274 THE GUHAYNA GROUP iii.s.iv.

may have happened. When the Arabs entered the central states^

they came no doubt with their camels and sheep : cattle they presum-

ably had none, or but few. As they would have been a nuisance to

the sedentary population cultivating the central belt and would have had themselves no security for their herds, they naturally gravitated, some to the more barren spaces of the north, and some to the forests and bogs of the south. The camel of course cannot exist in the south

because of the tsetse fly and the poisonous "gulliim'' creeper, and such Arabs as went there imitated the indigenous population and

took to cattle-rearing^. This is merely suggested as one way in which

the tribes may have been divided, but there is no reason to suppose

that other causes which are readily imaginable did not also operate to

the same end. The southern group intermarried with the older negro

inhabitants and became darker in complexion: the northern group mixed in the west to some extent with the Tibbu tribes but remain

very much lighter.

V An interesting point may now be discussed. Did the Bakkara

reach their present habitat by way of the Nile or did they come due

south or south-east to the Chad region and Bornu and Wadai from North Africa, and thence spread eastwards to the Nile?

The fact that 'AbduUa el Guhani is generally regarded by them-

selves as their ancestor, and the fact that they consider the Fezara group as their cousins^, are obviously arguments in favour of the

former view: so also is the evidence of the Sudanese "nisbas," which make no suggestion of a south- easternly migration. On the other

hand, the "'Abdulla el Guhani" tradition might simply have been

appropriated from immigrants from the Nile, and some of the Bak- kara do state that their ancestors came direct from Tunis or Fezzan

with their camels to the countries west of Darfur^, and in giving

their genealogy^ or history others say of some particular forebear: "It was he who brought the tribe from Borku" [i.e. Wadai: s.c. to

Kordofan], and these forebears are, as a rule, said to have lived from

five to nine generations ago and to be the sons of the eponymous

ancestors of the various sections.

But though there is no room for doubting that considerable

^ They seem to have established themselves by "peaceful penetration" rather than by force of arms.

2 The Hawazma, e.g., told me their ancestors originally "bought a bull and a cow from a Fellati pilgrim."

^ See genealogical trees at the end of this chapter.

* E.g. see MacMichael, Tribes..., pp. 146, 151.

^ I have never seen a manuscript Bakkara pedigree, but have written down

several from oral information and seen several others so compiled. No two ever agree in every respect, but the degree of coincidence is remarkable.