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TAROUT
SAHARA CYPRESS, TUAREG CYPRESS, TASSILI CYPRESS
Tassili n'Ajjer (Berber: Tasili n Ajjer, meaning "Plateau of the Rivers"; Arabic: طاسيلي ناجر)
Cypress is the name applied to many plants in the cypress family Cupressaceae, which is a conifer of northern temperate regions. Most cypress species are trees, while a few are shrubs. Most plants bearing the common name cypress are in the genera Cupressus and Chamaecyparis, but several other genera in the family also carry the name.
Cupressus sempervirens is famous for its longevity, and has been a popular garden plant for thousands of years.
The word "cypress" is derived from Old French "cipres", which was imported from Latin "cyparissus," the latinisation of the Greek κυπάρισσος (kyparissos).
Localité TINTAROUT (Tassili n'Ajjer), date 04/2000
SAHARAN CYPRESS
Common Name: Saharan Cypress
Scientific Name: Cupressus dupreziana
Why is this species important?
There are only 233 known individuals left growing in the wild. They are also one of the 12 plants chosen by the species survival commission of the IUCN to highlight serious threats to species around the globe. The trees are the relict species of a saharan forest, from a time when the area had a milder, more mediterranean climate. They are also amongst the worlds oldest trees, with ages in excess of 3000 yrs. There is a tree in Wadi Tichouinet of average size estimated to be 2200 years old, which has taken three quarters of its life just to grow the last one third of its width.
Where is it found?
This species has a very limited distribution, scattered over a remote 1000 kilometer area of the Tassili N’Ajjer plateau in the south eastern corner of Algeria, at an altitude of 1500-1900m. It is an area described by UNESCO as very exposed, hyper-arid and barren. Estimated rainfall is 30 mm annually but this can be very localised. Average temperatures are in the region of 20-30 degrees but in the winter it can plummet to as low as -7 degrees. Snow has been reported on the higher elevations. The pollen record shows that these trees once had a distribution across the whole of the Sahara. Most of the population now consists of isolated specimens at a density of less than 1 tree per ha. However, there are also a handful of riverbeds that harbour collections of trees, such as at Tamrit, Ngarohad and Jabberen.
How do people use it?
The wood is suitable for the most exacting uses being of medium density, stable and aromatic. Traditionally the timber was used for saddles by the Tuareg and also as a structural timber due to its strength and resistance to decay. There are doors made from this timber in the nearby town of Ghat which have been carbon dated to around 400 years old. It could also be a valuable species for planting in arid regions. The tree has adapted well to this climate and is one of the most drought resistant species known, with considerable frost tolerance too. A recent study has shown that the trees can take quick advantage of even extremely brief wet cycles including winter hoar frost and morning dew, sometimes adding more than one growth ring per year. Conversely, in severe drought the trees may not produce a growth ring at all.
Selected references
Abdoun F, Jull AJT, Guibal F, Thinon M (2005) Radial Growth of the Sahara’s oldest trees: Cupressus dupreziana. Trees 19: 661-670
Stewart P (1969) Threatened Conifer of the Sahara. Biological Conservation Vol 2: No 1
Le cyprès du Tassili ou cyprès de Duprez (Cupressus dupreziana), est un arbre de la famille des Cupressacées, originaire du Sahara.
Cet arbre est considéré comme une espèce en danger de disparition et figure dans la liste rouge de l'UICN.
On le connaît aussi sous les noms vernaculaires de « cyprès du Tassili, cyprès du Sahara, cyprès de Duprez » et « tarout » (en tamahaq).
see http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Touareg_(langue)
Le terme « alphabet berbère » peut désigner :
le tifinagh, alphabet utilisé essentiellement par les Touaregs et au Maroc ;
l'alphabet berbère latin, utilisé essentiellement pour écrire le kabyle et, plus généralement, les parlers berbères d'Algérie, ainsi que par l'Académie berbère.
see http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Touareg_(langue)
Le terme « alphabet berbère » peut désigner :
le tifinagh, alphabet utilisé essentiellement par les Touaregs et au Maroc ;
l'alphabet berbère latin, utilisé essentiellement pour écrire le kabyle et, plus généralement, les parlers berbères d'Algérie, ainsi que par l'Académie berbère.
Localité REYAYE (Tassili n'Ajjer), date 04/1999
Les Garamantes étaient un ancien peuple libyco-berbère qui nomadisait, depuis le IIIe millénaire avant notre ère, entre la Libye et l'Atlas plus particulièrement autour des oasis de Djerma (nom moderne de leur capitale, Garama) et de Mourzouk. Leur nom signifierait « les gens de la cité ». Ils faisaient partie de cet ensemble de populations à peau sombre qui se distinguent des populations soudanaises et méditerranéenes. Il est probable qu'ils auraient été encore plus au Sud, jusqu'au fleuve Niger et la région de Gao. "Ils étaient hautement civilisés, vivaient dans de grandes agglomérations fortifiées, surtout autour des oasis. Cette civilisation formait un état organisé avec des villes et villages, une langue écrite et des technologies de pointe. Les Garamantes ont été des pionniers dans l'urbanisation des oasis et l'ouverture du commerce transsaharien », a déclaré le professeur David Mattingly, de l’université de Leicester.
Hérodote, dans le chapitre IV.183 mentionne le peuple des Garamantes, habitant l'intérieur de la Libye, en situant leur pays à trente jours de la Méditerranée.
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Dans l’Énéide (VI, 794-795), Virgile cite les Garamantes comme l'un des peuples conquis représentant l'étendue de la domination future (car encore à venir dans le temps du récit, aux temps mythiques d'Enée) d'Auguste : "super et Garamantas et Indos / proferet imperium" (sur les Garamantes et les Indiens, il étendra l'empire).
Gustave Flaubert, dans Salammbô, montre le rôle que tenaient les Garamantes dans les armées carthaginoises de mercenaires, éventuellement anthropophages en cas de nécessité (Chapitre XIV : Le défilé de la hache) :
"Le soir du neuvième jour, trois Ibériens moururent. Leurs compagnons, effrayés, quittèrent la place. On les dépouilla ; et ces corps nus et blancs restèrent sur le sable, au soleil. Alors des Garamantes se mirent lentement à rôder tout autour. C’étaient des hommes accoutumés à l’existence des solitudes et qui ne respectaient aucun dieu. Enfin le plus vieux de la troupe fit un signe, et se baissant vers les cadavres, avec leurs couteaux ils en prirent des lanières ; puis, accroupis sur les talons, ils mangeaient. Les autres regardaient de loin ; on poussa des cris d’horreur ; – beaucoup cependant, au fond de l’âme, jalousaient leur courage."
Courant 2011, des observations satellites ont permis de découvrir un grand nombre de constructions appartenant à la civilisation Garamante1 prouvant que leur culture était bien plus avancée et historiquement plus importante que ce qui était supposé par les premiers historiens.
Localité INELEDJ (Tassili n'Ajjer), date 04/2000
Garamantes;North Africa;cross-sectional geometry;biomechanics Efthymia Nikita /Yun Ysi Siew /Jay Stock/ David Mattingly /Marta Mirazón Lahr
Abstract
The Garamantian civilization flourished in modern Fezzan, Libya, between 900 BC and 500 AD, during which the aridification of the Sahara was well established. Study of the archaeological remains suggests a population successful at coping with a harsh environment of high and fluctuating temperatures and reduced water and food resources. This study explores the activity patterns of the Garamantes by means of cross-sectional geometric properties. Long bone diaphyseal shape and rigidity are compared between the Garamantes and populations from Egypt and Sudan, namely from the sites of Kerma, el-Badari, and Jebel Moya, to determine whether the Garamantian daily activities were more strenuous than those of other North African populations. Moreover, sexual dimorphism and bilateral asymmetry are assessed at an intra- and inter-population level. The inter-population comparisons showed the Garamantes not to be more robust than the comparative populations, suggesting that the daily Garamantian activities necessary for survival in the Sahara Desert did not generally impose greater loads than those of other North African populations. Sexual dimorphism and bilateral asymmetry in almost all geometric properties of the long limbs were comparatively low among the Garamantes. Only the lower limbs were significantly stronger among males than females, possibly due to higher levels of mobility associated with herding. The lack of systematic bilateral asymmetry in cross-sectional geometric properties may relate to the involvement of the population in bilaterally intensive activities or the lack of regular repetition of unilateral activities. Am J Phys Anthropol, 2011. © 2011 Wiley-Liss, Inc.
Sahara: Barrier or corridor? Nonmetric cranial traits and biological affinities of North African late holocene populations
AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY
Volume 147, Issue 2, February 2012, Pages: 280–292, Efthymia Nikita, David Mattingly and Marta Mirazón Lahr
Article first published online : 20 DEC 2011, DOI: 10.1002/ajpa.21645
Activity patterns in the Sahara Desert: An interpretation based on cross-sectional geometric properties
AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY
Volume 146, Issue 3, November 2011, Pages: 423–434, Efthymia Nikita, Yun Ysi Siew, Jay Stock, David Mattingly and Marta Mirazón Lahr
Article first published online : 27 SEP 2011, DOI: 10.1002/ajpa.21597
Un Tergui solitaire sur un Cyprès solitaire de la région d'AMAZAR
A paper by Abdoun and Beddiaf (2002) has summarised and updated what is know about this species in Algeria. Until the mid-1940s, it was thought that there were no more than ten living individuals of this cypress. However, by 1949 the population was estimated to have 200 living trees. The counting of the trees has gone on for a number of decades. Between 1950 and 1965 various expeditions to the area undertook censuses of the living trees, but in most cases this was simply a record of the number of individuals in each wadi. A methodological survey started in 1965, when 85 individuals were sufficiently described to be recognized again. Between 1971 and 1972, a forester, Säid Grim, counted 230 living trees and numbered each one. Those numbers are still evident today. An inventory between 1997 and 2001 conducted by Abdoun and Beddiaf (2002) discovered that 20 of the 230 trees counted by Grim had died, while there were 23 new ones added to the tally. The current population size is therefore 233 living cypresses, in varying states of health. About ten of the newly listed trees are very young, indicating that recruitment does continue in spite of the current drought.
The 233 trees are distributed over a strip 12 km long by 6 km (on average) wide, along the southwestern border of the Tassili plateau.
In Morocco, one or two small groves remain in dry woodland on steep scree slopes in Oued n'Fiss Valley south of Marrakech in the Atlas Mountains. Estimates of the area of occupancy have declined from 5,500 ha in 1950 to 1,460 ha in 1986.
The 233 trees are distributed over a strip 12 km long by 6 km (on average) wide, along the southwestern border of the Tassili plateau.
In Morocco, one or two small groves remain in dry woodland on steep scree slopes in Oued n'Fiss Valley south of Marrakech in the Atlas Mountains. Estimates of the area of occupancy have declined from 5,500 ha in 1950 to 1,460 ha in 1986.
Cupressus dupreziana, the Saharan Cypress or tarout, is a very rare coniferous tree native to the Tassili n'Ajjer mountains in the central Sahara Desert, southeast Algeria, where it forms a unique population of trees hundreds of kilometres from any other trees. There are only 233 specimens of this critically endangered species, the largest about 22 m tall. The majority are very old, estimated to be over 2000 years old, with very little regeneration due to the increasing desertification of the Sahara. Rainfall totals in the area are estimated to be about 30 mm annually. The largest one is named Tin-Balalan is believed to be the oldest tarout trees with a circumference of 12 meters or 36 feet.
This species is distinct from the allied Cupressus sempervirens (Mediterranean Cypress) in its much bluer foliage with a white resin spot on each leaf, the smaller shoots often being flattened in a single plane. It also has smaller cones, only 1.5-2.5 cm long. Cupressus atlantica (Moroccan Cypress) is more similar, and is treated as a variety of the Saharan Cypress (C. dupreziana var. atlantica) by some authors.
Probably as a result of its isolation and low population, the Saharan Cypress has evolved a unique reproductive system of male apomixis whereby the seeds develop entirely from the genetic content of the pollen. There is no genetic input from the female "parent", which only provides nutritional sustenance (Pichot et al., 2000). The Moroccan Cypress does not share this characteristic.
The Saharan Cypress is occasionally cultivated in southern and western Europe, in part for ex situ genetic conservation, but also as an ornamental tree. .
An International Arboretum is being established in Canberra, Australian Capital Territory (ACT), Australia within which will be established forests of rare and endangered species from throughout the world. One of these forests is dedicated to Cupressus dupreziana and 1300 of the trees have been propagated for planting in late 2007.