Page 40 - The Sloughi Review - Issue 6
P. 40
T H E S L O U G H I R E V I E W 4 0
Left: figure 21, Kritikos Lagonikos, Cretan hound; right: figure 20, Basenji.
DIVERSION II - THE EMERGING GENETIC The original Berber population has
POPULATION OF NORTH AFRICA however not been replaced by later
Arabs/Bedouins.
We shouldn’t forget the genetic aspect of
the North African population, as today this Genetics support this impression: for 80
population is thought of as “Arabic”. If Ibn % of North Africans, the male hereditary
Khaldun is right in saying that ‘the line shows that 65 % are of Berber origin
landscape shapes culture’ and not otherwise, and only 15 % are of Arab origin. Among
that culture shapes the landscape, the use of other sources, the female hereditary line
Sloughis for hunting in North Africa must has a diverse proportion of European
be an original, deeply rooted culture over origin, ranging from 45 % to 80 %
centuries, even millennia, precisely: 'the (Iberian, Italian, North European).
Culture of The Sloughi'. Genetically speaking the population of
the Maghreb is not Arabic (35).
Ninety eigth percent of modern Tunisians
believe that they are of Arab origin. Historically, ‘arabization’ is explained by
However, Ibn Khaldun (1332 to 1406) pointed the fact that, for political reasons, various
out that the people of Tunisia, and to the Berber tribes have joined the Muslim
same extent Algeria and Morocco, possibly conquerers, but for centuries resistance
for the whole of North Africa, are ‘Arabized’. has been provided by independent Berber
The concept of ‘Arabization’ here, unlike our tribes.
western use, refers exclusively to the
adoption of cultural elements such as
language, writing and religion of Arabic
origin.
