Mu_hammad appeared to _ kill Coppolani, the him in a dream and called him to travel south and colonial administration understood Mawlāy Zāyn’s act as politically motivated through the Ghuzfiyya.98 The small Sufi order then fell under _ the scrutiny of colonial administrators concerned with containing a politicized Islam. Those religious communities, such as the Ghuzfiyya _ 95 96

97

98

Constant Hamès, “Taktub ou la magie de l’écriture Islamique : Textes Soninké à Usage Magique,” Arabica 34, no. 3 (1987): 305 24, 309. For more on Coppolani and his death, see ANS 2G5/10, “Mauritanie: rapports politiques mensuels, 1905”; Georges Coppolani, Xavier Coppolani: fils de Corse, homme d’Afrique, Fondateur de la Mauritanie (Paris: Harmattan, 2005); and Commandant Frèrejean, Mauritanie, 1903 1911: mémoires de randonnées et de guerre au pays des Beidanes (Paris: Karthala, 1995), 285 311. Colonial administrators generated copious notes on the Ghuzfiyya. See, for example, _ ANS 9G78 (107), Annexe au rapport de mission en Mauritanie de M. J. Beyries, administrateur en Chef des Colonies. “NOTE sur les Ghoudf de Mauritanie,” Divers, affaires islamiques, sur les Ghoudfs, 15 juin 1935; ANRIM E1/49, Rapport politique du janvier et février 1908 pour les maures du Guidimaka, Guidimaka, 1906 1914; and Hamès “La Shâdhiliyya,” in Une voie soufie dans le monde, ed. Geoffroy, 365. Descendents of Sīdī Mawlāy Zāyn remember his assassination of Coppolani as “a religious act.” Sīdī Ahmad ould ʿArabī ould Sīdī Mawlāy Zāyn, interview. Louis _ Brenner reminds his readers that Muslim spiritual leaders have historically received messages in visions from God or the Prophet Muhammad. Sīdī Mawlāy Zāyn, like al _ Hajj ʿUmar Tāll and Uthman don Fodio, also received his call to holy war through a vision. See Brenner, Controlling Knowledge: Religion, Power and Schooling in a West African Muslim Society (Indiana University Press, 2001), 7 and 32.

Colonial Logics of Islam

137

or especially the followers of Shaykh Mā’ al-ʿAynayn in Smāra, that were depicted as “heretical” by other Muslims or whose leaders expressed opposition to French rule appear often in the colonial archive as potentially problematic groups for colonial expansion and control.99 Again, because French officers felt wary of religious practices they could not understand, they were responsive to suggestions from other inhabitants of Mauritania that the religious communities whose members observed unconventional teachings or endorsed practices involving invisible forces were particularly susceptible to resistance against colonial authority. The attack on Coppolani, the recognized expert on Sufi orders, in the Tījīkja colonial fort shook the French administrators’ confidence that they were capable of understanding the political landscape of the Sahara. The following year, Governor General of French West Africa from 1902 to 1907, Ernest Roume (1858–1941), called for the creation and collection of fiches de renseignements, or information files, on colonial subjects in local, African communities who had somehow distinguished themselves as worth reporting on. In the colonial territory of Mauritania, most men (for they were almost always men) were marabouts – a catch-all term the French used for Muslim religious teachers, guides, and judges. The typical fiche de renseignements allowed space for a French officer to note the name of the specific person, his age, his origins, his education, the number of disciples or students he has garnered, how many books his personal library might contain; in many files we also see comments about the general affability or trustworthiness of the person.100 These folders were then to be collected and analyzed by the Service des affaires musulmanes, an office opened in 1906 in Dakar, whose staff would track problematic figures with the goal of preventing them from engaging in any anti-colonial action. Subsequent years witnessed the production of reports and publications aimed at assessing the role of Islam and its religious authorities in French territories and whether or not this role threatened colonial political, cultural, and economic objectives.101 99

100

101

Because these Sufi orders and their leaders turn up frequently in colonial reports, they have often been the subject of academic research. See Soares, Islam and the Prayer Economy; Hanretta, Islam and Social Change in French West Africa; Robinson, Paths of Accommodation; Harrison, France and Islam in West Africa. See ANS 15G/103, “Fiches de renseignements,” Affaires musulmanes, 1903 1914; ANS 9G/40 Fiches de Renseignements, Baie du Lévrier, Brackna, 1911 1913; ANRIM E1/46, Les Marabouts du Guidimaka, 1912; and ANS 10G/12 (107), Haute Volta correspondance au sujet des marabouts, fiches bibliographiques des marabouts influents, 1922 1923 for examples of the kinds of information collected in these colonial administrative forms. ANS 12G/18 Surveillance de la zone saharienne, 1916 1920, Rapport trimestriel no. 2223, 1920; ANS 7D16/89, Gardes méharistes, Mauritanie, lettres 1926 1933; ANS 7D/28, Rapport no. 2306, 30 octobre 1939, Réorganisation des méharistes.

138

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

The surveillance format of the fiches de renseignements – organized around specific African individuals – reflected or shaped, as Christopher Harrison states, “the growing administrative preoccupation with the personalities rather than the structures of West African Islam.”102 Harkening back to historical memories of militarized jihāds of yore launched by Fulbe leaders Al-Hājj ʿUmar Tāll, Uthman don Fodio, and bīdān Nāsir _ _ _ al-Dīn, French administrators also assumed, as Sean Hanretta writes, that 103 Reflecting on “religious activity was by definition a political matter.” the 1908 events in Sélibaby, a French officer noted that “the influence of marabouts is such in this region that a native doesn’t hesitate to spend sometimes enormous amounts [on the marabout] to avoid paying his taxes to France. This maraboutic influence also serves to provide worrisome advice, advice to rebel against our authority.”104 When compared to neighboring French colonies such as Morocco, Algeria, or Senegal, where plans for social engineering in welfare, hygiene, and urban development meant a greater production of documents describing these facets of daily life, the colonial archive for Mauritania is relatively limited. However, as Edmund Burke and Ellen Amster have written in regard to the construction of a “Moroccan Islam,” and as George Trumbull has explored in positing the formation of an “Algerian Islam” in the colonial archive, ethnographic writings in Mauritania portrayed a “Moorish Islam” as a religious tradition that, yes did have a basis in doctrine and texts, and yet was still, as Trumbull writes of the colonial construction of an “Algerian Islam,” “constructed in the absence of science as inadequate explanations of natural events.”105 The colonial administration was less concerned in Mauritania than elsewhere with establishing a well-functioning infrastructure for health care and delivery, but administrators still believed in the superiority of European science and medicine borne out of a particular conception of causality.106 This idea of science and causality, “an aggressive positivism” as characterized by Amster, informed French efforts to push their colonial subjects toward an embrace of “a universal secular modernity”

102

103 104 105 106

Colonial officers’ suspicion of religion as latently political was partly informed by the broader French political context: 1905 saw the passing of France’s law separating church and state in the métropole. Harrison, France and Islam in West Africa, 43 and 126. Hanretta, Islam and Social Change in French West Africa, 126. ANRIM E1/49, “Journal du poste, Sélibaby, mars 1906,” Guidimaka, 1906 1914. Burke, The Ethnographic State; Trumbull, An Empire of Facts. By 1940, there were only fourteen schools (including six high schools) in the colony, with a total of 780 students enrolled. Francis de Chassey, 156.

Colonial Logics of Islam

139

that had no place for buried amulets and magical books.107 As colonization moved from military conquest to routinized administration, knowledge production turned toward the ethnographic with descriptions of cultural and social norms observed by French colonial officers. An early example is that of French sociologist and ethnologist Edmond Doutté’s 1908 monograph Magie et Religion dans l’Afrique du Nord.108 Doutté, writing from Algeria about religious practices in North Africa, argued that magic and religion could be separated, and that sustaining a belief in both was evidence of a “primitive” nature: “the savage [man] does not yet have the understanding of the relationship between cause and effect.”109 Implicit in Doutté’s analysis of “magic and religion in North Africa” was the idea that the supernatural – as represented by amulets and esoteric formulas – served utilitarian teleological ends for people who lacked a scientifically grounded understanding of causality. In Doutté and others’ ethnographic descriptions of Muslim people there we see also a tension between an assumed orthodox Islam, with its own history of therapeutic practice, and a local variant, marked by the social and territorial category of “Algerian,” “Moroccan,” or “Moorish” and reflecting what were claimed to be pre-Islamic “Berber” or “animist” or “black African” superstitions which inevitably were depicted as marks of imperfection. French officers saw North African Muslims as following a more advanced form of religious practice than that of animist Africans south of the Sahara who believed in what the French called le fétichisme.110 As administrator Alain Quellien laid out in 1910: In West Africa, France finds itself in the presence of two different ethnic groups: fetishists and Muslims. The first are, in general, agriculturalists and sedentary, quiet and docile, they are unfortunately very backward on an intellectual level and their civilization is more than rudimentary. Muslims do not have the same characteristics: they tend to be engaged in commerce and are more evolved. Under the influence of certain elements, they can rather quickly become

107 108 109 110

Ellen J. Amster, Medicine and the Saints: Science, Islam, and the Colonial Encounter in Morocco, 1877 1956 (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2013), 80. Doutté, Magie et Religion dans l’Afrique du Nord. Doutté, Magie et Religion dans l’Afrique du Nord, 311 and 313. Amster, Burke, and Trumbull all mention Doutté’s influence. ANS 15G103, N. B11, “Circulaire au sujet de la Politique musulmane dans le Haut Sénégal Niger,” Affaires musulmanes, 1903 1914, August 12, 1911. Florence Bernault remarks similarly on colonial Gabon where “colonialists never recognized the legitimacy of local healers and diviners,” using the terms sorcellerie, fétichisme, charlatan to refer to these locally legitimate specialists. Bernault, Colonial Transactions, 15 and 91.

140

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

fanatical and their resistance against European penetration is sometimes more violent and better organized than that of the fetishists.111

Here, animism and Islam are used as ethnic categories that map implicitly onto French racial categories and onto French notions of political danger. As Bruce Hall has shown in neighboring Mali, officers often appropriated racialized ideas from North Africa identifying black Africans as nonMuslim, less civilized inhabitants of the dār al-kufr, or abode of nonbelievers.112 This long-standing image of bilād al-sūdān, or “black” Africa, as being inhabited by non-Muslims (who were thus, within Islamic jurisprudence, legally enslaveable) partly explains the movement of the transSaharan trade from a south imagined as non-Muslim by Muslims who identified as “Arab” to a north identified as Muslim and legally able to enslave nonbelievers. For colonial officials, Islam was problematic as an ideological force that could mobilize anti-colonial resistance; yet, animism signaled irrationality and deficiency. French commanding officer Voisin presented l’islam maure in just this way: If we attempt to say something general about Moorish Islam, we should mention the broad influence of [Sufi] brotherhoods and significant traces of animist superstition, so much so that as one moves south toward the regions where there is more mixing with black populations, there is a propensity for hysterical religious displays that are unique to the black soul.113

For colonial administrators, a long history of written legal tradition, the sharī‘a, gave shape to Islamic practice and attested to the intellectual nature of the religion and its practitioners. The textual tradition of Islam provided evidence of civilizational progress and reason while anything enacted or ritual based confirmed an atavistic stage of development to the French.

111

112

113

Here, even though Quellien is using the terms “Muslim” and “fetishist,” he is also implicitly suggesting the racial categories generally understood to fall under these terms, that is, “Arab” and “Black.” Alain Quellien, La politique musulmane dans l’Afrique Occidentale Française (Paris: Émile Larose, 1910), 188. As opposed to dār al islām. Countless French documents rely on these racist stereotypes. Rudolph Treanor Ware III, “Knowledge, Faith, and Power: A History of Qur’ānic Schooling in 20th Century Senegal” (PhD diss., University of Pennsylvania, 2004), 261; Harrison, France and Islam in West Africa, 36. Coppolani, Maurice Delafosse, Marty, and Marie François Joseph Clozel, members of the French colonial corps who were influential in shaping French notions of Islam, all spent time in Algeria before serving in West Africa. See also Hall, whose work most thoroughly considers the transmission of these notions of race in relation to Islam. Hall, A History of Race in Muslim West Africa. Rüdiger Seesemann has thankfully checked this tendency to see black Africans as the inheritors of an Arab dominated and Arab generated Islam in “The Shurafa’ and the ‘Blacksmith’.” Voisin, “I’islam maure.”

Colonial Logics of Islam

141

The French attempt to distinguish between a “more evolved” and rational Islam and that which they categorized as fanatical and, thus, dangerous – such as that of the Ghuzfiyya – put them in an awkward _ position in relation to l’hjāb and Sufi knowledge. French colonial theory _ would dictate that a Sufi practitioner of esoteric sciences was a dynamic leader with followers he could potentially turn against the State. This led colonial officers to oppose experts in l’hjāb who did not, in the words of _ colonial project.114 Colonial David Robinson, “accommodate” the agents thus focused on the indirect power of l’hjāb, understanding that _ shyūkh, even as they it was part of what defined the authority of Sufi dismissed its direct and applied power. French colonial officials also saw the disenchantment of the world as a sign of evolutionary progress and one that justified their own mission to civilize colonial subjects who insisted on the existence of invisible spirits and the power of “magic.”115 After Coppolani’s death, Governor General Roume sent Robert Arnaud (1873–1950), a friend of the assassinated officer, on a mission to evaluate the state of Islam in France’s African colonies. Arnaud’s personal papers maintained in the National Archives of France documenting the colonial empire in Aix-en-Provence where they are labeled under the pseudonym Randau, include a collection of geometric squares, labeling one as coming from the papers of the famous Senegalese Sufi Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba (d. 1927).116 Writing to the Governor of Senegal in 1906,_ Arnaud had explained that marabouts lived among “extremely ignorant animist populations … [the marabouts] tend to replace the sorcerer, so powerful among black people … they only teach new superstitions, new taboos, and other miraculous gris-gris that they sell at high prices.”117 This refrain, that Muslim spiritual mediators and healers displaced pre-Islamic healers and witches, also contributed to narratives of “Islamization” since some analyses saw the magical amulet as the gateway incentive to religious conversion among black populations. As shown in the previous chapter, long before the colonial period, Sufi scholars had led itinerant lives in the Saharan West, travelling great distances in search of knowledge and to build their reputations as religious guides and specialists in l’hjāb. But when viewed through the _ 114 115 116 117

Robinson, Paths of Accommodation. Jason Josephson Storm, The Myth of Disenchantment: Magic, Modernity, and the Birth of the Human Sciences (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2017). FRANOM FP 75 APOM 3, Papiers Randau, “Gris gris contre les démons, 06 juin 1899, trouvé dans les papiers d’Amadou Bamba.” FRANOM 75 APOM 3, Papiers Randau. “Amadou Bamba et les Mourides, Lettre du 27 mai 1906 au Gouverneur du Sénégal.”

142

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

dominant French lens – which turned every activity political – these movements natural to the acquisition and dissemination of religious instruction and protective services looked problematic. While the French generally perceived Islam as more sophisticated than le fétichisme, they also feared it as a politicized, anti-colonial, and expanding religious tradition. Administrators lamented the ubiquity of the wandering marabout, almost always feared as a foreign troublemaker.118 This vision led to increasingly suspicious monitoring of Sufi shuyūkh believed to instigate local struggles for political authority or to propagate Islam and/or political propaganda against France and its projects.119 French administrators from the first decades of colonial rule argued that it would be best to contain Islam and to protect West African subjects from its disruptive tendencies even as others maintained that Islam provided an intermediary level of “civilization” between European culture and local “fetishist” beliefs. The 1907 assassination of French doctor Emile Mauchamp (1870–1907), a murder said to have been instigated by followers of Shaykh Mā’ al-ʿAynayn, was later understood as a warning to foreigners and a sign of the growth of an ideological strain of Islam promoting a rejection of “disparate ethnic elements for political ends.”120 Though French colonial officials in Mauritania had worried about Shaykh Mā’ alʿAynayn as an agent of this “force of cohesion,” the elderly shaykh eluded capture by the French and died of natural causes in the northern regions of the Saharan West in Tiznīt in 1910. French administrators had disregarded the depth of his religious knowledge or education and often portrayed the Sufi shaykh as a petty tyrant surrounded by followers who

118

119

120

See Coppolani and Depont, Les confréries religieuses musulmanes, xiii. South Asian Studies has produced a rich literature on the association between itinerant ascetics and unlawfulness. For example, see Nitin Sinha, “Mobility, Control and Criminality in Early Colonial India, 1760s 1850s,” Indian Economic Social History Review 45 (2008): 1 33; Rianne Siebenga, “Colonial India’s ‘Fanatical Fakirs’ and Their Popular Representations,” History and Anthropology 23, no. 4 (December 2012): 445 66. Surveillance activities focused on Shaykh Hamallah (d. 1943) of Nioro du Sahel in the French Soudan (contemporary Mali) as well as Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba of Touba, _ See Hanretta, Islam and Senegal are most abundantly recorded in the colonial archives. Social Change in French West Africa; Soares, Islam and the Prayer Economy; Cheikh Anta Babou, Fighting the Greater Jihad: Amadu Bamba and the Founding of the Muridiyya of Senegal, 1853 1913 (Athens: Ohio University Press, 2007); and Robinson, Paths of Accommodation for more on these notorious Sufi figures. For example, ANRIM E2 folders 10 79 deal overwhelmingly with “Agitation Hamalliste” in the 1930s when the French were especially worried about Shaykh Hamallah and his community. ANS 15G/103, “Note sur l’état social des indigènes et sur la situation politique de l’Islam au Soudan Français,” 1908, Lieutenant Gouverneur Clozel, Affaires musulmanes, 1903 1914, 3.

Colonial Logics of Islam

143

worshipped his every move.121 When France’s grand foe in the Saharan West disappeared, rumors circulated that his library had been destroyed. Although the French may have seen the destruction of the library as a symbolic gesture of political erasure, Shaykh Mā’ al-ʿAynayn’s legacy demonstrates the interrelationship of the political and the religious.122 Shaykh Mā’ al-ʿAynayn’s lasting reputation for sorcery, the recounted incidents of miracles performed and punishments leveled through divine intervention, and his follower’s continued reliance on and publication of his spiritual manuals attest, however, to his ongoing religious influence. Al-Mamūn would be able to invoke God’s help convincingly in his attack twenty years later at Tijunīn – in the episode that opened this chapter – least because of his blood and spiritual ties to Mā’ al-ʿAynayn and the Fadelīyya. _ the 1910s, French policy increasingly represented esoteric From religious practice as a political risk. A 1911 circular stressed knowing more about the marabouts in the colony as a precursor to preventing them from “exercising their occult powers and proceeding in their alms tours.”123 Colonial arguments for restricting the movement of religious figures often emphasized the risks of mobility: a common refrain was that the influence of the marabouts only intensified when they travelled outside of their home villages. Mobility, then, became evidence of political activism and economic fraud: “Each marabout travelling without authorization will be presumed to be engaging in practices of charlatanry, disciplinarily punished and redirected to his village.”124 Moreover, concerned about the “anti-French propaganda” feared to be circulating in the Arabian Peninsula, Governor General Clozel would also ask his subordinates in 1912 to watch those West Africans going to Mecca on pilgrimage.125 121

122

123 124 125

Traveler Camille Douls provided some of the earliest images of the shaykh. See Douls, “Voyage d’exploration” and “Cinq mois chez les maures nomades du Sahara occidental,” Le Tours du Monde IV, 1888, 177 224. Boubrik notes that the French arrived in Smāra only in 1913, three years after the shaykh’s death, to find an abandoned and mostly destroyed village. The library, according to some, still held old books and copies of the Qur’ān, but others reported that the library had been razed by the shaykh’s followers. Boubrik, Saints et société, 160 ft. 52. Colonial administrator Albert Leriche noted later that the shaykh was rumored to have written on the topic of “sorcery” and that his descendants destroyed any remaining copies of the “treatise.” A. Leriche, “L’Islam en Mauritanie,” Bulletin de Correspondance Saharien, no. 3 (Août 1949): 24 40, 33. ANS 15G/103, B. 11, “Circulaire au sujet de la politique musulmane dans le Haut Sénégal Niger,” le 12 août 1911, Affaires musulmanes, 1903 1914. ANS 15G/103, B. 11. ANRIM E1/82, N. 214, Gouverneur Général de l’AOF aux Gouverneurs Généraux, le 6 avril 1912.

144

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

The geopolitical dynamics of the period leading to World War I also meant that French metropolitan concerns about alliances between Germany, the Ottoman Empire, and parts of the Arabian Peninsula led to increased monitoring of Muslims who might have affiliated with some kind of pan-Islamic anti-French political movement.126 The need to protect West African subjects from the political messaging administrators feared might be embedded in religious activities and texts meant that colonial authorities introduced policies aimed at restricting the circulation of Arabic texts, restricting the movements of people perceived to be plugged in to trans-regional political networks linked to the Ottoman and German empires, and in ultimately restricting Islam itself. The French idea of restricting mobility was not just to keep problem ideas from entering or from circulating within Mauritania, but that a key part of colonial policy was to keep problem ideas the French saw as initiated in Mauritania from traveling outside it to other regions of West Africa. Responding to a request from Clozel that colony administrators collect data about their regions’ cultural customs, administratorethnographer Maurice Delafosse (1870–1926) compiled a series of detailed reports on esoteric Islamic religious practices observed in the first decade of the twentieth century and published as Haut-Sénégal-Niger in 1912.127 Delafosse addressed the topic of fétichisme, which he defined as practices neither Christian nor Islamic that rely heavily on the use of talismans and amulets.128 Delafosse argued that such practices were found in all societies and stemmed from “the need for man to defend himself against forces he does not understand or poorly understands.”129 Delafosse sought to explain whether or not “magicians are sincere or are simple exploiters of public gullibility” and concluded that “the magician, in general at least, himself believes in the virtues of the talismans that he fabricates.”130 Delafosse specifically identified a “new and formidable” kind of Islamic practice emerging in the broader region, with Mauritania at its center: 126

127 128 129

130

FRANOM FP 75 APOM 3, Papiers Randau, Le Chatelier, Notes et Extraits de l’Islam dans l’Afrique Occidentale, “Le Sénousisme, 1907.” See Knut Vikør, Sufi and Scholar on the Desert Edge: Muhammad b. ʻAlī Al Sanūsī and His brotherhood (Evanston: _ Press, 1995). Northwestern, University Maurice Delafosse, Haut Sénégal Niger (Soudan Français): Tome I, 19. Delafosse, Haut Sénégal Niger : Tome III, 162. Delafosse acknowledged that undeveloped European terminology did not allow for accurate description of these amulets with their various local specific iterations. He attempted to explain the basic methods of the science of amulets, explaining the transmission of knowledge through initiation and the use of jinn to fulfill a client’s request. Delafosse, Haut Sénégal Niger: Tome III, 178 85. Delafosse, Haut Sénégal Niger: Tome III, 185 and 208.

Colonial Logics of Islam

145

For some time, a wind of mysticism coming maybe from Mauritania has blown over the Muslim lands of lower Senegal and has given maraboutism in this region a new aspect. Until now, this sort of religious reform seemed to be localized in the provinces extending from Gambia to the Fouta Tooro but it seems to wanting to spread to certain Soninké circles around Kayes and it might lead to some converts in the heart of the Upper Senegal Niger colony due to the presence of numerous Wolof and Futanké who maintain relationships with their compatriots in their [home]regions. It seems interesting to me, then, to study this new and formidable kind of maraboutism.131

In this key passage, Delafosse proposes that Mauritania, peripheral though it was to the French empire as a whole, could be the central point of diffusion for various types of Islam deemed problematic for the colonial state. The wider colonial policy of containing Islam was partly shaped by a goal of keeping whatever was going on in Mauritania from spreading, especially south across the Senegal River Valley or east toward the Niger Bend. The French, always using their own label “marabouts” for the powerful Muslim religious figures that local followers called shuyūkh, hajjāba, or awliyā’, saw these men and their esoteric sciences as the very _ means by which Africans converted to Islam. “The invasion in certain [administrative] circles of foreign marabouts, notably Moor” who used the amulet to “quietly and smoothly infiltrate in fetishist societies” was especially worrisome to upper-level bureaucrats.132 An administrator in the Fouta Jallon noted that “Moors and Moroccans” travelled south from the Saharan West to the forest region of what is today GuineaConakry. These Saharan scholars were “more literate and knowledgeable than the [local] black religious leaders,” and they thus succeeded in tricking the local populations with their amulets and of magic powers.133 Professing to be shurafā’ (descendants of the Prophet), these “white” Muslims arrived in the Fouta Jallon, found wives, and multiplied like “parasites.”134 Using the terminology of war, this officer described what was happening as an “invasion,” with some shurafā’ arriving by sea to Conakry, by land from Casamance and Gambia, or from the Sahel with their herds of goats.135 William Ponty (1866–1915), governor general from 1908 to 1915, thought it best to keep France’s black African 131 132

133 134

Delafosse, Haut Sénégal Niger: Tome III, 208. ANS 19G/1 Situation de l’Islam en AOF, 1906 1916, “Circulaire aux Lieutenant Gouverneurs,” mai 1915 and “Envoi de deux rapports, concernant la situation de l’Islam,” 17 décembre 1913. A series of “local Arab amulets, with their translations,” were supposedly included in this latter report but I was unable to find these in the current colonial archives. FRANOM 14 MIOM 826, 7G/86, Mission politique dans la Fouta Djallon, 16 juin 1909. 135 FRANOM 14 MIOM 826, 7G/86. FRANOM 14 MIOM 826, 7G/86.

146

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Figure 3.1 “Femme Maure”. A hand drawing of a veiled woman wearing an amulet attached to her forehead in Marty, L’émirat des Trarzas, 121. Source: gallica.bnf.fr / Bibliothèque nationale de France and Médiathèque du musée du quai Branly Jacques Chirac, 2013 161681. Public domain.

subjects happy, “sheltered from any foreign excitement” since there was no reason that they “should be visited by foreign marabouts, more educated and in general a lot less open to our ideas than our local black marabouts.”136 As used by Ponty, the word “foreign” indexed racial difference as defined by genealogical descent from the Arab Prophet and geographic distance from West Africa. Paul Marty, who, during his service to French West Africa, served in the Service des affaires musulmanes office in Dakar from 1912–21, was considered the expert on Islam in West Africa and offered a more historically nuanced interpretation for this “invasion” of “foreign marabouts.” Writing in 1921 that eighteenth- and nineteenth-century explorers had previously identified the presence of l’influence maure – a Moorish influence defined here by perceptions of race, origin, and also reliance on amulets (Figure 3.1) – in the Fouta Jallon, he also observed 136

ANS 19G/1, “Circulaire aux Lieutenant Gouverneurs,” mai 1915.

Colonial Logics of Islam

147

that the French “pacification” of West Africa meant that more of these religious figures travelled to the region.137 Marty told of French explorer Louis Hyacinthe Hecquard (1814–66) who came across in the midnineteenth century in the Fouta Jallon a bīdān man who used the _ village. According to European traveler’s Bible to dupe people in the Marty, the bīdān man “took a Bible written in French and began to read verses of the _Qur’ān as if he read them from the French text, begging Hecquard in a low voice in Arabic, not to expose him. This trick validated his arts in the eyes of the amazed Foula [Fulbe] and permitted him to sell his amulets at the highest prices.”138 Marty also argued that these “tricks” were used to “Islamicize black [Africans]” and that writing constituted the central aspect of the power of geomancy: “In effect, it’s through writing that the amulet won the admiration of Blacks,” most of whom were illiterate and thus, Marty explained, impressed by those who could read Arabic to decipher and write the geometric numerological squares and recipes for jedāwil.139 Marty included translations of some amulets used to make enemies flee, to maintain domestic peace, to acquire wealth, and to kill one’s enemies. Some of these would sell, he wrote, for the equivalent of 180 pieces in gold and twelve enslaved people.140 French colonial officers recognized that these esoteric sciences, signaled by amulets, were valuable to West Africans, who solicited protective and healing services from figures. These trans-regional administrative concerns would persist well into the colonial period, as evidenced by a 1930 circular sent through the French empire aiming to restrict the movement and activities of “faqir, dervishes and other Islamicized magicians.”141 These later descriptions of l’hjāb in West Africa reveal a hardening of the dichotomy the French _ understood to exist between “orthodox” and “heterodox” practices, with l’hjāb in the latter category: _ Magic always flourished in the Maghreb because here, like everywhere, religions overlap with each other without destroying themselves. In rigid Islam, it’s the

137

138 139 140 141

Marty referenced a mid nineteenth century explorer who had encountered a bīdāniyya woman abandoned by her husband or brother. Paul Marty, L’Islam en Guinée:_ Fouta Djallon (Paris: Ernest Leroux, 1921). Marty, L’Islam en Guinée, 271. Paul Marty, “Les amulettes musulmanes au Sénégal,” Revue du Monde Musulman, 27 juin 1914: 319 68, 321 22. Paul Marty, “Les amulettes musulmanes,” 344 46. ANRIM E2/12, Circulaire N. 192, Questions musulmanes, Tijanisme, et Soufisme, 1 mai 1930, Affaires diverses, 1922 1941.

148

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

[Sufi] brotherhoods that, in making a place for magic next to orthodoxy, attracted those whose beliefs rest on the power of sorcerers and it’s thanks to this mix that black societies could assimilate the religion of Muhammed.142

The colonial state came to oppose l’hjāb as a set of practices its officers _ deemed heterodox because they recognized the power of jedāwil to attract Africans to Islam – and they understood Islam as a political force opposed to colonialism. In other words, while the dangers the French saw in Islam writ large could coexist with orthodox Islam – the danger was not specifically theological, but that a transnational religion could act as a political force – in West Africa, the French paradoxically found themselves adopting the perspective and language positioning an imagined orthodox Islam against an equally imagined heterodox l’hjāb _ of in order to fight a form of Islam they thought likely to foster the spread a political Islam they most greatly feared. The tension that emerges in this chapter is, in part, the tension between the French “respect” for Islam as a monotheistic religion with its own set of written legal codes and literate experts – and its own orthodoxy and heterodoxy – and the concurrent French fear that the religion could unify and empower anti-colonial and anti-French political ideology. Seen in this way, l’hjāb served as a means to prep African _ of Islam. Even if French administrators Muslims for the larger messaging tended to dismiss the actual sciences behind l’hjāb, the opaque became suspect. Particularly because knowledge of _l’hjāb was restricted to _ Muslim experts with a deep knowledge of the spirit and cosmological worlds, it eluded understanding for the colonizer. Exceptional French observers – such as Pierre Laforgue who, in 1935 would publish the third of three articles under the heading “Jenun (spirits) of the Mauritanian Sahara” – recognized that what many other colonial officers dismissed as pre-Islamic was in fact constituent of local Islamic practice: “[T]oday, Moorish magic is exclusively Muslim.”143 Laforgue argued against the dominant French understanding of l’hjāb _

142

143

ANRIM E2/12, N. 112 AP, 1930 Questions musulmanes, Gouverneur des Colonies Lieutenant Gouverneur de la Mauritanie à Monsieur le Gouverneur Général de l’AOF, le 26 Septembre 1930, Affaires diverses, 1922 1941. Laforgue, “Les Djenoûn de la Mauritanie Saharienne: rites magiques et djedoual,” 34. Appearing over three years in the Bulletin du Comité d’études historiques et scientifiques de l’Afrique occidentale française, a journal founded by Governor General Clozel that would support scientific research in what was then colonial French West Africa for over twenty years, from 1916 to 1938; these articles by Laforgue provide the only lengthy description from colonial era Mauritania of the methods and uses of l’hjāb and the _ major families known as practitioners.

Colonial Logics of Islam

149

practices as a group of unorthodox, non-Muslim practices that were restricted to l’islam noir. Drawing on texts from the larger Muslim world, Laforgue showed how the history of l’hjāb could be traced back to ancient _ Iblīs.144 He pointed out that the Persia as well as the Qur’ānic figure of esoteric practices now seen in Mauritania had been the subject of debate in the nineteenth century among Saharan intellectuals such as Sīdī ʿAbd Allāh ould al-Hājj Ibrāhīm, who had contended, as Laforgue cites, that _ those who engaged in these sciences would meet “humiliating poverty and a sad end.”145 Laforgue’s approach to writing about the influences of l’hjāb on religious and social life in Mauritania reflect a rare rooting in _ local knowledge. His articles reference some of the most renowned hajjāba in the region, paying attention to tribal affiliation and the names _ famous jinn while also differentiating among particular kinds of experts. of Laforgue relied on local informants he had known for twenty years to gather information on l’hjāb and its purveyors. Employing translations from Arabic provided by _African intermediaries, Laforgue included replications and explanations of jedāwil aimed at curing headaches, fulfilling a request for peaceful sleep, and obtaining a woman’s love. He noted that the famous Kunta tribal confederation used jedāwil to protect Ijīl, their salt mine, and that women especially sought out jedāwil to conceive children and to ensure their husbands would treat them well. Warriors also used these sciences in war to guarantee success and protection.146 Laforgue realized that the subtleties of l’hjāb he saw had been dismissed _ by other colonial administrators as mindless superstition. He suggested that “[m]aybe we should not pressure ourselves to come up with clear conclusions on this magical science of the Moors that escapes our means of analysis and logic. We really don’t know how to study or analyze this in a rational way. We are not on the same psychological level.”147 Colonial officers could not merely judge these practices as illogical; they would have to accept that the inner logic of a belief in invisible forces might elude French understandings of causal relations. The preface to Laforgue’s 1935 article explained that ethnographic work on these specific “magical rituals” would help the colonial state “better penetrate Mauritanian individual and social psychology,” and presumably would facilitate a more effective management of those who invoked the invisible in Mauritania.148 Laforgue’s articles certainly fall 144 145 146 147

Laforgue, “Les Djenoûn de la Mauritanie Saharienne, magiciens, croyances et légendes,” BCEHSAOF XV, no. 2 3 (1932): 400 24, 404. Ould al Hājj Ibrāhīm qtd in Laforgue, “Les Djenoûn,” 406, ft. 2. Laforgue, “Les Djenoûn de la Mauritanie Saharienne, rites magiques et djedoual,” 11 12, 19, 21, 26, 29. 148 Laforgue, “Les Djenoûn,” 8. Laforgue, “Les Djenoûn” and André Charton, 1.

150

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

into the category of “colonial forms of knowledge production,” emphasizing what by the early 1930s had become an almost unquestioned assumption that ethnographic studies of colonial subjects would help French administrators better govern their territories and populations.149 Not only could a better understanding of local African subjects help French administrators generate policies that would minimize local resistance, but they could use this knowledge of local practices to justify the civilizing mission: ethnographic description of African cultural practices and spiritual or religious traditions facilitated framing those practices and traditions as vestigial, and consequently justifying the need to intervene for the supposed benefit of the people who practiced and followed them.

End of an Era At the start of the twentieth century, for the first time since the Almoravid period, the Saharan West had fallen under a centralized state that sought to make its diverse language, social, and descent groups into colonial subjects. French imperial rule over the whole of the Mauritanian territory, from Bir Moghrein to Sélibaby, technically lasted for twenty-six years. Many local inhabitants lived those decades without ever having sustained contact with the colonial state or its agents. Yet French colonial military and administrative officers encountered opposition to colonialism from local populations.150 Overtaken by a French military and governed by overarching policies dictated by a foreign and non-Muslim power, these colonial subjects would in 1934 officially be grouped together in a polity called la Mauritanie, under an overarching regional structure of French West Africa which determined regional trade routes, educational and administrative institutions, and structures of authority. From 1934 until independence in 1960, the impact of a 149

150

See Gary Wilder, The French Imperial Nation State: Negritude and Colonial Humanist between the Two World Wars (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005) on AOF Gouverneur Général Brévié’s 1931 decree entreating French administrators to collect ethnographic data on their African populations. For more on the role of ethnography in colonial policy, see Alice Conklin’s In the Museum of Man: Race, Anthropology, and Empire in France, 1850 1950 (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2015), 189 235. On resistance to colonial rule, see also Camille Evrard and Erin Pettigrew, “Du baptême du nouvel aéroport de Nouakchott à la réforme constitutionnelle (fin 2015 2018) : Politiques de l’histoire en Mauritanie,” L’Année du Maghreb 21, no. 2 (December 2019): 295 319; Francisco Freire and Elemine ould Mohamed Baba, “Looters vs. Traitors : The Muqawama (“Resistance”) Narrative, and Its Detractors, in Contemporary Mauritania,” ASR 63, no. 2 (June 2020), 258 80; and Acloque and Evrard, “Modalidades, fuentes y narraciones del ghazzi Mutunsi.”

Colonial Logics of Islam

151

more established administrative effort would further diminish hassān political power, while – despite continued French skepticism about_ local Islamic practice and Islam more generally – bolstering the authority of cooperative Sufi leaders. In 1936, the colonial government reorganized l’administration maure, meaning that among Hassānophone, generally nomadic populations the _ would thereafter be nominated by the governor, positions of émir and chef with these formerly independent – political authorities and their taxing authority over other communities subsumed under the colonial state. With this halt to the customary payments that had traveled from European traders or dependent Saharan communities to hassān confeder_ ations, warriors often turned to herding as a means of subsistence. The people most starkly affected by colonialism were the hassān and those who _ lifestyle by raiding were enslaved. The hassān had sustained their nomadic _ other more vulnerable encampments and villages for booty and through the collection of customary payments. French colonial policy ultimately prevented them from exercising this activity and instead favored sedentarization, the enforcement of territorial borders with Morocco and Senegal, and the protection of dependent communities. The decline of hassān authority, specifically as exercised by the emir, _ had indirect consequences for the region’s experts in l’hjāb. From at least _ the seventeenth century, the emirs had depended extensively on l’hjāb to _ and protect themselves against assassination attempts by family members opposing lineages who wanted to usurp power. They sought amulets for immunity from harm when they led their warriors in surprise attacks on unsuspecting encampments. The photograph in Figure 3.2 shows members of the Trārza emir’s entourage wearing amulets, as they would have done for protection in battle or from those who might have wanted to usurp their positions as leaders of decentralized polities. The emirs, like so many other Saharans and West Africans, solicited the intervention of spiritual intermediaries for reasons of health, love, and stability. In exchange, the hajjāba who provided protective and healing services to the _ emirs earned reputations as powerful experts as well as tax exemptions and gifts. The Sīdiyya family and religious confederation were well known for providing their services to the Brākna emirs. The Idaw al-Hajj confederation, made up of merchants and religious scholars, were said_ to have been the primary hajjāba for the Trārza emirs. As long as the _ their physical and political security, its hassān needed l’hjāb to guarantee _experts were ensured _ a prominent role in the political and religious spheres. The weakening, with colonial rule, in hassān dominance and wealth might have meant a corresponding loss for_ those skilled in l’hjāb, except that their services as spiritual guides and legal experts were_ still

152

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Figure 3.2 Photograph of Trārza emir. Trārza emir (sitting front right), Ahmad Sālim ould Ibrāhīm Sālim (r. 1905 28) _ Senegal with his entourage. _ dit Ahmad Sallūm III, in Saint Louis, This _photograph was most likely taken before 1920. FRANOM FP 15 APC/2 Gaden. Permissions from Archives nationales d’outre mer (FRANOM).

sought out by the region’s inhabitants. By the end of colonial rule, the position of temporal authority that the emirs and their warriors claimed no longer existed as anything but symbolic, but the spiritual authority of religious experts among zwāya persisted. Additionally, because the majority of these religious experts originated in the zwāya confederations whom, along with populations of the Senegal River Valley, the French had sought to engage in the colonial administrative and educational system, members of their communities were some of the first to benefit from civil service jobs in the late colonial and then postcolonial economies. The zwāya also benefited from the new colonial order because their herds of camels, goats, and cows could now multiply in the absence of pillaging or heavy taxes from the warriors. Their trade activities could continue in peace and a shift toward a more sedentary life benefited their religious activities, making it easier to pursue scholarship, to offer religious education for new potential followers, to dispense legal advice, and to respond to requests for l’hjāb from _ their communities.

Colonial Logics of Islam

153

Conclusion Laforgue participated in a French colonial understanding of religion and magic that saw religion as reflecting collective needs and magic as representing individual desires.151 French colonial writings about the Sahara and its people reflect the empiricism of Enlightenment beliefs – especially belief in the capacity of science to understand and control the natural world, the anti-clericalism of early twentieth-century France, and the hierarchical thinking typical of early anthropology. Colonial-era observers were inclined to categorize local populations, as Omnia el-Shakry writes of Egypt, as “collective representations of their race with a hierarchical notion of graded humanity.”152 And, yet, even with these obvious caveats and even though colonial documentary projects were explicitly intended to support the colonizing project, the few French archival documents from the first part of the twentieth century that discuss events involving invisible spirits, magic formulae, or poisonous charms also indirectly reveal evidence of socioeconomic strains that were linked to the operation of colonization in the Western Sahel and Saharan West. A recurring refrain in Africanist historiography is that colonial administrators misunderstood or ignored major aspects of social life and the ways that the colonial policies based on these misunderstandings could affect their African subjects. The flaws inherent in colonial systems of knowledge production led to significant discrepancies between the colonizers’ understanding and policies and the realities of local cultural, political, or religious life. When colonial administrators enforced anti-slavery laws, collected taxes, tried to restrict movement and weapon purchases, and forced nomadic people into settlement in the desert, these actions in particular appear to have fueled new tensions in the Saharan West and bolstered l’hjāb as a means of coping with these changes. _ The fundamental incompatibility in reasoning between a local Saharan perspective in which divine forces could effect change and a French view that the invisible spirit forces the hajjāba claimed to invoke _ officers found themsimply did not exist mattered because colonial selves tasked with settling cases where the claimants believed invisible forces were at work. A case where the victim had been attacked or murdered because they were suspected of lethal bloodsucking would often be shelved administratively, because colonial officers did not 151 152

Emile Durkheim, Elementary Forms of Religious Life: A Study in Religious Sociology (first published 1912) and Marcel Mauss, A General Theory of Magic (first published in 1902). Omnia el Shakry, The Great Social Laboratory: Subjects of Knowledge in Colonial and Postcolonial Egypt (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2007), 18.

154

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

believe in the substance of the accusations against the victim.153 Yet in the Saharan belief system, claims with an immaterial or spiritual basis could have material and legal implications. Citing the very real power of beliefs in immaterial spirits, Laforgue had reflected in 1935 on the Kunta confederation’s claims over lucrative salt mines: the group’s control over the regional salt trade was based on their ability to communicate with the spirits inhabiting the mines. Laforgue mused that, if it were one day necessary to determine the legal status of Kunta rights of access to the mines, “it’s strongly possible that these rights would not be confirmed.”154 These fundamental differences in the understanding of causality and the sources of political power and religious authority affected whether conflicts were brought to local Muslim clerics or colonial courts. Saharans learned that French officers did not believe in the spirits summoned by the region’s respected religious leaders, nor in the power or rights claimed by those who invoked them. As a result, most incidents or disputes involving invisible forces were not brought to the attention of colonial administrators. For the historian seeking to reconstruct the history of l’hjāb during the colonial period, this side_ stepping of colonial administrative systems adds another veil to an already secret science. It is not that French officers were wrong in thinking of sorcery and magic as means used to express a political language of resistance to colonial rule, for l’hjāb and sihr could be used toward these ends. Controlling access to_ knowledge _of l’hjāb did give Muslim spiritual medi_ ators the power over their communities that so concerned colonial officers. But colonial administrators and ethnographers were incorrect in thinking they understood how the people of the region constructed, contained, and delineated the forces of magic and religion.155 The force of l’hjāb was not necessarily restricted to the texts stashed away in individual _Muslim experts’ personal libraries, nor in the material object of an amulet. And the power of l’hjāb was not limited only to a few prominent _ diffuse and applied than theoretical. Thus, Sufi leaders. It was much more colonial efforts to destroy the material centers of power – whether libraries, buried amulets, or the experts themselves – only confirmed for the people of Mauritania that colonial knowledge and authority was 153

154 155

The Mauritanian colonial experience thus differs sharply from that in British occupied territories where colonial administrators presided over anti witchcraft trials. See Katherine Luongo, Witchcraft and Colonial Rule in Kenya, 1900 1955 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005). Laforgue, “Les Djenoûn de la Mauritanie saharienne: magiciens, croyances et légendes,” 423. René Bravmann, African Islam (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution, 1983), 36.

Colonial Logics of Islam

155

illegitimate, while l’hjāb as a body of knowledge and practice persisted, _ circulated, and mobilized people into action. Laforgue was one of the first colonial administrators to recognize that practices like lettrism and sand divination should not be dismissed as evidence that Africans “wrongly” attributed their misfortunes or successes to imaginary spirits and forces. While it is difficult to say that he believed in the efficacy of l’hjāb, this colonial scholar-administrator did attempt to understand some_ of the inner logic and history of these secret sciences. Between 1940 and 1960, Islamic esoteric sciences and “magic” appear much less frequently in colonial reports and documents about Muslim populations in West Africa. In these intervening years. French officers, worried about political Islam, shifted away from monitoring individual practitioners, reporting less often on amulets and their purveyors, at least not in the explicitly political terms they had used before.156 During the colonial period, l’hjāb mattered as a vocabulary and a mode _ for sustaining communities in time of of resistance, as an actual force significant socioeconomic and political change, as a means for the scholarly zwāya to advance power, and as a target of French fear. L’hjāb also mattered because the lack of understanding on the part of colonial_ officers meant that the French were paralyzed when it came to managing a particular kind of interaction when, in the social and economic transitions that emerged from French policy – the end of legal slavery, a direct and indirect push toward sedentarism, and new circuits of mobility – people turned to the vocabulary and practices of l’hjāb and sihr as methods of _ the challenges _ managing social change, especially surrounding of incorporating formerly enslaved people into a hierarchical social structure from which they had previously been excluded. The generalized French colonial administration and military cooperation with zwāya confederations and antagonism toward warrior hassān buttressed zwāya spiritual and _ life to their expertise in the Islamic political authority which gave further esoteric sciences. Likewise, the French colonial presence destabilized preexisting social, economic, and political instability which generated further needs of support from esoteric practitioners.

156

Vincent Monteil, “La cryptographie chez les maures : note sur quelques alphabets secrets du Hodh,” BIFAN 13, no. 4 (Octobre 1951): 1257 64 and ANRIM E1/114, “Note sur un jeu de divination de l’Adrar mauritanien, le Gzan,” Lieutenant Commandant de Goum Trancart, le 12 août 1938, Dossier pas titré.

4

Postcolonial Transfigurations Contesting l’hjāb in the Era of Social Media _

In March 2013, Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba ould Sayār and Shaykh _ _ Muhammad ould Abuwāh appeared on Mauritanian television to debate _ the place of l’hjāb in Islamic jurisprudence and in the local therapeutic _ Mauritanian, Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba served as a landscape.1 Both spokesperson for a confederation of families_known as the Ahl Guennar, long recognized as experts in the esoteric sciences, and Shaykh ould Abuwāh earned a living as a preacher. Representing opposing views on the issue, the two men spent the program responding to callers’ questions and to each other’s comments on the nature and permissibility of l’hjāb. _ by Bamba, who rarely dressed in anything but the full cotton robes worn West African men, chose for this television appearance to wear a dark gray suit over an open-collared pressed white shirt (Figure 4.1). Youthful and clean-shaven, Bamba also spoke fluently in Modern Standard Arabic, not once slipping into his native Wolof or Hassāniyya. The host intro_ duced Bamba as “Doctor Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba ould Sayār,” acknow_ _ ledging his identity as a foreign university-educated figure engaged in academic scholarship. With his doctorate obtained in Morocco, Bamba projected an image of “modernity” connected to global Islamic scholarship and contemporary political issues while defending l’hjāb as a legitim_ discourses in ate applied use of knowledge within Islam.2 Modernizing contemporary Mauritania often depict l’hjāb as a sign of the unmodern, a backward superstition only practiced _in rural areas where access to education has remained limited. Bamba challenged this image of l’hjāb as “traditional” with his Western-styled dress, standardized Arabic, _and use of current events as comparative case studies. 1 2

For this specific program, see “Al islām wa l nās al ruqya wa l’hjāb,” BellewarMedia _ page, YouTube, March 8, 2013, www.youtube.com/watch?v=a 9jb1Tgmow. Patrick Haenni has examined how Muslim preachers utilize media to disseminate their messaging. See Patrick Haenni and Tjitske Holtrop, “Mondaines spiritualités: ‘Amr Khâlid, ‘shaykh’ branché de la jeunesse dorée du Caire,” Politique africaine 3, no. 87 (2002): 45 68 and Lara Deeb, An Enchanted Modern: Gender and Public Piety in Shi’i Lebanon (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006).

156

Postcolonial Transfigurations

157

Figure 4.1 Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba ould Sayār _ _

Ould Abuwāh, in contrast, debated Bamba wearing a Saudi-styled role, a beard dyed red with henna, and a white turban in the style of conservative Islamists, with the loose end hanging down the back of his neck (Figure 4.2).3 The reformist preacher spoke in Hassāniyya, localiz_ most commonly ing his identity and position. He argued against the recognized tools of l’hjāb – the use of amulets and jedāwil, or geomantic _ formulas. Affiliated with a political party that has ties to the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, Ould Abuwāh represented another kind of global Islamic discourse, but one that characterized l’hjāb as bidʿa, or illicit _ other programs innovation.4 Ould Abuwāh had appeared on numerous as an authoritative reformist voice on a variety of social issues. Here, he condemned any therapeutic techniques other than the recitation of the Qur’ān or prayers invoking God’s help. Ould Abuwāh thus simultaneously represented a geographically and culturally specific cadre of bīdān Saharan Muslim clerics and a more recent reformist discourse _

3 4

The reformist scholar follows a model set by the Prophet Muhammad, who used henna to _ color his beard red. See “Ūld Abuwāh: man yaʿjaz ʿan himl lihya ghayr qādir ʿalā tahammul masʾūliyyat _ _ _ For more on the balad,” al ʿilm, July 9, 2014, www.alem.mr/spip.php?article4198. contemporary history in Mauritania of groups generally considered “Islamist,” see Zekeria ould Ahmed Salem, Prêcher dans le desert: l’islam politique et changement social en Mauritanie (Paris: Karthala, 2013).

158

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Figure 4.2 Shaykh Muhammad ould Abuwāh. _ television station, Sahel TV, which aired in March Screenshots from the private 2013. “Al islām wa l nās al ruqya wa l’hjāb,” BellewarMedia page, YouTube, _ March 8, 2013, www.youtube.com/watch?v=a 9jb1Tgmow.t. Permissions from Sahel TV.

that seeks to standardize religious practice by denouncing the doctrinal legitimacy of l’hjāb.5 _ Callers telephoned into the program, addressing questions about l’hjāb _ to both guests. One woman explained that her brother had something “unnatural” about him, that people said he was majnūn, or possessed/ crazy, and that she had been told to seek out al-hikmat le-kwār aw al_ magic” (al-kahla), kahla to cure him. She not only referenced “black _ _ using the term to describe color or to characterize the quality of the magic practiced, but she also racially indexed the kind of esoteric knowledge, al-hikma, as “black”, coming from “black people (al-kwār).” She asked if _ seeking such a solution was permitted in Islamic jurisprudence. A second caller directed his question specifically to Bamba, asking him to better articulate the difference between illicit magic and secrets (sihr wa sirr) in terms suggesting he doubted there was a tangible difference _between the two. Another asked about the utility of visiting Sufi saints’ tombs, mirroring concerns raised at the time by the destruction of Sufi tombs in neighboring Mali after the sacking of Timbuktu by al-Qāʿida in the

5

Robert Launay compares cassettes and television as mediums of messaging used in Muslim sermons in “Spirit Media: The Electronic Media and Islam among the Dyula of Northern Côte d’Ivoire,” Africa: Journal of the International African Institute 67, no. 3 (1997): 441 53, 451.

Postcolonial Transfigurations

159

Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and its affiliates.6 Follow-up comments thanked guests for discussing a topic that was simultaneously “important” and “dangerous.” Thus, Mauritanians’ conceptions of the interplay between race, evil, and contemporary politics inflected this recent discussion about the permissibility of l’hjāb in the Mauritanian context. _ Events in Mali aside, these callers’ concerns highlight consistencies in debates about permitted methods of engaging with invisible spiritual forces, with both traits of the practitioner (skin color not least among these) and aspects of practice (praying at saints’ tombs) remaining controversial despite centuries of discussion. As Ould Abuwāh responded to callers’ questions, he relied on longstanding arguments against esoteric knowledge discussed in previous chapters – namely, that incantations in non-Arabic languages, anything relying on an intermediary to connect with God, any attempt not using the Qu’rān, any secret knowledge are not permitted by Islamic jurisprudence. Bamba, aware that within Mauritania his racial identity was stigmatized as it pertained to Islamic knowledge, represented not only his family and their history but l’hjāb in general.7 As such, he was careful to argue for the need to maintain_ the secrecy of some knowledge, comparing the secret sciences of l’hjāb to the specialized knowledge of biomedicine and the military. He _chose the term mushefr, or “encoded,” to describe how the Islamic esoteric sciences are composed of specific codes, only legible to its specialists. In the conversation, he also sought to differentiate between ʿaqīda and fiqh, or creed and Islamic law, seemingly to discuss the difference between lived practice and Islamic doctrine – though this argument made little sense to Ould Abuwāh who counter-argued that lived practice must follow doctrine. Bamba also argued against a kind of “racial profiling” that assumed al-kwār (“blacks”) would practice illicit magic, stating that Chinese Muslims, Senegalese Muslims, Mauritanian Muslims, were all the same under Islam.8 He argued against Ould Abuwāh’s condemnation of jedāwil, suggesting that because such geomantic inscriptions contained only the names of God and some simple numbers, they should not be problematic. He then moved on to address the issue of visiting the graves of holy persons – a common practice among Muslims, and not just in the Saharan West or Western Sahel – by referencing the Saudi religious 6 7

8

See the short reflection by Benjamin Soares, “Mali’s Tomb Raiders,” The New York Times, July 8, 2012, www.nytimes.com/2012/07/09/opinion/Timbuktus tomb raiders.html. During an informal conversation after the television program aired, I asked another hajjāb _ on what he thought of Bamba’s responses. He told me “I’m with Bamba, of course. He’s the side of l’hjāb!” Skype conversation with Sīdī Dieng, December 12, 2013. For more on_the etymology of kwār, see Taine Cheikh, “La Mauritanie en noir et blanc,” 100 02.

160

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

and social reformer referred to in Chapter 2, Muhammad b. ʿAbd al_ Wahhāb who called for the destruction of tombs at gravesites, seeing any burial marker as an effort to convert a gravesite into a place of worship. Bamba acknowledged the long history of debate on these topics but said he belonged to an opposing “big Islamic school [of thought],” referencing earlier Sufi figures, a school of thought that allowed believers of Islam to pray peacefully at tombs and to practice l’hjāb. Bamba seemed _ to be arguing for an inclusive Islam that would embrace local practices while Ould Abuwāh argued for a narrower interpretation of Islamic jurisprudence that condemned l’hjāb as unlawful intercession between a worshipper and God. The central_ tensions were about how to relate lived practice with strict interpretations of religious doctrine that did not allow for the acceptance of hundreds of years of diversity within Islam. Both he and Ould Abuwāh supported their divergent views referencing established Islamic sources to support their arguments. The debate between Bamba and Ould Abuwāh that opens this chapter is emblematic of changes in media programming seen in Mauritania following the opening of television and radio broadcasting to the private sector in 2010. Media platforms in that decade could serve as a forum for expression of continued concern about the place of l’hjāb in Mauritania _ and the place of l’hjāb’s methods of healing and protecting within Islam. _ Local journalists, radio hosts, and television programs provided spaces for the larger public to weigh in with their questions and thoughts, directed candidly at expert guests, allowing for an open debate in the public sphere not possible via written fatāwā, which were inevitably onesided and generated by an elite class of scholars. In the early years of the 2010s, new television and radio stations struggled to fill airtime with something other than the nightly news, recorded music performances, and images of Mauritania’s countryside set to traditional music. Talk shows, commercials, and sketch comedies were some of the new productions broadcast on private television and radio programs. Producers created situational vignettes based on comedic interpretations of common scenes of daily life in Mauritania (e.g., “marriage,” “the countryside,” or “cars”) to meet the needs of these new stations. Other new programs explored locally salient cultural situations, figures, or concepts in organized debates between public intellectuals or well-known political or religious leaders, or in talk shows. Mauritania’s comparative poverty as a nation limited options when it came to production costs and encouraged debate talk shows which were relatively cheap to generate. These talk shows yielded a valuable opportunity to promote public discussion on controversial topics where a wealthier country might have paid writers and actors to create more curated material. Short situational or sketch comedy television programs sometimes used l’hjāb as a narrative hook for _

Postcolonial Transfigurations

161

an episode relying on specific gendered tropes and stereotypes about its experts to elicit laughs from viewers. L’hjāb would appear frequently as _ part of the narrative for short comedy sketches on television, illustrating both its pervasive presence and its ambiguous status in Mauritanian cultural life. In the same decade, Islamist preachers also began using social media to their advantage, broadcasting videos on private television stations, on YouTube, or on their Facebook pages where they provided commentary on the Qu’rān, reflected on contemporary social issues, and developed interpretative readings into lessons on how to move through the world as a pious Muslim. In the late 2010s, one young Islamist preacher, Yehzīhi __ a ould Dāhī, began uploading videos online that showed him applying new method of evoking jinn that was supposed to both heal the spiritual maladies afflicting his patients and expunge any forces or practices deemed un-Islamic. While this preacher attracted interest from ordinary Mauritanians with this technique imported from the Arabian Peninsula, he was also subjected to derision from viewers who found his videos disturbing and full of false claims. The choice to include l’hjāb as an object of discussion or a mechanism for storytelling necessarily _provoked conversation and debate. As we have seen in earlier chapters, l’hjāb – as an object of contempt, fascination, or fear – has attracted intense_ engagement throughout the longer history of the Islamic esoteric sciences, from critiques of Sufism that predominated in the Arabian Peninsula’s centers of religious learning to modernist skepticism about the efficacy of its wisdom. In the opening decades of the twenty-first century, these debates, stories, and TV shows attested to the ubiquity of l’hjāb in people’s daily lives in Mauritania despite its _ (in Mauritania and elsewhere). This chapter uses controversial nature popular media to examine how a larger Mauritanian public understands, criticizes, makes use of, and ignores l’hjāb, its experts, and its detractors. While the representations of l’hjāb in _ the media in the late 2010s show _ Mauritanians challenging the legitimacy of its bases, its experts and its efficacy, these images nonetheless provide evidence of its persistent relevance to the challenges of daily life and its capacity to adapt and respond to questions of modernity. The Limits of Modernizing Discourses Over the past century, the leather-wrapped amulets that earlier European observers described as hanging from every neck have become less common. In general terms, the materiality of the amulet – typically a small, lightweight leather vessel meant to hold requests formulated by an expert in the esoteric sciences and directed toward God or any variety of

162

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

spiritual entities – makes visible an ontology that would otherwise remain hidden. As we have seen, people in the region had for centuries worn written talismans, or jedāwil as the embodied science of lettrism and a public advertisement of the connection between its wearer and the immaterial, spiritual world. In the 1900s, residents of Sélibaby had buried amulets to rid their village of the French colonial presence. Photographs taken by the French in the 1930s show the Trārza emir wearing tens of amulets on his chest as visible shields against assassination attempts. These physical manifestations of divine protection had helped Saharans lay claim to land, reinforce existing social hierarchies, and display political formations. While l’hjāb was also deployed through other _ means – cowrie shells, sand divination, ingesting the Qur’ān or a saint’s baraka through treated water, using a string to measure the level of one’s affliction, or massaging a prayer into a client’s body – it was the amulet that most consistently served as the signifier of these esoteric sciences in the region. The persistent wearing of leather amulets evidenced longstanding popular recourse to lettrism and belief in the power of the Qur’ān and God’s blessings, and showed that Saharans continued to seek out the role of the spiritual mediator and their authority to effectively manage relationships with intangible entities and forces by manipulating both divine knowledge and material objects. In postcolonial Mauritania (Map 4.1), however, it became increasingly rare for people to openly display, by wearing amulets, their reliance on l’hjāb. As suggested by the dynamics of the debate that opened this _ chapter – where choices of clothing, language, and self-presentation signaled relationships to modernity and to the global Muslim community (umma) – I examine this change in practice with reference to the dual discourses of modernization and Islamist reform. Political leaders and army generals no longer prominently displayed their metaphysical shields as a warning and show of strength. The slapstick comedies on television further indicate that some Mauritanians might have been embarrassed to show a reliance on forces others questioned or treated with skepticism, either for their non-modern pseudoscience and inefficacy or because their methods were judged religiously illicit. Some men and women continued through the 2000s to wear amulets around their necks, waists, or arms but under, rather than over, clothing. Parents may have continued to string amulets around their young children’s chests. But the custom of wearing many visible leather-bound talismans generally disappeared by the end of the twentieth century. Some spiritual mediators adapted new technologies, such as printing out computerized patterns of God’s divine names in yellow ink, which they then inserted into water bottles they gave to their clients for bathing with or drinking. One expert told me that he sent

Postcolonial Transfigurations

163

Map 4.1 Political map of contemporary Mauritania Map created by Tom Abi Samra.

electronic talismans across the internet to clients living abroad.9 Other hajjāba recited invocations over the telephone to clients in France or the _ Arabian Peninsula. In some appointments I observed, a woman client 9

Sīdī Dieng, interview, Nouakchott, 2012.

164

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

would be instructed to wrap a folded piece of paper with talismanic writing into her hair before veiling. If they wore amulets at all, most adults would now hang them somewhere under their clothing – touching their skin but hidden from public view. What changed most dramatically in the materiality of the occult in Mauritania was the shift toward even more ephemeral and less visible techniques of merging the realms of the spiritual and the physical. Officially, postcolonial notions of political modernity excluded l’hjāb. _ While the country’s first president, Mukhtar ould Daddah (d. 2003), never instituted an explicit policy against l’hjāb, he did attempt to under_ religious leaders, regarding mine the authority of regional tribal chiefs and the dispersal of power among these multiple sources of authority as a threat to his own authority, based in Nouakchott, and to the kind of unanimous body he saw as crucial to constructing the nation. As the president wrote in his memoir, “the defense of tribal interests was incompatible with the existence of an independent nation state … tribes and nation are antithetical [to each other].”10 State-sponsored radio programs in the 1960s and 1970s, most prominently presented by the well-known poet and cultural ambassador Hammām Fāll, dit al-Mālik (d. 1979), targeted l’hjāb, tribalism, and political opposition as enemies of the _ 11 Some of these programs produced as part of state modern nation-state. messaging campaigns portrayed the practice of l’hjāb as ineffective and _ superstitious, a leftover from some premodern period. And, yet, at the level of the national government, political messaging on l’hjāb and mod_ ernity was not dissimilar to French colonial efforts to undermine the authority of Sufi religious teachers and leaders, so as to limit their power – understood as political – over their communities. Mike McGovern has argued that the “demystification programs” in Guinea during the period immediately following independence from France were an important part of then-President Sékou Touré’s socialist agenda.12 With a specific policy to eliminate cultural practices deemed 10

11

12

Ould Daddah, La Mauritanie, 301. It is worth noting here that when blogger Muhammad _ ould Mkheitīr was condemned to death in 2014 for alleged blasphemy against the Prophet, support for _the verdict was divided largely according to Sufi networks. One Mauritania scholar juxtaposed the Mauritanian president’s political choices with those of the first Senegalese president, Léopold Sédar Senghor, who courted Sufi shuyūkh as a minority Catholic leader. Ould Daddah wanted to limit the power of Sufi authority figures. Deddoud ould ʿAbdellahī, interview, Nouakchott, July 29, 2013. For more on Hammām Fāll, see M’bouh Séta Diagana, “La littérature mauritanienne de langue française: essai de description et étude du contenu,” PhD Diss., University of Paris XII, Val de Marne, 2004, 21 23. Mike McGovern, Unmasking the State: Making Guinea Modern (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2013).

Postcolonial Transfigurations

165

precolonial, “traditional,” and thus backward, the newly independent government ordered the destruction of masks and sculptures used in ritual practice. Touré also worked to weaken the position of marabouts and Catholic priests, fearing the political influence these religious figures might have over communities of followers.13 Ould Daddah expressed great admiration for Touré and, like the Guinean president and many other African leaders at that time, the Mauritanian president contended that his people were also not yet ready for multiparty democracy and, instead, needed an initial one-party state to create a sense of unity.14 Ould Daddah did not implement the same annihilative program targeting the sites of spiritual intercession, prayer, or gathering as Sékou Touré but he tried to convince Mauritanians that Sufi religious figures and their sciences were incompatible with a modern nation state. In considering l’hjāb through a political, rather than a theological, lens, _ Ould Daddah echoed the fears of his colonial predecessors and postcolonial peers who were concerned that religious leaders could embody nodes of political resistance. In Mauritania, independence meant rejecting foreign interference in Mauritanian local affairs but it also signaled aspirations for the development of a nation that a younger generation hoped would invest in education, infrastructure, social equality, and economic activity to produce modern, Muslim citizens. What the colonial administration had neglected and exploited (public services, infrastructure, and colonial subjects), Mauritanians expected their new government to use for the benefit of the nation’s people. But Ould Daddah’s ruling party was far from the only group to oppose l’hjāb on ideological grounds. An _ from 1968 to 1978 called the underground political movement active kādihīn (proletariat/workers), which identified as Maoist, also targeted l’hjāb_ as an obstacle to its concept of modernity.15 Attacking traditional _ authority structures as “feudal” in nature, the kādihīn initiated a reed_ ucation campaign: its members instructed rural communities on the historic inequalities of tribal hierarchy, slavery, and religious authority. The kādihīn’s primary initiatives called for the nationalization of the _ 13 14

15

McGovern, Unmasking the State, 149 and 170. Ould Daddah, La Mauritanie, 263 and 329. Boubacar N’Diaye suggests that Touré also provided a model for Mauritania’s militarization. Boubacar N’Diaye, “Mauritania: The Institutionalization of Military Supremacy,” in Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Politics, August 27, 2020, doi: 10.1093/acrefore/9780190228637.001.0001/acrefore 9780190228637 e 1838. While Maoist in their militant stances against economic and political neocolonialism, the kādihīn denied accusations of atheism from their critics. See their longest running _ monthly pamphlet Sayhat al madhloum (Ar. The Cry of the Oppressed) that circulated from 1971 to 1975.

166

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

international mining consortium (MIFERMA) extracting iron ore from the country’s northern deposits and the rejection of neo-colonial political and economic interventions in a newly independent Mauritania. And, yet, the kādihīn movement is also remembered for having a strong social and cultural _agenda that included a discourse against l’hjāb as ineffective _ 16 folklore exploiting a vulnerable and ignorant population. While the decreasing invisibility of l’hjāb’s most obvious symbols hints _ at discontinuity with practices of the precolonial and colonial past, we also see indications of continuity, as centuries-old tropes of human–jinn interaction were reworked to fit new urban realities. In a joke popular in the early 2010s, Mauritanians recounted how Ould Daddah, a descendent of a family of religious scholars, had signed a pact with the original tribes who circulated around what was, at the time of Independence, the insignificant settlement of Nouakchott.17 This pact allowed Ould Daddah to establish Nouakchott as the political and administrative center of what in 1960 would become the nation of Mauritania in exchange for the constant presence of jinn who would ride the backs of those who moved to Nouakchott. The joke continues that the capital’s inhabitants return home every night exhausted from trying to satiate the ravenous jinn who drive them to run around Nouakchott all day, but never actually accomplishing what they intend. The joke points to important differences between lived experience in the capital and memories of a more peaceful rural existence. It also reveals the new kinds of stresses associated with urban life in Nouakchott: the pursuit of economic opportunity, the difficulties of moving around a city with a poor public transport system, the challenges of navigating bureaucratic obstacles, and the demands of maintaining a family and home in an increasingly expensive place. 16

17

The movement was short lived. By 1975, many had abandoned the kādihīn movement to _ hammad Fāll join Ould Daddah’s Parti du Peuple Mauritanien. Ould ʿAbdellahī; Mu ould ‘Umayr, interview, Nouakchott, July 10, 2012; Ahmed Salem ould _elMoctar dit Cheddad, Ce que je pense avant de tout oublier (Paris: l’Harmattan, 2017); Céline Lesourd, “Femmes mauritaniennes et politique: De la tente vers le puits?,” L’Année du Maghreb III (2007): 333 48; and Zekeria ould Ahmed Salem, “Le prétexte de la berceuse: femmes, poésie populaire et subversion politique en Mauritanie,” Annuaire de l’Afrique du Nord XXXIV (1995): 771 89; Francis de Chassey, Mauritanie, 1900 1975 (Paris: L’Harmattan, 1984); Bonte, La Montagne de Fer; Ould Sīdī Yahyā, al mujtamaʿ al fadfād _ the Present: Identity, _ _ 105; Meskerem Brhane “Narratives of the Past, Politics of Subordination and the Haratines of Mauritania” (PhD diss., University of Chicago, 1997), 266 68. See also Mark Drury, “Disorderly Histories: An Anthropology of Decolonization in Western Sahara” (PhD diss., The City University of New York, 2018), 259 87. Muhammadū ould Meyine and Fātimatū mint ʿAbd al Wahhāb, informal conversation, _ __ Nouakchott, 2012.

Postcolonial Transfigurations

167

Furthermore, the pact between Daddah and jinn in Nouakchott points to continuities in the mechanisms of l’hjāb. Historical accounts from the Ahl Guennar in Tigumātīn described_ a pact formed in the sixteenth century between Sandiri _Marsa Diop and the jinn living in the region, while his descendant, N’Derī Sayār, trapped thieves in circular move_ the emir. As with the satirical comedy ment so they could be caught by sketches on television in the 2010s that engage viewers in a familiar shared cultural experience even as they mock l’hjāb, the inhabitants of Nouakchott laugh at the joke of jinn pestering the_ city’s inhabitants both because they identify with the familiar urban sensations of fatigue and frustration that follow a day out in the capital and because they recognize in the joke well-known regional tropes: making a deal with local jinn as a prelude to establishing a village and settling on what had previously been jinn land, or jinn tricking humans into running around in circles.18 Government officials and actors signaled that a reliance on l’hjāb and its purveyors was incompatible with political modernity _and threatened centralized political power. Therapeutic and protective practices identified as l’hjāb were increasingly displaced, attributed to _ unnamed and absent friends or concealed under clothing and sent virtually as electronic talismans. At the same time, Mauritanians recognized the limits of modernizing discourses that promised a more stable, prosperous, and easier life. If l’hjāb has been more intensely _ scrutinized in recent years by those considered “modern,” “rationalist,” or “reformist,” we must consider this scrutiny in the context of the broader Muslim world where similar intellectual, social, and political impulses operate. Television shows that mock supposed experts in the esoteric sciences and actors making sartorial and rhetorical choices that make fun of their credulous clients provide evidence of discomfort with openly revealing a reliance on these sciences. L’hjāb’s _ users have displaced their narratives, methods, and even their linguistic choices onto alternative speakers, technologies, and terms to be explored in the following sections.

Public Displacement In the 2010s, made-for-television comedy skits drew audience attention to what some Mauritanians perceived as a predatory prayer economy that left credulous clients duped out of money and without solutions to their 18

Sarr, Islam, Power, and Dependency in the Gambia River Basin; Rachel Mueller, “The Spirits Are My Neighbors: Women and the Rab Cult in Dakar, Senegal” (2013), Anthropology Honors Projects, Paper 18, http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/anth honors/18, 49.

168

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

problems. In a humor sketch from 2015 called “A quick l’hjāb,” a hajjāb _ sits cross-legged at the center of an otherwise unfurnished_ room where 19 two thin mats have been thrown on the ground. Prayer beads in hand, paper and writing instruments in front of him, the man wears a simple robe and is further identified professionally as a hajjāb by the narrative _ and sit next to him context: two women seeking his help enter the room on the floor. The women settle down with their purses in front of them, one with her sunglasses on her head over her veil, as the hajjāb explains _ with exaggerated emphasis that knowledge he has garnered in India means he – and only he – can solve their problems. He tells one of the women that, for only 75,000 Ouguiya (then roughly the equivalent of $200, more than a month’s salary for most Mauritanians), he can help her. He gives her a jedwal al-arbʿa (a four-part magic square) on a piece of paper, telling her to fold it up and put it in her bag, and waves his prayer beads around theatrically. She then gives him some jewelry as payment. He turns to the second woman and immediately compliments her on her smartphones lying on the floor. She pushes one toward him, telling him he can have it, and he pushes it back toward her. She pushes it again, and he finally accepts it as payment for a second jedwal, which she also folds up and places in her bag. Other clients come to visit, asking for protection for a son who is travelling “to Africa,” for economic success in a small shop, for work for a young man who accompanies his mother on the visit. The hajjāb prescribes to each client familiar steps to follow, _ to burn incense and put a red chicken head at the door telling one woman of her boutique, pushing a man’s forehead to a rock placed strategically on the floor (over which the hajjāb prays), and shuffling through ran_ scene shows the various clients in a domly piled jedāwil. The final different room, shaking their heads in sadness as mournful music plays behind them. They shed tears, complain, and commiserate. They recount how the hajjāb cheated them: none of their desires were fulfilled, though they paid_ him money and followed his directions. As the young job-seeker laments, “he is a crook” (huwa bandī). H ajjāba appear as preying on the human discomfort with precarity and_ uncertainty; they promise solutions to disheartened urban residents who willingly participate in the prayer economy – giving gifts of money or material objects in exchange for efficacious prayer and spiritual mediation – in the hope of a more prosperous future. Two 2015 episodes of the sketch comedy series called Me and My Uncle, on the al-wataniyya television station, depict l’hjāb in more _ _ 19

“al hjāb shatran,” YouTube, September 26, 2015, www.youtube.com/watch?v= _ p0qY9541uo4.

Postcolonial Transfigurations

169

exaggerated terms.20 Here, the series’ main characters decide to set up a scam business with a man specializing in sorcery (sihr). As in the previous example, this diviner is linked to India, having just _arrived in Mauritania from, as we saw in Chapter 1, the country understood by many Muslims to be the origin of these sciences. Promising people from the neighborhood that this spiritual expert will be able to solve their problems, the young con men set him up in a corrugated metal shack: new clients line up outside with tickets for an appointment with the purported hajjāb. As _ but in in the first series, this alleged spiritual mediator sits on the floor, this depiction his appearance and mannerisms expand toward the preposterous. Indian music plays in the background. Incense burns behind him, and animal horns hang in a corner. His face is painted, an animal horn sticks out of his turban, and multiple amulets and necklaces encircle his neck. His caftan is dirty. He mumbles incomprehensibly and chuckles inexplicably, shakes branches at his clients, spits water on their faces, gives them unidentified kernels to swallow and jedāwil to soak in water and then pour over their couscous. The hajjāb tells his clients that he has successfully worked with former French_ president Jacques Chirac and with an American president: he insists that he has plenty of income and material wealth – “anā batrūn wa dīār wa wattāt” (“I’m rich! I [have] houses and cars”) – but this_ financial stability does not prevent him from wanting to be paid for his work as a matter of principle. These episodes rely on the common tropes of l’hjāb – as a needlessly _ nothing – emphaobscure scheme full of sound and fury and signifying sizing its wild gestures, animal body parts placed strategically, the namedropping of impossibly famous and powerful clients. These episodes, however, also speak to the harsh realities that push men and women to seek out the expertise of these paradigmatic figures. Men come asking for help finding work or promotions and women ask for help in conceiving a child.21 In contemporary Mauritania, university degrees, time in a marriage, and hard work do not necessarily amount to employment, children, or promotion. The l’hjāb episodes of Me and My Uncle end with a _ would-be thief who has asked for the power of invisibility caught and 20

21

Episodes 1 and 2, “Musalsal anā wa ʿammī al halaqa 04 al hjāb al juz’ al awwal qanāt al _ _ Wataniyya,” YouTube, January 28, 2015, www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoaby11G5 8 and _ “Halqa al hjāb tarn hhhhhhh,” YouTube, September 26, 2015, www.youtube.com/ _ _ watch?v=Ms6olJhFpfU. A 2019 news article reported that an unnamed “senior state official” went to see a hajjāb _ this asking for a promotion in the government and paid significant sums of money for request. “Mas’ūl bāriz fī al dawla yatawajjah li hajjāb talaban lil taʿyīn” Wikālat al wi’ām _ _ al watanī lil anbā’,” August 31, 2019, http://alwiam.info/node/6506?fbclid=IwAR1oqfw _ zrznDO0rRxWH4NMaYMqzszmBEceOu5NrX6a2K1L 5nTDEui6Hzkg. Thanks to Ahmed Maouloud ould Eida for alerting me to this news story.

170

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

beaten up by shop owners, the women who have not conceived as promised, and the men without guaranteed jobs banging at the hajjāb’s door and demanding reimbursement. The hajjāb scrambles over a_ wall to _ the hajjāb is called a bandī, flee his angry clients. In all of these examples, _ or crook, and depicted as a lying con artist who dupes desperate people 22 with false promises. The satirical episodes show pseudo-healers and diviners relying on anything but the Qur’ān to assuage their clients’ anxieties. They instead invoke knowledge from India and indistinct incantations, putting on a show to distract from their fraudulent schemes. The word l’hjāb in these sketch comedies is used to identify a scam that preys on the_ desperation and vulnerability of poor people. The episodes do not portray l’hjāb as practiced by respected Sufi guides or as _ for Mauritanians. a valuable source of support In the public reexamination of l’hjāb taking place in the 2010s, media _ aspects of l’hjāb, gesturing to an hosts often focused on the gendered _ association of l’hjāb with folklore primarily preserved by women. _ Television producers highlighted women’s uses of these sciences, portraying l’hjāb as pointless superstition or, in the case of ligzāna, as a hobby for_ bored housewives.23 One middle-aged woman interviewed by a Mauritanian journalist for a never-finished documentary on l’hjāb _ in in Mauritania attempted to differentiate between different age cohorts their uses of the Islamic esoteric sciences, asking if the journalist wanted to know about l’hjāb among young women or old ladies.24 The journalist amalgamated the_ two, saying, “No, just women in general. It’s the same thing.” The young woman then responded that most women believe in l’hjāb, relying on it to cope with problems with their husbands, with their _ bosses or their domestic servants, or a store owner. She explained that married women in unhappy marriages seek out the help of hajjāba, who _ will prepare talismans, incense, or herbs and plants for the woman to add to food or water her husband will then consume. She continued, citing a friend whose fiancé left her twice, but who finally visited a hajjāb in the _ northern city of Nouadhibou and paid 100,000 ouguiyas (roughly $300) for his services – after which, the two presumably married. Personal

22

23

24

Bandī comes from the French bandit. Yet another sketch series treats l’hjāb as a sham and _ al murābitūn,” its experts as imposters, “musalsal ‘amkhaytirāt’ al halqa 24 l hjāb qanāt _ _ _ _ YouTube, June 20, 2017, www.youtube.com/watch?v=IR li0dQfX4. Interview recorded by Mauritanian journalist Ishagh ould Mukhtār, who shared with me material he had collected in connection with a documentary he was producing on the topic of l’hjāb. Muhammad Mahmūd Sīdī Yahyā, interview, Recorded by Ishagh ould _ _ Mukhār, c._ 2011. _ Interview with a middle aged woman recorded by Ishagh ould Mukhtār, c. 2011.

Postcolonial Transfigurations

171

relationships were the motivating factor for women to seek out the expertise of the esoteric sciences. A 2014 television program called The Ladies (al-tāfilāt) similarly _ focused on l’hjāb as a gendered practice through which women especially _ 25 sought recourse for what troubled them. The program roughly mimicked the American talk show The View (1997–), with five women of different generations and cultural identities settled on the ground in a living room drinking tea and discussing each day’s chosen topic. In an episode dedicated to l’hjāb, women asked each other what they thought _ of the practice. Most denied that they had ever even considered going to a hajjāb, though each claimed she had friends who had sought out the _ of l’hjāb for issues related to infertility, “late” marriage, work, and help divorce.26_ The participants’ timidity in claiming their own experience with l’hjāb – the displacement of belief onto “friends” – points to the _ consequences of acknowledging reliance on l’hjāb. Doing so would, first, _ mean publicly airing personal problems on national television. Yet the hesitation to declare openly one’s own use of and belief in l’hjāb also _ jurisstems from the ambiguous position the sciences occupy in Islamic prudence and ideas about what it means to be a “modern,” urban citizen. At times, the women erupted into fits of laughter, falling over each other and covering their faces with their veils in modesty as hearty laughter shook their bodies, and they joked about the quality and taste of the tea they drank. But they grounded their discussion of l’hjāb in the wellknown verses of the Qur’ān, agreeing that the word of_ God was always the best remedy for whatever ailed a person. These television programs, from the sketch comedies to the unfinished documentary to the televised debate to the talk show, attest to the pervasiveness of l’hjāb in contemporary Mauritania. A dominant dis_ course in these scenes is the depiction of the methods and experts of l’hjāb as depending on the uncritical credulity of desperate people. The _ “experts” in these sciences are often characterized as imposters who promise the world to their clients at a hefty cost. And the sciences themselves appear as obscure and ridiculous techniques that only humiliate their user. Yet the examples of men and women seeking out the 25 26

See “l’hjāb, barnāmaj al tāfilāt qanāt al wataniyya,” YouTube, January 21, 2014, www _ _ _ .youtube.com/watch?v=K5lYqC51dPk. In 2018, 37 percent of Mauritanian women had married before the age of 18 years. Nene Oumou Deffa Kane, Problématique de l’entrepreneuriat féminin en Mauritanie (Balti, Moldova: Éditions universitaires européennes, 2017), 46; ONS, Recensement Général de la Population et de l’Habitat (2013); “La Mauritanie engagée à bannir le mariage des enfants,” Thaqafa, October 12, 2018, https://aidara.mondoblog.org/2018/10/12/ mauritanie engagee a bannir mariage enfants/.

172

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

expertise of hajjāba in these programs also reflects a reality of contem_ this, I mean that these programs of the 2010s show many porary life. By Mauritanians turning to l’hjāb to cope with the challenges they face, a _ pointed out in the documentary interviews reality of precarious existence and in the program The Ladies. Economic security, job advancement, marriage, fertility, and physical safety remained elusive goals. The comedic sketches of early twenty-first-century television were funny precisely because they spoke to familiar situations. Incense-filled rooms garnished with hanging animal horns, amulets, and the sound of incomprehensible mumbling, the promise of fulfilled desires – these were materials and settings that many Mauritanians knew well. If viewers had not visited such settings for their own or a friend’s or relative’s reasons, they had certainly heard them described by others. The laughter was elicited in part because the sketches recognized an everyday phenomenon: l’hjāb was a shared frame of reference, and these portrayals of the _ who profited from people’s desperation to improve their lives faux hajjāb _ reflect Mauritanians’ ongoing engagement with its practices. The skepticism here could be read as a rejection of l’hjāb as obsolete and, yet, the _ people seeking help were anything but. They had multiple university degrees, smart phones, and urban lives, indicating an ongoing belief in and desire for reliable and effective practitioners. Mauritania Dispossessed In the twenty-first century, critics have come to use the term l’hjāb as essentially synonymous with sihr, or sorcery. Linguistic change –_ many people preferred to self-identify_ publicly as experts in al-ruqya al-sharʿ iyya (permitted recitation of the Qur’ān), rather than l’hjāb – reflected a _ desire to distance oneself from the stereotype of spiritual mediator as imposter, the stereotype we have seen mocked in the television skits discussed above. As I interviewed them during my research for this book, some experts in the esoteric sciences specified Anā mā nʿadel l’hjāb, ānā _ nʿadel lā ruqya al-sharʿiyya, or “I don’t use l’hjāb, I only use permitted _ recitation of the Qur’ān.” Other experts did identify themselves as hajjāba. And in some cases, the techniques and material technologies _ used by those who claimed to practice only al-ruqya al-sharʿiyya, and those who self-identified as hajjāba, appeared to be the same. One _ expert in al-ruqya al-sharʿiyya used sand woman who self-identified as an taken from the graves of al-salihīn (the righteous ancestors) for her own _ and _ protection. She did this even though clients who sought divination that Islamist reformists often condemned intercession from humans (alive or dead) and especially the visiting of graves. Her use of this new

Postcolonial Transfigurations

173

terminology, al-ruqya al-sharʿiyya, served as a means of translating preexisting methods long associated with l’hjāb into the contemporary lan_ guage of Islamist reformists who publicly criticized anything that deviated from literal readings of the Qur’ān. As a kind of linguistic gloss to obscure the already obscure, the expression al-ruqya al-sharʿiyya did not necessarily indicate a change in content but rather a manipulation of the label, with the explicit purpose of relocating the sciences within Islamist discourses about correct practice. What is clear from my fieldwork is that reformist discourse against l’hjāb in recent years has influenced the way my interlocutors discuss _ therapeutic and protective services. Depending on the audience, most practitioners prefer to apply the term al-ruqya al-sharʿiyya to refer to their methods and expertise, instead of l’hjāb. Several experts in the esoteric sciences explained to me directly _that they feared aggression from al-salifīn, or Islamic reformists, and that this was a reason why they might deny practicing l’hjāb or claim only to engage with Qur’ānic _ have consistently implied that l’hjāb is recitation.27 The reformists _ synonymous with sihr, an accusation that hajjāba vehemently denied, _ _ since the sihr label would categorize their work as illicit and, thus, _ Muslims. forbidden for Scholarship on therapeutic practice, Islamic reformism, and spirit possession in Morocco has provided a helpful comparative case study to the ongoing engagement with l’hjāb in Mauritania. As Emilio Spadola observed, al-ruqya al-sharʿiyya in _the contemporary Moroccan context has come to reference the recitation of the Qur’ān with the express goal of exorcising jinn from a victim’s body.28 In Morocco, “Islamist activists” film and upload footage of spirit exorcisms as part of what Spadola calls “an ongoing revivalist call to Islam” through “legitimate curing,” or alruqya al-sharʿiyya.29 A simple internet search using the terms ruqya and maghrib, or Morocco, easily pulls up multiple videos of men reciting the Qur’ān over possessed individuals, speaking to the jinn occupying the person’s body, asking questions about whether the jinn is Muslim or not, 27

28

29

Ahmadū Bamba asked several times that I not depict his family as experts in “sorcery” (si_hr) despite my repeated attempts to reassure him I understood the difference between _ sorcery and l’hjāb. _ The Calls of Islam: Sufis, Islamists, and Mass Mediation in Urban Morocco Emilio Spadola, (Bloomington: University of Indiana Press, 2014). It should be noted that, in Morocco, official policies toward religious practice underline the religious authority of Morocco’s kings who, as descendants of the Prophet Muhammad, are all divine figures themselves. _ In Mauritania, while the constitution stipulates the president must be Muslim, the presidency has remained a position of military and political, rather than religious, authority. Spadola, The Calls of Islam, 1.

174

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

and demanding that it leave its host alone.30 Because the spirits taking over the bodies of the afflicted are often identified as non-Muslim, they are then classified as demonic shayātīn, unworthy of veneration and _ verses.31 Spadola contrasts this necessarily removed by reciting Qur’ānic antagonistic relationship toward spirits against the relationship evolved by Sufis, who are understood to cooperate with spirits to achieve their spiritual ends: the revivalist exorcists “demonstrate power and authority: to denounce and expel local, often Sufi, customs, and above all to call their audiences to ‘legitimate’ practice.”32 In Morocco, this discrediting of Sufism often manifests itself through discourses directed specifically against the intermediary role Sufi teachers, alive or deceased, are understood to play between their disciples and God. In Spadola’s study, these young Islamist activists who emerged in the public sphere starting in the 1980s also denounced a reliance on jedāwil and trance practices, linked in the popular imagination to Sufism.33 Zekeria ould Ahmed Salem has argued that two factors explain a decline in the cultural and political importance of Sufi orders in postcolonial Mauritania.34 First, as I have suggested earlier, the centralizing nation-state dispossessed local branches of Sufi orders of their regional influence, concentrating political activity in the capital Nouakchott. Second, in the decades following Independence, large numbers of Mauritanians traveled east to the Arabian Peninsula to work as legal scholars or in the fields of religious studies education, police work, or animal husbandry and herding.35 As in other countries, the back-andforth movement between Mauritania and locations in what is often considered the Islamic heartland has been credited (or blamed) with a desire to standardize religious practice in relation to models learned and 30

For example, see “al rāqī al maghribī al shaykh Naʿīm Rabīʿ,” YouTube, July 1, 2014, www.youtube.com/watch?v=gEiY31i6JBY; “qirā’a rā’i‘a li rāqī maghribī,” YouTube, September 10, 2010, www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uh9KNXmOmMA; or the YouTube channel “al rāqī al maghribī ʿabd al ʿAlī bilhabīb,” August 5, 2019, www.youtube.com/ channel/UCsuWhfOdlcXr3HqFMGb4c5A. _

31

32 Spadola, The Calls of Islam, 19. Spadola, The Calls of Islam, 1. Hamès, “Problématiques de la magie sorcellerie en islam et perspectives africaines,” CEA 48, no. 1 2, 189 90 (2008): 81 99. Ould Ahmed Salem, Prêcher dans le désert, 84 86. Mauritanian migration to the Arabian Peninsula seems to especially have been the case in the United Arab Emirates for reasons specific to the Emirates. See Zekeria ould Ahmed Salem, “Islam in Mauritania between Political Expansion and Globalization: Elites, Institutions, Knowledge, and Networks,” Islam and Muslim Politics in Africa, eds. Benjamin F. Soares and René Otayek (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007), 27 47; David H. Warren, Rivals in the Gulf: Yusuf al Qaradawi, Abdullah Bin Bayyah, and the Qatar UAE Contest Over the Arab Spring and the Gulf Crisis (London: Routledge, 2021); and Francisco Freire, “Saharan Migrant Camel Herders: Znāga Social Status and the Global Age,” in The Journal of Modern African Studies 52, no. 3 (2014): 425 46.

33 34 35

Postcolonial Transfigurations

175

lived abroad.36 In Ahmed Salem’s analysis, Sufi orders in the twenty-first century no longer attracted the large followings of disciples and practitioners they had in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and their importance on the political scene decreased as religious practice and learning grew more individualized. Reformist critiques of Sufism and its traditional cultivation of close and long-term relationships between students and their teachers have encouraged this change in the culture of religious education toward more independent, individual study. Likewise, an increase in literacy through the spread of basic education has permitted Mauritanians to access religious knowledge without having to depend on Sufi teachers as they did before. Because l’hjāb, its methods of accessing spirits and knowledge, and its experts have _historically been associated with Sufi thought and scholars, changes in the status and role of Sufism in Mauritania have in part caused a change in the role of l’hjāb. _ I observed in numerous casual conversations with younger Mauritanians, outside the formal interviews conducted for this study, a general acceptance that knowledge of the Qur’ān could be gained without the guidance of a Sufi shaykh. For many, an affiliation with one particular Sufi path or another has, since the late twentieth century and early twenty-first, lost its social and educational importance. In Morocco, Spadola observed a “Sufi revivalism” after a series of deadly bombings in 2003 in Casablanca, bombings understood to have been carried out by young Islamists. In a country where the King is both religious and political leader for his country, these attacks implied that the Moroccan sovereign was failing to rule effectively as either amīr almu’minīn (“Commander of the Faithful”) or as president of a postcolonial nation state.37 Since then, the Moroccan government has strategically promoted Sufism as a ritualized religious practice, inspiration for vibrant musical performances, and a quietist political alternative to Islamism.38 36

37 38

Brenner, Controlling Knowledge; Kaba, The Wahhabiya; Ould Ahmed Salem, Prêcher dans le désert. Michael Farquhar and Alexander Thurston, however, have recently criticized the center to periphery model of influence and have argued instead for local production and transmissions of knowledge as not only distinct from the cultural production and circulation patterns of the Gulf but also as influencing religious thought there. Farquhar and Thurston, “How Mauritania exports religion to Saudi Arabia and not just the other way around,” Brookings, December 13, 2018, www.brookings.edu/blog/order from chaos/2018/12/13/how mauritania exports religion to saudi arabia and not just the other way around/. Salim Hmimnat, “Recalibrating Morocco’s Approach to Salafism,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, January 14, 2016, https://carnegieendowment.org/sada/62463. Intissar Fakir, “The Moroccan Monarchy’s Political Agenda for Reviving Sufi Orders,” Islamic Institutions in Arab States: Mapping the Dynamics of Control, Co option, and Contention, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, June 7, 2021, https://carnegieendowment.org/ 2021/06/07/moroccan monarchy s political agenda for reviving sufi orders pub 84656.

176

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

In contrast, in Mauritania, presidents have generally avoided lending official support for Sufism even as both Muʿāwiya ould Sīd Ahmad Tāya _ of and ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz, targeted Islamist scholars with a repressive_ politics 39 arrest and censorship, especially in the post-9/11 period. Muhammad _ al-Hassen ould Dedew (b. 1963), the most prominent Mauritanian _ Islamic thinker of his generation, was often in the 1990s and early 2000s the subject of such state persecution. Dedew, who memorized the Qur’ān at the precocious age of seven and studied in both the mahādra and the _ public higher education systems in Mauritania, travelled to_ Saudi Arabia to study Islamic jurisprudence and eventually returned to Mauritania, where he served as the director of the Center for the Training of Islamic Scholars, the president of ʿAbd Allāh b. Yāsīn University in Nouakchott, and a trustee of the International Union for Muslim Scholars based in Qatar.40 Alexander Thurston has identified Dedew as part of a “postSalafi” moment in West Africa where prominent Islamist scholars broke with discourses of “Salafi purism” predominantly supported by the political and religious coalitions of the Gulf (Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Kuwait) to voice criticism of political and doctrinal stances they deemed antithetical to their objectives of religious reform and the unification of the Muslim community.41 Dedew has given ambiguous responses to questions about the place of Sufism in Islamic doctrine, explaining that he learned from many a Sufi shaykh and, because of that, he has no reaction, “either positive or negative,” to Sufism.42 While Dedew has been critical of Sufi practices involving the visiting saints’ tombs, he also maintains relationships with 39

40

41

42

Boubacar N’Diaye, Mauritania’s Colonels: Political Leadership, Civil Military Relations and Democratization (London: Routledge, 2017) and Erin Pettigrew, “Authoritarian Africa beyond Guantánamo: Freedom in Captivity,” ASR 63, no. 2 (2020): 411 16. Ould Ahmed Salem included a detailed biography of the Mauritanian cleric in his Prêcher dans le désert. Ould Dedew’s criticisms of the former president Tāya had landed him in prison several times toward the end of Tāya’s rule. President Mu_ hammad ould ʿAbd al _ _ ʿAzīz’s administration closed Ould Dedew’s Islamic education institutions in 2019. See his official homepage “Muhammad al Hassen ould Dedew,” Online, www.dedew.net/. _ al ruqya al_ shar‘iyya al nāfi‘a (no publication information, A manual of Ould Dedew’s, n.d.), could be found in Mauritanian markets and bookshops at the time of research. See also Thurston, “Shaykh Muhammad al Hasan al Dedew (b. 1963), a Salafi Scholar in Contemporary Mauritania,” Contemporary Mauritania,” Annual Review of Islam in Africa 11 (2012): 64 67. Alexander Thurston, “An Emerging Post Salafi Current in West Africa and Beyond,” Maydan, October 15, 2018, www.themaydan.com/2018/10/emerging post salafi current west africa beyond/. See also “al shaykh Muhammad al Hassen ould Dedew: _ _ 2017, http://elwatan.info/node/ ānā laysit min haraka ‘al ikhwān’,” El Watan, April 20, _ 7468. See “Position du Cheikh ould Dedew vis à vis des tariqas soufis,” YouTube, July 3, 2016, www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ksd6xUCM gI.

Postcolonial Transfigurations

177

Sufi figures and acknowledges them as important scholars in the intellectual history of Islam.43 It was Dedew, after all, who led the funerary prayer in 2013 when the prominent hajjāb Eʿli Shieykh ould Momma _ his disciples ushered his remains passed away in France and thousands of from the airport in Nouakchott to their burial in Amdayr, the site of “the serpents’ entry” and the bloodsucking incident involving the saint’s wife and daughter described in the opening to this book. Dedew’s presence was not without controversy, however. Some disciples accused him of usurping the rightful role of the imām of Atār, the city where Eʿli _ had always prayed Shieykh eventually settled. Because Eʿli Shieykh behind the imām of Atār, the saint’s disciples argued he, not Dedew, _ should have led the funeral prayer. The saint’s disciples also expressed dismay that Dedew – as a preacher of Salafi persuasion, known to be hostile to the saint’s expertise – would be given this honorific task.44 In popular discourse, Dedew is also remembered as the first person to introduce the al-ruqya al-sharʿiyya method of Qur’ānic recitation in Mauritania for the purpose of therapeutic healing and as a reformist alternative to lettrism, talismans, sand divination, and saintly intercession.45 Dedew promotes an oral reading of selected verses of the Qur’ān by a supplicant appealing directly to God with no human or material mediation, in direct opposition to the techniques practiced by hajjāba _ who see themselves as essential service providers for the dispensation of protection and healing. Reformist efforts such as Dedew’s can have the unintended effect of admitting or, even ironically, reinforcing the real spiritual power of l’hjāb as they recast it as forbidden and evil. The _ l’hjāb are not contested by someone like Dedew. ontological realities of Instead, the techniques_ used to mobilize spiritual agents – and the unseen entities themselves – are condemned as potent and dangerous (khatīr). The tensions primarily associated with these Islamist reform _ stem from the labeling as non-Muslim and, thus, religiously illegal efforts and punishable, any local cultural or religious practice not identified explicitly in the Qur’ān. The consequences for practitioners and for 43 44

45

“Position du Cheikh,” and Ould Ahmed Salem, Prêcher dans le désert, 98. “Inhumation d’Ely Cheikh : la prière funéraire a fait polémique à Atar,” Cridem, August 31, 2013, http://cridem.org/C Info.php?article=647032. See also the hagiographical video filmed after the saint’s death where he is eulogized by two prominent Sufi ʿulamā’ in Mauritania, Hamden ould Tāh and Muhammad Al Hafidh al Nahawī. _ _ “waraqa ʿan wafāt al qutb_ Eʿli Shaykh ould Momma min ʿidād a,” _YouTube, October 22, 2018, www.youtube.com/watch?v=3txZ3KXhNOs. See Dedew (see fn. 45) or YouTube, which returns dozens of links if “dedew” and “al ruqya al shar‘iyya” are searched. See his personal YouTube page, “al ruqya al shar‘iyya kāmila || fadīlat al shaykh Muhammad al Hassen ūld Dedew hafizahu Allāh,” _ _ _ YouTube, April_ 9, 2017, www.youtube.com/watch?v=3zhl5pSJG6k.

178

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

clients of l’hjāb could lead to being marked an infidel and, thus, an open _ target for criticism and even physical harm or death. A young preacher named Yehzīhi ould Dāhī has recently popularized al-ruqya al-sharʿiyya as practiced_ _in Morocco, that is, as a method of jinn expulsion to treat people afflicted with sorcery (sihr) or the evil eye (ʿayn). _ during the late 1990s After traveling throughout the Arabian Peninsula where he observed in Kuwait a healing session for a young woman that relied on al-ruqya al-sharʿiyya, he then studied in Saudi Arabia: as he has said, “jinn are stronger there.”46 Labeled colloquially as wahhābī – a signifier for someone with real or imagined ties to Saudi Arabia who preaches reform to coreligionists based on the teachings of the eighteenth-century Saudi theologian Muhammad b. ʿAbd al-Wahhāb – _ Dāhī has appeared on local Mauritanian television programs as a conser47 vative voice on social issues. He has also cultivated an identity through social media, selling thistle pills he promised would cure cancer and hepatitis and serving as the director of the markaz ahbāb al-rasūl _ (Center of the “Lovers of the Prophet”) for al-ruqya al-sharʿiyya in 48 Nouakchott. Online and WhatsApp sharing of videos of al-ruqya al-sharʿiyya sessions has garnered broad public attention for this preacher. In 2016, fans and skeptics shared grainy footage of Dāhī standing in a room of women rocking back and forth, screaming, and holding each other down. In the video, as the veiled women roll on the floor and hit each other, Dāhī’s voice can be heard amplified by a microphone and repeating Qur’ānic verses and Arabic terms such as sihr and nazra (“sight”).49 A year prior, _ spirit exorcism _ Dāhī released a similar recording of but that earlier video shows him bending over a veiled woman, forcing the spirit possessing her to respond to his questions about her identity. Spitting on the woman’s head, hitting her with a wooden stick, he aggressively asks “What’s your name? What’s your religion? What’s your language?” The spirit responds that she is Muslim and speaks the Egyptian dialect of Arabic.50 Most Mauritanians with whom I spoke agreed that Dāhī was the first practitioner they had seen perform a mass exorcism of this kind, a ritual they 46 47 48

49 50

“ra’īs markaz ahbāb al rasūl lil ruqya al shar‘iyya fī liqā’ “muthīr” ma’ qanāt shinqīt,” _ _ YouTube, December 30, 2016, www.youtube.com/watch?v=93VMBVrRPp4. See “barnāmaj abʿād al khabar ma’ wild beniūk wa Yehzīhi ūld Dāhī hawl al ifrāj ʿan ūld __ _ amkheitīr” Tawatur, July 12, 2019, www.youtube.com/watch?v=wz8kYk I6y0. _ were derived from al qast al hindī (saussurea costus) and according to Dāhī The pills _ came from the Arabian Gulf. “barnāmaj abʿād” and Bābā Adū, Facebook, direct message to the author, July 7, 2017. “ra’īs markaz ahbāb al rasūl,” YouTube. _ “al ruqya al sharʿiyya fī morītānyā,” YouTube, October 29, 2015, www.youtube.com/ watch?v=51FQsK 9 jU.

Postcolonial Transfigurations

179

described as “foreign” and “imported from Saudi Arabia” and as a lucrative scam.51 Dāhī himself might have insisted upon the Saudi origin of his techniques of spirit exorcism to defend his work as legitimate within Islam. And, yet, Mauritanian public intellectuals criticized the spirit exorcist for exploiting the ignorance of his clients, seeing this as a disturbing and inappropriate introduction of a new scheme to swindle Mauritanians. They asked if he considered himself the “supreme authority of audiovisual,” mocking him as the television sketches made fun of the charlatan hajjāba who concealed their trickery with strange gestures and objects.52_ Mauritanians also circulated through WhatsApp networks the tale of a young woman afflicted by nefarious spirits who sought treatment from an expert who promised to heal her. The expert in al-ruqya al-sharʿiyya remained unnamed, but it was easy to imagine Dāhī in the role of the caregiver in this account. When the young woman’s illness continued, her family confronted the exorcist, who tried to escape. When the family attacked him – insisting he promise to treat their daughter effectively – the exorcist pressed charges against them. According to the WhatsApp stories, the incident would now be considered in court.53 When Dāhī declared himself a candidate for the presidential elections in 2019, he was jokingly described as “the jinn representative,” even though his political agenda called for the strict application of Islamic jurisprudence and a policy against atheism.54 Dāhī appeared yet again in the national news in April 2020, in the early weeks of the COVID-19 pandemic, when police arrested him for making false claims about his ability to heal people afflicted with the deadly virus. Just before Mauritania erroneously declared the country free of COVID19, Dāhī claimed the thistle pills he sold would protect against contracting the illness.55 The preacher posted a link on his Facebook page about the medicine, explaining that the head of the Department of Research in 51

52 53 54

55

Bābā Adū told me Dāhī charged 6 10,000 ouguiya (roughly $20 $30 in 2017) per session. In 2011 and 2012, Senegalese high school students were known to experience frequent attacks of spirit possession, or raab, especially around the time of final exams or the national high school exam, the BAC. Again, mass incidents of spirit possession have not occurred in a similar way in Mauritania. See Mueller, “The Spirits are My Neighbors.” “Al ruqya al sharʿiyya fī morītānyā,” YouTube. Ahmad Mahmūd “Jamāl” ould Muhammad, WhatsApp communication to the author, _ _ January 13, _2017.

“dajja kubrā fī morītānyā bʿad turashshuh ‘mumaththil al jinn’ lil ’intikhābāt al _ _ ri’āsiyya,” Sputnik ʿarabī, April 16, 2019, https://arabic.sputniknews.com/arab world/ 201904161040518926 ‫ﺍﻟﺠﺪﻝ‬-‫ﻣﻮﺭﻳﺘﺎﻧﻴﺎ‬-‫ﻣﺮﺷﺢ‬-‫ﺍﻟﻤﻠﺤﺪﻳﻦ‬-‫ﻣﺤﺎﺭﺑﺔ‬-‫ﻭﻋﺪ‬/. Mauritania announced that the country was free from positive cases of COVID 19 on April 22, 2020. On May 13, an elderly man died of the virus in Nouakchott, leading to

180

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Prophetic Medicine in Medina, Saudi Arabia, had attested that these pills from India served as an effective cure for COVID-19.56 The Mauritanian Minister of Health pressed charges against Dāhī for false advertising, leading to a fifteen-day imprisonment and the closing of his center in Nouakchott.57 In the month following his release, the preacher posted on his Facebook account that he had already opened a new center for al-ruqya al-sharʿiyya opposite the Shaykh Zayed hospital in a poorer neighborhood of Nouakchott; he claimed the center would offer medicine imported from South Africa. Signs plastered on the front of the building advertised that the center specialized in al-muss (bloodsucking), sihr (sorcery), ʿayn (the evil eye), malignant diseases, cupping therapy, _ prophetic medicine. The preacher’s lack of compunction about and broadcasting his proficiency in using the above sciences indicates that at least a portion of the population understands illness and misfortune as caused by and healed through these techniques. While Dāhī has been an object of derision and criticism for many Mauritanians throughout his public career – from his videos of jinn exorcism in 2015, to his run for president in 2019, and then to his imprisonment in 2020 – his substantial social media following and the construction of yet another center for al-ruqya al-sharʿiyya indicate that he also had supporters and clients. He offers pills, allegedly imported from India and touted by Saudi authorities, according to longestablished patterns of legitimation – asserting a foreign origin, specifically Indian, and a reformist seal from the perceived center of Islamic authority. While one can dismiss someone like Dāhī as a real bandī, swindling money from the poor for useless pills during a global health crisis (and being jailed by state authorities for doing so), his ability to maintain his activities at a rehabilitated center and across numerous social media platforms speaks to his ability to find financial backing for his business in dealing with the spiritual world. Unlike the horn-wielding con artists in the televised satirical depictions of l’hjāb, Dāhī relies on few _

56 57

the discovery that the virus was, in fact, widespread. “Deuxième décès lié au coronavirus (COVID 19),” Le Calame, May 13, 2020, http://lecalame.info/?q=node/10302. The video in which Dāhī made these claims was removed from YouTube for violating the platform’s community guidelines, see www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYYz9E9FOyE& feature=youtu.be. Statement from the prophet’s loved ones group, Facebook, April 14, 2020, www .facebook.com/permalink.php?story fbid=680325952723814&id=100022392472470. “iʿatiqāl ūld Dāhī ithr shakwa taqadamat bihā wizārat al siha,” al Siraj, April 11, 2020, _ http://essirage.net/node/19303. Dāhī released a short video where he claimed he was “the first to discover the medicine against COVID 19 but the State does not want to believe it.” See “Yehzīhi ūld Dāhī ānā awal min ikteshef doā’ kovid19/ lākin al dawla lā turīd _ iʿatimādihi,” _YouTube, April 18, 2020, www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFZH YPmRg4.

Postcolonial Transfigurations

181

material objects for his work, thistle pills aside, thus conforming to the austerity expected within Islamist circles. At the time of writing, the spirit exorcisms he has introduced remain a rarity in Mauritania, despite the increasingly common recourse to these wahhābī techniques in neighboring Morocco.58 Yet, Dāhī is able to sell his services because these social and physical afflictions such as unemployment, the loss of a loved one, and COVID-19 are understood by some to be caused by and remedied through the spiritual world. Conclusion After a coup d’état in 2012 that followed an uprising in northern Mali by Tuareg people who claimed autonomy from the Malian central government and sought to establish the state of Azawād, fighters claiming affiliation with al-Qāʿida of the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and Ansār _ ad-Dīn took over northern cities, including Timbuktu, Gao, and Kidal. There they imposed their interpretation of Islamic law. In July 2012, the Islamists desecrated and destroyed the tombs of Sufi saints and Muslim scholars in Timbuktu, arguing that the practice of visiting these tombs resulted in the illicit veneration of saints as intermediaries between worshippers and God. Journalists reported that those claiming affiliation with AQIM established new courts in the city where people were tried for practices long associated in Mauritania with l’hjāb, which the courts _ labeled illegal “magic”: The Islamic court of Timbuktu referred to it as Case Number 25. The date written on the court document is Oct. 10, 2012. “In front of us stands a man, Muhamad bin Moussa, who is accused of practicing magic,” reads the document. “During investigation he admitted to have used talismans, magical tables, and magical seals, and to writing [Qur’ānic] verses and tearing them, which makes him a magician.”59

Other reports from the 2011 14 period listed amulets, magic, and sorcery alongside smoking, playing football, listening to music, and drinking alcohol as practices forbidden after the Islamist take-over of the city.60 Mauritanians heard about these trials and about the 58 59

60

See also Zakaria Rhani, Le pouvoir de guérir: Mythe, mystique et politique au Maroc (Leiden: Brill, 2006). Harald Doornbos and Jenan Moussa, “Inside the Islamic Emirate,” Foreign Policy, February 14, 2013, https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/02/14/inside the islamic emirate of timbuktu/. “Timbuktu: ‘Anyone can be a victim in a war like this,” Irish Times, April 6, 2013, www .irishtimes.com/news/world/africa/timbuktu anyone can be a victim in a war like this 1.1350444 and “Un djihadiste malien devant la Cour pénale internationale,” Le Monde

182

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

destruction of Sufi saints’ tombs and could not help but reflect on what this might mean for Sufi practice, religious leaders, and l’hjāb in their _ as part of own country. They identified the events in Timbuktu and Kidal a larger trend of opposition by reformists they labeled as “salafī” to local therapeutic and religious practices. Simultaneously, rumors circulated within Mali that les jihadistes, these Islamists who imposed reform by force, were protected by gris-gris in Timbuktu so that bullets shot at them by Malian military soldiers were repelled. One Malian explained of les jihadistes, “[t]hey brought the gris-gris with them. You know, there are big marabouts from among them. […] They took our gris-gris from Timbuktu to disarm us, they wanted to disarm us.”61 Mali’s inhabitants understood the Islamist fighters not only as foreign – imagined to come primarily across the desert from Libya and Algeria – but also as having arrived protected by more powerful spiritual forces, made visible by the amulets they wore. Their success in taking over northern Malian towns was explained through the deployment of these amulets. While the combatants might have then set up courts that tried locals for “magic,” this interlocutor argued that the Islamists forbid the use of these practices only to disable the protective powers of talismans and magic seals that were already in use locally. In other words, classifying esoteric sciences and protective forces as illicit within Islam was only a means of preventing the people of Timbuktu from using their own most powerful weapons – their Islamic esoteric knowledge and the protective baraka found at the graves of Sufi saints. Directing suppressive efforts at local esoteric and therapeutic practices might thus reinforce or even increase their centrality and power in the minds of consumers. McGovern has theorized that efforts to destroy local practices, such as l’hjāb, might achieve the opposite of the desired _ effect: the reformer, “by accusing those who use the fetish of belief (in his view, naı¨ve belief ), he in fact attributes to it powers that it may never have had in the eyes of the actual users.”62 The Malian witness’s perspective on the Islamist occupiers’ simultaneous rumored reliance on marabouts and amulets and condemnation of local esoteric knowledge as forbidden only amplified the spiritual potential of local protective sciences. In Mauritania, thus far having escaped the recent endemic political instability of regional neighbors such as Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, and Chad,

61

62

Afrique, July 17, 2019, www.lemonde.fr/afrique/article/2019/07/17/un djihadiste malien devant la cour penale internationale 5490445 3212.html. Emphasis and italics mine. Thanks to Jeremy Dell for emailing a written record in French of an informal discussion in Timbuktu on this issue. Email communication, February 3, 2014. McGovern, Unmasking the State, 10.

Postcolonial Transfigurations

183

practitioners and seekers of l’hjāb feared similar attacks on Sufi religious _ guides, saints’ tombs, and seekers of spiritual remedies in their country. The Mauritanian exorcist and preacher, Yehzīhi ould Dāhī, for all of _ remained a marginal his noise on social media and in local news, _has figure in the therapeutic landscape. Yet the intervention of the Mauritanian state during a global health crisis to prevent the distribution of what it claimed was an ineffective prophylactic points to the threat the young preacher posed to public health officials’ efforts to bring the virus under control. Dāhī’s arrest and imprisonment signal that the Mauritanian state is claiming the authority to protect its citizens, enact justice, and define what claims or practices are acceptable. These are roles previously assumed by warrior and clerical groups before the imposition of colonial rule and then in postcolonial nation-states. L’hjāb has come under attack in recent years from modernists, who see _ its sciences and experts as useless and express skepticism towards their perceived trickery and ineffectiveness, and from religious reformers, who see these practices as nefariously powerful but illicit. Television programming from the past decade invokes the critiques of the former group while the claims of Dedew and Dāhī, that their own methods of al-ruqya al-sharʿiyya are the only proper form of treating spiritual afflictions, illustrate the position of the reformists. Effectively censoring those Mauritanians who practice l’hjāb, these parallel critiques have precipi_ tated a range of linguistic displacements and transfigurations. Experts in l’hjāb increasingly manipulate the form and terminology of their work – _ hiding an amulet under a veil, or using the reformist label al-ruqya alsharʿiyya while all the traditional content of l’hjāb is maintained, includ_ ing the use of jedāwil based on lettrism, referencing planetary movement, or investing in relationships with jinn. That “modern” Mauritanians do not openly display their reliance on l’hjāb does not, however, necessarily _ its experts and sciences. Dāhī’s mean that they rely less frequently on bold rebuilding of his practice in a highly populated area of the capital and where he treats al-muss, sihr, and ʿayn indicates that these remain _ common afflictions in contemporary Mauritania. As the parodic spectacles and televised discussions confirm, Mauritanians are intimately familiar with the symbols and lived experiences of l’hjāb. _

Part III

Articulating Race, Gender, and Social Difference through the Esoteric Sciences

5

Desert Panic Bloodsucking Accusations and the Terror of Social Change

L’hjāb has consistently been one of the primary means Saharan _ populations have used to manage changes in the configuration of social, environmental, and economic dynamics over time. Affirming that the foundations of l’hjāb are deeply rooted in a longer history of Islam and _ book has also examined various contestations of the local sciences, this legitimacy and efficacy of the esoteric sciences. This chapter examines an entirely different but related phenomenon, one specific in its manifestations to the Saharan West and one that has, since at least the fifteenth century, been diagnosed and neutralized through l’hjāb. While we have seen that l’hjāb could be activated in revenge or to _punish offenders or _ wrongs, the experts of l’hjāb have generally deployed it to opponents for heal and protect. This chapter, then,_ highlights a particular force – known locally as sell – that relies on arts inimical to l’hjāb whose supposed agents have traditionally mobilized their skills only_ to harm others: we examine sell not as a related art, but as a practice occasioning communities to resort to l’hjāb. _ look closely at the social status of those accused of Moreover, we will sell: we see the distinct Saharan intersection of sorcery and racecraft reveals the functional role of the idioms of sell and l’hjāb in defining the _ nature of social relationships in the changing circumstances of colonial and postcolonial Mauritania. The association of sell with social hierarchy as a link that would simultaneously seem to reinforce the exclusion of those from low status craftsperson (muʿalim), black African, and enslaved origin not only from positions of religious leadership in Muslim communities more broadly but also from access to l’hjāb and, especially, from obtaining the education and access to religious_ training that would allow them to become hajjāba. _ This book opened with an incident from the life of twentiethcentury Mauritanian saint, Eʿli Shieykh ould Momma, drawn from a hagiographical biography in which a student listed examples of the

187

188

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

shaykh’s miraculous acts to demonstrate his teacher’s spiritual prowess.1 Addressing two woes most often associated with l’hjāb, the student _ describes Eʿli Shieykh using an amulet to heal a Senegalese man with an incurable disease and relieving a man of his infertility problems so that the man subsequently had multiple children.2 Yet, according to the shaykh’s disciple, “the most amazing miracle” of all was his ability to thwart the nefarious effects of “what is known in Hassāniyya as sell,” a widespread phenomenon that terrorized desert and _oasis communities.3 The shaykh’s ability to overcome the evil powers of sell was illustrated when he compelled an old and apparently wicked woman to cower and beg for forgiveness after the Sufi saint caught her sucking life-giving energy out of his wife and daughter as they slept. The “extremely old and weak woman” (al-ʿajūza) claimed to work in tandem with a waiting friend before she hurried away (dhāhiba masrʿa).4 We have already seen in the Islamic culture of the Saharan West how experts in the esoteric sciences were simultaneously praised as knowledgeable saints and decried as dangerous charlatans because of their ability and their claims to function as intermediaries between the spiritual and the temporal (including the political) realms of desert life. This case of Eʿli Shieykh and the old woman illustrates the experts’ role in diagnosing and treating the harmful effects of illicit sorcery, here as manifested in the uniquely Saharan phenomenon of sell. Two competing modes of administering the invisible could be accessed by Saharan populations: first, were the sciences whose practitioners labeled Islamic because of their professed reliance on techniques permitted in the Qur’ān; second were those labeled un-Islamic and thus forbidden because of their malevolent aims or diabolical premises. For much of the region’s history, Saharans located l’hjāb in the former category because Qur’ānic texts _ activating sciences and its experts accessed its force formed the basis of its through their knowledge of these texts. Sell, on the other hand, was viewed as a tool wielded by the otherwise disempowered, who were often imagined to have inherited their evil ability to suck energy from their victims. H ajjāba were the locally recognized diagnosticians and l’hjāb the _ correct response for countering sell in moments of social crisis for_ desert communities, particularly as those communities adjusted to changes in social interactions following the French colonial abolition of slavery, an intervention that in the twentieth century suddenly changed the status of large populations of enslaved people. 1 2 4

Ahmad b. Muhammad b. Hamayn, al Wusūl wa l tarsīkh. _ _ _ sūl wa l tarsīkh, Hamayn, al Wu 193 94. _ 3 Hamayn, al Wusūl wa l tarsīkh, 190. _ amayn, al Wusūl _ _ wa l tarsīkh, 192. _ H _ _

Desert Panic

189

Despite the sparse details in the episode involving Eʿli Shieykh – an episode that occurred in the mid-twentieth century – that encounter with a malevolent old woman clearly belongs to a wider phenomenon involving accusations of “extraction” (sellāla) or the drawing out of such vital bodily substances as the heart and, more commonly, the victim’s blood, in the Saharan West. Examining these cases and their contexts permits a consideration of crucial questions about the kinds of anxieties that troubled Saharan populations over the longer period of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. While bloodsucking events in Mauritania follow certain patterns, the explanations victims and bystanders offer for this type of event vary considerably. Thus, while researchers of other communities in Africa have analyzed bloodsucking and witchcraft as relatively cohesive phenomena – coherently expressing community members’ shared understanding of colonialism and the extractive nature of neoliberalism, in Mauritania bloodsucking expressed a range of discordant meanings.5 Bloodsucking accusations could provide an explanatory framework for a sudden illness, but they could also be leveled against a neighbor or enemy as a means of contesting her wealth, his independence of thought, or their claims for manumission. Expertise in l’hjāb remained, in the nineteenth and twentieth century, _ associated with deep knowledge of the Qur’ān, and thus the reputation of having mastered its sciences was largely positive and those who did so were praised as guides and saints. Meanwhile, a reputation for being able to suck or extract life from others (sell), was negative, not only deemed non-Islamic but also associated with social marginality marked by skin color and occupational status. The supposedly offending parties were often, though not always, enslaved women or those of slave descent (hrātīn). The unmarried woman, the disheveled hermit, the shrewd _ _ craftsperson (muʿalim) of low social status were also potential assailants. Sell was uttered as an accusation, not a compliment, and its purported agents always denied this label. Bloodsucking accusations and their related events thus offer an opportunity to view local conceptions of social identity and related fears about shifts in hierarchy, old hostilities between lineages, and understandings of the nature of health and illness. Services provided by hajjāba included establishing whether or not someone might be the victim _of bloodsucking 5

See Ashforth, Witchcraft, Violence, and Democracy; Comaroff and Comaroff, “Occult Economies and the Violence of Abstraction”; Crais, The Politics of Evil; Evans Pritchard, Witchcraft, Oracles and Magic among the Azande; Geschiere, Sorcellerie et politique; Robert Harms, River of Wealth, River of Sorrow: The Central Zaire Basin in the Era of the Slave and Ivory Trade, 1500 1891 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1981); and White, Speaking with Vampires.

190

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

and, if so, identifying the responsible party. In this context when the accused was always a marginalized person and the punishment was death or banishment, l’hjāb could also be deployed to maintain privilege in a _ society defined by genealogy and gender. deeply hierarchical While the Arabic sources document the existence of bloodsucking at least as early as the fifteenth century, the colonial archive provides the most concentrated number of records. These records demonstrate that bloodsucking was a lived and feared reality for desert communities during the colonial period, and previous research on bloodsucking events has consequently focused solely on the colonial period when French officers confronted patterns of accusation that targeted the enslaved and those of purported enslaved origin.6 This research highlighted administrative fears and stressed the limits of colonial governance over the actual practice of slavery in Mauritania.7 In Saharan regions where colonial governance was tenuous at best, French officers had made a range of compromises with regional political and religious leaders in exchange for formal declarations of submission to French rule.8 Such compromises often required colonial administrators to turn a blind eye to the persistence of slavery and also a promise they would refrain from intervening in matters deemed “Islamic.” Bloodsucking incidents in this Saharan region were thus doubly problematic from an administrative perspective because they tended to involve the enslaved (ʿabīd, Fr. euphemisms captifs, serviteurs) – or those considered free but whose slave origins were still recognized (hrātīn) – as well as questions of religion. _ the status that accrued to “white” A further complicating factor_ was (bīdān), Arabophone scholarly groups, where race combined with reli_ knowledge to enhance an individual’s perceived authority.9 gious

6

7

8 9

Acloque, “Accusations,” 286; E. Ann McDougall, “Slavery, Sorcery and Colonial ‘Reality’ in Mauritania, c. 1910 1960,” in Agency and Action in Colonial Africa: Essays for John E. Flint, eds. Christopher Youé and Tim Stapleton (Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan, 2001), 69 82; Bonte, “L’émirat de l’Adrar.” Acloque, “Accusations”; McDougall, “Slavery, Sorcery,”; Acloque, “Embarras de l’administration colonial. La question de l’esclavage au début du XXe siècle en Mauritanie,” in Groupes serviles au Sahara: approche comparative à partir du cas des arabophone de Mauritanie, ed. Mariella Villasante de Beauvais (Paris: CNRS, 2000), 97 120; E. Ann McDougall, “A Topsy turvy World: Slaves and Freed Slaves in the Mauritanian Adrar, 1910 1950,” in The End of Slavery in Africa, eds. Suzanne Miers and Richard Roberts (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1988), 362 88. See ANRIM E1/103, Soumission années 1904 13. For more on these terms and histories of race in the Sahara, see Hall, A History of Race in Muslim West Africa; Katherine Ann Wiley, Work, Social Status and Gender in Post Slavery Mauritania (Bloomington: University of Indiana Press, 2018); Urs Peter Ruf, Ending Slavery: Hierarchy, Dependency and Gender in Central Mauritania (Bielefeld: transcript Verlag, 1999); Villasante de Beauvais, ed., Groupes serviles au Sahara; and El Hamel,

Desert Panic

191

Accounts of bloodsucking during the colonial period provide some contextual clues as these were relayed to and written down by French officers. Direct eyewitness accounts are, however, absent from these records. Both physical and social distances separated colonial knowledge production about such events from local, Saharan epistemologies – and thus relying solely on French reports can provide only partial understanding. To get to the heart of this local lived experience we must move outside of the colonial archive and turn to locally produced Arabic texts and ethnographic interviews. From these Saharan sources, a fuller understanding emerges of how desert communities envisioned the political and spiritual forces of their social worlds during periods of famine, economic stagnation, and domestic tension. Local economic and political shifts in the first half of the twentieth century, animated by cyclical droughts, World War II, and gradual movement away from enslaved labor greatly affected Saharan daily life: colonial reports demonstrate that a phenomenon identified as “bloodsucking” may have emerged as a response to such changes in Mauritania. But these administrative documents never take the accusations seriously – and they rarely provide substantial information about the social dynamics at play in the incidents they describe. This chapter reexamines histories of colonial governance beside Arabic texts and ethnographic interviews to argue that Saharan populations experienced the political changes of the colonial period as a disruption of the spiritual order as well as the social and environmental order. They drew on the practices and vocabulary of l’hjāb to explain the _ that malady by spiritual malady that afflicted them and assign blame for leveling accusations of bloodsucking during local crises of environmental and social change. Both the accusation of sell and the l’hjāb used to counter it signal the contestation of a society’s status quo. _

Precolonial Descriptions of Bloodsucking As early as the fifteenth century, some inhabitants of the Saharan West were acquainted with bloodsucking episodes. To my knowledge, Muhammad b. Muhammad b. ʿAlī al-Lamtūnī’s letter to Jalāl al-Dīn _ tī – previously _ mentioned in Chapter 1 – provides the earliest al-Suyū _ written evidence for the existence of sell in the greater Saharan West. Black Morocco, 109 11, 9. Notably, the case of Bilāl ould Mahmūd (died c. 1885), a _ formerly enslaved Muslim saint, defies this racialized assumption about spiritual authority. See Khaled Esseissah, “Enslave Muslim Sufi Saints in the Nineteenth Century Sahara: The Life of Bilal Ould Mahmoud,” JAH 62, no. 3 (November 2021): 1 16.

192

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

On a list of practices he considered signs of weak Islamic adherence among local inhabitants, Al-Lamtūnī described the ability of some akhdām, or enslaved people, to kill or to make others fall ill from a simple touch.10 Al-Lamtūnī seemed to think of this destructive ability to harm others through light physical touch as specific to the enslaved and he contested its permissibility within Islam as he contested other regional customs, including the use of amulets and certain immodest behaviors of women. Al-Lamtūnī described how women with this strange power would, as night fell, “fly with fire and kill (people by this means).”11 Others, according to al-Lamtūnī, claimed the ability to cure the nefarious effects of the malevolent forces that he attributed primarily to enslaved women.12 Presumably, these “others” were those we categorize here as hajjāba, although the letter does not identify them as such. Enslaved _ people and specifically enslaved women in the Sahara were, then, known by the end of the fifteenth century to be able to cause illness or even death by brushing against or passing by their victim. Roughly three centuries later, Sīdī ʿAbd Allāh ould al-Hājj Ibrahīm similarly described familiarity with a harming touch, what Ya_ hyā ould al_ work, as Barā has described in his study of the reformist scholar’s major “a kind of ability to harm people by focusing on them with sight and determination.”13 Ould al-Hājj Ibrahīm’s early nineteenth-century trea_ bloodsucking in a formula for constructing tise, Rushd al-ghāfil, mentions a magic square (jedwal) to heal victims of sellāl.14 Ould al-Barā explains that reciting the formula of letters in the square afforded protection from “the kind of magic known as al-saghnīa or al-mass or al-sell,” alternative _ _ to refer to the same terms found throughout written and oral sources 15 extractive force. Ould al-Hājj Ibrahīm had studied Islamic esoteric sciences with the express goal_ of combatting the effects of bloodsucking, speaking to both the possibility of encountering sell in the Saharan West and the enduring use of l’hjāb to treat it.16 _ 10 11 12 13 14

15 16

Hunwick, “Notes on a Late Fifteenth Century Document,” 14 and Ould Cheikh, “Nomadisme, islam et pouvoir politique,” 176. Hunwick, “Notes on a Late Fifteenth Century Document,” 14. Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh, “La société Sanhaja méridionale au XVe siècle,” Masadir: Cahier des sources de l’histoire de la Mauritanie 1 (1994): 5 35, 13. Yahyā ould al Barā “al fuqahā wa ʿulūm al sirr wa al shirr (al muʿarif al khaffīya),” _ Unpublished article shared with permission by author. See Muhammad Lemīn ould Muhammad al Amīn al Sālim, “Awwal bahth hawl al _ sirr al harf,” Morītānyā Akhbār, April _ 10, _ 2013, kitāba al_ talsamiyya fī Morītānyā aw _ _ https://goo.gl/ti1IAv. Ould al Barā, “al fuqahā.” It was when the Tagānt scholar studied in the Fouta Jallon with Fulbe scholar Alfā Ibrāhīm that he was provided the formula described here. Husayn ould Mahand, _ al Tāh, interview. _ interview Nouakchott, July 17, 2012, and Hamden ould _

Desert Panic

193

Bloodsucking emerges again in textual form in the contemporaneous legal opinions (fatāwā) from the Kunta. In one fatwa, Sīdī Muhammad al-Kuntī responded to a question about bloodsucking and its _ punishment: the questioner asked if those “who suck the blood from inside the body [are] to be killed,” referencing the practice with the terms “al-saghnīa called by most Arabs al-sellāla, what the Songhay call karkara.”17 Sīdī Muhammad Al-Kuntī lived primarily among Tuareg, _ communities who knew bloodsucking by the Songhay, and Arab Songhay term, karkara. While a French-Songhay lexicon published in 1994 defines the term, kar-kar, to mean “to tap/pat with a hot knife, to tap/to pat,” kar-karkaw as “he who taps,” and kar-karro as the process of “tapping,” the early nineteenth-century shaykh wrote about the karkaaw as a specific group of people who are known for “bloodsucking from the veins inside the body until the drained person dies or nearly dies.”18 Sīdī Muhammad Al-Kuntī provided more details about bloodsucking in a second_ fatwā after being asked by the Fulani scholar Nūh b. al-Tāhir _ about the kind of people who practice saghnīa.19 He gave _an example of those who suck their victims’ blood, writing “[a]mong them is a group from India that kills people on the spot. They tear [open] the chest and do not find a heart there. They snatch it [the heart] from the chest with ambition and determination and psychological strength.”20 In locating the origin of this practice in India, al-Kuntī underscored its pre-Islamic foundation but also echoed patterns we have seen earlier of how esoteric practices were understood to have traveled. Here the shaykh

17

18

19

20

Bibliothèque Nationale de la France (BNF), Richelieu, manuscrits orientaux, Arabe 6851, ff 284 85V. See also Rebstock, Maurische Literaturgeschichte, 712. Ould al Barā, al majmūʿa al kubrā, Fatwā 6590, 6591. Recent online publications also use these terms interchangeably. See “Al sughnīa,” Al markaz al ʿālamī li dirāsāt wa abhāth ʿulūm al jānn, August 15, 2016, www.jinnsc.com/vb/archive/index.php/t 12822 _ .html. Ould al Barā, al majmūʿa al kubrā, Fatwā 6588, 6585. Perhaps a sign of a written error, in Ould al Barā”s collection of published legal opinions, both karkara and karawa appear. Ould al Barā, al majmūʿa al kubrā and Fatwā 6590 91. For the Songhay/ French lexicon, see Youssouf Mohamed Haı¨dara, Youssouf Billo Maı¨ga, Mohamed Bagna Maı¨ga, and John P. Hutchinson, eds. Kalimawey citaabo soŋay annansaara šenni / Lexique soŋay français (Bamako: DNFLA, 1994). Thanks to Brandon County for these details and those in Pulaar and Soninké below. For more on Nūh b. al Tāhir, see Nobili, Caliph and the Renewer of the Faith. This term _ with a_ q (saqnīa), but appears more in written texts across time than in can also be spelled contemporary interviews. The Soninké term sharing roots, suxuña (pl. suxuñanu), has been translated more broadly as “sorcerer” by Oudiary Makan Dantioko in Dictionnaire sonkinké français (Bamako: Éditions Jamana, 2003). Dimé Thiam confirmed this usage and specified the Soninké also use the term horo miñaane (bloodsuckers/drinkers) in personal communication with the author via WhatsApp, June 20, 2019. Ould al Barā, al majmūʿa al kubrā, Fatwā 6588, 6585.

194

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

argued, “learning and teaching [sellāla], like all harmful magic, is to be a non-believer.”21 Classifying bloodsucking as “harmful magic,” that is, illicit sihr, meant that those who engaged in bloodsucking committed an _ act antithetical to Islam. Only a non-Muslim, a non-believer, would employ such methods. He explained that evildoers “practice this with a pomegranate by gathering from it the seeds until there are no longer any seeds left.”22 In both cases, the heart and the seeds were removed without lacerating the skin. This notion of an ability to remove the innermost body parts and liquids without actually touching the victim was widespread in bloodsucking accusations in Mauritania. The removal of essential life forces or organs occurred imperceptibly, so much so that the victims of sellāla were often unaware that their heart or blood had been removed. And, yet, for all the heavy and frequent condemnation of its agents, little is written about the actual science of bloodsucking. Sīdī Muhammad _ Al-Kuntī reports that “they” – perhaps the bloodsuckers themselves, perhaps witnesses – claim that attackers work in pairs and rely on a gendered division of labor. Somehow using a shadow as an entry point, the male agent would murder the victim and the female agent would subsequently drain the body of blood. Yet, some would-be victims, however, had “protected” (maʿsūm) blood which, bitter in taste, repelled _ vomit up the acerbic fluid, unable to their attackers who would then 23 swallow it. According to the Saharan shaykh, skill in the art of bloodsucking was either “innately-driven or acquired.”24 Instead of celestial bodies, sacred texts, or jinn activating or ensuring the efficacy of sell’s powers, only the bloodsucker himself (or, more often, herself ) triggered sell as a craft independent of any other agent or technique. These fatāwā also indicate a connection in the minds of nineteenthcentury Saharans between bloodsucking and miscarriages, providing us rare historical information about pregnancy and abortion.25 Sīdī Muhammad Al-Kuntī’s response notes people often confuse early preg_ loss (al-fāsh l-haml, or the “draining of pregnancy”) with bloodnancy sucking. He clarifies _ that some miscarriages can be purposely induced with herbal concoctions, such as the plant resins asafoetida (al-hantīt), _ ferula tingitma (al-fāsūkh) or incense, treatments that are unrelated to

21 22 23 24 25

Ould al Barā, al majmūʿa al kubrā, Fatwā 6588, 6585. The North African scholar Ibn Khaldūn wrote a similar description five centuries earlier. Ould al Barā, al majmūʿa al kubrā and Ibn Khaldūn, The Muqaddimah, 394. Ould al Barā, al majmūʿa al kubrā, Fatwā 6588. Ould al Barā, al majmūʿa al kubrā. Ould al Barā, al majmūʿa al kubrā, Fatwā 6590 91.

Desert Panic

195

sorcery.26 If an abortion results, the offending party should be made to pay compensation, or dīya, in the form of manumitting either an enslaved man or woman.27 If the pregnant woman dies in the process, then Islamic law calls for qawad, or the retaliative killing of the responsible person. The abortive methods via herbal medicine were unrelated to sorcery, according to the shaykh, but he then specified that miscarriages could also be activated by evil desires, non-Arabic utterances, and magic. In the latter cases – a collection of practices that would have been identified with sorcery – punishment would be the same as for all acts of unbelief (kufr): death.28 Ills related to fertility and childbearing were an enduring focus of l’hjāb.29 The question about miscarriages shows _ child was understood as related to the draining that the loss of an unborn of life forces caused by sell. In either circumstance, l’hjāb was the _ operative cure. These legal opinions from one of the Sahara’s most prominent Sufi shuyūkh in the first part of the nineteenth century furnish significant evidence of the reach of bloodsucking accusations through time and space, and how these practices were understood to operate in contemporary social life. From Sīdī Muhammad al-Kuntī’s responses to one of _ the primary advisors of the Hamdallāhi caliphate in Masina just south of _ Azawād where the Kunta were based, we learn first, that bloodsucking was identified among several language groups of the Sahara West, second, that these arts were clearly understood to fall into the category of sihr, and thus, non-belief, and, third and consequently, that the _ practitioners of sell should be punished with death, per Islamic jurisprudence. These fatāwā indicate that a protection against sell existed: “bitter” blood that could save some targeted victims from a full and deadly draining (though the sources do not clarify whether the bitterness was innate or acquired via consultation with a practitioner like a hajjāb). _ These written opinions also offer an unexpected portrait of women’s options regarding the termination of pregnancy and illustrate contemporaries’ understanding of why miscarriages might occur. While al-Kuntī identifies any purposeful use of herbal medicines as belonging to the 26

27 28 29

Both herbal remedies have been known to have abortive and menstruation inducing properties. W. Jöchlea, “Menses Inducing Drugs: Their Role in Antique, Medieval and Renaissance Gynecology and Birth Control,” Contraception 10, no. 4 (1974): 425 39; Poonam Mahendra and Shradha Bisht, “Ferula asafoetida: Traditional uses and pharmacological activity,” Pharmacognosy Reviews 6, no. 12 (2012): 141. Ould al Barā, al majmūʿa al kubrā, Fatwā 6590, 6591. An unexplored subject when it comes to the Kunta is the question of slavery. Ould al Barā, al majmūʿa al kubrā. Constant Hamès highlights such a recipe from the fourteenth century used to ease a difficult birth. See Hamès, “Entre recette magique d’Al Bûnî,” Fétiches II, 192.

196

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

same category (feticide) as the use of physical violence, such as a blow to the stomach, he also allows for the possibility that sorcery might cause the end of a pregnancy. In this context, we can imagine jealousy or shame as explanatory frameworks for why a malevolent person might wish a miscarriage on a pregnant woman. An important source for scholars writing on bloodsucking in the past has been Sīdī Ahmad ould al-Amīn’s (d. 1913) The Encyclopedia of the Biographies of the_ Literati of Shinqīt – better known as al-Wasīt – which _ addresses local practices of bloodsucking under the term sihr.30_ Ould alAmīn (dit al-Shinqīt) published al-Wasīt in Cairo in 1911 in_ part to assert _ at the end of the nineteenth Mauritania’s place _ in the Muslim world century, describing intellectual activity and traditions of al-Shinqīt’s _ birthplace. Reflecting social life in the decades before the French colonial incursion, al-Wasīt was written before the abolition of the regional trade in enslaved people_ and before colonial officials worked to monitor and shape local politics. Writing for an audience unfamiliar with the cultural specificities of Mauritania, al-Shinqīt had an interest in portraying his native land as part _ of the Arab world instead of the “Land of the blacks” (bilād al-sūdān), at the time largely considered non-Muslim.31 Al-Shinqīt included a short _ t.” Considerate section in al-Wasīt entitled, “Words on Sorcery in Shinqī _ of his audience, he used a term more broadly recognized_ in the Muslim world, sihr, instead of the regionally specific term sellāla, to describe an undated _episode of bloodsucking accusations and fears in the date oasis town of Tījīkja. Explaining that this “sorcery” spread among the slaves in oasis communities, Al-Shinqīt confirmed that an aggressor might attack _ by “looking at the chest of a person” when he would “pull out his heart, but he does not take it [the heart] except if he has contact with [the person] or with his shadow …,” emphasizing the malignant possibilities of a gaze.32 By locating the accusation in this highly contested contact zone between bīdān and “black” populations, al-Shinqīt’s account reveals the _ _ 30

31

32

Acloque and McDougall incorrectly claim that the earliest written evidence appears in Sīdī Ahmad b. Amīn al Shinqīt’s al wasīt and that the phenomenon emerged later than _ Arabic_ texts indicate. Acloque,_ “Accusations,” 286 and McDougall “Slavery,” 70 76. Bonte does not hypothesize about the timing of sellāla’s emergence but he only cites colonial mentions of “sorcery.” Bonte, “L’émirat de l’Adrar,” 1729 and 1732. Ould Cheikh translated the text in “Nomadisme, islam et pouvoir politique,” 431 32. See under the section heading (translated here) “Words on Shinqīt: is it part of the _ Sūdān or of the Maghrib?”. Ould Cheikh, “Nomadisme, islam et pouvoir politique,” 422. Ould Cheikh, “Nomadisme, islam et pouvoir politique,” 509. McDougall examines this case in “Slavery.”

Desert Panic

197

crucial function of ideas about race, social hierarchy, and belonging in these incidents in Mauritania. In al-Wasīt’s Tījīkja case, sorcery is portrayed as an enslaved person’s revenge for_ a master’s mistreatment: “If a master or anyone else hits an enslaved person, he [can] be certain that two days later his head will fall on a pillow and he will die suddenly and people [will] say the slave is a sorcerer.”33 As al-Shinqīt writes, “the reason for the existence of sihr among the slaves of Shinqīt_ [present-day _ among the Mauritania] is that many of_ the slaves are imported from Bambara and they are black people and sihr among them is beyond measure.”34 Indeed, for al-Shinqīt and many_ of his bīdān contemporar_ _ ies, enslaved Africans were conceptualized as non-Muslim outsiders who came from a language and cultural group identified vaguely with the “Bambara” a term used to describe people from further east near the Niger River basin.35 The Saharan traveler must have also considered this kind of sihr specific enough to his homeland to explain it to curious readers in _the Middle East, since other forms of sorcery and magic, such as the mixing of plant-based concoctions, animal and human hair and body parts, or formulae of incomprehensible incantations, were also widespread and often classified under the same term; yet, sellāla was the only practice he classified as “sorcery.” Ann McDougall has argued that this case in Tījīkja illustrates, in two crucial respects, how bloodsucking changed over time in Mauritania. She argues first that members of the dominant bīdān community simply were _ of extraction, which they not equipped to deal with this nefarious practice

33

34 35

al Shinqīt, al Wasīt, 509. Susan Rasmussen notes among Nigerian Tuareg a similar _ _ work,” in which people of enslaved origin kill from a distance. practice called “bad Rasmussen, “Betrayal or affirmation? Transformations in witchcraft technologies of power, danger and agency among the Tuareg of Niger,” in Magical Interpretations, eds. Henrietta Moore and Todd Sanders, 136 59, 148. al Shinqīt, al wasīt, 509. _ Until the_ 1905 decree banning slavery, most Saharan communities procured enslaved people through war and trade with Wolof and Mandé speaking neighbors. James Searing notes that nineteenth century accounts mention enslaved Bambara as making up the biggest group of enslaved people and that these Bambara probably made up the majority of enslaved people in Mauritania. James F. Searing, “Aristocrates, esclaves et paysans: Pouvoir et dépendance dans les états wolof, 1700 1850,” in Groupes serviles, ed. Villasante De Beauvais, 25 57, fn 35, 35. See also ANS 2G1/96 in which a colonial officer notes that Bambara and Malinké make up the majority of the enslaved, though he adds that the number of slaves from French Soudan was decreasing at the end of the nineteenth century, Sénégal cercle de Kaédi, rapports trimestriels d’ensemble, 1898. See Jean Bazin and his argument that “Bambara appears in this [colonial and West African] world as the signifier for ‘the other’” and that “in Senegal, all the captives coming from the interior were then called ‘Bambara.’” Jean Bazin, “A Chacun Son Bambara,” in Au cœur de l’ethnie: ethnies, tribalisme, et état en Afrique, eds. Jean Loup Amselle and Elikia M’Bokolo (Paris: la Découverte, 1985), 87 125, 105 06.

198

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

perceived as new to the region arriving at the end of the nineteenth century with an influx of enslaved men and women.36 She further claims that for community members to have deemed bloodsucking the consequence of the evil eye (ʿayn) signals a narrowing of the distance between “‘Moor’ and ‘black’ supernatural powers” as master and slave societies blended over the nineteenth century.37 As the antecedent Arabic documentation discussed earlier demonstrates, however, bloodsucking was – certainly by the early nineteenth century and potentially as early as the fifteenth – already known and subject to evaluation and interpretation by bīdān _ scholars much further into the Sahara. If anything, the earliest descriptions of practices related to bloodsucking seem most directed in their assertions that the determined stare – something quite closer to ʿayn or the evil eye – was the operative force more often than physical touch. In the Tījīkja case, al-Shinqīt writes that the inhabitants of the oasis _ enslaved populations and concluded town discovered sihr among their _ they had to massacre all enslaved people to rid their community of this threat. To proceed, the Tījīkja inhabitants called for an expert from “the land of the blacks” to undertake the task of cleansing the date oasis of its problematic enslaved population.38 Presumably, bīdān in Tījīkja trusted _ as proximate to the their invitee because he came from a region perceived geographic origins of the enslaved persons and because he had already confronted sorcery successfully in other communities. Once the enslaved people had gathered, this paid specialist would “give them curative drinks so they [would] vomit and the accused vomited what was known as sihr.”39 Even though the specialist performed this procedure, taking _ his money and leaving, “it was obvious that sihr remained in the slaves as before and people then killed whoever was_ a sorcerer.”40 Al-Shinqīt omitted how sorcerers were then distinguished from among the entirety_ of the enslaved population, but a further indication of the deep links in the minds of the dominant bīdān population between slavery and sellāla is _ the fact that al-Shinqīt mentioned the towns of Tījīkja, Atār, and Awjeft _ and caravan as especially notorious_ for sellāla incidents. Busy date oases centers, these Saharan communities into the 1940s remained sites of enslaved labor and trade between sub-Saharan and North Africa. Imagined as ritually powerful by bīdān, enslaved “Bambara” and other _ non-Arab men and women were reputed to be knowledgeable experts in the arts of herbal remedies and poison, in the practice of harmful magic.

36 38 40

McDougall, “Slavery,” 76. al Shinqīt, al wasīt, 509. _ al wasī_t, 509. al Shinqīt, _ _

McDougall, “Slavery,” 76 77. al Shinqīt, al wasīt, 509. _ _

37 39

Desert Panic

199

They were also believed to eat human flesh.41 Often identified as non-Muslim or only marginally so even after converting, these enslaved non-Arabs allegedly practiced sciences forbidden by the Qur’ān and this illicit knowledge made them appear especially dangerous. Bīdān _ communities reliant on enslaved labor likely heard about or witnessed possession rituals and incidents of “soul-eating” that took place in neighboring Wolof, Halpulaaren, or Soninké communities.42 Conceivably, bīdān caravan traders and itinerant Muslim scholars could _ have carried observations and accounts of these practices from their travels in the Western Sahel back to their home communities in the Sahara. In the lower Senegal valley, people denounced as “flesh-eaters” were sometimes sold to bīdān and, thus into slavery, as punishment for _ history of language in these communities their malevolent magic.43 The help us understand how the plurilingual communities of West African shared concepts of and/or terms to describe a being who could harm others through the consumption of bodily matter. The terms used in the region – karkar in late eighteenth-century or early nineteenth-century Songhay for the harmful touching or patting of another; suxuña, horomiñaane, and saghnia in Soninké for sorcerers and bloodsucking; ñaamneejo for people-eaters in Pulaar; sell for blood extraction in Hassāniyya; and deum for flesh-eating in Wolof – indicate a well_ circulated concept of a powerful figure who could attack through invisible means or a simple touch, killing the victim or afflicting her with sudden and otherwise inexplicable illness. As enslaved individuals were purchased and voyaged with caravans further north into the desert, some may have carried with them reputations as dangerous sorcerers. Those enslaved and captured or sold as adults might have also carried rituals associated with sell into bīdān-dominated oasis towns. Much as al_ end of the fifteenth century, so the people Lamtunī was persuaded at the

41

42

43

In interviews, bīdān interlocutors recounted bloodsucking was of Bambara origin. ʿAbd _ al Rahīm ould Hanshī, interview, Shinqīt, February 1, 2012. For parallels, see Robin _ article, “Haitians, magic, and money: _ Derby’s raza and society in the Haitian Dominican borderlands, 1900 1937,” Comparative Studies in Society and History 36, no. 3 (July 1994): 488 526 in which she explores how Dominicans imagine connections between Haitians and harmful magic. Saint Louis and Dakar fishing communities were known for ndoëp, an event commemorating alliances with spirits. Ndoye, Le N’Dôep. Wolof populations also referred to “soul eaters” (deum) and Halpulaar communities to “people eaters” (niamneddo). Sow, Divination Marabout Destin and Dilley, Islamic and Caste Knowledge Practices, 140. Acloque referencing Abbé David Boilat, “Accusations,” 286. Boilat, Esquisses Sénégalaises (Paris: Karthala, 1984, 1853), 316.

200

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

of late nineteenth-century towns such as Tījīkja or Awjeft believed that enslaved men and women in oasis communities might wield their potent magic against local Muslim communities. Al-Shinqīt, writing about the phenomenon of sell at the end of the _ nineteenth century, explained that enslaved people were motivated to strike out, not least because of food shortages: “the intensity of desire for meat, hunger and anger.”44 Meat and milk from camel, goat, and sometimes cow made up the foundation of desert diets in semi-nomadic and settled communities. Millet, dates, sugar, tea, and the rare vegetable grown in the colder months supplemented the usual Saharan fare. Both meat and milk, however, were scant in the diets of the enslaved: their typical nourishment of mostly seed grasses and grains left them susceptible to disease, and their mortality rates were high.45 Bloodsucking thus was not only envisioned as expressing metaphorically their malice toward individuals but also as a way for undernourished enslaved people to enrich their diets with victims’ blood. Enslaved men and women were not always “permanent strangers” in oasis towns: over time they came to live among the dominant bīdān, convert to Islam, speak Hassāniyya, bear their masters’ children, _and breast-feed the children of_ their mistresses.46 Slave status, however, still carried the stigma of servility, restricted freedom of movement and freedom to have a family, and limited enslaved people’s economic independence. Opportunities differed depending on gender: men were more likely than women to be manumitted by their masters and also had access to possibilities of employment and movement in a colonial wage economy that were rarely afforded to enslaved women. In the minds of some bīdān, women of slave status might be especially covetous of their _ masters’ marriages, kinship relations, or children if they were unable to similarly attain them.47

44 46

47

45 al Shinqīt, al wasīt, 509. Webb, Desert frontier, 25, 119. _ “Slavery,” _ McDougall, 77; Ruf, Ending Slavery, 98; Villasante de Beauvais, “La question des hiérarchies sociales et des groupes serviles chez les Bidan,” in Groupes Serviles, ed. Villasante de Beauvais, 277 322, 296; Martin A. Klein, “The slave trade in the Western Sudan during the nineteenth century,” Slavery and Abolition 13, no. 1 (1992), 39 60; Paul Lovejoy, Transformations in Slavery: A History of Slavery in Africa (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009); Marie Rodet, Les migrantes ignorées du Haut Sénégal, 1900 1946 (Paris: Karthala, 2009) and Richard Roberts, Warriors, merchants, and slaves: the state and the economy in the middle Niger valley, 1700 1914 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1987). See traveler René Caillié’s conversations with bīdān women concerned about _ Qtd. in Ruf, Ending Slavery, relationships between husbands and enslaved women. 101 02.

Desert Panic

201

Administrative Concerns during the Colonial Period In 1905, two years after claiming Mauritania as a territory, the French administration abolished the purchase and exploitation of enslaved people in its West African colonies. But the French colonial position on slavery (official prohibition combined with tacit toleration) meant that colonial documents often obscured the relationship between slavery and sell: the accused were ambiguously labeled “captives” or “servants,” rather than explicitly recorded as “slaves.”48 Colonial administrators’ everyday acceptance of slavery in its various persevering forms of unpaid labor and service meant that the racialized and statusbased nature of bloodsucking accusations in Mauritania were partly camouflaged. In some cases, Mauritanians might conceal the identity of the accused to avoid calling attention to illegal labor practices: in others, French officers likely masked the known slave status of those accused of bloodsucking. And if slavery could not be acknowledged in official correspondence, then how could coal tensions – or malevolent spiritual or magical practices that the de facto enslaved directed against the dominant bīdān – be recognized or addressed? Causal factors related to slavery _are part of the subtext in colonial reports on cases of accusation of sell and subsequent mob violence, but French officers avoid addressing them head on. Despite the ambivalence of the colonial administrators who should have enforced the 1905 anti-slavery laws, the colonial period was characterized by a gradual reduction in slavery: enslaved people did increasingly purchase, demand, or escape to freedom.49 Manumitted men sometimes continued to work for their former masters but under new conditions. Men who had achieved a release from enslaved status could seek opportunities away from villages or oases where they formerly served, especially in the Senegal River Valley and on peanut plantations in Senegal.50 Many women, however, remained in servile relationships. Responsible for their children, and often with more intimate connections to their masters’ families through concubinage or milk kinship, women lacked the same geographic and economic options. During a period when people in West Africa increasingly recognized and acted on the French abolition of slavery, two acute periods of famine 48 49

50

I discuss the social context in greater detail in “The Heart of the Matter.” Bonte estimates enslaved people made up 25% of the population in the Adrār at the beginning of the twentieth century and 13% at the end of the 1950s. Bonte, L’émirat de l’Adrar, 123. Olivier Leservoisier, “Les hrâtîn et le Fuuta Tooro, XIXème XXème siècle: entre émancipation et dépendance,” Groupes serviles, ed. Villasante de Beauvais, 147 67.

202

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

in the Adrār region of the Mauritania further motivated the enslaved to leave their masters.51 From 1939 to 1944, Mauritanian populations suffered from the combined impact of a severe drought and an agricultural restructuring intending to support the Allied war effort in Europe. During this terrible period, colonial officers reported that desert inhabitants strained to feed and clothe themselves.52 Periods of drought and famine led masters to sell enslaved people they could no longer afford to feed.53 A colonial report from the Adrār region observed that slave owners tried to “get rid of their useless servants who [then] come fatten up the mass of miserable [people] and prostitutes” – prostitution being one of the only paid jobs then available to desperate women.54 Children ate trash to fill their bellies while their parents perished, and French administrators wrote reports on the catastrophic exacerbation of WWII’s global economic consequences in a country that lacked adequate rain, transport, trade, and healthy livestock.55 Amidst these immediate concerns, colonial documents of the early 1940s barely reported on events or phenomena connected to bloodsucking, sorcery, or other invisible forces. Conceivably, Mauritanians had come to understand that colonial officers did not share an appreciation for bloodsucking’s dangers. Saharans might have learned through experience to silence any betrayal of sellāla accusations and the oftenconsequent violence. When bloodsucking cases appeared in the record, officers were dismissive of the accusations themselves: they more often focused on the resulting violence or tensions as a matter of administrative

51

52

53

54 55

Pettigrew, “The Heart of the Matter”; ARA, Dossier 1924, Objet: Dégrèvement zekkat moutons, 7 March 1927. See also ANS 2G27/17, Mauritanie rapport politique annuel, 1927. In 1930, a colonial officer worried about the “sudden end of the caravan trade in camels and livestock to Senegal” and its effects on Adrār populations. APC Dossier 1930, Rapports Politiques, Novembre 1930. See also APC Dossier 1931, Rapports Politiques, Janvier 1931 and ANS 9G31(17) Famine, no. 113 and no. 190, 1941. See ANS 17G553/15, no. 743C, Chinguetti, Mauritanie, synthèse trimestrielle 1943 1955 and no. 230C, Rapport du lieutenant colonel Schneider, 30 mars 1943; ANS 9G31/17, no. 85, 113, 190, 18; ANS 17G10/1, no. 24, 30 January 1943, Notes et renseignements. Schneider noted that seventy people died due to famine related causes during a two week period in Shinqīt. _ Alain Chambon, “La population de condition ou d’origine servile ou ‘maures noirs’ dans la République Islamique de Mauritanie,” ANPS, Côte 20000002/189, CHEAM, no. 3607, 1961, 22. Ruf, Ending Slavery, 185 and E. Ann McDougall, “Un monde sans dessus dessous: esclaves et affranchis dans l’Adrar mauritanien, 1910 1950,” Groupes Serviles au Sahara, ed. Villasante de Beauvais, 121 43, 131 32. ANS 17G553 (152), Chinguetti, Mauritanie, synthèse trimestrielle 1943 1955, no. 743C, Mise en valeur de l’Adrar, 1943. ANS 17G553 (152), no. 230C.

Desert Panic

203

concern rather than engaging in an extended anthropological inquiry into the practices that triggered the retaliatory violence.56

Patterns and Context While records in colonial archives do permit the identification of bloodsucking as a historical phenomenon, and the scant paperwork generated by these cases facilitates some analysis of general patterns during the colonial period, ethnographic conversation and oral history interviews help us to begin to understand, in Luise White’s phrasing, how “ordinary people recode and translate beliefs.”57 Between 2011 and 2016, I conducted more than ninety formal and ad hoc interviews with Mauritanians belonging to each of the country’s regions, occupational groups, and language communities. Sometimes these conversations were public, with other family members or neighbors listening. More often, and especially with people whose social status might prevent them from speaking forcefully in public, I talked with individuals alone. Over time, I noticed repeated patterns in the ways interlocutors discussed bloodsucking, the narrative conventions that they adopted as they situated the phenomenon within the moral and religious landscape of Saharan life. This received model locates bloodsucking within an Islamic framework – where methods of invoking invisible forces are categorized as illicit versus permitted – and illustrates that bloodsucking accusations work to maintain the social status quo in the Sahara. In the Arabophone southwestern Sahara, local explanations of extraordinary exsanguination rely on two related terms that this chapter glosses as “bloodsucking”: a verb meaning “to extract” or “draw out” (sell) and a noun phrase meaning “the sucking of blood” (imtisās _ _ al-damm).58 In oral history interviews, interlocutors most frequently spoke of “extraction” (sellāla) to describe this drawing of blood from

56

57

58

Acloque, “Accusations.” There are exceptions to this, see, for example, Cmdt. Busquet, “Note sur la sorcellerie,” Rapport Politique de la subdivision d’Atar, 1936, ANRIM E1/ 8, and Erin Pettigrew, “Muslim Healing, Magic, and Amulets in the Twentieth Century History of the Southern Sahara” (PhD diss., Stanford University, 2014). Luise White, “On unpacking the occult: Why we need to go back to Friuli (or Transylvania for that matter),” University of Wisconsin Madison, August 14, 2016. http://z3.invisionfree.com/Free Thinkers II/ar/t542.htm. Of note, al sell in Arabic means “tuberculosis”; however, local ethnographic and written sources do not draw connections between bloodsucking and tuberculosis. Al Shinqīt listed tuberculosis among other common maladies such as worms and conjunctivitis in_ “Words on Illness and Health in Shinqīt,” yet he clearly understood tuberculosis as a lung problem cured by drinking curdled _milk. al wasīt, 507 09. _

204

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

someone’s body.59 In contemporary local conceptions of good and evil, sellāla falls under the rubric of practices condemned in the Qur’ān for their opaque techniques, for their reliance on sources of power other than God, and their goal of harming others. The actions of consuming bodily fluids and organs are particularly condemned because drinking blood and eating carrion are explicitly prohibited in Islamic dietary law.60 Saharans have also understood blood as a vital fluid that ensured physical health, the red liquid constituting the human soul.61 Bloodsucking was denounced then as a category of “sorcery” and “black magic” (sihr and al-hikma al-kahla), both clearly forbidden in _ _ _ Mauritania through the word Islam, but also racialized in contemporary al-kahla, indicating the dark arts but also what people identified racially _ 62 as “black.” Contemporary oral testimony places bloodsucking under the umbrella of the evil eye (ʿayn); although, as noted earlier, the gaze had also been an important aspect of early descriptions of harmful practices.63 As with the evil eye, the bloodsucking assailant fixed a person with their eyes, staring at the victim’s chest and unleashing the destructive consequences of jealousy. Explanatory examples offered by informants included stories of an infertile or unmarried woman envying a married mother or a man of weak social standing coveting another’s social standing in his community. Bloodsucking expertise was generally understood to be inherited from mother to child through birth or breast milk as an innate and harmful ability.64 Stories warned children not to drink or eat anything from someone identified as a sellāl since ingesting something they prepared might lead to sickness or death.65 Relatives of known aggressors were feared and marginalized based on the presumption that they had inherited this harmful potential. 59 60 62 63

64

65

In interviews, these terms were almost interchangeable with the second term (imtisās al _ _ damm) shortened to “the act of sucking” (al muss). 61 _ _ “‘El ʿOmda’,” 44. The Qur’ān, 2:173. Awfa quoted in Dubié, Among the most cited verses of the Qur’ān are: 20:66, 7:116, 2:102, 113, and 114. ʿAbdel Azīz ould Fata ʿAma, interview, Nouakchott, May 15, 2012; Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba ould Sayār, interview, Tigumātīn, January 19, 2012; Mawlāy Ahmad_ ould _ Mawlāy Zāyn, _interview, Shinqīt, March_ 19, 2012. ʿAbdel Azīz ould Fata ʿAma and_ interview with Muhammad ould Zāmel, Nouakchott, July 9, 2012. For more on milk and its symbolic and_ generative role in Mauritania, see Corinne Fortier, “Le lait, le sperme, le dos. Et le sang? Représentations physiologiques de la filiation et de la parenté de lait en islam malékite et dans la société maure de Mauritanie,” CEA, 1 no. 161 (2001): 97 138. Many enslaved women served as wet nurses and prepared food for their masters or employers. Senī ould ʿAbdāwa, interview, Nouakchott, July 28, 2012. For recent descriptions of bloodsucking, see Ould Sīdī Yahyā, Al mujtamaʿ al fadfād, 103 05 and _ _ Al Bārik Allāh al Fādilī, al wusūl wa l tarsīkh bimanāqib al shaykh, 189_ 92. _

Desert Panic

205

Even if practitioners were said to have studied sellāla techniques from known specialists, the content and pedagogical method were mentioned only in the vaguest terms. In an ethnographic interview in Shinqīt, an _ to elderly male interlocutor described a townswoman who demonstrated her town’s religious leaders how she exercised her sinister powers. Instead of the exotic pomegranate, she used a date palm – a plant typical of oasis agriculture – to illustrate how sellāla worked in the Sahara: This was during the date harvest season and she pointed to some date palms that were far from where they were standing, pointing out that some were red and some were yellow. She looked at the dates and the dates were suddenly in her clothes, in her veil. That’s how she sucks the blood of people. She sucked the dates or was able to magically take one off the far off trees. She said that that’s the way she uses sell.66

Pulling ripe dates off a distant tree and, then still without moving, producing them in the folds of a veil operates as a metaphor for a recurring narrative of what Benjamin Acloque has termed “remote vampirism.”67 An older female healer in Shinqīt recounted how a woman in the town once held the end of a string, telling_ her victim to sit across from her holding the other end. When the woman began twisting the string over and over again, blood dripped down the center, falling to the sand underneath. The blood trickled from an invisible wound, terrifying the victim.68 While the sellāla, or bloodsucker, never physically touched her victim, the string was pulled taut between them, allowing her to slowly draw out the woman’s blood, which then seeped down the fiber and collected on the sand beneath it. If the process of removing bodily fluids and organs could occur imperceptibly, the symptoms that resulted from the secret harm of sellāla were more visible. Drained of blood, the victim would turn pale and she might flutter in and out of consciousness. We can see vivid descriptions of these symptoms in the 1936 “Notes on Sorcery” penned by a French administrator in the regional capital of Atār, as the region struggled with a series _ of incidents of bloodsucking accusations and subsequent violence.69 Commandant Busquet was situated between the towns of Shinqīt and Wādān, and between the palm oases of Awjeft and M’heirith, the _latter _ two notorious for their high incidence of sellāla. Busquet observed of bloodsucking incidents in the Adrār that “the sick person practically cannot make even the smallest movement: he is ‘like dead’; he mumbles in a sort of delirium …” The pallid victim no longer had any blood 66 67 69

Abba ould Ahmad Mahmūd, interview, Shinqīt, March 22, 2012. 68 _ _ Acloque, “Accusations.” ‘Ā’ishatū mint _Samorī, interview, Shinqīt, July 2, 2013. _ Busquet, “Note sur la sorcellerie.”

206

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

beneath his skin, drained such that “Moors say that one could even cut the skin or even a vein or an artery of such a sick person; no blood would come out. They say that these witches [feminine] … drink the blood or eat the heart of their victims.”70 Those who fell prey to bloodsucking were left near death in the Sahara, where their family members found them. A decade later Lieutenant François Beslay, serving in Shinqīt from _ pre1945 to 1947, similarly reported on the “beliefs and para-religious 71 cepts in Mauritania.” He explained that “the Moors claim there are a number of people gifted with a magical power who kill their victims from a distance by drinking the blood (usell) […] Shinqīt is a place reputed as full of people (particularly black [people]) with this_ power.”72 Fading in and out of consciousness, the sick person would release “only inarticulate sounds where one can discover the name of the sorceress, when he saw her, [when she] looked at him.”73 It is at this moment when the victim exhibits symptoms that the history of sell intersections with, and inescapably becomes, a part of a history of l’hjāb as a system of spiritual management. Narrowing down _ the causal factor in the invalid’s case necessitated the expertise of a Muslim spiritual mediator, specifically a hajjāb, to examine the sick _ person’s body and aliments. Families would seek out those hajjāba _ known to diagnose and heal such cases. Following an investigation of the victim’s body, symptoms, and recent social interactions, the hajjāb _ sell would then breakdown his analysis and conclusion. If he pronounced as the cause of illness, he would then suggest possible attackers and prescribe treatment, such as an amulet to be worn or a potion to be swallowed. At this point, the victim’s family or community would usually turn on the alleged attacker, demanding that the attacker reverse their attack or be punished. Accused bloodsuckers rarely confessed their crime, but they nevertheless remained objects of suspicion. Intense community energy was focused on eliminating the threat of illness and the death that bloodsucking carried with it. At the worst, suspicion and anger could erupt into violence. Regarded as “sorcerers” (sāhira), those convicted of bloodsuck_ a French student wrote in a 1938 ing were to be punished with death. As master’s thesis on the penal code in Mauritania, sorcery was punished with execution even though it was “very difficult to prove: the sorcerer has to have performed supernatural acts in public … and punishment is 70 71 72

Busquet, “Note sur la sorcellerie.” Lieutenant François Beslay, “Croyances et préceptes parareligieux en Mauritanie,” ANPS, Côte 20000002/37, CHEAM, no. 1003, 1946. 73 Busquet, “Notes sur la sorcellerie.” Busquet, “Notes sur la sorcellerie.”

Desert Panic

207

usually decided by public opinion.”74 Desecration was added to execution: the bodies of accused sorcerers were often dragged out of town and abandoned in the desert, without a proper Muslim funeral.75 In one interview, an elderly interlocutor from the oasis of Awjeft condemned mob attacks neighbors in his village carried out against the accused, suggesting that there were other, more sanctioned options for suturing the social wounds caused by bloodsucking accusations. He described this aggressive process of accusation and retaliatory violence as “brutal,” saying “it was against the sharī‘a what they were doing before. […] People would accuse, then just torture, beat, and kill.”76 As with the examples we have seen from the Kunta fatāwā, l’hjāb was _ not the only possible response to sell. Victims of sell could also approach a Muslim cleric of their choice for a legal opinion on the matter at hand and on how best to cope with situations of illness caused by bloodsucking. Because of the nonbinding nature of fatāwā, those seeking guidance might follow a cleric’s ruling but they could also consult with another cleric for guidance. Angry crowds usually rejected opinions from religious leaders who recognized the possibility for false accusation or counseled forgiveness instead of punishment. A cleric in Shinqīt corroborated _ this tendency to seek vengeance when explaining a colonial-era case of a woman who killed a woman enslaved in her service: “Before colonization, everyone engaged in these practices. Slaves were killed. Those who owned slaves had the right to do this. Slaves were like animals at that time. When that [bloodsucking accusations] happened, people did not go see the Muslim clerics. The slave did not have a family, so no one pressed charges.”77 These past customs of private punishment might partly explain why mobs would ignore late pleas from respected male elders that they restrain their anger. That those pleas were made at all, however, also indicates that bloodsucking accusations were not universally accepted as credible, or that some Muslim scholars and community leaders have advocated for an alternative process for mediating the situation. Those convinced that bloodsucking had in fact occurred avoided the formal spaces of resolution – a colonial administrative office or a Muslim cleric’s room – since each venue’s authorities might have prevented the type of trial and brutal punishment desired by incensed

74 75 76 77

Robert Lemoyne, “Enquête sur le droit pénal local de la Mauritanie,” ANPS, Côte 20000002/34, CHEAM, no. 897, 1938. Muhammad ould Bahan, interview, Shinqīt, May 1, 2012. _ AhmadʿAbdī, interview. _ _ Ould _ Ahmad Mahmūd, interview. The case Acloque analyzes in “Accusations” Abba ould _ supports the claim about_ the lack of family connections.

208

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

mobs.78 But when these cases concluded in moments of hostility and public violence, news of the events would reach French officers, who were then obliged to consider intervention in the resulting disturbance of social order. Colonial reports of bloodsucking incidents in Mauritania, like the episode in al-Wasīt, point to the clustering of such episodes in oasis towns. Awjeft, east_ of Atār, appears most prominently in these reports. _ Once a thriving date oasis and stop for caravans trading in African captives and salt, Awjeft and the neighboring villages of Tungād and M’heirith relied primarily on enslaved labor to harvest dates and seasonal _ 79 These three Saharan communities were known for a high agriculture. incidence of sellāla in their environs, a fact linked to the significant numbers of enslaved men and women working in these date oases. Some interlocutors who accepted sellala as a matter of fact, explained that it was the restricted meat consumption among the poorly fed enslaved, or later hrātīn, that led them to suck another person’s blood. _ One elderly hajjāb _in Awjeft recounted how a woman from his town once _ sucked people’s blood, mixing it with camel hair and turning it into a bloody string, with which she then magically fabricated a goat to eat.80 Because meat was an expensive yet vital part of the desert diet, these ties between red meat and bloodsucking stories seemed especially evocative of the challenges of life in the Sahara.81 Local historians and elders who rejected the notion that bloodsucking had real power to harm tended to explain bloodsucking accusations as a way of rationalizing illness caused by anemia, diabetes, malaria, or high blood pressure. Any of these illnesses might cause a person to faint, feel weak, and appear pale after a medical crisis. Other interviewees saw jealousy as playing a large role in cases where accusations were linked to fears about social reproduction in Saharan communities.82 Anxieties among bīdān about mixed racial and status sexual relationships were, as _ has highlighted, based on local knowledge that elite bīdān McDougall women often suffered from high rates of infertility.83 Force-fed from_ an 78

79 80 81 82 83

In fiqh, Islamic jurisprudence, one should avoid calling for criminal sanctions if there are any ambiguities in a case: the absence or invisibility of hard evidence in cases of bloodsucking would make it hard to carry out a trial following fiqh principles of evidence. Muhammad ʿAbd Allāh ould AhmadʿAbdī, interview, Awjeft, July 14, 2012. _ Ahmad ʿAbdī, interview. _ Ould See also_ Ould Sīdī Yahyā, al mujtamaʿ al fadfād, 103. _ _ _2012. Senī ould ʿAbdāwa, interview, Awjeft, July 13,

E. Ann McDougall, “‘To Marry One’s Slave Is as Easy as Eating a Meal’: The Dynamics of Carnal Relations within Saharan Slavery,” in Sex, Power and Slavery, eds. Elizabeth Elbourne and Gwyn Campbell (Athens: Ohio University Press, 2015), 139 66, 155 56.

Desert Panic

209

early age with the goal of initiating early onset puberty and displaying their signs of wealth, elite and sedentary bīdān women could easily _ encounter complications in pregnancy and birth, resulting in miscarriage, stillborn babies, or infants with major birth defects. Even if enslaved women might suffer from mistreatment and malnutrition because of their lowly status, in the 1920s and 1930s they were known to be more fertile than their elite counterparts.84 It seems bīdān men _ with infertile wives sought out opportunities to have sexual intercourse with enslaved or hrātīn women so that they might be able to ensure _ progeny. Children_ produced from these encounters, if recognized as offspring by their biological fathers, would inherit their paternal social (and racial) identity.85 Bīdān women leveled bloodsucking accusations against certain _ enslaved women thus discouraging husbands from extramarital relationships with the accused and thus preserving the social status afforded by bīdān genealogy. With a labor economy depending largely on enslaved _ hrtāniyya women as domestic servants, bīdān women had good and _ _to be anxious about their husbands striking _ up relationships with reason these women. The low status accorded to the enslaved and hrtāniyya, _ later together with the increasingly gendered nature of service in_ the colonial period as men disproportionately moved into other economic roles, made women especially vulnerable to accusations of sellāla, which could be leveled to socially isolate and exclude women who threatened to destabilize a socially dominant family.86 While the earlier Arabic sources do not point to gender as a noticeable factor in bloodsucking episodes, some colonial reports and the bulk of my conversations with Mauritanians indicate that women were more likely to be accused of this crime. Accounts of specific incidents – as well as general explanations of the phenomenon – in both sets of sources point to women, especially those of slave status or servile origin, as attackers. While both past and present narratives also connect bloodsucking to men of servile origin and people of both sexes belonging to the low-ranking occupational groups, especially the craftspeople

84

85 86

McDougall, “‘To Marry One’s Slave,” 156 and E. Ann McDougall, “Colonialism, Pastoralism, and ‘Le problème servile’: Case Study Mauritania,” in L’anthropologie en partage: Autour de l’œuvre de Pierre Bonte, eds. Yazid Ben Hounet, Anne Marie Brisebarre, Barbara Casciarri and Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh (Paris: Karthala, 2020), 57 74, 70 71. McDougall, “To Marry One’s Slave.” See the novel, Adabāy, written by a young hartānī writer, Shaykh Nūh, in which a bīdān _ sell _ murder to avoid _ _ as justification for her man accuses a pregnant enslaved woman of the shame of her pregnancy by his cousin. Adabāy (Riyādh: Dar mudārāk, 2019).

210

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Figure 5.1 “Fête des haratin (esclaves affranchis), 1934”. Photograph from Odette du Puigaudeau and Marion Sénones, Mémoire du pays maure: 1934 1960, ed. Monique Vérité (Paris: Ibis Press, 2000), 121. Permissions from Monique Vérité.

(muʿallimīn), enslaved and hrātīn women were overwhelmingly the victims (Figure 5.1).87 When_ I _asked present-day hrātīn interlocutors _ _ how they understood the motivations behind bloodsucking accusations, their responses pointed to skin color, arguing that such charges were almost always blamed on those considered “black” and of slave descent.88 For these members of the most-often accused community, these accusations were not a response to any actual power or practice, but more narrowly an attempt to marshal a popular conviction (that malevolent spiritual forces exist and can be directed against enemies) against a group targeted because of their comparative lack of social power. These explanations, not unlike histories of witchcraft accusation in medieval Europe and later New England, show us in action the use of 87

88

Recent jokes and stories about bloodsucking include examples of accusations against the iron working/craftspeople occupational group suspected of Jewish origins. See Ould Sīdī Yahyā, al mujtamaʿ al fadfād, 103 and an earlier example from the 1960s in Hamès, _ _ _ Bûnî,” Fétiches II, 216, fn. 24. “Entre recette magique d’Al Āminatū mint Swaydi Muhammad, interview, Awjeft, July 14, 2012; Boubacar _ Messaʿūd, interview, Nouakchott, August 5, 2012; Tijānī ould Ramadān ould Saʿīd, interview, Atār, July 3, 2013. See Pettigrew, “Muslim Healing, Magic,_ and Amulets,” 263 71 for a_ 1960s example in which a bīdān Sufi figure manumitted two enslaved _ women accused of bloodsucking.

Desert Panic

211

bloodsucking claims against marginalized women to maintain social norms. Carol Karlsen writes that “[t]he story of witchcraft is primarily the story of women. Witchcraft confronts us with ideas about women, with fears about women, with the place of women in society, and with women themselves.”89 A prominent anti-slavery activist understood the sellāla charges against an elderly enslaved woman in his hometown as stemming from her owner’s envy after the woman had achieved economic independence and purchased a home.90 “We accuse the most intelligent people of sell,” he stated, explaining that the owner’s family members, having used the allegations to turn neighbors against her, were then able to claim the woman’s property.

A New Social Order In mid-twentieth-century Mauritania, though the economy remained weak, enslaved people and hrātīn progressively felt emboldened to leave _ masters. Some joined religious groups and act independently from_ their that members of hegemonic Islamic denominations considered heterodox, meeting autonomously and promoting new forms of religious practice and piety. Conceivably, a master class worried about shifts in the dynamics in the interactions between labor and social authority could have deployed an already-existing idiom, the language of bloodsucking in accusations against those threatening to destabilize gender and religious norms.91 In these interactions, accuser and accused may disagree over the validity of a specific accusation, and even over whether the victim’s presenting problem is spiritual in nature. While French accounts of bloodsucking incidents indicate the accused consistently denied the accusations, colonial officers did not reflect on whether or not the accused expressed doubt about whether or not sell existed at all as a phenomenon. Contemporary interviews with hrātīn, however, displayed _ _ hrtāniyya woman in an ontological rejection of bloodsucking.92 One _ _ for local Muslim Awjeft interpreted bloodsucking accusations as a way spiritual mediators to earn money: these mediators earned their fees by diagnosing bloodsucking as a cause of illness, and thus had a motive to facilitate their clients in taking revenge through public allegation.93 This 89 90 91 92 93

Karlsen, The Devil in the Shape of a Woman, xii, 117. Boubacar Messaʿūd, interview. Ould Sīdī Yahyā confirms this, writing that bloodsucking is based in an understanding that “the poor_ are a threat to the powerful and the nobles” in Al mujtamaʿ al fadfād. _ See Pettigrew, “The Heart of the Matter” and Acloque, “Accusations of _Remote Vampirism.” Āminatū mint Swaydi Muhammad, interview. _

212

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

interlocutor, like many hrātīn I interviewed, categorically denied that sell existed as anything but_ an_ accusation. For her, bloodsucking persisted solely as a charge leveled by those seeking to safeguard their social station or functional role in their villages. If preservation of status is a primary motivator for accusers, then we might see these spiritual mediators – in the context of the increasing challenge to their status inherent in better, though still inadequate, access to biomedical care – as similarly motivated. Insisting on bloodsucking as a cause of misfortune would also preserve the spiritual leader’s own role in a local community.94 Experts in l’hjāb were the only people capable of single-handedly overcoming the evil _ manifested through bloodsucking, a transgression that could be neutralized only through the Islamic sciences. Without a more substantial set of quantitative data, I cannot make an argument here that bloodsucking accusations increased over time. Rather, sell existed as an accusation that continued to be effectively mobilized to contest changes to the social status quo as it had been since at least the fifteenth century. As the colonial system encouraged attendance in state-sponsored schools, as access to medical care slowly improved, and as the formerly enslaved were gradually integrated into desert communities, we might expect stories of bloodsucking to have faded away. Instead, in the late 1960s and early 1970s, an Adrār-based Sufi figure, Shaykh Muhammad Lemīn ould Sīdīna, initiated an antianti-sellāla campaign.95 _Muhammad Lemīn ould Sīdīna disputed the _ claiming that bloodsucking accusations existence of sellāla altogether, were simply generated by hajjāba and spread among a credulous popula_ of the hajjāba themselves. Part of the zwāya tion for the material benefit _ Smāsīd confederation based in Awjeft, Ould Sīdīna was born in 1908 in Atār where his father worked for the colonial army.96 At fifteen, he _ moved to Awjeft to begin religious training under Islamic scholars from the Smāsīd, and he then pursued higher Islamic education in mahādir _ 94 95

96

Elderly Awjeft hajjāb Ould Ahmad ʿAbdī lamented that no one sought his healing _ interview. _ expertise anymore, See the locally published and circulated article on this hajjāb: Cheikhani ould Sidina, “A _ la mémoire d’un anti esclavagiste des années 50: Ould Sidina fondateur de l’oasis miraculée El Ervane,” Cridem, April 17, 2013, http://cridem.org/C Info.php?article= 642036. For more on the Smāsīd, see Pierre Bonte, “L’émirat de l’Adrar.” Sīdīna’s grandfather was a caravan trader who transported and sold salt and dates in what is today Mali. His father, Sīdīna, left Awjeft after a struggle over land ownership, moving his family to Atār _ where he joined the colonial army. According to his grandson, Sīdīna strategically changed occupations to claim land in Tirobān, a neighboring village. Shaykhāni ould Sīdīna, interview, Atār, July 5, 2013, and ʿAbdoulaye ould Ahmad ʿAbdī, interview, _ Awjeft, July 5, 2013._

Desert Panic

213

established by Sufi specialists in the Brākna, Tagānt, and Assāba _ regions.97 Eventually studying primarily under Shaykhāni _ould Muhammad al-Tolba (1907–86) in the Tagānt, Sīdīna officially affiliated _ branch of Ibrahim Niasse (1900–75).98 Shaykh ould with_ the Tijāniyya Sīdīna’s own divergent teachings eventually led him to conflicts between his primary Sufi teacher, Ould Muhammad al-Tolba, and with other _ _ aimed to obliterate teachings Muslim notables in Mauritania.99 These social boundaries and hierarchies rooted in tribal affiliation, gender, and inherited occupational roles. One controversial application of his teachings promoted marriage between men of servile origin (hrātīn) from his _ _ religious community and women of noble status (bīdāniyyat). Because _ genealogy and thus social status flowed through men as fathers, such marriages were seen to denigrate bīdān women who customarily married paternal cousins and thus preserved_ their family’s honor. Following the path of his own spiritual guide, Ould Muhammad al-Tolba, Sīdīna also _ _ encouraged mixed gender and public dhikr performances that often involved repeated recitation of ritual prayers. While Sīdīna most likely had studied the Islamic esoteric sciences as part of his Sufi training, he was not especially known for his skills in l’hjāb. Instead, it was his _ suggestion of radically upending the conventional gender and social norms at a moment of great change in Mauritania that shaped his legacy as a Muslim spiritual leader. Sīdīna’s unconventional doctrine intentionally introduced the kind of socially disruptive behaviors that earlier in the colonial period had often been met with accusations of sell. The Sufi shaykh encouraged his followers to shake hands across gender lines, a teaching that generated further outside criticism in a region where Muslims avoided all crossgender physical contact between unrelated kin or milk relations. Sīdīna claimed he based his argument that men and women could shake hands 97

98

99

The town hosted multiple Sufi communities, the coexistence of which interlocutors mentioned as a phenomenon of the past. Isselemū ould Ahmad ould Ehmān, _ interview, Maʿaden el Ervān, July 4, 2013, and ould Ahmad ʿAbdī, interview. For _ more on the Ghuzfiyya, see Pierre Laforgue, “Une secte hérésiarque en Mauritanie: les _ Ghoudf,” in BCEHSAOF XI, no. 4 (1928): 654 65 and ANS 9G78 (107), Divers, Affaires islamiques, Sur les Ghoudfs. Shaykhāni ould Muhammad al Tolba was a descendent of al Shaykh Muhammad _ first introduced _ _ al Hāfiz al Tījānī, who the Tijāniyya Sufi wird to Mauritania. See _ _Frede, “Shaykhani ould Muhammad al Tulba,” in Dictionary of African Britta Biography, eds. Henry Louis Gates, Emmanuel Akyeampong, and Steven J. Niven (Oxford University Press, 2012), doi: 10.1093/acref/9780195382075.001.0001/acref 9780195382075 e 1870 and Rudiger Seesemann, The Divine Flood: Ibrahim Niasse and the Roots of Twentieth Century Sufi Revival (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011). Ould Shaybanī, interview, Awjeft, July 5, 2013 and Shaykhāni ould Sīdīna, interview, Tirjīt, July 5, 2013.

214

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

in greeting on his readings of the hadīth.100 He also allowed women to _ pray alongside men in Awjeft’s central mosque, which became another point of contention among the town’s other religious scholars. Some critics suggested Sīdīna’s goal in promoting these teachings was to make women rebel against their husbands.101 Claiming that adherence to his community meant recognizing social and gender equality for all believers, Sīdīna challenged the political importance of tribal affiliation and claimed that Mauritanian society should eliminate social inequality based on hierarchical markings of status (such as slave status, hrātīn _ _ identity, or the tributary terminology that persistently identifies certain 102 The shaykh’s groups and individuals as the lowly ranked znāga). followers numbered more than 60 in 1953 and, the next year, according to Pierre Bonte, he counted 136 followers among the Smāsīd of Awjeft plus 23 from another tribe, the Idayshīlī.103 Sīdīna’s interpretations of hadīth sources especially appealed to marginalized social groups: _ women, hrātīn, and znāga. Starting in the 1960s, some from these _ _ groups traveled to Awjeft to participate in the community of disciples who professed adherence to Sīdīna’s teachings as ashāb al shaykh, or the __ of the Adrār, shaykh’s companions.104 In this date-producing region a rumor spread that the Sufi leader fed dates laced with magic or drugs to the weak, tricking them into following him and joining his community.105 100

101

102 103

104

105

Shaykhāni ould Sīdīna, interview, July 3, 2013, in transit between Nouakchott and Maʿaden el Ervān and phone conversation, July 11, 2013. According to detractors in Awjeft, Sīdīna’s claims were based on unverified hadīth sources, ʿAbdoulaye ould _ July 5, 2013. Abdel Wedoud Ahmad ʿAbdī and ould Shaybanī, interview, Awjeft, _ Cheikh cites an interview in the Mauritanian newspaper with two Sudanese ould intellectuals, al Shaʿb, as the inspiration for Sīdīna’s declaration that men and women could shake hands. Ould Cheikh, “Brotherhoods and Gender Relations in Mauritania,” ISIM Newsletter 8, 2001, 26. However, when asked why Sīdīna would want women to rebel against male authority, these critics shrugged their shoulders saying, “so that women could go dance and sing with him.” Dancing and singing are also viewed in the region as antithetical to generally accepted Islamic ritual. ‘Abdoulaye ould Ahmad ʿAbdī, ould Shaybanī, and _ July 5, 2013. Muhammad ould Ahmad ʿAbdī, interview, Awjeft, _ Reportedly, Sīdīna _began officially defending his doctrinal positions around 1958. Shaykhanī ould Sīdīna, July 3, 2013. Pierre Bonte, “Égalité et recherche: jeux et enjeux depuis un siècle; des mouvements confrériques dans le sud de l’Adrar mauritanien,” Confréries soufies d’Afrique: Nouveaux rôles; nouveaux enjeux (Actes du Colloque international Rabat 2 4, 2001, Institut des études africaines: Rabat, Morocco, 2001): 17 63. Salma mint Lolaid told me that she heard of Sīdīna’s teachings as a young woman in the Tagānt and decided to move to Awjeft to join his community there. Salma mint Lolaid, interview, Maʿaden el Ervān, July 5, 2013. Bonte, “Égalité et recherche.” Shaykhāni ould Sīdīna denied this as a myth generated by his father’s detractors, interview, Nouakchott, July 1, 2013.

Desert Panic

215

Rejecting regional beliefs in sellāla and the use of jedāwil and l’hjāb to combat its effects, Sīdīna claimed that bloodsucking accusations_ were simply invented by hajjāba who spread these accusations among a credulous population for _the hajjāba’s own material benefit. Generally denying the doctrinal basis of l’_ hjāb and dismissing belief in and use of these _ Islamic sciences as “charlantry,” Sīdīna argued that hajjāba fabricated _ and create an charges of bloodsucking to protect their social status 106 As Sīdīna’s son and contemporary followers economy of healing. explained to me on several occasions, these diagnoses followed a consistent pattern: a child would fall ill and the parents would call in a hajjāb to diagnose the problem. The hajjāb would claim that someone had_ sucked _ the child’s blood, perhaps pointing to a passing cat as the transformed figure of the bloodsucker herself or suggesting that the next person who arrived was the guilty party.107 “Sell mao khalig” (there is no [such thing as] sell) professed several disciples of Sīdīna, who then described the accused as poor, perhaps mentally unstable, or unkempt hrātīn or enslaved individuals who lived near the supposed victims of sell._ 108_ When asked about Sīdīna’s campaign against sellāla accusations in the 2010s, members of his community linked his actions and pronouncements to his position against slavery and all forms of social inequality. They remembered how his actions freed two enslaved women, Messaʿūda and Mahmūda, in Awjeft, from death and a lifetime of enslavement. _ an Awjeft notable, Ibrāhīm al-Khalīl, Mahmūda was reputed Owned by for her beauty and lovely singing voice. When a boy _in Awjeft suddenly fell ill, the townspeople accused Mahmūda of bloodsucking. Her daughter, fearing that Mahmūda would be _the victim of torturous violence and _ for help. Sīdīna offered to purchase Mahmūda from murder, ran to Sīdīna _ 106 107

108

Shaykhāni ould Sīdīna, interview. Shaykhāni ould Sīdīna, interview; Salma mint Lolaid; Moyna mint Sayed and Tijānī ould Ramadān ould Saʿid, interview, Atār, July 3, 2013. An elderly companion of Sīdīna _ related how_ the shaykh arranged a scenario to trick a hajjāb and prove that both l’hjāb and bloodsucking were fabrications. The story follows_ that Sīdīna asked a woman_ to play ill and called a hajjāb to diagnose her illness. When the hajjāb gave the anticipated _ then asked how much he owed the expert _ verdict of sellāla, Sīdīna and was told the price was to include a camel and diya (blood money between tribal groups in case of a member’s wrongful death). He then told the woman to stand up, declared the hajjāb _ a fraud and pronounced sellāla a false accusation. Isselemū ould Ahmad ould Ehmān. _ Atinga movement Ibid all interviews above. Andrew Apter has shown that the anti witch in 1950s Yorubaland should be analyzed “as a drama which sought to comprehend and control” structural change as a growing cocoa economy created new opportunities for women and junior men to bypass patriarchal authority in “Atinga revisited: Yoruba witchcraft and the cocoa economy, 1950 51,” in Modernity and Its Malcontents: Ritual and Power in Postcolonial Africa, eds. Jean Comaroff and John Comaroff (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993), 111 28, 120 21.

216

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

al-Khalīl – saying he would personally punish her by death – but instead used this transaction to release Mahmūda from both enslaved status (by _ freeing her) and the immediate dangers of accusation (by placing her 109 under his responsibility). Mahmūda’s name was almost always linked to that of another woman – _ Messaʿūda – who also endured bloodsucking accusations. When I asked an elderly Awjeft hajjāb (born in 1901, seven years before _ either woman’s name, he emphatically Sīdīna), if he had ever heard replied, “Mao kiv shi,” or he knew them “unlike anything else.” This hajjāb contradicted the explanations provided by the shaykh’s community _ members and said neither Mahmūda nor Messaʿūda was wrongly accused or was either purchased_ by Sīdīna. According to ʿAbdoulaye ould Ahmad ʿAbdī, these women were in fact sellāla, and they never left _ their towns or the families with whom they were affiliated. In the narrative provided by those critical of Sīdīna, Mahmūda remained a servant of _ Ibrāhīm al-Khalīl, and it was Ibrāhīm al-Khalīl who protected her from the angry violence that arose following the accusations of bloodsucking. In the accounts offered by these subjects, Messaʿūda’s story is similar to the narrative of an enslaved woman from the neighboring oasis town Tungād who suffered frequent beatings at the hands of her owner, Muhammad Gayla, and then faced the possibility of death once people _ in Tungād believed her to be sellāla.110 There is no indication in these versions that Sīdīna ever purchased Messaʿūda or that he was personally involved in protecting her. Showing that accusations of bloodsucking did not always follow gender lines, contemporary interviews in Awjeft introduced a third story involving an older hrtānī man named Saberū. When angry villagers came _ _ an alleged bloodsucking incident, Saberū asked looking for him after them to wait for him to pray one last time before they killed him. For the shaykh’s community, the sight of Saberū’s skeleton – which for decades lingered unburied outside of the oasis village – was a sad reminder of a pious man wrongly accused of bloodsucking. As one hrtānī member of the Sīdīna community sighed, “It just broke my heart _ _ every time I saw his skeleton lying where they killed him.”111 Muhammad ʿAbd Allāh ould Ahmad ʿAbdī, however, recalled that _ Saberū’s own family had killed him_ after bloodsucking accusations circulated in the community.112 Whether followers of Sīdīna in Atār, Awjeft, _ 109 110 112

Group interview, Maʿaden el Ervān, July 3, 2013. 111 ʿAbdoulaye ould Ahmad ʿAbdī. Tijānī ould Ramadān ould Saʿīd. _ ʿAbdoulaye ould A_ hmad ʿAbdī explained that Saberū was a hrtānī from Shinqīt, _ _ _ _ affiliated with the Laghlāl tribe there. His daughter, Dwayda Taveltū mint Saberū,

Desert Panic

217

or Maʿaden el-Ervān or detractors in Awjeft, people identified Saberū, Mahmūda, and Messaʿūda as having been labeled as sellāl while their _ as either ʿabd (enslaved person) or hrtānī was debated. In Awjeft, status _ _ detractors of descriptions that linked bloodsucking to slave status also denied that any of these accused sellāla were purchased by Sīdīna. According to village elders in Awjeft, if the accused left at all, it was either because they were seduced by Sīdīna’s calls for an uprising among enslaved communities or because they moved on their own toward the south-central Assāba region where many of the previously enslaved trav__ eled hoping to reestablish themselves in new communities as free men 113 And yet, even as Awjeft elders denied the origins of and women. enslavement and sought to discredit other remembered details of the lives of Mahmūda, Messaʿūda, and Saberū, their explanations paradoxically point to_ slavery as a concern of the time and central to these stories. We see in their answers the lamentable persistence of slavery in the region at least fifty years after its formal abolition by the colonial administration, and we see these elderly bīdān nobles remembering Sīdīna’s role as belonging to the emergence of a_ new social order in rural oases. As a growing number of his followers adopted teachings that ignored preexisting regional social and religious customs, Sīdīna came into direct conflict with his master, Shaykhāni ould Muhammad al-Tolba. The _ 1970s were especially grim for ashāb al-shaykh _as tensions between the _ _ spiritual guide’s followers and Ould Muhammad al-Tolba’s community _ increased to the point that ʿulamā’ in the Tagānt oasis_town of Moudjeria forbade Sīdīna from returning. Revisiting his ancestral community of Awjeft, the Sufi leader struggled to maintain his relevance by relying on his Smāsīd connections to garner him a designation as muqaddam, or appointed close follower, to Ibrahim Niasse.114 Despite this official support from the established Tijānī leader, in Awjeft, Sīdīna’s teachings and unconventional practices continued to provoke opposition from the town’s other religious scholars and community leaders. The established clerics and zwāya leaders likely felt threatened by the major social

113 114

was also accused of bloodsucking, as was another man, Sīdī ould Bilāl, whose family now lives in Akjoujt. Moyna mint Sayed. According to Pierre Bonte, as cited by Ann McDougall, a hrtānī man was accused of causing the illness of a woman from Awjeft _ and, when he _failed to cure the woman’s illness, he was beaten and killed. Without further details, I can only suggest this incident might be the same episode involving Saberū that my sources described to me. ʿAbdoulaye ould Ahmad ʿAbdī and Muhammad ould Ahmad ʿAbdī. _ These events and _ terms were related_ by Awjeft detractors. A powerful relative intervened on Sīdīna’s behalf so that he could avoid this “spiritual death” in the eyes of the tribe and introduced Sīdīna to Niasse in the southern town of Arkīz before the former traveled to Kaolack. Ould Shaybanī and Muhammad ould Ahmad ʿAbdī. _ _

218

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

changes that Sīdīna’s teachings called for. Women praying in mosques and shaking men’s hands (and, supposedly, participating in dancing circles at night) defied norms of gender segregation and religious practice. These practices were especially threatening in the context of broader social changes: tributary znāga populations no longer accepted that education, religious or otherwise, should be restricted solely to zwāya tribes, nor that zwāya groups were somehow exempt from physical labor. And hrātīn and still-enslaved populations rejected the lingering _ _slavery, most often expressed through relationships of obligations of dependence on certain bīdān families. These rejections of hereditary _ occupational status and residual hrātīn–bīdān ties severely destabilized _ oasis _ _ the accepted division of labor in the economy of Awjeft. Specialists in l’hjāb – those who diagnosed, accused, protected against, and healed _ bloodsucking – regarded Sīdīna’s rejection of their sciences and of the existence of sellāla as strategic means for him to entice more people to join his community. In short, the ruling religious, political, and economic figures in the town must have felt their livelihoods and authority endangered by Sīdīna’s calls for major social transformations among his community of followers. In 1975, these ʿulamā’ chased him and his community from Awjeft, and the seventy-year-old shaykh settled with his followers in the thenuninhabited and barren rocky plateau and sandy desert shores of Maʿaden el-Ervān. So named by Sīdīna, and meaning “Source of Knowledge,” the town became the spiritual center of ashāb al-shaykh. _ With an emphasis on physical work as an expression of _religious piety, the community built a dam to hold back the scarce desert water and planted a small oasis in the isolated dunes. Sīdīna married one of his two daughters to a hrtānī and the other to a man identified as Wolof_ _ above, such marriages between a bīdāniyya woman speaking. As noted and a “black” man are rare where custom demands that _children inherit the genealogical status of their father. Sīdīna’s friendships likewise reflect his determination to break down traditional social barriers: his body today lies in a shrine in Maʿaden el-Ervān next to that of his most favored companion, a hrtānī man.115 _ As an elderly_ woman recited: “Lo līana ould Sīdīna inaʿudu matet moayt laqbīna,” or “If it were not for Ould Sīdīna, we would have died an abrupt

115

Sīdīna’s followers used these alliances to emphasize Sīdīna’s socially progressive message and how that message should be applied. Sīdīna’s daughter, Miriam, is married to a Senegalese car mechanic formerly employed by the leader, and they identify their children proudly as children of a korī father.

Desert Panic

219

death.”116 While this poetic saying recited by the shaykh’s community members could well address any number of ideas about religious salvation, my interlocutor uttered it in conversation about bloodsucking accusations and the liberation of Mahmūda. She described how, before adhering to Sīdīna’s community, she _believed in sellāla accusations and had even witnessed the death of an accused woman in her town in the Tagānt. After she came to Awjeft to live with her spiritual guide, she came to understand that “sellāla mao khalig,” or, again, “There is no [such thing as] sellāla.”117

Conclusion Importantly, the accused never, whether in the written sources surviving from the colonial period or in the oral accounts of my contemporary informants, conceded to or accepted the accusations of bloodsucking. From the written and oral sources collected, the women and (few) men accused of sell contested the charges voiced by others in their communities: the accused denied their participation up to the very end. A belief that destructive power inhered in low status and, most often, skin color was not hegemonic. Sīdīna and his community of disciples challenged the existence of sell, seeing it as an accusation used to maintain in oasis spaces the social status quo of genealogy, religious authority, and gender. Karen E. Fields has written about the ways that two phenomena usually considered separately – witchcraft and “racecraft”– share a certain “invisible ontology” that relies on biological or physical proof of their existence, yet are separately analyzed by scholars who, in dividing these phenomena, arrive at different and contradictory conclusions.118 Fields tracks how the disciplines of anthropology and history have endeavored to take the rationality of “witchcraft” seriously while scholars in both disciplines have unequivocally denied the possibility of “race” as real. While Fields relies primarily on an American context to examine “racecraft” – where “race” as an association of certain behavioral characteristics to skin color is a social construct and yet the consequences of that association are concrete and real – and emphasizes the African context when it comes to witchcraft, she argues that both rely on “a complex system of beliefs” that assumes that invisible forces, or entities, “underl[y] and continually ac[t] 116 118

117 “‫ﻟﻮ ﻻﻥ ﻭﻟﺪ ﺳﻴﺪﻳﻦ ﺃﻧﻌﻮﺩ ﻣﺘﺖ ﻣﻮﻳﺖ ﻟﻘﺒﻴﻦ‬,” Salma mint Lolaid. Salma mint Lolaid. Karen E. Fields, “Witchcraft and Racecraft: Invisible Ontology in Its Sensible Manifest,” Witchcraft Dialogues: Anthropological and Philosophical Exchanges, eds. George Clement Bond and Diane M. Ciekawy (Athens: Ohio University, 2001), 283 315.

220

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

upon the visible, material realm of beings and events.”119 Invoking the invisible here through sell, alleging that a person with a certain skin color or low social status has the innate ability to extract the life forces of another through unseen means, is where these ontologies of race and sorcery collide head-on. The members of Sīdīna’s community rejected both ontologies. They rebuked the allegations of sell directed toward the enslaved and formerly enslaved in their community just as they rejected the prevailing belief that skin color determined, as Fields writes, “the inward, invisible content of the person’s character” or one’s place in the social hierarchy. The marriage and burial practices both encouraged and modeled by the shaykh demonstrate his rejection of these social norms and his willingness to think outside of racecraft, rejecting the ontologies of witchcraft, here identified as sell.120 What becomes visible, however, in these accounts of the invisible and destructive forces of sell and those perceived as “black” (the enslaved or formerly enslaved hrātīn) are the dynamics of social relationships in _ _ desert oasis communities. Blood, sustaining life in the precarious environment of the Sahara Desert, was envisioned as coveted by the hungry and socially marginalized. As early as the late fifteenth century, bloodsucking appeared in textual sources from the broader Saharan region and, by the eighteenth century, in locally produced legal texts of prominent Sufi experts in the esoteric sciences of healing and protection. In towns with substantial enslaved populations, bīdān feared their enslaved _ residents as non-Muslim and thus ritually powerful, ravenous, and jealous. The idiom of bloodsucking remained the same through time and was in turn mobilized by the powerful as a tool of social alienation and cause for murder. During periods of drought and related scarcity in the colonial period, the accusation was leveled against the weakest members of the community. In the twentieth century, as some hrātīn and formerly _ and _ enslaved accumulated capital and sought economic educational opportunities, sell was a kind of idiom particular to this Saharan West used to preserve the old social order. Powerful elites who wanted to preserve the old social order countered ascendant groups by leveling accusations that invoked the traditional idiom of sell against individual members of the increasingly socially mobile hrātīn and znāga groups. The _ specific contexts of each incident reveal how_ broad forces such as colonialism, the end of slavery, or famine played out in the local through tribal tensions, an ill child, or domestic intimacy and jealousy. The reasons for mobilizing the idiom of sell might vary over time and according to 119 120

Fields, “Witchcraft,” Witchcraft Dialogues, 291 92. Fields, “Witchcraft,” Witchcraft Dialogues, 296.

Desert Panic

221

context; however, a remarkable consistency points to the same people being accused. Overwhelmingly uttered by bīdān against black inhabit_ ants of desert communities, sellāla thus emerged as an accusation that demarcated and preserved social difference. Bloodsucking accusations were directed at the weakest members of society: enslaved men and women, hrtanī, alienated unmarried women and mentally ill men, or _ _ the low-ranking craftspeople who were also imagined to have limited or no access to Islamic knowledge.121 This second presupposition – that genealogy, as marked by skin color and occupation and qualified in part by gender, indicated an individual’s religious adherence or practice – was what made the accusations of sorcery persuasive. One of the functions of the sell accusation is to reinforce the relationship between hrātīn/enslaved _ of _ exclusion, person/blackness and sorcery/sell/sihr and, thus, by a process _ to define l’hjāb as the property or territory of bīdān populations whose _ hajjāba diagnose and “treat” the harmful effects of_ bloodsucking. We will _see in the next chapter how one family has refused the conflation of witchcraft and racecraft, establishing themselves as powerful hajjāba des_ pite their skin color.

121

Tijānī ould Ramadān ould Saʿīd, interview. _

6

Sui Generis Genealogical Claims to the Past and the Transmission of l’hjāb _

This chapter addresses the history of the Ahl Guennar, a confederation of families known for their mastery of l’hjāb, whose members are dis_ the Senegal River. The Ahl persed among several villages just north of Guennar’s ambiguous racial identity – either bīdān or black depending _ on the interlocutor – their shifting religious and occupational affiliations, their secrecy and enigmatic reputation, and their long history in the region make them a compelling case study for the role of Islamic esoteric knowledge in Mauritania’s mercurial political and cultural environment. Claiming descent from a well-known religious figure, Sharīf Bubazūl, and a miraculous origin story for their principal village, Tigumātīn, the _ Ahl Guennar established themselves by the seventeenth century learning and teaching the Qur’ān and its sciences, formulating jedāwil and amulets for their clients, and carving out an exclusive space for themselves in the political dynamics of the Gebla, or southwestern region of Mauritania. The ties binding the Ahl Guennar to communities and centers of religious learning in Senegal are deep and enduring, while the family’s spiritual mediators have also provided their protective and miraculous services to prominent bīdān emirs and politicians. This _ speaks to the Ahl Guennar’s history of straddling social categories unique ability to develop and sustain fluid racial, religious, and occupational identities over time, living and working among populations that contemporary Mauritanians often expect to be rigidly hierarchical and racially segregated. The Ahl Guennar’s shared historical memories of a distinctive genealogy of blood relations and Islamic knowledge link their community in a unique configuration with sainthood, the land, and spiritual agents. Here, I will consider the Ahl Guennar as an example of a family of specialists in l’hjāb. Their narrative spans much of the history of the _ called “Mauritania.” The community’s oral tradition region that is now links members to the Almoravid empire and to Idrisid Morocco, and Portuguese sources mention its role in facilitating early trade with 222

Sui Generis

223

Europeans on the Atlantic Coast.1 Colonial sources comment on the Ahl Guennar community’s special relationship with the Trārza emirate, while my own historical ethnography of the family highlights its capacity to navigate postcolonial political and religious change as “black shurafāʾ,” as other Mauritanians often described them to me during my fieldwork. The events and figures recounted in these stories are examples of the broad regional and historical connections between Morocco, Mauritania, and Senegal. This chapter deals with the long-term history of the family, focusing on several key stories told by its members in an effort to better understand how they deploy these stories to claim religious and social roles in the region and to illustrate how Islamic knowledge is transmitted and the ways these Muslim mediators of the spiritual and material worlds depended upon this knowledge to thrive. As the previous chapters have argued, Saharan populations have often imagined Islamic knowledge to be distributed unevenly across racial groups. Some Mauritanians would have dismissed altogether the notion that a family identified as “black” would have accessed Islamic esoteric knowledge, since kwār, or black Africans, were often perceived as less Muslim than their Arab or bīdān counterparts.2 While this book has _ historically inaccurate, the stereotype shown that such assumptions were persists, in part because most widely recognized hajjāba are in fact _ situated on both identified as bīdān.3 But the Ahl Guennar, historically _ the north and south sides of the Senegal River, traversed the contemporary state boundaries between Senegal and Mauritania which largely, but not entirely, marked off Wolof-speaking from Arabic-speaking communities and divided spiritual practitioners by reputation (impressive Muslim scholars of the Qu’rān and its related protective sciences, or “sorcerers” (sāhirūn)). The last of these distinctions was, of course, _ and dependent on the interlocutor’s own position in highly subjective relation to Mauritania’s social divisions. While blood also plays a part in the Ahl Guennar’s shared historical memories, it manifests differently than in the stories of extraordinary exsanguination we saw in the previous 1 2

3

Ahmadū Bamba ould Sayār Fāll, “Tigumātīn fī al dhākira al wataniyya,” Tigumātīn, March _ 2, 2022, http://tigoumatin.blogspot.com/2012/03/blog _ 2012, accessed July _ _ _ _post.html. 15, Taine Cheikh, “La Mauritanie en noir et blanc.” In a discussion of sorcery and the evil eye, Ibrahima Sow also notes that Moroccans and Tuareg have expressed fear of black Africans for their perceived knowledge of both. Sow, Divination, Marabout, Destin, 267, fn. 169. Eʿli Shieykh ould Momma and Shaykh ʿAlī al Ridā, descendents of the Kunta confederation and Sīdiyya and Fādiliyya families, and _ Būha ould Mustafā were those repeatedly identified in the course_ of my fieldwork. Even_ though the_ _ rare surviving photographs of Eʿli Shieykh ould Momma depict an elderly man with dark skin, his paternal bloodline defines him as bīdān. _

224

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Map 6.1 Ahl Guennar towns and precolonial polities in the Senegalese Mauritanian zone. Map created by Tom Abi Samra. Based on Robinson, Paths of Accommodation, 29; Ware, The Walking Qur’an, 120.

chapter. For the Ahl Guennar, blood seeps from the ground and pours out of spigots to signal the community’s authority over the spirits that inhabit the land. The biological fluid also runs through the genealogical imagination of the family members who claim parentage from a powerful saint and thus legitimize their access to esoteric Islamic knowledge. Blood binds the family to the land and to an identity that, in this region, is singularly theirs: as black, Wolof-speaking descendants of the Prophet Muhammad known for their expertise in l’hjāb. _ _ Along the Senegal River Today, the extended family of the Ahl Guennar primarily inhabits three villages in the Gebla – Tigumātīn, Toungen, and Garak (Map 6.1).4 The _ 4

Ould Hāmidūn also identifies the Guennar with these three villages, the last once known _ as Absaynet. Ould Hāmidūn, H ayāt moritānīā: hawādith al sinīn Arbʿa qurūn min tārīkh _ lil Thaqāfah wa al Turāth, 2011), 97, _ wa jūwārihā _(Abu Dhabi_ : Hay’at Abū Ẓaby morītānī fn. 4.

Sui Generis

225

agricultural fields of Garak and Toungen line the Senegal River’s banks and the people in these two villages speak Wolof, dress in typical Wolof clothing (pagne wrap skirts, wax print, large būbū tunics), and build their homes from the fertile muds of the land. Thirty kilometers north in Tigumātīn, the terrain becomes sandy. There are few acacia trees and _ dry gardens (some abandoned). Here, the family members dress mostly in the styles identified with the bīdān and hrātīn who are their neighbors _ – and the men in flowing (the women wearing melhfa – long,_ colorful_ veils _ robes called drāʿa), speak mostly Hassāniyya with non-family members, _ and live in concrete homes, separated by dunes and lining a busy highway. It is Tigumātīn that serves as the spiritual home of the Ahl Guennar. _ powers of l’hjāb were first granted, here that their It is here that their saintly primogenitor decided to _settle, here that their most important ancestors are buried, and here that they become shurafāʾ.5 The name Ahl Guennar most accurately reflects the family’s distinctive identity in the region. Ahl simply translates as “people” or “family” in Arabic but the second term, guennar, has been defined in multiple ways by scholars and local interlocutors. Naar, in Wolof, means “Arab” and Ga generally translates to “place of,” so guennar has been broadly defined as “place of the Arabs.”6 The modern political border established in 1899 to separate Mauritania and Senegal hardened a barrier that had previously been relatively porous, but the conceptual boundary separating the “Arabs” from the “black” Wolof had been the Senegal River. Wolof speakers thus often used the term guennar, as the place of the Arabs, to refer to the northern bank of the Senegal River. Though guennar occasionally encompassed the desert above the Gebla where bīdān and hrātīn populations were predominant, it most often described _ chemama, _ _a fertile band of alluvial soil just along the western end of the the Senegal River. Here, primarily Wolof-speaking populations lived in relatively fixed villages: the Wolof speakers engaged in small-scale agriculture and fishing while pastoral bīdān and their hrātīn shepherds _ on either bank _ _of the river.7 circulated seasonally through the villages Trade between these Wolof populations and the bīdān – who brought salt _

5 6

7

When Muhammed Saʿīd Sayār Fāll died in 2020, he was also buried in the _ _ village cemetery. Today, naar, is used pejoratively in Senegal when talking about Mauritanians, specifically bīdān. Paul Marty described the Guennar as the “right bank of the Senegal [River]” in _ L’émirat des Trarzas, 43. Ould Hāmidūn identifies the term as Wolof to mean sand dunes _ and white land along the Chemama region and the people there as bīdān in Ould _ Hāmidūn, H ayāt moritānīā: hawādith al sinīn, 98, fn.1. _ _ _ Entire villages might move depending on the availability of fertile soil or the political (in)stability at the time.

226

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

and livestock south to the region to exchange for grains, cloth, and enslaved people – made the region, along both sides of the Senegal River, a site of frequent contact between these groups of people living on the desert edge. In the location historian Jean Schmitz has described as an “interstitial space where borderland populations settled, connected to their two neighbors” by the end of the eighteenth century, the Ahl Guennar were identified by others as having cultural markers of identity that were “betwixt and between.”8 Often described in Wolof as the Wolof Guennar-Guennar – as distinguished from those interlocutors called Wolof Waalo-Waalo – these Wolof-speaking populations were seen to have a particular evolving relationship with bīdān communities. Here _ the cultural affiliations the double linguistic emphasis on region specifies of Wolof-speaking groups in neighboring regions, the Guennar or Waalo river valley. Thus, the Wolof Guennar-Guennar were Wolof-speaking communities living in the land of the naar, or bīdān, and sharing some _ cultural norms with bīdān populations. Emic differentiation among the _ Wolof themselves distinguished this large family (and especially its members living north of the Senegal River) from the agricultural and fishing populations living in what had been, before French colonial occupation, the Waalo kingdom: different because of close contact over time with Arabic-speaking merchants and warriors, and consequently different in being more open to bīdān influence in the realms of religion, _ the Wolof Waalo-Waalo were language, and livelihood.9 In contrast, understood to be situated culturally, as well as geographically, in the Waalo valley along the Senegal River where they were expected to engage more in agriculture and eat more fish than their Wolof Guennar-Guennar neighbors, and to live in mud structures that would have been impossible in the more arid landscape surrounding Tigumātīn.10 By the end of the _ seventeenth century, the Ahl Guennar, as their sobriquet underlines, selfconsciously maintained a separate identity and were imagined by their neighbors as sui generis in their sociocultural environment.

8 9

10

Schmitz, “Le souffle de la parenté,” 248. The Waalo as a political entity took shape after the disintegration of the Jolof kingdom in the sixteenth century with its political center in what is today the southern Mauritanian village of Djourbel. Oumar Moussa Ba, Noirs et Beydanes mauritaniens: l’école, creuset de la nation? (Paris: l’Harmattan, 1993), 37. In interviews, attaching Waalo Waalo to Wolof projected a sense of being more “authentically” Wolof, rather than of the Guennar who abandoned some of their “real” Wolof identity in favor of dominant bīdān norms. _

Sui Generis

227

The Ahl Guennar are notoriously tight-lipped around researchers, local and foreign. In my interviews with them in the 2010s, even as they recounted their family history and explained their practices, principal members of the family anxiously worried about community dynamics, family politics, injurious accusations from outsiders, and their future trajectory as a group.11 The silences that fell over certain events and the life histories of some members underlined the persistent significance and power of l’hjāb and its purveyors in the area. Tentative reasons for _ some of these silences emerged from my research experience as I spent time with the most prominent member of this community, his close family, and related group members in their villages. Nevertheless, as will become clear in this chapter, gaps still remain in my understanding of the Ahl Guennar’s politics, activities, and religious affiliations of the community. The ruptures preventing a comprehensive narrative speak to constraints imposed by the contemporary salience of debates about the permissibility and efficacy of l’hjāb and the politics of the family’s racial and occupational identity. By _preserving their privacy and by resisting pressure from external sources, including scholars, who would fix their narratives or explanations as they exist at a particular point in time, the Ahl Guennar were able to maintain a veneer of secrecy around current methods of healing, protecting, and invoking the invisible. The larger Ahl Guennar community has been able to make different kinds of claims to identity, knowledge, and status depending on the social, political, and cultural demands of the moment.

Prophetic Descent The Ahl Guennar have long based their claim to religious knowledge and miraculous powers on a genealogy that connects the family to the regionally famous sharīf, Sharīf Bubazūl. To be a sharīf (pl. shurafāʾ) is to be a descendent of the Prophet Muhammad through his daughter, Fātima. _ _ his Asserting genealogical descent from the Prophet, his companions, or direct descendants has long carried with it significant social prestige in Muslim communities and specifically in the Moroccan and eventually the 11

Mauritanians spoke of the family as one with an idiosyncratic history and unique position in the landscape of l’hjāb and they pointed me toward the family’s public spokesperson _ and unofficial gatekeeper, Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba ould Sayār. Because Bamba had _ an annual conference on _ earned a PhD in Islamic Studies in Morocco and organized the history of Sufism in the region, my interlocutors thought he would understand the goals and process of my research. Bamba invited me to visit his father, Sayār Fāll, in his _ home village, Tigumātīn. French and Mauritanian researchers had ongoing research projects that relied on _contact with Bamba at the time.

228

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Saharan context where shurafāʾ functioned as influential arbiters and custodians of religion-based honor.12 During the early years of the Moroccan state, the founder of the Idrisid dynasty, Idrīs I (745–91), claimed sharīf status as the great grandson of Hassān, the Prophet Muhammad’s grandson through Fātima and her _ husband, ʿAlī, also _ to the Prophet.13 In the Saharan _ West during this early period, cousin genealogical descent from the Prophet does not appear to have so prominently influenced configurations of power and authority as was true by the fifteenth century in Morocco where subsequent Saʿadī (1554–1659) and ʿAlawī (1669–present) dynasties both promoted prophetic descent as a way to maintain a heredity aristocracy, meaning a social order that reserved positions of political leadership to members of their families.14 This new interest in saintly genealogy emerged in Morocco during a period of profound social and political change and was thus used to undergird claims to political authority and to protect economic privileges. It is likely that the concepts of sharifism would have spread to the region that would be known as Mauritania through the commercial and intellectual exchanges between Morocco and the Saharan West engaging Muslim merchants, Arab travelers, and West African students of Islam. The Saharan West witnessed the same general pattern of an increase in claims to prophetic descent though, as Pierre Bonte has described, it was “only a pale reflection of that [movement] that happened in the Maghreb.”15 Contrary to Morocco, a relatively centralized state where dynastic rulers used sharīf status to defend their claims to political power and where sharifism seems to have been strongest in the urban centers of commerce, the southern Sahara does not seem to have seen a similar trend toward asserting saintly lineage until the sixteenth century.16

12

13 14 15 16

Pierre Bonte and Vincent Cornell date the timing of the use of claims to sharifian descent for political authority to the thirteenth century in Morocco under the Marinids, a group understood to descend from the Berber confederation of the Zenāta, who ruled Morocco from the thirteenth to fifteenth centuries. Bonte, Récits d’origine, 454 57; Cornell, Realm of the Saint, 161. See also Bazzaz, Forgotten Saints; Halima Ferhat, Le culte du prophète au Maroc au XIIIe siècle: Organisation de pèlerinage et célébration du Mawlid (Rome: École française de Rome, 1995); Halima Ferhat, “Chérifisme et enjeux du pouvoir au Maroc,” Oriente Moderno 18 (79), no. 2, The role of the Sādāt/Asāfin Muslim History and Civilization (1999): 473 82, 475; Abdelahad Sebti, “Chérifisme, symbole, et histoire,” in Oriente Moderno 18 (79), no. 2 (1999): 629 38. See also Abderrahmane Moussaoui, Espace et sacré au Sahara : Ksour et oasis du sud ouest algérien (Paris : CNRS Éditions, 2002), 33 43. For more on the Idrisid dynasty, see Ferhat, “Chérifisme et enjeux du pouvoir au Maroc.” Schumann, “A Path of Reverent Love,” 13. Pierre Bonte, L’émirat de l’Adrar, 230. Ferhat, 481 and Amster, Medicine and the Saints, 20 21.

Sui Generis

229

Nevertheless, the timing and process of what skeptics might call a “fabrication” of saintly lineages in Morocco helps us to understand what happened in Mauritania a century or more later and thus to recognize the significance of similar genealogical reconfigurations among the Ahl Guennar. The consensus among scholars of the region is that southern Saharan populations began to make similar claims of sharīfian descent in the sixteenth century in response to the profound shift in the ethnic and linguistic make-up of the Sahara, a shift initiated in part by the fourteenth-century arrival of the Bānū Hassān.17 The Bānū Hassān vari_ _ Saharan West as did ant of Arabic, Hassāniyya, spread in the cultural _ practices that included a progressive transformation from matrilineal- to patrilineal-based social formations and the construction of Arabness as the dominant ethnic category.18 Bruce Hall, tracing how Saharan populations claimed Arab lineage in part to legitimate the enslavement of black West Africans who were then characterized as non-Muslim, writes that “the process of Arabization was less an invasion than a realignment of language, cultural practice, and genealogy.”19 It was not that the Arab Bānū Hassān arrived in large numbers to conquer and displace local Sanhāja_ Berber or Soninké, Pulaar, or Wolof-speaking communities. _ Rather, the region’s population saw a gradual process of language acquisition, adoption of Arab cultural practices, and the emergence of claims to sharifian and, thus, Arab descent. Claiming sharifian status also meant privileging the male blood line over the female – a significant departure from preexisting practices among the non-Arab populations – since prophetic status was transmitted through fathers, not mothers. Patrilineal descent within Islamic law confers on men rights of inheritance over women as well as rights within marriage and over children. Whether the sociopolitical transformations that fostered a more pervasive reliance on prophetic lineage were grounded in racial difference (claiming Arab vs. Sanhāja Berber or Sūdān identity), temporal authority _ justified through genealogical affiliation (the Saʿadī subjugation of Songhay in 1591 in the neighboring Songhay empire), or lineage and rights (naming and inheritance practices shifting to patrilineality), these

17

18

19

Bonte, L’émirat de l’Adrar; Ould Cheikh, “Nomadisme, Islam et pouvoir politique,” 215, 956; Cleaveland, Becoming Walāta, 387; Norris, The Arab Conquest, 15; and Soares, Islam and the Prayer Economy, 258 fn. 13. Bonte, L’émirat de l’Adrar, 227. For more on early matrilineal customs among Saharan women, see Ibn Battūta as quoted in Levtzion and Hopkins, Corpus of Early Arabic _ _ _ Farias, Arabic medieval inscriptions, 17. See also Peter Webb, Sources, 285. De Moraes Imagining the Arabs: Arab Identity and the Rise of Islam (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2016). Hall, A History of Race in Muslim West Africa, 35.

230

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

transformations seem to have coalesced around the sixteenth century in the southwestern Sahara when the founding myth of the Ahl Guennar dates as a family origin story that strongly reflects the political and cultural circumstances of the period. The Legend of Sharīf Bubazūl The Ahl Guennar situate their origins as a distinct community in the figure of Muhammad b. Shams al-Dīn al-Maknī Bubazūl. This saint, whose life _ entwined with the early political history of Morocco – and, as is deeply explained earlier, to the expansion of claims to prophetic descent – serves as the common ancestor for the Ahl Guennar who root their sense of ethnic belonging in his life story. As a lone Arab political dissident peregrinating through the Sahara during a period of cultural transmutation, Sharīf Bubazūl served as the legendary figure around whom five primary tribal confederations, in what is now Mauritania, consolidated Arab identity and a saintly genealogy. When the Moroccan Idrisid dynasty (788–959 CE) had fallen in the second half of the tenth century, the conquering Fatimids instructed their allies, the Zenāta Berbers, to hunt down and kill all Idrisid supporters. Allied with members of the Idrisid dynasty, Sharīf Bubazūl was forced to flee Morocco. He journeyed southeast from there and he married a woman, al-Hosātīa, with whom he had a son, Muhammad _ Zenāta warriors came looking to _kill him, Fūdīya.20 Not long thereafter, and he escaped with his son but without his wife. Alone and moving through a harsh landscape with a hungry infant, the sharīf was compelled to pull out his own breast to miraculously nurse his crying son. Some oral traditions tell of another remarkable event that occurred as the Zenāta gained ground in their search for Sharīf Bubazūl. Hearing them closing in behind, the sharīf turned around to face the Zenāta and shot blood out of his breasts to scare his pursuers away. Ahl Guennar accounts of the sharīf do not include these first events but instead begin with Sharīf Bubazūl arriving in Shinqīt where he married and had a child with a woman from the Idawʿalī_ tribe, one of two dominant zwāya tribal confederations in the town.21 When the mother died, the sharīf then again miraculously served as wetnurse. This extraordinary ability to provide nourishment to his son despite the biologically 20 21

In some versions, Bubazūl bore a son with a Hausa speaking woman, in others, with a woman named al Hosātīa in the town of Walāta. _ ould Sayār Fāll, interview, Tigumātīn, February 22, 2012. Ould Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba _ descendants of Bubazūl. _See Ould Hāmidūn, H ayāt Hāmidūn _ lists the Guennar as _ _ _ moritānīā: hawādith al sinīn, 97 fn. 4. _

Sui Generis

231

gendered barriers explains the meaning of his name, Sharīf Bubazūl, or “sharīf of the breasts.” Oral tradition agrees that the son born out of the Shinqīt marriage, Shams al-Dīn, fathered what would eventually become _ five well-known clerical tribes in Mauritania: the Smāsīd, Tendgha, Ahl Itfagha Habīb Allāh, Tashumsha, and the Ahl Guennar. Each of these _ would claim sharifian descent through the offspring of Shams al-Dīn as transmitted through the blood and milk of his father, Sharīf Bubazūl, who, in having assumed a maternal role in his lifetime, could go on to represent both patrilineal and matrilineal ancestry for his descendants. The earliest written record of the Ahl Guennar corresponds to an expedition of the Moroccan Saʿadī army under sultan Ahmad alMansūr (d. 1603) to the Senegal River in 1584 when the _Guennar _ descendants of Shams al-Dīn were included in a list of the region’s notables with Ibrāhīm Redwān Fāll as their progenitor.22 This last figure is significant as the father_ of Hammad Fāll who reportedly founded the first Ahl Guennar village in the_ sixteenth century.23 The shared historical memory of the village’s establishment recounts how Hammad Fāll lost track of his cattle herd as he followed them south from _his father’s village near the coast. He came upon one of his cows alone in the midst of lowlying bushes with its horns turned downward as she used them to dig into the sandy ground. Though she had not yet burrowed too far, water suddenly burst forth from the spot, indicating a clean and easily accessible water source.24 Not long after, Hammad Fāll encountered a Wolof_ speaking chief, Sandiri Diop, in the village of Dara.25 Able to command jinn and defeat human and spiritual enemies, Sandiri Diop could count two hundred children, half of them jinn, whom he led as part of a humanspirit army. These spirits usually spent their nights in the village mosque but sometimes attacked Sandiri Diop’s visiting guests. The risk of attack 22

23

24

25

Hamā Allāh ould al Sālem, Tārīkh bilād shinqītī morītānīā min al ʿasūr al qadīma ilā _ al_ harb shurbbūba al kubrā bayn awlād al nāsr wa _dawla ibddūkal al lamtūnīa (Beirut: Dār _ _ Mougin, “Les premiers sultans sa’dides et al kutub al ʿilmiyya, 2010), 424. See also Louis le Sahara,” Revue de l’Occident musulman et de la Méditerranée no. 19 (1975): 169 87. Hammad Fāll is the son of Ibrāhīm Redwān Fāll. French administrator Paul Marty wrote _ Redwān Fāll came to the region from _ that Egypt in the sixteenth century in L’émirat des Trarzas, 286. Bamba gives 1141 as the date for the founding of Tigumātīn in Ould Sayār _ _ Fāll, “Tigumātīn fī al dhākira al wataniyya.” _ Assan Sarr notes a _trope of hunters and blacksmiths being led to water In Senegambia, sources by a cow where they should then settle. Sarr, Islam, Power, and Dependency in the Gambia River Basin, 95 96. In interviews, Bamba and Sayār both used the term malik in Arabic meaning “king” to _ explain the importance of Sandiri Diop. Bamba referred to this Wolof figure as Serigne Marsa Diop, though his father insisted that his “true name” was Sandiri Diop. Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba ould Sayār Fāll and Sayār Fāll, interview, Nouakchott, February _ _ _ 2012. 29,

232

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

meant his guests were never allowed to sleep alone and, even as they slept, the Wolof ruler would stay awake at night to guard his unsuspecting visitors from the harmful spirits who might strike at any moment. Hammad Fāll not only chose to stay alone after entering the village of _ Dara at night, but he remained unthreatened and unharmed by the prowling jinn. Taking this as a sign of Hammad Fāll’s own spiritual force _ and authority and remembering the extraordinary miracle of the water gushing from the ground, the Wolof leader gave land to his guest, inviting him to settle there.26 Marrying a local, Wolof-speaking woman, Hammad Fāll established Tigumātīn, or the “place where an animal with _ _ curved horns found a well.”27 Most scholars tend to treat the story of Sharīf Bubazūl as a metaphorical explanation for the kinds of social and political changes mentioned earlier, in which “Arab” warriors descended into the southern Sahara and Sahel to claim military dominance over local Berber or black populations by the sixteenth century.28 The Ahl Guennar themselves, however, date this story to sometime around the twelfth century, which accords with the claim that Hammad Fāll was the great grandson of _ Sharīf Bubazūl who is said to have lived during the closing stages of the Idrisid dynasty at the end of the tenth and beginning of the eleventh centuries. Bonte argues that the Ahl Guennar have consciously pushed back the moment of the village Tigumātīn’s founding to make it correspond to the life of Shams al-Dīn, while_ he contends that the timing of genealogical claims to prophetic descent probably emerged between the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, as the Bānū Hassān became increas_ shift from matriingly present in the southern Sahara.29 The progressive lineal to patrilineal descent can be read symbolically through the role of milk in the legend of Sharīf Bubazūl. Milk, a biological fluid associated with kinship and social solidarity, is an inherently female secretion that provides the basic sustenance for new life.30 As we saw in the preceding chapter on bloodsucking, breastfeeding also serves as a means of 26 27

28

29 30

Sayār Fāll, interview, Nouakchott, February 29, 2012. _ The Ahl Guennar provide two etymological explanations for the name of their town one that Tegummad, in the Znāga language, means “cow without horns” and in means “well,” the other that Te means “well,” guma “cow,” and tin “well.” Shaykh Ahmadū _ Bamba ould Sayār Fāll, interview, Nouakchott, February 29, 2012. _ Zekeria ould Ahmed Salem, “Les marges d’un état frontière : histoire régionale, clôture nationale et enjeux locaux,” in Les trajectoires d’un état frontière: espaces, évolution politique, et transformations sociales en Mauritanie, ed. Zekeria ould Ahmed Salem (Dakar: CODESRIA, 2004), 9 46, 28; Norris, Arab Conquest, 15; Webb, Desert Frontier, 31. Bonte, L’émirat de l’Adrar, 226 and Récits d’origine, 469. Susan Rasmussen, Those Who Touch: Tuareg Medicine Women in Anthropological Perspective (DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 2006), 76 and 143.

Sui Generis

233

transmitting through the maternal line genealogical characteristics, whether they be physical, behavioral, or occupational. In the founding narrative of the Ahl Guennar, Sharīf Bubazūl usurped this feminine role, ensuring the well-being of his newborn son and bestowing his saintly baraka on his descendants. He impregnated local West African and Saharan women with his seed, an allegory to explain encounters between Arab and non-Arab Saharans, but he also assumed the role of mother and, thus, his social identity as sharīf and Arab became that of his descendants who previously might have identified matrilineally. Although members of the Ahl Guennar did not report these events in their conversations with me, Bonte – who interviewed members of the family in the 1980s for his anthropology dissertation – heard repeated mention of the moment when the sharīf first arrived in Shinqīt and _ married a local Idawʿalī woman. According to Bonte’s interlocutors, Sharīf Bubazūl married this woman only after having used his powerful knowledge of Islamic sciences to cure one of two people – the woman herself or her son – of troubles caused by spirit possession. In either case, the foreign sharīf arrived and expunged the spirits afflicting the possessed, and then married the woman who had been affected, either personally or through her child, by the spirits.31 For Bonte, this masculine use of Islamic religious knowledge to cure and marry a local woman, when paired with the miracle of a man nursing his son at his own breast, a task normally limited to women and mothers, functions as an affirmation of patrilineality in this Saharan society.32 The story falls within a literary trope identified by Xavier Luffin in which Muslim Africans link the founding of their village to the arrival of an Arab ancestor or prestigious family from the Arab peninsula or the Levant.33 This group of traditions highlight the pattern of Arab men of sharifian descent marrying local women, whether black African (in the case of Sharīf Bubazūl and al-Hosātīa, or Hammad Fāll who married a Wolof woman in Tigumātīn) or_ Sanhāja_ zwāya (in the case of the Idawʿalī woman who Sharīf_ Bubazūl_ married in Shinqīt). In a patrilineal _ system, men assert their genealogy – not just Arab ancestry but also sharīfian – through the children born of these marriages. They also assert their spiritual force through miraculous biological fluids – blood and milk – and by curing the possessed. James Webb argues that “[t]he 31

32 33

Bonte, L’émirat de l’Adrar, 218. The burial place for Sharīf Bubazūl is identified as Wayrejiyya, 40 km south of Nouakchott. See Bonte, “Figures historiques de sainteté dans la société maure,” Annuaire de l’Afrique du Nord XXXIII (1994): 283 91, 286. Bonte, L’émirat de l’Adrar, 227. Xavier Luffin, “‘Nos ancêtres les Arabes…’ Généalogies d’Afrique musulmane,” Civilisations 53 (2005): 177 209, 178.

234

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

north-to-south direction of these migrations, a trope in the oral traditions, carried a strong cultural value: it was confirmation of the Whites’ North African and Islamic heritage.”34 For Webb, the story of Sharīf Bubazūl and his descendants serves to explain how entering into Islam entailed a reconfiguration of how kinship would be traced, from the female to the male line.35 In oral history interviews, informants recount that, once Hammad Fāll _ married and settled in Tigumātīn, he attracted Wolof inhabitants as _ adherents to a new Muslim community. In an area rumored to be writhing with poisonous snakes and mischievous birds, the newcomer also affirmed his ability to protect himself against the malicious intentions of harmful jinn who sometimes cloaked themselves in these forms.36 Since Hammad Fāll had proven himself capable of fending off nocturnal jinn in _Dara, his new village garnered the reputation of being built on protected ground.37 As descendants of Sharīf Bubazūl through Hammad _ Fāll, the Ahl Guennar asserted – and continue to assert – their prophetic status and spiritual authority through this oral tradition. This narrative of a Muslim outsider granted land inhabited by malevolent spirits is common among Wolof and Mande-speaking populations. Assan Sarr’s scholarship on Mandika communities in the Gambia River Basin provides a useful comparison to the stories told by the Ahl Guennar: in the Mandika communities Sarr studied, Muslim newcomers in the midnineteenth century similarly came to appropriate the spiritual and political authority previously claimed by non-Muslim hunters and a Soninké elite. Communities had left land “vacant” for the spirits understood to haunt the banks and rocks and trees along the Gambia River until new Muslim holymen arrived and subjugated or expelled the spirits with their superior Islamic sciences manifested through miracles and amulets.38 This pattern also recalls the Kunta claim to engagement with spirits and control over the Ijīl salt mines of northern Mauritania in Chapter 2. Ann McDougall’s work has highlighted a narrative in which a shepherd from the Kunta confederation was led to the source of salt by an animal, in this instance a lizard. Here, the Kunta encountered spirits protecting

34 35 36

37 38

Webb, Desert Frontier, 29. Webb, Desert Frontier, 30 and Amster, Medicine and the Saints, 25. Sayār Fāll, interview, Nouakchott, February 29, 2012. It should also be remembered that _ important Qur’ānic stories related to the power of Islamic esoteric sciences include both serpents and birds, as mentioned in Chapter 1. In Islamic tradition, snakes often represent evil and they are equated with jinn. Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba, interview, Tigumātīn, April 6, 2012. _ Power, and Dependency in the Gambia _ Sarr, Islam, River Basin, 3. See also Hall, A History of Race in Muslim West Africa, 60.

Sui Generis

235

the Ijīl mountain and reached an agreement with them allowing the Kunta to access the salt mines found within. The Kunta maintain that their rights of exploitation of Ijīl’s salt are based on their relationship with the jinn inhabiting the mountain.39 Similarly, the Ahl Guennar substantiated their rights over the land in Tigumātīn through Hammad Fāll’s _ _ discovery of water there (in this case following the curved-horn cow rather than a lizard, as in the Kunta version) and his subsequent overpowering of the jinn who dwelled invisibly in the environs. Although contemporary members date the birth of their principal village and their communal identity as shurafāʾ to the twelfth century, it is more likely that this group identity did not emerge until centuries later. Beginning in the sixteenth century, environmental change led to a slow expansion of arid lands and an accompanying movement of Saharan pastoralists south into what had been agricultural zones inhabited by non-Arab and non-Berber communities. For these reasons as well as in relation to the described progressive Arabization of genealogies, language, and cultural practices, the most likely explanation is that the Ahl Guennar emerged as a distinct ethnic group during this sixteenthcentury period of environmental and social change. I choose to consider the ways the Ahl Guennar have consciously constructed an identity for themselves in the Gebla of what is now Mauritania in terms of “ethnicity” and not “race” following scholars including Jonathan Glassman and Bruce Hall to recognize that ethnicity is not fixed or timeless and that it, like race, is a form of identity co-constituted over time by a diversity of actors. While Hall has suggested that ethnicity implies a sense of belonging to a community that is based on language, rather than skin color or genealogy, more appropriate to the Ahl Guennar experience is likely Glassman’s broad understanding of “groupness.”40 Glassman has argued that the “distinction between ‘race’ and ‘ethnicity’ is one of degree, not kind” with “the aura of descent” connected to both.41 And, yet, as Glassman further articulates, blood relationships are even more central to the construction and understanding of “race” than they are to “ethnicity.” It is this sense of “groupness” – which has otherwise been defined as reflecting the “creative choices of individuals and groups as 39

40

41

Even French administrator Pierre Laforgue reported that “the Kunta were ‘absolutely indispensable’ intermediaries in obtaining permission to extract salt from the salines of the Kedia of Ijīl and the jnūn were ‘the true masters of the sebkha.’” McDougall, “Snapshots from the Sahara,” 3. Hall, A History of Race in Muslim West Africa, 245 and Jonathan Glassman, War of Words, War of Stones: Racial Thought and Violence in Colonial Zanzibar (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2011), 11. Glassman, War of Words, War of Stones, 11.

236

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

they define themselves” – that I want to emphasize in this chapter.42 Even if others might label the Ahl Guennar racially as “black,” members of the confederation strove over centuries to construct an ethnic identity that eluded racial categorization but emphasized instead religious knowledge and genealogical descent. At key moments in the region’s history, Ahl Guennar drew upon locally salient histories and religious, gender, and legal norms to make their own identity claims believable. In the sixteenth century, then, the people not yet known as the Ahl Guennar who inhabited this land at that time made several claims: 1) they were descendants of Shams al-Dīn and, thus, the Prophet Muhammad; 2) this bloodline made them Muslim figures in the region who_ explained their control over certain agricultural lands and the ability to protect those lands’ inhabitants from outside threats of pillaging and theft through their skill in manipulating supernatural forces; 3) their skill in manipulating supernatural forces derived from their Muslim heritage and explained their control over certain agricultural lands and the ability to protect those lands’ inhabitants from outside threats of pillaging and theft; 4) they were specialists authorized to transmit Qur’ānic sciences to students; and 5) they played an important role in the trans-Saharan trade as situated between the Atlantic Ocean and the Senegal River, two major points of commercial exchange at the time. It is to this last assertion that this chapter now turns, since this trading relationship and positioning between river and ocean explain the importance of ongoing educational and marital relationships between the Ahl Guennar and the trading confederation, known as the Idaw al-Hājj. _ The Legend of Muhammad N’degSʿad _ The coming of a second outsider to Tigumātīn marked another import_ ant shift for the Gebla region. For the members of the Ahl Guennar I spoke with in Tigumātīn and Garak, the arrival of Muhammad _ _ founding village at the end of the sixteenth N’degSʿad (d. 1626) in their century signaled economic change. Originally from the Saharan trading and scholarly town of Wādān, the zwāya trader and hajjāb N’degSʿad _ from conflicts called his community in Wādān to migrate south away intensifying there between the two dominant tribal confederations in town – the Kunta and the Idaw al-Hājj. Predicting a worsening in _ tensions, he used his formidable knowledge of l’hjāb to fabricate a jedwal _ 42

Joane Nagel summarizing what she identifies as a “constructionist view” in “Constructing Ethnicity: Creating and Recreating Ethnic Identity and Culture,” Social Problems 41, no. 1 (February 1994): 152 76, 152.

Sui Generis

237

which gave him and his dependents the ability to soar away from Wādān on a flying palanquin, a covered seat usually mounted on a camel for trans-Saharan travel.43 Arriving in Tigumātīn only a few hours later, _ after a trip that spanned more than 600 kilometers that would normally have taken weeks, Muhammad N’degSʿad left his saddle where he _ married a bīdān woman of sharīfian descent landed.44 The Wādān trader _ tīn.45 This move marked the named Haffsiatou and settled in Tigumā establishment of a satellite trading stop _for the Tashadbīt and Idaw al-Hājj trading confederations. The former group was known to deal in the _ enslaved, gum arabic, salt, cereals, and livestock up and down the western Sahara where its merchants forged trade routes as far as the forests of the Fouta Jallon.46 Hammad Fāll’s much earlier move south and his settling of _ Tigumā tīn had marked a progressive expansion of bīdān zwāya mer_ routes. That _ chant communities south along the trans-Saharan trade earlier expansion might explain why Muhammad N’degSʿad, a trader, _ to close his eyes, draw his could have heard of Tigumātīn and decided _ dependents close to him, and transport them extraordinarily across the dunes to safety to Tigumātīn. Bonte recounts that, in his 1980s interviews, people from Tigumā_ tīn recounted that Muhammad N’degSʿad _ by inhabitants of _ and his community were initially greeted with distrust the village. The local population, however, so feared N’degSʿad’s saintly powers that they believed him when he threatened to leave and take the town’s agricultural riches with him. Retreating from their original hostility, the villagers then welcomed the merchant traveler and became his followers.47

43

44

45

46 47

The term in Arabic is hūdej, meaning camel chair or saddle. Hamad ould Maham, _ interview, Nouakchott, May 14, 2012. Sayār Fāll, interview, Tigumā tīn, August_ 27, _ in “L’émirat de l’Adrar,” _245 and Récits 2012, and Bonte also mentions this story d’origine, 288. The spot where he landed later became important to the sacred geography of the Ahl Guennar. A shrine is now built here, marked by a large stone, and is visited by members of the confederation as well as those from the Tāshadbīt. Members of the Ahl Guennar explained that the stone had served the community in moments of danger by exploding up into the sky to warn people of approaching threats. Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba, written _ note. Bamba called the stone muʿaret. _ February 29, 2012. Webb’s collected oral history Sayār ould Fāll, interview, Nouakchott, _ calls Muhammad N’degSʿad “Najib” and situates his arrival in Tigumātīn in the _ sixteenth _century. It also specifies his wife, Hafsa (Haffsiatou) mint Mahmisigdigh, was from the Tendgha zawāya tribe. This story also recounts that one of Najib and Hafsa’s sons was the first to trade in gum arabic with the Europeans. Desert Frontier, 110. Tāshadbīt comes from the term tāshbīt, meaning to “travel through time.” Hamad ould _ Maham, interview. Hamden ould al Tāh, interview. Marty, L’émirat des Trarzas, 236. _ “L’émirat de_ l’Adrar,” 195 and Bonte, Récits d’origine, 288. Bonte,

238

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

The miraculous travel of N’degSʿad – and his landing in Tigumātīn – _ tīn can be read as metaphorical explanation to why the village of Tigumā _ subsequently served as a point of commodity conglomeration for the commerce in horses, the enslaved, and gum arabic along trans-Saharan routes connecting this region of the Trārza with traders from further north. At the coastal post of Mbul, 7 km to the west, Portuguese traders waited to transport the enslaved and gum arabic to Europe and across the Atlantic.48 Most likely, Tigumātīn also served as an entrepôt for _ horses and salt before these two commodities were transported to the Senegal River and further south for trade.49 Webb hypothesizes that Mbul had served as capital of the Wolof state, Kajoor, until, in the seventeenth century, first, Wolof populations moved progressively south across the Senegal River in reaction to climate change and the slow descent of Berber pastoralists and, second, Tigumātīn surpassed Mbul _ Mbul, perin regional trade importance.50 This interchange between haps the center of Kajoor political authority, and Tigumātīn and the larger Gebla region can also be seen in the spread and use – _both by the Wolof Kajoor royal lineage and bīdān in the region – of the surname _ Fāll. Fāll is also the name the Ahl Guennar use as their family surname, a use that Webb claims points to the “shared cultural features” or intermixing of the people in this region.51 It was during the seventeenth century that the region suffered from a dry period and subsequent famine, pushing some of Tigumātīn’s people to migrate 50 km south toward the Senegal River where _they took their cattle to graze and settled in two neighboring and connected villages, Garak and Toungen. And it was also during the seventeenth century that these people, now spread among three principal villages, seem to have defined themselves as a more cohesive group in religious and racial terms, effecting a change in their social status in the region.52

48

49

50 51 52

Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba ould Sayār, interview, Tigumātīn, April 6, 2012. In an aside, _ _ _ Bamba commented that the enslaved were one of the primary commodities at the time. For more on gum arabic, see Dorrit Van Dalen, Gum Arabic: The Golden Tears of the Acacia Tree (Leiden: Leiden University Press, 2020) and James Webb, “The Trade in Gum Arabic: Prelude to French Conquest in Senegal,” JAH 26, no. 2 (1985): 149 68. Webb posits that Tigumātīn served as a port of entry for horses into the western Wolof _ the animals to launch wars of expansion and pillaging for states that depended upon slave raiding. Webb, Desert Frontier, 32 and 69. Webb also states incorrectly that Tigumātīn no longer exists. Webb, Desert Frontier, 31, _ 150, fn. 11, and 152 fn. 19. Webb, Desert Frontier, 31. Webb agrees about the chronology of this story and the fluid nature of identities in earlier centuries, writing that it “refers to an early period of changing ethnic identities at the desert edge, most likely before the seventeenth century.” Webb, Desert Frontier, 30.

Sui Generis

239

From Slaves to Shurafāʾ Oral history tells us that before the arrival of Hammad Fāll, the people who had settled in the Gebla region, especially_ in this southern part on the northern banks of the Senegal River where Garak and Toungen are situated, were Wolof speakers and primarily sedentary.53 After Hammad Fāll drove out the aforementioned non-Muslim spirits and _ married a local woman and after Muhammad N’degSaʿad disembarked _ from his flying camel mount in Tigumā tīn, Wolof speakers were also _ drawn to the village because of its saintly reputation. As a Muslim trader but also a cleric, Muhammad N’degSaʿad attracted local Wolof-speaking populations with_ his teachings, even though there is a strong probability that he, and more particularly his kin, were involved in the trans-Saharan and trans-Atlantic trade in enslaved people. Desert economies, and specifically those like Tigumātīn, Garak, and Toungen _ that depended on a mix of agriculture and scholarly activities, relied on enslaved labor to tend fields or palm groves or to herd animals while the zwāya engaged in commerce and provided services such as education and legal counsel. The population of Tigumātīn most likely reflected _ this division of labor, composed of bīdān Idaw al-Hājj traders and _ _ scholars, multilingual Wolof students and followers who were linked to the Idaw al-Hājj through ties of marriage, birth, or education, and _ women who worked the fields, tended to the liveenslaved men and stock, and worked as domestic servants. Generally situated in proximity to the Senegal River, these agriculturally based villages were prone to attack from warrior groups seeking captives, grains, animals, and other loot. Converting to Islam and affiliating with the genealogical community of shurafāʾ from Tigumātīn, who _ have were regarded as adept hajjāba and spirit mediators, would possibly _ provided these vulnerable villages some protection against raids conducted by hassān and Wolof and Halpulaaren aristocracies.54 Wolof_ speaking students who studied the Qur’ān under the Idaw al-Hājj seem _ to have been recognized by bīdān and Wolof alike as religious experts in _ both the exoteric and esoteric Islamic sciences. The fact that the Wolofspeaking Ahl Guennar were, by the seventeenth century, accepted as descendants of Sharīf Bubazūl along with four bīdān lineages disrupts _ the racialized understandings of skin color as determining the extent of 53

54

Oral tradition places Tigumātīn coeval to the founding of the Moroccan city of Fez and _ the religious and political movement of the Almoravids. Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba, _ interview, Tigumātīn, April 6, 2012. _ Webb, Desert Frontier, 34.

240

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

an individual’s religious authority among Muslims. Here, a Wolofspeaking confederation, sometimes described as “black” by outsiders, was able to claim prophetic descent and deep Islamic knowledge. By the mid-seventeenth century, Wolof-speaking students educated in Tigumātīn had acquired enough religious authority to travel across the Senegal _ River and thence further into the Kajoor state that was itself moving progressively south of the river. It is here that these Wolofspeaking students established communities dedicated to religious learning and agricultural production.55 Jean Boulègue, writing about the founding of centers of Islamic learning in the Kajoor and Jolof regions, describes this Wolof appropriation of religious authority as the “nationalization of Islam” by Wolof speakers.56 Members of the Ahl Guennar related that their ancestors were responsible for introducing Islam and ensuring its expansion among the Wolof Waalo and Kajoor states.57 This process of conversion was explained as occurring through the establishment of Qur’ānic schools in previously non-Muslim areas. Listing the names of Omar Fāll, Samba Abbé, and Mukhtār Ndumbé Diop as the original founders of the towns of Pīr, Būl, and Kokkī, interlocutors connected the genealogies of these towns in the Kajoor and Waalo to Tigumātīn and, usually, to a period between the late seventeenth and _ early eighteenth centuries.58 Evidence of these religious credentials secured by the mid-seventeenth century can be found in the history of Shur Būbba explored in Chapter 1, when the seventeenth-century Tashūmsha cleric and saint Nāsir al-Dīn, _ during tried to forge a theocratic state. Nāsir al-Dīn sought a delegate _ the war to represent the Waalo-Waalo Wolof-speakers in the Chemama. The Waalo-Waalo nominated Intay Sarr, a man affiliated matrilineally to the shurafāʾ of Tigumātīn.59 In written sources, one of Nāsir al-Dīn’s _ _ 55

56 57 58

59

Ware, Webb, and Boulègue situate the founding of the Kajoor town of Pīr, one of the first satellite educational centers of the Ahl Guennar, before the war of Shur Būbba; whereas Jean Schmitz argues that the Ahl Guennar only created these villages of religious learning after the war. Ware, The Walking Qur’an, 97; Webb, Desert Frontier, 31; Boulègue, Les royaumes wolof, 282; and Schmitz, “Le souffle de la parenté,” 254. Boulègue, Les royaumes wolof, 281. Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba ould Sayār Fāll, interview, Tigumātīn, February 22, 2012. _ _ Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba and S_ ayār Fāll both listed the founding of the towns in that _ _ Fāll related that Omar order. Sayār Fāll, the founder of Pīr, had studied under Ibrāhīm Redwān_ Fāll, pushing back the chronology of the founding. Samba Abbé was the qādī of _ Būl and Tigumātīn and it was his son, Mukhtār (appearing as Matar in Wolof _ ) both _ Ndumbé Diop, who founded Kokkī. Interviews, January19, 2012, February 22, 2012, July 14, 2013. Boubacar Barry writes that “Indeed, the Waalo choice was Intay Sarr, who was no other than Yerim Koodé, the maternal uncle of the children of Hammad Fāll.” Even though

Sui Generis

241

delegates was killed by Intay Sarr’s troops through sorcery.60 While oral tradition supports this claim connecting the Ahl Guennar to the war, it also contradicts the narrative of Intay Sarr’s attack on Nāsir al-Dīn’s _ delegate. Instead, members of the Ahl Guennar explained that Tigumātīn affiliates participated in Shur Būbba on the side of the zwāya _ clerics. According to their descendants, the Ahl Guennar used l’hjāb to _ protect fighters from Tigumātīn from injury in battle.61 _ The precarity of life in this zone between the Sahara and the Sahel, on the edges of the Senegal River where hassān confederations could des_ cend at any moment and where environmental change increasingly made life difficult for agricultural and pastoral communities, could explain the appeal of the stability and sanctuary ensured by experts in the Islamic esoteric sciences.62 Here we might return to the idea – suggested by eighteenth- and nineteenth-century European travelers and merchants and twentieth-century French colonial officials – that l’hjāb and its material manifestation, the amulet, could have served as an_ initial point of entry into Islam for West Africans. Historian Jean Schmitz agrees that the proliferation of saintly villages along the river in this period was, in part, tied to increased threats of violence against these sedentary communities. Little by little, as he writes, “it was the maraboutic groups who, protected by their talismans, occupied these zones.”63 While I am hesitant to make any mono-causal claims for reasons for conversion or belief, one has to consider the contradiction between seeing the esoteric sciences as the entry point into Islam by some and the critique by others that these sciences were anything but Islamic in nature. In the case of the Ahl Guennar, claiming descent from both Sharīf Bubazūl and Muhammad N’degSaʿad had not only permitted them to _ identity for themselves but also to use their religious assert a new ethnic knowledge to shield their land and members from raids. Schmitz makes a

60

61 62

the maternal uncle in this case should have been Wolof, as the Tāshadbīt and Idaw al Hājj men tended to marry local Wolof women, Barry identifies the descendants of Yerim _ Koodé as a “Moorish family long established in the Waalo and entirely assimilated.” Either, by this point, the people of Tigumātīn were already seen by Wolof populations as being strongly affiliated with bīdān society_ or Yerim Koodé is in fact a member of the _ the Waalo and Kajoor, marrying there, and learning Idaw al Hājj who moved early into Wolof to_become known among the Wolof as the Damankour, a parallel but contrasting phenomenon to the Ahl Guennar who were a Wolof people who became integrated into bīdān society. Barry, 82. _ Hamet writes that “the notables of the Kinar and El Qadi Othman gave the command to Inthassar, maternal uncle of the children of Hammad Fal.” Hamet, Chroniques de la Mauritanie sénégalaise, 176, fn. 1 and Norris, “Znaga Islam,” 519. Sayār Fāll and Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba ould Sayār Fāll, interview, Tigumātīn, July _ 2013. _ _ _ 14, 63 Webb, Desert Frontier, 34. Schmitz, “Le souffle de la parenté,” 248.

242

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

compelling argument that the Ahl Guennar specifically took shape as a cohesive identity of shurafāʾ after discarding their identity as ceddo, or Wolof professional soldiers of enslaved origin. He writes that these displaced ceddo, excluded from power after Shur Būbba, “created places of higher levels of education in the heart of the kingdoms by accumulating two kinds of legitimacy: magico-religious and political.”64 Supporting Schmitz’s hypothesis about the fluid nature of identity, especially regarding ceddo during this period, Boubacar Barry also notes that, “it was common for princes to change their names when they quit the indigenous ceddo party to become marabouts.”65 In contemporary Mauritania, I found it impossible to verify such claims that the Ahl Guennar had discarded origins of enslavement when they reinvented themselves as hajjāb. The sensitivities surrounding histories of enslavement have been_ well documented in Africa and the Arabian Gulf, where descent from the enslaved has often been lived as shameful, with the low social status of earlier family enslavement preserved genealogically.66 I felt hesitant to directly insinuate a heritage linked to slavery during my interviews with Ahl Guennar members, and was thus never able to correlate the ceddo origins Schmitz and Barry have suggested. Another contingent factor in this dispersal and expansion of Ahl Guennar religious authority and people is the disastrous famine that immediately followed Shur Būbba. Most directly caused by the fickleness of the desert environment, the famine was made more acute by Nāsir al_ Dīn’s millenarian jihād: the leader instructed pastoral and sedentary populations to abstain from planting their crops, promising them eternal salvation. People who had heeded the cleric’s instructions resorted to killing their livestock in order to have enough to eat, and were then left without a sustainable food supply or animals to sell at the market. When asked why some Tigumātīn villagers moved closer to the river in the _ Garak and Toungen, my interviewees cited seventeenth century to found the famine and desertification as the primary drivers.67 In Garak, the Fāll family established two villages whose dynamic religious activities were 64 66

67

65 Schmitz, “Le souffle de la parenté,” 254. Barry, 82. Martin A. Klein, “Studying the History of Those Who Would Rather Forget: Oral History and the Experience of Slavery,” History in Africa 16 (1989): 209 17; Marie Rodet, “Mémoires de l’esclavage dans la région de Kayes: Histoire d’une disparition,” CEA, special issue: Jeux de mémoires 197 (2010): 263 91; Matthew Hopper, Slaves of One Master: Globalization and Slavery in Arabia in the Age of Empire (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2015). David Graeber observed a similar forgetting in David Graeber, Lost People: Magic and the Legacy of Slavery in Madagascar (Bloomington: University of Indiana Press, 2007). Mar Fāll Masamba, interview, Toungen, April 4, 2012, and August 9, 2012. Sayār Fāll, interview, Tigumātīn, July 14, 2013. Sayār also gave “family problems” as a _secondary _ _

Sui Generis

243

supported by agriculture tended mostly by enslaved labor.68 One of the early founders of Garak, Omar Fāll Anna Sall, married a local Wolof woman, Aissa Thiam, who already owned enslaved people, whom she employed in the village in agricultural and fishing tasks.69 Projecting back into the past, contemporary members of Ahl Guennar estimated that, at the time their family moved there in the seventeenth century, enslaved inhabitants accounted for sixty percent of Garak’s population. Members of the Fāll scholarly status group were only able to maintain their control over enslaved laborers through their expertise in l’hjāb, which they used to prevent enslaved people from running away as _well as to protect themselves from theft via predatory raids.70 The Ahl Guennar remember their own history as one of a people who employed enslaved labor in villages connected by their teaching of Islam and the use of Arabic in a Wolof-speaking region.71 By the end of the seventeenth century, the brak, or king, of the Waalo state that had extended to both sides of the Senegal River, had moved the royal Waalo capital south of the river to Nder. The Waalo brak was unable to ensure the safety of sedentary villages continuously attacked by the hassān who galloped on horses and camels to seize women and _ pilfer livestock and harvested crops, and leave instability in their children, wake. With the hassān emirs consolidating their power in the second half _ century, the brak’s departure from the Gebla solidified of the seventeenth the kind of political articulation in the southern Sahara exemplified with the end of the Shur Būbba war.72 The Wolof states – the Kajoor, Waalo, and Jolof – were all limited to the southern bank of the Senegal River, a geographic boundary that became a political, economic, and porous-butpresent racial threshold. Groups of camel- and horse-mounted hassān seized temporal power, progressively centralizing it in the figure _of the amīr, or prince. The Ahl Guennar villages of Tigumātīn, Garak, and Toungen were situated within the Trārza emirate which_ took shape as politically centralized and hassān-dominant tribal confederation and regional political _

68

69 70 71 72

reason for the move. When I pressed him for details, he responded saying that was a question he did not want to answer. Writing about the Fāll family in Garak, a colonial officer noted, “They claim to descend from a sharīf from Mauritania whose son, Muhammadu N’Doumba, came and settled in Garak, married Hamma Thiam, who belonged to the village that was only a village of captives at the time.” ANRIM E1/98, Chefs Indigènes, 1892 1924, Fiches de Renseignements, 1912. Muhammad Ruqayya Fāll, interview, Garak, August 8, 2012. _ Ahmadū Bamba, interview, Tigumātīn, July 14, 2013. Shaykh _ souffle de la parenté,” 254. _ Schmitz, “Le Ould As Sa’d, “Émirats et espace émiral maure.”

244

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

power at the end of the seventeenth century.73 When Nāsir al-Dīn and _ his fellow zwāya lost the war of Shur Būbba, they formally recognized and submitted to hassān political and military supremacy. Concretely, this meant hassān _were entitled to three major concessions from the subju_ gated zwāya whenever they dropped in on zwāya encampments: first, food and shelter, provided by their hosts, for up to three days; second, the use of any animals needed for transport between camps; and third (and most humiliating and punishing for the zwāya who controlled access to water resources), up to one-third of any water drawn at wells. Effectively, these three rules served to remind zwāya of their subordinate and defeated status by forcing them to serve the hassān, a group most zwāya clerics considered non-practicing Muslims._ Thus, for communities like those of the Ahl Guennar, who had a well in their village, a portion of the water that was at the center of their foundational narrative would now de facto belong to the hassān. _ The suggestion from early twenty-first-century Ahl Guennar interviewees that the family’s control over large numbers of enslaved persons encouraged one use of l’hjāb to prevent the escape of some of their labor _ of l’hjāb as a means of translating spiritual reflects the larger function _ this crucial period of environmental power into earthly power. During and social change in the Saharan West and Senegal River Valley, the Ahl Guennar added their status as powerful spiritual intermediaries between jinn and desert populations and as teachers and experts of the Qur’ān and sharī‘a to their affiliation with important bīdān trading confederations _ interviews that Mukhtār (like the Idaw al-Hājj). Members detailed in oral _ Ndumbé al-Kabīr, the qādī of Tigumātīn, was said to have converted _ of Kajoor,_ to Islam in the late eighteenth Saqur Fatim Diop, the king century; Ahl Guennar members recall this conversion as a mark of the group’s influence at the time.74 During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries – marked by the emergence of emirates such as the Trārza and Brākna north of the Senegal River, a multiplication of Muslim educational satellite villages south of the river, a southward shifting of the center of Waalo power, and the critical and intensifying presence of Europeans on the coast – the Ahl Guennar took advantage of the accompanying fluidity in identity, religion, and place to redefine their role in the region. The family gained acceptance in the region for its claims to an Arab bīdān ethnic identity and to expertise in l’hjāb because they _ _ 73

74

It was in the battle of Ntitam (1630 31) that those who came to identify as descendants of Tarrūz bin Haddāj, the eponymous ancestor of the Trārza confederations and then emirate, distinguished themselves militarily. Ould Sayār Fāll, “Tigumātīn fī al dhākira al wataniyya.” _ _ _

Sui Generis

245

successfully drew upon then-ascendant discourses on sharifism and Sufism that focused on the transmission of religious knowledge moving through well-established genealogical lineages to enact their group’s ability to make land habitable for humans by driving out nefarious spirits, and to reinforce those broadly religious claims via the more mundane process of marrying women from Tigumātīn, Garak, and Toungen to _ Smāsīd and Idaw al-Hājj bīdān men from the well-established zwāya _ _ confederations. The Ahl Guennar’s hypergamous approach to matrimony established intimate alliances between communities, tying them together socially and politically. The instability the region had seen during the seventeenth century continued well into the eighteenth. With the trans-Atlantic slave trade at its height, communities in the Senegal River Valley and further south were beleaguered by looting and intense famines, the former intensifying the latter. Agricultural villages suffered from the pervasive insecurity of aggressive kidnapping and slave-raiding, looting, and destruction of their villages by bīdān warrior groups and attacks from the large Wolof states.75 Even as the _ Trārza and Brākna emirates used their military might to enforce the occupational hierarchy between hassān, zwāya, and znāga tributaries while also forcing the Wolof Kajoor,_ Waalo, and Jolof states to recognize their dominance on the right bank of the river, the southwestern Sahara remained generally ungoverned. Many captives destined for slavery were transported north into the Sahara and toward the Maghreb, though others remained nearby and were sometimes stolen back by villagers who crossed the Senegal River north in search of their missing family members.76 Thus, European demand at the coast and the North African market across the Sahara for enslaved people, gum arabic, 75

76

James Webb notes that the 1720s 1770s were especially difficult, with a major drought and famine troubling the region’s populations from 1747 to 1758. Webb, Desert Frontier, 40 43. Webb, Desert Frontier, 43. In contemporary Mauritania and Senegal, Wolof and Halpulaaren maintain collective memories of kidnappings by bīdān slave raiders. _ Conversations with Wolof speakers and Halpulaaren triangulated a pervasive story that warned that, if the children were to play outside of town in the thickets often surrounding riverine villages, bīdān could come and steal them, taking them far away where they would be forced to _drink magical donkey milk. This milk would make them forget their language, their family, and their origins and become a hardworking slave of the bīdān. If _ children were kidnapped at an early age, this legend of the milk induced amnesia speaks to a process of enculturation that occurred when living among Arabic speaking bīdān _ whose cultural traditions differed from their Wolof speaking and Halpulaaren counterparts. These still circulating stories only speak to the bīdān enslavement of black populations and not to practices of enslavement among the _ Wolof, Soninké, or Halpulaaren themselves. Ameth Gueye, Habib Gueye, Habib Sy, CNRS employees in Saint Louis, informal conversations, in Atār and Saint Louis, various dates in 2011 _ and 2012.

246

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

grains, and livestock drove the consolidation of bīdān emirates and _ Senegal River Wolof states as well as war between them in the Gebla where Ahl Guennar villages lay. In this shifting political environment, zwāya communities, like their Ahl Guennar neighbors, also relied on slavery to sustain their villages’ livelihoods through agriculture and herding. Their Muslim clerics and scholars concentrated on learning, teaching, and adjudicating legal disputes, thereby creating roles for themselves as religious experts.77 They mediated between desert peoples when tensions arose, enforced community norms through the implementation of sharī‘a judgments, and garnered respect as teachers of the Qur’ān and its related sciences. In the various interconnected villages in the Senegal River Valley where they lived, the Ahl Guennar were at the interstitial point between the Saharan, Atlantic, and River trades. Members who lived in Garak, Toungen, and especially Tigumātīn lived between the racial worlds of black and white _ through their matrimonial practices, linguistic and sartorial choices, and educational networks. Their origin narratives also situated them between the heritage of Islamic religious culture and pre-Islamic traditions. These Wolof-speaking shurafāʾ built a reputation as religious scholars, political intermediaries, spirit mediators, and as figures who had the potential to harm when provoked.

Royal Favor The Ahl Guennar’s reputation as “dangerous” masters of the invisible sciences seems to have been solidified generally in the eighteenth century and explains the development of an enduring relationship with the Trārza emirate in particular.78 Oral accounts relate that a Trārza emir and his party passing through the area around Tigumātīn offended the Ahl _ Guennar by sending dirty laundry to the community to be washed. Seeing this task as beneath their status as learned shurafāʾ, the Ahl Guennar refused the emir’s request. To further express their unhappiness with the emir’s lack of respect, they cursed him.79 Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh explains that the specific kind of punitive curse unleashed by the Ahl Guennar, locally known as tazzuba, is best understood as “the atonement for an injustice or an attack committed by 77 78 79

Muhammad Ruqayya Fāll, interview, Garak, August 8, 2012. Interlocutors often labeled the Ahl Guennar as khatīr, or dangerous, because of their _ perceived mastery of sorcery. Bonte, “L’émirat de l’Adrar,” 276, fn 75. Bonte’s interlocutors did not provide the historical context of this specific event.

Sui Generis

247

an invisible hand against a weaker party, a marabout, or a wali.”80 The invisible hand could be a jinn, sent to pester the offending party, a harmful concoction of astrological formulas used in jedāwil, or the use of magic relying on ingredients (plant based, spiritual, or other) deemed illicit in Islamic tradition. As seen in Chapter 2, Saharan shuyūkh used tazzuba to punish those who cheated them in commerce or theft, asserting their ability to defend their communities and their own interests.81 Brandishing their formidable powers of tazzuba against the Trārza emir who had dared to send them his soiled laundry, the Ahl Guennar protested his disregard for their religious knowledge and sacred genealogy – and thus for their elevated social status – and instituted a new kind of relationship between their communities and the emirate. Following this event and through the colonial period, emirs would show deference to the shurafāʾ of Tigumātīn by seeking out their spiritual counsel and _ village. refraining from raiding their In oral tradition, the Ahl Guennar point to another event during this period that confirmed their emergent status as hajjāba. Since the 1750s, _ internal tensions between two factions of the Trārza warriors, the Ahl Attam and the Awlād Ahmad b. Damān, had led to armed conflict of _ violence.82 At some point before 1782, increasing dimension and members of the Ahl Attam stole cattle from an Awlād b. Damān herd drinking from a well at Banba in the Iguīdī region near Akjoujt.83 The Awlād Ahmad b. Damān had long claimed the position of emir and _ expanded the emirate’s reach into the Waalo and Kajoor successfully regions south of the Senegal River under ᷾Alī Shanzūra (r. 1703–27) and _ years until 1757. It his son ʿUmar ould ᷾Alī Shanzūra for the next thirty _ was under ʿUmar’s son, Mukhtār ould ʿUmar (1757–59), that the Moroccan sultan Muhammad b. ᷾Abd Allāh (1710–90) presented the _ 80 81

82 83

Ould Cheikh, “Nomadisme, Islam, et pouvoir politique,” 924. For example, Nouhi uses the example of the Kunta to explain that a shaykh could “strike fatally those who dared challenge his sanctity and conduct ghazū [raids] against his camps, caravans, and herds … reveal[ing] the dangers threatening the economic basis of the shaykh’s politico religious enterprise.” Nouhi, 291. Contemporary Mauritanian interlocutors often refer to l’hjāb and the operational power of Sufi shuyūkh as _ explained, “If you had twenty knives to choose from, “weapons.” A Mauritanian hajjāb you’d choose the strongest _ and the sharpest, wouldn’t you?” Shaykh ould Ahmadū, _ interview, Nouakchott, July 18, 2012. Raymond M. Taylor, “L’émirat pré colonial et l’histoire contemporaine en Mauritanie,” Annuaire de l’Afrique du Nord 37 (1999): 53 69. The primary figure in the story, N’Derī Sayār, passed away in 1782, according to Sayār _ Fāll, who added that camel, women, and _children were also looted. Sayār Fāll, interview, _ was followed in Tigumātīn, August 27, 2012. The basic storyline of this incident _ with Bashir Bedi Bābā, interview, Nouakchott, July 22, 2013; Shaykh interviews Ahmadū Bamba, interview, Tigumātīn, August 27, 2012. _ _

248

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Trārza emirs with a drum – to be beaten in times of war and to enclose protective amulets specifically created to protect during armed conflict – that came to function as a symbol of their authority.84 In the raid, the Ahl Attam thieves not only stole cattle; they also stole the cherished drum and threw it to the ground, signaling their rejection of Awlād b. Damān authority and disrespect for the current emir, ʿAli al-Korī ould ʿUmar (d. 1786). In retaliation for the raid, the Awlād b. Damān sought the help from Ahl Guennar member N’Derī Sayār, “a marabout prolific in marvelous magic secrets” who was among _the most powerful hajjāb in the region at the time.85 N’Derī Sayār is remembered as the first_ shaykh in the family _ to have used his knowledge of l’hjāb in the service of the emir, who in _ 86 Oral narratives about N’Derī return promised livestock and land. Sayār’s response to the insult against the Awlād b. Damān feature the _ essential fluids of blood and milk. N’Derī, performing a hikma (here, _ meaning “spell”) directed at the thieves, is said to have stabbed a knife into the trunk of a local vernana tree. If milk emerged at the edges of the knife’s insertion, he declared, the intended hikma would be useless and _ he would not be able to help. If blood appeared at the base of the trunk, his hikma would work. As the Trārza emir watched, blood flowed from the _tree’s bark, indicating its potent efficacy. N’Derī then composed a jedwal for the emir and instructed him to throw it toward the thieves: “When the talisman’s virtues reach them,” he explained, “they will be immobilized and you will catch them.”87 As the Ahl Guennar master hajjāb Sayār Fāll explained to me, the hassān thieves galloped all day and _ _ _ moving all the while in circles: night through the desert, unknowingly “They would leave in the morning and come back to the same place. They could not tell directions and they would get lost.”88 N’Derī’s strategy against the thieves repurposed a technique otherwise used by owners against enslaved persons: the same jedāwil that hajjāba otherwise _ 84

85

86 87 88

Marty, L’émirat des Trarzas, 79 80. This was confirmed by a descendant of the Tagānt emir who also recounted that his grandfather, the emir of the Tagānt, possessed a drum with amulets fabricated by the Kunta inside. Muhammad ould Ibrāhīm ould el Day, _ interview, Nouakchott, July 17, 2012.

This flattering praise was enunciated by Muhammad ould Ahmad Youra in his Le livre _ des lettrés renseignés sur l’histoire des puits, trans. Paul Marty,_ BCEHSAOF III, no. 3 (1920): 311 45, 331. Of note is that Ould Ahmad Youra, or his translator Marty _ chief of the fraction of blacks of the writing in the 1910s, identify N’Deri Sayār as “the Ahl Omar Fal, a tribe in Tigounaten,” _showing how the name used to identify this family changed over time. Page 333, fn. 2. Youra, Le livre des lettrés, 333. Translated by Paul Marty in Ould Ahmed Youra, Les Lettrés, 333. Sayār Fāll, interview, Tigumātīn, August 27, 2012. _ _

Sui Generis

249

aimed at those who dared to leave the constraints of slavery were here redirected against the thieves who dared challenge the power of the Awlād b. Damān.89 The hajjāb’s maneuver kept the thieves in place _ could catch up with them, killing 100 of until the emir and his party them and taking back their possessions.90 N’Derī Sayār had also guar_ anteed that Al-Korī and his men were invulnerable to bullets, thus further enabling them to overpower the Ahl Attam. Al-Korī paid N’Derī for his services, cementing the alliance between the Trārza emirate and the Ahl Guennar.91 The Ahl Guennar were thereafter at the service of the emirs in exchange for financial compensation, either through direct payment or relief from paying the horma protection tax. And while the family’s hajjāba were certainly not the only religious experts consulted by the _ Trārza emir, they remember N’Derī Sayār’s service to the emir as an _ important instance of their service, abilities, and special status. From the blood spurting out around the knife’s edges to the use of jedwal to entrap the thieves, N’Derī Sayār proved his powers were both grotesque and effective. The story is_ also a reminder of Sharīf Bubazūl: the biological fluids of milk and blood flow at the earth’s surface in Tigumātīn, ready to _ a gush forth when beckoned by village hajjāba. But however significant _ role milk may have played in the past, it is blood – the liquid understood as marking male genealogical descent – that is more often evoked at moments when a member of the Ahl Guennar performed a magical deed. N’Derī Sayār’s story fits into general patterns of service provided by _ desert shuyūkh to their clients. His successful intervention in the crisis between the Ahl Attam and Awlād Ahmad Damān meant that members of his community benefited from the_ special status bestowed on those with this applied knowledge of l’hjāb. Distinct here from bīdān desert _ these services as a member _ shuyūkh, N’Derī Sayār performed of a _ “black,” Wolof-speaking family, and we might read the narrative’s emphasis on blood as distinctly important for its relation to the male genealogical descent that defined the Ahl Guennar’s prophetic ancestry. The Ahl Guennar villages became safe sites immune from hassān pillaging and horma taxes because of their special relationship_ with the

89

90 91

Ahmadū Bamba ould Sayār explicitly mentioned the method and effect of N’Derī Sayār’s _ _ jedwal as synonymous _with methods used to keep enslaved people from escaping. Shaykh

Ahmadū Bamba, interview, August 27, 2012, Tigumātīn. Ould Hāmidūn remarked in _ H _ayāt Morītānyā that hajjāba were known to use their_ skills to punish and kill thieves, _ H_ ayāt Morītānyā: hawādith al sinīn , 84. _ _ Muhammad Muhammadū Ahzānā, interview, Nouakchott, July 25, 2012. _ Fāll, interview, _ _ 2012. Sayār August _27, _

250

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

Trārza emirate.92 After N’Derī Sayār’s intervention on behalf of the _ Awlād Damān, amulets and jedāwil fabricated by the Tigumātīn _ shuyūkh were permanently inserted into the royal drum – recovered via Ahl Guennar intervention – that symbolized the Trārza emir’s power.93 Emir ʿAli al-Korī died in 1786, killed by a coalition of Brākna and Fouta Tooro fighters. The death of the region’s most significant commercial and political figure, who had perhaps earned his nickname al-Korī (the black man) from his close interactions with non-bīdān _ populations in the Waalo and Trārza, was followed by conflicts over succession and for control of the growing trade with Saint Louis.94 These conflicts beleaguered the Trārza for the last decades of the eighteenth century and continued into the nineteenth.95 Warriors, emirs, traders, and sedentary agriculturalists in the Gebla sought the expertise of hajjāba from Tigumātīn, Garak, and Toungen for protection, the _ _ success of commercial endeavors, and fulfillment of social expectations and desires for marriage and family.

Contact with Colonialism In 1821, the French colonial administration signed a treaty with the Trārza emir Muhammad ould ʿAli al-Korī recognizing the rights of the Trārza over the _Waalo but preventing the emir and his fraction from pillaging on the southern bank of the river.96 Even though Wolof and Halpulaar states progressively moved south of the river, members of those groups still lived and moved among the various ethnolinguistic worlds of the region. Emirs were sometimes born of bīdān fathers and black _ mothers. They engaged in trade, pillaged, and journeyed between bīdān _ and Wolof, Halpulaaren, and Soninké communities. Wolof-speaking 92

93

94 95

96

Ahmadū Bamba told me that during the “periods of war,” “warriors and killers did not _ come to bother” the Ahl Guennar. Muhammad Ruqayya Fāll and Shaykh Ahmadū _ 2012. _ Bamba, interview, Tigumātīn, February 22, _ longer used in any official capacity, still includes some The Trārza drum, while no amulets from the Ahl Guennar. Muhammad Ruqayya Fāll, interview, Garak, August _ 8, 2012 and Muhammad Fāll ould ‘Umayr, interview, Nouakchott, July 10, 2012. _ Ould Cheikh hypothesizes this etymology, Éléments d’histoire, 81. Muhammad ould al Mukhtār ould ᷾Amar ould ᷾Alī Shanzūra ruled from 1786 to 1793, _ _ his brother for only a year after that, and ‘Amar ould al Mukhtār until 1796. This latter’s nickname was ‘Amar ould Coumba, Coumba being the name of his enslaved black mother. The early 1800s were similarly dogged by such rapid changes of succession. Ould Cheikh, Éléments d’histoire, 80 82. ANS 3B 93, Correspondance avec la Brakna et Trarza, Treaty June 7, 1821. This treaty specified that, in exchange for the Trārza rights over the Waalo, the French were entitled to a presence on the northern bank of the river, and the Trārza emir had to abstain from pillaging and going into the Waalo.

Sui Generis

251

students memorized the Qur’ān under the guidance of bīdān clerics. _ Bīdān scholars studied in the Fouta Jallon with Fulbe hajjāba. Waalo _ _ families sent their sons to study on the north bank of the river in Garak and Tigumātīn with Qur’ānic teachers from the Ahl Guennar. These _ return to religious centers south of the Gebla like Pīr and students might Kokkī in the Kajoor, or to their Waalo villages to function as local imams and Qur’ānic teachers. When Muhammad al-Habīb ould ‘Amar took over as emir in _ of internal_ squabbling, his ascent to power marked the 1829 after years beginning of one of the longest periods of consistent political rule in Trārza history. And, yet, Muhammad al-Habīb’s thirty-year tenure as _ an end to the insecurities _ stability or emir did not necessarily produce that confronted desert populations; internal struggles between hassān _ groups, razzia on sedentary villages, the harsh physical environment, and especially the encroaching commercial and political claims to authority from the French provided reasons for desert populations to continue consulting hajjāba like the Ahl Guennar. When Muhammad_ al-Habīb married Djembot, the sister of the Waalo _ worried about their own interests, correctly _ the French, brak, in 1833, understood this marriage between the Trārza emir and Waalo lingeer (female monarch) as a commercial and political alliance that could shift the balance of power away from the French.97 Once Djembot found herself pregnant, French colonial actors feared that the birth of a child conceived through this alliance would reinforce the Trārza–Waalo monopoly on trade: Al-Habīb’s son, ʿAlī ould Muhammad al-Habīb (born _ inherit authority over both _ all of the _ polities and 1834), might eventually geographic, population, and commercial trade relations and continuities that came with them. The French contested Trārza’s control of Waalo by aggressively attacking Waalo villages, forcing Djembot and the brak to flee and eventually, in 1835, forcing Muhammad al-Habīb to surrender his own _ and his children’s claims to the Waalo crown._98 French efforts to consolidate authority and prevent local alliances continued into the midnineteenth century and culminated in 1854 when Louis Faidherbe, then governor of Senegal, launched a military conquest of the Waalo to prevent ‘Alī Djembot, the son of Muhammad al-Habīb and Djembot, _ _ 97

98

Cédric Jourde has argued that this moment typifies political tactics by regional elite and shows how racial divisions were less static among ruling classes than they are today. Cédric Jourde, “Dramas of Ethnic Elites Accommodation: The Authoritarian Restoration in Mauritania” (PhD diss., University of Wisconsin Madison, 2002), 12. ANS 3 B 93, Traité du 30 août 1835.

252

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

from annexing his mother’s possessions. Faidherbe embarked on a devastating mission, burning somewhere between twenty-four and forty Waalo villages before declaring the Waalo a French territory.99 From observations recorded by French administrator Paul Marty, we know that the Ahl Guennar living in Garak also fled their village in 1855; Marty claimed that “with the first struggles of Faidherbe’s government against the Trārza [tribes], the head of the family Ahmad Fāll Mukhtār, _ son of Marfal, son of Mamadi Dimbé, son of Massemba, had to evacuate 100 In 1858, Muhammad the village to take refuge in the interior.” al-Habīb, bankrupt after the prolonged war, signed a treaty _granting the _ French control over Waalo and Faidherbe appointed himself brak, telling Waalo refugee communities to “restore the villages in which you lived before the war.” The Garak Ahl Guennar then proceeded to return to their village.101 A French military officer at the river town of Dagana reported during this tumultuous time of escape, return, and resettlement that “Moors came every day to reclaim their Wolof captives in the months following the war of 1855–58 that had witnessed a large number of Ahl Guennar deported toward the southern basin of the river.”102 Here, this colonial agent seemed to amalgamate a group of enslaved Wolof with the Ahl Guennar, a blurring of ethnic lines that reminds us how ambiguous the identity of the Ahl Guennar was at the time. It is possible that the neighboring town of Toungen served as a satellite site for the enslaved people of the Ahl Guennar, many of whom must have also fled during the conflict between French colonial forces and the Waalo, albeit potentially in different directions than their masters. We know that French military action in the mid-nineteenth century significantly disrupted the lives of Ahl Guennar living along the Senegal River because colonial officers specifically mention in their reports the community and the displacements its members experienced. 99

100 101 102

ANS 3 B 93, Correspondance avec Brakna et Trarza, Gouverneur Faidherbe à Muhammad Sidi, chef du Brakna, n. 1, juillet 1855. Faidherbe told the Brākna emir that he burned out the Waalo people to punish them for pillaging the traders, probably referring to Waalo ceddo who had taken up raids as a way to sustain their livelihoods since the Waalo brak could no longer pay them for their duties. See Boubacar Barry, The Kingdom of Waalo: Senegal before the Conquest (New York: Diasporic Africa Press, 2012), 210 and ANS 1G 19, Voyage chez les Braknas par M. du Château, Saint Louis, 20 mai 1848. Marty, L’émirat des Trarzas, 287. Barry, 232. In oral tradition and in Marty’s account, the neighboring village of Toungen goes unmentioned in this fleeing. As translated by Raymond Taylor in Taylor, “Statut, médiation et ambiguı¨té ethnique en Mauritanie précoloniale (XIXe siècle): Le cas des Ahl al Gibla et des Ahl Ganaâr du Trarza,” Groupes serviles au Sahara, ed. Villasante de Beauvais, 84 95, 89, fn. 7.

Sui Generis

253

At the beginning of the nineteenth century, the Ahl Guennar attracted students from long distances as experts in Islamic knowledge and they served people from the Gebla as spiritual mediators and miracle workers. Seeking to explain the family’s special status in the Trārza, Marty wrote in 1919 that this “group of black Chorfa from Garak … always situated themselves as catechists and missionaries of Islam on the river. Their alliances and Senegalese Wolof cousins colored them with black blood. Their quality of Chorfa helped them avoid being taken in the webs of civil wars among the Moorish tribes.”103 Marty observed the Ahl Guennar reinforcing their reputations as teachers and experts in the Qur’ānic sciences and attracting students from south of the Senegal River whose parents considered it “fashionable” to send their children to these villages for a religious education.104 Notably, Marty commented that their genealogical status – their claim to be descendants of the Prophet Muhammad – safeguarded their community from the violence between _ fractions that unsettled the Gebla over the nineteenth and early hassan _twentieth centuries. Additionally, the Ahl Guennar had achieved a relationship of favor with the Waalo royal family after having converted the Waalo lingeer to Islam. Marty’s reports indicate that Garak then housed the confederation’s spiritual leader, Ahmad Fāll Būna, who was widely _ respected for his knowledge and saintly qualities, and that the Ahl Guennar were known to follow the Qādiriyya Sufi path but also had the ability to initiate students into the Shādhiliyya.105 Ahl Guennar oral traditions and interviews say little directly about the process of colonization, the community’s interactions with colonial authorities, or changes in the Trārza under French administration after Faidherbe’s aggressive conquest. Members of the family living in Tigumātīn at the time of my research vaguely remembered that their leading l’_ hjāb experts provided amulets and prayers “against colonialism” _ emir had requested their help when facing threats from the and that the French military.106 A village elder in Garak remembered that “the French wanted to move all the Wolof to Senegal” after Faidherbe’s 1858 victory against the Trārza emir Muhammad al-Habīb, referring to _ _ 103 105

106

104 Marty, L’émirat des Trarzas, 286. Marty, L’émirat des Trarzas, 286. Marty, L’émirat des Trarzas, 287. This information differs slightly from that provided in my oral interviews where family members emphasized only an early Shādhiliyya affiliation until the emergence of Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba Mbacké (d. 1927) when some members followed the Murīdiyya Sufi_ order he established. The Shādhiliyya affiliation was transmitted through Bābā ould Hamdī (died 1802). Bashir Bedi Bābā told me that Ndoumbé Fāll (born 1862) took _the Shādhiliyya from the Mutalī clan, prominent Muslim clerics in the Trārza, interview, Nouakchott, July 22, 2013. For example, Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba, interview, Nouakchott, June 13, 2012. _

254

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

French efforts to crystallize a border demarcating colonial Senegal from the Mauritanian territory.107 In this telling, French officers categorized the Ahl Guennar in Garak ethnically as Wolof living north of the River and, hence, subject to forced migration. The village elder hinted that the Ahl Guennar used their Islamic knowledge to punish a French administrator who was trying to force Garak’s inhabitants to move across the river, laughing as he explained that the colonial official had drowned in his boat, his death a divine retribution for having tried to compel the migration. My sources never explicitly described how the abolition of the internal and external slave trades impacted social structures or social and economic activities in the agricultural and scholarly villages along the river and in Tigumātīn. But the same Garak elder who told me the cautionary tale _ lamented the passing of an older hierarchical structure from above also which his ancestors had benefitted: “The French destroyed everything.”108 He explained that “the nobles don’t exist anymore,” the result of shifting social hierarchies, favoring the absorption of enslaved people and a leveling of status divisions into village communities.109 Echoing a complaint common among those historically considered part of the regional elite, this village elder regretted a loss of inherited political authority – an authority that had been directly undermined by the competing authority structures of the colonial system and indirectly by the social and population upheaval that colonial interventions had wrought. If it is true what French administrators claimed – that their colonial presence created a more secure environment for desert and riverine populations by reducing the frequency of hassān raids – this paix coloniale _ might explain the emergence of a culture of Islamic education, in Tigumātīn and Garak particularly. While these two villages had already _ built reputations as centers of religious learning, the wars between hassān _ groups and the French, especially the 1848–54 struggle between Muhammad al-Habīb and Faidherbe, had significantly unsettled these _ villages. Between_ Faidherbe’s slash-and-burn campaign and raids by warrior groups from the hassān and Wolof, all of them desperate to sustain their way of life, many _Waalo families had interrupted their children’s Qur’ānic studies with the Ahl Guennar. If French administrators were correct in believing their conquest of the northern side of the river would reduce razzias on sedentary villages, then during the relatively peaceful colonial period that succeeded the tumultuous mid-century struggle, it is 107 108 109

Muhammad Ruqayya Fāll, interview, Garak, August 8, 2012. _ Muhammad Ruqayya Fāll, interview, Garak, August 8, 2012. _ Muhammad Ruqayya Fāll, interview, Garak, August 8, 2012. _

Sui Generis

255

likely that Garak, Tigumātīn, and Toungen benefited from the cessation in violence and instability _in the region.110 Colonial-era surveillance sources document not only the colonial state’s determination to keep tabs on important religious leaders but also French administrators’ struggle to categorize the Ahl Guennar’s inbetween ethnicity. Fiches de renseignements from 1912 provide limited details on the roles the Ahl Guennar played during the French colonial period but documents like these do tell us something about paths of knowledge transmission, economic activity, and Sufi practice. The standard surveillance reports introduced in Chapter 3 generated by colonial officials listed Garak’s then-prominent Muslim experts, including birthdates and information on their religious teachers.111 One document recorded Bara MBeti Fāll as another important member of the Ahl Guennar. Born in 1870, Bara MBeti is described as “Wolof, Muslim, Shadhili, and a student of Abdallah ould Muhammaden ould Mukhtar of the Idaw al-Hajj, travels a lot south of the river.”112 Sayār Fatim Fāll _ (born 1872) and Dam Yare Fāll (born 1870), brothers, had studied under ‘Amar Fāll ould Massamba ould Mukhtār in Garak. Dam Yare served as imam of the Garak mosque.113 These Garak-based Muslim educators and community leaders, per the fiches, claimed to descend from a sharif who came from Mauritania, his descendant would have come to live in Garak … Their situation in the Trārza has always been very peculiar. They were protected by the emir and didn’t pay the warriors the bakh tax on the lands they cultivated. Almost all did their studies in Mauritania. They have talibés in the river villages of Konia, Dick, Brenn and in the Kajoor. They traveled a lot selling gris gris and prayers.114

A decade later, Marty wrote about the Idaw al-Hājj’s “influence on the _ black Wolof on the two sides of the river in the Chamama in Keur Mour 110

111

112 114

Xavier Coppolani used Garak as a temporary base for his military planning in 1902. Geneviève Désiré Vuillemin, “Coppolani en Mauritanie,” Revue d’histoire des colonies 42, no. 148 149 (1955) : 291 342, 306. Those listed are Dam Yare Fāll, Mafall Ndumbé Fāll, and Bara MBeti Fāll. The short description notes that Mafall was born in 1862, was a student of the Ahl Mutalī, a prominent subgroup from the larger Tendgha tribe mentioned earlier as part of the Ahl Shams al dīn. The Ahl Mutalī had a reputation as effective hajjāba in their own right but _ also served notably as qādī for the Trārza region. Marty disparagingly described the Ahl Mutalī as “exploit[ing] _public gullibility as makers of amulets and gris gris.” The administrator monitoring Mafall continued that this Garak spiritual mediator had weak eyesight, though this did not prevent him from being well educated and travelling to see students on the other side of the river in Rouae (sp?), Brenn, and Dick. ANRIM E1/98, “Chefs indigènes, 1892 1924,” Fiches de renseignements, 1912. 113 ANRIM E1/98. ANRIM E1/98. ANRIM E1/98. The bakh tax was a tax levied on cultivator communities by hassān _ tribes who pledged not to attack the villages in exchange.

256

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

canton [and that] the village of Garak partially falls under their influence.”115 Thus by the twentieth century the members of this extended family were widely recognized as Wolof shurafāʾ, as favored by the emir and, thus, immune from paying the usual land taxes, and as well-educated Islamic teachers who sustained their livelihood through agriculture and the sale of their magico-protective services. French colonial administrators generally did not perceive the Ahl Guennar as a threat to colonial rule, and as a result they appear rarely in the colonial record. As one officer explained “on an administrative level, it seems redundant to speak about them. Their behavior is correct.”116 The kind of colonial racial profiling of Muslims explored in Chapter 3 that defined l’islam noir as more docile and malleable than l’islam maure might implicitly inform which figures are left out of these surveillance records. And, yet, that the family appeared at all in colonial documents was primarily due to their shifting affiliation toward the Murīdiyya Sufi order, then led by its founder Shaykh Amadu Bamba (d. 1927) in Senegal.117 Certain members of the Ahl Guennar had contact with the famous religious figure during Bamba’s exile in Mauritania from 1903 to 1907. Over the first two decades of the twentieth century, the French colonial administration feared resistance to colonial rule that would manifest itself in a pan-Islamic ideology originating in the Middle East, then the Ottoman Empire.118 Their efforts to limit the potential spread of resistance ideology included outlawing the circulation of printed texts coming from the Ottoman presses, including the Qur’ān. Members of the Ahl Guennar collectively remember that an ancestor, Bara MBeti Fāll, gave the founder of the Murīdiyya, Shaykh Amadu Bamba, a handwritten copy of the Qur’ān during the latter’s exile in Mauritania. This event is recounted in a way that highlights the early and close relationship between the Ahl Guennar community and the famous Senegalese Sufi figure, and also to showcase the high level of Islamic learning and language skills then common among the Ahl 115

116 117 118

Marty, L’émirat des Trarzas, 270. Interlocutors from the Ahl Guennar today, in delineating the specialized knowledge they obtained from the Ahl Mutalī, make clear that members of the family never learned ‘ilm asrār (science of letters), or l’hjāb, from the Ahl Mutalī or the Idaw al Hājj. Instead, they distinguish this knowledge, _specific to _ their family, from important pronunciation skills, which they learned from the two other tribes. Sayār Fāll, interview, Tigumātīn, August 27, 2012. _ E1/98, “Chefs indigènes, 1892 _ ANRIM 1924,” Fiches de renseignements, 1912. See Babou, Fighting the Greater Jihad for more information about this important West African Sufi figure. See Harrison for an overview of these French policies and attitudes toward the Ottoman Empire, especially heightened during World War I. Harrison, France and Islam in West Africa.

Sui Generis

257

Figure 6.1 Sayār Fāll Photograph _taken by author of Sayār Fāll in his home in Nouakchott, _ Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba ould Sayār. November 2012. Permissions from _ _

Guennar.119 After Marty’s mention of the Ahl Guennar in his 1919 publication, the community disappears from existing colonial documents – attesting to the distance they maintained from the colonial administration and its policies.

Internal Tensions and Global Affiliations When I was researching this book in the early 2010s, the recognized leader of the Ahl Guennar, Sayār Fāll (whom I have mentioned earlier in _ this chapter), was also considered the confederation’s master hajjāb _ (Figure 6.1). Born in Garak sometime in the early 1940s, Sayār moved _ to Tigumātīn in the 1950s to begin his religious studies with his father, _ ʿAmī Mukhtār Fāll, when Garak and Toungen had eclipsed Tigumātīn as _ the center of Ahl Guennar spiritual life.120

119 120

Muhammad Ruqayya Fāll, interview, Garak, August 8, 2012; Sayār Fāll, interview, _ _ tīn, August 27, 2012. Tigumā _ interview, Tigumātīn, July 14, 2013. Mokhtar ould Hamidoun listed the Sayār Fāll, _ _ “Ahl Gannar of Garag, Toungen and elsewhere” as claiming affiliation as Awlād Būbazūl, or descendants of Sharīf Būbazūl. Omitting Tigumātīn from this short entry might indicate that the village had receded in importance _in the first part of the twentieth century and most likely due to environmental change and the droughts previously mentioned in the immediately preceding decades. For a village whose existence depended on access to underground water sources, the increasingly frequent droughts of the twentieth century most likely made life there unsustainable.

258

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

When Sayār arrived in Tigumātīn in the 1950s, a woman named Sherakūba,_ who was aunt to Sayār_ and cousin to ʿAmī controlled the spiritual entities that lived in _and around the village. Known for her protective and destructive esoteric powers, Sherakūba is a rare example of a feminine figure in the sphere of the Islamic esoteric sciences. When ʿAmī reappeared in Tigumātīn after a long absence and claimed leader_ decades of conflict that divided the popuship of the village, he sparked lation between the two cousins.121 Sherakūba’s affiliation with a minority Sufi path, the Siddīqiyya, instead of the Murīdiyya path followed by most _ of the Ahl Guennar, including ʿAmī, marked a difference in religious affiliation and, thus, social and spiritual networks.122 Sherakūba lived in Tigumātīn with her husband and did not have children, which meant she _ could dedicate her time to teaching the Qur’ān to her many students. According to Nouakchott gossip in the 2010s, children who grew up in the Trārza region were sometimes told stories about Sherakūba’s nefarious spiritual abilities and warned never to drink tea or eat anything offered to them by this able hajjāba.123 Critics of Sherakūba accused her of _ practicing sorcery, an illicit and harmful set of knowledge that, as we have seen in Chapter 5, was understood to be transmitted matrilineally.124 In some oral accounts, Sherakūba and her male cousin were described as having used their knowledge of esoteric sciences against each other as they struggled for authority over the community in Tigumātīn. Researching the life history of this woman hajjāb proved_ challenging. _ met with embarrassed Questions about her, more often than not, were 125 silences and limited details. Sayār Fāll’s son, Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba, _ shared an account of a 1974 event when Sherakūba used_ her protective

121 122

123 124 125

Mokhtar ould Hamidoun, Précis sur la Mauritanie, Études Mauritaniennes 4 (1952), Saint Louis, Sénégal: Centre IFAN Mauritanie, 43. An elderly resident of Rosso and political figure explained that a “family fight” was the reason for the move. Alioune Diop, interview, Rosso, April 4, 2012. Members of the Ahl Guennar who claimed affiliation to the Siddīqiyya followed the teachings of a controversial figure named Shaykh Muhammad_ ᷾Abd al Hayy. A 1923 _ letter to the colonial administration complained about_ ᷾Abd al Hayy’s practices. As a _ French officer wrote that the Sufi figure was “well versed in the Muslim sciences [and he] had teachings contrary to custom, encouraging something nearly like prostitution.” ANOM 9G 64/14 MIOM 2177, “Note de Renseignements sur le Cheikh Muhammad Abdel Hay.” Service des Renseignements et des Affaires Musulmanes. Bashir Bedi Babba, interview, Nouakchott, July 22, 2013 and Mom mint Khalīva ould Muhammad _ Fāll, interview, Tigumātīn, September 10, 2012. _ Elemine ould Muhammad Bābā repeated this warning in Among others, historian informal conversation. Nouakchott, 2011. _ Anonymous, Interview with Mauritanian scholar who asked that his name not be used, Nouakchott. My meeting with Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba on the topic seemed to embarrass him. Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba ould_ Sayār to author, Nouakchott, April 4, 2012. _ _

Sui Generis

259

powers to prevent a hassān traveler from drawing water from the Tigumātīn well. When _the outsider tried to pull water from the well – _ having neglected to obtain Sherakūba’s permission to do so – the buckets he raised were filled with blood. In opposition to Sharīf Bubbazūl’s miraculous appropriation of gender roles through milk, Sherakūba elicited a fluid associated with masculinity. Frightened, the man fled.126 Another story involving Sherakūba’s rival, ʿAmī, tells of a moment in the early 1960s when French plans to build a road between Nouakchott and Rosso, running through Tigumātīn, were met with resistance from the people of the village. When the_ French told ʿAmī they would throw him in prison if his wandering cows continued to interfere in the road construction, he deployed l’hjāb to kill some of the road workers.127 _ The timing of this remembered event is uncertain, as France granted Mauritania independence in 1960 but only the most basic road then existed between Nouakchott and Rosso. And yet the story points to the extent to which people in the Gebla drew on l’hjāb as a method or tool of _ resistance toward unwanted and imposed change – as well as to the explanatory power of l’hjāb in remembering those events and acts of _ resistance. My interviewees remembered both spiritual figures as using their powers to protect the community from outside intervention. As a strategy to circumvent the silences surrounding Sherakūba and the feud with her cousin, I asked questions about the nature of gender and religious authority. A village elder in Garak, responding to a question about whether women could ever become hajjāba, or at least as famously _ asked if he could name any as men, chided, “Of course they do.” Yet when women from the Ahl Guennar who were well-versed in l’hjāb, he uttered _ just one name – Sherakūba. Hoping to probe more directly into her specific status and story, I was disappointed when he quickly backed away from the conversation, telling me that “Sayār and Sherakūba did not have good relations” and that “Garak went_ to Tigumātīn to help solve the _ telling me he would problems.” He pointedly stopped the discussion there, say no more. From this brief reply, I understood that the feud extended to the next generation of the family, as rivalry apparently extended beyond ʿAmī Mukhtār to his son, Sayār. When I asked the Garak elder if he could _ of the well and the blood, he replied that the at least confirm the 1974 story story was true, but cautioned me against speaking to his nephew (Bamba) 126 127

Sayār Fāll, interview, Tigumātīn, August 27, 2012 in presence of Shaykh _ hmadū Bamba. _ A _ I heard a similar recounting of the story from a young man from Tigumātīn who told me _ activities so that the Europeans wanted to use Tigumātīn as a base for their construction _ that ʿAmī burned their materials as punishment. Bashir Bedi Bābā, interview, Nouakchott, July 22, 2013.

260

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

about Sherakūba, on the grounds that “he is too young to know anything about her.”128 When I asked this chief’s counterpart in neighboring Toungen the same question about the dominance of men in the sciences of l’hjāb, he also told me that “two women in Tigumātīn had students” but _ _ conversations with he refused to specify who or when.129 In my various them, both elderly men repeated that “Tigumātīn and our villages are like _ one. We have no problems between us,” an unprovoked insistence that made me wonder if these declarations of unity accurately reflected the complicated relationship between these villages.130 Questions in another village about the dispersion of Ahl Guennar between four different villages were answered briefly with, “Jealousy and competition led to these disputes.”131 Meeting with one of Sherakūba’s students in Tigumātīn, I was _ Sayār, told that ʿAmī’s arrival in Tigumātīn, and then the arrival of his son _ are _ had destabilized village social life. The former student told me, “We the original [people], the others are new.” He suggested family tensions began in the early 1980s when Sayār came to Tigumātīn to claim his _ the Ahl Guennar.132 _ elderly father’s position as leader of Reluctance to speak of Sherakūba did not seem to be driven by gender concerns but by a desire for unity and/or a desire to convey a message of harmony to those outside the community. It seems that ‘Amī overlooked older sons when he designated Sayār as heir to the family’s spiritual authority and leadership. Even if _there might have been an expectation that leadership of the village would be transferred according to birth order, Sayār’s assumption of village leader showed that it was not deter_ Sayār defended his right to the leadership of Tigumātīn in his minative. _ and reviving one of the original wells in the village. _ rediscovering This narrative of (re)discovering water sources not only supports the argument that Tigumātīn had suffered from a lack of water access, not only after the droughts_ of the 1930s and 1940s but again in the terrible droughts of the 1960s and 1970s. It also harkens back to the legendary unearthing of the village’s first well by the wandering cow, and thus 128 129 130 131 132

Muhammad Ruqayya Fāll, interview, Garak, August 8, 2012. Mar_ Fāll Samba, interview, Toungen, August 9, 2012. Muhammad Ruqayya Fāll and Mar Fāll Samba, interviews, Garak and Toungen, April _ 4, 2012. Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba ould Sayār, interview, Car ride between Dara and Tigumātīn, _ _ August 27,_ 2012. Sayār returned during the zemān al hayekul, or the time of educational and political _ reform. It is only by asking other Mauritanians about the meaning of this phrase that I understood this political reform took place in the early 1980s and probably hinted at a moment when the national government interfered directly in the lives of Tigumātīn’s inhabitants. Momm mint Khalīva ould Muhammad Fāll, interview, Tigumā_ tīn, _ _ September 10, 2012.

Sui Generis

261

articulates a connection between Sayār and the respected founder _ Hammad Fāll, reinforcing both spiritual power over the landscape and _ its resources and Sayār’s association with sharifian descent. Detecting _ water sources thus legitimized declarations of leadand then controlling ership over the community. But Sayār’s claim to political and religious authority over the Ahl Guennar_ seems to have been questioned by Sherakūba – the logical continuation of her feud with his father – and by Sayār’s older brothers, ‘Abd Allāh and Ibrāhīm, who also lived in _ tīn. As one Tigumātīn-born interlocutor told me, the conflict Tigumā _ between_ ‘Amī, Sayār and Sherakūba was “really about the land” but _ was expressed through the lens of l’hjāb. As he said, the decades-long _ 133 feud “was about prestige and reputation.” Sayār had not necessarily pursued his religious education with the goal of _becoming a powerful hajjāb, and he was the youngest of the three _ brothers: either of these facts might have frustrated his older siblings. Sayār had, in fact, worked in construction and other odd jobs outside of _ Tigumā tīn after his religious education. As the son with the closest _ relationship to his father, however, Sayār was named heir to his father’s _ tīn, he asserted power over the position. When he returned to Tigumā _ wells in the village, punishing a bīdān developer who wanted to build a _ hotel and agricultural project in one of Tigumātīn’s gardens. When the investor went forward on construction without S_ayār’s permission, blood poured out of the water spigots.134 Gossip from_ the capital, Nouakchott, told of Sayār’s frightening abilities to summon snakes and blood from the ground _when challenged or simply as a show of strength. Stories on the theme of “Sayār was very dangerous” also framed memories of the recent past, when_ his control over the invisible jinn in Tigumātīn and his capacity to successfully withstand Sherakūba’s attacks proved _his physical vigor and spiritual stamina. In their struggle for authority over spirits, land, and political control in the village, Sherakūba, ‘Amī, and Sayār all used l’hjāb against each other. _ _ ‘Amī went so far as to turn Sherakūba into a chicken, who in return retaliated by transforming her cousin into a dog, an animal disparaged in

133 134

Bedi Bābā. Muhammad Fāll ould ‘Umayr, interview, Nouakchott, July 10, 2012 and Bedi Bābā, _ interview. The issue of land ownership and access to water in Tigumātīn resurfaced in the _ refused to allow Mauritanian news as Ahmad ould ʿUmayr, “an influential businessman,” _ Macene from accessing water coming from Tigumātīn. Online thirsty inhabitants of Keur _ sources cited “political reasons” as the motivation behind his stinginess. See “Karamsīn rajul muntafed yamnaʿ al sukkān min al mā’ al sharūb,” Wikālat al mustaqbal, December _ 3, 2013, http://amicinfo.com/old/index.php?option=com content&view=article&id= 11007:2013 11 26 15 22 40&catid=1:2011 05 18 11 02 35&Itemid=172.

262

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

some hadīth.135 During les événements of 1989 and 1990 – turbulent events _when a dispute between Mauritanian and Senegalese herders over grazing rights, taking place in a context of social tensions, led to widespread violence and expulsions of racialized others from both Mauritania and Senegal – it was Sayār, not Sherakūba, whom people recognized as _ protecting the Ahl Guennar from political and social upheaval that was especially acute in the Senegal River Valley where black Mauritanians were attacked or forced to leave.136 When Sherakūba passed away in 1991, reportedly at the age of 102, the family’s rupture was still a painful reality, though Sayār had by then become the undisputed master of _ Tigumātīn’s underground world of spirits, snakes, and bodily fluids.137 _ The 1990s and early 2000s were a time of relative prosperity for the Ahl Guennar in Tigumātīn. Sayār’s skill in prescribing certain prayers _ _ amulets and jedāwil to be worn as earned him a respectable living to support his multiple wives and growing family. His relationship with the Murīdiyya leaders in Touba, Senegal, was strong.138 As his son, Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba, put it, “[i]n that time, that was a good period. We had _ 139 Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba himself had studied in Morocco money.” and travelled outside _of Mauritania to North Africa and the Middle East, establishing relationships with political figures in Muʿammar al-Qadhāfī’s Libya and in Ahmadīnejād’s Iran. He used these trips to _ and religious reputation as an early site of advance Tigumātīn’s historical _ peaceful racial coexistence, Islamic learning, and esoteric sciences. And he courted the al-Qadhāfī government for financial support that during this period would allow him to build a new mosque, a schoolroom for Qu’rānic studies, a health clinic, an electrical generator, and an “African Center for Sufi Studies and Research.” As his father’s health worsened in the 2000s, Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba diligently worked to build connections with organizations_ and political figures, advocating investment in Tigumātīn.140 Al-Qadhāfī’s government _ 135 136 137

138 139 140

See al Bukhārī, 3:515 where Muslims are warned that angels do not enter houses with dogs. See Jourde, “Dramas of Ethnic Elites Accommodation,” for more on the 1989 events. Alioune Diop, interview. A full understanding of what exactly was at stake and for whom in these conversations eluded me, and efforts to speak with Sherakūba’s partisans or other family members did little to clarify the dynamics. At least one of Sayār’s wives was from Touba and there were visits regularly exchanged _ between the Senegalese holy city and Tigumātīn. _ July 14, 2013. Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba, interview, Tigumātīn, _ _ Sayār suffered from the symptoms of diabetes progressively worsening blindness and _ rapid weight loss while also losing his hearing and much of his physical strength. However, some understood Sayār’s physical state as a sign of his pact with jinn, since a _ deal between a hajjāb and the jinn under his command widely known condition of the _

Sui Generis

263

supported projects in the village until the Libyan leader was ousted in 2011. And, while he claimed to never have received financial support or other direct assistance from the Iranian government under Ahmadīnejād, _ Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba did travel several times to Iran, especially to _ Qom, where he participated in conferences organized around political and religious themes.141 The Nouakchott gossip about these visits was that the Tigumātīn son was entertaining converting to Shīʿism, a poten_ tial conversion many believed to be financially motivated. When Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba himself recalled his travels and activities in Iran, he first _ remarked on how badly he had been treated in Iran as a man of color. He then said he had not converted to Shīʿism, though he suggest that Muslims could learn much from this branch of Islam about the esoteric sciences and the interpretation of secret knowledge. Tigumātīn’s participation in an annual “Quds Day,” or protest against the Israeli _ occupation of Palestine – complete with handmade posters displaying pictures of the ‘Āyat Allāh Khumaynī and the Iranian president – only reinforced rumors about the new kinds of political and religious affiliations that Sayār’s oldest son might be exploring.142 In an _ overwhelming majority of inhabitants are Islamic republic where the Sunnī, conversion to or affiliation with Shīʿism was often viewed skeptically by local interlocutors. If Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba was in indeed the process of converting to Shīʿism, he was_ doing so presumably without his father’s consent and in a way that might eventually change the political and certainly the religious orientation of the Ahl Guennar. Most people suggested they understood such interest in Shīʿism as purely functionalist and thought that Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba was courting other donors and support now that al-Qadhāfī_ and his grand African projects were dead. While the leadership conflicts emerging in Tigumātīn over the second _ half of the twentieth century hint that the demonstration of significant spiritual power could potentially transcend other factors (including gender and birth order) in shaping community respect and loyalty, the relationship of race and spiritual power is more nuanced. Of particular

141

142

manifested itself in a sacrifice on the part of the hajjāb. Mahjūba mint Sīdī Muhammad, _ _ _ interview, Nouakchott, June 1, 2012. Qom is also a holy site in Shīʿi Islam and a religious learning and pilgrimage center. Some of Bamba’s siblings also travelled to Iran and Lebanon on trips paid for by Shīʿi centers of learning. Amenitou mint Sayār and ‘Amī Sayā, Nouakchott, 2018. _ _ month of Ramadan. The ‘Āyat Quds Day falls annually on the last Friday of the holy Allāh Khumaynī organized the first day of protest in 1979. Anthropologist Mara Leichtman explored recent conversions among Senegalese to Shīʿism. See Mara Leichtman, Shi’i Cosmopolitanisms in Africa: Lebanese Migration and Religious Conversion in Senegal (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2015).

264

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

concern is the perceived relationship between black ancestry and sihr – _ the harmful sorcery discussed in the previous chapter. I became aware of the impact of Ahl Guennar ethnicity on their reputations in Mauritania when studying the family itself for this book. In the 2010s and 2020s, Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba and his siblings spoke Modern Standard Arabic, Hassāniya,_ and Wolof fluently, allowing them to engage without relying on_ interpreters with government officials, the media, foreign visitors, and hosts from the Middle East; their Mauritanian disciples; and their Senegalese contacts. Wolof-speaking Mauritanians sometimes criticized Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba for publicly speaking Arabic more than _ practice an effort to claim bīdān status and to Wolof, seeing in this _ dān with whom downplay his Wolof heritage. Conversely, many bī _ suspected them I spoke identified Sayār and his family as Wolof and, thus, _ of practicing sihr instead of l’hjāb or other sciences based in the Qur’ān. _ to be identified _ In this respect, as Wolof by others meant belonging to the racial and ethnic category of korī (black African) and, as outlined in the previous chapter, being accused of knowing “black magic” (al-hikma al-kahla). Sayār and Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba expressed concern_ that _ _ portray I might them as sāhirūn,_ or versed in black magic, instead of as _ 143 And, in fact, stories circulated in Nouakchott that people in hajjāba. _Tigumātīn ate snakes, a practice that my interviewees understood to indicate_that an individual used sorcery and was lacking in moral character. Critics told of how Sayār or his ancestors had summoned snakes _ from the ground and accused the powerful hajjāba of beckoning cats and _ 144 The Ahl Guennar categorically rejected any knoweggs from the sky. ledge of sorcery and emphasized the aspects of their family’s history explored in this chapter – long presence in the region, prophetic descent, religious learning and reputation – to lay claim to their own particular use of the systematic knowledge that is l’hjāb. _ Conclusion In this chapter, I have avoided questioning the veracity of legendary episodes involving flying palanquins or bleeding tree trunks. Instead, 143

144

One of Sayār’s cousins, known as umm al tirkī, or “mother of children,” had been physically_ attacked by a man the family identified as salafī. Umm al tirkī’s reported liaisons with jinn made her a target of attack for those who viewed her practices as illicit. While Sayār and his son might not have been openly or physically attacked, they had _ good reason to challenge outsiders’ assumptions about the nature of their practices. Bashir Bedi Bābā. Many hadīth advise that snakes, as the incarnation of evil and the _ form taken by often heretical jinn, should be killed immediately. See S ahīh Bukhārī, _ _ _ hadīth: 3297, S ahīh Muslim, hadīth: 2233. _ _ _ _ _

Sui Generis

265

I sought to explain why these events were invoked at all. The collective memories of mythic figures and extraordinary events make up the origin stories of the Ahl Guennar, stories that support claims the community now makes in the contemporary political and cultural environment of Mauritania. The efforts at self-fashioning have varied in this community of Wolof-speaking shurafāʾ spiritual mediators, and agriculturalists, and over time those efforts have privileged diverse Ahl Guennar concerns and priorities. Assertions of prophetic genealogical origins, political alliances with emirs or foreign leaders, and religious affiliation with Sufi paths depended on the moment and on the nature of the community’s internal concerns about identity and social dynamics. Thus, while the Ahl Guennar tell the legend of Muhammad N’degSaʿad riding on a palanquin from Wādān to explain the _ongoing marriage and educational relationships between the Ahl Guennar and the Idaw al-Hājj, the repeated mention by members of the family of Sandiri Diop as a_ powerful Wolof authority in the Chemama speaks to political dynamics and social categories that existed prior to the cultural and genealogical reconfigurations of the sixteenth-century Sahara. The tales about N’Derī Sayār and the Trārza emir explain the historical favoritism enjoyed by the_ Ahl Guennar, such as their exemption from certain land taxes. Stories about the longstanding role that the family’s religious specialists have played as hajjāba for the emir also sustain the deference _ family as part of the Gàmmu festival held the current emir shows the annually in Tigumātīn on the Prophet’s birthday. When important figures among the Ahl _Guennar pass away, descendants of the Trārza emir still travel to their towns to pay their respects. Similarly, recalling the Ahl Guennar leader’s hand-copying of the Qur’ān for Shaykh Ahmadū _ Ahl Bamba Mbacké explains the close relationship between the 145 Guennar and the Murīdiyya hierarchy in Touba, Senegal. The dominant postcolonial nationalist discourse among those in political power in Mauritania – the bīdān – focuses on the four ancient Saharan towns of Shinqīt, Wādān, _ Walāta, and Tīshīt, now primarily _ inhabited by Hassāniya speakers, as symbols of Mauritania’s long commercial and religious activity in the Saharan West. But Africans from 145

In June 2021, Tigumātīn hosted a memorial a year after Sayār Fāll’s death. Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba posted_ photographs and a statement on his_ Facebook page where he _ emphasized the town’s embrace of Sufism writ large and its inclusion of members of the Murīdiyya, Qadirīyya, Tijāniyya, and Shādhiliyya paths as well as Shi‘ī and Islamist groups. See D. Cheikhe Ahmed Bamba page, Facebook, June 29, 2021, www.facebook.com/Cheikheahmedbamba/posts/6170704636274692 and Taarou Mouride page, Facebook, June 26, 2021, www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story fbid=1169608550213402&id=193754967798770.

266

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

other language communities and racial categories in what is now Mauritania were also involved in the regional and trans-Atlantic trades and in early efforts to spread Islam, whether through education or by demonstrating Islam’s protective capabilities. Returning to Tigumātīn’s _ history as the story of another ancient town and retelling the sacred history of centuries of inhabitants and teachers permits the Ahl Guennar to complicate the overarching definition of what it means to be Mauritanian. The history of the Ahl Guennar is a reminder that “black,” nonArabophone Mauritanians have also inhabited the desert space for centuries and have also been involved in the transmission of Islamic knowledge. The tales of ‘Amī, Sherakūba, and Sayār and how each protected the village from outside forces using the_ tools of l’hjāb show the relative _ isolation of Tigumātīn from larger national infrastructure and economic _ projects. Tigumātīn’s small health clinic and electric generator were built _ with help from al-Qadhāfī’s Libya, not the Mauritanian government, and shows the Ahl Guennar leaders’ ability to get things done via personal ties and respect for themselves in the international community as spiritual leaders. Although a state elementary school does function in the town, many of the young children there were sent by families in Gambia, Senegal, and parts of Mauritania to study the Qur’ān with Sayār and Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba. As Sayār’s health and strength slowly _ _ faded in the 2010s,_ gossip in Nouakchott turned toward speculation about who would succeed the powerful hajjāb. Bamba, positioned him_ self publicly as the spokesperson and gatekeeper for the Ahl Guennar. In 2012, he began working directly for his father as the town’s full-time Qur’ānic teacher, as gardener for Tigumātīn’s dry gardens, and some_ times as the family’s delegate to Touba in Senegal. By the winter of 2017, women lined up in the family’s home in Nouakchott waiting to consult with Bamba. While Sayār Fāll was not necessarily the hajjāb most widely _ _ cited by Mauritanians over the course of my research, he and his extended family were known as powerful experts of l’hjāb who were _ able to make accessible to those who sought their help in Nouakchott or their way to Tigumātīn. _ chapter on the Ahl Guennar family because of I chose to focus this their unparalleled and successful efforts in constructing a unique ethnic identity for themselves in the Saharan West as black descendants of the Prophet. Over the course of what was a turbulent seventeenth century, the people living between Tigumātīn, Garak, and Toungen imagined _ themselves as separate from other Saharan communities. They became the Ahl Guennar by consciously propagating a narrative of common ancestry and a link with territory that explained shared cultural elements and a proper name expressing their identity. The blood and milk said to

Sui Generis

267

pour, flow, surge, and seep out of the ground, spigots, and trees underlines the importance of the genealogical question in this Muslim region of West Africa. Blood and milk delineate kinship and lineage. Claiming descent from the Prophet Muhammad and the status accorded to shurafāʾ and’Āl al-Bayt (“People _of the House” [of the Prophet]) while simultaneously cultivating an expertise in the Islamic esoteric sciences, the Wolof-speaking Ahl Guennar were able to ensure a privileged position in the southwestern region of the Gebla despite the color of their skin.

Epilogue

In the years when I was first researching this book, the name Eʿli Shieykh ould Momma came up more frequently than any other in conversations on the role of l’hjāb in the history of the Saharan West. I introduced this _ account of the young shaykh setting up camp with his book with a short wife and infant daughter in the desert near Atār; by the early 2010s, now _ elderly, he was living in an immense complex surrounded by walls topped with barbed wire, its fortress-style doors manned by guards. This forbidding center to the shaykh’s community was located at the edge of the regional administrative center of Atār. Access to the shaykh _ was tightly controlled and most Mauritanians would never be admitted to the complex. Only the wealthy or well-connected could gain an audience without interminable delays (rumors named well-known politicians and business leaders as disciples and clients) and those who were allowed to enter were usually made to wait days or even weeks, only leaving with the permission of the shaykh’s family members who managed the compound’s logistics, told supplicants where to wait, provided visitors simple meals of plain rice with camel meat, and directed the many young men who served as porters where to carry the succession of gifts brought by those hoping to see the shaykh. I easily could have chosen Eʿli Shieykh, a distant relative of the historically more prominent religious figure Muhammad Fādil ould _ focus.1 Few _ other Māmīn discussed in Chapter 3, as this book’s primary contemporary Sufi figures had attained the notoriety of the Atār shaykh _ who (if before his death in 2013 and there was much speculation on anyone) from his family would inherit the leadership of a community created by his charismatic authority. Would this be an instance that proved sociologist Max Weber’s claim that hereditary charisma withers once routinized?2 The development of a hierarchically structured 1 2

For more on Muhammad Fādil ould Māmīn, see Boubrik, Saints et société. _ my fieldwork, _ Over the course of interlocutors repeatedly identified as the most famous Būha ould Mustafā, Khalī Hinnā, Muhammadū ould Mahmūdin, Shaykh ould Ovāh, _ _ _ __

268

Epilogue

269

religious community around this Sufi shaykh was hardly unique to the dā’ira, or spiritual center, of Eʿli Shieykh or to the Saharan West.3 But Eʿli Shieykh was the example par excellence of a Sufi saint in early twentyfirst-century Mauritania. My own visit to Eʿli Shieykh’s dā’ira in 2012 allowed me the opportunity to observe the powerful prayer economy in action. After approaching one of the main gates of the walled compound, I was told to wait in a neighboring shop until the shaykh’s son met with me to discuss my intentions in coming to the community. Though typically the shaykh’s representatives expected a formal introduction from someone who was already a part of the spiritual community, I had naively assumed my identity as a foreign researcher interested in the history of the family would help me gain access to the community. I was eventually allowed to enter the compound, but I then spent three days within its confines without catching sight of Eʿli Shieykh. The dā’ira was a bustling space: there were camels inside the compound walls waiting to be slaughtered next to vehicles disciples had offered as gifts; construction was underway on a new room financed by a wealthy Moroccan; the women’s waiting room was luxuriously cooled by an air-conditioner. The shaykh’s youngest son, rumored as a possible successor, gave me a veil and some jewelry when I arrived. I settled in to wait, and watched as women from southern Morocco entered with the shaykh’s porters carrying gifts in duffle bags and were led immediately to see the elderly man. During my three days in the dā’ira, I spent many hours talking with other women waiting to see Eʿli Shieykh. One woman in her late twenties, from neighboring Western Sahara, was visiting the shaykh for issues related to infertility. Unable to conceive a child, she had travelled to Casablanca and Rabat for fertility treatment, and then to Spain, but nothing had resulted in a pregnancy. Now, she was in Atār seeking the _ blessings of E‘li Shaykh as a remedy for infertility. Her husband drove down from Western Sahara to stay with her at night, and the shaykh instructed them to spend a week together in Atār, sharing a hotel room _ and relaxing. This woman obviously had the financial means to pay for

3

Shāykh ʿAlī al Ridā, and Shaykh al Qūl. See Max Weber, “Charisma and Its _ Economy and Society, eds. Guenther Roth and Claus Wittich Transformation,” in (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), 1121 48. The Arabic term dā’ira translates literally to “circle” and was used at the time in Mauritania only for large spiritual communities like Eʿli Shieykh’s. See, for example, Ed van Hoven, “Saint Mediation in the Era of Transnationalism: The da’ira of the Jakhanke marabouts,” Africa: Journal of the International African Institute 73, no. 2 (2003): 290 308; Boubrik, “Fondateur et héritiers,”; Soares, Islam and the Prayer Economy.

270

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

expensive fertility treatments, to travel to major Moroccan cities and then to Europe for consultations. Yet she had made the journey to the hot, sandy city of Atār, where she spent days waiting to see Eʿli Shieykh, hoping that his baraka_ would reach her and give her what she most desired.4 I left the compound after three days of waiting. I breathed a sigh of relief as I walked through the heavy steel doors, feeling freed from the pressure of social stratification and the sense of being under constant observation. I had been allowed to witness the functioning of what was, at the time, Mauritania’s ultimate dā’ira, a religious community built around this most famous hajjāb, and yet, I never met him. And the few _ days I spent in the community hardly compared to the weeks or even months that others waited for an audience with the shaykh. I reasoned, however, that most Mauritanians had neither the time nor the piles of gifts needed to reach a hajjāb like Eʿli Shieykh and they relied instead on _ much more ordinary hajjāba who receive clients in modest rooms with _ doors open wide to visitors. While this specific dā’ira would not feature prominently in my own research, my visit to the compound helped me comprehend how the power to evoke God’s blessings and other divine forces, as Eʿli Shieykh did, could be the foundation for an entire economic, political, and educational system constructed around a singular – and potentially irreplaceable – spiritual figure. My conversations with the others who waited to see the shaykh, and with those who lived permanently in his compound, helped me understand the social, financial, and spiritual conditions that led people to his community and to hajjāba across Mauritania. And, in the year before his death, I heard the_ community’s anxieties about the future of the dā’ira and its economy once its central figure, Eʿli Shieykh, would no longer be around to ensure its smooth functioning. Ultimately, I turned my researcher’s gaze toward the Ahl Guennar because their community, led at the time by Sayār Fāll, exemplified some _ of the norms of the paradigmatic Sufi dā’ira – supplicants seeking guidance for and solutions to their existential crises, students learning the Qur’ān, a (more limited) prayer economy, members traveling to and from other centers of Islamic learning, and concerns over who might inherit spiritual authority when the current leader died – while remaining accessible to me, the nisrānīa (non-Muslim outsider).5 Focusing on the _ 4 5

I stayed in touch with this woman via Skype for eighteen months after our encounter but during that time she had yet to become pregnant. In contemporary Mauritania, the Hassāniyya term nisrānī is used to identify non Muslim _ tourists, from Europe _ foreigners and outsiders, most often and the Americas. It is often used as a gloss to racially index whiteness of European origin. The Arabic term nasrānī _ refers to a specific religious category, al Nasārā or Nazarenes, from early Islamic history. _

Epilogue

271

Ahl Guennar permitted me to address stubborn misconceptions in the broader public sphere about the nature of Islamic knowledge in Africa – that Islamic jurisprudence, doctrine, and practices were unidirectionally transmitted from and determined by an Arab north – and about the nature of the esoteric sciences as practiced by African Muslims – that talismans were a sign of African syncretism and ignorance about Islamic norms. Even if other scholars cited throughout the book have successfully challenged such tenacious misunderstandings, the Ahl Guennar’s exceptional long-term engagement with the Islamic esoteric sciences, their unique ethnic identity as black shurufā’, and the atypical public role that the family played in promoting and defending l’hjāb illustrate that _ to the esoteric Africans have long studied, mobilized, and contributed sciences within a thoroughly Islamic framework. Proximity to Power My visit to Eʿli Shieykh’s dā’ira in 2012 confirmed that l’hjāb can be _ inseparable from money and power in contemporary Mauritania. The generalized perception among Mauritanians with whom I spoke was that some of the most powerful politicians, military leaders, and business people were known to have sought the Sufi saint’s baraka for help maintaining or expanding political power and their wealth. In the year or two before Eʿli Shieykh’s death, I often heard the name al-Shaykh alRidā (shorthand for ʿAlī al-Ridā ould Muhammad Nājī al-Saʿīdī) _ _ _ of the country’s (b._ 1970) mentioned in the streets capital as a possible 6 replacement in the thriving prayer economy. Just five years later in 2018, when I was continuing research on my next project, Shaykh al-Ridā had _ been identified as the mastermind of a fourteen-year-long Ponzi scheme that defrauded thousands of Mauritanians. These Nouakchott inhabitants had trusted the so-called “saint” when he and his representatives offered exaggerated sums of money to buy their homes, promising payment at a later date. Now some 8,000 people belonged to the al-nādī al-dahāyā al-shaykh al-ridā (“Club of the Victims of Shaykh al-Ridā”); _ _ of them were now homeless _ _ of many and had received not a single ouguiya the payments that were due. Crowds of the shaykh’s creditors protested in front of the presidential palace demanding justice while Shaykh al-Ridā _

6

For more on the term’s etymology, see J. M. Fiey, “Nasārā,” Encyclopaedia of Islam, _ Second Edition, eds. P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C. E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, W. P. Heinrichs, Online, 2012, doi: 10.1163/1573 3912 islam COM 0848. Shaykh al Ridā came from Wād al Nāga, a town 50 km east of the capital known as a site _ of religious learning, but he established his spiritual community and schools just north of Nouakchott in a locality called Taysīr.

272

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

went on social media, explaining into a camera that he would repay his debts as soon as he was able to gather more capital than the measly two camels and their milk that he claimed were his only assets.7 It was widely known at the time that this “Mauritanian Madoff” had close connections with then president Muhammad ould ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz _ for spiritual guidance and who, it was rumored, depended on the shaykh 8 protection. Photographs on an online news site showed President ʿAzīz with a discreet amulet buried in his hair at the nape of his neck. Surely, the journalist mused, the president sought spiritual protection to ensure a third term in power.9 It was hardly a surprise when, in March 2019, two Mauritanian bloggers exposed members of ʿAzīz’s close family as involved in purchases related to the housing scheme orchestrated by Shaykh al-Ridā. The bloggers – who would soon be imprisoned for defamation – _ had brought to light evidence of widespread corruption involving the president’s family and members of the government, just as speculation emerged that ʿAzīz would campaign for an unconstitutional third term.10 Now the administration declined to investigate the claims of fraud, police attacked the protestors outside the palace, and the president resolutely refused to address the accusations. Shaykh al-Ridā _ and ʿAzīz lost the confidence of their respective spiritual and political constituents, and ʿAzīz left power, permitting elections to occur (though he determined that his hand-picked successor would win). The next year saw an investigation of the former president for corruption, which kept both ʿAzīz and his spiritual guide in the news. In August 2020, ʿAzīz organized a press conference where he responded to journalists’ questions about the sources of his wealth with a defiant “What do you know? Maybe I was practicing al-ruqya al-sharʿiyya (l’hjāb) and this is the source _ of my money!”11

7

8 9 10

11

Cheikh Sidiya, “Mauritanie. Système de Ponzi : Cheikh Ridha, un « érudit » derrière la plus grosse arnaque du pays,” Le 360, March 4, 2019, https://afrique.le360.ma/ mauritanie/societe/2019/03/03/25334 mauritanie syteme de ponzi cheikh ridha un erudit derriere la plus grosse arnaque du pays and “Bʿad tasjīlāt sawtīa al shaykh al _ April 12, 2018, ridā yeqasim fī fīdīo latmāna al dā’inīn,” Alakhbarinfo, YouTube, _ _ https://youtu.be/ynejwz9FHSo. “Le Cheikh Ali Ridha serait il le Madoff mauritanien?” Mauriweb, February 14, 2018, http://mauriweb.info/node/4350. “Mauritanie: le grigri du président Aziz,” Mondafrique, January 17, 2019, https:// mondafrique.com/mauritanie le grigri du president aziz/. Nasser Weddady, “My brother is in jail in Mauritania For reporting on a massive fraud,” The Washington Post, April 1, 2019, www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/ 04/01/my brother is jail mauritania reporting massive fraud/. “ʿAzīz yerafad keshf ‘asrār’ therūtihi wa yesā’il ʿan ‘amwāl al jaysh’,” Sahara Medias, _ August 28, 2020, https://tinyurl.com/3zvvr7n3.

Epilogue

273

The historical continuities in the connections between political and spiritual power were undeniable. In the precolonial period, hassān emirs _ protected triumphed in battle and remained alive in succession disputes by jedāwil composed by zwāya spiritual mediators. These zwāya spiritual mediators were repaid with guaranteed protection against raids and exemption from taxes paid to the hassān. Close proximity between Sufi _ and political figures had been mutually generative, with religious leaders able to direct their disciples to vote for specific politicians, while politicians direct cash and gifts in the opposite direction as recompense for ensuring political success. It is no coincidence that Eʿli Shieykh ould Momma rose to prominence in the Adrār during the long authoritarian presidency of Muʿāwiya ould Sīd Ahmad Tāya (1984–2005), who came _ _passed away, Shaykh al-Ridā from the same region. Once Eʿli Shieykh _ spent a short five years as President ʿAzīz’s marabout before they both fell into disgrace, with their deceit, greed, and corruption mirroring the charlatanism that shows up in the accusations contemporary critics leveled against Muslim spiritual mediators. The research, politics, and imagery came full circle for me one day in 2021, when I discovered that a social media activist accusing hajjāba of quackery had incorporated into a video essay a short clip from_ an interview I had recorded with a journalist from a Nouakchott-based online media company. The activist opened his eight-minute video essay with my explanation in Arabic of my research into l’hjāb, spliced in a clip of a _ launched into a series man whining, “Ohhhh myyy goddddd!” and then of scenes from news reports on sorcery in Nouakchott; hidden-camera montages where hajjāba strike their clients with prayer beads and sit _ surrounded by bottles of colored water; and random exclamations of disgust and disbelief paired with questions about the religious legitimacy of l’hjāb and its experts. The second half of the montage dealt directly with_ Shaykh al-Ridā, the ways that prominent men in the country had _ him, and his downfall; this half of the video is filled supported and lauded with scenes where men and women cry out for justice in the protests that followed exposure of al-Ridā’s fraud.12 The acerbic clip created a _ in l’hjāb became a target for a discourse moment when my own interest _ some of its experts in the public that sought to discredit its bases and sphere. The overarching argument was plain: that l’hjāb is a cover for _ past, and that it dishonest men, that it is a backward holdover from the

12

Khaled Moulay Facebook page, Facebook, April 10, 2021, www.facebook.com/khaled .moulay.14/videos/3892485604199545.

274

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

has nothing to do with the Qur’ān and everything to do with financial and political power.13 By May 2021, there was a new most-discussed Sufi figure. Capital gossip and social media attention now centered on Shaykh Sīdī Muhammad ould ʿAbderrahmān ould Mohammad ould Sīdī al_ Mukhtār ould Shaykh Sīdiyya,_ dit al-Vakhāma _(b. 1968), a descendant of the well-known Sīdiyya family from Būtilimīt. Shaykh al-Vakhāma had appeared on the political and religious scene in 2017 as a strong supporter of ʿAzīz and his government.14 Chapter 2 included mention of al-Vakhāma’s ancestor Shaykh Sīdiyya al-Kabīr, whom Charles Stewart, in his foundational Islam and Social Order in Mauritania, described as a “kingmaker in Mauritanian politics” during the nineteenth century in the Gebla region.15 Not only did Sīdiyya al-Kabīr make himself an indispensable mediator between populations in the region, he also provided spiritual and political support to hassān leaders _ al-Kabīr’s who claimed and fought for temporal authority. Sīdiyya grandson, Sīdiyya Bābā, also appears in Chapter 3 of this book, where he garnered French support and argued for accommodating the French, an advocacy position that ensured his community’s growth and welfare during the turbulent colonial era.16 Al-Vakhāma (Ar. al-Fakhāma), meaning “his Excellency,” is a greatgreat-great grandson in the line that began with Shaykh Sīdiyya al-Kabīr. He cultivated close ties with government officials, some of whom were kin through the Sīdiyya line, and established himself as a figure of unparalleled generosity, offering his political support to those already in power, and working as an educator in the mahadra he established, called _ father had been nickal-Balad al-Amīn, 30 km from Būtilimīt.17 _His named al-Hakūma, meaning “the government,” a sobriquet which reflected his_ role in the Gebla as an alternative form of political authority when it came to regional conflict and distribution of wealth to poor 13

14

15 17

In 2019, local news stories reported that an unnamed “senior state official,” seeking promotion within the government, sought help from hajjāb. “Mas’ūl bāriz fī al dawla _ 2019, http://alwiam.info/node/ yetwajihi li ’hjāb’ talaban li ltaʿīn,” al Wiam, August 31, _ _ 6506?fbclid=IwAR3A yw7udaHFDgDIUUxHxs9XwpX6XW0msYt t hWn6qXBm9 RUN44vNv9vU. “Al fakhāma ould al shaykh sīdiyya yesīr qāfila ila madīna roso li istaqābāl al ra’īs _ www.youtube.com/ muhammad ould ʿabd al ʿazīz,” Tawatur, YouTube, July 26, 2017, _ watch?v=oZTbIPMxSl8. 16 Stewart, Islam and Social Order, 11. See Robinson, Paths of Accommodation. In 2020, newly elected president Muhammad ould Ghazwānī nominated two members of the Sīdiyya family to his cabinet as_ prime minister and the minister of Social Affairs, Childhood, and Family. “Barnāmaj wathāqī ʿan hayāt al shaykh sīd muhammad ould _ al hakūma ould al shaykh sīdiyya “al fakhāma” _ qanāt al watanīa,” BellewarMedia, _ _ YouTube, June 20, 2017, https://youtu.be/MgcOVfeMU9M.

Epilogue

275

inhabitants. Al-Vakhāma perpetuated and amplified his family’s history of cultivating close relationships with those in political power, of making public demonstrations of charity, and of mediating tensions in the region. He also flaunted his privileged position, breaking COVID-19 confinement rules that forbade the circulation between Mauritanian cities when he travelled in a convoy with his disciples from Nouakchott to Būtilimīt in May 2020, at the height of the pandemic’s first wave.18 The shaykh’s above-the-rules behavior – not to mention the crowds greeting him at the country’s international airport, his fleets of cars, and rumors that he may have sexually exploited some of his women disciples and clients – have made him a target of criticism. Condemnation has been especially sharp online, where social media personalities have not hesitated to characterize him, together with other hajjāba, as a self_ pointed out to interested imposter. Several Mauritanian interlocutors me that time is on the critics’ side. Simply by surviving unscathed after having publicly criticizing figures like al-Vakhāma or Shaykh al-Ridā, the detractors demonstrate the emptiness of the claims these shuyūkh_ make regarding l’hjāb; if they are indeed masters of l’hjāb, then why can they _ not unleash_ the power of tazzuba to retaliate against the disrespectful 19 skeptics? Their proximity to power elevated these figures’ public reputations in Mauritania and certainly attracted disciples and wealth. But that relationship to temporal authority, and the prosperity that derived from it, also meant some observers suspected they were chasing power and money instead of demonstrating humility and piety.

Alternative Visions As this book has shown, it is hardly new to criticize those who claim the ability to serve as spiritual mediators. What does seem new is the potential for criticism to coalesce and deliver impact in an era of expanding media. Charges of fraud and self-aggrandizement for financial gain and the accumulation of political and social capital persist, and these are magnified in contemporary Mauritania through social media. An alternative critical discourse is voiced by those who see l’hjāb as ineffective, _ 18 19

“Khurūj al fakhāma min nwākshott ‘al maghlaq’ yethīr radūdān sākhina,” Taguint, May 24, 2020, www.tig.mr/contents/article/54188. Several people with whom I spoke in May 2021 raised the question of tazzuba. Disciples of al Vakhāma threatened a social media influencer with tazzuba after he mocked the shaykh, saying the influencer would be turned into a makkaresh, or a kind of water kettle used in the toilet after defecating. See Ahmed Abdawa’s page, Facebook, February 5, 2019, www.facebook.com/ahmed.abdawa.5/posts/1549015388534122. Thanks to Bābā Adū for this link.

276

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

harmful at worst, and a placebo at best. Al-Husayn Dia, the first Mauritanian psychiatrist (who opened a mental_ health center locally called “Tab Dia,” or Dia’s hospital), has argued that a lack of medical _ and psychiatric services explains the persistence of l’hjāb in Mauritania. _ Very often, it is people who knocked on all the doors and, as that hasn’t worked, they say, Why not that guy, it seems that he heals? The marabout’s advantage is the proximity. It’s enough to wait a little in the yard and, after a moment, the big guy will see you. In modern medicine, it’s more structured, thus more rigid and less accessible.20

Dia assesses the harsh realities of medical care in Mauritania in a 2013 interview for a Nouakchott-based magazine. The specialized biomedical care of hospitals and clinics remains an elusive luxury for most Mauritanians. Local dispensary clinics provide only the most basic services, usually through a nurse who can treat common afflictions such as conjunctivitis, insect bites, giardia, dehydration or constipation but who is not equipped to treat complicated illnesses or injury. For Mauritanians without the financial means or social networks to help them travel to regional capitals, or for more advanced care to Nouakchott, Dakar, Tunisia, or France, traditional herbalists or hajjāba often become the best _ option for treatment. Even those who are physically able to wait in line at the national hospital see the quality of care there as very poor. Doctors like Dia surmise that, because accessing quality medical care remains nearly impossible, Mauritanians will turn to l’hjāb, spirit exorcism, and herbal medicine as more accessible, if not more_ efficacious, options. Yet the wealthy and formally educated also find comfort and efficacy in l’hjāb. High school students wanting to pass the standardized _ national exam or university students applying for visas to France and Senegal often visit hajjāba asking for help in achieving their objectives. _ who passed the exam or who travelled abroad but Young Mauritanians still face unemployment or overriding unhappiness with their lives explained their circumstances to me as caused by the evil eye and jealous spirits. As the psychiatrist Dia said in an interview, “Especially for a very pious population, there is always a bit of evil in illness that only the Qur’ān can remove.”21 Where this wickedness originated is a question that Mauritanians have answered differently over time and according to circumstance – blaming bad spirits or enslaved women

20

21

“Ils avaient prévu le pavillon, mais pas le psychiatre,” City Mag (August 2013), 10 11. See also Al Houssain Dia, Le psychiatre aux pays des marabouts (Paris: l’Harmattan, 2008). City Mag, 11.

Epilogue

277

or jealous friends – but God and his words have remained the most effective means of providing relief from the crises of daily life. Contestations This book has illustrated the debates and discussions about l’hjāb in the _ greater Muslim community, debates that date to the early centuries of Islam’s emergence and have included thinkers in the Saharan West since at least the late fifteenth century. Despite the arguments from prominent and respected scholars who positioned many of l’hjāb’s methods squarely _ within the realm of the illicit, or ghayr sharʿī (not permitted within Islamic jurisprudence), this secret wisdom has persisted. And yet, in the years immediately preceding and following the end of colonialism in Mauritania, we can see noticeable changes in the signifiers, material and linguistic, of l’hjāb. _ rule diminished the overall power of the hassān As French colonial _ that emirs, the emirs’ need to openly wear the amulets of l’hjāb – amulets _ had formerly protected them in raids and in battles with those who might have wanted to usurp power – likewise declined. And, thus, correspondingly, reduced the emirs’ reliance on the practitioners who created these protective amulets. The region’s transition from a loosely grouped set of emirates with fluid territorial boundaries to a centralized state, first as a colonial territory with its capital in Saint-Louis and later as an independent nation with its capital in Nouakchott, had a significant impact on the ways people talked about and relied on l’hjāb. The colonial state endeavored to end pillaging attacks on sedentary_ and submitted communities – a policy that limited the frequency of raids and, thus, the level of physical insecurity. As the use and threat of force by hassān diminished, _ protection from one can posit a recasting of the demand for l’hjāb as _ armed and mounted attack: while Saharan communities remained vulnerable to environmental threats and illness, French rule and Independence meant a decline in the level of the imminent threat of physical violence from political or territorial rivals. Governing the colony also meant that the French would establish regional administrative centers, where large numbers of rural and nomadic colonial subjects migrated to settle. Starting with the terrible cycles of famine in the 1930s and 1940s, then 1960s and 1970s, people of the Saharan West and Western Sahel fled rural areas for regional capitals hoping to find work and access to food. Some experts in the religious sciences moved with their clients and students to growing population centers where they worked as teachers, clerics, leaders of prayer, and hajjāba. Mauritania became progressively more urban and sedentary and, _

278

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

yet, daily lives for rural people who relocated to cities did not necessarily become more stable: for many, the transition to living under a centralized state and in an urban environment brought new precarity.22 The capitalist economy and civil bureaucracy translated into stricter educational requirements: the need to pay rent and buy food that came with urban living led to increased pressure to earn money. As men left villages to work in regional centers or elsewhere in the empire, women left behind faced increasing pressure to provide for their families. As should also be evident from previous chapters, Mauritania had never, during the colonial period, experienced a significant investment in medical services. Thus, even as Mauritanians began new “modern” lives in urban settings, therapeutic options outside of l’hjāb and herbal medicine remained _ limited in most Saharan communities. Love, loyalty, economic success, and good physical health remained elusive and much desired. The question in 2022 is not so much why people’s worlds are “still” enchanted but, rather, why anyone would expect those worlds no longer be inhabited by spirits or managed through prayer. Rudolph Ware, in writing about Qur’ānic education in Senegal, has argued that the durability there of religious study in its current form, a “traditional” form, “is evidence of its flexibility and dynamism, not as some would suggest, a sign of stagnation.”23 This book has endeavored to argue the same for l’hjāb in Mauritania. Experts in these esoteric sciences were called upon in_ precolonial periods to protect zwāya and znāga communities from hassān raids, to punish thieves, and to prevent enslaved people from _ escaping. Individuals sought out amulets and talismanic formulas to assure marriages for their daughters, protect the safety and health of children, and achieve reconciliation between couples. Muslim spiritual mediators built reputations as religious authorities, a recognized status that afforded them some political capacity and some influence over local holders of political power. As both pillaging and the trans-Saharan trade declined during the colonial period, Saharans mobilized l’hjāb to cope with new social imbalances associated with the end of slavery,_ imbalances that are often revealed in the surviving accounts of sellāla accusations.

22

23

When Mauritania proclaimed its independence from France in 1960, only 9% of the country’s inhabitants lived in what would become urban centers and 65% of the population was considered nomadic. Sixty years later, over 50% of Mauritanians live in cities and fewer than 6% have resisted sedentarization. Philippe Tanguy, “L’urbanisation irrégulière à Nouakchott : 1960 2000,” Insaniyat / ‫ ﺇﻧﺴﺎﻧﻴﺎﺕ‬22 (2003): 7 35 and ONS, Annuaire Statistique 2019 (Département des Statistiques Économiques et de la Conjecture, November 2020), http://ansade.mr/images/Archive/doc/publication/ Annuaire Statistique 2019.pdf. Ware, The Walking Qur’ān, 242.

Epilogue

279

The slow waning of the practice of slavery, initially in response to colonial prohibitions and especially, after much delay, resulting from the enforcement of those anti-slavery decrees, led to a reconfiguration of working conditions in oasis towns and agricultural settlements. Inevitably, families who depended on enslaved labor felt their way of life threatened; they would now have to pay wages to their workers or else do their household work themselves. Some oasis inhabitants of enslaved origin also affiliated with new Muslim communities that promoted rituals and social practices deemed objectionable by some clerics. Some bloodsucking accusations thus appear as efforts to control social and cultural changes by targeting those of enslaved status. Despite continued debates about the permissibility of l’hjāb, as one _ Mauritanian legal scholar noted in 2011, “al-ruqya al-sharʿiyya is constant and will continue and ruqya [that is] not sharʿiyya is constant and will continue. This is the truth of the matter.”24 L’hjāb has withstood reformist attacks, colonial and postcolonial efforts to_ limit the power of local Sufi hajjāba, the introduction and (limited) expansion of “modern” _ medical services, the spread of Western education, and changes in the Mauritanian social order. L’hjāb endures because it remains a potent _ means of dealing with the difficulties and frustrations of daily life – and also because it sits in the interstitial space between a politicized reformist Islam and a thriving prayer economy.25 The central aim of this book has been to consider this in-between status of the Islamic esoteric sciences in Mauritania, to call into question the dichotomies that – on the ground and in academic scholarship – divide people, geographies, and knowledge into categories of Arab and Black, the Maghrib and Africa south of the Sahara, orthodox and unorthodox, spiritual and material, and historical and ethnographic. Responding to tired and yet persistent misperceptions of an Africa on the edges of the Muslim world, its therapeutic and protective practices echoing this marginality, I have tried instead to take a longue durée approach to the history of l’hjāb – considering its entry, circulation, and _ uses in the Saharan West – reasserting the normative place of the esoteric sciences in Islamic knowledge and practice and demonstrating that these sciences have been the subject of contesting discourses about their permissibility, efficacy, and existence in Mauritania. More broadly, this

24 25

Shaykh Muhammad Fādil ould Muhammad Lemīn, interview, recorded by Ishagh _ _ _ ould Mukhtār. Soares argues that in neighboring Mali, “certain processes of commodification … have proliferated and intensified around such religious leaders in the postcolonial period.” Soares, Islam and the Prayer Economy, 153.

280

Invoking the Invisible in the Sahara

project not only points toward the need for a distinct field of Saharan Studies characterized by its attention to the particularities of what happens socially and historically in the arid lands themselves. It also suggests that when we begin from a practice previously deemed marginal to a more widespread or imagined norm, we are challenged to reconsider the universality of some previously accepted claims. At this point, I hope that readers question sweeping narratives of nineteenth-century decline in the esoteric sciences in the Muslim world, of race-making as timed to and originating solely in the European trade in enslaved Africans and subsequent colonization, of exclusively north to south direction for the transmission of knowledge in West Africa. As the book moves into the ethnographic present, I hope it convincingly argues that contestation does not necessarily mean a decline in practice. L’hjāb _ is thriving in contemporary Mauritania, even though it has been transformed in some key material aspects, and even as it is the object of much disparagement and denunciation. Intensified scrutiny of its experts – and the wider reach of criticism through social media – may instead suggest that these spiritual mediators are no longer able to help seekers confront the disappointing realities of social, professional, and political lives as successfully as they did in the past. By paying attention to how the spirit world has been engaged – and continues to be engaged – in a specific geographic and cultural setting, historians can more accurately depict the material and practical realities of their subjects’ everyday lives and, importantly, can achieve a more representative explanation of local and temporal “imaginaries,” or epistemological and ontological understandings of how the world functioned.26

26

Bernault, Colonial Transactions.

Glossary

ʿabd (pl. ʿabīd) ahl ahl al-lighla

ʿayn Bafūr baraka barzakh (pl. barāzikh)

bātin _ ʿ bida bīdānī (pl. bīdān, pl. _ _ feminine bīdāniyāt) _

bilād al-sūdān damel dā’ira

– enslaved person. – meaning “people” and used to refer to a social group usually connected by kinship. – Hassāniyya expression meaning _ “people of the empty dunes,” used to refer to spiritual entities. – “eye,” used to refer to the “evil eye.” – early inhabitants of the Saharan West. – blessings from God that might be transmitted through a saint. – literally partition, barrier, isthmus, or diving space used in Islamic thought to refer to an intermediate state of human existence between life and death. – inner, hidden, secret, esoteric. – illicit innovation in Islamic jurisprudence. – inhabitants of the Saharan West who consider themselves, as the term’s root suggests, “white” (racially or ethnically of Arab and/or Berber origin) Hassāniyya speakers. _ – Land of the black [people]. This is the name historically used to identify Africa south of the Sahara. – the Wolof term used for the sovereign in the Kajoor kingdom (1549–1879) in what is now northwest Senegal. – “circle,” a spiritual and religious education center. 281

282

Glossary

dār al-islām

dār al-kufr daʿwa (pl. dʿawāt) dhikr

fawā’id faqīh (pl. fuqahā’) fiqh fatwā (pl. fatāwā) gris-gris hadīth _ l’hjāb _ hajjāb (pl. hajjāba) _ _ hassān _ H assāniyya _

hikma _

hrtānī (pl. hrātīn) _ _ _ _

– “abode of Islam,” used historically to identify lands falling under Muslim rule or where Islam is the dominant religion. – “abode of unbelievers,” a term historically used to identify lands falling under non-Muslim rule. – voiced invocations or supplications to God, also an “invitation” or “call” to Islam. – remembrance of God, a devotional act common among Sufi orders that involves repeated recitation of God’s name or short prayers. – benefits, formulas related to the Islamic esoteric sciences. – jurisprudent. – Islamic jurisprudence. – nonbinding legal opinion issued by a Muslim scholar trained in jurisprudence. – French term used in West Africa to refer to amulets. – the reported sayings and actions of the Prophet Muhammad used as part of the basis for _Islamic jurisprudence. – Hassāniyya term for the Islamic _ esoteric sciences. – Hassāniyya term for experts in l’hjāb. _ _ – used in the Saharan West to demarcate an elevated status group usually identified as warriors and emirs. – dialect of Arabic used in the Saharan West in what is today parts of southern Morocco and Algeria, Mauritania, Mali, and Niger. – “wisdom”; if indexed with a color, such as white or black, it can be used to categorize beneficial or harmful applied knowledge or magic. – Hassāniyya term perhaps meaning _ “freed twice,” “second-class free

Glossary

ʿifrīt (pl. ʿafārīt) ʿilm al-hurūf w-l-asmā’ _ ʿilm al-raml invīl

jedwal (pl. jedāwil)

jihād

jinn (pl. jnūn) karāma (pl. karāmāt) korī (pl. kwār) lahma _

ligzāna

lithām madhhab

283

person,” or “dark-colored.” In Mauritania, used to designate Hassāniyya speakers understood to be _ enslaved origin. of – a malicious or demonic spirit. – “the science of letters and the [divine] names,” lettrism. – “the science of sand,” sand divination. – Hassāniyya term to describe a _ technique of finding lost things by communicating with the spirit world and using a string to measure the depth of one’s involvement with said spirits. – geometric squares, here used in conjunction with numerology and the Islamic esoteric sciences to further a user’s demands. – meaning “struggle,” it is often used to mean a holy war against infidels but also means a struggle for a deeper spiritual connection to God. – spiritual beings, can be either evil or beneficial. – a miracle, especially performed by a saintly person. – Hassāniyya word used to identify _ someone racially as “black,” nonArabophone origin. – from the term “meat” in Arabic, a word in Hassāniyya used to describe a _ social identity in the Saharan West indicating dependency and tributary status. – Hassāniyya term used to describe a _ technique of divination relying on cowrie shells, sand, or camel excrement. – veil or face covering, as worn by men from nomadic populations of the Saharan West. – school of Islamic jurisprudence.

284

Glossary

maghrib mahādra _ _

mahdī _ majnūn malāk (pl. malā’ika) marabout mashriq muftī mukāshafa muthallath murābitūn _

musabbaʿ muʿalim (pl. muʿalimīn) muʿawwidhatān muʿjiza nazra _

– the Islamic West, used geographically in reference to North Africa. – Hassāniyya term used to refer to a _ tertiary qur’anic educational institution with classes held under tents or on camels’ backs. – “the rightly guided one,” a messianic figure who will appear at the end of times. – possessed by jinn, or demons. – angels. – French term for a Sufi religious guide, teacher, and leader in West Africa, derived from the Arabic murābit. _ – the Islamic East, used geographically in reference to the Middle East. – a Muslim scholar versed in Islamic jurisprudence qualified to issue a fatwā. – the metaphysical “lifting of the veil” between the material and spiritual worlds in Sufi thought. – “the third,” used to refer to a numerological square based on values of three. – used in the Sahara to refer to those who participated in the Almoravid religious education and military campaign – “the seventh,” used to refer to a numerological square based on values of seven. – a term in Hassāniyya for the _ identity of a craftsperson occupational – the last two verses of the Qur’ān often evoked in the Islamic esoteric sciences. – miracles performed only by prophets, especially the Prophet Muhammad. _ describe a – a term in Hassāniyya used to _ technique of divination using a piece of string and striking it against the person supposedly victim of the evil eye.

Glossary

qādī _ rūhānīa (pl. rūhāniyyāt) _ _ ʿiyya al-ruqya al-shar ruqā sellāla, sell sharīf (pl. shurufā’) shaytān (pl. shayātīn) _ sharī_ ʿa shaykh (pl. shuyūkh) sihr _ silsila sirr al-harf subkha_ tahsīn __ takfīr tilasm (pl. talāsim) _tamīma (pl. _ tamā’im) tarīqa (pl. turuq) _ _ tasawwuf _ tazzuba al-tibb al-taqlīdī _ torodbe

ʿālim (pl. ʿulamā’) ʿulūm al-bātin _ ʿulūm al-zāhir _ wangara

285

– a Muslim scholar who applies Islamic jurisprudence and consults the legal opinions of a muftī. – spirits – “permitted recitation of the Qur’ān.” – spirit exorcism. – Hassāniyya term for bloodsucking, _ invisibly removing the essential life forces from another’s body – descendants of the Prophet Muhammad. _ – diabolical, evil spirits. – Islamic jurisprudence. – term used to describe a Muslim person with religious learning and authority. – sorcery. – a “chain,” or genealogy, of knowledge transmission, especially referencing Islamic knowledge. – “the secrets of letters,” lettrism. – salt mine. – “protection,” referring to an applied use of l’hjāb. _ an accusation of unbelief. – “unbelief,” – talisman. – amulet. – literally “path,” used to refer to identify Sufi orders. – Sufism. – Hassāniyya term referring to a form of _ retribution exercised by zwāya and relying on l’hjāb. _ – traditional medicine. – Pulaar term used for those who make up the clerical occupational group in the Fouta Tooro and Fouta Jallon. – religious scholar. – “inner sciences,” esoteric sciences. – “visible sciences,” exoteric sciences. – a subgroup of Soninké-speaking West Africans who were identified as mobile and engaged in commerce.

286

Glossary

walī (pl. awliyā’) znāga zwāya

– saint. – Hassāniyya term referring to people of _ tributary status, hierarchically below the warriors and scholars – Arabic term used in Hassāniyya to distinguish the social _group usually identified as having scholarly status.

Bibliography

Oral Interviews Abba ould Ahmad Mahmūd ould Sebtī, March 22, 2012, Shinqīt. _ ʿAbd al ‘Azīz_ould Fata_ ʿAma, July 15, 2012, Nouakchott. ʿAbd al Hayy ould Ahmad ʿAbdī, July 5, 2013, Awjeft. _ hīm ould Hanshī, _ ʿAbd al Ra February 1, 2012, Shinqīt. _ _ Nouakchott. Ahmad ould ʿAbd al Rahmān ould Dindū, August 5, 2012, _ _ Alioune Diop, April 4, 2012, Rosso. Amenitū mint Swaydi Muhammad, July 14, 2012, Awjeft. Ameth Gueye, 2012, Atār._ Anonymous, March 1, _2012, Nouakchott. ʿAyshetū mint Samorī, April 1, 2012, July 2, 2012, Shinqīt. _ Bashīr Bedi Bābā, July 22, 2013, Nouakchott. Boubacar Messaʿūd, August 5, 2012, Nouakchott. Deddoud ʿAbd Allāh, July 29, 2013, Nouakchott. Elias Saba, July 10, 2014, telephone conversation. Habīb Gueye, 2012, Atār. _ abīb Sy, 2012, Toungen. _ H _ amad ould Maham, May 14, 2012, Nouakchott. H _ amden ould al _Tāh, April 20, 2012, Nouakchott. H _ usayn ould Mahand, July 17, 2012, Nouakchott. H _ _ Isselemū ould Ahmad ould Ehmān, July 4, 2013, Maʿaden al Ervān. _ Mar Fāll Samba, April 4, August 9, 2012, Toungen. Mawlāy Ahmad ould Mawlāy Zāyn, March 19, 2012, Shinqīt. _ Momm mint Khalīva ould Muhammad Fāll, September _10, 2012, _ Tigumātīn. _ Sayyid, July 3, 2013, Atār. Moyna mint Muhammad ʿAbd Allāh ould Ahmad_ ‘Abdī, July 13, 14, 2012, and July _ 5,_ 2013, Awjeft. Muhammad _ Muhammad _ Muhammad _ Muhammad _ Shinqī t. _ Muhammad _ Muhammad _

al Mukhtār ould Zāmel, July 9, 2012, Nouakchott. Fāll, September 10, 2012, Tigumātīn. _ Fāll ould ‘Umayr, July 10, 2012, Nouakchott. Lemīn ould Muhammad Mahmūd, January 27, 2012, _ _ Lemīn ould Sadfa ould Bābā, July 6, 2012, Nouakchott. Muhammadū Ahzānā, July 25, 2012, Nouakchott. _ __ 287

288

Bibliography Muhammad ould Ahmad ʿAbdī, July 5, 2013, Awjeft. _ Muhammad ould Ba_han, May 1, 2012, Shinqīt. _ _ Muhammad ould Ibrāhīm ould al Day, July 17,_ 2012, Nouakchott. _ Muhammad ould Zāmel, July 9, 2012, Nouakchott. _ Muhammad Roqayya Fāll, April 4, August 8, 2012, Garak. _ ould Shaybanī, July 5, 2013, Awjeft. Sayār Fāll, February 29, June 13, 2012, Nouakchott. _ August 27, 2012, July 14, 2013, Tigumātīn. Selma mint Lolaid, July 4, 2012, Maʿaden_ al Ervān. Senī ould ʿAbdāwa, July 13, 2012, Awjeft. July 28, 2012, Nouakchott. Shaykh Ahmadū Bamba ould Sayār, January 19, February 22, April 6, _ 14, 2013, Tigumā_tīn. 2012, July _ August 27, 2012, Car ride between Dara and Tigumātīn. _ Shaykh ould Ahmadū, July 18, 2012, Nouakchott. _ Shaykhānī ould Sīdīna, July 1, 2013, Nouakchott. July 3, 2013, in transit between Nouakchott and Maʿaden al Ervān. July 5, 2013, Atār. _ July 11, 2013, phone conversation. Sīdī Ahmad ould Arbī ould Sīdī Mawlāy Zāyn, July 15, 2012, M’heirith. _ Sīdī Dieng, December 12, 2013, Skype communication. Tijanī ould Ramadān ould Saʿid, July 3, 2013, Atār. _ July 24, 2012, Nouakchott. _ Yahyā ould al Barā, _ Ya‘qūb ould Muhammad ould Shaykh Sīdiyya, May 18, 20, 2012, Nouakchott. _ Yensarha mint Muhammad Mahmūd, July 11, 2012, Nouakchott. _ Sālem, July_ 30, 2012, Nouakchott. Zekeria ould Ahmad _

Archival Materials Bibliothèque al Fejar, Nouakchott. Bibliothèque Nationale de France (BNF), Paris: BNF, Richelieu, manuscrits orientaux, Arabe 5635, ff 3b 112. BNF, Richelieu, manuscrits orientaux, Arabe 6851, ff 284 285V “qasīda bā’ īa mahadā’” authored by Alfā Ibrāhīm. Institut Fondamental d’Afrique Noire (IFAN), Dakar.

Archives Nationales d’Outre-Mer (FRANOM), Aix-en-Provence 4 MIOM 826, 7G/86 Mission politique dans la Fouta Djallon. 14 MIOM 2177, 9G 64 Service des Renseignements et des Affaires Musulmanes. 75 APOM 9 Randau. 1704 Col I, Mauritanie IV 1 (1901 04). FP 15 APC/2 Gaden. P 75 APOM 3, Papiers Randau, Notes et Extraits de l’Islam dans l’Afrique Occidentale.

Bibliography

289

Archives Nationales Pierrefitte-sur-Seine (ANPS) Lieutenant François Beslay. “Croyances et préceptes parareligieux en Mauritanie.” Côte 20000002/37, CHEAM, n. 1003, 1946. Alain Chambon. “La population de condition ou d’origine servile ou ‘maures noirs’ dans la République Islamique de la Mauritanie.” Côte 20000002/189, CHEAM, n. 3607, 1961 Capitaine de la Chapelle, Le Sahara avant la conquête, no. 148, 4 mai 1937, Côte 20000002/8, CHEAM, n. 148, 4 mai 1937. Robert Lemoyne. “Enquête sur le droit pénal local de la Mauritanie.” Côte 20000002/34, CHEAM, n. 897, 1938. Commandant Trancart, Base et structure de la société maure, Côte 20000002/3, CHEAM, n. 1024, 10 avril 1947. Commandant Ch. Voisin “L’islam maure.” Questions Sahariennes, Côte 20000002/3, CHEAM, n. 1009, 1946.

Archives Nationales de la République Islamique de Mauritanie (ANRIM), Nouakchott E1/2. E1/8 Rapport politique de la subdivision d’Atar. E1/16 Trarza, 1919 1921. E1/18 Esclavage, n.d. E1/40 Généalogie des Ahl Cheikh Muhammad Fadel. E1/47 Cercle du Trarza, Correspondance divers, 1912 1913. E1/49 Guidimaka, 1906 1914. E1/75. E1/77 Tagant, 1926 1939. E1/82 Gouverneur Général de l’AOF. E1/98 Fiches de Renseignements, 1912. E1/102 Correspondances des agents du Maroc en Mauritanie. E1/103 Soumission années 1904 1913. E1/114 Dossier pas titré. E2 folders 10 79 “Agitation Hamalliste.” E2/12 Affaires diverses, 1922 1941. E2/44 Enseignement.

Archives Provinciales de Chinguetti (APC) Bulletins de renseignements subdivision de Chinguetti, janvier 1941. Dossier 1930. Dossier 1931, Rapports Politiques, janvier 1931.

Archives régionales d’Atar (ARA) Dossier 1924. Rapport Annuel, 1938.

290

Bibliography

Archives nationales du Sénégal (ANS), Dakar 1G19 Voyage chez les Braknas par M. du Château. 1G27/1 of 4 Coutumes de la Mauritanie. 1G346 “Notice de Paul Marty sur les Fadels.” 1914. 2G1/96 Sénégal cercle de Kaédi, rapports trimestriels d’ensemble, 1898. 2G5/6 Mauritanie: rapports politiques trimestriels, 1906. 2G5/10 Mauritanie: rapports politiques mensuels, 1905. 2G6(5) Mauritanie: rapports politiques trimestriels, 1906. 2G7 (2) Mauritanie: Rapport politique annuel, 1906. 2G27/17 Mauritanie: rapport politique annuel, 1927. 2G30/3 Mauritanie: Rapport politique annuel, 1930. 2K4 “Enquête de la société des nations sur l’esclavage”. 3B93 Correspondance avec la Brakna et Trarza 7D16/89 Gardes méharistes, Mauritanie, lettres 1926 1933. 7D28 Réorganisation des méharistes. 9G21 Dossier Situation politique et administrative, 1904. 9G31/17 Renseignements sur les cercles du Sud. 9G40 Fiches de Renseignements, Baie du Lévrier, Brackna, 1911 1913. 9G78 (107) Divers, affaires islamiques, sur les Ghoudfs. 9G86 (107) “Affaire de sorcellerie en Mauritanie”. 10G12 (107) Haute Volta correspondance au sujet des marabouts, fiches bibliographiques des marabouts influents, 1922 1923. 12G18 Surveillance de la zone saharienne, 1916 1920. 13G64 Actions des maures sur le Sénégal, 1903. 15G103 Affaires musulmanes, 1903 1914. 17G10/1 Notes et renseignements. 17G50 (17) Enquête de la commission parlementaire sur les procès pour faits de sorcellerie. 17G92 (17) Direction des Affaires Politiques. 17G553/15 Mauritanie, synthèse trimestrielle 1943 1955. 18G183/160 Questions des serviteurs en Mauritanie: Aperçu sommaire sur la question des serviteurs en Mauritanie. 19G1 Situation de l’Islam en AOF, 1906 1916. Dossier pas classé sur ‘Magie sorcellerie Fétichisme.

University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Collection 1538/101/13, al Shaykh Sīdiyya, Boutilimit (Mauritania) Library of Arabic Documents and Manuscripts. microfilm.

West African Arabic Manuscript Database “Rushd al ghāfil.” AMMS ID # 781, Boutilimit 79, by Ould al Hājj Ibrāhīm. _ Online. https://bit.ly/2IVfy7g.

Bibliography

291

Unpublished Sources in Arabic Ahmed Abdawa Facebook page. Facebook. February 5, 2019. www.facebook .com/ahmed.abdawa.5/posts/1549015388534122. Ahzānā Muhammad Muhammadū. “Rushd al ghāfil wa nasīhat al jāhil li sīdī _ _ ʿabd allāh _ al hājj ibrāhīm _ _ muqārabāt wa mulāhazāt fī _fahm al siyāq min _ n.p. Shared by author. _ _ khilāl al mawū‘.” Dieng, Sīdī. Personal communication with the author. Whatsapp. August 13, 2021. Khaled Moulay Facebook page. Facebook, April 10, 2021. www.facebook.com/ khaled.moulay.14/videos/3892485604199545. Ould al Barā, Yahyā. “al fuqahā’ wa ‘ulūm al sirr wa l sharr (al ma‘ārif al kha _ fiyya).” Unpublished article shared with permission by author. Ould al Dedew, Muhammad al Hassan. “Al ruqya al shar‘iyya al nāfi‘a.” _ _ manuscript. Photocopied printed Ould Muhammad Lemīn, Shaykh Muhammad Fādil. Interview with Ishagh ould _ _ Mukhtār. Video Recorded. USB. _ Sīdī Yahyā, Muhammad Mahmūd. Interview with Ishagh ould Mukhtār. Video _ _ _ Recorded. USB. “Risālat al shaykh.” Shared by Husayn ould Mahand, July 17, 2012, Nouakchott. _

Published Sources in Arabic Al Amīn al Sālim, Muhammad al Amjād ould Muhammad. “awwal bahth hawl _ _ _ 10, al kitāba al talsamiyya fī morītānya aw sirr al _harf.” El Meda.net, June _ _ 2014, www.elmeda.net/spip.php?article721. Ahmad al Amsamī, Muhammad b. “Al ʿalawī al shinqītī (sāhib murāqī al saʿūd) _ wa minhaji fī naqd ʿulūm _ _ _ _ al ghāfil (al sihr w al bātl min khilāl kitābihi rushd _ al _ an nāwaʿihi wa tawābʿihi).” al majla al ʿilmiyya l kuliyya asūl al dīn w _ daʿua bil zaqāzīq jāmiʿa al Azhar 28, no. 2 (2016): 1523 92. Ahzānā, Muhammad Muhammad. Maʿqūl al lāma’qūl fī al wa’y al jamʿī al ʿarabī: _ _ sūrat al mughayyab _ fī _al mukhayyila al shaʿbiyya al morītāniyya “namūdhajan. _n.p., 2002. Āl Bārikallāh fīhi Fādilī, Ahmad b. Muhammad b. Hamayn min. al Wusūl wa l _ _ _ _ al shaykh tarsīkh bimanāqib eʿli al shaykh, aw, hādī al rijāl ilā hadrat_ dhī al _ _ _ jalāl. Nouakchott: Imprimerie, n.d. al Būnī, Ahmad b. ʿAlī. Shams al maʿārif al kubrā wa latā’if al ʿawārif. Beirut: _ _ The People’s Library, 1975. Ibn Khaldūn. Muqaddimat al ‘allāma ibn khaldūn: al musammā dīwān al mubtada’ wa l khabar fī tārīkh al ‘arab wa l barbar wa man ‘āsarahum min dhawī al _ sha’n al akbar. Beirut: Dār al fikr, 2010. Marjān, Sahar ‘Antar Muhammad Ahmad. Fuqahā’ al mālikiyya wa atharuhum fī _ al sūdān al _gharbī fī ‘ahday _ mujtama‘ malī wa sunghī. Kitab Inc.: Maktabat _ al thaqāfa al dīnīyya, 2018. Muhammad Fādil b. Māmīn, al Shaykh Sīdī. naʿt al bidāyāt wa tawsīf al nihāyāt. _Dar al bayda’: _ _ Dar al rushd al hadīth, 2006. _ _

292

Bibliography

Muhammad Fādil b. Māmīn al Shinqītī, al Shaykh Mā’ al ʿAynayn al Shaykh. _Kitāb madhhab _ _ al makhūf ʿalā daʿawāt al hurūf. Beirut, al maktaba al shaʿ _ biyya, 1951. Nūh, Shaykh. Adabāy. Riyādh: Dar mudārāk, 2019. _ al Barā, Yahyā. Al Majmūʿa al kubrā al shāmila li fatāwā wa nawāzil wa Ould _ ahkām ahl gharb wa janūb gharb al sahrā’, vol. 12. Nouakchott: al Hasan _ _ b._ al Mukhtār b. al Hasan Mawlāy al_ Sharīf, 2010. _ Ould Hāmidūn, Al Mukhtār. H ayāt Morītānyā. al juz’ al thānī: al hayāt _ _ al thaqāfiyya. Tūnus: Al dār al_ ʿarabiyya lil kitāb, 1990. H ayāt Morītānyā: hawādith al sinīn, arbʿa qurūn min tārīkh morītānī wa jūwārihā. _ Abu Dhabi: Hay’at _ Abū Ẓaby lil Thaqāfah wa al Turāth, 2011. Ould al Sālem, Hamā Allah. Tārīkh bilād shinqītī morītānīā min al ʿasūr al qadīma _ _ ilā al harb _ shurbbūba al kubrā bayn awlād al nāsr wa dawla ibddūkal _ _ al lamtūnīa. Beirut: Dār al kutub al ʿilmiyya, 2010. Ould Sayār Fāll, al Shaykh Ahmadū Bāmbā. “Tigumātīn fī al dhākira _ taniyya.” Tigumātīn. March _ 15, 2012. July 2, 2022._ http://tigoumatin al wa _ _ .blogspot.com/2012/03/blog post.html. Ould al Shaybānī, Muhammad. “Qissat mariam bint ahmad bezaid wa ‘ibnatihā _ _ al muthīra.” Souhoufi. January 17, 2019, www.souhoufi.com/article15256 .html. Ould Sīdī Yahyā, Muhammad Mahmūd ould Ahmad Sīdī. Al mujtama‘ al fadfād: _ sūsyū naqdiyya _ _ _ mulāhazāt hawl_ al mar’a wa _l sulta wa l thaqāfa fī al mujtama‘ _ _ al mu‘āsir. Mu’assasat _ _ _ al morītānī al thiqa lil ma‘lūmātiyya, 2002. _ al Amīn. al wasīt fī tarājim ’udabā’ shinqīt. Cairo: Al al Shinqītī, Sīdī Ahmad _ __ _ _ Jumalia, 1911.

No Author Listed, Ordered Alphabetically by Title “Attahim ould ʿumayr bijāh bi muhāsarat kān makka.” al hurriyya, December 3, _ _ 2013. http://motaded.net/show_ 828266.html. “ʿAzīz yerafad keshf ‘asrār’ therūtihi wa yesā’il ʿan ‘amwāl al jaysh’.” Sahara _ Medias, August 28, 2020. https://tinyurl.com/3zvvr7n3. “Bʿad tasjīlāt sawtīa al shaykh al ridā yeqasim fī fīdīo latmāna al dā’inīn.” _ YouTube, April 12,_2018. https://youtu.be/ynejwz9FHSo. _ Alakhbarinfo, “Barnāmaj ’ab‘ād al khabar maʿ ould benyūk wa yehzīhi ould dāhī hawl al ifrāj __ _ ‘an ould amkheitīr.” Tawatur, July 12, 2019, www.youtube.com/watch?v _ wz8kYk I6y0. “Barnāmaj wathāqī ʿan hayāt al shaykh sīd muhammad ould al hakūma ould al _ _ _ shaykh sīdiyya “al fakhāma” qanāt al watanīa.” BellewarMedia. YouTube, _ June 20, 2017. https://youtu.be/MgcOVfeMU9M. “Bi daʿūa min al shaykh ould babā: tazāhira l ilaʿāda iʿamār tamghart.” Mohamed Ely Dendou page. YouTube,_ May 11, 2017. www.youtube.com/ watch?v VpG9Svs6S9E&t 100s&ab channel MohamedElyDendou. “Ḍajja kubrā fī morītānyā baʿd tarashshuh ‘mumaththil al jinn’ lil ’intikhābāt al ri’āsiyya.” Sputnik ʿarbī , April 16, _ 2019, https://arabic.sputniknews.com/ arab world/201904161040518926 ‫ﺍﻟﺠﺪﻝ ﻣﻮﺭﻳﺘﺎﻧﻴﺎ ﻣﺮﺷﺢ ﺍﻟﻤﻠﺤﺪﻳﻦ ﻣﺤﺎﺭﺑﺔ ﻭﻋﺪ‬/.

Bibliography

293

“Al fakhāma ould al shaykh sīdiyya yesīr qāfila ila madīna roso li istaqābāl al ra’īs Muhammad ould ʿAbd al ʿAzīz.” Tawatur, YouTube, _July 26, 2017, www _ .youtube.com/watch?v oZTbIPMxSl8. “Halaqat al hjāb tarn hhhhhhh.” YouTube, September 26, 2015. www.youtube _ .com/watch?v _ Ms6olJhFpfU. “Hal al muʿtadūn ʿala drīh al walī al sālih ahmad bezeid fī al trārza hum min al _ sākhin. June _ _2016. https://tinyurl.com/3abh5cax. _ al _ 15 jihādīn?.” al Khabar “Al hjāb shatran.” YouTube, September 26, 2015. www.youtube.com/watch?v _p0qY9541uo4. “L’hjāb, barnāmaj al tāfilāt qanāt al wataniyya.” YouTube, January 21, 2014. _ www.youtube.com/watch?v _ _ K5lYqC51dPk. “Iʿatiqāl ūld dāhī ithr shakwa taqadamat bihā wizārat al siha.” al Siraj, April 11, _ 2020. http://essirage.net/node/19303. “Intishār al sihr wa l sha‘wadha fī dawlat morītānyā.” YouTube, July 9, 2014. _ www.youtube.com/watch?v qugfQ4TZhvw “Al islām wa l nās al ruqya wa l’hjāb.” BellewarMedia page. YouTube, March 8, _ 2013. www.youtube.com/watch?v a 9jb1Tgmow. “Karamsīn rajul muntafed yamna‘ al sukkān min al mā’ al sharūb.” Wikālat al _ 3, 2013. http://amicinfo.com/old/index.php?option mustaqbal. December com content&view article&id 11007:2013 11 26 15 22 40&catid 1:2011 05 18 11 02 35&Itemid 172. “Khurūj al fakhāma min nwākshott ‘al maghlaq’ yethīr radūdān sākhina.” Taguint, May 24, 2020. www.tig.mr/contents/article/54188. “Musalsal anā wa ʿammī al halaqa 04 al hijāb al juz’ al awwal qanāt _ al wataniyya.” YouTube, January 28, 2015._ www.youtube.com/watch?v _ aoaby11G5 8. “Mas’ūl bāriz fī al dawla yatawajjah li hajjāb talaban lil ta‘yīn.” Wikālat al wi’ām al wataniyya lil ’anbā’ , August 31,_ 2019._ http://alwiam.info/node/6506?fbclid _ IwAR1oqfwzrznDO0rRxWH4NMaYMqzszmBEceOu5NrX6a2K1L 5nTDE ui6Hzkg. “Musalsal ‘āmḫ aytirāt’ al halaqa 24 l hjāb qanāt al murābitūn.” YouTube, June _ _ _ 20, 2017. www.youtube.com/watch?v IR li0dQfX4. _ “Muhammad al Hasan ould Dedew.” www.dedew.net/. _ _ “Nubdha ‘an al mujāhid al shaykh muhammad al ma’mūn.” Mojibu Jake blog, _ October 2, 2012. http://ifhamni.blogspot.com/2012/10/blog post 2.html. “Qirā’a rā’i‘a li rāqī maghribī.” YouTube, September 10, 2010. www.youtube .com/watch?v Uh9KNXmOmMA. “Qissat bint Ahmad bezaid wa ’ibnatihā al muthīra.” Shebeka īnshīrī al iʿalāmiya, January 15_ 2019. http://inchiri.net/node/2156. “Al rāqī al maghribī ʿAbd al ʿAlī Bilhabīb.” August 5, 2019, www.youtube.com/ _ channel/UCsuWhfOdlcXr3HqFMGb4c5A. “Al ruqya al shar‘iyya wikālat ’akhbār morītānyā.” YouTube. July 1, 2014. www .youtube.com/watch?v 8No1Otvu2TA. “Al ruqya al sharʿiyya fī morītānyā.” YouTube, October 29, 2015. www.youtube .com/watch?v 51FQsK 9 jU. “Al rāqī al maghribī al shaykh naʿīm rabī‘.” YouTube. www.youtube.com/watch? v gEiY31i6JBY.

294

Bibliography

“Al saġnīa.” The world centre for studies and research of jinns Sciences, March 28, 2013. www.jinnsc.com/vb/t12822/. “Al shaykh muhammad al hasan ould dedew: anā lastu min harakat al ikhwān.” _ _ http://elwatan.info/node/7468._ al Watan, April 20, 2017. “Al ruqya _al sharʿiyya kāmila || fadīlat al shaykh muhammad al hasan ould _ _ _ dedew hafidhahu Allāh.” YouTube, April 9, 2017. www.youtube.com/ _ watch?v 3zhl5pSJG6k. “Ra’īs markaz ahbāb al rasūl lil ruqya al sharʿiyya fī liqā’ “muthīr” ma‘ qanāt _ Shinqīt.” YouTube, December 30, 2016. www.youtube.com/watch?v _ 93VMBVrRPp4. “Tahiʾna ʿāma wa ihtifā’ wāsiʿa bi injāz bi’r tamghart.” al dolfīn, November 24, _ 2016. https://hourriyamedia.com/node/2053 “Waraqa ʿan wafāt al qutb eʿli shaykh ould momma min ʿidād a.” YouTube, October 22, 2018. www.youtube.com/watch?v 3txZ3KXhNOs. “Yehzīhi ūld dāhī ānā awal min ikteshef doā’ kovid19/ lākin al dawla lā turīd _iʿatimādihi.” _ YouTube, April 18, 2020. www.youtube.com/watch?v FFZH YPmRg4.

Unpublished Sources in English and French Abdulkadir, Abubakar Sadiq. 2018 African Studies Association of the United Kingdom paper. Abstract online. March 27, 2019, https://coms.events/ ASAUK2018/data/abstracts/en/abstract 0130.html Acloque, Benjamin. “Une improbable frontière précoloniale au Sahara. Questions autour d’un tracé départageant des puissances tribales en 1868 en Mauritanie (Sahel/Adrar).” Paper presentation in Paris at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, 20 février 2019. Cited with permission from the author. Adū, Bābā. Personal Communication. Facebook Messenger. July 7, 2017 Med Lemin Bellamech page. “al hamdulillāh.” Facebook. Attributed to the Ahl _ Bilʿamesh Library, Shinqīt, Posted April 6, 2014. Accessed June 29, 2021. _ www.facebook.com/photo?fbid 649367418463973&set a .124268254307228. Berndt, Jeremy. “Closer than Your Jugular Vein: Muslim Intellectuals in a Malian Village, 1900 to the 1960s.” PhD diss., Northwestern University, 2008. Bibed, Fatima. “Les Kunta à travers quelques extraits de l’ouvrage al tara’if wa l’tala’id de 1756 à 1826.” PhD diss. Université d’Aix Marseille, 1997. Bonte, Pierre. “L’émirat de l’Adrar: histoire et anthropologie d’une société tribale du sahara occcidental.” PhD diss., L’École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, 1998. Botzung, Marc. “L’autre médecine: santé, magie et esprits.” Article at the Bibliothèque al Fajr, Nouakchott, May 2007. Brhane, Meskerem. “Narratives of the Past, Politics of the Present: Identity, Subordination and the Haratines of Mauritania.” PhD diss., University of Chicago, 1997.

Bibliography

295

Coulon, Jean Charles “Qui sont Hârût et Mârût?” Questions d’islam. Produced by France Culture. Podcast. 55:00. www.franceculture.fr/emissions/questions dislam/qui sont harut et marut. Dell, Jeremy. Email communication with author. February 3, 2014. Diagana, M’bouh Séta. “La littérature mauritanienne de langue française: essai de description et étude du contenu.” PhD diss., University of Paris XII, Val de Marne, 2004. Drury, Mark. “Disorderly Histories: An Anthropology of Decolonization in Western Sahara.” PhD diss., The City University of New York, 2018. Gubara. Dahlia El Tayeb M. “Al Azhar and the Orders of Knowledge.” PhD diss., Columbia University, 2014. Hamès, Constant. “L’art talismanique en Islam d’Afrique Occidentale. Personnes. Supports. Procède. Transmission. Analyse Anthropologique et Islamologique d’un Corpus de Talismans à Écritures.” PhD diss., École Pratique des Hautes Études, Sorbonne, 1996 97. Hunt, Lynn in conversation with Marty Lasden. “The Future of History Up Next: Perspectives on the Future of Everything.” YouTube, April 12, 2016. https://youtu.be/amkZ5TkxwY8. Jourde, Cedric. “Dramas of Ethnic Elites Accommodation: The Authoritarian Restoration in Mauritania.” PhD diss., University of Wisconsin Madison, 2002. McDougall, E. Ann. “The Ijil Salt Industry: Its Role in the Precolonial Economy of the Western Sudan.” PhD diss., University of Birmingham, 1980. Melvin Koushki, Matthew. “The Quest for a Universal Science: The Occult Philosophy of Sa’in al Din Turka Isfahani (1369 1432) and Intellectual Millenarianism in Early Timurid Iran.” PhD diss., Yale University, 2012. Moosa, Ebrahim. “The Literary Works of Shaykh Sîdî Al Mukhtâr Al Kuntî (d. 1811): A Study of the Concept and Role of “Miracles” in al minna fī i’tiqād ahl al sunna.” MA thesis, University of Cape Town, 2011. Mueller, Rachael. “The Spirits Are My Neighbors: Women and the Rab Cult in Dakar, Senegal.” BA thesis, Macalester College, 2013. http://digitalcommons .macalester.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article 1022&context anth honors. Nouhi, Mohamed Lahbib. “Religion and Society in a Saharan Tribal Setting: Authority and Power in the Zwāya Religious Culture.” PhD diss., University of Alberta, 2009. O’Brien, Susan M. “Power and Paradox in Hausa Bori: Discourses of Gender, Healing, and Islamic Tradition in Northern Nigeria.” PhD diss., University of Wisconsin Madison, 2000. Ould Cheikh, Abdel Wedoud. “Nomadisme, Islam et pouvoir politique dans la société maure précoloniale (XIème siècle XIXème siècle): Essaie sur quel ques aspects du tribalisme.” PhD diss., Paris V, René Descartes, 1985. “Revisiting a Hunwick translation on the Southern Sanhaja Society in the XVth Century.” Unpublished paper from the Sacred Word: The Changing Meanings in Textual Cultures of Islamic Africa. A Symposium Dedicated to the Memory of Professor John O. Hunwick, Northwestern University, April 21 22, 2016, paper shared by author.

296

Bibliography

“De quoi le Sahara est il le nom ? Images du Sahara et des Sahariens dans Kitâb al bâdiyya d’al Shaykh Muhamd al Mâmi.” Unpublished paper pre sented in Guelmim, Morocco for the conference Le Sahara Lieux d’histoire … Espaces d’échanges, May 26, 27, and 28, 2016. Shared on the author’s Academia.edu page. Ould Muhammad, Ahmad Mahmūd “Jamāl.” Personal communication. _ Whatsapp. January _13, 2017. _ Pâques, Viviana. “L’arbre cosmique dans la pensée populaire et dans la vie quotidienne du nord ouest africain.” PhD diss. Université de Paris, 1964. Pettigrew, Erin. “Muslim Healing, Magic, and Amulets in the Twentieth Century History of the Southern Sahara.” PhD diss., Stanford University, 2014. Saba, Elias. E mail message and skype conversation with author. April 4, 2014, July 6, 2014 and August 13, 2014. Sayat al madhloum. Circulated from 1971 75. Schumann, Matthew Conaway. “A Path of Reverent Love: The Nāsiriyya Brotherhood across Muslim Africa (11 12th/17th 18th centuries).”_ PhD diss., Princeton University, 2020. Taylor, Raymond Michael. “Of Disciples and Sultans: Power, Authority, and Society in the Nineteenth Century Mauritanian Gebla.” PhD diss., University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, 1996. Thiam, Dimé. Personal communication with the author. Whatsapp. June 20, 2019. Ware III, Rudolph Treanor. “Knowledge, Faith, and Power: A History of Qur’ānic Schooling in 20th Century Senegal.” PhD diss., University of Pennsylvania, 2004. Personal email communication. October 10 11, 2018. White, Luise. “On unpacking the occult: why we need to go back to Friuli (or Transylvania, for that matter).” Unpublished Paper, delivered April 6, 2001. Accessed November 26, 2013. http://faculty.history.wisc.edu/bernault/ magical/Luise%20White%20occult.htm.

Primary Sources in English and French “Afrique Occidentale Française: En pays maure.” Bulletin du Comité de l’Afrique française et du Comité du Maroc 4, no. 7 (1903): 224. Abdullah Yusuf Ali, Translator. The Qur’an: Text, Translation and Commentary. Elmhurst, NY: Tahrike Tarsile Qur’an, Inc., 2008. Abdul Wahhab, Muhammad b. Kitab At Tauhid. Translated by Abdul Malik Mujahid. pdf. Dar us Salam Publications, www.islamicbasics.com, nd. https://epdf.pub/kitaab at tawhid the book of the unity of god.html. al Bakri. Description de l’Afrique septentrionale. Translated by Mac Guckin de Slane. Imprimerie impériale: Paris, 1857. Boilat, Abbé David. Esquisses Sénégalaises. Paris: Karthala, 1984. Original Paris: P. Bertrand, 1853. Caillié, René. Travels through Central Africa to Timbuctoo, vol. II. Translated by M. Jomard. London: Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley, 1830.

Bibliography

297

“Carte de l’Afrique occidentale française.” L’Illustration. February 29, 1936. “Le Cheikh Ali Ridha serait il le Madoff mauritanien?” Mauriweb, February 14, 2018. http://mauriweb.info/node/4350. Coppolani, Xavier and Octave Depont. Les confréries religieuses musulmanes. Alger: Adolphe Jourdan, 1897. de la Courbe, Michel Jajolet. Premier Voyage du Sieur de la Courbe Fait à la Coste d’Afrique en 1685. Paris: Édouard Champion, 1913. Davidson, John. Notes taken during Travels in Africa. J.L. Cox, 1839. Delafosse, Maurice. Haut Sénégal Niger (Soudan Français): Tome I, le pays, les peuples, les langues, l’histoire, les civilisations. Paris: Émile Larose, 1912. Haut Sénégal Niger (Soudan Français): Tome III, les civilisations. Paris: Émile Larose, 1912. “Deuxième décès lié au coronavirus (COVID 19).” Le Calame, May 13, 2020. http://lecalame.info/?q node/10302. Doornbos, Harald and Jenan Moussa. “Inside the Islamic Emirate of Timbuktu.” Foreign Policy, February 14, 2013, https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/02/14/ inside the islamic emirate of timbuktu/. Douls, Camille. “Cinq mois chez les maures nomades du Sahara occidental.” Le Tours du Monde IV (1888): 177 224. “Voyage d’exploration à travers le Sahara occidental et le sud marocain.” Bulletin de la Société de Géographie IV (1888): 437 80. Doutté, Edmond. Magie et Religion dans l’Afrique du Nord. Alger: Adolphe Jourdan, 1908 and Paris: Librarie d’Amérique et de l’Orient, 1983. Dubié, Paul. “‘El ʿOmda’. Poème sur la médicine maure.” Translated by Muhammad ould Ebnou Aden. Bulletin de l’IFAN 5, no. 5 (1943): 38 66. Durkheim, Émile. Elementary Forms of Religious Life: A Study in Religious Sociology (first published 1912). “En Mauritanie: Muhammad Mamoun.” Bulletin mensuel du comité de l’Afrique _ du Maroc (Janvier 1932): 672 77. française et du comité Gouraud, Général. Mauritanie Adrar: souvenirs d’un africain. Paris: Librairie Plon, 1945. Hamet, Ismaël. Chroniques de la Mauritanie sénégalaise: Nacer Eddine. Paris: Ernest Leroux, 1911. Houdas, Octave and Maurice Delafosse, translated. Tārīkh al fettāsh fi Akhbâr El Bouldân Oua L Djouyouch Oua Akâbir En Nâs, ou Chronique du chercheur pour servir à l’histoire des villes, des armées et des principaux personnages du Tekrour. Paris: E. Leroux, 1913. Ibn Hawqal. Description de l’Afrique. Translated by Mac Guckin de Slane. Paris: Imprimerie Impériale, 1842. Ibn Khaldun, Histoire des Berbères et des dynasties musulmanes de l’Afrique de l’Afrique septrionale, vol. 1. Translated by William MacGuckin Baron de Slane. Algiers: Imprimerie du Gouvernement, 1852. The Muqaddimah: An Introduction to History. Translated by Franz Rosenthal. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1967, 2005. “Inhumation d’Ely Cheikh: la prière funéraire a fait polémique à Atar.” Cridem, August 31, 2013. http://cridem.org/C Info.php?article 647032.

298

Bibliography

Kamara, Shaykh Muusa. Florilège au jardin de l’histoire des noirs: zuhur al basatin, vol. 1. Edited by Jean Schmitz. Paris: CNRS Éditions, 1998. Al Koni, Ibrahim. “Ibrahim al Koni: In the desert we visit death.” Vimeo. Louisiana Channel, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, 2014. Online. June 26, 2022. https://vimeo.com/92607891. Laforgue, Pierre. “Une secte hérésiarque en Mauritanie: les Ghoudf.” Bulletin du Comité d’Études Historiques et Scientifiques, XI, no. 4 (1928): 654 65. “Les Djenoûn de la Mauritanie: magiciens, croyances, légendes.” Bulletin du Comité d’Études Historiques et Scientifiques XV, no. 2 3 (1932): 400 24. “Les Djenoun de la Mauritanie saharienne, rites magique et djedoual.” Bulletin du Comité d’Études Historiques et Scientifiques XVIII, no. 1 (1935): 1 35. “La mission Théveniaut dans l’Adrar.” Bulletin du Comité de l’Afrique française et du Comité du Maroc 4, no. 10 (1903): 311. Leriche, A. “L’Islam en Mauritanie.” Bulletin de Correspondance Saharien, no. 3 (Août 1949): 24 40. Lory, Pierre and Jean Charles Coulon, translators. Talismans al Buni: Le soleil des connaissances, Shams al ma’ârif. Paris: Orients, 2013. Loyewski, Otton. “Rezzous sur l’Adrar.” Pages d’Histoire Africaine. Rufisque, Senegal: Imprimerie du Gouvernement Général, 1942. 35 44. le Maire, Jacques Joseph. Les voyages du Sieur le Maire: aux îles Canaries, Cap Verd, Sénégal et Gambie. Paris: J. Collombet, 1695. Marty, Paul. “Les amulettes musulmanes au Sénégal.” Revue du Monde Musulman, 27 juin 1914: 319 68. L’émirat des Trarzas. Paris: Ernest Leroux, 1919. L’Islam en Guinée: Fouta Djallon. Paris: Ernest Leroux, 1921. “La Mauritanie engagée à bannir le mariage des enfants.” Thaqafa, October 12, 2018. https://aidara.mondoblog.org/2018/10/12/mauritanie engagee a ban nir mariage enfants/. “Mauritania to launch private tv stations.” Magharebia, July 9, 2014. http:// magharebia.com/en GB/articles/awi/features/2012/10/30/feature 03. “Mauritanie: le grigri du président Aziz.” Mondafrique, January 17, 2019. https:// mondafrique.com/mauritanie le grigri du president aziz/. Mauss, Marcel. A General Theory of Magic (first published in 1902). Merlin, M. “Afrique Occidentale Française: La situation générale.” Bulletin du Comité de l’Afrique française et du Comité du Maroc 8, no. 1 (1907): 26 28. Monteil, Vincent. “La cryptographie chez les maures: note sur quelques alphabets secrets du Hodh.” Bulletin de l’IFAN 13, no. 4 (Octobre 1951): 1257 64. Mosto, Alvise Ca’da. Voyages en Afrique Noire d’Alvise Ca’da Mosto. Translated by Frederique Verrier. Paris: Éditions Chandeigne, 1994. Office National de la Statistique. Annuaire Statistique 2019 (Département des Statistiques Économiques et de la Conjecture, November 2020). http:// ansade.mr/images/Archive/doc/publication/Annuaire Statistique 2019.pdf. Recensement Général de la Population et de l’Habitat (2013). Ould Ahmed Youra, Mohammed. “Le livre des lettrés renseignés sur l’histoire des puits.” Translated by Paul Marty. Bulletin du Comité d’Études Historiques et Scientifiques III, no. 3 (1920): 311 45, 331. Ould Sidina, Cheikhani. “A la mémoire d’un anti esclavagiste des années 50: Ould Sidina fondateur de l’oasis miraculée El Ervane.” Cridem, April 17, 2013. http://cridem.org/C Info.php?article 642036.

Bibliography

299

Park, Mungo. Travels to the Interior Districts of Africa: Performed under the Direction and Patronage of the African Association in the Years 1795 1796, and 1707. London: W. Bulmer and Company, 1807. Perrigault, J. On se bat dans le desert. Paris: L. Fournier, 1933. “Position du Cheikh ould Dedew vis à vis des tariqas soufis.” YouTube, July 3, 2016. www.youtube.com/watch?v Ksd6xUCM gI. Poulet, Georges. Les Maures de l’Afrique Occidentale française. Paris: Augustin Challamel, 1904. Quellien, Alain. La politique musulmane dans l’Afrique Occidentale Française. Paris: Émile Larose, 1910. “Qur’an.” Quran Explorer, June 16, 2014. www.quranexplorer.com/quran/, Ritchie, Carson I.A. “Deux Textes sur le Sénégal (1673 1677).” Bulletin de l’IFAN XXX, B, no. 1 (1968): 289 353. al Saʿdī, ʿAbd al Rahmān ibn ʿAbd Allah, in Timbuktu and the Songhay Empire: _ Al Sūdān Down to 1613 and Other Contemporary Documents. Al Saʻdī’s Ta’rīkh Edited by John Hunwick. Leiden: Brill, 1999. Sidiya, Cheikh. “Mauritanie. Système de Ponzi: Cheikh Ridha, un « érudit » derrière la plus grosse arnaque du pays.” Le 360. March 4, 2019. https:// afrique.le360.ma/mauritanie/societe/2019/03/03/25334 mauritanie syteme de ponzi cheikh ridha un erudit derriere la plus grosse arnaque du pays. Soares, Benjamin. “Mali’s Tomb Raiders.” The New York Times, July 9, 2014. www.nytimes.com/2012/07/09/opinion/Timbuktus tomb raiders.html. Timbukti, Mahmud Kuti b. and Mutawakkil Kuti. Tarikh el Fettach: Akhbar el Boulda oua l Djouyouch oua akabir en nas. Translated by Octave Houdas and Maurice Delafosse. Paris: Adrien Masonneuve, 1913, 2nd ed., 1964. “Timbuktu: ‘Anyone can be a victim in a war like this.” Irish Times, April 6, 2013, www.irishtimes.com/news/world/africa/timbuktu anyone can be a victim in a war like this 1.1350444. “Un djihadiste malien devant la Cour pénale internationale.” Le Monde Afrique, July 17, 2019. www.lemonde.fr/afrique/article/2019/07/17/un djihadiste mal ien devant la cour penale internationale 5490445 3212.html. Weddady, Nasser. “My brother is in jail in Mauritania for reporting on a massive fraud.” The Washington Post, April 1, 2019. www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/ 2019/04/01/my brother is jail mauritania reporting massive fraud/. Al Yadālī. Chronique de la Mauritanie Sénégalaise. Nacer Eddine. Translated by Ismail Hamet. Paris: Ernest Leroux, 1911.

Secondary Sources in English and European Languages Abitol, Michel. “Une élite soudanaise des XVII XVIIIe siècles: les Arma de Tombouctou.” La Revue française d’histoire d’outre mer 64, no. 237 (1977): 445 55. “The End of the Songhay Empire.” In UNESCO General History of Africa, vol. 5 Africa from the Sixteenth to the Eighteenth Century. Edited by Bethwell A. Ogot. Oxford: James Curry, 1999. 153 65. Acloque, Benjamin. “Embarras de l’administration colonial. La question de l’esclavage au début du XXe siècle en Mauritanie.” In Groupes serviles au

300

Bibliography

Sahara: Approche comparative à partir du cas des arabophones de Mauritanie. Edited by Mariella Villasante de Beauvais. Paris: CNRS, 2000. 97 120. “Accusations of Remote Vampirism: the Colonial Administration in Mauritania Investigates the Execution of Three Slaves: 1928 1929.” In African Voices on Slavery and the Slave Trade. Edited by Alice Bellagamba, Sandra Greene, and Martin Klein. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013. 282 304. “De la constitution d’un territoire à sa division: l’adaptation des Ahl Bârikallah aux évolutions sociopolitiques de l’Ouest saharien (XVIIe XXIe siècles).” Canadian Journal of African Studies 48, no. 1 (2014): 119 43. Acloque, Benjamin and Camille Evrard. “Modalidades, fuentes y narraciones del ghazzi Mutunsi (18 de agosto de 1932).” In Rebelarse en el desierto : Movilizaciones populares en el Oeste sahariano. Edited by Alberto Lopez Bargados and Francesco Correale. Madrid: Bellaterra, 2022. 47 80. Ahmed, Chanfi. West Africa ʿulama’ and Salafism in Mecca and Medina: Jawab al Ifriqi the Response of the African. Leiden: Brill, 2015. Ahmed, Shahab. What Is Islam? The Importance of Being Islamic. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2016. Aloudat, Nala and Hanna Boughanim, Trésors de l’Islam en Afrique de Tombouctou à Zanzibar. Paris: Institut du Monde Arabe, 2017. Amster, Ellen J. “The Many Deaths of Dr. Émile Mauchamp: Medicine, Technology, and Popular Politics in Pre Protectorate Morocco, 1877 1912.” International Journal of Middle East Studies 36, no. 3 (2004): 409 28. Medicine and the Saints: Science, Islam, and the Colonial Encounter in Morocco, 1877 1956. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2013. Anderson, Greg. “Retrieving the Lost Worlds of the Past: The Case for an Ontological Turn.” American Historical Review 120, no. 3 (2015): 787 810. Apter, Andrew. “Atinga Revisited: Yoruba Witchcraft and the Cocoa Economy, 1950 51.” In Modernity and Its Malcontents: Ritual and Power in Postcolonial Africa. Edited by Jean Comaroff and John Comaroff. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993. 111 28. “History in the Dungeon: Atlantic Slavery and the Spirit of Capitalism in Cape Coast Castle, Ghana.” American Historical Review 122, no. 1 (2017): 2 54. Artaud, Hélène. Poı¨étique des flots: Une anthropologie sensible de la mer dans le banc d’Arguin (Mauritanie). Paris: Éditions PETRA, 2018. Ashforth, Adam. Witchcraft, Violence, and Democracy in South Africa. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005. Austen, Ralph A. “The Moral Economy of Witchcraft: An Essay in Comparative History.” In Modernity and Its Malcontents: Ritual and Power in Postcolonial Africa. Edited by Jean Comaroff and John Comaroff. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993. 90 110. Trans Saharan Africa in World History. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010. Ba, Abdourahmane. “Le Takrur historique et l’héritage du Fuuta Tooro: L’histoire politique ancienne du fleuve Sénégal.” In Histoire et politique dans la vallée du fleuve Sénégal: Mauritanie. Edited by Mariella Villasante Cervello and Raymond Taylor. Paris: L’Harmattan, 2017. 95 162.

Bibliography

301

Bâ, Amadou Hampaté and Jacques Daget. L’empire peul du Macina (1818 1853). Paris: Les Nouvelles Éditions Africaines, 1975. Ba, Idrissa. “Mythes et cultes du serpent chez les Soninkés et les Peuls: étude comparative.” Oràfrica, revista de oralidad alriana 8 (April 2012): 159 69. Ba, Oumar Moussa. Noirs et Beydanes mauritaniens: l’école, creuset de la nation? Paris: l’Harmattan, 1993. Babou, Cheikh Anta. Fighting the Greater Jihad: Amadu Bamba and the Founding of the Muridiyya of Senegal, 1853 1913. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2007. Bailey, Michael. Magic and Superstition in Europe: A Concise History from Antiquity to the Present. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007. Barry, Boubacar. La Sénégambie du XVe au XIXe siècle: Traite négrière, Islam et conquête coloniale. Paris: L’Harmattan, 1988. The Kingdom of Waalo: Senegal before the Conquest. New York: Diasporic Africa Press, 2012. Bashier, Salman. “Barzakh, Sūfī understanding.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam, 3rd _ Gudrun Krämer, Denis Matringe, John Nawas, ed. Edited by Kate Fleet, and Everett Rowson. Online: Accessed August 14, 2021. doi: 10.1163/1573 3912 ei3 COM 25238. Batran, Aziz A. “A Contribution to the Biography of Shaikh Muhammad b. ʿAbd _ al Karīm b. Muhammad (ʿUmar Aʿmar) al Maghīlī.” Journal of African History 14 (1973):_381 94. “The Kunta, Sidi al Mukhtar al Kunti, and the office of shaykh al Tariqa’l Qadiriyya.” Studies in West African History 1 (1979): 113 46. Bazzaz, Sahar. Forgotten Saints: History, Power, and Politics in the Making of Modern Morocco. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Center for Middle Eastern Studies, 2010. Bazin, Jean. “A chacun son Bambara.” In Au cœur de l’ethnie: ethnies, tribalisme, et état en Afrique. Edited by Jean Loup Amselle and Elikia M’Bokolo. Paris: La Découverte, 1985. 87 125. Bennison, Amira K. The Almoravid and Almohad Empires. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2016. Bernault, Florence. Colonial Transactions: Imaginaries, Bodies, and Histories in Gabon. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2019. Bhabha, Homi K. The Location of Culture, 2nd ed. London: Taylor & Francis, 2014. Blanes, Ruy and Diana Espírito Santo. The Social Life of Spirits. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2014. Bloom, Jonathan M. “Paper in Sudanic Africa.” In The Meanings of Timbuktu. Edited by Shamil Jeppie and Souleymane Bachir Diagne. Cape Town: HSRC Press, 2008. 45 57. Boddy, Janice. Wombs and Alien Spirits: Women, Men and the Zar Cult in Northern Sudan. Madison: University of Wisconsin, 1989. Boilley, Pierre.”Les sociétés nomades aux franges de l’AOF: intégration ou marginalisation?” In AOF: réalités et héritages: Sociétés ouest africaines et ordre colonial, 1895 1960. Edited by Charles Becker, Saliou Mbaye, and Ibrahima Thioub. Dakar: Direction des Archives du Sénégal, 2007. 900 06. Bonte, Pierre. “Égalité et recherche: jeux et enjeux depuis un siècle; des mouve ments confrériques dans le sud de l’Adrar mauritanien.” Confréries soufies

302

Bibliography

d’Afrique: Nouveaux rôles; nouveaux enjeux (Actes du Colloque international Rabat 2 4, 2001). Institut des études africaines: Rabat, Morocco, 2001. 17 63. La Montagne de Fer: la SNIM (Mauritanie): Une entreprise minière saharienne à l’heure de la mondialisation. Paris: Karthala, 2001. L’émirat de l’Adrar mauritanien: harîm, compétition et protection dans une société tribale saharienne. Paris: Karthala, 2008. Récits d’origine: Contribution à la connaissance du passé ouest saharien (Mauritanie, Maroc, Sahara occidental, Algérie et Mali). Paris: Karthala, 2018. Bonte, Pierre and Mohamedou ould Mohameden Meyine. “La Mauritanie au passé (re)composé.” The Maghreb Review 35, no. 1 2 (2010): 27 63. Boubrik, Rahal. Saints et Société en Islam: La confrérie ouest saharienne Fâdiliyya. Paris: Centre National de Recherches Scientifiques, 1999. “Fondateur et héritiers: la gestion d’une succession confrèrique (Mauritanie).” Cahiers d’Études Africaines 159, XL 3 (2000): 433 65. Boulègue, Jean. Les royaumes wolof dans l’espace sénégambien (XIII XVIIIe siècle). Paris: Karthala, 2013. Bravmann, René. African Islam. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution, 1983. Brenner, Louis. “Muslim Thought in Eighteenth Century West Africa: The Case of Uthman bin Fudi.” In Eighteenth Century Renewal and Reform in Islam. Edited by Nehemia Levtzion and John Voll. Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1981. 39 67. “The Esoteric Sciences in Islam.” In African Healing Strategies. Edited by Brian Du Toit and Ismail Abdalla. Owerri, Nigeria: Trado Medic Books, 1985. 20 28. “Sufism in Africa in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries.” Islam et sociétés au Sud du Sahara 2 (1988): 80 93. Controlling Knowledge: Religion, Power and Schooling in a West African Muslim Society. Indiana University Press, 2001. “Sufism in Africa.” In African Spirituality: Forms, Meanings and Expressions. Edited by Jacob K. Olupona. New York: A Herder and Herder Book, 2011. 324 49. Brower, Benjamin Claude. A Desert Named Peace: The Violence of France’s Empire in the Algerian Sahara, 1844 1902. New York: Columbia University Press, 2013. Burke III, Edmund. The Ethnographic State: France and the Invention of Moroccan Islam. Oakland: University of California Press, 2014. Cadena, Marisol de la. Earth Beings: Ecologies of Practice across Andean Worlds. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2015. Caratini, Sophie. Les Rgaybat (1610 1934), tome 2 Territoire et société. Paris: L’Harmattan, 1989. Centre de recherches et d’études sur les sociétés méditerranéennes et Centre d’étude d’Afrique noire, eds. Introduction à la Mauritanie. Aix en Provence: Institut de recherches et d’études sur les mondes arabes et musulmans, 1979. Chakrabarty, Dipesh. Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical Difference. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000. Charmasson, Thérèse. Recherches sur une technique divinatoire, vol. 44 Hautes études médiévales et modernes. Paris: Librairie Droz, 1980. Chelhod, Joseph. “ʿIfrīt.” Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed. Edited by P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, and W.P. Heinrichs. Online (2012). doi: 10.1163/1573 3912 islam SIM 3502.

Bibliography

303

Ciavolella, Riccardo. Les Peuls et l’état en Mauritanie: une anthropologie des marges. Paris: Karthala, 2010. Cleaveland, Timothy. Becoming Walāta: A History of Saharan Social Formations and Transformations. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 2002. “Ahmad Baba al Timbukti and His Islamic Critique of Racial Slavery in the Maghrib.” Journal of North African Studies 20, no. 1 (2015): 42 64. Clossey, Luke, Kyle Jackson, Brandon Marriott, Andrew Redden, and Karin Vélez. “The Unbelieved and Historians, Part I: A Challenge” and “Part II: Proposals and Solutions” as well as Roland Clark, Clossey, Simon Ditchfield, David M. Gordon, Arlen Wiesenthal, and Taymiya R. Zaman. “Part III: Responses and Elaborations.” History Compass 2016 and 2017. doi: 10.111/hic3.12360; 10.111/hic3.12370; 10.111/hic3.12430. Collet, Hadrien. “Échos d’Arabie. Le Pèlerinage à La Mecque de Mansa Musa (724 725/1324 1325) d’après des Nouvelles Sources.” History in Africa 46, no. 1 (2019): 105 35. Comaroff, Jean and John Comaroff. “Introduction.” In Modernity and Its Malcontents: Ritual and Power in Postcolonial Africa. Edited by Jean Comaroff and John Comaroff. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993. xi xxxvii. “Occult Economies and the Violence of Abstraction: Notes from the South African postcolony.” American ethnologist 26, no. 2 (1999): 279 303. Commins, David. The Mission and the Kingdom: Wahhabi Power behind the Saudi Throne. London: I. B. Tauris & Company, 2016. Conklin, Alice. A Mission to Civilize: The Republican Idea of Empire in France and West Africa, 1895 1930. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997. In the Museum of Man: Race, Anthropology, and Empire in France, 1850 1950. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2015. Coppolani, Georges. Xavier Coppolani: fils de Corse, homme d’Afrique, Fondateur de la Mauritanie. Paris: Harmattan, 2005. Cornell, Vincent J. Realm of the Saint: Power and Authority in Moroccan Sufism. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1998. Correale, Francesco. “Mā’ al ʿAynayn, il Marocco e la Resistenza alla Penetrazione Coloniale (1905 1910).” Oriente Moderno 78, no. 1 (1998): 277 78. Coulon, Jean Charles. “Histoire du Shams al maʿârif.” Talismans: le soleil des connaissances, Translated by Pierre Lorry and Jean Charles Coulon. Paris: Orients, 2013. Coulon, Jean Charles. “Sorcellerie berbère, antiques talismans et saints protec teurs au Maghreb medieval.” In Dynamiques religieuses et territoires du sacré au Maghreb médiéval: éléments d’enquête. Edited by Cyrille Aillet and Bulle Tuil Leonetti. Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigacions Cientificas, 2015. 103 47. La Magie en terre d’islam au Moyen Âge. Paris: Éditions du CTHS Histoire, 2017. Crais, Clifton. The Politics of Evil: Magic, State Power, and the Political Imagination in South Africa. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Crapanzano, Vincent. The Hamadsha: A Study in Moroccan Ethnopsychiatry. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973.

304

Bibliography

Imaginative Horizons: An Essay in Literary Philosophical Anthropology. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004. Cruise O’Brien, Donal. “Towards an Islamic Policy in French West Africa, 1854 1914.” Journal of African History 8, no. 2 (1967): 303 16. Dallal, Ahmed. “The origins and objectives of Islamic revivalist thought, 1750 1850.” The Journal of the American Oriental Society 113, no. 3 (1993). 341 59. Dantioko, Oudiary Makan. Dictionnaire sonkinké français. Bamako: Éditions Jamana, 2003. Dakake, Maria. “Hiding in Plain Sight: The Practical and Doctrinal Significance of Secrecy in Shiʿite Islam.” The Journal of the American Academy of Religion 74, no. 2 (June 2006): 324 55. Deeb, Lara. An Enchanted Modern: Gender and Public Piety in Shi’i Lebanon. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006. De Chassey, Francis. Mauritanie, 1900 1975. Paris: L’Harmattan, 1984. DeLong Bas, Natana J. Wahhabi Islam: From Revival and Reform to Global Jihad. New York: Oxford University Press, 2008. De Moraes Farias, Paolo. “The Oldest extant writing of West Africa: Medieval epigraphs from Issuk, Saney, and Egef n Tawaqqast (Mali).” Journal des africanistes 60, no. 2 (1990): 65 113. Paolo. editor. Arabic Medieval Inscriptions from the Republic of Mali: Epigraphy, Chronicles and Songhay Tuareg History. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003. Derat, Marie Laure. “Du lexique aux talismans: occurrences de la peste dans la Corne de l’Afrique du XIIIe au XVe siècle.” Afriques 9 (2018). doi: 10.4000/ afriques.2090. Derby, Robin. “Haitians, Magic, and Money: Raza and Society in the Haitian Dominican Borderlands, 1900 1937.” Comparative Studies in Society and History 36, no. 3 (July 1994): 488 526. Désiré Vuillemin, Geneviève.”Coppolani en Mauritanie.” Revue d’histoire des colonies 42, no. 148 149 (1955): 291 342, 306. “Aperçu historique de la Mauritanie du XIXe siècle à l’indépendance.” In Introduction à la Mauritanie. Centre de recherches et d’études sur les sociétés méditerranéennes et Centre d’étude d’Afrique noire, eds. Aix en Provence: Institut de recherches et d’études sur les mondes arabes et musulmanes, 1979. 67 100. De Smet, Daniel. “Esotericism and exotericism.” Encylopaedia of Islam, THREE. Edited by Kate Fleet, Gudrun Krämer, Denis Matringe, John Nawas, Everett Rowson. Online (2015). doi: 10.1163/1573 3912 ei3 COM 26230. Dia, Al Houssain. Le psychiatre aux pays des marabouts. Paris: l’Harmattan, 2008. “Ils avaient prévu le pavillon, mais pas le psychiatre.” City Mag (August 2013): 10 11. Diagana, Ousmane Moussa. Dictionnaire soninké français (Mauritanie). Paris: Karthala, 2013. Dilley, R.M. Islamic and Caste Knowledge Practices among Haalpulaar’en in Senegal: Between Mosque and Termite Mound. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2004.

Bibliography

305

Diouf, Jean Léopold. Dictionnaire wolof français et français wolof. Paris: Karthala, 2003. Douglas, Mary. “Introduction: Thirty Years after Witchcraft, Oracles, and Magic.” In Witchcraft, Confessions and Accusations. Edited by Mary Douglas. London: Tavistock, 1970. xi xxxviii. El Hamel, Chouki. “The Transmission of Islamic Knowledge in Moorish Society from the Rise of the Almoravids to the 19th Century.” Journal of Religion in Africa 29, no. 1 (February 1999): 62 87. La vie intellectuelle islamique dans le Sahel Ouest Africain (XVIe XIXe siècles): Une étude sociale de l’enseignement islamique en Mauritanie et au Nord du Mali (XVIe XIXe siècles) et traduction annotée de Fath ash shakur d’al Bartili al Walati (mort en 1805). Paris: l’Harmattan, 2002. “‘Race,’ Slavery and Islam in Maghribi Mediterranean Thought: the Question of the Haratin in Morocco.” Journal of North African Studies 7, no. 3 (2002): 29 52. “Constructing a Diasporic Identity: Tracing the Origins of the Gnawa Spiritual Group in Morocco.” Journal of African History 49, no. 2 (2008): 241 60. Black Morocco: A History of Slavery, Race, and Islam. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013. El Tom, Abdellahi Osman. “Drinking the Koran: The Meaning of Koranic Verses in Berti Erasure.” Africa: Journal of the International Africa Institute 55, no. 4, Popular Islam (1985): 414 31. Epelboin, Alain, Constant Hamès, Johana Larco Laurent and Jean Louis Durand, editors. Un art secret: les écritures talismaniques de l’Afrique de l’Ouest. Exposition du 14 février au 28 juillet 2013 au musée de l’institut du monde arabe. Catalogue “enrichi” de l’exposition. Paris: Avril, 2013. Esseissah, Khaled. “Enslaved Muslim Sufi Saints in the Nineteenth Century Sahara: The Life of Bilal Ould Mahmoud.” The Journal of African History, 62, no. 3 (November 2021): 1 16. Evans Pritchard, E.E. Witchcraft, Oracles and Magic among the Azande. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1937. Evrard, Camille and Erin Pettigrew. “Du baptême du nouvel aéroport de Nouakchott à la réforme constitutionnelle (fin 2015 2018): Politiques de l’histoire en Mauritanie.” L’Année du Maghreb 21, no. 2 (December 2019): 295 319. Fahd, Toufic. “Sihr.” In Encyclopedia of Islam, 2nd ed. Edited by P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, W.P. Heinrichs. Brill Online (2012), http://referenceworks.brillonline.com/entries/encyclopaedia of islam 2/sihr SIM 7023. _ Fakir, Intissar. “The Moroccan Monarchy’s Political Agenda for Reviving Sufi Orders.” Islamic Institutions in Arab States: Mapping the Dynamics of Control, Co option, and Contention, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, June 7, 2021, https://carnegieendowment.org/2021/06/07/moroccan monarchy s political agenda for reviving sufi orders pub 84656. Farquhar, Michael and Alexander Thurston. “How Mauritania Exports Religion to Saudi Arabia and Not Just the Other Way Around.” Brookings, December 13, 2018. www.brookings.edu/blog/order from chaos/2018/12/13/how mauri tania exports religion to saudi arabia and not just the other way around/.

306

Bibliography

Feierman, Steven. Peasant Intellectuals: Anthropology and History in Tanzania. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1990. “Colonizers, Scholars, and the Creation of Invisible Histories.” In Beyond the Cultural Turn: New Directions in the Study of Society. Edited by Victoria E. Bonnell, Lynn Avery Hunt, and Richard Biernacki. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999. 182 216. Ferhat, Halima. Le culte du prophète au Maroc au XIIIe siècle: Organisation de pèlerinage et célébration du Mawlid. Rome: École française de Rome, 1995. “Chérifisme et enjeux du pouvoir au Maroc.” Oriente Moderno 18 (79), no. 2, The role of the Sādāt/Asāfin Muslim History and Civilization (1999): 473 82. Ferretti, Fiorenza. “Regine del Sahara.” Africa: Rivista Trimestrale Di Studi E Documentazione Dell’Istituto Italiano per L’Africa E L’Oriente 63, no. 4 (2008): 658 67. Fields, Karen E. “Witchcraft and Racecraft: Invisible Ontology in Its Sensible Manifestations.” In Witchcraft Dialogues: Anthropological and Philosophical Exchanges. Edited by George Clement Bond and Diane M. Ciekawy. Athens: Ohio University, 2001. 283 315. Fields, Karen E. and Barbara J. Fields. Racecraft: The Soul of Inequality in American Life. London: Verso, 2014. Fiey, J. M. “Nasārā” Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed. Edited by P. Bearman et al. _ Online (2012). doi: 10.1163/1573 3912 islam COM 0848. Foster, Michael Dylan. Pandemonium and Parade: Japanese Monsters and the Culture of Yokai. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2009. Fortier, Corinne. “Une pédagogie coranique: Modes de transmission des savoirs islamiques (Mauritanie).” Cahiers d’Études Africaines 169 170 (2003): 235 60. Frede, Britta. “Shaykhani ould Muhammad al Tulba.” Dictionary of African Biography. Edited by Henry Louis Gates, Emmanuel Akyeampong, and Steven J. Niven, Oxford University Press, 2012. doi: 10.1093/acref/ 9780195382075.001.0001/acref 9780195382075 e 1870. Freire, Francisco. “Saharan migrant camel herders: Znāga Social Status and the Global Age.” The Journal of Modern African Studies 52, no. 3 (2014): 425 46. “The Hemeila Riddle: Genealogical Reconfigurations of Pre colonial Encounters in Southwestern Mauritania.” History and Anthropology 28, no. 2 (2017): 149 65. Gaiser, Adam. Muslims, Scholars, and Soldiers: The Origin and Elaboration of the Ibādī Imāmate Traditions. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010. Garden,_ Kenneth. The First Islamic Reviver: Abu Hamid al Ghazali and His Revival of the Religious Sciences. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014. Gardiner, Noah. “Forbidden Knowledge? Notes on the Production, Transmission, and Reception of the Major Works of Ahmad al Būnī.” _ Journal of Arabic and Islamic Studies 12 (2012): 81 143. “Esotericism in a Manuscript Culture: Ahmad al Buni and His Readers through the Mamluk Period.” PhD diss., University of Pennsylvania, 2014. “Esotericist Reading Communities and the Early Circulation of the Sufi Occultist Ahmad al Būnī’s Works.” Arabica 64, no. 3 4 (2017): 405 41. _

Bibliography

307

“Stars and Saints: The Esotericist Astrology of the Sufi Occultist Ahmad al _ Būnī.” Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft (Spring 2017): 39 65. Geschiere, Peter. Sorcellerie et politique: la viande des autres. Paris: Karthala, 1995. The Modernity of Witchcraft: Politics and the Occult in Postcolonial Africa. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 1997. Geoffroy, E. “Al Suyūtī.” Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed. Edited by P. Bearman et al. (2012). doi: _10.1163/1573/3912 islam COM 1130. Gilson Miller, Susan. A History of Modern Morocco. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013. Gimaret, Daniel. La doctrine d’al Ashʿari. Paris: Cerf, 1990. Glassman, Jonathan. War of Words, War of Stones: Racial Thought and Violence in Colonial Zanzibar. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2011. Gluckman, Max. ‘The Logic of African Science and Witchcraft.” Human Problems in Central Africa 1 (1944): 61 71. Gomez, Michael. “The Problem with Malik Sy and the Foundation of Bundu.” Cahiers d’Études Africaines 25, no. 100 (1985): 537 53. African Dominion: A New History of Empire in Early and Medieval West Africa. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2018. Goody, Jack. The Logic of Writing and the Organization of Society. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986. Gordon, David. Invisible Agents: Spirits in Central African History. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2012. Graeber, David. Lost People: Magic and the Legacy of Slavery in Madagascar. Bloomington: University of Indiana Press, 2007. Graf, Fritz. “Theories of Magic in Antiquity.” In Magic and Ritual in the Ancient World. Edited by Paul Mirecki and Marvin Meyer. Leiden: Brill, 2002. 93 104. Graz, Bertrand, Vincent Barras, Anne Marie Mouin, and Corinne Fortier, editors. Maqari, le Receuil des vertus de la médecine ancienne. La médecine gréco arabe en Mauritanie contemporaine. Paris: Éditions BHMS, 2017. Greene, Sandra E. Sacred Sites and the Colonial Encounter: A History of Meaning and Memory in Ghana. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2002. Grehan, James. Twilight of the Saints: Everyday Religion in Ottoman Syria and Palestine. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014. Gril, Denis. “La science des lettres.” In Ibn ʿArabi, Les Illuminations de la Mecque. Edited by Michel Chodkiewicz. Paris: Albin Michel and Sindbad, 1988. 165 282. Haenni, Pierre and Tjitske Holtrop. “Mondaines spiritualités: ‘Amr Khâlid, ‘shaykh’ branché de la jeunesse dorée du Caire.” Politique africaine 3, no. 87 (2002): 45 68. Haı¨dara, Youssouf Mohamed, Youssouf Billo Maı¨ga, Mohamed Bagna Maı¨ga, and John P. Hutchinson, editors. Kalimawey citaabo soŋay annansaara šenni / Lexique soŋay français. Bamako: DNFLA, 1994. Hall, Bruce S. A History of Race in Muslim West Africa, 1600 1960. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. “Rethinking the Place of Timbuktu in the Intellectual History of Muslim West Africa.” In Landscapes, Sources and Intellectual Projects of the West African Past:

308

Bibliography

Essays in Honour of Paulo Fernando de Moraes Farias. Edited by Toby Green and Benedetta Rossi. Leiden: Brill, 2018. 239 58. Hamès, Constant. “Taktub ou la magie de l’écriture islamique. Textes Sononiké à usage magique.” Arabica 34, no. 3 (1987): 305 25. “Entre recette magique d’Al Bûnî et prière islamique d’Al Ghazâlî: textes talismaniques d’Afrique occidentale.” Fétiches II: Puissances des objets, charme des mots, systèmes de pensée en Afrique noire 12 (1993): 187 224. La Shâdhiliyya dans l’Ouest saharien et africain: nouvelles perspectives.” In Une voie soufie dans le monde: la Shâdhiliyya. Edited by Éric Geoffroy. Paris: Maisonneuve et Larose, 2005. 355 75. Editor. Coran et talismans: Textes et pratiques magiques en milieu musulman. Paris: Karthala, 2007. “La notion de magie dans le Coran.” In Coran et talismans: Textes et pratiques magiques en milieu musulman. Edited by Constant Hamès. Paris: Karthala, 2007. 17 47. “Problématiques de la magie sorcellerie en islam et perspectives africaines.” Cahiers d’Études Africaines 48, no. 189 190, Territoires sorciers (2008): 81 99. “La Shâdhiliyya ou l’origine des confréries islamiques en Mauritanie.” In Islam et sociétés au sud du Sahara 3. Edited by Jean Louis Triaud. Paris, Les Indes savantes, 2013. 73 89. Hanegraaff Wouter and Roelof van den Broek, editors. Gnosis and Hermeticism from Antiquity to Modern Times. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1998. Hannoum, Abdelmajid. “Historiography, Mythology and Memory in Modern North Africa: The Story of the Kahina.” Studia Islamica, no. 85 (1997): 85 130. Hanretta, Sean. Islam and Social Change in French West Africa: History of an Emancipatory Community. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. Harrison, Christopher. France and Islam in West Africa, 1860 1960. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988. Harms, Robert. River of Wealth, River of Sorrow: The Central Zaire Basin in the Era of the Slave and Ivory Trade, 1500 1891. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1981. Hell, Bertrand. “L’esclave et le Saint: les Gnawa et la baraka de Moulay Abdallah Ben Hsein (Maroc).” Des hommes de devoir: les compagnons du tour de France (XVIIIe XXe siècles) 30 (2008): 149 74. Henare, Amiria, Martin Holbraad, and Sari Wastell. Thinking through Things: Theorising Artefacts Ethnographically, editors. London: Routledge, 2007. 1 31. Hmimnat, Salim. “Recalibrating Morocco’s Approach to Salafism.” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, January 14, 2016. https://carnegieendowment .org/sada/62463. Holbraad, Martin and Morton Axel Pederson, editors. The Ontological Turn: An Anthropological Exposition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017. Holder, Gilles. “Chérif Ousmane Madani Haidara and the Islamic Movement Ansar Dine. A Popular Malian Reformism in Search of Autonomy.” Cahiers d’Études Africaines 206 207, no. 2 (2012): 389 425.

Bibliography

309

Hopper, Matthew. Slaves of One Master: Slaves of One Master: Globalization and Slavery in Arabia in the Age of Empire. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2015. Horden, Peregrine. “Situations Both Alike?: Connectivity, the Mediterranean, the Sahara.” In Saharan Frontiers: Space and Mobility in Northwest Africa. Edited by James McDougall and Judith Scheele. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2012. 25 38. Hunwick, John O. “Notes on a Late Fifteenth Century Document Concerning al Takrūr.” In African Perspectives: Papers in the History, Politics and Economics of Africa Presented to Thomas Hodgkins. Edited by Christopher Allen and R. W. Johnson. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970. 7 33. Sharia in Songhay: the replies of al Maghili to the Questions of Askia al Hajj Muhammad, vol. 5. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985. “Secular Power and Religious Authority in Muslim Society: The Case of Songhay.” Journal of African History 37, no. 2 (1996): 175 94. Timbuktu and the Songhay Empire: Al Saʿdī’s Ta’rīkh al Sūdān down to 1613, and Other Contemporary Documents. Leiden: Brill, 2003. “Takrūr.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed. Edited by P. Bearman, et al. (2012), doi: 10.1163/1573 3912 islam SIM 7348. Hunwick, John O. and R. S. O’Fahey, Arabic Literature of Africa, Volume 4: The Writings of Western Sudanic Africa. Leiden: Brill, 2003. Idris, H. R. “Examen des sources attestant la survivance d’un culte du bélier au magrib vers le xe siècle.” Arabica 12 (1965): 297 305. Insoll, Timothy. The Archaeology of Islam. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 1999. Janzen, John M. The Quest for Therapy: Medical Pluralism in Lower Zaire. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978. Jöchlea, W. “Menses Inducing Drugs: Their Role in Antique, Medieval and Renaissance Gynecology and Birth Control.” Contraception 10, no. 4 (1974): 425 39. Johnson, Paul Christopher, editor. Spirited Things: The World of ‘Possession’ in Afro Atlantic Religions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2014. Kaba, Lansiné. The Wahhabiyya: Islamic Reform and Politics in French West Africa. Evanston:Northwestern University Press, 1974. Kane, Nene Oumou Deffa. Problématique de l’entrepreneuriat féminin en Mauritanie. Balti, Moldova: Éditions universitaires européennes, 2017. Kane, Oumar. La première hégémonie peule: le Fuuta Tooro de Koli Tenella à Almaami Abdul. Dakar: Karthala, 2004. Kane, Ousmane. Beyond Timbuktu: An Intellectual History of Muslim West Africa. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2016. Kassibo, Bréhima. “La géomancie ouest africaine. Formes endogens et emprunts extérieurs.” Cahiers d’Études Africaines 32, no. 128 (1992): 541 96. Karlsen, Carol F. The Devil in the Shape of a Woman: Witchcraft in Colonial New England. New York: Vintage Book, 1987. Keane, Webb. “Ontologies, anthropologists, and ethical life.” HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory 3, no. 1 (2013): 186 91.

310

Bibliography

Kenyon, Susan M. Spirits and Slaves in Central Sudan. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012. Klein, Martin A. “Studying the History of Those Who Would Rather Forget: Oral History and the Experience of Slavery.” History in Africa 16 (1989): 209 17 “The Slave Trade in the Western Sudan During the Nineteenth Century.” Slavery and Abolition 13, no. 1 (1992): 39 60. Knight, Michael Muhammad. Magic in Islam. New York: Tarcher Perigee, 2016. Knysh, Alexander. Sufism: A New History of Islamic Mysticism. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2017. Kobo, Ousman Murzik. Unveiling Modernity in Twentieth Century West African Islamic Reforms. Leiden: Brill, 2012. Kohn, Eduardo. How Forests Think: Toward an Anthropology beyond the Human. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2013. Kone, Kassim. “The Soninke in Ancient West African History.” Oxford Research Encyclopedia of African History. March 2018. doi: 10.1093/acrefore/ 9780190277734.001.0001/acrefore 9780190277734 e 160. Kuczynski, Lillian. Les marabouts africains à Paris. Paris: CNRS Éditions, 2002. LaGamma, Alisa. Sahel: Art and Empires on the Shores of the Sahara. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2020. Lambek, Michael. Knowledge and Practice in Mayotte: Local Discourses of Islam, Sorcery, and Spirit Possession. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1993. Last, Murray. The Sokoto Caliphate. New York: Humanities Press, 1967. Launay, Robert. “Spirit Media: The Electronic Media and Islam among the Dyula of Northern Côte d’Ivoire.” Africa: Journal of the International African Institute 67, no. 3 (1997): 441 53, 451. Launay, Robert and Benjamin Soares. “The Formation of an ‘Islamic Sphere’ in French Colonial West Africa.” Economy and Society 28, no. 4 (November 1999): 497 519. Lecocq, Baz. “Distant Shores: A Historiographic View on Trans Saharan Space.” The Journal of African History 56, no. 1 (March 2015): 23 36. Leconte, F. “al Yadālī.” Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed. Edited by P. Bearman et al. (2012). doi: 10.1163/1573 3912 islam SIM 7936. Lefebvre, Camille. Frontières de sable, frontières de papier: histoire de territoires et de frontières du jihad de Sokoto à la colonisation française du Niger, XIXe XXe siècles. Paris: la Sorbonne, 2015. Leichtman, Mara. Shi’i Cosmopolitanisms in Africa: Lebanese Migration and Religious Conversion in Senegal. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2015. Leservoisier, Olivier. “Les hrâtîn et le Fuuta Tooro, XIXème XXème siècle: entre émancipation et dépendence.” In Groupes serviles au Sahara: approche comparative à partir du cas des arabophone de Mauritanie. Edited by Mariella Villasante de Beauvais. Paris: CNRS, 2000. 147 67. “Ethnicity and Interdependence: Moors and Haalpulaaren in the Senegal Valley.” In Saharan Frontiers: Space and Mobility in Northwest Africa. Edited by James McDougall and Judith Scheele. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2012. 146 64.

Bibliography

311

Lesourd, Céline. “Femmes mauritaniennes et politique: De la tente vers le puits?” L’Année du Maghreb II I (2007): 333 48. Levtzion, Nehemia. “Ancient Ghana: A Reassessment of Some Arabic Sources.” Revue française d’histoire d’outre mer 66, no. 242 243 (1979): 139 47. “The Eighteenth Century: Background to the Islamic Revolutions in West Africa.” In Eighteenth Century Renewal and Reform in Islam. Edited by Levtzion and John Voll. Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1981. 21 38. Levtzion, Nehemia and J. F. P. Hopkins, editors. Corpus of Early Arabic Sources for West African History. Princeton: Markus Weiner Publishers, 2000. Lewicki, Tadeusz. “The Ibadites in Arabia and Africa.” Journal of World History 13, no. 1 (1971): 51 130. “The Role of the Sahara and Saharians in Relationships between North and South.” In UNESCO General History of Africa: Africa from the Seventh to the Eleventh Century. Edited by M. Elfasi and Ivan Hrbek. Paris: UNESCO, 1988. 277 313. “Lamtūna.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed. Edited by P. Bearman, et al. Publication 2012, doi: 10.1163/1573 3912 islam COM 0798. Loimeier, Roman. Muslim Societies in Africa: A Historical Anthropology. Bloomington: Indiana University, 2013. López Bargados, Alberto. Arenas Coloniales: los Awlad Dalím ante la colonización franco española del Sáhara. Castellano: Bellaterra, 2003. Lory, Pierre “Divination and Religion in Islamic Medieval Culture.” In Power and Protection: Islamic Art and the Supernatural. Edited by Francesca Leoni. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016. 13 31. Love, Jr., Paul M. Ibadi Muslims of North Africa: Manuscripts, Mobilization and the Making of a Written Tradition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018. Lovejoy, Paul. Transformations in Slavery: A History of Slavery in Africa. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983 2009. Lucas, A. J. “Considérations sur l’ethnique maure et en particulier sur une race ancienne: les Bafours.” Journal de la Société des Africanistes 1, no. 2 (1931): 151 94. Luffin, Xavier. “‘Nos ancêtres les Arabes…’ Généalogies d’Afrique musulmane.” Civilisations 53 (2005): 177 209. Luongo, Katherine. Witchcraft and Colonial Rule in Kenya, 1900 1955. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. Lydon, Ghislaine. On Trans Saharan Trails: Islamic Law, Trade Networks, and Cross Cultural Exchange in Nineteenth Century Western Africa. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. “Saharan Oceans and Bridges, Barriers and Divides in Africa’s Historiographical Landscape.” Journal of African History 56, no. 1 (March 2015): 3 22. Maarouf, Mohammed. Jinn Eviction as a Discourse of Power: A Multidisciplinary Approach to Moroccan Magical Beliefs and Practices. Leiden: Brill, 2007. Mack, Beverly B. and Jean Boyd. One Woman’s Jihad: Nana Asma’u, Scholar and Scribe. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2000.

312

Bibliography

Mahamoudou, Mahamane. “The Works of Shaykh Sidi al Mukhtar al Kunti.” In The Meanings of Timbuktu. Edited by Shamil Jeppie and Souleymane Bachir Diagne. Cape Town: HSRC Press, 2008. 213 30. Mahendra, Poonam and Shradha Bisht. “Ferula Asafoetida: Traditional Uses and Pharmacological Activity.” Pharmacognosy Reviews 6, no. 12 (2012): 141. Makris, G. P. Changing Masters: Spirit Possession and Identity Construction among Slave Descendants and Other Subordinates in the Sudan. Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 2000. Marchesin, Philippe. Tribus, ethnies et pouvoir en Mauritanie. Paris: Karthala, 2010. Marcus Sells, Ariela. “Science, Sorcery, and Secrets: in the Fawāʾid Nūrāniyya of Sīdi Muhammad Al Kuntī.” History of Religions 58, no. 4 (2019): 432 64. _ Sorcery or Science? Contesting Knowledge and Practice in West African Sufi Texts. University Park: Penn State University Press, 2022. Martin, Sylvia J. Haunted: An Ethnography of the Hollywood and Hong Kong Media Industries. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017. Masquelier, Adeline. “Narratives of Power, Images of Wealth: The Ritual Economy of Bori in the Market.” In Modernity and Its Malcontents: Ritual and Power in Postcolonial Africa. Edited by Jean Comaroff and John Comaroff. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993. 3 33. El Masri, F.H. “The Life of Shehu Usuman dan Fodio before the Jihad.” Journal of the Historical Society of Nigeria, 2, no. 4 (1963): 435 48. McDougall, E. Ann. “The Economics of Islam in the Southern Sahara: The rise of the Kunta clan.” Asian and African Studies 20, no. 1 (1986): 45 60. “A Topsy Turvy World: Slaves and Freed Slaves in the Mauritanian Adrar, 1910 1950.” In The End of Slavery in Africa. Edited by Suzanne Miers and Richard Roberts. Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1988. 362 90. “Research in Saharan History.” Journal of African History 39, no. 3 (1998): 467 80. “Un monde sans dessus dessous: esclaves et affranchis dans l’Adrar maurita nien, 1910 1950.” In Groupes serviles au Sahara: approche comparative à partir du cas des arabophone de Mauritanie. Edited by Mariella Villasante de Beauvais. Paris: CNRS Éditions, 2000. 121 43. “Slavery, Sorcery and Colonial “Reality” in Mauritania, c. 1910 1960.” In Agency and Action in Colonial Africa: Essays for John E. Flint. Edited by Christopher Youé and Tim Stapleton. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan, 2001. 69 82. “Snapshots from the Sahara: ‘Salt’, the Essence of Being.” Journal of Libyan Studies, special issue, The Libyan Desert: Natural Resources and Cultural Heritage. Edited by David Mattingly, Sue McLaren, Elizabeth Savage, Yahya al Fasatwi, and Khaled Gadgood (2003): 295 303. “‘To marry one’s slave is as easy as eating a meal’: The Dynamics of Carnal Relations within Saharan Slavery.” In Sex, Power and Slavery. Edited by Elizabeth Elbourne and Gwyn Campbell. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2015. 139 66.

Bibliography

313

“Colonialism, Pastoralism, and ‘Le problème servile’: Case Study Mauritania.” In L’anthropologie en partage: Autour de l’œuvre de Pierre Bonte. Edited by Yazid Ben Hounet, Anne Marie Brisebarre, Barbara Casciarri and Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh. Paris: Karthala, 2020. 57 74. McDougall, James and Judith Scheele.“Frontiers, Borderlands, and Saharan/ World History.” In Saharan Frontiers: Space and Mobility in Northwest Africa. Edited by James McDougall and Judith Scheele. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2012. 73 90. McDougall, James and Judith Scheele, eds. Saharan Frontiers: Space and Mobility in Northwest Africa. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2012. McGovern, Mike. Unmasking the State: Making Guinea Modern. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2013. Melvin Koushki, Matthew. “Of Islamic Grammatology: Ibn Turka’s Lettrist Metaphysics of Light.” Al ʿUsūr al Wustā 24 (2016): 42 113. _ _ “Mobilizing Magic: Occultism and the Continuity of High Persianate Culture under Russian Rule.” Studia Islamica 111 (2016): 231 83. “(De)colonizing Early Modern Occult Philosophy.” Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft 12, no. 1 (Spring 2017): 98 112. “In Defence of Geomancy: Šaraf al Dīn Yazdī Rebuts Ibn Khaldūn’s Critique of the Occult Sciences.” Arabica 64 (2017): 346 403. “Introduction: De orienting the Study of Islamicate Occultism.” Arabica 64, no. 3 4 (2017): 287 95. “Review Essay on Liana Saif, The Arabic Influences on Early Modern Occult Philosophy.” Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft, 12, no. 1 (2017): 98 112. “Persianate Geomancy from Tūsī to the Millennium: A Preliminary Survey.” _ In The Occult Sciences in premodern Islamic Cultures. Edited by Nader El Bizri. Leiden: Brill, 2018. 151 99. Meyer, Birgit. Translating the Devil: Religion and Modernity among the Ewe in Ghana. Trenton: Africa World Press, Inc., 1999. “Response to ter Haar and Ellis.” Africa 79, no. 3 (2009): 413 15. Michot, Yahya J. “Ibn Taymiyya on Astrology: Annotated Translation of Three Fatwas.” Journal of Islamic Studies 11, no. 2 (2000): 147 208. Moin, Azfar. The Millennial Sovereign: Sacred Kingship and Sainthood in Islam. New York: Columbia University Press, 2012. Mommersteeg, Geert. “He Has Smitten Her to the Heart with Love”: The Fabrication of an Islamic Love Amulet in West Africa.” Anthropos 83 (1988): 501 10. “Allah’s Words as Amulet.” Etnofoor, 3, no. 1 (1990): 63 76. Moore, Henrietta L. and Todd Sanders. “Magical interpretations and material realities: An introduction.” In Magical Interpretations, Material Realities: Modernity, Witchcraft and the Occult in Postcolonial Africa. Edited by Moore and Sanders. London: Routledge, 2001. 1 27. Mougin, Louis. “Les premiers sultans sa'dides et le Sahara.” Revue de l’Occident musulman et de la Méditerranée 19 (1975): 169 87. Moussaoui, Abderrahmane. Espace et sacré au Sahara: Ksour et oasis du sud ouest algérien. Paris: CNRS Éditions, 2002.

314

Bibliography

Nagel, Joane. “Constructing Ethnicity: Creating and Recreating Ethnic Identity and Culture.” Social Problems 41 no. 1 (February 1994): 152 76. Al Naqar, ʿUmar. “Takrūr: The History of a Name.” Journal of African History 10, n 3 (1969): 365 74. Naylor, Paul. “Abdullahi dan Fodio and Muhammad Bello’s Debate over the Torobbe Fulani: Case Study for a New Methodology for Arabic Primary Source Material from West Africa.” Islamic Africa 9, no. 1 (2018): 34 54. From Rebels to Rulers: Writing Legitimacy in the Early Sokoto State. London: James Curry, 2021. N’Diaye, Boubacar. Mauritania’s Colonels: Political Leadership, Civil Military Relations and Democratization. London: Routledge, 2017. “Mauritania: The Institutionalization of Military Supremacy.” Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Politics. August 27, 2020, doi: 10.1093/acrefore/ 9780190228637.001.0001/acrefore 9780190228637 e 1838. Ndiaye, Mamadou. L’enseignement arabo Islamique au Sénégal. Istanbul: Centre de recherches sur l’histoire, l’art et la culture islamique, 1985. Ndoye, Omar. Le N’Dôep: transe thérapeutique chez les Lébous du Sénégal. Paris: l’Harmattan, 2010. Ngaı¨dé, Abderrahmane. “Du Bilad el Makhzen au Bilad es Siba. Continuité historique ou revitalisation?” In Les relations transsahariennes à l’époque con temporaine. Edited by Laurence Marfaing and Steffen Wippel. Paris: Karthala, 2003. 321 36. Nicholson, Reynold A. Sufism: The Mysticism of Islam. Los Angeles: Indo European Publishing, 2009. Nobili, Mauro. “A Propaganda Document in Support of the 19th century Caliphate of Hamdallāhi: Nūh b. al Tāhir al Fulānī’s ‘Letter on the _ _ Appearance of _ the Twelfth Caliph’ (Risāla fī zuhūr al khalīfa al thānī _ ʻashar).” Afriques 7 (2016). doi: 10.4000/afriques.1870. Sultan, Caliph and the Renewer of the Faith: Ahmad Lobbo, the Tarikh al fattash, and the Making of Islamic State in West Africa. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020. Norris, H. T. “The History of Shinqīt: According to the Idaw ʿAlī Tradition.” _ Bulletin de l’institut fundamental d’afrique noire 26, no. 3 4 (1962): 393 413. “Shāykh Ma’ al ʿAynayn al Qalqami in the Folk Literature of the Spanish Sahara I.” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 31, no. 1 (1968): 113 36. “Shāykh Ma’ al ʿAynayn al Qalqami in the Folk Literature of the Spanish Sahara II.” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 31, no. 2 (1968): 347 76. Shinqītī Folk Literature and Song. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1968. _ Islam during the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries.” Bulletin of the “Znāga School of Oriental and African Studies 32, no. 3 (1969): 496 526. “New Evidence on the Life of ʿAbdullah B. Yasin and the Origins of the Almoravid Movement.” Journal of African History 12, no. 2 (1971): 255 68. The Tuaregs: Their Islamic Legacy and Its Diffusion in the Sahel. Wilts: Avis and Phillips, 1975.

Bibliography

315

“Muslim Sanhaja Scholars of Mauritania.” In Studies in West African Islamic History, vol. 1: The Cultivators of Islam. Edited by J. R. Willis. London: Taylor and Francis, 1979. 147 59. The Arab Conquest of the Western Sahara: Studies of the Historical Events, Religious Beliefs and Social Customs Which Made the Remotest Sahara a Part of the Arab World. Beirut: Librarie du Liban, 1986. Nouhi, Mohammed Lahbib. “Sufism in Pre colonial Southwestern Sahara.” Islam et sociétés au sud du Sahara 3. Edited by Jean Louis Triaud. Paris: Les Indes savantes, 2013. 89 134. O’Dell, Emily J. “Waging War on the Dead: The Necropolitics of Sufi Shrine Destruction in Mali.” Archaeologies 9, no. 3 (2013): 506 25. Ogorodnikova, Darya. “ʿAjamī Annotations in Multilingual Manuscripts from Mande Speaking Areas: Visual and Linguistic Features.” Islamic Africa 8, no. 1 2 (2017): 111 43. Omar, Cheikh el Hadj. Les Rimâh: un traité de sciences religieuses musulmanes. Translated by Maurice Puech. Paris: Éditions al Bouraq, 2017. Ould Abdallah, Deddoud. “Guerre sainte ou sédition blâmable? Nasiha de sheikh Sa’d Bu contre le jihad de son frère sheikh Ma al Ainin.” In Le temps des marabouts: Itinéraires et stratégies islamiques en Afrique occidentale française v. 1880 1960. Edited by David Robinson and Jean Louis Triaud. Paris: Karthala, 1997. 119 53. “Le passage au Sud: Muhammad al Hafiz et son héritage.” In La Tijâniyya: Une Confrérie Musulmane à la Conquête de l’Afrique. Edited by Jean Louis Triaud and David Robinson. Paris: Karthala, 2000. 69 100. Ould Ahmedou, El Ghassem. Enseignement traditionnel en Mauritanie: La maha dra ou l’école à dos de chameau. Paris: l’Harmattan, 1997. Ould Ahmed Salem, Zekeria. “Le prétexte de la berceuse: femmes, poésie populaire et subversion politique en Mauritanie.” Annuaire de l’Afrique du Nord XXXIV (1995): 771 89. “Les marges d’un état frontière: histoire régionale, clôture nationale et enjeux locaux.” In Les trajectoires d’un état frontière: espaces, évolution politique, et transformations sociales en Mauritanie. Edited by Zekeria ould Ahmed Salem. Dakar: CODESRIA, 2004. 9 46. “Islam in Mauritania between Political Expansion and Globalization: Elites, Institutions, Knowledge, and Networks.” In Islam and Muslim Politics in Africa. Edited by Benjamin F. Soares and René Otayek. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007. 27 47. Prêcher dans le desert: l’islam politique et changement social en Mauritanie. Paris: Karthala, 2013. Ould al Bara, Yahya. “Les théologiens mauritaniens face au colonialisme français: Étude de fatwa s de jurisprudence musulmane.” In Le temps des marabouts: Itinéraires et stratégies islamiques en Afrique occidentale française v. 1880 1960. Edited by David Robinson and Jean Louis Triaud. Paris: Karthala, 1997. 85 117. “Morsures de serpents: thérapeutique et magie chez les Bidân de Mauritanie.” In Coran et talismans: textes et pratiques magiques en milieu musulman. Edited by Constant Hamès. Paris: Karthala, 2007. 175 208.

316

Bibliography

“The Life of Shaykh Sidi al Mukhtar al Kunti.” In The Meanings of Timbuktu. Edited by Shamil Jeppie and Souleymane Bachir Diagne. Cape Town: HSRC Press, 2008. 193 211 Ould Cheikh, Abdel Wedoud. Éléments d’histoire de la Mauritanie. Nouakchott: Institut Mauritanien de Recherche Scientifique, 1991. “La société Sanhaja méridionale au XVe siècle.” Masadir: Cahier des sources de l’histoire de la Mauritanie 1 (1994): 5 35. “Introduction: Vous avez dit ‘histoire’ ?” In Histoire de la Mauritanie. Essais et synthèses. Nouakchott: Imprimerie Nouvelle, 1999. 1 35. “Les perles et le soufre: une polémique autour de la Tijâniya en Mauritanie.” In La Tijâniyya: une confrérie musulmane à la conquête de l’Afrique. Edited by Jean Loup Triaud and David Robinson. Paris, Karthala, 2000. 125 63. “Brotherhoods and Gender Relations in Mauritania.” ISIM Newsletter 8, (2001): 26. “Les sciences au(x) miroir(s) du prince. Savoir et pouvoir dans l’espace arabo musulman d’hier et d’aujourd’hui.” Revue des mondes musulmans et de la Méditerranée, Sciences, savoirs moderns et pourvoir dans le monde musulman contemporain, no. 101 102 (juillet 2003): 129 55. “A Man of Letters in Timbuktu: al Shaykh Sidi Muhammed al Kunti.” In The Meanings of Timbuktu. Edited by Shamil Jeppie and Souleymane Bachir Diagne. Cape Town: HSRC Press, 2008. 231 48. “Théologie du désordre. Islam, ordre et désordre au Sahara.” L’Année du Maghreb, VII (2011): 61 77. La société maure: Éléments d’anthropologie historique. Rabat: Centre des Études Sahariennes, 2017. “La lettre et/ou l’esprit? Soufisme et proto salafisme dans l’espace mauritanien (XVIIe XXe s.).” In Le Sahel musulman entre soufisme et salafisme: Subalternité, luttes de classement et transnationalisme. Edited by Jean Schmitz, Abdel Wedoud ould Cheikh and Cédric Jourde. Paris: Karthala, 2022. 81 105. Ould Cheikh, Abdel Wedoud and Bernard Saison. “Vie(s) et mort(s) de al Imām al Hadrāmī: Autour de la postérité saharienne du mouvement almoravide _ 17e).” _ (11e Arabica 37, no. 1 (1987): 48 79. Ould Daddah, Mokhtar. La Mauritanie: contre vents et marées. Paris: Karthala, 2003. Ould Ebnou, Moussa. Barzakh. Paris: L’Harmattan, 1994. Ould elMoctar, Ahmed Salem dit Cheddad. Ce que je pense avant de tout oublier. Paris: l’Harmattan, 2017. Ould Hamidoun, Mokhtar. Précis sur la Mauritanie. Études mauritaniennes 4. Saint Louis, Sénégal: Centre IFAN Mauritanie, 1952. Ould Khalifa, Abdallah. La région du Tagant en Mauritanie: L’oasis de Tijigja entre 1660 et 1960. Paris: Karthala, 1998. Ould Mohamed Baba Moustapha, Elemine and Francisco Freire. “Looters vs. Traitors: The Muqawama (“Resistance”) Narrative, and Its Detractors, in Contemporary Mauritania.” African Studies Review 63, no. 2 (June 2020). 258 80. Ould as Sa’d, Mohamed al Mukhtar. “Émirats et espace émiral maure: le cas du Trârza aux XVIIIe XIXe siècles.” Revue du monde musulman et de la méditerranée 54 (1989): 53 82.

Bibliography

317

Owusu Ansah, David. Islamic Talismanic Tradition in Nineteenth century Asante. Lewiston: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1991. Palmié, Stephan. “Historicist Knowledge and Its Conditions of Impossibility.” In The Social Life of Spirits. Edited by Ruy Blanes and Diana Espírito. Santo. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2014. 218 39. Pederson, Morton Axel. “Common Nonsense: A Review of Certain Recent Reviews of the ‘Ontological Turn’.” Anthropology of this Century 5 (October 2012), Online, http://aotcpress.com/articles/common nonsense/. Perinbam, B. Marie. “‘Animist’/ Islamized Imagining in the Western Sudan: the Fulbe’s ‘Bambara’ in the Bamako region, c. 1700 c. 1900.” In Peuls et Mandingues: Dialectique des constructions identitaires. Edited by Mirjam de Bruijn and Han van Djik. Paris: Karthala, 1997. 101 28. Pettigrew, Erin. “Colonizing the Mahadra: Language, Identity, and Power in Mauritania under French Control.” Ufahamu: A Journal of African Studies 33, no. 3 (Spring 2007): 60 88. “The Heart of the Matter: Interpreting Bloodsucking Accusations in Mauritania.” Journal of African History 57, no. 3 (November 2016): 417 35. “Authoritarian Africa beyond Guantánamo: Freedom in Captivity.” African Studies Review 63, no. 2 (2020): 411 16. Philips, John Edwards. “Causes of the Jihad of Usman don Fodio: A Historiographical Review.” Journal for Islamic Studies 36 (2017): 18 58. Porter, Venetia, Liana Saif, and Emilie Savage Smith. “Medieval Islamic Amulets, Talismans, and Magic.” In A Companion to Islamic Art and Architecture. Edited by Finbarr Barry Flood and Gülru Necipoglu. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley Blackwell, 2017. 521 57. Puigaudeau, Odette du and Marion Sénones, Mémoire du pays maure: 1934 1960. Edited by Monique Vérité. Paris: Ibis Press, 2000. Rahel, Ahmed. La communauté noire de Tunis: thérapie initiatique et rite de posses sion. Paris: l’Harmattan, 2000. Ranger, Terence. “Scotland Yard in the Bush: Medicine Murders, Child Witches and the Construction of the occult: a literature review.” Africa 77, no. 2 (2007): 272 28. Rasmussen, Susan. “Betrayal or Affirmation? Transformations in Witchcraft Technologies of Power, Danger and Agency among the Tuareg of Niger.” In Magical Interpretations, Material Realities: Modernity, Witchcraft and the Occult in Postcolonial Africa. Edited by Moore and Saunders. London: Routledge, 2001. 136 59. Those Who Touch: Tuareg Medicine Women in Anthropological Perspective. DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 2006. “An Ambiguous Spirit Dream and Tuareg Kunta Relationships in Rural Northern Mali.” Anthropological Quarterly 88, no. 3 (Summer 2015): 635 63. Rebstock, Ulrich. Maurische Literaturgeschichte, vol. I III. Wurzberg: Ergon Verlag, 2001. Reese, Scott. Imperial Muslims: Islam, Community and Authority in the Indian Ocean, 1839 1937. Edinburgh: University of Edinburgh Press, 2018.

318

Bibliography

Regourd, Anne. “Au sujet des sources manuscrits de l’ouvrage imprimé au Caire sous le titre d’al fasl fī usūl ʿilm al raml d’Al Zanātī.” Annales islamologiques _ _ 35 (2001): 393 407. Rhani, Zakaria. Le pouvoir de guérir: Mythe, mystique et politique au Maroc. Leiden: Brill, 2006 “Le chérif et la possédée: Sainteté, rituel et pouvoir au Maroc.” L’Homme. Revue française d’anthropologie 190 (2009): 27 50. Richards, Audrey. “A Modern Movement of Witch Finders.” Africa viii, no. 4 (1935): 448 61. Roberts, Richard. Warriors, Merchants, and Slaves: The State and the Economy in the Middle Niger Valley, 1700 1914. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1987. Litigants and Households: African Disputes and Colonial Courts in the French Soudan, 1895 1912. Portsmouth: Heinemann, Social History of Africa Series, 2005. Robinson, David. “Abdul Qadir and Shaykh Umar: A Continuing Tradition of Islamic Leadership in Futa Toro.” International Journal of African Historical Studies 6, no. 2 (1973): 286 303. “The Islamic Revolution of Fuuta Tooro.” International Journal of African Historical Studies 8 (1975): 185 221. “French ‘Islamic’ Policy and Practice in Late Nineteenth Century Senegal.” Journal of African History 29, no. 3 (1988): 415 35. Paths of Accommodation: Muslim Societies and French Colonial Authorities in Senegal and Mauritania, 1880 1920. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2000. “Revolutions in the Western Sudan.” In The History of Islam in Africa. Edited by Nehemia Levtzion and Randall L. Pouwels. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2000. 131 52. Muslim Societies in African History. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004. Robinson, David, Philip Curtin and James Johnson. “A Tentative Chronology of Futa Toro from the Sixteenth through the Nineteenth Centuries.” Cahiers d’Études Africaines 12, no. 48 (1972): 555 92. Rodet, Marie. Les migrantes ignorées du Haut Sénégal, 1900 1946. Paris: Karthala, 2009. “Mémoires de l’esclavage dans la région de Kayes: Histoire d’une disparition.” Cahier d’Études Africaines, special issue: Jeux de mémoires 197 (2010): 263 91. Ross, Eric. “A Historical geography of the trans Saharan trade.” In The Trans Saharan Book Trade: Manuscript Culture, Arabic Literacy and Intellectual History in Muslim Africa. Edited by Graziano Krätli and Ghislaine Lydon. Leiden: Brill, 2010. 1 34. Rouighi, Ramzi. Inventing the Berbers: History and Ideology in the Maghreb. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2019. Rudolph, Ulrich. “Occasionalism.” In The Oxford Handbook of Islamic Theology. Edited by Sabine Schmidtke, Online. doi: 10.1093/oxfordhb/ 9780119696703.013.39. Ruf, Urs Peter. Ending Slavery: Hierarchy, Dependency and Gender in Central Mauritania. Bielefeld: transcript Verlag, 1999.

Bibliography

319

Saad, Elias N. Social History of Timbuktu: The Role of Muslim Scholars and Notables 1400 1900. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982. Saif, Liana. “From Gāyat al hakīm to Šams al maʿārif wa latāʾif al ʿawārif: Ways of Knowing and_ Paths _of Power in Medieval Islam.”_ Arabica 64 (2017): 297 345. “What Is Islamic Esotericism?” Correspondence 7, no. 1 (2019): 1 59. Saif, Liana and Francesca Leoni. “Introduction.” In Islamicate Occult Sciences in Theory and Practice. Edited by Leoni Saif, Matthew Melvin Koushki and Farouk Yahya. Leiden: Brill, 2020. 1 40. Sall, Ibrahima Abou. Mauritanie du Sud: conquêtes et administration coloniale française, 1890 1945. Paris: Karthala, 2007. Sarr, Assan. Islam, Power, and Dependency in the Gambia River Basin: The Politics of Land Control, 1790 1940. Rochester: University of Rochester Press, 2016. Sartain, E.M. “Jalal al Din al Suyuti’s Relations with the people of Takrur.” Journal of Semitic Studies 16, no. 2 (October 1971): 193 98. Savage, Emilie. “Berbers and Blacks: Ibādī Slave Traffic in Eighth Century _ 33, no. 3 (1992): 351 68. North Africa.” Journal of African History, Savage Smith, Emilie. “Introduction: Magic and Divination in Early Islam.” In Magic and Divination in Early Islam. Edited by Savage Smith. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2014. xiii xlviii. Scheele, Judith. Smugglers and Saints of the Sahara: Regional Connectivity in the Twentieth Century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012. Schmitz, Jean. “Le souffle de la parenté: Mariage et transmission de la baraka chez des clercs musulmans de la Vallée du Sénégal.” L’homme, Le corps en parentage 151 (2000): 241 77. Searing, James F. “Aristocrates, esclaves et paysans: Pouvoir et dépendance dans les états wolof, 1700 1850.” In Groupes serviles au Sahara: approche compara tive à partir du cas des arabophone de Mauritanie. Edited by Mariella Villasante de Beauvais. Paris: CNRS Éditions, 2000. 25 57 Sebti, Abdelahad. “Chérifisme, symbole, et histoire.” Oriente Moderno 18 (79), no. 2 (1999): 629 38. Seesemann, Rüdiger. “The Shurafa’ and the ‘Blacksmith’: the Role of the Idaw ʿAli of Mauritania in the career of the Senegalese Shaykh Ibrahim Niasse (1900 75).” In The Transmission of Learning in Islamic Africa. Edited by Scott S. Reese. Leiden: Brill, 2004. 72 98. The Divine Flood: Ibrahim Niasse and the Roots of Twentieth Century Sufi Revival. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011. Sells, Michael A. Early Islamic Mysticism Sufi, Qur’an, Mi`raj, Poetic and Theological Writings. New York: Paulist Press, 1996. Sevea, Teren. Miracles and Material Life: Rice, Ore, Traps and Guns in Islamic Malaya. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020. Sewell, Jr., William H. Logics of History: Social Theory and Social Transformation. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005. El Shakry, Omnia. The Great Social Laboratory: Subjects of Knowledge in Colonial and Postcolonial Egypt. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2007.

320

Bibliography

Shaw, Rosalind. “Cannibal transformations: colonialism and commodification in the Sierra Leone hinterland.” In Magical Interpretations, Material Realities: Modernity, Witchcraft and the Occult in Postcolonial Africa. Edited by Henrietta Moore and Todd Sanders. London: Routledge, 2001. 50 70. Siebenga, Rianne. “Colonial India’s ‘Fanatical Fakirs’ and Their Popular Representations.” History and Anthropology 23, no. 4 (December 2012): 445 66. Sinha, Nitin. “Mobility, Control and Criminality in Early Colonial India, 1760s 1850s.” Indian Economic Social History Review, 45 (2008): 1 33. Soares, Benjamin F. Islam and the Prayer Economy: History and Authority in a Malian Town. Ann Arbor: Michigan University Press, 2005. Sow, Ibrahima. Divination Marabout Destin: aux sources de l’imaginaire. Dakar: IFAN Ch. A. Diop, 2009. Spadola, Emilio. The Calls of Islam: Sufis, Islamists, and Mass Mediation in Urban Morocco. Bloomington: University of Indiana Press, 2014. Stearns, Justin. Revealed Sciences: The Natural Sciences in Islam in Seventeenth Century Morocco. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021. “The Place of Sorcery in the Thought of a Seventeenth Century Moroccan Astronomer and Alchemist.” Magic, Ritual and Witchcraft 16, no. 2 (Fall 2021): 139 17. Stewart, Charles. Islam and Social Order in Mauritania: A Case Study from the Nineteenth Century. Oxford: Clarendon, 1973. “Frontier Disputes and Problems of Legitimation: Sokoto Masina Relations 1817 1837.” Journal of African History 17, no. 4 (1976): 497 514. “Southern Saharan Scholarship and the Bilad Al Sudan.” Journal of African History 17, no. 1 (1976): 73 93. “Calibrating the Scholarship of Timbuktu.” In Landscapes, Sources and Intellectual Projects of the West African Past: Essays in Honour of Paulo Fernando de Moraes Farias. Edited by Toby Green and Benedetta Rossi. Leiden: Brill, 2018. 220 38. Stewart, Charles, with Sidi Ahmed wuld Ahmed Salim, editors. Arabic Literature of Africa, Volume 5. The Writings of Mauritania and the Western Sahara, Parts 1 and 2. Leiden: Brill, 2016. Stoller, Paul. The Power of the Between: An Anthropological Odyssey. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2009. Stokes, Laura. Demons of Urban Reform: Early European Witch Trials and Criminal Justice, 1430 1530. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2001. Storm, Jason Josephson. The Myth of Disenchantment: Magic, Modernity, and the Birth of the Human Sciences. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2017. Syed, Amir. “Between Jihād and History: Reconceptualizing the Islamic Revolutions of West Africa.” In Handbook of Islam in Africa. Edited by Fallou Ngom, Mustapha Kurfi, and Toyin Falola. Cham, SZ: Palgrave Macmillan Press, 2020. 93 116. Taine Cheikh, Catherine. “La Mauritanie en noir et blanc. Petite promenade linguistique en hassaniya.” Revue du monde musulman et de la Méditerrané 54 (1989): 90 105.

Bibliography

321

“Des ethnies chimériques aux langues fantômes: L’exemple des Imraguen et Nemâdi de Mauritanie.” In In and out of Africa: Languages in Question, vol. 1. Edited by C. de Féral. Louvain: Bibliothèque des Cahiers de l’Institut de Linguistique de Louvain, 2013. 137 64. Tal, Tamari. Les castes de l’Afrique Occidentale: Artisans et Musiciens Endogames. Nanterre: Société d’Ethnologie, 1997. Taneja, Anand Vivek. Jinnealogy: Time, Islam and Ecological Thought in the Medieval Ruins of Delhi. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2018. Tanguy, Philippe. “L’urbanisation irrégulière à Nouakchott: 1960 2000.” Insaniyat / ‫ﺇﻧﺴﺎﻧﻴﺎﺕ‬, 22 (2003): 7 35. Taussig, Michael. The Devil and Commodity Fetishism in South America. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1980. Shamanism, Colonialism, and the Wild Man: A Study in Terror and Healing. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987. Taylor, Raymond. “L’émirat pré colonial et l’histoire contemporaine en Mauritanie.” Annuaire de l’Afrique du Nord 37 (1999): 53 69. “Statut, médiation et ambiguı¨té ethnique en Mauritanie précoloniale (XIXe siècle): Le cas des Ahl al Gibla et des Ahl Ganaâr du Trarza.” In Groupes serviles au Sahara: approche comparative à partir du cas des arabophone de Mauritanie. Edited by Mariella Villasante de Beauvais. Paris: CNRS Éditions, 2000. 84 95. “Les frontières coloniales et leur imposition dans la vallée du fleuve Sénégal, 1855 1871.” In Histoire et politique dans la vallée du fleuve Sénégal: Mauritanie. Hiérarchies, échanges, colonisation et violences politiques, VIIIe XXIe siècle. Edited by Mariella Villasante Cervello, Raymond Taylor, and Christophe de Beauvais. Paris: L’Harmattan, 2017. 295 320. Tesei, Tommaso. “The barzakh and the Intermediate State of the Dead in the Qur’an.” In Locating Hell in Islamic Traditions. Edited by Christian Lange. Leiden: Brill, 2016. 31 55. Ter Haar, Gerrie and Stephen Ellis. “The Occult Does Not Exist: A Response to Terence Ranger.” Africa 79, no. 3 (2009): 399 412. Thomas, Keith. Religion and the Decline of Magic. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1974. Thourzery, Michel and ʿAbdellahi ould Muhammad Vall. Plantes Médicinales de Mauritanie: Remèdes traditionnels et guérisseurs: du Sahara au fleuve Sénégal. Toulouse: L’association Plantes et Nomades, 2011. Thurston, Alexander. “Shaykh Muhammad al Hasan al Dedew (b. 1963), a Salafi Scholar in Contemporary Mauritania.” Annual Review of Islam in Africa 11 (2012): 64 67. “An Emerging Post Salafi Current in West Africa and Beyond.” Maydan, Online, 15 October 2018, www.themaydan.com/2018/10/emerging post sal afi current west africa beyond/. Toorawa, Shawkat M. “Seeking Refuge from Evil: The Power and Portent of the Closing Chapters of the Qur’an.” Journal of Qur’anic Studies 4, no. 2 (October 2002): 54 60.

322

Bibliography

Trieger, Alexander. “Al Ghazālī’s Classifications of the Sciences and Descriptions of the Highest Theoretical Science.” Dîvân: Displinlerarasi Çalışmalar Dergisi 16, no. 1 (2011): 1 32. Trumbull IV, George R. An Empire of Facts: Colonial Power, Cultural Knowledge, and Islam in Algeria, 1870 1914. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. Turner, Victor. Schism and Continuity in an African Society: A Study of Ndembu Village Life. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1957. Vanacker, Christiane. “La Mauritanie jusqu’au XXe siècle.” In Introduction à la Mauritanie. Centre de recherches et d’études sur les sociétés méditerranéennes et Centre d’étude d’Afrique noire, eds. Aix en Provence: Institut de recherches et d’études sur les mondes arabes et musulmans, 1979. 45 65. Van Dalen, Dorrit. Gum Arabic: The Golden Tears of the Acacia Tree. Leiden: Leiden University Press, 2020. Van Hoven, Ed. “Saint Mediation in the Era of Transnationalism: The da’ira of the Jakhanke Marabouts.” Africa: Journal of the International African Institute 73, no. 2 (2003): 290 308. Van Wensinck, Arent and Louis Gardet. “Iblīs.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed. Edited by P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C. E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, and W.P. Heinrichs. Online (2012). doi: 10.1163/1573 3912 islam SIM 3021. Vernet, Robert. “La préhistoire de la Mauritanie.” In Introduction à la Mauritanie. Centre de recherches et d’études sur les sociétés méditerranéennes et Centre d’étude d’Afrique noire, eds. Aix en Provence: Institut de recherches et d’études sur le monde arabe et musulman, 1979. 17 44. Vidal, Laurent. Rituels de possession dans le sahel. Paris: l’Harmattan, 1990. Vikør, Knut S. Sufi and Scholar on the Desert Edge: Muhammad b. ʻAlī Al Sanūsī _ and His Brotherhood. Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1995. “Jihad in West Africa: A Global Theme in a Regional Setting.” In Muslim Diversity: Local Islam in Global Contexts. Edited by Leif Manger. New York: Routledge, 1999. 80 101. “Sufi Brotherhoods in Africa.” In The History of Islam in Africa. Edited by Nehemia Levtzion and Randall L. Pouwels. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2000. 441 76. Villasante de Beauvais, Mariella. “Genèse de la hiérarchie sociale et du pouvoir politique ‘bidân’.” Cahiers d’Études Africaines 37, no. 147 (1997): 587 633. Parenté et Politique en Mauritanie: Essai d’Anthropologie historique. Paris: L’Harmattan, 1998. editor. Groupes serviles au Sahara: approche comparative à partir du cas des arabophones de Mauritanie. Paris: CNRS Éditions, 2000. Villasante Cervello, Mariella and Raymond Taylor, editors. Histoire et politique dans la vallée du fleuve Sénégal: Mauritanie. Paris: L’Harmattan, 2017. Vimercati Sanseverino, Ruggero. Fès et sainteté, de la fondation à l’avènement du Protectorat (808 1912): Hagiographie, tradition spirituelle et héritage prophétique dans la ville de Mawlāy Idrīs. Rabat: Centre Jacques Berque, 2014. Voguet, Élise. “Tlemcen Touat Tombouctou: Un réseau transsaharien de diffusion du malikisme (fin VIII/XIVe XI/XVIIe siècle).” Revue des mondes musulmans et de la Méditerranée 141 (Juin 2017). http://journals.openedition .org/remmm/9963.

Bibliography

323

“Le peuplement du Touat au xive xvie siècle: mémoire locale de lignages au sein d’un espace socioculturel connecté.” In Une histoire sociale et culturelle du politique en Algérie et au Maghreb. Études offertes à Omar Carlier. Edited by M. Corriou, M. Oualdi. Paris, Éditions de la Sorbonne, 2018. 39 55. Voll, John. “Hadith Scholars and Tariqahs: An Ulama Group in the 18th Century Haramayn in Their Impact in the Islamic World.” Journal of Asian and African Studies 15, no. 3 4 (1980): 264 73. Ware III, Rudolph T. The Walking Qur’an: Islamic Education, Embodied Knowledge, and History in West Africa. Chapel Hill: The University of North Caroline Press, 2014. Warren, David H. Rivals in the Gulf: Yusuf al Qaradawi, Abdullah Bin Bayyah, and the Qatar UAE Contest Over the Arab Spring and the Gulf Crisis. London: Routledge, 2021. Warscheid, Ismail. Droit musulman et société au Sahara prémoderne: La justice islamique dans les oasis du Grand Touat (Algérie) aux XVIIe XIXe siècles. Leiden: Brill, 2017. “Le Livre du désert: La vision du monde d’un lettré musulman de l’Ouest Saharien au XIXe siècle.” Annales. Histoire et Sciences Sociales 73, no. 2 (2018): 359 84. “The West African Jihād Movements and the Islamic Legal Literature of the Southwestern Sahara (1650 1850).” Journal of West African History 6, no. 2 (2020): 33 60. Webb, Jr., James L. A. “The Trade in Gum Arabic: Prelude to French Conquest in Senegal.” Journal of African History 26, no. 2 (1985): 149 68. Desert Frontier: Ecological and Economic Change along the Western Sahel, 1600 1850. Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1995. Webb, Peter. Imagining the Arabs: Arab Identity and the Rise of Islam. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2016. Weber, Max. “Charisma and Its Transformation.” In Economy and Society. Edited by Guenther Roth and Claus Wittich. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978. 1121 48. Whitcomb, Thomas. “New Evidence on the Origins of the Kunta I.” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 38, no. 1 (1975); 103 23. “New Evidence on the Origins of the Kunta II.” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies (1975): 403 17. White, Luise. Speaking with Vampires: Rumor and History in Colonial Africa. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000. Wilder, Gary. The French Imperial Nation State: Negritude and Colonial Humanist between the Two World Wars. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005. Wiley, Katherine Ann. Work, Social Status and Gender in Post Slavery Mauritania. Bloomington: University of Indiana Press, 2018. Willis, John Ralph. “Jihad fi Sabil Allah Its Doctrinal Basis in Islam and Some Aspects of Its Evolution in Nineteenth Century West Africa.” Journal of African History 8, no. 3 (1967): 395 415. “The Torodbe Clerics: A Social View.” Journal of African History 19, no. 2 (1978): 195 212.

324

Bibliography

Wright, Zachary V. “Secrets on the Muhammadan Way: Transmission of the Esoteric Sciences in 18th Century Scholarly Networks.” Islamic Africa 9 (2018): 77 105. Realizing Islam: The Tijaniyya in North Africa and the Eighteenth Century Muslim World. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2020. “The Islamic Intellectual Traditions of Sudanic Africa with Analysis of a Fifteenth century Timbuktu Manuscript.” In The Palgrave Handbook of Islam in Africa. Edited by Fallou Ngom, Mustapha H. Kurfi, and Toyin Falola. Cham, SZ: Springer Nature and Palgrave Macmillan, 2020. 55 76. Zappa, Francesco. “La magie vue par un exégète du Coran: le commentaire du verset de Harût et Marût (s2v102) par al Qurtubi (XIIIe).” In Coran et talismans: Textes et pratiques magiques en milieu musulman. Edited by Constant Hamès. Paris: Karthala, 2007. 49 74. Zebadia, Abdel Kader “The career of Ahmad al Bekkay in the oral evidence and recorded documents.” Revue d’histoire maghrébine 3 (1975): 75 83.

Index

Page numbers in the form 90m indicate maps. Page numbers in the form 146f indicate figures. Abba ould Ahmad Mahmūd ould Sebtī, 74 _ _ Abbasid caliphate, 46 47 Abbé, Samba, 240 ʿAbd al Hayy, Muhammad, 258n122 _ _ ʿabīd (enslaved people). See slavery abortion, 194 196 Acloque, Benjamin, 205 ʿAden (city), 19 Adrār (emirate), 32, 72, 77, 90m, 124m, 128n63, 136, 201 202, 205, 214, 273 agriculturalists, 23, 91, 122, 139, 165, 250, 265 Ahl Attam, 247 250 Ahl Bārik Allāh, 43, 78 Ahl Guennar in general, 31 32, 156, 167, 222 226, 236, 246, 264 265, 270 271 bīdān and, 225 226, 245 _ colonial officials and, 223, 252 257 education by, 239 240, 253, 254 255 ethnic identity of, 235 236, 238 240, 241, 244 245, 252, 254, 255, 266 family tensions, 259 262, 263 genealogy (see Ahl Guennar, prophetic descent of) l’hjāb, 222, 224, 226, 240 242, 243, _ 244 245, 246 250, 258 259, 261 262, 266 Islam and, 236, 240, 256 257, 271 occupational status, 222 race, 222, 223 224, 239 240, 253, 264, 266 267 religious authority of, 240 242 secrecy by members of, 226 227 Shur Būbba, 72, 240 241 slavery and, 238, 239, 242 243, 244, 252, 254 Sufism and, 265n145 towns, 224m

trade by, 236, 237 238 Trārza and, 223, 243 246, 246 251, 265 See also Bamba ould Sayār, Ahmadū; Fāll _ Tigumā _ tīn (family and surname); Ahl Guennar, prophetic descent of _ in general, 222 blood and, 223 224, 230 231, 248 249, 258, 261, 266 267 Bubazūl, Sharīf, 227, 230 234, 239 240 enslavement, origins of, 241 242 l’hjāb, expertise in, 242, 244 245, 253 _ and, 230 231, 232 233, 266 267 milk race and, 266 267 as safeguard from hassān, 253 _ Tigumātīn, importance of, 224 See also _Bubazūl, Sharīf Ahl Itfagha Habīb Allāh, 231 _ ahl al lighla (spiritual entities), 9 See also jinn (spirits) Ahl Mutalī, 253n105, 255n111, 256n115 Ahmad b. Daman, 42 _ Ahmad b. Mokhtār b. Zwayn al Tinwājīw, _ 12n37 Ahmad al Mansūr, Sultan of Morocco, 231 _ _ Ahmad ould ʿUmayr, 261n134 _ Ahmad Sallūm III, emir of Trārza, 152f _ Ahmadīnejād, Mahmoud, 262 263 _ ʿĀ’isha (wife of Prophet Muhammad), 82 _ ʿĀ’isha Qandīsha, 18 ʿAlawī dynasty, 228 Alfā Ibrāhīm, 98 99, 192n16 Algeria, 22, 35, 126, 128, 139 ʿAlī (cousin of Prophet Muhammad), 227 _ ʿAlī b. al Mukhtār b. al Aʿmash, 8 9 ‘Alī Djembot, 251 252 ʿAlī ould Muhammad al Habīb, 251 _ ʿAlī Shanzūra,_ 106n112, 247 _ Allah Naagande, le, 135 Almohad empire, 26, 48

325

326

Index

Almoravid empire, 25 26, 27m, 48, 52, 222, 239n53 Amary Ngoné Ndella, 71 Amazigh, 47, 51, 63 Amdayr, 1, 177 al Amīn, Ahmad ould (al Shinqīt), _ 200 _ 196 198, Amster, Ellen, 138 amulets (tamā’im) in general, 6 Black Africans, used by, 131n74 in contemporary Mauritania, 162 163, 166 Europeans on, 34n104, 145 147 gris gris, 66 67, 134 135, 182, 255 hassān emirs, worn by, 151 152, 152f, _ 162, 273, 277 hiding of, under clothing, 33, 162 163, 166 as illicit practice, 58 59, 61 materiality of, 161 162 modern technology, 162 163, 166 Ould Abuwāh on, 157 pictured, 146f, 152f popularity of, 162 power of, 66 Qur’ān and, 59, 81 82 zwāya, as symbol for, 73 See also baraka; l’hjāb; jedāwil; talismans; written charms _

Arnaud, Robert, 141 asafoetida (plant resin), 194 195 ashāb al shaykh (followers of Sīdīna), _ 213 214, 216, 217, 218 219 See also Sīdīna, Muhammad Lemīn ould Ashʿarīsm, 29, 79, 102_ Asma’u, Nana, 96n80 Assāba Region, 163m, 217 __ assassinations of Coppolani, 99n93, 136 137 of Mauchamp, 142 astrology, 6, 46 47, 61, 101 102 Atār (town), 124m, 163m, 177, 198, 205, _ 268 270, 271 Awdāghost (city), 27m, 53, 56m _ Awjeft (town), 124m, 163m, 198, 205, 207, 208, 212 213, 214, 215 218 Awlād Ahmad b. Damān (warrior group), 247 _250 Awlād Bū Sbaʿ (tribal confederation), 73n123 Awlād Rizg (warrior group), 70 awliyā’ (Sufi saints). See saints āyat al kursī (Qur’ān 2:255), 5, 84n35, 85 ʿayn (evil eye), 3, 82, 183, 198, 204, 276 See also al nazra Azawād, 92, 93,_ 95, 181 al ʿAzīz, Muhammad ould ʿAbd, 176, 272, _ 273

Anbiya (expanse of Sahara), 24 al Andalus, 26 Anderson, Greg, 19 animism, 61, 114, 139 140 Ansār ad Dīn (Defenders of the Faith), 42, _ 181 anthropology, 16 19, 31, 153 anti colonialism, 109 112, 126, 132, 133 140, 148, 150 apostasy. See unbelief Apter, Andrew, 17 18 al ʿAqil, Ahmad, 98 99 _ al ʿAqil, Khadīja, 99n90, 103 AQIM (al Qāʿida in the Islamic Maghreb), 158 159, 181 Arab descent and identity Ahl Guennar and, 224 225 Fulbe and, 88 89, 98 l’hjāb linked to, 53, 74 75, 98 _ Muslim Blacks vs., 88, 139 140 non sharifism and, 229 230 Arab warriors. See hassān Arabian Peninsula,_ 54n50, 91n61, 93, 94 95, 143 144, 161, 174, 178 Arabic language, 7, 28, 48, 53, 60, 83, 156, 264

Azqar (tribe), 50 Azūgī (town), 26, 56m Baal, Souleyman, 71 72, 89n56 Bābā ould Hamdī, 253n105 Babylon, 46_ Bafūr (original inhabitants of Sahara), 23, 26 Baghdad, 46 47 al Balad al Amīn (mahadra), 274 _ _ 141, 142n119, Bamba Mbacké, Amadu, 253n105, 256 257, 265 Bamba ould Sayār, Ahmadū _ tīn, 262 264 investment _in Tigumā on Sherakūba, 258 _ on sihr and l’hjāb, 173n27, 264 _ _ for Ahl Guennar, as spokesperson 226n11, 266 on Sufism, 265n145 televised debate on l’hjāb, 156 160, 159f See also Ahl Guennar_ Bambara (ethnolinguistic category), 116, 133, 197 199 Bambuk, 52, 56m, 90m Banū Hassān, 27 28, 63, 229 baraka_ (blessings from God)

Index Bezeid, Ahmad, 42 emanating_ from graves, 42, 59 60, 63, 94, 182 Nāsir al Dīn, 66 _ in Qur’ān, 81 wearing of amulets, 6 al Barbarī, Khalāf, 51 Barreira, Baltasar, 34n104 Barry, Boubacar, 242 barzakh (state of existence between life and death), 20 22, 29 30, 31 (isthmus), 21, 24, 105 basmala (Islamic phrase), 82 al bātin, ʿulūm (inner sciences), 10, 49 _ 157 beards, al Bekkai, Ahmad, 77n5 Berbers, 47, _51, 63 Beslay, François, 206 Bezeid, Ahmad, 41 42, 43, 45, 64, 78, 95 _ Bhabha, Homi, 21 Bible, 147 bidaʿ (illicit innovation), 94, 157 bīdān (“white”, Arabophone inhabitants of _ Saharan West) in general, 29 Ahl Guennar and, 225 226, 245 colonial officials on, 114, 127 l’hjāb and, 114, 223 _ infertility, 208 209 raids by, 127 129, 245 sell and, 190, 196 200, 220 221 Wolof populations and, 225 226, 250 251 bilād al sūdān (“land of the black people”), 24, 140, 196 Bilāl ould Mahmūd, 191n9 Bilʿamesh, Mu_ hammad ould al Mukhtār _ 103 ould, 67 68, Bilqīs, Queen of Sheba, 84n34 birds, communicating with, 61 black magic, 102, 204, 264 See also sihr (sorcery) Black people_ (sūdān and al kwār) in general, 29 bilād al sūdān, 24, 140, 196 colonial officials on, 127 128, 131 l’hjāb, 223 _ illicit magic, 157, 158, 264 as legally enslaveable, 24 25, 140 marriage with bīdān women, 218 _ 114, 141, 146 148 proselytization and, blasphemy, 164n10 blessings from God. See baraka blood Ahl Guennar and, 223 224, 230 231, 248 249, 258, 261, 266 267

327 bitter, 194, 195 as nourishment for enslaved people, 200 prohibition of drinking of, 204 of sacrificed sheep, 68 See also milk; sell bloodsucking. See sell bombings, 175 Bonte, Pierre, 214, 228, 232, 233, 237 borī (spirit possession), 97 Boubrik, Rahal, 129 Boulègue, Jean, 240 Brākna (emirate), 72, 90m, 124m, 128n63, 151, 244 246, 132n77, 250, 252n99 breast milk, 56, 201, 204, 230 231, 232 233 See also blood Brenner, Louis, 4 British colonial rule, 154n153 Bubazūl, Sharīf, 68, 222, 227, 230 234, 239 240, 249, 258 See also Ahl Guennar, prophetic descent of Būh, Saʿd, 128 129, 132 Būha ould Mustafā, 223n3, 268n2 _ __ al Bukhārī, 46n16 Būl (town), 240 Bulletin du Comité d’études historiques et scientifiques, 148n143 Bundu (region), 89n56, 106 al Būnī, Ahmad, 101 Buré (gold_ field), 52, 56m, 90m, 124m Burke III, Edmund, 112, 138 Busquet (French commander), 205 206 Bustān al fawā’id (al Kābarī), 55 58 Caillié, René, 118 120 Cairo, 91 92, 93 94 camels, 8 9, 130 131 camphor, 120 121 cannibalism, 199 See also sell Casablanca, 175 ceddo (soldiers of enslaved origin), 242, 252n99 Chaı¨man (Tūjunīn), 109 110, 124m Chakrabarty, Dipesh, 11 chemama (band of alluvial soil), 225, 240 Chirac, Jacques, 169 climate change, 29, 238 clothing, 156 157, 224 Clozel, Marie François Joseph, 140n112, 143 144, 148n143 colonization in Mauritania administration, 22 23, 123 125, 150 151

328

Index

colonization in Mauritania (cont.) anti colonialism, 109 112, 126, 132, 133 140, 148, 150 court cases, 153 154, 181 difficulty of establishing territory, 111 education, 138 139 empiricism, 138, 153 ethnographic studies, 35, 138 139, 149 150 famine, 115, 277 hassān and, 110 112, 126 127, 128 129, _ 155, 254 l’hjāb and (see l’hjāb, colonial officials _ and) _ Islam and (see Islam, colonial officials on) map, 124m military component, 123 129 mobility, restricting of, 133, 143 145 race, 35, 131, 139 141, 153 representation of colonized, 14, 138 139, 153 slavery and, 133 134, 155, 188, 190, 201 202, 211, 278 279 surveillance, 109 111, 125, 137 138, 142 144, 255 257 trade, impact on trans Saharan, 22, 44, 111 112 Trārza and, 250 254 zwāya, cooperation with, 110 112, 119 120, 126 129, 134, 136 138, 141 146, 151 152, 155 See also French empire comedy television, 160 161, 162, 166 170, 171 172, 179 commodities agricultural goods, 127 enslaved people, 24, 64, 127, 238 gold, 52 53 gum arabic, 64, 238 hassān, given to, 64 _ horses, 238 paper, 117, 118 salt, 76, 77, 149, 154, 238 in Tigumātīn, 238 _ trade; trade; trans Saharan See also slave trade conversion to Mālikī Sunnī Islam, 25 26 Coppolani, Xavier, 99n93, 126 128, 136 137, 140n112 corruption, 272 court cases, 153 154, 181 covering faces (lithām), 23 24 COVID 19 pandemic, 179 180, 183, 275 craftspeople (muʿallimīn), 209 210, 221 cursing, 246 247

Dāhī, Yehzīhi ould, 161, 178 181, 183 __ dā’ira (spiritual center), 269 270, 271 Dalā’il al Khayrāt (Muhammad al Jazūlī), _ 59 Daniel, Prophet, 50 dār al islām (“abode of Islam”), 24 dār al kufr (“abode of unbelievers”), 24, 140 dates and date palms, 200, 205, 214 Davidson, John, 120 122 De la Courbe, Michel Jajolet, 66 death sentences, 49 50, 61, 163n10, 195, 206 207 Dedew, Muhammad al Hassen ould, _ 176 178_ Delafosse, Maurice, 114, 140n112, 145 desecration of graves. See graves, desecration of devils (shayātīn), 84n34, 174 _ dhikr performances, 93, 101, 132n77, 213 Dia, al Husayn, 276 _ Dieng, Sīdī, 89n55 diets, 200, 208 See also famine; milk Dihya (prophetess), 51n37 Diop, Mukhtār Ndumbé, 240 Diop, Sandiri, 167, 231 232, 265 Diop, Saqur Fatim, 244 diseases, 208 divination in general, 50 52 ʿilm al raml, 50, 61, 101 ligzāna, 87, 101, 170 al nazra, 7, 86n44, 87, 101 Ould_ al Hājj Ibrāhīm on, 101 102 _ of Muhammad al Habīb), Djembot (wife _ _ 251 252 dogs, 261 262 Don Fodio, Uthman, 89n56, 96 97, 136n98, 138 Doutté, Edmond, 139 dreams, 71 72 droughts, 43, 62, 202, 220, 257n120, 260 See also famine drums, 247 248, 250 Al durr al manzūm (al Katsinawī), 92 _ mint Saberū, Dwayda Taveltū 216 217n112 economy, 44 See also prayer economy education by Ahl Guennar, 239 240, 253, 254 255 in colonial period, 138 139 exchange through, intellectual, 88, 91, 93 Islamic education, 44, 47 48, 79 80

Index in postcolonial Mauritania, 175 reform and, 91, 92 93 in Saharan West, 44, 47 48, 79 80 in Shinqīt, 63, 79 80, 93 _ 48, 79 Sufism and, in Tigumātīn, 239 240, 254 255 _ 44, 56, 59 60, 62 63 in Timbuktu, of Wolof speaking students, 239 240 educational missions, religious, 25 26, 52 elephants, 70n111 Eʿli Shieykh ould Momma accessibility, lack of, 31, 268 270 funerary prayer for, 177 prayer economy, 271, 273 race of, 223n3 sell, encountering, 1 2, 187 189 el Shakry, Omnia, 153 emirates, 90m, 104 emirs, 151 152, 152f, 162, 273, 277 See also hassān _ 138, 153 empiricism, enchantment (saharū), 83 84 enslaved people. _See slavery esoteric Islamic sciences (ʿulūm al bātin), _ 10, 49 See also l’hjāb (Islamic esoteric sciences) _ 236 ethnicity, 235 See also Ahl Guennar: ethnic identity of; race ethnographic studies, 3, 16 17, 19, 31, 35, 138 139, 149 150 evil eye (ʿayn), 3, 82, 183, 198, 204, 276 See also al nazra _ exchange, intellectual/religious/commercial through education, 88, 91, 93 of hassān culture, 63 _ hjāb, 47 48, 51 54, 59 of l’ _ of Islam, 24, 47 48 by Kunta students, 88 of reformist attitudes, 93, 96 of sell, 196 200 of sharifism, 228 230 of Sufism, 174 175 in Timbuktu, 44, 54, 56, 59 60, 62 63 through trade, 44, 47, 54 See also migration excrement, 70, 101 exorcisms, 173 174, 178 179 See also healing; jinn exoteric Islamic sciences (ʿulūm al zāhir), _ 49, 99, 102, 104 al Fādil, Muhammad, 80n22, 129 131 _ path), 98, 129 130, 131n74, _ Fādiliyya (Sufi _ 132n77

329 Faidherbe, Louis, 251 254 al falaq (Qur’ān 113), 5n11 Fāll (family and surname), 238, 242 243 See also Ahl Guennar; Bamba ould Sayār, _ Ahmadū; Sherakūba _ Fāll, ‘Abd Allāh, 261 Fāll, ʿAmī Mukhtār, 257 258, 259 260, 261 262, 266 Fāll, Bara MBeti, 255, 256 Fāll, Dam Yare, 255 Fāll, Hammad, 231 232, 233 235, 237, _ 261 Fāll, Hammām (al Mālik), 163 Fāll, Ibrāhīm, 261 Fāll, Ibrāhīm Redwān, 231, 240n58 _ Fāll, Ndoumbé, 253n105 Fāll, Omar, 240, 243 Fāll, Sayār, 224n5, 248, 257, 259 262, _ 260f, 264, 265n145, 266 Fāll, Sayār Fatim, 255 _ Fāll Būna, Ahmad, 253 _ famine during colonial period, 115, 277 dependence on l’hjāb, leading to, 43 _ enslaved people affected by, 200, 201 202, 208 sell and, 200, 208, 220 Shur Būbba and, 65, 242 slave trade and, 245 in Timbuktu, 62 travellers, witnessed by European, 121 See also droughts fuqahā’ (legal experts), 79, 105 fatāwā (nonbinding legal opinions), 34, 61, 79, 80, 160, 207 al fātiha (Qur’ān 2:255), 5, 84n35, 85 _ (daughter of Prophet Muhammad), Fātima _ _ 227 al fawā’id (secret beneficial prayers), 56, 58 al Fazarī, 52n44 feces, 70, 101 Feierman, Steven, 14, 115, 135 fertility and infertility, 194 196, 208 209, 269 270 Ferula tingitina (herb), 194 195 fétichisme, 139 140, 142, 145 Fez (city), 239n53 fiches de renseignements (information files), 137 138, 255 256 Fields, Karen E., 219 220 fiqh. See Islamic jurisprudence flesh eaters, 199 food, 200, 208 See also famine; milk Fouta (confederation), 74

330

Index

Fouta Jallon, 75, 89, 90m, 93, 106 Fouta Tooro, 71, 75, 89, 90m, 93, 97, 106, 224m France, 138n102 fraud, 271 272 French empire, 22 23, 114, 123 125, 124m, 138, 150 See also Algeria; colonization in Mauritania; l’hjāb, colonial officials _ and; Islam, colonial officials on; Senegal French language, 32 “friends of God.” See saints Fulbe (linguistic community) l’hjāb, spreading of, 52, 75 _ culture, 53 oral race of, 88 89, 98 revolutions, 89 91, 92 94, 94 96, 98, 132 See also torodbe (scholarly elite) funerary prayer, 177 Gabriel (angel), 86 Gambia River, 19 Gàmmu festival, 265 Garak (village), 224, 224m, 238, 239, 242 244, 246, 252, 253 255, 263m Gebla (region), 63 64, 66, 72 73, 79 80, 93, 239 gender appropriation of, 230 231, 232 233, 258 instruments, playing, 58 in media presentation of l’hjāb, 170 171 _ 259 religious authority of women, Sīdīna on, 213 214 veiling, 23 24 See also women gender equality, 213 214, 217 218 genealogy Arab descent linked to l’hjāb, 53, 74 75, _ 98 of bīdān women, 208 209, 213 _ officials on, 146 colonial of enslavement, 242 of Kunta, 77 78 matrilineality, 18, 44, 229, 231, 232 234 patrilineality, 229 230, 231, 232 234, 249 pedagogical, 93 prophetic descent, 146, 224, 227 233 sell and, 208 210 See also Ahl Guennar, prophetic descent of; Arab descent and identity geomancy, 6, 15, 51 52 Germany, 144

Ghana empire, 25, 27m, 52 53, 56m al ghayb, ʿulūm (sciences of the unseen), 77 al Ghazālī, 85n41, 99 100 Ghuzfiyya (Sufi path), 136 137, 141 _ Glassman, Jonathan, 235 236 global Muslim community (umma), 162 God, 9, 10, 48 49, 77 78, 80, 101 102, 105 gold, 52 53 graves Bamba on, 158 160 baraka emanating from, 42, 59 60, 63, 94, 182 Ould Abuwāh on, 158 160 sand taken from, 26, 33, 172 of Sīdīna, 218, 220 See also tombs graves, desecration of of accused sellala, 207 Bezeid’s, Ahmad, 41, 43, 45 _ 42, 157, 181 182 in Timbuktu, by Wahhābī, 94, 95, 159 Greece, 45 46 Grehan, James, 11 griots (musicians and storytellers), 58 gris gris (written prayers), 66 67, 134 135, 182, 255 Groupes nomades (GN), 109 110 Gubara, Dahlia, 92 Guelta Zemmour (oasis), 110 Guidimakha (administrative region), 124m, 133 135 Guinea, 163 164 gum arabic, 64, 238 Haddi b. Ahmad Damān, 72 _ of Prophet Muhammad), hadīth (sayings _ 46, 81 83, 86, 213 214 _ al Hadrāmī, al Murādī, 26, 68 _ _ Haffsiatou mint Mahmisigdigh, 237 hājj (pilgrimage), 54, 94, 96, 130, 143 _ hajjāba _ in general, 7 accessibility, lack of, 30, 270 barzakh and, 22 colonial officials on, 114 comedy sketch on, 167 170 as crooks, 167 170, 171, 215, 271 272, 273 275 emirs, providing services for, 151 152 jinn and, 262 263n140 Laforgue on, 149 al ruqya al sharʿiyya, 172 173 secrecy by, 33 sell, countering, 206, 211 212, 215 See also l’hjāb; shuyūkh _

Index al Hakūma, 274 _ Bruce, 140, 229, 235 Hall, Halpulaaren communities, 65, 127, 199, 250 See also Pulaar (language) Hamallah (Shaykh), 142n119 Hanretta, Sean, 138 Harrison, Christopher, 138 hassān (Arab warriors) _ administration, lack of, 105 106 colonial officials and, 110 112, 126 127, 128 129, 155, 254 l’hjāb, reliance on, 151 152, 152f, 162, _ 273, 277 occupational status of, 29, 104 spreading of culture, 63 66 violence, monopoly on, 70 71, 104, 128 zwāya and, 70 71, 72 73, 104, 243 244 Hassān (grandson of Prophet Muhammad), _ 227 _ Hassāniyya (language and linguistic _ community), 28 29, 32, 63, 157, 199, 229, 264 See also hrātīn _ Hausaland,_ 89n56, 93, 96, 106 Hawd (administrative region), 124m, 131 _ _ healing with camphor, 120 121 of COVID 19, 179 180, 183 early exchange of techniques of, 54 exorcisms, 173 174, 178 179 with herbal medicine, 120 121, 194 196, 276 with l’hjāb, 7 9, 96 97, 276 277 _ on, 56 al Kābarī Park on, 116 Qur’ān, 5 7, 33, 81 83, 276 277 sell, victims of, 192, 206, 211 212 by thistle pills, 178, 179 180, 183 with traditional medicine, 7 8, 86 wiping the sick, 82 health care, 138, 212, 276, 278 hearts, removing of, 193 194, 196 Hecquard, Louis Hyacinthe, 147 Henare, Amiria, 12 henna, 157 herbal medicine, 120 121, 194 196, 276 herding, 151, 152 al hijāb (head covering), 7n18 _ 93 94, 96 Hijāz, _ hikma al kahla (black magic), 102, 204, 264 _ hikma kuntiyya _ “al aw fūtiyya” (expression), _ 74 75, 98 al Hindī, Tumtum, 51

331 historiography, 11 17, 19 20, 22, 31, 115, 153 l’hjāb (Islamic esoteric sciences) _ in general, 2 5, 6 10, 31 34 Ahl Guennar and, 222, 224, 226, 240 242, 243, 244 245, 246 250, 258 259, 261 262, 266 amulets (see amulets) Arab descent linked to, 53, 74 75, 98 barāzikh and, 22, 24 colonial officials and (see l’hjāb, colonial _ officials and) comedy television, portrayed in, 160 161, 162, 166 170, 171 172, 179 in contemporary Mauritania, 6, 157, 158, 162 163, 165 166, 168 daily life, use of in, 9 10, 12, 23, 36, 96 97, 118, 161, 171 172 durability of believe in, 278 280 exchange of, 47 48, 51 54, 59 healing (see healing) historiography on, 11 17, 19 20, 22 history of use of, 50 51, 54, 56 58 illicit practices (see illicit practices) Islam, as point of entry into, 239, 241 jedāwil (see jedāwil) kādihīn on, 164 165 _ knowledge, Islamic, vs., 80 81, 92 93 Kunta and, 74 75, 77 81, 85, 87 88, 93, 98 material signs of, 33, 45, 113, 154 155, 162 164, 241 modern technology, 162 163, 166 modernity and, 156, 161 166, 171 172, 183, 277 278 Ould al Hājj Ibrāhīm on, 100 101 payment _for, 8 9, 116 117, 119, 121, 168, 172 permissibility of, 50, 80 83, 88, 122, 156 160, 226, 279 political component of, 62, 96, 164 165 practical remedies, 122 practices, esoteric, 45, 75, 77 78, 80 81, 157 prayer economy, 2, 9, 167 170, 269 270, 271 272, 279 pregnancy and, 14, 194 195 privilege and, 276 277 protection (see protection) punishment, used for, 66 Qur’ān, reliance on (see Qur’ān) race and, 157 158, 222 223, 249 reform movements, 44 45, 96, 172 173, 181 183

332

Index

l’hjāb (Islamic esoteric sciences) (cont.) _ as scam, 147, 167 170, 171, 178 180, 273 274, 275 secrecy, 7 8, 32 33, 158, 226 227 sentimental reasons for seeking out, 119, 120, 149, 169, 170 171 Sufism and, 48, 74 75, 175 talismanic squares (see jedāwil) talismans (see talismans) tazzuba, 70 71, 73, 77, 130, 246 247 term, use of, 85, 87 transparancy requirement, 102 103 travel writing on, 116 122 women making use of, 119, 120, 146f, 149, 170 171, 195 women performing, 257 259 written charms (see written charms) zwāya and, 65 66 See also invisible forces and entities; lettrism; sell; sihr _ l’hjāb, colonial officials and _ in general, 34 35 anti colonialism, 110 111, 126, 148 on gris gris, 66 67 as heterodox practice, 147 149 Islam and l’hjāb, 123, 135 136, 141, 147 149 _ on jedāwil, 35, 147 149 on jinn, 149 material signs, focus on, 113, 134 135, 154 155 sell, 190 191, 201, 202 203 sorcery, described as, 131 132 superstition, described as, 122 understanding, lack of, 112 115, 135 136, 148 149, 153 155 utilized against colonial officials, l’hjāb, 23, 115, 123, 128, 133 135, 154_ zwāya, collaboration with, 110 112, 119 120, 126 129, 134, 136 138, 141 146, 151 152, 155 See also Islam, colonial officials on Holbraad, Martin, 12 holy war (jihād), 67 68 See also reformist movements; Shur Būbba horses, 238 al Hosātīa (wife of Sharīf Bubazūl), 230, 233 hrātīn_ (Hassāniyya speakers understood to _ enslaved origin), 208 211, 213, _ _ be of 216 217, 218, 220 221, 225 Hunt, Lynn, 31 Hunwick, John O., 61, 62 Ibādī Islam, 47 _ 9, 149 Iblīs,

Ibn Battūta, 54 __ _ Ibn Khaldūn, 5n11, 84n35, 194n22 Idaw al Hajj (trading confederation), 72, _ 93, 151, 236 237, 239, 245, 255 256, 265 Idawʿalī (tribal confederation), 99, 230 Idaw Da (tribe), 69n105 Idayaʿqūb (tribal fraction), 43 Idayshīlī (tribe), 214 idolatry (shirk), 94 Idrīs I, 227 Idrīs, Prophet, 51 al Idrīsī, 50 Idrisid dynasty, 227, 230 illicit innovation (bidaʿ), 94, 157 illicit practices in general, 21 22 Bamba on, 159 160 controversies surrounding, 58 59 discrediting political opponents, 60 62 fatāwā on, 34, 61, 79, 80, 160, 207 identifying of, 80 88 Islamic knowledge vs., 43 Mā’ al ʿAynayn, performed by, 131 132 Ould Abuwāh on, 157 Ould al Hājj Ibrāhīm on, 100 102 _ saint veneration, 94, 97, 103, 181 unintelligible language, 83, 86, 96, 158 Wahhābi on, 94 95, 100 102 See also sell; sihr illnesses, 208 _ ʿilm al hurūf w l asmā.’ See lettrism _ ʿilm al raml (sand divination), 50, 61, 101 Imazighen, 47, 51, 63 incense, 194 195 India, 51, 84, 93, 168, 169, 193 infertility and fertility, 194 196, 208 209, 269 270 ink, 5, 7, 33, 162 international mining consortium (MIFERMA), 165 166 invīl (technique of finding lost things), 87 invisible forces and entities in general, 2, 3 4, 10 historiographical approach to, 11 17 Ould al Hājj Ibrāhīm on, 101 _ 20, 46, 49 in Qur’ān, in Saharan Islam, 76 sell and, 203, 219 220 See also l’hjāb; jinn; sell _ Iran, 262 263 Islam Ahl Guennar and, 236, 240, 256 257, 271 intellectual nature of, 139 140

Index knowledge, Islamic (see knowledge, Islamic) literacy and, 53, 140 race and, 24 25, 223 in Saharan West, 28 spreading of, 24, 47 48 in West Africa, 52 53, 96 97 Islam, colonial officials on anti colonialism and, 140, 142, 148 containment of Islam, 125 128, 136 138, 145 148 fétichisme, 139 140, 142, 145 l’hjāb and Islam, 123, 135 136, 141, _ 147 149 l’islam maure, 35, 113, 140, 256 l’islam noir, 35, 113, 256 political component of Islam, 135 138, 141 144, 148, 154 155 proselytization, fear of, 114, 141, 146 148, 241 restricting Islam, 144 l’islam maure, 35, 113, 140, 256 See also Moors l’islam noir, 35, 113, 256 Islamic East (mashriq), 47 Islamic jurisprudence. See jurisprudence, Islamic Islamic knowledge. See knowledge, Islamic Islamic Republic of Mauritania. See Mauritania Islamist reformers. See reformist movements Israel, 263 jadhb (trance ritual), 132n77 al Jazūlī, Muhammad, 59 jealousy, 82, _195 196, 204, 208 209, 220 See also evil eye jedāwil (talismanic squares) Bamba on, 158 Bezeid, Ahmad, 42 _ colonial officials on, 35, 147 149 in comedy sketch, 168 enslaved people, used against, 248 249 Fāll, Sayār, 262 hassān_ relying on, 151 152, 152f, 162, _ 273, 277 al Kābarī on, 56 Kunta and, 77 78 materiality of, 33, 162 N’degSʿad, 236 237 N’Derī Sayār, 248 250 _ Ould Abuwāh on, 157 reformists on, 45 sell, used to counter, 192

333 seven part square (musabbaʿ), 100 See also amulets; talismans; written charms Jews, 60n74, 122 Jibrīl b. ʿUmar, 94, 96 jihād (struggle or holy war), 67 68 See also reformist movements; Shur Būbba jinn (spirits) in general, 9 10 Ahl Guennar and, 231 232, 234 235 anthropological scholarship on, 18 19, 20, 22 colonial officials on, 149 in contemporary Mauritania, 165 166 exorcisms, 173 174, 178 179 hajjāba and, 262 263n140 _ illicit practice, communicating with, as 61 Kunta and, 77 78, 234 235 in Nouakchott, 165 166 protection from, 18, 120 121 rights gained through overpowering, 77 78, 234 235 Shamharūsh, 18, 62n82 in Sufism, 174 Jolof (polity), 224m, 243 jurisprudence, Islamic criminal sanctions in, 208n78 discrediting political opponents, 61 God, reliance on, 49 50, 101 l’hjāb and, 171 in_ Saharan West, 86 87 sharīʿa, implementation of, 87, 104 on sihr, 49 50 _ and, 140 slavery Sufism and, 78 79 Kābara, 55, 56m, 90m al Kābarī, Muhammad, 55 58, 59 _ movement), 164 165 kādihīn (political _ (city), 128, 224m Kaédi al kāhina (prophetess), 51n37 Kajoor, 71 72, 90m, 224m, 238, 240, 243 Kane, ʿAbd al Qādir, 71 72, 89n56, 99, 99n91 karamāt (miracles), 78 Karamokho Ba, 89n56 karkara (bloodsucking), 193, 199 See also sell Karlsen, Carol, 211 Kassibo, Bréhima, 52, 53 Katsina, 92 al Katsinawī, Muhammad, 89, 91n57, 92, _ 94 Keane, Webb, 12

334

Index

Kedjia Ijīl (salt mine), 56m, 77, 78, 90m, 149, 124m, 154, 234 235 Khalī Hinnā, 268n2 al Khalifa (Muhammad al Kuntī), 71n117, 80, 81 85,_ 97, 103, 193 196 al Khalīl, Ibrāhīm, 215 Kharijites (Islamic sect), 97 Khumaynī, ‘Āyat Allāh, 263 Kīffa, 128n63, 163m kings, 173n28, 175 Knight, Michael Muhammad, 5 knots, blowing on, 5, 84 knowledge, Islamic in general, 30 discrediting political opponents, 62 exchange of, 51 52, 54, 55 of Fulbe, 75, 88 al Katsinawī on, 92 of Kunta, 74 75, 77 81, 85, 87 88, 93, 98 race and, 31, 75 sihr vs., 43 of_ zwāya, 30, 43, 65 66, 69 71, 104, 246 See also l’hjāb _ 71 72, 90m, 93, 124m, Kokkī (town), 224m, 240 al Koni, Ibrahim, 1 al Korī, ʿAli, 248 250 Koulikoro (town), 116 kufr (unbelief ). See unbelief Kumbī Sālih (town), 27m, 52 53, 56m _ _ confederation) Kunta (tribal commercial dominance of, 76 79 Fādiliyya, hostility towards, 132n77 jinn_ and, 77 78, 234 235 knowledge, Islamic, 74 75, 77 81, 85, 87 88, 93, 98 Ould Būna and, 103 Qādiriyya and, 76, 80, 93, 97 98, 132n77 salt mines, 76, 77, 149, 154, 238 on Shādhiliyya religious practices, 93 as warriors, 73n123 al Kuntī, Muhammad (al Khalifa) (d. 1826),_ 71n117, 80, 81 85, 97, 103, 193 196 al Kuntī, al Mukhtār (d. 1811), 80, 86, 97 Ladies, The (television show), 171 172 Laforgue, Pierre, 109, 113 114, 148 150, 153, 154 155, 235n39 lahma (dependent social status), 29 _ Lamtūna, 50 al Lamtūnī, Muhammad bin Muhammad _ 62, 96, 191 192, _ 199 200 b. ʿAlī, 58 59, language Arabic, 7, 28, 48, 53, 60, 83, 156, 264

French, 32 Hassāniyya, 28 29, 32, 63, 157, 199, _ 229, 264 Latin, 48 Pulaar, 7n18, 199 sell, used to describe, 199, 203 204 Soninké, 7n18, 25, 52, 199 unintelligible, danger of, 81 83, 83, 86, 96, 102, 158, 197 Wolof, 7n18, 199, 264 Znāga, 63 Laʿrūssīn (tribal confederation), 73n123 Latin language, 48 legal experts (fuqahā’), 79, 105 legal opinions, nonbinding (fatāwā), 34, 61, 79, 80, 160, 207 legal questions (nawāzil), 81 leprosy, 59 Leriche, Albert, 143n122 lettrism (ʿilm al hurūf w l asmā’) in general, 6, 7_ Ahl Guennar and, 256n115 al Idrīsī on, 50 history of use of, 15, 56 58 Kunta on, 85 86 Ould al Hājj Ibrāhīm on, 101 _ permissibility of, 80 Levtzion, Nehemia, 91 libraries, 113, 131, 137, 143, 154 Libya, 262 263, 266 lifting the veil of the senses (al mukāshafa), 10 11, 14 ligzāna (technique of divination), 87, 101, 170 litany of prayers (wird), 97 literacy, 50, 53, 113, 117 118, 121, 147, 175 See also written charms lithām (covering faces), 23 24 lizards, 77n6 Lobbo, Ahmad, 88, 89n56, 94, 98 love, 119, _120, 170 171 See also marriage Luffin, Xavier, 233 luxury items. See commodities Mā’ al ʿAynayn, 130 132, 137, 142 143 Maʿaden el Ervān (town), 218 Madīnat al kilāb (Town of the Dogs), 26 al Maghīlī, Muhammad b. ʿAbd al Karīm, _ 93, 96 60 61, 77n5, Maghreb (Islamic West), 47, 228, 245 magic. See divination; hajjāba; l’hjāb; _ entities;_ lettrism; invisible forces and sell; sihr; written charms _ mahadra (institution of advanced Islamic _ education), _ 44

Index mahdi (renewer of Islam), 67 Ma_hmūd Kaʿtī, 62n82 _ Mahmūda (freed woman), 215 217, 219 _ (someone who is possessed by jinn majnūn or demons), 157 Malaya Peninsula, 19 Mali, 42, 181 182 Mali empire, 29n96, 56m al Mālik (Hammām Fāll), 163 Mālikī legal school, 25, 26, 29, 47, 79, 102 malnutrition, 209 See also diets; famine al Māmī, Muhammad, 21, 87, 99, 105 _ hammad, 109 111, 112, al Mamūn, Mu _ 268 129 130, 143, manumission, 195, 200, 201 Maoism, 165 marabouts. See shuyūkh Marrakesh, 25, 26 marriage Ahl Guennar on, 245 colonial officials worried about political alliances through, 251 l’hjāb used to find partners, 119 _ l’hjāb used to fix marriage, 120, 170 171 _ infertility and, 208 209 patrilineal descent and, 229, 233 sell and, 208 209 Sīdīna on, 213, 218, 220 Marty, Paul, 131, 140n112, 146 147, 252, 253, 255 257 Maryam (daughter of Ahmad Bezeid), 42 _ mashriq (Islamic East), 47 Masina, 90m, 106 Masʿūd (convert known for therapeutic knowledge), 120 matrilineality, 18, 44, 229, 231, 232 234 Mauchamp, Emile, 142 Mauritania colonization in (see colonization in Mauritania) constitution of, 173n28 development of, 138, 164 “hyphen” metaphor, 37 map, 163m media landscape (see media; television) urbanization, 165 166, 277 278 variety of populations in, 31 Mauritanian government centralized state, 66, 150, 163 165, 174, 277 278 fraud, 272 274 modernity, 156, 161 166, 171 172, 183, 277 278 Mauritanian People’s Party (PPM), 163 164, 166n16 Mawlāy Zāyn, Sīdī, 99n93, 136

335 Mawlud Fāll b. Muhammadhen Fāll, 95n77 Mbul (coastal post),_ 238 McDougall, Ann, 197 198, 208, 234 McGovern, Mike, 163 164, 182 Me and My Uncle (television show), 168 170 meat consumption, 208 Mecca, 91 92, 93 94 See also hājj _ media private sector, 160 radio broadcasting, 160, 163 social media, 161, 178 180, 272, 273 television (see television) medicine, traditional (al tibb al taqlīdī), _ 7 8, 86 See also healing; health care Medina, 91, 94 Messaʿūda (freed woman), 215 217 methodology anthropology, 16 19, 31, 153 ethnographic studies, 3, 16 17, 19, 31, 35, 138 139, 149 150 historiography, 11 17, 19 20, 22, 31, 115, 153 interviews, 31 32 primary sources, 14, 28, 33 35, 51 M’heirith, 205, 208 _ MIFERMA (international mining consortium), 165 166 migration, 27 28, 47 48, 63, 174 175, 238, 277 See also exchange, intellectual/religious/ commercial milk Ahl Guennar and, 230 231, 232 233, 266 267 breast milk, 56, 204, 230 231, 232 233 donkey’s, 245n76 N’Derī Sayār’s spell, 248 249 _ 201, 204n65, 230 231 wet nurses, miracles (karamāt), 78 miraculous events French colonial officials on, 110 Mā’ al ʿAynayn, performed by, 130 131 al Mamūn, performed by, 110 Moses, performed by, 83 84 Nāsir al Dīn, performed by, 66, 103 _ Būna, experienced by, 103 Ould Ould Majdhūb, experienced by, 68 transport, magical, 69 70, 236 238 al Yadālī, performed by, 69 miscarriages, 194 196, 208 209 Mkheitīr, Muhammad ould, 164n10 _ 161 166, 171 172, 183, _ modernity, 156, 277 278

336

Index

Moors, 123, 139, 146 147, 198 See also l’islam maure Morocco Ahl Guennar and, 222 223 centralized state in, 26 colonial administration in, 138 exorcisms in, 173 174, 178, 181 al ruqya al sharʿiyya in, 173 174, 178 sharifism in, 227 229 Sufism in, 48, 174, 175 Moses, 83 84 Moudjeria (oasis town), 217 muʿallimīn (craftspeople), 209 210, 221 al muʿawwidhatān (two protective ones), 5, 82, 84n35 Muhamad bin Moussa, 181 Muhammad, Prophet _ activist Sufism and, 95 beard, coloring of, 157n3 blasphemy against, 163n10 descent of, 146, 224, 227 233, 266 267 divination, teaching of, 51 hadīth, 46, 81 83, 86, 213 214 _ healing, 81 83, 86 on jihād, authority of declaring, 68 Mawlāy Zāyn, appearing in dream of, 136 Muhammad I, Askiya of Songhay, 60 62, _93, 96 Muhammad b. ʿAbd al Wahhāb, 91n61, _94 95, 160, 178 Muhammad b. ʿAbd Allah, Sultan, 247 248 _ Muhammad b. al Mokhtār b. al Aʿmash, _9n24 Muhammad b. Shams al Dīn al Maknī _Bubazūl. See Bubazūl, Sharīf Muhammad al Bashīr b. Ahmad Mahmūd, _8 9 _ _ Muhammad Fūdīya, 230 _ Muhammad Gayla, 216 _ Muhammad al Habīb, 251, 254 _ āfiz, 97, 104 _ Muhammad al H _ _ b. al Hājj al Bashīr, _ Muhammad al Mahdī _ _8 9 Muhammad ould ʿAli al Korī, 250 _ Muhammad ould Lahbīb, 129 _ Muhammad ould Mu_hammad Shayn, _71n117 _ Muhammadū ould Mahmūdin, 268n2 _ _ Muhammaden Fāll b. Mutālī al Tendghāy, _86 al mukāshafa (lifting the veil of the senses), 10 11, 14 al Mukhtār al Kuntī Sīdī, 80, 86, 97 Mukhtār Ndumbé al Kabīr, 244 Mukhtār ould ʿUmar, 247 248

mulaththamūn (“wearers of the face veil”), 23 24 Mūlay al ʿAbbas (fictional sharif ), 62n82 Mūlay Ismaʿīl, Sultan of Morocco, 106n112 Murīdiyya (Sufi path), 253n105, 256, 258, 262, 265 Musa, Mansa, 54n50, 59 musabbaʿ (seven part square), 100 mushefr (encoded), 159 al muss (bloodsucking), 180, 183 See also sell al muthallath (numerological squares), 85, 96, 99 100 Nabatea, 84 al nafth (spitting), 82 83 See also saliva al Naqīl, ʿAbd al Karīm b. Ahmad, 95n77 Nāsir al Dīn, 64 69, 72, 103,_ 138, _ 240 241, 242, 244 Nāsiriyya (Sufi path), 48 _ nawāzil (legal questions), 81 al nazra (technique of divination, sight), 7, _86n44, 87, 101, 130n68, 178 See also evil eye (ʿayn) N’degSʿad, Muhammad, 236 239, 265 _ Nder (Waalo capital), 243 N’Derī Sayār, 166, 248 250, 247n83, 265 _ Ndiao (village), 133 Niasse, Ibrahim, 213, 217 Nimjāt (village), 129 _ nomadism, 44, 63, 125 See also hassān _ 165 166, 258 259 Nouakchott, Nouhi, Muhammad Lahbib, 80 _ Nūh b. al Tāhir, 62n82,_ 193 _ _ numerological squares (al muthallath), 85, 96, 99 100 oasis towns, sell in, 188, 196, 199 200, 208 O’Brien, Susan, 97 occult knowledge, 83 occupational status in general, 29, 44 Ahl Guennar and, 222 of craftspeople, 209 210, 221 of enslaved people, 29, 64, 200, 218 of griots, 58 lahma, 29 sell_ and, 209 210 Sīdīna on, 214 social equality and, 214 See also hassān; social hierarchy; zwāya _ Ottoman Empire, 144 Oulād Bu Sbaʿ, 132n77

Index Ould Abuwāh, Muhammad, 156 160, 158f Ould Ahmad ʿAbdī,_ ʿAbdoulaye, 216 _ Ould Ahmed Salem, Zekeria, 174 175 Ould al Barā, Yahyā, 192 _ Ould Bilāl, Sīdī, 217n112 Ould Būna, al Mukhtār, 99, 103 105, 132 Ould Cheikh, Abdel Wedoud, 12, 26, 246 247 Ould Daddah, Mokhtar, 37, 163 164, 165 Ould Ebnou, Moussa, 21 Ould al Hājj Ibrāhīm, Sīdī ʿAbd Allāh, _ 99 105, 132, 149, 192 Ould Majdhūb, “the Illuminated,” 68, 103 Ould Māyaba, Muhammad al Habīballāh, _ 100 Ould Mayāba, Muhammad al Khadir, 103 _ Tolba, Shaykhāni, _ Ould Muhammad al _ _ 213, 217 Ould Mukhtār, ‘Amar Fāll ould Massamba, 255 Ould Mukhtār, Ishagh, 170n23 Ould Tāh, Hamden, 41 _ palanquins, 236 237 Palestine, 263 Palmié, Stephane, 11 12 pandemic, COVID 19179 180, 183, 275 paper, 117, 118 Park, Mungo, 116 118, 121 Parti du Peuple Mauritanien (PPM), 163 164, 165n16 pastoralists, 91, 165 patrilineality, 229 230, 231, 232 234, 249 Pederson, Morten Axel, 13 Persia, 45 46, 149 pilgrimage (hājj), 54, 94, 96, 130, 143 Pīr (village),_ 71 72, 90m, 93, 124m, 224m, 240 planet worship, 84 See also astrology poetry, 42 poison, 86 Ponty, William, 146 Portendick, 64n87, 90m, 224m possession, spirit (borī), 97 post Salafism, 176 practices, esoteric, 45, 75, 77 78, 80 81, 157 See also illicit practices prayer, 1 2, 177, 218 prayer economy, 2, 9, 167 170, 269 270, 271 272, 279 pregnancy, 194 196 See also breast milk; fertility and infertility

337 primary sources, 14, 28, 33 35, 51, 116 122 “primitive” nature, 139 progeny, 208 209 proselytization, 114, 141, 146 148, 241 prostitution, 202 protection in general, 8 by Bezeid, Ahmad, 41 42 _ by Fāll, Hammad, 234 of hassān_emirs, 151 152, 152f, 162, 273, _ 277 of houses, 18 by Islamic esoteric sciences, 96 97 from jinn, 18, 120 121 Park on, 116 117 Qur’ān, 5 6 against raids, 239, 273 against sell, 194, 195 seven part square (musabbaʿ), 100 tazzuba, 70 71, 73, 77, 130, 246 247 in Trārza, 18 Pulaar (language), 7n18, 199 See also Halpulaaren communities al Qadhāfī, Muʿammar, 262 263, 266 Qādiriyya (Sufi path), 74, 76, 77n5, 80, 93, 97 98, 104, 109, 129, 132n77, 253 al Qāʿida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), 157 159, 181 Qom, 263 Quds Day protests, 263 Quellien, Alain, 139 140 al Qūl, Shāykh, 269n2 Qur’ān 2:255, 5, 84n35, 85 17:82, 49n30 20:66, 83 41:44, 49n30 113, 5n11 amulets and, 81 82, 147 authority of, 5, 81 83, 102, 122, 162, 171, 173, 276 277 āyat al kursī, 5, 84n35, 85 Bamba, Amadu, handwritten copy given to, 256, 265 barzakh in, 21 concealed truths in, 49 on devils, 84n34 al falaq, 5n11 al fātiha, 5, 84n35, 85 _ 5 7, 33, 81 83, 276 277 healing, ingesting of words, 5, 7, 33, 116 117, 121 122, 162

338

Index

Qur’ān (cont.) invisible agents, authenticating, 20, 46, 49 al muʿawwidhatān, 5, 82, 84n35 Ould al Hājj Ibrāhīm on, 102 _ sharʿiyya (permitted recitation al ruqya al of the Qur’ān), 172 173, 177 181, 183, 272, 279 on sihr, 46 _ 70, 83 T āhā, _ _ tubī, 82 al Qur _ race in general, 29 Ahl Guennar and, 222, 223 224, 239 240, 253, 264, 266 267 bīdān (see bīdān) _ magic_(hikma al kahla), 102, 204, black 264 Black people (see Black people) colonial officials on, 35, 127 128, 131, 139 141, 153 ethnicity and, 235 236 les événements of 1989/90, 262 of Fulbe, 88 89, 98 in Ghana empire, 53 l’hjāb and, 157 158, 222 223, 249 _ Islam and, 24 25, 223 proselytization and, 114, 141, 146 148 sell and, 190, 196 200, 201, 209 210, 219 220 sihr and, 196 198, 263 264 _ white people (see bīdān) _ 163 radio broadcasting, 160, Ragāybāt (tribal confederation), 73n123, 109 110 raids by Ahl Attam, 247 248 by bīdān, 127 129, 245 _ by hassān, 151, 254 255 _ Mamūn, 109 111, 143 by al protection from, 239, 273 slave raiding, 243, 245 Ranger, Terence, 15 recitation with non Arabic words, 81 83, 86, 96, 102, 158, 197 Reese, Scott, 10, 19, 20 reformist movements in Arabian Peninsula, 94 95 by Dedew, 176 178 by Fulbe, 89 91, 92 94, 94 96, 98, 132 in Hausaland, 89n56, 93, 96, 106 against l’hjāb, 44 45, 96, 172 173, 181 183 _ local contexts of, 96, 105 106 in Mali, 41 42, 44 45, 181 182

military requirement for, 104 against non Muslim powers, 132 Sufism and, 94 95, 97 98 Wahhābiya, 91n61, 94 95, 97 religious authority of Ahl Guennar, 240 242 gender and, 259 of Wolof speaking students, 240 of zwāya, 30, 43, 65 66, 104, 246 remote vampirism, 205 See also sell (bloodsucking) renewer of Islam (mahdi), 67 retribution, form of (tazzuba), 70 71, 73, 77, 130, 246 247 al Ridā, ʿAlī (ould Muhammad Nājī _ al_ Saʿ īdī), 223n3, 269n2, 271 272, 273 _ ancestors (al salihīn), 172 righteous _ _ rituals, 17 18 roads, 258 259 Robinson, David, 141 Rosso (city), 124m, 163m, 224m, 258 259 Roume, Ernest, 137, 141 ruqya (recitation), 81 83, 86, 96, 102, 158, 197, 279 al ruqya al sharʿiyya (permitted recitation of the Qur’ān), 172 173, 177 181, 183, 272, 279 rural populations, 91, 165 Rushd al ghāfil wa nasīhat al jāhil (Ould _ al Hājj Ibrāhīm),_ 100 _ Saʿadī dynasty, 227, 229 Saberū (freed man), 216 217 sacrificial slaughtering, 68 saghnīa (sorcerers/bloodsucking), 193, 199 See also sell Sahara in general, 3 4 as barzakh, 21 22, 29 30 colonization, 35, 111 economy, 44 education in, Islamic, 44, 47 48, 79 80 emirates, 90m harsh environment, 9, 119, 121 l’hjāb in, 9, 43, 59, 188 _ inhabitants, 22 24 Islam in, spread of, 24 Islamic culture, Saharan, 75 76, 113 Islamic jurisprudence in, 86 87 map, 27m, 90m migration and exchange in, 27 30 political administration, lack of, 26, 43 44, 65 66, 105 106, 150 polities, 90m religions in, 121 122

Index sharifism in, 228 230 trade in (see trans Saharan trade)See also colonization in Mauritania; Mauritania; West Africa saharū (enchantment), 83 84 _ Liana, 46 47 Saif, Saint Louis (Senegal), 124m, 125, 224m saints baraka emanating from graves, 42, 59 60, 63, 158 160, 182 criticism of veneration of, 94, 97, 103, 181 desecration of graves (see graves, desecration of) God, closeness to, 48 49 See also shuyūkh; Sufism salafism, 41, 42, 182 al salihīn (the righteous ancestors), 172 _ _ 7, 66, 82 83 saliva, salt, 76, 77, 149, 154, 238 sand divination, 50, 61, 101 from graves, 172 healing, used for, 33 Sanhāja (Berber) confederation, 23 24, _ 25 26, 52, 53, 64 Sansanding (town), 117 Sāqiya al Hamrā’ (desert space), 130 Sarr, Assan, 234 Sarr, Intay, 240 241 Saudi Arabia, 178 179 “savages,” 139 Schmitz, Jean, 225, 241 242 scholarly elite (torodbe), 75, 88, 98 scholars. See education; Fulbe; Kunta; zwāya sciences of the unseen (ʿulūm al ghayb), 77 secrecy, 7 8, 32 33, 158, 226 227 secret beneficial prayers (al fawā’id), 56, 58 sedentarization, 151, 152 Sélibaby, 124m, 133 135, 138, 162, 263m, 224m sell (bloodsucking) in general, 187 191, 203 204 bitter blood, 194, 195 colonial officials on, 190 191, 201, 202 203 denial of accusations, 206, 211, 219 Eʿli Shieykh ould Momma, 1 2, 187 189 enslaved people and (see sell and slavery) healing victims of, 192, 206, 211 212 karkara, 193, 199 al Kuntī on, 193 194 legal counsil after, 207 208, 211 212 in oasis towns, 188, 196, 199 200, 208

339 occupational status and, 209 210 precolonial descriptions of, 191 194 pregnancy and, 194 196 protection against, 194, 195 punishment for, 206 207 race and, 190, 196 200, 201, 209 210, 219 220 remote vampirism, 205 saghnīa, 192, 193, 199 Sīdīna on, 215, 219 as sihr, 194, 195 199, 204 _ and (see sell and slavery) slavery social hierarchy and, 187, 189 190, 210 211, 211 212, 220 221 soul eating, 199 symptoms of victims, 205 206 unique to Saharan West, 87 women and (see sell and women) sell and slavery countering of, by hajjāba, 188 enslaved accused _of sell, 190 192, 196 201, 207 209, 220 221, 278 279 Sīdīna and, 216 217 sell and women Muhammad al Kuntī on, 194 195 _ in oasis towns, 200 Sīdīna and, 215 216 women accused of sell, 189, 192, 204 206, 208 211 Senegal, 125, 138, 179n51, 223, 224 225 Senegal River Valley, 66 67, 127, 224 225, 224m, 241, 245 246, 262 Senegambia, 18 Senghor, Léopold Sédar, 163n10 Service des affaires musulmanes, 137, 146 Sevea, Teren, 20 seven part square (musabbaʿ), 100 Seville, 26 Shādhiliyya (Sufi path), 48, 69, 76, 79n19, 93, 253 Shamharūsh (jinn), 18, 62n82 Shams al Dīn, 68, 231, 232 Shams al maʿārif (Ahmad al Būnī), 101 _ sharīʿa. See Islamic jurisprudence sharifism. See Ahl Guennar, prophetic descent of; shurafā’ shayātīn (devils), 84n34, 174 _ al Shaykh Muhammad al Hāfiz al Tījānī, _ _ 213n98 _ Shaykh ould Ovāh, 268n2 shaykhs. See hajjāba; shuyūkh _ Sherakūba (aunt of Sayār Fāll), 258 262, _ 266 Shīʿism, 94, 263, 265n145

340

Index

Shinqīt _ education in, 63, 79 80, 93 Ould al Hājj Ibrāhīm in, 99 _ political authority in, 26 postcolonial discourse on, 265 sell in, 205 206 as trading town, 54 al Shinqīt (Ahmad ould al Amīn), 196 _198,_ 200 shirk (idolatry), 94 Shiyam al zwāya (al Yadālī), 69 shrines, 237n44 Shur Būbba (war), 44 45, 64 73, 91, 240 244 shurafā’ (descendants of the Prophet), 146, 224, 227 233 See also Ahl Guennar, prophetic descent of shuyūkh (Sufi teachers and guides) colonial officials and, 110 112, 119 120, 126 129, 134, 136 138, 141 146, 151 152, 155 in contemporary Mauritania, 175 God, closeness to, 48 49 mobility, restricting of, 112, 143 postcolonial state relations with, 163 164 See also hajjāba Siddīqiyya_(Sufi path), 257 _ Sīdīna, Muhammad Lemīn ould, 212 219, 220 _ Sīdiyya Bābā, 128 129, 274 Sīdiyya family, 98, 132n77, 151, 274 275 Sīdiyya al Kabīr, 12n37, 80, 85 86, 100, 274 sihr (sorcery) _ in general, 5 comedy sketch on, 169 170 l’hjāb and, 172 173, 264 _ Islamic knowledge vs., 43 Mā’ al ʿAynayn, performed by, 131 132, 143n122 Muhammad al Kuntī on, 83 85 _ al Hājj Ibrāhīm, 99 100 Ould permitted_ uses of, 84 86 punishment for, 49 50, 61, 195, 206 207 in Qur’ān, 46 race and, 196 198, 263 264 Saʿd Būh accused of using, 129 sell as, 194, 195 199, 204 seven part square (musabbaʿ), 100 treating of, 183 unintelligible language as, 83 Sijilmāsa (town), 25, 27m, 47, 52n44, 56m, 79n19

slave trade after Shur Būbba, 64, 91 commodities, enslaved people as, 24, 64, 127, 238 kidnapping, 243, 245 slavery abolition of, 22, 133 134, 155, 188, 190, 201 202, 211, 278 279 Ahl Guennar and, 238, 239, 242 243, 244, 252, 254 Black non Muslims as legally enslaveable, 24 25, 140 ceddo (soldiers), 242, 252n99 in colonial period, 201 202, 211 diets of enslaved people, 200, 208 genealogy and, 242 hrātīn, 208 211, 213, 216 217, 218, _ 220 _ 221, 225 jedāwil used against enslaved people, 248 249 killing of enslaved people, 207 manumission, 195, 200, 201 occupational status, 29, 64, 200, 218 sell associated with (see sell and slavery) Sīdīna on, 215 218 in Tigumātīn, 239 _ women, enslaved, 189, 192, 200, 201, 208 211 zwāya scholars and, 239, 246 Smāra (town), 44, 130, 252n99 Smāsīd (tribal confederation), 68, 212, 214, 217, 231, 245 snakes, 1, 70n111, 83, 234, 264 social hierarchy in general, 29 sell and, 187, 189 190, 209 211, 211 212, 220 221 Sīdīna on, 213 214, 215 216, 217 218 See also gender; genealogy; occupational status; race social media, 161, 178 180, 272, 273 soldiers of enslaved origin (ceddo), 242, 252n99 Songhay empire, 56m, 60 63, 105, 199, 229 Soninké (language), 7n18, 25, 52, 199 Sonni ʿAlī Ber, 60, 61 62 sorcery. See sihr (sorcery) _ soul eating, 199 Spadola, Emilio, 173 174, 175 spirit possession (borī), 97 spirits. See jinn spiritual mediators in general, 2 4 jinn and, 9 11, 262 263n140

Index reformists on, 102 respect earned by, 119 120 in Tijāniyya Sufism, 104 105 See also hajjāba; shuyūkh _ spiritual world, 9 11, 20 spitting (al nafth), 82 83 See also saliva Stewart, Charles, 274 Sufism in general, 15, 48 49 affiliations, shifting of, 104 105 Ahl Guennar and, 265n145 barzakh in, 20 21 colonial officials and, 110 112, 119 120, 126 129, 134, 136 138, 141 146, 151 152, 155 criticism of, 103 Dedew on, 176 177 exchange of, 174 175 Fādiliyya path, 98, 129 130, 131n74, _ 132n77 Ghuzfiyya path, 136 137, 141 l’hjāb_ and, 74 75, 175 _ Islamic jurisprudence and, 78 79 jinn in, 174 in Morocco, 48, 174, 175 Murīdiyya path, 253n105, 256, 262, 265 Nāsiriyya path, 48 _ in postcolonial Mauritania, 174 175, 176 Qādiriyya path, 74, 76, 80, 93, 97 98, 132n77, 253 reformist movements and, 94 95, 97 98 saints in (see saints) Shādhiliyya path, 48, 69, 76, 79n19, 93, 253 shuyūkh (see shuyūkh) Siddīqiyya path, 257 _ sawwuf (knowledge), 10 ta in_ Tigumātīn, 265n145 _ Tijāniyya path, 74, 95, 97 98, 104 105, 213 summoning of spirits to find lost things (invīl), 7 Sunni Mālikī Islam, 25, 26, 29, 47, 79, 102 superstition, 11 12, 122 surveillance, 109 111, 125, 137 138, 142 144, 255 257 al Suyūtī, Jalāl al Dīn, 58, 59, 60, 62n82, 191_ 192 Sy, Malik, 89n56, 90 91n57 Tagānt (emirate), 72, 90m, 99, 124m, 128n63 Tāhart (town), 47 Tajakānet (tribal confederation), 103

341 takfīr (unbelief ). See unbelief Takrūr (polity), 27m, 53, 89 talismans al Lamtūnī on, 58 59 astrology and, 46 47 in contemporary Mauritania, 6, 157, 158, 162 163, 168 electronic, 162 163 European travellers making, 116 119, 120 122 as illicit practice, 45, 58 59, 61, 157 squares, talismanic (see jedāwil (talismanic squares)) See also amulets; written charms talk shows, 171 172 tamā’im. See amulets (tamā’im) Tamghart, 41, 43 Taneja, Anand Vivek, 18 tarbiya (spiritual training), 104 105 Tārīkh al fettāsh (chronicle), 62n82 Tarrūz bin Haddāj, 244n73 tasawwuf (Sufi knowledge), 10 _ Tāshadbīt (trading confederation), 237 Tashumsha (zwāya confederation), 43, 64, 65, 69 70, 231 taxation, 104, 111, 151, 249, 255 256, 273 Tāya, Muʿāwiya ould Sīd Ahmad, 176, 273 _ _ 70 71, 73, tazzuba (form of retribution), 77, 130, 246 247 television comedy, 160 161, 162, 166 170, 171 172, 179 debate on l’hjāb, 156 160 _ 160 private sector, talk shows, 171 172 Tendgha (tribe), 231 terrorism, 175 Thiam, Aissa, 243 thistle pills, 178, 179 180, 183 Thurston, Alexander, 176 al tibb al taqlīdī (traditional medicine), 7 8, _ 86 Tigumātīn (village), 163m, 224m _ in general, 265 266 droughts in, 257n120, 260 education in, 239 240, 254 255 family tensions in, 257 258, 259 264 Gàmmu festival, 265 investment and development in, 262 263, 266 jinn in, 166 Muhammad N’degSʿad in, 236 239 _ Sayār, 246 250 N’Derī _ of Ahl Guennar, 222, 224, origin story 231 232, 235

342

Index

Tigumātīn (village) (cont.) Quds _Day protests, 263 shrine, 237n44 slavery in, 239 Sufism in, 265n145 wells, 231, 244, 258, 260 261 See also Trārza (emirate) al Tījānī, Ahmad, 95, 97 _ path), 74, 95, 97 98, Tijāniyya (Sufi 104 105, 213 Tījīkja (town), 124m, 137, 196 198, 163m, 224m Tijunīn, 109 111, 124m, 143 Timbo (town), 89n56, 90m Timbuktu (town), 27m, 56m, 90m, 124m destruction of graves in, 42, 157 exchange in, intellectual, 44, 54, 56, 59 60, 62 63 fall of, 111 112 l’hjāb in, 55, 59 60 _ Islamist reform in, 181 182 Tīshīt (town), 26, 27m, 54, 56m, 63, 90m, 124m, 128n63, 265 tombs, 26, 68, 70n111, 94, 103 See also graves torodbe (scholarly elite), 75, 88, 98 See also education; Fulbe Touba (city), 163m, 262, 265, 266 Toungen (village), 163m, 224m, 224, 238, 239, 243 244, 246, 252 Touré, Sékou, 164 165 trade commodities (see commodities) Kunta, 76 slave trade (see slave trade) trading confederations (see specific trading confederations) trans Atlantic, 64 trans Saharan (see trans Saharan trade) between Wolof populations and bīdān, _ 225 traditional medicine (al tibb al taqlīdī), 7 8, _ 86 trance ritual (jadhb), 132n77 Tranchant (French commander), 110 111 translating of texts, 48 transport, magical, 69 70, 236 238 trans Saharan trade Ahl Guennar and, 236, 237 238 Almoravid, conquered by, 25 colonialism, impact of, 22, 44, 111 112 exchange of ideas through, 44, 47, 54 map, 56m See also slave trade Trārza (emirate), 90m

Ahl Guennar and, 223, 243 246, 246 251, 265 amulets worn by emirs from, 151, 152f jinn in, protection of, 18 map, 90m, 124m military control in, 128n63 political instability in, 105n111 Saʿd Būh in, 129 Shur Būbba in, 72 See also Tigumātīn (village) travel writing, 116_ 122 trees, 68, 70n111, 248 tribes, 163, 214 See also specific tribes and tribal confederations Trumbull IV, George, 138 Tuareg people, 121, 181, 125, 197n33, 223n2 tuberculosis, 203n58 Tungād (village), 90m, 124m, 208, 216 turbans, 130, 157 ʿulamā’ (scholars). See education; Fulbe; Kunta; zwāya ʿulūm al bātin (inner sciences), 10, 49 _ ʿulūm al ghayb (sciences of the unseen), 77 ʿulūm al zāhir (exoteric Islamic sciences), _ 102, 104 49, 99, ʿUmar ould ʿAli Shanzūra, 247 _ ‘Umar Tāll, al Hājj, 89n56, 94, 95, 97 98, _ 136n98, 138 umm al tirkī (cousin of Sayār Fāll), 264n143 _ umma (global Muslim community), 162 unbelief discrediting political opponents, 61 62 punishment for, 49 50, 194 195 reformist movements, 93, 94 95, 97, 103 saints, belief in, 94 95, 103 sorcery used to identify unbelievers, 84 United Arab Emirates, 174n35 urbanization, 165 166, 277 278 al Vakhāma, 274 275 vampirism, remote, 205 vandalism. See graves, desecration of veiling, 7, 23 24, 29, 146f Vikør, Knut, 94 violence by hassān, 69n110, 70 71, 104 _ against Jews, 60n74 Ould Būna on, 99n91 protection from, 42 against sorcerers, 206 208 against women, 69n110

Index visions, 136 Voisin (French commander), 140 Voll, John, 91, 95 Waalo (polity), 90m, 225, 224m, 240, 243, 250 252, 253 Wādān (town), 56m, 90m, 124m Kunta in, 77 N’degSʿad moving away from, 236 237 scholarship in, 63, 79 80, 93 as trading town, 26, 54, 265 Wahhābi activism, 91n61, 94 95, 97, 101, 178, 181 Walāta (town), 26, 48, 54, 56m, 63, 79n19, 90m, 124m, 163m, 265 walī. See hajjāba; shuyūkh; spiritual _ mediators war (Shur Būbba), 44 45, 64 73, 91, 240 244 Ware, Rudolph, 55, 56, 278 Warjābī b. Rābīs, 53 warriors, Arab. See hassān _ 196 198, 200 al Wasīt (al Shinqīt), Wastell,_ Sari, 12 _ weapons, 64, 73, 133 “wearers of the face veil” (mulaththamūn), 23 24 Webb, James, 233 234, 238 Weber, Max, 268 wells, 78, 110n7, 134 135, 231, 244, 258, 260 261 West Africa abolition of slavery, 201 al Suyūtī and, 59 l’hjāb in,_ 31 32, 52 54 _ Islam and race in, 24 25 map, 90m, 124m, 163m revolutionary events in, 93 94 See also Mauritania; Sahara Western Sahel, 90m, 95, 116 117 wet nurses, 201, 204n65, 230 231 See also breast milk WhatsApp, 178 179 “white”, Arabophone inhabitants of Saharan West (bīdān). See bīdān _ _ White, Luise, 203 wird (litany of prayers), 97 witchcraft and witchcraft trials, 154n153, 210 211, 219 Wolof populations Ahl Guennar and, 223 226, 233 234, 239 240 on Bamba, 264 bīdān, relations with, 225 226, 250 251 _ clerical revolutions, 65

343 education of, 239 240 language, 7n18, 199, 264 raids by, 245 246 soul eating in, 199 Wolof Guennar Guennar, 225 226 Wolof Waalo Waalo, 225 226, 240 women breast milk, 56, 204 dhikr performances, attending mixed gender, 213 domestic servants, 209 enslaved, 189, 192, 200, 201, 208 211 fertility and infertility, 194 196, 208 209, 269 270 gender equality, 213 214, 217 218 l’hjāb, performing, 257 259 _ l’hjāb, use of, 119, 120, 146f, 149, _ 170 171, 195 instruments, playing, 58 marriage, 119, 120, 170 171 matrilineality, 18, 44, 229, 231, 232 234 of noble status, 213, 218 pregnancy, 194 196 prostitution, 202 sell associated with (see sell and women) Sīdīna on, 213 214 violence against, 69n110 World War II, 202 Wright, Zachary, 55, 80, 95 written charms gris gris, 66 67, 134 135, 182, 255 incomprehensible words, 83, 96 ingesting of words, 5, 7, 33, 116 117, 121 122, 162 magical properties of writing, 5 6, 49, 116 118 permissibility of, 83, 96, 122 See also amulets; jedāwil; Qur’ān; talismans al Yadālī, Muhammad, 69, 70, 71 72 _ Yahyā b. Ibrahīm, 25 _ Koodé,_ 240 241 Yerim al zāhir, ʿulūm (exoteric Islamic sciences), _ 49, 99, 102, 104 Zaynab (Berber woman), 25 zemān al hayekul (time of reform), 260n132 Zenāta tribe, 25, 230 al Zenātī, Abū ʿAbd Allah Muhammad, _ 51 52 Znāga (language), 63 znāga (social group of tributary status), 29, 214, 218, 220

344

Index

zwāya (social group of scholarly status) in general, 29 colonial officials and, 110 112, 119 120, 126 129, 134, 136 138, 141 146, 151 152, 155 Fāll, Hammad and, 233 Kunta_ as, 77 81, 85, 87 88, 93 political power and, 273 religious authority of, 30, 43, 65 66, 69 71, 104, 246

Shur Būbba, consequences of, 64 68, 70 71, 71 73, 244 Sīdīna and, 217 218 slavery and, 239, 246 tazzuba, 70 71, 73, 77, 130, 246 247 al Yadālī on, 69 71 See also hassān; Kunta (tribal _ confederation); Tashumsha (zwāya confederation)

African Studies Series 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30

City Politics: A Study of Leopoldville, 1962 63, J.S. La Fontaine Studies in Rural Capitalism in West Africa, Polly Hill Land Policy in Buganda, Henry W. West The Nigerian Military: A Sociological Analysis of Authority and Revolt, 1960 67, Robin Luckham The Ghanaian Factory Worker: Industrial Man in Africa, Margaret Peil Labour in the South African Gold Mines, Francis Wilson The Price of Liberty: Personality and Politics in Colonial Nigeria, Kenneth W. J. Post and George D. Jenkins Subsistence to Commercial Farming in Present Day Buganda: An Economic and Anthropological Survey, Audrey I. Richards, Fort Sturrock, , and Jean M. Fortt (eds), Dependence and Opportunity: Political Change in Ahafo, John Dunn and A. F. Robertson African Railwaymen: Solidarity and Opposition in an East African Labour Force, R. D. Grillo Islam and Tribal Art in West Africa, , Rene´ A. Bravmann, Modern and Traditional Elites in the Politics of Lagos, P. D. Cole Asante in the Nineteenth Century: The Structure and Evaluation of a Political Order, Ivor Wilks Culture, Tradition and Society in the West African Novel, Emmanuel Obiechina Saints and Politicians, Donal B. Cruise O’Brien The Lions of Dagbon: Political Change in Northern Ghana, Martin Staniland Politics of Decolonization: Kenya Europeans and the Land Issue 1960 1965, Gary B. Wasserman Muslim Brotherhoods in the Nineteenth Century Africa, B. G. Martin Warfare in the Sokoto Caliphate: Historical and Sociological Perspectives, Joseph P. Smaldone Liberia and Sierra Leone: An Essay in Comparative Politics, Christopher Clapham Adam Kok’s Griquas: A Study in the Development of Stratification in South Africa, Robert Ross Class, Power and Ideology in Ghana: The Railwaymen of Sekondi, Richard Jeffries West African States: Failure and Promise, , John Dunn (ed), Afrikaaners of the Kalahari: White Minority in a Black State, Margo Russell and Martin Russell A Modern History of Tanganyika, John Iliffe A History of African Christianity 1950 1975, Adrian Hastings Slaves, Peasants and Capitalists in Southern Angola, 1840 1926, W. G. Clarence Smith The Hidden Hippopotamus: Reappraised in African History: The Early Colonial Experience in Western Zambia, GywnPrins Families Divided: The Impact of Migrant Labour in Lesotho, Colin Murray Slavery, Colonialism and Economic Growth in Dahomey, 1640 1960, Patrick Manning

31 Kings, Commoners and Concessionaries: The Evolution of Dissolution of the Nineteenth Century Swazi State, Philip Bonner 32 Oral Poetry and Somali Nationalism: The Case of Sayid Mahammad ‘Abdille Hasan, Said S. Samatar 33 The Political Economy of Pondoland 1860 1930, William Beinart 34 Volkskapitalisme: Class, Capitals and Ideology in the Development of Afrikaner Nationalism, 1934 1948, Dan O’Meara 35 The Settler Economies: Studies in the Economic History of Kenya and Rhodesia 1900 1963, Paul Mosely 36 Transformations in Slavery: A History of Slavery in Africa,1st edition, Paul Lovejoy 37 Amilcar Cabral: Revolutionary Leadership and People’s War, Patrick Chabal 38 Essays on the Political Economy of Rural Africa, Robert H. Bates 39 Ijeshas and Nigerians: The Incorporation of a Yoruba Kingdom, 1890s 1970s, J. D. Y. Peel 40 Black People and the South African War, 1899 1902, Peter Warwick 41 A History of Niger 1850 1960, Finn Fuglestad 42 Industrialisation and Trade Union Organization in South Africa,1924 1955, Stephen Ellis 43 The Rising of the Red Shawls: A Revolt in Madagascar 1895 1899, Stephen Ellis 44 Slavery in Dutch South Africa, Nigel Worden 45 Law, Custom and Social Order: The Colonial Experience in Malawi and Zambia, Martin Chanock 46 Salt of the Desert Sun: A History of Salt Production and Trade in the Central Sudan, Paul E. Lovejoy 47 Marrying Well: Marriage, Status and Social Change among the Educated Elite in Colonial Lagos, Kristin Mann 48 Language and Colonial Power: The Appropriation of Swahili in the Former Belgian Congo, 1880 1938, Johannes Fabian 49 The Shell Money of the Slave Trade, Jan Hogendorn and Marion Johnson 50 Political Domination in Africa, Patrick Chabal 51 The Southern Marches of Imperial Ethiopia: Essays in History and Social Anthropology, Donald Donham and Wendy James 52 Islam and Urban Labor in Northern Nigeria: The Making of a Muslim Working Class, Paul M. Lubeck 53 Horn and Crescent: Cultural Change and Traditional Islam on the East African Coast, 800 1900, Randall L. Pouwels 54 Capital and Labour on the Kimberley Diamond Fields, 1871 1890, Robert Vicat Turrell 55 National and Class Conflict in the Horn of Africa, John Markakis 56 Democracy and Prebendal Politics in Nigeria: The Rise and Fall of the Second Republic, Richard A. Joseph 57 Entrepreneurs and Parasites: The Struggle for Indigenous Capitalism in Zaire, Janet MacGaffey 58 The African Poor: A History, John Iliffe 59 Palm Oil and Protest: An Economic History of the Ngwa Region, South Eastern Nigeria, 1800 1980, Susan M. Martin 60 France and Islam in West Africa, 1860 1960, Christopher Harrison

61 Transformation and Continuity in Revolutionary Ethiopia, Christopher Clapham 62 Prelude to the Mahdiyya: Peasants and Traders in the Shendi Region, 1821 1885, Anders Bjorkelo 63 Wa and the Wala: Islam and Polity in Northwestern Ghana, Ivor Wilks 64 H.C. Bankole Bright and Politics in Colonial Sierra Leone, 1919 1958, Akintola Wyse 65 Contemporary West African States, Donal Cruise O’Brien, John Dunn, , and Richard Rathbone (eds), 66 The Oromo of Ethiopia: A History, 1570 1860, Mohammed Hassen 67 Slavery and African Life: Occidental, Oriental, and African Slave Trades, Patrick Manning 68 Abraham Esau’s War: A Black South African War in the Cape, 1899 1902, Bill Nasson 69 The Politics of Harmony: Land Dispute Strategies in Swaziland, Laurel L. Rose 70 Zimbabwe’s Guerrilla War: Peasant Voices, Norma J. Kriger 71 Ethiopia: Power and Protest: Peasant Revolts in the Twentieth Century, Gebru Tareke 72 White Supremacy and Black Resistance in Pre Industrial South Africa: The Making of the Colonial Order in the Eastern Cape, 1770 1865, Clifton C. Crais 73 The Elusive Granary: Herder, Farmer, and State in Northern Kenya, Peter D. Little 74 The Kanyok of Zaire: An Institutional and Ideological History to 1895, John C. Yoder 75 Pragmatism in the Age of Jihad: The Precolonial State of Bundu, Michael A. Gomez 76 Slow Death for Slavery: The Course of Abolition in Northern Nigeria, 1897 1936, Paul E. Lovejoy and Jan S. Hogendorn 77 West African Slavery and Atlantic Commerce: The Senegal River Valley, 1700 1860, James F. Searing 78 A South African Kingdom: The Pursuit of Security in the Nineteenth Century Lesotho, Elizabeth A. Elredge 79 State and Society in Pre colonial Asante, T. C. McCaskie 80 Islamic Society and State Power in Senegal: Disciples and Citizens in Fatick, Leonardo A. Villalon 81 Ethnic Pride and Racial Prejudice in Victorian Cape Town: Group Identity and Social Practice, Vivian Bickford Smith 82 The Eritrean Struggle for Independence: Domination, Resistance and Nationalism, 1941 1993, Ruth Iyob 83 Corruption and State Politics in Sierra Leone, William Reno 84 The Culture of Politics in Modern Kenya, Angelique Haugerud 85 Africans: The History of a Continent, 1st edition, John Iliffe 86 From Slave Trade to ‘Legitimate’ Commerce: The Commercial Transition in Nineteenth Century West Africa, , Robin Law (ed), 87 Leisure and Society in Colonial Brazzaville, Phyllis Martin 88 Kingship and State: The Buganda Dynasty, Christopher Wrigley 89 Decolonialization and African Life: The Labour Question in French and British Africa, Frederick Cooper 90 Misreading the African Landscape: Society and Ecology in an African Forest Savannah Mosaic, James Fairhead, , and Melissa Leach, 91 Peasant Revolution in Ethiopia: The Tigray People’s Liberation Front, 1975 1991, John Young

92 Senegambia and the Atlantic Slave Trade, Boubacar Barry 93 Commerce and Economic Change in West Africa: The Oil Trade in the Nineteenth Century, Martin Lynn 94 Slavery and French Colonial Rule in West Africa: Senegal, Guinea and Mali, Martin A. Klein 95 East African Doctors: A History of the Modern Profession, John Iliffe 96 Middlemen of the Cameroons Rivers: The Duala and Their Hinterland, c.1600 1960, Ralph Derrick, Ralph A. Austen, , and Jonathan Derrick, 97 Masters and Servants on the Cape Eastern Frontier, 1760 1803, Susan Newton King 98 Status and Respectability in the Cape Colony, 1750 1870: A Tragedy of Manners, Robert Ross 99 Slaves, Freedmen and Indentured Laborers in Colonial Mauritius, Richard B. Allen 100 Transformations in Slavery: A History of Slavery in Africa, 2nd edition, Paul E. Lovejoy 101 The Peasant Cotton Revolution in West Africa: Cote d’Ivoire, 1880 1995, Thomas E. Basset 102 Re imagining Rwanda: Conflict, Survival and Disinformation in the Late Twentieth Century, Johan Pottier 103 The Politics of Evil: Magic, State Power and the Political Imagination in South Africa, Clifton Crais 104 Transforming Mozambique: The Politics of Privatization, 1975 2000, , M.Anne Pitcher, 105 Guerrilla Veterans in Post War Zimbabwe: Symbolic and Violent Politics, 1980 1987, Norma J. Kriger 106 An Economic History of Imperial Madagascar, 1750 1895: The Rise and Fall of an Island Empire, Gwyn Campbell 107 Honour in African History, John Iliffe 108 Africans: A History of a Continent, , 2nd edition,, John Iliffe 109 Guns, Race, and Power in Colonial South Africa, William Kelleher Storey 110 Islam and Social Change in French West Africa: History of an Emancipatory Community, Sean Hanretta 111 Defeating Mau Mau, Creating Kenya: Counterinsurgency, Civil War and Decolonization, Daniel Branch 112 Christianity and Genocide in Rwanda, Timothy Longman 113 From Africa to Brazil: Culture, Identity, and an African Slave Trade, 1600 1830, Walter Hawthorne 114 Africa in the Time of Cholera: A History of Pandemics from 1817 to the Present, Myron Echenberg 115 A History of Race in Muslim West Africa, 1600 1960, Bruce S. Hall 116 Witchcraft and Colonial Rule in Kenya, 1900 1955, Katherine Luongo 117 Transformations in Slavery: A History of Slavery in Africa, , 3rd edition,, Paul E. Lovejoy 118 The Rise of the Trans Atlantic Slave Trade in Western Africa, 1300 1589, Toby Green 119 Party Politics and Economic Reform in Africa’s Democracies, M. Anne Pitcher 120 Smugglers and Saints of the Sahara: Regional Connectivity in the Twentieth Century, Judith Scheele

121 Cross Cultural Exchange in the Atlantic World: Angola and Brazil during the Era of the Slave Trade, Roquinaldo Ferreira 122 Ethnic Patriotism and the East African Revival, Derek Peterson 123 Black Morocco: A History of Slavery and Islam, Chouki El Hamel 124 An African Slaving Port and the Atlantic World: Benguela and Its Hinterland, Mariana Candido 125 Making Citizens in Africa: Ethnicity, Gender, and National Identity in Ethiopia, Lahra Smith 126 Slavery and Emancipation in Islamic East Africa: From Honor to Respectability, Elisabeth McMahon 127 A History of African Motherhood: The Case of Uganda, 700 1900, Rhiannon Stephens 128 The Borders of Race in Colonial South Africa: The Kat River Settlement, 1829 1856, Robert Ross 129 From Empires to NGOs in the West African Sahel: The Road to Nongovernmentality, Gregory Mann 130 Dictators and Democracy in African Development: The Political Economy of Good Governance in Nigeria, A. Carl LeVan 131 Water, Civilization and Power in Sudan: The Political Economy of Military Islamist State Building, Harry Verhoeven 132 The Fruits of Freedom in British Togoland: Literacy, Politics and Nationalism, 1914 2014, Kate Skinner 133 Political Thought and the Public Sphere in Tanzania: Freedom, Democracy and Citizenship in the Era of Decolonization, Emma Hunter 134 Political Identity and Conflict in Central Angola, 1975 2002, Justin Pearce 135 From Slavery to Aid: Politics, Labour, and Ecology in the Nigerian Sahel, 1800 2000, Benedetta Rossi 136 National Liberation in Postcolonial Southern Africa: A Historical Ethnography of SWAPO’s Exile Camps, Christian A. Williams 137 Africans: A History of a Continent, , 3rd edition,, John Iliffe 138 Colonial Buganda and the End of Empire: Political Thought and Historical Imagination in Africa, Jonathon L. Earle 139 The Struggle over State Power in Zimbabwe: Law and Politics since 1950, George Karekwaivanane 140 Transforming Sudan: Decolonisation, Economic Development and State Formation, Alden Young 141 Colonizing Consent: Rape and Governance in South Africa’s Eastern Cape, Elizabeth Thornberry 142 The Value of Disorder: Autonomy, Prosperity and Plunder in the Chadian Sahara, Julien Brachet and Judith Scheele 143 The Politics of Poverty: Policy Making and Development in Rural Tanzania, Felicitas Becker 144 Boundaries, Communities, and State Making in West Africa: The Centrality of the Margins, Paul Nugent 145 Politics and Violence in Burundi: The Language of Truth in an Emerging State, Aidan Russell 146 Power and the Presidency in Kenya: The Jomo Kenyatta Years, Anaı¨s Angelo

147 East Africa after Liberation: Conflict, Security and the State since the 1980s, Jonathan Fisher 148 Sultan, Caliph, and the Renewer of the Faith: Ahmad Lobbo, the Tārīkh al fattāsh and the Making of an Islamic State in West Africa, Mauro Nobili 149 Shaping the African Savannah: From Capitalist Frontier to Arid Eden in Namibia, Michael Bollig 150 France’s Wars in Chad: Military Intervention and Decolonization in Africa, Nathaniel K. Powell 151 Islam, Ethnicity, and Conflict in Ethiopia: The Bale Insurgency, 1963 1970, Terje Østebø 152 The Path to Genocide in Rwanda: Security, Opportunity, and Authority in an Ethnocratic State, Omar Shahabudin McDoom 153 Development, (Dual) Citizenship and Its Discontents in Africa: The Political Economy of Belonging to Liberia, Robtel Neajai Pailey 154 Salafism and Political Order in Africa, Sebastian Elischer 155 Performing Power in Zimbabwe: Politics, Law and the Courts since 2000, Susanne Verheul 156 Revolutionary State Making in Dar es Salaam: African Liberation and the Global Cold War, 1961 1974, George Roberts 157 Race and Diplomacy in Zimbabwe: The Cold War and Decolonization, 1960 1984, Timothy Lewis Scarnecchia 158 Conflicts of Colonialism: The Rule of Law, French Soudan, and Faama Mademba Sèye, Richard L. Roberts