Sanhaja


The Sanhaja were once one of the largest Berber tribal confederations, along with the Zanata and Masmuda confederations. Many tribes in Algeria, 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.

Triad

and others defined the Sanhaja as a grouping made up of three separate confederations, not as a single confederation. The distinction is usually made with a diacritical point placed above or below that is present in the Arabic text and often lost in English.
  1. Danhāǧa/Sanhaja is a confederation of: Kutāma-Zawāwa of the Kabyle mountains, including some areas like Algiers and Constantine that no longer speak Taqbaylit dialects. This confederation includes the Massissenses of the Quinquegentiani, which we identify with the Msisna/Imsissen/Masinissa of the Massylii, on the right bank of the Soumam. The Zirid Dynasty, Hammadid Dynasty, Fatimid Caliphate, Taifa of Alpuente, Taifa of Granada, Kingdom of Ait Abbas and Kingdom of Kuku originate from this confederation.
  2. Aznag/Iẓnagen is a confederation of: Lemta, Massufa, Warith/Banū Warit, Lamtuna/Ilemteyen, Gudāla/Djudalla/Gazzula/Geuzula/Gaetuli, Anifa, Charta, Mandala. The Gezoula-Heskoura are defined as the brothers of the Aznag as opposed to being part of the Aznag confederation. The Tebo/Tebou/Toubou speakers of Tebu are defined as Znaga according to Agnosti, Lemta by al-Yaqubi. This confederation is located primarily around the Western Sahara, Mauritania and Senegal. The Almoravids stem from the Lamtuna confederation.
  3. Ṣanhāja is a confederation of: Maṣmūda- speakers of Shilha. This confederation is located primarily in the area of the Moroccan Atlas' Shilha speakers. Some Riffians today have these tribe names. The Almohads and Hafsid Dynasty stem from this confederation.

    Origins

Berber tribes such as the Sanhadja or Kutama are often attributed Himyarite origins by Arab historians. The historian Al-Idrīsī presents one example of the Himyarite myth as following:

History

After the arrival of the religion of Islam, the Sanhaja spread out to the borders of the Sudan as far as the Senegal River and the Niger.
Sanhaja Berbers were a large part of the Berber population. From the 9th century, Sanhaja tribes were established in the Middle Atlas range, in the Rif Mountains and on the Atlantic coast of Morocco as well as large parts of the Sanhaja, such as the Kutâma, were settled in central and eastern parts Algeria and also in northern Niger. The Kutama created the empire of the Fatimids conquering all North African countries and parts of the Middle East. The Sanhaja dynasties of the Zirids and Hammâdids controlled Ifriqiya until the 12th century and established their rule in all of the countries in the Maghreb region.
In the mid-11th century, a group of Sanhaja chieftains returning from the Hajj invited the theologian Ibn Yasin to preach among their tribes. Ibn Yasin united the tribes in the alliance of the Almoravids in the middle of the 11th century. This confederacy subsequently established Morocco, and conquered western Algeria and Al-Andalus.
The Sanhaja tribes would remain in roles as either exploited semi-sedentary agriculturalists and fishermen, or higher up on the social ladder, as religious tribes. Though often Arabized in culture and language, they are believed to be descended from Sanhaja Berber population present in the area before the arrival of the Arab Maqil tribes in the 12th century, which was finally subjected to domination by Arab-descended warrior castes in the 17th century Char Bouba war.
According to Mercer, the words Zenaga or Znaga are thought to be a romanized distortion of Zenata and Sanhaja from Arabic.

Present day

The descendants of the Sanhaja and their languages are still found today in the Middle Atlas mountains, Souss, Western Sahara eastern Morocco, northern Morocco, western Algeria, Kabylia and Kabyle territories.
The Zenaga, a group believed to be of Gudala origin, inhabit southwestern Mauritania and parts of northern Senegal. However, they are a small population.