Imazighen

Imazighen (singular, Amazigh), the proper collective name of all the Mauritanian Berbers, meaning either "Descendants of Mazigh," a legendary ancestor of the Berber race, or more probably the "Free" or "Noble." This term, which is of vast antiquity, being already known under various forms (Mazyes, Machmes, Jdazices, etc.) to Herodotus and other early writers, is merely a dialectic variant of Imoltagh, Imoshagh, the proper collective name of the Tuaregs or Saharan Berbers. In Morocco it answers to the Sheluh or Shliih of the Arabs, although this term is now restricted to the tribes of the central districts of the Great Atlas, those of the north being more commonly known as Kabyles, like the kindred peoples of North Algeria.