The great raid between Adrâr and Tagant

The city of Atar founded in the 17th century in the borderland plain (bâten) that stretches north of the great escarpment, is protected from sand by its geographical location.
It is the most important city in the Saharan zone. It was formerly an emirate city a garrison city for the Americans then the French and finally a regional capital.

The flattened dome of Guelb Er Richât, which appears during the secondary period, is located at the edge of the dark mountains of the Mauritanian Adrâr, to the west, and the vast expanses of rocks, rocky slabs and dunes of the Taoudenni basin, to the east.
The strange system of concentric ridges of the Richât is so imposing that it appears today on all maps, even at small scales.
Richât is the plural of richa (feather), a term that well describes the appearance of its ridges whose downwind flanks are striped with tongues of sand and which dominate the deep flats where goats and camels graze… when, by chance, it has rained.
Because of its very size, it was only revealed much later, by professor Théodore Monod in 1934.
Indeed, no one, whether coming from the rough plateaus of the north or the dunes of the Majabat Al Koubra (Monod, 1958), to the south and south-east, could imagine that these low ridges are organized in such a perfect concentric system, vaguely elliptical with 22 km and 25 km diameter, emerging from a buttonhole of 45 km, the Taguenzé, opened in the sandstone plateau.

The ksar of Wadâne, (Ouadâne) which was founded, it is said, the same year as Tichîtt (1141), derives its name from the Arabic word meaning "two river beds" (wadân). The details according to which these two wadis would be the wadi of dates and the wadi of sciences are entirely to the credit of the city.
The ancient city is mentioned in writing in the middle of the 15th century in a Portuguese travel report but it remains difficult to form a precise idea of the city's beginnings despite its position on the western axis of trans-Saharan caravan traffic.
Wadâne is a dense urban center, of ksourian type, formerly surrounded by a very secure fortified wall that resisted all foreign forces until the arrival of the French.
The dominant tribes are the Kounta, the Ida ou El Hadj, the Chorfa, the Amgârîj and the Aghzazir.

The semi-nomadic camp of El Kheouiya is set up there during major droughts. The camp has been organizing itself for several years: development of goat and camelid breeding (from 2 camels in 1993, now a herd of over 70 animals), creation of a school in 1994, establishment of a small palm grove associated with gardens in 1999 and, now, a few permanent structures.
«But we, we remain under the tent» Atfeil, the camp leader, assures us …
The bonds we maintain with the different families of the camp are close and greatly friendly.

The ancient city of Chinguetti
Chinguetti was founded by the Ida Ouali around 1525, upstream from Abweyr, which has since disappeared and was itself created in 1261.
The probable etymology of the toponym shingitî would be:

• horse well, from Soninké: si: well + n: of + gede: horse.

Chinguetti was the most active commercial center and the most important city in the western Sahara. It was considered by Mauritanians as the 7th holy city of Islam with its 11 mosques, its 100 wells and its circle of scholars.
In 1675, a massacre perpetrated by part of the Ida-ou-Ali led to the breakup of the group whose survivors founded another ksar in Tagant, Tidjikja.
Today only one mosque and the memory of prosperous periods remain…
The main tribes that make up its population are the Ida-ou-Ali, the Laghlal and the Oulad Gheilan.

With their narrow and winding streets, their numerous dead ends, their low and dark houses made of local materials, their near absence of squares and communal spaces, Chinguetti and Wadâne have the structure of old ksour densely huddled around their mosques.

Rachid was founded in the early 18th century by the important Kounta tribe.
The ancient city, destroyed several times over the past centuries, is now in ruins. Since 1968, a new village has been built on the other side of the wadi.

Tidjikja is the capital of the region. It is said to have been founded in the 17th century by the Ida-ou-Ali who came from the Adrar.
Like Chinguetti, it was a religious center, but of lesser importance.

N'Beika, 20 km from Moudjéria, is located on the right bank of the Tamourt valley and occupies a splendid site between dunes and rocks.

Wildlife is important in the Tagant, although often nocturnal.
Carnivores: striped hyenas, jackals (whose yelping is often heard during the night), foxes, fennecs, wild cats (Felis sylvestris). Note that the cheetah has only disappeared since the 1960s or 70s.
Rodents: hares, squirrels, gundis, jerboas and gerbils. Also note their neighbors the hyraxes.
Various animals: porcupines (Hystrix cristata), hedgehogs, monkeys (patas and baboons).
Gazelles are rare as they are decimated by hunting. Their tracks are occasionally spotted (dune and plateau region of the Er Roueissat sector).
Reptiles: various snakes (Moïla, Schockari), vipers (Vipera cerastes, sand viper and Cerastes cerastes, horned viper), various reptiles including many dobs (Uromastix), agamas and monitors.
Scorpions can be frequent, especially during hot periods.
Birds are relatively abundant: ravens, falcons, owls, doves, bee-eaters, as well as a large number of European or African songbirds, often with very colorful plumage.
Certain gueltas shelter fish such as Clarias or catfish.
A few, more significant ones, such as the one at Matmata near N'Beika, in the southwest of the Tagant, still hide a few crocodiles.

Ksar el Barka (1690), like Rachid (1723) are the ksour founded in the Tagant by the Kounta in relation with the Touat (Algeria).
The Kounta form a tribe that claims both Arab and Sanhaja origins, guardians of Islamic orthodoxy and propagators of the Kadriyya Bekkaiyya way. Their haratine cultivate the palm groves while they themselves are active merchant caravaneers.

The western part of the Adrâr in Mauritanie offers a very great diversity of landscapes.
The plateau is crisscrossed by a dense network of faults of tectonic origin where wadis flow. Here the blonde ergs come to rest against the upturned blades of black sandstone. Erosion has shaped the landscapes over millennia.
At the bottom of the valley, the gentleness of the palm groves stands out from the steep and austere mountain massifs. In secret crevices are set gueltas with clear waters.
The sedentary cultivators, established in the palm groves, continue their traditional life in this Sahara which can be generous. On the surrounding plateaus, nomads in search of pasture for their herds punctuate their time with long seasonal movements in search of life-saving rains. Their white or brown tents are there, sheltered from view, in the movements of the terrain.
Here in Adrâr, the complementarity between these two necessities of life takes on all its force. We cross the territory of the tribe of the Oulad Sassi of the confederation of the Ideichily.