Tichitt tradition
[6][7] In 4000 BCE, the start of sophisticated social structure (e.g., trade of cattle as valued assets) developed among herders amid the Pastoral Period of the Sahara.
[8] Saharan pastoral culture (e.g., fields of tumuli, lustrous stone rings, axes) was intricate.
[15] The settlements of Dhar Tichitt consisted of multiple stone-walled compounds containing houses and granaries/"storage facilities", sometimes with street layouts.
[10][16] Additionally, around some settlements, larger stone common "circumvallation walls" were built, suggesting that "special purpose groups" cooperated as a result of decisions "enforced for the benefit of the community as a whole.
[9] Consequently, state-based urbanism in the Middle Niger and the Ghana Empire developed between the 2nd and 3rd centuries CE.
[15] In the Malian Lakes Region, which is located in northwestern Inland Niger Delta region of the Niger River, near Lake Faguibine and the Faguibine Depression, and north of Méma, these drystone constructed stone-walled settlement sites may be connected with the Tichitt Tradition of Mauritania.
[22] The pastoralist culture included social stratification, as evidenced by lavish items (e.g., beads, bracelets, hachettes, lustrous stone axes) found in tumuli.
[22] Planned, level streets spanned several hundred kilometers among the 400 drystone-constructed villages, hamlets, and towns.
[1] Primary entry points of residences with access ramps (e.g., fortified, non-fortified) and watchtowers were also present.
[1] Households used various tools (e.g., arrowheads, axes, borers, grindstones, grooved stones, needles, pendants).
[26] The people of Tichitt culture crafted (e.g., arrows, arrowheads, grindstones, quartz beads, scrapers) in workshops as well as farmed and penned livestock, fished, and hunted.
[1] A primary feature of the Tichitt culture is the shepherding of livestock and the cultivation of pearl millet.
[2] Various kinds of local food sources (e.g., Panicum laetum, Cenchrus biflorus, Pennisetum mollissimum; fruits from Ziziphus lotus, Balanites, Celtis integrifolia, and Ephedra altissima; Citrullus, Gazella, Addax nasomaculatus, Oryx dammah, Mellivora capensis, Taurotragus derbianus, Kobus, Hippotragus equinus, Tragelaphus, Cricetomys gambianus, Genetta genetta, Panthera pardus, Equus, Rhinoceros, Ichthyofauna, Clarias, Tilapia, Molluscs, Parreysia) were eaten by the people of the Tichitt culture.
[27] At Dhar Tichitt and Dhar Walata, the people of the Tichitt Tradition were considerably mobile each season; they practiced animal husbandry[12] (e.g., sheep, goat, cattle),[10] fished,[12] and, by at least 3600 BP, domesticated and farmed pearl millet.
[22] At Dhar Tichit, Dakhlet el Atrouss I, which is the largest archaeological site of the Tichitt Tradition and is 80 hectares in scale, serves as the primary regional center for the multi-tiered hierarchical social structure of Tichitt culture; it features nearly 600 settlement compounds, agropastoralism, a large enclosure for cattle, and monumental architecture as an aspect of its funerary culture, such as hundreds of tumuli nearby.
[2] Engraved and painted Pastoral rock art relating to the agropastoralists of Dhar Tichitt, characterized by dark patina and developed using hammerstones only or hammerstones used with a lithic or metal implement, were composed of various rock artforms (e.g., humans/herders, domesticated and undomesticated animals, walled compounds, symbols – cattle, oxen, two ox carts being pulled by oxen, cows with udders, a calf, sheep, goats, two large ostriches) that date to the Late Stone Age.
[33] Human skeletal remains found at Bou Khzama in Dhar Néma have been dated to 3690 ± 60 BP.
[34] At Dhar Tagant, there are also various geometric (e.g., rectilinear, circular) constructions, and a possible late period, involving a funerary tomb with a chapel at Foum el Hadjar from 1st millennium CE and wadis with evidence of crocodiles.
[15] In the Malian Lakes Region, there is a drystone enclosure that is greater than 4 meters in height and several hundred meters in circumference, two cemeteries, and within the enclosure, a possible cistern building with remnants of a room that is between 6 meters and 7 meters in diameter; there are also other drystone structures of different sizes and kinds, which include a large rectangular enclosure, enclosures with small-sized circular structures, a carved stone as part of a broader system of structures, stone walls, as well as cemeteries with stones positioned in the head and foot areas of the graves.
[15] In 1st millennium CE, earthen tells were created in the plains, along the shoresides and in floodplains of the Niger River at Tondidarou; the difference in distance and dates may indicate that there was gradual change in settlement sites, from the regional section of the Malian Lake Region where the escarpments are located toward the regional section where Tondidarou is located, as well as gradual technical shift toward construction of earthen settlement mounds.
[37] From Mauritania, the people of the Tichitt Tradition may have migrated into the Malian Lakes Region, Macina, and/or Méma.
[3] In addition to complex social structure and agriculture, tumuli construction may have also spread from Tichitt, through the Inland Niger Delta, to Dogon Country.
