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The original inhabitants of Mauritania were the Bafour, presumably a Mande ethnic group, connected to the contemporary Arabized minor social group of Imraguen ("fishermen") on the Atlantic coast.
The history of Western Sahara can be traced back to the times of Carthaginian explorer Hanno the Navigator in the 5th century BC. Though few historical records are left from that period, Western Sahara's modern history has its roots linked to some nomadic groups such as the Sanhaja group, and the introduction of Islam and the Arabic language at the end of the 8th century AD.
Dakhla is a city in the disputed territory of Western Sahara, currently occupied by Morocco. It is the capital of the claimed Moroccan administrative region Dakhla-Oued Ed-Dahab. It has a population of 106,277 and is on a narrow peninsula of the Atlantic Coast, the Río de Oro Peninsula, about 550 km (340 mi) south of Laayoune.
The Atlantic humpback dolphin is a species of humpback dolphin that is found in coastal areas of West Africa.
Beni Ḥassan was a Bedouin Arab tribe which inhabited Western Sahara, Mauritania, Morocco and Algeria. It was one of the four sub-tribes of the Beni Maqil who emigrated in the 11th century from South Arabia to the Maghreb with the Bani Hilal and Banu Sulaym Arab tribes. In the 13th century, they occupied the Sanhaja territories in the southwest of the Sahara. In Morocco, they first settled, alongside their Maqil relatives, in the area between Tadla and the Moulouya River. The Sous Almohad governor called upon them for help against a rebellion in the Sous, and they resettled in and around that region. They later moved to Mauritania, and from the 16th century onwards, they managed to push back all black Mauritanians southwards to the Senegal Valley river. The Beni Hassan and other warrior Arab tribes dominated the Sanhaja Berber tribes of the area after the Char Bouba war of the 17th century. As a result, Arabian culture and language came to dominate, and the Berber tribes underwent Arabisation. The Bani Hassan dialect of Arabic became used in the region and is still spoken, in the form of Hassaniya Arabic. The hierarchy established by the Beni Hassan tribe gave Mauritania much of its sociological character. That ideology has led to oppression, discrimination and even enslavement of other groups in Mauritania.
Hassānīya is a variety of Maghrebi Arabic spoken by Mauritanian Arabs and the Sahrawi. It was spoken by the Beni Ḥassān Bedouin tribes of Yemeni origin who extended their authority over most of Mauritania and Morocco's southeastern and Western Sahara between the 15th and 17th centuries. Hassānīya Arabic was the language spoken in the pre-modern region around Chinguetti.
The Sahrawis, or Sahrawi people, are an ethnic group and nation native to the western part of the Sahara desert, which includes the Western Sahara, southern Morocco, much of Mauritania, and along the southwestern border of Algeria. They are of mixed Hassani Arab and Sanhaji Berber descent, as well as Sub-Saharan African and other indigenous populations.
The Banc d'Arguin National Park of Bay of Arguin lies in Western Africa on the west coast of Mauritania between Nouakchott and Nouadhibou and is the former mouth of the Tamanrasset River. The World Heritage Site is a major site for migratory birds and breeding birds, including flamingos, pelicans and terns. Much of the breeding is on sand banks including the islands of Tidra, Niroumi, Nair, Kijji and Arguim. The surrounding waters are some of the richest fishing waters in western Africa and serve as nesting grounds for the entire western region.
The Sanhaja were once one of the largest Berber tribal confederations, along with the Zanata and Masmuda confederations. Many tribes in Algeria, Burkina Faso, Libya, Mali, Mauritania, Morocco, Niger, Senegal, Tunisia and Western Sahara bore and still carry this ethnonym, especially in its Berber form. Other names for the population include Zenaga, Znaga, Sanhája, Sanhâdja and Senhaja.
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Tidra is an offshore island 29 kilometres long and 8 km (5 mi) wide. It is the largest island off the shore of Banc d' Arguin, Mauritania and is home to a community of Imraguen fishing tribe. The island is part of the Banc d'Arguin National Park.
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Mauritania's wildlife has two main influences as the country lies in two biogeographic realms. The north sits in the Palearctic which extends south from the Sahara to roughly 19° north latitude and the south is in the Afrotropic realm. Additionally Mauritania is an important wintering area for numerous birds which migrate from the Palearctic.
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Nouamghar is a coastal village and rural commune in the Dakhlet Nouadhibou region of western Mauritania. The village is 150 kilometres north north-east of the capital Nouakchott and is located at the entrance to Cape Timiris. It is a traditional and active fishing port where ancient fishing techniques are used in which dolphins are used to surround and bring schools of fish closer to the coast and then they are caught in nets prepared for this purpose. The origin of this cooperation between people and dolphins is unknown.
Cintra Bay or the Gulf of Cintra is a large, half-moon shaped bay on the coast of Río de Oro province, Western Sahara. It is located about 120 km (75 mi) south of Dakhla. Its coastline is sparsely populated, and the environment is mostly wild and undeveloped. Originally called "St. Cyprian's Bay", it was renamed after Captain Gonçalo de Sintra, a 15th-century Portuguese explorer who was thought to have met his death in the bay during an unauthorized, unsuccessful slave raid.
Western Saharan cuisine comprises the cuisine of Western Sahara, a disputed territory in the Maghreb region of North Africa, bordered by Morocco to the north, Algeria to the extreme northeast, Mauritania to the east and south, and the Atlantic Ocean to the west. The Western Saharan cuisine has several influences, as the population of that area (Sahrawi), in their most part are of Arabic and Berber origin. The Saharawi cuisine is also influenced by Spanish cuisine owing to Spanish colonisation.
References
- ↑ Virginia Thompson and Richard Adloff, The Western Saharans, 1980, ISBN 0-7099-0369-3, page 50
- 1 2 Fishermen who "walk on water" burn their nets, Panda.org, 5 May 2004
- 1 2 (in Spanish) El pueblo imraguen, protector de la cultura y naturaleza en Mauritana, Webislam.com, 17 June 2006
- 1 2 3 4 5 (in French) Jean-Pierre Turquoi, Mauritanie : au pays des Imraguen, Lemonde.fr, 11 April 2008
- ↑ (in Spanish) Jesús Cabaleiro Larrán, La Güera, ciudad fantasma del Sahara, Periodistas-es.com, 1 August 2016
- ↑ "Language Representative Counts" . Retrieved 2023-09-01.
- ↑ Hammarström (2015) Ethnologue 16/17/18th editions: a comprehensive review: online appendices
