274 
TRAVELS IN AFRICA. Chap. XXIX. 
dom ; I need only mention the examples of Giimsu 
(" gumsu " means the chief wife) Fasami, who im- 
prisoned her son Biri, when already king, for a 
whole year, and of A'aishad or 'Aisa, the mother of 
Edris, who for a number of years exercised such 
paramount authority, that in some lists, and even by 
many ulama at the present time, her name is in- 
serted in the list of the sovereigns of the country. 
These circumstances may be best explained by sup- 
posing that a kind of compromise took place between 
the strangers — Berbers, or rather Imoshagh (Ma- 
zigh) from the tribe of the Berdoa — and the tribe or 
tribes among whom they settled, just in the same 
manner as we have seen that a stipulation of the 
same kind was probably made between the con- 
quering Kel-owi and the ancient inhabitants of Air 
of the G6ber race ; and the same circumstances, with 
similar results, are observable in ancient times, in the 
relations subsisting between the Grecian colonists 
and the original inhabitants of Lycia. 
The most important among the indigenous tribes 
of Kanem are the Kiye or Beni Kiya, also men- 
tioned in the time of Edris Alawoma*, the Meghar- 
* aL*£ or J)j^ ^ The diacritic points 
over in the word JjjJ have been omitted in the copy of the 
chronicle which I forwarded to Leipsic, and Mr. Blau therefore 
reads " Derw ;" but where the name is mentioned by Imam Ahmed 
the points are never omitted. However, where the country Derk or 
Derg is to be looked for I cannot say with any degree of certainty. I 
once thought that jyO Jjfcl might be " the people of the shields," 
