ii6 THE NON-ARAB RACES OF DARFUR 1. 4. xxvi.
Note on certain Egyptian or Hamitic
SURVIVALS IN DaRFUR
XXVI Sir H. Johnston^ speaks of "a wave of late Egyptian cul- ture" being borne "across the Sudan along the southern fringe of
the Sahara Desert to the Upper Niger." This he dates "immediately
prior to the Christian era." At Agades arose the Songhay people who "adopted accidentally or by influence an imitation of ancient Egyptian architecture in clay and wood instead of stone...." After subduing the Mandingo of Melle they made their headquarters for
a time "the city of Jenne at the confluence of the Niger and the
Bani. From Jenne was radiated over all the Western Sudan an apparent Egyptian influence in architectural forms, in boat-building, and other arts."
Professor Seligman, however, objects to the stress laid on Egypt: he would prefer to speak of the "Hamitic influence (of which the Egyptian civilization was only a special development) which was
leavening dark Africa, perhaps for thousands of years before Egypt
herself emerged into the light of history 2."
In this connection three facts may be cited. El Tunisi relates
as follows^:
Autre exemple de bizarrerie....Autrefois, on ne permettait pas au
Sultan du Ouaday de boire du lait frais. " Car," disaient les Ouadayens,
"si le sultan boit du lait, qu'est-ce que boiront les sujets?" Or il advint qu'un Sultan se procura une vache laitiere. On le sut dans le public ; on
s'ameuta, et on alia dire au sultan: "tu vas te defaire de ta vache, nous promettre de ne plus boire de lait, ou bien nous te tuons." II fallut obeir. Aujourd'hui cette coutume est abolie, et les sultans boivent du lait comme
tout le monde.
Superstitions concerning milk are prevalent among the tribes of
the eastern Sudan and East Africa and the Nilotic negroes, being
characteristic of a Hamitic stock or culture*. Whether the one quoted
necessarily reached Wadai from the Nile across Darfur or whether it may have come in from the north with other Libyo-Berber influences
' Loc. cit. p. 387.
^ Journ. Attthr. Inst, xlhi, 1913, p. 420. See also "Address to the Anthrop. Section of the Brit. Assoc, for the Advancement of Science," 1915. Barth thought he found various linguistic analogies between Tibbu and ancient Egyptian, and the " Tarfkh el Khamfs " (q.r. supro, p. 72) appears to derive the Tibbu from Egypt (see Carbou, u, 116), but M. Ren^ Basset notes (Carbou, I, 117) the matter is extremely doubtful and "Si le toubou est apparent^ h I'^gyptien, il Test par consequent au berbere qui appartient au groupe chamitique, appel^ aussi proto-semitique."
* Voy. au Ouaday, p. 393.
* Seligman, loc. cit. p. 654, and in Man, March 1915 {re the Bishdrfn). Cp. Browne, p. 466, for one striking instance.