The anthropologist Henri Schirmer pointed out that " with the Tuareg, the idea that a man is free and a brigand is so inseparable that the same verb (Iohagh) means both 'he is free' and 'he pillages'. "


In Tuareg society the men wear veils, the women don't.
The tagelmoust was designed expressly for protection against blowing sand and the sun. But traditionally the tagelmoust is kept in place even when at home, sipping tea with the cup passed under the veil and keeping the mouth covered. In certain clans the tagelmoust is even kept in place when sleeping and it is said, when making love. The Tuareg have forgotten the reason they do this tagelmoust. It must be right, they say, for it was the fashion of their forefathers.




The Tuaregs are a desert semi-nomadic people of the Sahara, and as muslims, although errant in their beliefs, and as bandits, although a proper caravan with reasonable booty hasn't passed their best ambush hills in fifty years or more, the men are entitled to four wives, who, under law, must be treated equally.
Now here's the catch. It is not enough for them to treat their females equality. They, all four disconcerting* females, must each think that they are being treated equally. So catch 22, each Tuareg male, ha ha, has but one wife.

Tuareg women--young and old, vassal and noble--look and act like aristocrats. They seem not just independent but occasionally overbearing: They leave their husbands and return to their parents on the slightest pretext. All matters of inheritance pass through the female line, which is one reason the men find divorce so difficult, and why many Tuareg men prefer to delay marriage until after their mid-twenties, and content themselves with non-Tuareg concubines.

Traditionally, women are held in such respect that they are seldom molested, and rape is vanishingly uncommon, punishable by death."Men and women toward each other are for the eyes and for the heart, and not just the bed" is a common Tuareg aphorism. After marriage, a Tuareg woman is expected to keep a number of male friends who are encouraged to visit her tent even while the husband is away.

In a society with unsubmissive females and males so often away for extended periods, there are many curiosities of belief. Gustav Nachtigal found that "no Tuareg doubts for a moment that a child can 'sleep' in the womb for many years, or even forever. This pious faith gives a frivolous wife a welcome and convenient pretext for representing to her husband in a respectable light any increase in the family that might have taken place in his absence. The embryo of the child was conceived before he set out on his long journey but God then neglected to waken it on time to effective life, to birth. In such a case, indeed, a husband may be unable completely to suppress his doubts, but against the possibility there is nothing to be said."


Wording in blue denotes direct quotes from the book
SAHARA: A NATURAL HISTORY ~ Marq de villiers and Sheula Hirtle


* Note:[post edit] There....thats better.


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