The inscription of Azrou Klane (Southern Morocco)

              ALMOGAREN XXXVIII/2007MM135
Almogaren XXXVIII / 2007 Wien 2007 135 - 139
Alain Rodrigue & Werner Pichler
The inscription of Azrou Klane
(Southern Morocco)
Keywords: Morocco, rock art, inscriptions, Libyco-Berber
Zusammenfassung:
Die Autoren präsentieren eine neue Libysch-Berberische Inschrift im Süden Marokkos.
Eine kurze Beschreibung der Fundstelle und des Kontextes der Inschrift wird durch ei-nen
vorläufigen epigrafischen Kommentar ergänzt, der vor allem die besondere Situation
der Zeichen für den Lautwert /k/ behandelt.
Abstract:
The authors present a new Libyco-Berber inscription in the southern part of Morocco.
A short description of the site and the context of the inscription is followed by a first
epigraphic comment which in particular deals with the situation of signs for the
phoneme /k/.
Resumen:
Los autores presentan una nueva inscripción líbico-bereber localizada en el Sur de
Marruecos. A una breve descripción del sitio y del entorno de la inscripción, le sigue un
comentario epigráfico provisional, que aborda, fundamentalmente, la particular situación
de los signos para el valor fonético /k/.
The site
The rock art site of Azrou Klane is located some seventy kilometres east/
south-east of Assa, in the northern region of the Wadi Draa and two hundred
kilometers south of Agadir. The region is slightly mountainous but possesses
all the climatic, botanical and geological conditions of the desert. The site is
located in a river bank (the Wadi Azrou Klane), directly beneath Mount Taskala
(898 m).
The rock art itself consists of drawings, pecked out a dark purplish-blue
sand stone surface, practically horizontal. However, it looks as if the majority
of the drawings have been made head-up in the direction of the very smooth
declivity (10° to 15°). This is particularly obvious with the drawings of
horsemen or animals. It's the case of the well-known drawing of a boat.
136MMALMOGAREN XXXVIII/2007
The rock art site of Azrou Klane is probably the most ancient Moroccan
rock art site ever noticed. It has been published in 1875 by Duveyrier, following
the observations and an article of a rabbi, travelling in these regions at that
time. Very strangely, each person who visited the site since the discovery talked
about the drawing of a boat, something amazing indeed, when one can notice
that the ocean is eighty kilometres far from the site.
Simoneau (1977) registered the site “Azrou Klan” by the inventory number
150 220 without any comment.
The first real inventory, as far as we know, appears in the very well
documented article of Martinet (1996). He mentioned 178 drawings, including
22 horsemen, 19 feet or sandals, camels, various animals, many enigmatic
signs and what he calls “signe en +, signe en t, signe en m”, all drawings
usually considered as “libyco-berber”. We barely can imagine that Martinet
Fig. 1
The inscription
(photo)
ALMOGAREN XXXVIII/2007MM137
didn't see the inscription nevertheless he didnĕt speak of it in his article. He
didn't give any drawing of the “signes”.
After our visit, in December 2005, we registered an inscription, at one end
of the rock surface, very close to the river bed. The engraving is very discreet,
the patina is dark and some drawings are difficult to follow. We spent a
noticeable time to bring into relief the exact contour of each sign. Our drawing
gives back the normal disposition and direction of the inscription, the reader
standing at the bottom.
The three (or four) vertical lines of script present 14 (or 16) signs (= characters),
in total seven (or nine) different ones (fig. 1/2/3). This basis is by far too small to
achieve severe results concerning the whole alphabet. While line 1 and 2 are
beyond any discussion it is not sure if the sign   is the first one of line 3 or if it
belongs to a forth line which continues with a very dubious sign.
Fig. 2
The inscription
(sketch)
138MMALMOGAREN XXXVIII/2007
What can be said from the epigrapher's point of view are some noticeable
details:
•   can supposed to be a variant of  , otherwise the possibility of confusion
would be too high.
• There are no dotted signs or typical signs for Tifinagh alphabet. Therefore,
we can exclude that the inscription is very young.
• The most important sign seems to be VI (two times in line 3).
The general situation concerning the representation of signs for /k/ in
Morocco presents as follows:
Among the collection of IAM (Galand 1966) no usual sign for /k/ (like   or
 ) appears, the only one possible is   in IAM 21.
Among the corpus of Moroccan rock inscriptions possible signs for /k/ are
very rare too:     at Meskaou, possibly     at Tisserfine (comparable with an
example on Fuerteventura:     at Morro de la Montaña Blanca).
Among the rock inscriptions of Fuerteventura and Lanzarote VI is a
comparably seldom variant of the frequent signs 	 and 
 (the second one is
attested as a sign for /k/ by a biscript at the site Cuchillete de Buenavista/
Fuerteventura).
Fig. 3
The inscription
(scheme of lines)
ALMOGAREN XXXVIII/2007MM139
Interestingly enough signs like	
         do not occur among the numerous
inscriptions of Foum Chenna/Southern Morocco, but they are usual in the
southerly adjacent territories of the Western Sahara and Mauretania. This last
observation is not surprising if we consider that the site Azrou Klane is the
southernmost one of Morocco excluding the Western Sahara.
As we do not know the language used in this inscription every linguistic
comment is highly speculative. However, we can notice that the sequences of
line 1 and 2 are identical with personal names on North African steles: TMS/
Z* (= RIL 331) and MS/ZT (= RIL 675).
Based on the epigraphic examination we can suppose that this inscription
is older than those contemporary with the typical Libyco-Berber depictions of
Foum Chenna. This assertion is confirmed by the observation that the patina
of the characters is darker than that of the depictions of horsemen and camels
on the panels nearby.
References:
Chabot, J.-B. (1940): Recueil des inscriptions Libyques.- Paris (= RIL)
Galand, L. (1966): Inscriptions libyques.- in Inscriptions antiques du Maroc.-
Paris, 1-75 (=IAM)
Martinet, G. (1996): Le voilier du site d'Azrou Klane (“La pierre tatouée”)
(Sud-Marocain).- Bull. de la Société d'Étude et de Recherche Préhistorique
Les Eyzies 45, 83-97
Simoneau, A. (1977): Catalogue des sites rupestres du Sud-Marocain.- Rabat
* The signs for sibilants are the most instable ones among Libyco-Berber alphabets.
Therefore, we never can be sure which phoneme is represented by which grapheme.
134MMALMOGAREN XXXVIII/2007
Rodrigue, Alain; Pichler, Werner (2007): The inscription of Azrou Klane (Southern
Morocco).- Almogaren XXXVIII (Institutum Canarium), Wien, 135-139
Zitieren Sie bitte diesen Aufsatz folgendermaßen / Please cite this article as follows: