Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 38, Number 29, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 December 1905 — The Berber Women. [ARTICLE]

The Berber Women.

By far the larger portion of the Inhabitants of Morocco have no Arab blood in their veins, but belong to the Berber race, which is of Indo-Ger-nianic origin; and, although they have accepted the Mohammedan religion, they have never adopted the Turkish or Moorish attitude towards women. When one sees the women of the Berber classes the old idea of a weak, fading, human flower pining for light in a harem disappears. Here is no type of this sort, but an unveiled, stately form, strong and conscious of herself. And these women represent the majority of tne female Moors, numbering in all more than two millions. With the Bebbers the social position of a son is fixed by that of his mother. The son of a slave is a slave, that of a noblewoman a noble, no matter what the father might have been. The eldest son is not the heir at law, but the eldest daughter or sister, and in certain tribes the woman may be the absolute ruler. In all important matters the women are consulted among the Berbers and the women of the Tuareg tribe, in the southern part of Morocco, are important figures. In fact, they may be given a high place, not among the women of Islam, but among the women of the world. The wife is recognized by her husband as his equal in every sense.