Tracing golden past

This book deals with two puzzles: Who has lived on the mountain Shaybun, which has been a famous gold market in the Nuba Mountains (Sudan) until the 19th century, and why has it been deserted? The answering begins with a present ethnic group, the Shawabna, who are of unclear origin and have a contested position between the lines of being Arab ...

This book deals with two puzzles: Who has lived on the mountain Shaybun, which has been a famous gold market in the Nuba Mountains (Sudan) until the 19th century, and why has it been deserted? The answering begins with a present ethnic group, the Shawabna, who are of unclear origin and have a contested position between the lines of being Arab or being Black African. The book does not attempt to solve the historiographical and the ethnographical puzzles, but it presents different narratives surrounding these questions, in order to keep the diversity of perspectives and to relate the historical narratives to its conditions of creation. Simultaneously the text discusses the political and scientific treatment of yet uncertain, therefore imagined resources, which is inseparable from the narrative representation of Shaybun’s history.

ContentsAcknowledgements III
Preface V
Chapter 1: Shaybun as place of the present 1
Conditions 3
Descriptions 13
Encounters 16
Chapter 2: Shaybun as place of the past 36
Chapter 3: Shaybun as place of the future 53
19th century: Joseph Russegger 55
20th century: S. C. Dunn 64
21th century: Mansur Muhammad Ahmad 68
Chapter 4: Shawabna as Nuba and Arabs 72
Nuba and Arabs 73
Present lineages as past tribes 77
Dubab 89
cAbdallab 97
Musallamiyya 102
Chapter 5: Shawabna as Muslims 105
A tribal history – Shawabna and Shaybun 105
Alliances – Shawabna, Nuba, and Hawazma 114
Representations – Shawabna and Tagali 119
cAbd al-cAziz Khalid (2002) 121
cAbd al-Qadir Muhammad Dawrah (2003) 135
Hamid al-Faki cAbd al-Rahman cAbd Allah (2004) 147
Chapter 6: Shawabna in (Tira) Mandi 173
The cumda 178
Institutionalized fractions and cooperation 194
Being Arab 200
Languages and names 203
Lineages, clans, and tribes 205
Historical narratives and political claims 222
Origins and migrations 226
Arrival and changes 230
Original passages 235
References 249