The Tuaregs I: Tin Hinan: The mother of us all.

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Sunday March 07, 2010 · 1:36 AM PST

2010/03/07 · 01:36

A gentle introduction to a people that I regard with a great deal of love and who have given me so much joy in return. I'm not a anthropologist nor ethnologist; just a traveller and sometimes humanitarian worker.

So to start at the beginning, in the beginning there is often a legend:

Sometimes when you are so great your name travels down the ages that is embedded in the psyche of your people.

Tin Hinan is one such person whose deeds were so noteworthy that she is remembered as "The mother of us all" today by the Tuareg's.

There may be a glass ceiling these days but then it had steel shutters. She moulded a group of scattered tawshet [clans] into a great nation and became their first 'Queen'.

Leaving Morocco with her maid Takamat she moved east into the desert, the people were scattered she brought them together and gave them a common identity. Around 500 AD Tin Hinan led them south into the lands they now occupy.

Little remains of her reign; just a common memory and an abiding love and respect so much so they still celebrate her life with a festival. After all as the story goes she made them into the great nation that they are:

As with many legends there is often some supporting evidence to confirm their validity.

A grain of truth:

Passed on down through the ages was the location of her last resting place Abalessa in southern Algeria.

The tomb is about 26 by 24m and 4m high and was investigated quite thoroughly in 1933 by Maurice Reygasse from the Museum of Algiers.

A woman's [I believe to be that of Tin Hinan] body was found with a number of grave artefacts such as bracelets [7 gold] and wooden drinking bowls, her tomb was never plundered [until 1920's 'archaeologist's got there] another quite stunning detail in her legend.

If you visit Algeria be sure to stop in the National Museum of Bardo. If you are well prepared, feeling adventurous and in good health you can visit her tomb.