Written By: Marafi Al Kandaka Siddig

So this is an answer to my post and a few other posts about the Sudanese identity. Respond from (Ramey Dawoud)

I’ve been asked by a few people to make this post sharing my opinion about our identity as Sudanese people based on Sudan’s history. This is a discussion for questioning, learning, and having a healthy conversation.. let’s not get upset and get into meaningless arguments please.

So the question is are we Arab or African? Well what is an Arab? What is an African? If an Arab is any person who speaks Arabic.. that does not make us Arabs because when the prophet said that he was referring to those who’s mother tongue is Arabic and at the time of the prophet ancestors did not speak Arabic. A mother tongue is your indigenous language, not the language you were forced to speak after war, colonization, or intermarriage. Also there are two categories of Arabs. There are Arabs who are indigenous Arabs and there are Arabized Arabs. Prophet Ismael married a woman from the tribes of the ancient Arabs who are beduins that live in Yemen and Oman today and speak a language that is not understood by Arabic speakers to this day, in fact it resembles the Geez languages (Amharic, Tigrinja, Beni Amir, etc).. most Arabs today claim descent from prophet Ismael who was a canaanite (Canaan was a brother of Kush, another son of Ham) and his Arab wife. Ismael himself has a Nubian (African) mother in Hajar. So either way Arabs are still related to Africans (Kushites) through the lineage od their mothers. And as far as being African goes.. well African is not an ethnic group. Africa is a name of a continent. And we are from that continent. This is not to say that some Sudanese tribes don’t have Arab roots.. that would be a lie. But we have to dig deep. Africa has almost every genetic code out there tracing back to it. This is no because outsiders are ancestors of Africans but the other way around. For example it’s scientifically possible for two black parents to have a white child. But it is scientifically impossible for two white parents to have a black child. And Allah is all powerful of course, we are just speaking from a scientific point of view. A simpler example is when a baby is born we say “the baby looks like it’s mother” we don’t tell the mother “you look like your baby”. Africa is the mother. The rest of the world are the children. So to say “Sudanese people look the way we do because we are a mixed race” is a flawed idea. The oldest mtDNA on earth traces back to the San people in southern Africa and they have yellow skin and slanted eyes.

Lets go back to ancient times.. what is Kush? It’s much more than really good weed believe it or not Lol. Kush was the son of Ham, who was the son of prophet Noah (Nuh). So the Kushites are the children of Kush son of Ham son of Noah. Kush was the elder brother of Mizraim (Misr: Egypt). However that entire region was called Kemet. What is Kemet? Kemet comes from the word “Kham” which is also another way of saying “Ham” who as we said is the son of Noah. Noahs children populated the world after the flood and Ham was the father of the Africans (Kemetic peoples).
So what language was dominant in udan before Arabic?
Lets look at the story of prophet Moses (Musa).
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وَنَادَىٰ فِرْعَوْنُ فِى قَوْمِهِۦ قَالَ يَٰقَوْمِ أَلَيْسَ لِى مُلْكُ مِصْرَ وَهَٰذِهِ ٱلْأَنْهَٰرُ تَجْرِى مِن تَحْتِىٓ ۖ أَفَلَا تُبْصِرُونَ ﴿٥١﴾
English –
And Pharaoh called out among his people; he said, “O my people, does not the kingdom of Egypt belong to me, and these rivers flowing beneath me; then do you not see?(51)
Notice Pharaoh said “rivers” not “river”. So that means Pharaoh rules over a land that had many rivers and that is the same land where the story of Moses took place which was called “Misr “. Ancient Egypt is not modern Egypt. We all know borders of nations change throughout time (look at maps of Sudan before and after 2010). The Egypt or Misr of today only has one river, the Nile. Sudan has many rivers, main Nile, Blue Nile, White Nile, Atbara, etc. Also we know in the story of Moses he was rescued and was raised as Pharaohs son. His mother in the Torah is referred to as “Jochebed”, if we read the Torah in Arabic that name is “يوكابد/YoKabed”. “Yo” in he nubian language means motherand “kabid” comes from “kab” to eat. For example Nubians call gurrasa “kabida” similar to how bread is referred to as “عيش”. So yokabed means “the mother that feeds” and in Moses’ story that is exactly what Jochebed did, she breast fed young Moses. So we know that the Nubian language goes back to at least the time of prophet Moses.
Who spoke/speaks it?
Today when we say Nubian we refer to Kunuz, Fadijja (Aswan), Halfawyeen, Sikkot, Mahas, and Danagla. But those are not the only Nubian language speakers. The midob of Darfur also speak a Nubian language much similar to that of the Danagla and they trace their roots to the Nile as well as many tribes in the Nuba Mountains who also speak a Nubian language. So there are essentially three categories of Nubian speakers: Nile Nubians (Danagla/Mahas, etc), Kordofan Nubians (Karko, Ajanj, etc) and Darfur Nubians (Midob). There are diferences in the languages of course but they are all a part of the Nubian language family because they stem from the old Nubian language that was spoken in ancient Sudan. In fact when it comes to the Nile Nubians we are really all one. There is no ethnic group called Halfawyeen. Halfa is a plant, and the town was called Wadi Halfa after that plant. Dongola (Doonj, geila)literally means “red brick” and it was named after the red bricks used to build the city. which leaves us to Mahas and Sikkot. Sikkot (originally Sukkot)is a region between Halfa and Mahas. I is mentioned by name in the Torah (and Moses traveled to the Sukkot). Mahas isan arabized version of the word “Nahesi”. The Nahesi were the tribes living along the Nile river in lower Nubia. There was even a pharaoh from the Mahas region who called “Nehesi”, literally “الفرعون المحسي”.
So where did the Jaalyeen, Shaygiya, and others who claim Arab descent come from??
Nubia eventually became a Christian kingdom and broke up into three (Nobadia, Makuria, Alodia). Nobadia was the furthest north where Aswan and Halfa are today and was the most influenced by Egypt. Makuria was further south and Alodia was the furthest south stretching from the bend of the Nile to modern day Gizeira with it’s capital in Soba. The majority inhabitants of Alodia were the Nuba tribes who today live in Kordofan. Alodia is also the last to convert to Islam due to it’s distance.
So let’s focus on the islamization and arabization of these kingdoms.
We have to understand that this did not happen over night. In fact it took hundreds of years. War after war and battle after battle was fought between the Muslim rulers of Egypt and the Christian Nubians until a treaty called was signed and lasted for 700 years.
In fact it was in Sennar that Arabs were able to successfully spread Islam thus the Sultanate of Sennar was founded (السلطنة الزرقاء). Later the Funj people who settled in Sennar after fleeing the Shilluk, took over the Sultanate under the leadership of Amara Dunqas and changed it to the Funj Sultanate of Sennar. But before that, Abdallah Jamma who was seen an Islamic hero rose to power and was able to conquer Alodia. This is where there is controversy and Sudanese history gets confusing. Durng this time Alodia was very weak due to constant attacks by the Axumites (Eritrea/Ethiopia) (this can be found in writing by King Ezana of Axum).. After Abdallah Jamma, we find that the people of Alodia now call themselves the Abdallab and they claimed to be Arabs. Abdallah Jamma himself could not have been the ancestor of the Abdallab, his empire only lasted less than 100 years. So who are the Abdallab? They are simply the followers of Abdallah Jamma who to this day sing of the victories over the Kushites (دخلوها و صقيرها حام).. Even his name Jamma ,meaning the gatherer, was given to him because he would gather the people and was seen as a successful Muslim leader. By this time Arabic was beginning to take over from Nubian as the main language of the region (central Sudan). Alodia (the area of the shaygiya, jaaliyeen, down to Jizeira) began speaking Arabic while Makuria and Nobatia (the area of Danagla, Mahas, Sikkot, Halfa) united up north and continued speaking Nubian.
When the Arabs came over did they have women with them? Probably not. So lets imagine this.. in order to have children and continue the lineage the Arabs would have to marry the women available who happened to be Nubian.. if an Arab man has a child with a Nubian woman that child is 50% Nubian and 50% Arab. That child would grow up and have a child from either a 100%Nubian woman where that child would then be 75/25.. or he would have a child with a mixed woman where that child would still be 50/50.. in time the Nubian genes overtake the Arab because simply nubians outnumbered the Arabs. But in Nubian (African) culture the children take claim to the mothers ancestry .. even during pharaonic times a child could not be king unless his mother was a native Kushite.. while in Arab culture they take claim to the father.. which is why the Abdallab began claiming to be Arab, even though they had little to no Arab lineage at all.
Again this is based on my research and the many books and people I’ve spoken to. I don’t mean to offend anyone and I don’t want anyone to take my word for it. I recommend you do your own research. We are all learning everyday and asking questions and being open minded is a wonderful thing. Allah knows best.