Iwellemmedan People - History

History

Tuareg groups moved south into what is now Mali and Niger sometime around the 11th century CE, and the Iwellemmedan were established south and east of the Adar Ifoghas by the 17th century CE. Contesting oral histories agree that the Iwellemmedan came into conflict with the Kel Taddemekat confederation, but disagree whether the Iwellemmedan were pushed out of the Adar Ifoghas by their foes or conquered Kel Taddemekat territory south and west of the massif. Regardless, by the mid-15th century CE, the Iwellemmedan controlled an area from Lake Faguibine and north of Timbuktu east through all of what is now the Gao Region of Mali, into the Nigerien Azawagh all the way to the edge of the Aïr Massif. Engaged in long struggle with the inheritors of the 15th century CE Moroccan conquest of the Songhai Empire, the Iwellemmedan Kel Ataram clans eventually imposed indirect rule over Timbuktu, along with all of the Niger River valley from the Niger inland delta to what ito the town of Say, Niger. The Kel Ataram were only driven from Timbuktu in 1826 by the rise of the Fula Macina Empire, but retained much of the area to its north. At the moment of colonial expansion by the French into their territory at the end of the 19th century, the Iwellemmedan were the dominant Tuareg confederation in all western Niger and eastern Mali, down to the bend of the Niger River, where they held sway of many of the Songhay settlements. Following their defeat by the French after their seizure of Timbuktu in 1894, the Kel Ataram Amenokal pledged non-aggression with the French in 1896, and eventual peace in 1903. At this same time, the French concentrated on their conflict with the Kel Ifoghas to the north. Within a decade, roles were reversed, when the Ifoghas helped to put down the 1914–1916 rising of the Iwellemmedan and allied clans under their Amenokal Fihirun. Their resistance to French conquest cost them dearly, with the deaths of much of their warrior class, and the eventual favoriting of the Kidal based Kel Ifoghas by the colonial power. Several elements were eventually broken from the Iwellemmedan Kel Ataram by the French, further weakening the confederation.

The eastern Iwellemmedan Tuaregs' traditional homeland is in Niger. However, severe droughts in 1972 and 1982 forced the nomadic Iwellemmedan to migrate south to Nigeria in search of grazing areas for their animal herds. Many Aulliminden eventually moved closer to populated areas. These Tuaregs settled in the outskirts of cities in northern Nigeria, and many never returned to their homeland. In the 1970s, large numbers of Tuareg refugees, many of them Iwellemmedan, settled in the refugee camps of southern Niger, most prominently Lazert, on the northeastern edge of Niamey. Over time this has become a permanent neighborhood within the Nigerien capital.