Pre-Islamic burial monuments in the Sahara are stone witnesses to past cultures. They were constructed with loose stones, stone slabs, and dry stone walls. A tumulus, a rounded stone mound, is often found at their core. The burials are predominantly inhumations in individual graves. In addition to the simple forms of tumuli, there are a number of different configurations and extensions, such as keyhole monuments or tumuli with alignements. They date back approximately 1,000 to 7,500 years and are particularly common in the Central and Western Sahara.
Distribution
The Sahara contains hundreds of thousands of burial mounds and flatter burial monuments that come in a wide variety of forms. It is estimated that 95% of these monuments are located between the 16th degree of eastern longitude (east of the Ténéré Desert) and the Atlantic Ocean. They are rarely found in dune areas, though zones of rocky material exist between the dunes. These monuments are usually found in areas with sparse vegetation. As a result, they are clearly visible, even on high-resolution satellite images, so that today at least the larger burial monuments of the Sahara have been mapped by scientists.
Chronological context
The oldest stone monuments in the Sahara are located east and west of the Nile in Nubia and date back to around 7000 BC. These monuments are not yet associated with burials, but rather with ritual practices. Around 5500 BC, as animal husbandry developed, animal graves were covered with stone structures of various shapes and sizes. Around 5000 BC, tumuli and other funerary monuments marking human burials appeared. This tradition is believed to have originated in Nubia and spread rapidly from the eastern edge of the Sahara toward the west. Around 2800 BC, monuments marking animal graves disappeared. Islamic burial customs appeared sporadically beginning in the eighth century AD, but did not become widespread until the 12th century.
Cultural and chronological classification of burial monuments in the Sahara:
Cultural era Early Bovidian Late Bovidian Early Caballine Late Caballine Cameline Grave form 5500 – 4000 BC 4000 – 2200 BC 2200 – 1000 BC 1000 BC – 0 0 – 1000 AD Tumulus x (Animal graves) x x x x x x x x Basket monument x x (Animal graves) x (Animal graves) Keyhole monument x x x Crescent tomb x x x x Plat-form tumulus x x x x x Goulet x x x x Bazina x x x x x Ring tumulus x x x Crater tumulus x x x x x Drum-shaped tomb x x x x x Antenna tomb x x Tumulus with alignements x x x x Compass tomb x x Well-like monument x Cultural background
Many monuments, especially larger ones, are located in highly visible places, such as the edges of plateaus, hillsides, and low-lying areas, so they can be seen from nearby elevations. Monuments oriented in a particular direction are usually aligned toward the east, toward sunrise or moonrise.Over the course of the year, the moonrise covers a wider angle than the sunrise. There are also monuments that point toward distinctive landscape features on the horizon or toward other monuments. Therefore, their location and placement do not appear to have been chosen at random. The deceased is almost always positioned on the right or left side with bent knees and hands beneath the face, often oriented towards the east. Grave goods are rarely found, except in the Fezzan region of southwestern Libya.
To learn more about the cultural background and living conditions of the builders of these burial monuments, it is helpful to link the individual grave forms to prehistoric rock art created during the same era in the same region. Since sufficient data is often lacking, the correlations listed below are considered plausible by scientists but have not been definitively proven.[
Socioeconomic aspects
The size of a burial monument depends on many factors. One factor that always plays a role is the amount of time and labor required, which is then unavailable for daily work. In the far southeast of the Free Zone of Western Sahara, in the Erg Azefal, there are three burial grounds containing burial monuments up to 5 meters high and 20 meters in diameter. These burial grounds contain dozens of large burial monuments and perhaps hundreds of smaller ones. Building these burial complexes required careful planning and organization of labor and materials. This necessitated a certain degree of social complexity. It also suggests that some individuals may have been accorded higher social status, reflected in the size and complexity of the monuments. A study in Libya points to this as well. In the Fezzan, a large number of skeletal remains beneath burial monuments were examined. Those buried beneath large burial structures showed no biomarkers of stress. This could indicate that these individuals held important social positions.
Types of burial monuments
Tumulus
The tumulus is the simplest and most widespread type of burial monument in the Sahara. Most tumuli are round or slightly oval. They resemble a cone in structure. Others have a more spherical shape, resembling an open umbrella. They range in diameter from two to 15 meters and in height from one to 5 meters. Some contain a pit in which the body was placed, while others were laid directly on the ground. They are protected by a stone chamber. Tumuli are particularly common in the Fezzan, the Tassili n'Ajjer, the Immidir Mountains, and northeastern Hoggar Mountains, as well as the Free Zone of Western Sahara and southeastern Mauritania (in the Sahel). In the eastern Sahara, they have been documented in the Tibesti Mountains and the Ennedi Plateau of Chad. All other types of graves except flat burial monuments contain a tumulus beneath which the remains lie. However, there are also monuments that do not contain a grave.
In the Wadi Tanezzuft in southwestern Libya, small tumuli contain the graves of children. In the highlands of southeastern Mauritania, in the Tichitt region, approximately 9,000 simple tumuli were identified using satellite imagery and classified according to their size. Five burial fields containing about 2,800 tumuli were selected from these, each dating from a different period of the Tichitt tradition. These burial fields are densely covered with tumuli of varying sizes. Assuming the size of a burial mound correlates with the social and economic status of the deceased, the extent of social inequality was determined using the Gini coefficient. Further research is necessary to draw definitive conclusions, but initial insights have been gained.
Basket monument
(also called a "corbeille") It is a flat burial monument that is usually round with a diameter ranging from one to 5 meters. Upright or outward-sloping stone slabs are set into the ground at its edge. Sometimes, there are several layers of carefully angled slabs. The interior may be covered with stone slabs or contain one or more upright stelae, some of which are engraved. However, far more complex forms also exist. Some have concentric circles around the basket. Others have radial rows of stones that divide the perimeter into sectors. Some are flanked by small stone circles that are often arranged in a regular pattern. This type of grave is particularly prevalent on the Messak Settafet high plateau in southwestern Libya, where more than 300 have been discovered. The remains of livestock have been found in these graves. This type of burial monument has also been found in Western Sahara.
Keyhole monument Due to their size and striking architecture, keyhole monuments are among the most spectacular types of burial monuments in the Sahara. They attest to the importance that the builders attached to funeral rites. Together with the goulets, they are considered the tombs of prominent members of nomadic groups. They are also believed to have served as territorial markers. Keyhole monuments usually stand alone in the landscape and rarely form small necropolises. They also exhibit few variations. This could indicate a widespread, shared burial culture.
Two antenna-like structures extend from the tumulus, forming a passageway which usually faces the sunrise. A circular stone circle surrounds the tumulus, leaving the passageway open. A second, usually oval stone circle encloses the entire complex. The overall shape resembles a keyhole. There are also graves with one or more additional tumuli that were constructed along the enclosure or in its vicinity. It is believed that the passageway was used for ritual purposes. The diameter of the outer enclosure varies from 10 to over 200 meters, though most measure between 15 and 35 meters. The Tassili n'Ajjer is believed to be the origin of this burial type. Most of these tombs are also found there. All of the examined tombs contained the remains of men. The deceased were buried in cramped pits, requiring their legs to be bound. They lay on their right side facing east. No grave goods or jewelry were found within the burial sites. This burial type is distributed westward from the Tassili n'Ajjer to the Immidir Mountains, southward to the Hoggar Massif, and southeastward to the Emi Lulu hill, located south of the Niger-Algeria border.
Crescent tomb
This monument resembles a crescent moon with blunt tips. It consists of a platform often framed by small upright stones. A tumulus rises in the center. The span between the two ends of the crescent varies from 11.7 to 38 meters in the four graves surveyed in the Hoggar, and the tumulus is between one and two meters high Orientation toward sunrise is common. This type of grave is the second most common in the Sahara, after the simple tumulus, and it is widespread from the Ténéré to the Atlantic Ocean.
Plat-form tumulus
They rest on a flat base that is sometimes paved with stone slabs. The top is often flat as well, and the floor plan is usually round or oval. This type of tomb has been studied in the Aïr Mountains in Niger. Only the remains of men were found in all of them. Women and children were likely buried in unstructured graves. Two types of these tombs were found: those with simple stone walls and those carefully covered with quartz pebbles. The latter are attributed to more prominent personalities. Platform tumuli are also found in the Fezzan, the Tassili n’Ajjer, and the Hoggar Massif. Large tombs with diameters of up to 24 meters have been found there, while in other locations, the diameter ranges from 3 to 9 meters. There is evidence that circular platforms in the Hoggar may be connected to rock engravings in the Caballin style depicting "flying, galloping horses".
Goulet
Its shape resembles that of the keyhole monument. It features a round or oval enclosure and a passageway running along its long axis. The tumulus is typically built in the western half or on the western edge of the grave structure. It consists of loose stones and is usually less than one meter high. The goulet is primarily found in the Tassili n'Ajjer and the Immidir, and it has the same distribution area as the keyhole grave. It may be a further development of the latter. The goulet is also found in western Sahara. There, a variant exists with a simple, straight stone wall instead of a passageway. Reports exist of tombs reaching 50 m and up to 500 m in northern Mauritania.
Bazina
The bazina closely resembles the plat-form tumulus. It differs from it in that it is about twice as high as an average platform tumulus. Its distinguishing feature is its outer covering, which is a carefully constructed dry stone wall. This wall may be built in steps and have an opening. A circular floor plan is predominant, though some are square. They range in diameter from 2.5 to 15 meters and can reach heights of up to 5 meters.