Ababda people

Historically, most were Bedouins living in the area between the Nile and the Red Sea, with some settling along the trade route linking Korosko with Abu Hamad.

[10] There is rich evidence confirming that as late as the second half of the 19th century the Ababda were bilingual in Arabic and a Beja language that was either identical or closely related to Bisharin.

[12] At the turn of the 19th century, during the French campaign in Egypt and Syria, the engineer Dubois-Aymé wrote that the Ababda understood Arabic, but still spoke a language of their own.

[16] Alfred von Kremer believed them to be native Beja-speakers and was told that the Ababda were bilingual in Arabic, which they spoke with a heavy accent.

However, in the past they used to speak a Beja dialect that was now, as he was told, solely restricted to a few nomadic families roaming the Eastern Desert.

[19] Joseph Russegger, who visited the country around 1840, noted that the Ababda spoke their own language, although he added that it was heavily mixed with Arabic.

Two Ababda men in 1848
Ababda bedouin in Wadi um Ghamis (1961)
Three Ababda men riding their dromedaries, 1851