The Priest Chief (Durbi and Seng Wari) System in Hausa, Zaar land.

Source: UNESCO website 

The Priest Chief (Durbi and  Seng Wari) System  in Hausa, Zaar land. 

✍🏾 Madalla Kadiri, Zaar Activist 

Introduction:

In the ancient days The Priest Chief System of government was practice in many communities in Africa and Nigeria including the Hausa, Zaar community of Northern Nigeria. There is no historical record to prove when this system was  started, but it is believe by scholar like Ado Mahamman a Professor of history at the Abdulmumini Diof University Niamey,  Niger that it  started during the stone age between 

13th / 14th century AD to the 15th / 16th century AD.

The Priest Chief (Durbi) System  in Hausa land. 

According to Ado Mahamman a Professor of history at the Abdulmumini Diof University Niamey,  Niger in his interview with Garzali Abdu Tasawa DW Hausa correspondent in Niamey Niger some years back titled:"The history of Katsina Maradi of Niger and Katsina of Nigeria", the veteran historian said  that Durbawa Clan in Hausa land are the lineage of Chief Priest knowns as "Durbi" who  exercised both spiritual, political power over Hausa society in the olden day, currently Durbi is a traditional title holder and senior royal in Northern Nigeria Emirate System.

During the stone age era Hausa land practiced the priest chief system known as the Durbi.The Durbi was priest who exercised Spiritual,  political power over the Hausa society. 

Every family or clan appointed its own Durbi who acted as its Spiritual,  political  head. The appointment was based upon criteria such as dedication, loyalty, hard work, bravery and acceptable moral virtues approved by elderly class.

The Durbi was assisted by the elderly class who served as an advisory body. They therefore ruled over the community on the basis of the authority of the Hausa elders. 

On the aspect of responsibility, the Durbi played several roles for the day to day running of the 

Hausa society. Prominent among their duties were demarcation of boundaries between families and settled disputes that arose among aggrieved clans. They were also in charge of stranger in the Hausa communities. They received visitors and offered them necessary 

assistance. It should be noted that although DURƁI political system has disappeared, however, it represent modest form of political administration that kept the virtue of Hausa society.It is in this way that many African Communities put in place a cohesive social institutions, and were able to maintain law and order, and social harmony.

Prior to the coming of Islam the hausa's worship solar deity,  agrarian, proto-urban villages of the region Hausa land were presided over by a town head (or mai gari), who was the supposed representative of a senior lineage. 

The authority of the town heads in the Hausa area was based on their control of,  identification with the ancestry cults centered on the Durbi tombs "Durbi Takusheyi's".

In 2005, German archaeologists led by Prof. Peter Breunig started excavations of several sites related to the Nok culture. They gained the approval of the Nigerian museums commission (NCMM) to completely restore and analyze the Durbi Takusheyi artifacts. In 2007, the scholars are said to have exported "tons of materials" excavated from Durbi Takusheyi for restoration and conservation at the Romano-Germanic Central Museum in Mainz. In 2011 the museum opened the first exhibition of the materials, along with Nok culture artifacts, and all items were expected to be returned to Nigeria in 2012.

The Priest Chief (Seng Wari) System  in  Zaar land. 

Zaar  villages practiced the priest chief system known as the Seng Wari.The Seng Wari was priest who exercised Spiritual,  political power over the Zaar society. 

Every family or clan appointed its own Seng Wari who acted as its Spiritual,  political  head. The appointment was based upon criteria such as dedication, loyalty, hard work, bravery and acceptable moral virtues approved by elderly class.

The Seng Wari was assisted by the elderly class who served as an advisory body. They therefore ruled over the community on the basis of the authority of the Zaar elders. 

On the aspect of responsibility, the Seng Wari played several roles for the day to day running of the 

Zaar society. Prominent among their duties were demarcation of boundaries between families and settled disputes that arose among aggrieved clans. They were also in charge of stranger in the Zaar communities. They received visitors and offered them necessary 

assistance. It should be noted that although Seng Wari political system has disappeared, however, it represent modest form of political administration that kept the virtue of Zaar society.It is in this way that many African Communities put in place a cohesive social institutions, and were able to maintain law and order, and social harmony.

In recent years, however, the phenomenon of cultural domination in northern Nigeria has swept several minority groups into the cultural stream of the Hausa. This wave has also affected the boundary of Zaar generation.

With the adoption of some Hausa political titles such as Madaki, Ciroma among others. Although the towns of Bauchi are far away from the Hausaland, Hausa culture has become exclusive way of life.          

All African groups differ on the basis of their social organizations. The Bauchi area is a home for several ethnic groups with different traditional practices ranging from marriage celebration, birth, circumcision, funeral rites, belief system and festival. All these 

traditions are common to the Zaar. Reporting on the Zaar community, Sir Abubakar indicated that: "In the northern province of Nigeria there are many pagan tribes who are still in the primitive stage they seldom leave their homes, they have very few wants... But in spite of all these they are very happy and quite contented with life as it is. They have their own custom and belief which they honour very much. they have adopted hardly anything of the more advance people around them. There had never been a 

time when they seemed to think of any change in their beliefs"

No any team of archaeologists have showed interest in  excavations of several sites Seng Wari to completely restore and analyze the Seng Wari artifacts. 

similarities between Priest Chief (Durbi, Seng Wari) System in Hausa, Zaar land.

There are great  similarities of role played by Priest Chief (Durbi, Seng Wari) System in Hausa, Zaar land in the olden days 

- They serve as custodian of cultural heritage.

- Exercised both spiritual, political power. 

- acted as Spiritual,  political  head.

- They ruled over the community on the basis of the authority of the elders. 

- demarcation of boundaries between families and settled disputes that arose among aggrieved clans.

 -They are in charge of stranger in the  communities.

-They received visitors and offered them necessary assistance.

The Effect of Libyo-berber Civilization on Priest Chief (Durbi and  Seng Wari) System  in Hausa, Zaar land.

According to encyclopedia Britannica Berber, any of the descendants of the pre-Arab inhabitants of North Africa. The Berbers live in scattered communities across Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Mali, Niger, and Mauritania. They speak various Amazigh languages belonging to the Afro-Asiatic family related to ancient Egyptian.

An accurate count of Berbers is difficult to come by for a variety of reasons, including a lack of thorough surveys. The two largest populations of Berbers are found in Algeria and Morocco, where large portions of the population are descended from Berbers but only some of them identify as Amazigh. Roughly one-fourth of the population in Algeria is estimated to be Berber, while Berbers are estimated to make up more than three-fifths of the population in Morocco. In the Sahara of southern Algeria and of Libya, Mali, and Niger, the Berber Tuareg number more than two million.

From the very beginning, Islam provided the ideological stimulus for the rise of fresh Berber dynasties. Between the 11th and 13th centuries, the greatest of those—the Almoravids and the Almohads, nomads of the Sahara and villagers of the High Atlas, respectively—conquered Muslim Spain and North Africa as far east as Tripoli (now in Libya). Their Berber successors—the Marinids at Fès (now in Morocco), the Ziyanids at Tlemcen (now in Algeria), and the Ḥafṣids at Tunis (now in Tunisia) and Bijaya (now Bejaïa, Algeria)—continued to rule until the 16th century.

Meanwhile, Berber merchants and nomads of the Sahara had initiated a trans-Saharan trade in gold and slaves that incorporated the lands of the Sudan into the Islamic world. Those achievements of the Barbar were celebrated in a massive history of North Africa (Kitāb al-ʿIbār) by the 14th-century Arab historian Ibn Khaldūn. 

As a result of early Hausa contact with the Libyo Berbers through tran Sahara trade they adopted there civilization. 

Trans-Sahara trade refers to the long-distance trade carried 

out across the Sahara Desert by the West African kingdoms. In the other 

hand, it could also be seen as the trade across the Sahara and sub-Sahara 

African and North Africa.

The trans-Sahara trade existing from prehistorical time, the peak of the trade extended from the 8th century 

until the early 17th century.

There no precise date when Trans-Sahara trade started. However, in 

Nigerian history, the introduction of camel in about 17th century as a 

means of transportation in linking some Nigeria areas such Kanem Borno 

and Hausa state to the trans-Sahara trade because of their ability to 

withstand the difficulties of traveling across the desert. 

They carry heavy loads, they could stay for two to three weeks without 

drinking water, they could move faster and smoother in the desert sand 

and find their bearings or location with ease across the desert.

The location of towns like Kano and Katsina on the trade rout led to their 

development into cosmopolitan settlement. With the bounda Nigeria, there were four major centres identified with the trans-

Sahara trade; these are:

 Ngoru

 Birnin Ngazagamu 

 Nguru in Borno 

 Kano, Katsina and Zaria in Hausa land. 

The commercial centres were linked through trans-Sahara trade routes, 

similar centre in North Africa such as Tripoli and Tunis.

The civilization of the Libyo Berbers adopt by Hausa's  change the entire political system of the  Priest Chief (Durbi) system to Emirate system.

By the beginning of the 20th century, the Berber world had been reduced to enclaves of varying size. In Tripolitania and southern Tunisia those were chiefly formed by the hills of the Nafūsah Plateau and the island of Jerba, in eastern Algeria by the mountains of the Aurès and Kabylie, and in Morocco by the ranges of the Rif, the Middle and High Atlas, the Anti-Atlas, and the Saharan Atlas. In southern Morocco they consisted of the oases of the Drâa valley, and in the northern Sahara mainly those of the Mʾzab with those of Ghadames, Touggourt, and Gourara. In the central and southern Sahara was the vast area of the Ahaggar mountains and the desert to the south.