| Tin Hinan | |
|---|---|
| Tamenokalt | |
 An oil painting entitled, The Queen Tin Hinan, by Hocine Ziani. | |
| Reign | 4th-century |
| Burial | |
Tin Hinan was a 4th-century Tuareg queen. What may be her monumental tomb is located in the Sahara, at Abalessa in the Hoggar region of Algeria.
Tin Hinan is sometimes referred to as "Queen of the Hoggar", [1] [2] and by the Tuareg as Tamenokalt [3] which also means "queen". [4] The name literally means "woman of the tents", [4] but may be metaphorically translated as "mother of us all". [5]
According to the stories told in the region, Tin Hinan was a "fugitive princess" who lived some time in the fourth century AD. Driven from the northern parts of the Sahara, she and her caravan of followers, so the stories go, nearly perished in the wilderness until they stumbled upon grain in desert anthills. [6] In other legends less corroborated, Tin Hinan has been referred to as a Muslim [nb 1] of the Braber tribe of Berbers who came from Tafilalt oasis accompanied by a maidservant named Takamat. In this legend, Tin Hinan had a daughter (or granddaughter), whose name is Kella, while Takamat had two daughters. These children are said to be the ancestors of the Tuareg of the Ahaggar. Another version is that Tin Hinan had three daughters (who had totemic names referring to desert animals) who were the tribal ancestors.
By the early twentieth century, the story of Tin Hinan had long been told, and many believed that it was simply a legend or a myth. However, in 1925, explorers discovered her tomb, proving that she was a historical figure. [6] Located not far from the oasis of Abalessa, Algeria, about 1,000 miles (1550 kilometers) south of Algiers, on a rounded hill rising about 125 ft (38 meters) above the junction of two wadis, the tomb is pear-shaped in plan with a major axis of about 88 ft (27 meters). It contains 11 rooms or courts.
The tomb of Tin Hinan was opened by Byron Khun de Prorok with support from the French army in 1925, and archaeologists made a more thorough investigation in 1933. It was found to contain the skeleton of a woman (probably buried in the fourth century AD) on a wooden litter, lying on her back with her head facing east. She was accompanied by heavy gold and silver jewellery, some of it adorned with pearls. On her right forearm she wore 7 silver bracelets, and on her left, 7 gold bracelets. Another silver bracelet and a gold ring were placed with the body. Remains of a complex piecework necklace of gold and pearls (real and artificial) were also present.
A number of funerary objects were also found. These included a "Venus" statue, a glass goblet (lost during World War II), barbed arrowheads of iron, an iron knife, and a gold foil which bore the imprint of a Roman coin of Constantine I issued between 308 and 324 CE. A 4th to 5th century date is consistent with carbon dating of the wooden bed and also with the style of pottery, a pottery lamp of third-century Roman type, and other tomb furniture. [7] Tifinagh inscriptions are inscribed on the wall stones. The tomb itself is constructed in a style that is widespread in the Sahara.
An anthropological study of the remains concluded the skeleton was that of a tall middle-aged Berber woman. [7] The body is now in the Bardo National Museum in Algiers.[ citation needed ]
Tifinagh is a script used to write the Berber languages. Tifinagh is descended from the ancient Libyco-Berber alphabet. The traditional Tifinagh, sometimes called Tuareg Tifinagh, is still favored by the Tuareg Berbers of the Sahara desert in southern Algeria, northeastern Mali, northern Niger and northern Burkina Faso for use writing the Tuareg Berber language. Neo-Tifinagh is an alphabet developed by Berber Academy to adopt Tuareg Tifinagh for use with Kabyle; it has been since modified for use across North Africa.
Berbers, also called by their self-name Amazigh or Imazighen, are an ethnic group indigenous to the Maghreb region of North Africa, where they live in scattered communities across parts of Morocco, Algeria, and Libya, and to a lesser extent Tunisia, Mauritania, northern Mali, and northern Niger. Smaller Berber communities are also found in Burkina Faso and Egypt's Siwa Oasis. Historically, Berber nations have spoken Berber languages, which are a branch of the Afroasiatic language family.
The Tuareg people are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern Algeria, Niger, Mali, and Burkina Faso. Traditionally nomadic pastoralists, small groups of Tuareg are also found in northern Nigeria.
The Tuareg languages constitute a group of closely related Berber languages and dialects. They are spoken by the Tuareg Berbers in large parts of Mali, Niger, Algeria, Libya and Burkina Faso, with a few speakers, the Kinnin, in Chad.
The Sahara is a desert on the African continent. With an area of 9,200,000 square kilometres (3,600,000 sq mi), it is the largest hot desert in the world and the third-largest desert overall, smaller only than the deserts of Antarctica and the northern Arctic.
The Hoggar Mountains are a highland region in the central Sahara in southern Algeria, along the Tropic of Cancer. The mountains cover an area of approximately 550,000 km.
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Atlantida is a fantasy novel by French writer Pierre Benoit, published in February 1919. It was translated into English in 1920 as Atlantida. L'Atlantide was Benoit's second novel, following Koenigsmark, and it won the Grand Prize of the French Academy. The English translation of Atlantida was first published in the United States as a serial in Adventure magazine.
The Ténéré is a desert region in south central Sahara. It comprises a vast plain of sand stretching from northeastern Niger into western Chad, occupying an area of over 400,000 square kilometres (150,000 sq mi). The Ténéré's boundaries are said to be the Aïr Mountains in the west, the Hoggar Mountains in the north, the Djado Plateau in the northeast, the Tibesti Mountains in the east, and the basin of Lake Chad in the south. The central part of the desert, the Erg du Bilma, is centred at approximately 17°35′N10°55′E. It is the locus of the Neolithic Tenerian culture.
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Amenukal is a title for the highest Tuareg traditional chiefs; the paramount confederation leader.
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"Count" Byron Khun de Prorok was a Hungarian-American amateur archaeologist, anthropologist, and author of four travelogues. He has come to be regarded as a tomb raider, or grave robber, opening up graves and tombs and removing remains and artefacts against the wishes of those laying claim to them.
The Tin Hinan Tomb is a monumental tomb located at Abalessa in the Sahara, in the Hoggar Mountains of southern Algeria. The sepulchre was built for Tin Hinan, the Tuareg ancient Queen of the Hoggar (Ahaggar).
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