Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 2.djvu/315

 KABYLIA. 255 anterior even to the present Kubyles. These are designated by the term Juhalu, applied also both to llomaus and " pagans." In many places occur circular holes tilled with refuse, which apjicur to have served as human habitations. A looal legend, similar to that current in the Altai region regarding the mysterious " Chudes," relates how a denizen of these half-Hubterranean dwellings, <m falling seriously ill and feeling his end approach, sawed asunder the post supporting the roof, then with a last effort pushing the post aside, buried himself beneath the ruins. At present the population of Great Eabylia, with an area of 2,200 square miles, may be estimated at about half a million, or over two hundred to the square mile. Were this proportion maintained throughout the whole country, from the Mediter- ranean to the verge of the desert, Algeria would have a population of some forty millions. But before the French occupation, incessant intertribal warfare pre- vented the natural growth of the people. The Kabyles, who are grouped in at least a hundred tribes and over a hundred secondary clans, are also divided into »o/f«, or political factions, which are constantly uniting, breaking asunder, and reconstituting themselves, according to the shifting interests and passions of the several groups. Warfare was their destiny, said the natives themselves, a curse of Lalla Khedija having condemned them to everlasting discord. The confederations formed from time to time against a common enemy seldom lasted long, after the passing danger the league being dissolved and each fraction resuming its autonomy. Nevertheless the Kabyles were conscious of the ties of kinship connecting all their tribes, and the memory of their conmion origin was perpetuated by ethnical names common to the whole nation. The term Ait is used to indicate a federal union, not community of origin, like the Arab word U/dd, which is reserved for tribes of Semitic descent ; while Beni, also an Arab word, is applied to both races, but especially to the Kabyles. The chief tribal group is that of the Zwawa (Igawawen), whose name has been frequently used in a collective sense for all the Kabyles. In Tunis it was still recently applied to the Berber highlanders, and during the early days of the French occupation it served, under the form of " Zouave," to designate contingents of native troops recruited chiefly amongst the Kabyles. The Zwawas, numbering about one hundred and fifty thousand, occupy on the northern slope of the Jurjura nearly the whole Upper Scbau basin, nearly to its confluence with the Wed Aissi. To this family belong the Ait-Yahias, whose central village of Kuku or Kuko, occupying the site of an old Roman station, was formerly regarded as a sort of capital for the whole of Kabylia, although containing scarcely more than sixteen hundred inhabitants. The Ait-Fmucen are also Zwawas. and in their territory is situated the formerly imjjortant town of Jeinao'ea-Suhnj, or " Collection of Basins," so named from the numerous reservoirs constructed in this district during the Roman epoch. In the same group are classed the Ait-Batrun, settled west of the Wed Aissi, and the brave Ait-Iraten, whose village of Inheraiircn has been replaced by Fort Nntiona/, the chief French stronghold in Great Kabylia. In the upper Wed-Bu-Gdura basin, towards the south-west angle of these