Dawsahak people

Dawsahak
People	Idaksahak
Language	Tadáksahak

The Dawsahak people, Idaksahak (var.: Daoussahak,Dahoussahak,Dausahaq, Daosahaq, Daoussahaq, Daoussak, Dawsahaq) are pastoralist Berbers centered on Menaka and Inékar town in Menaka Cercle and Talataye in Ansongo Cercle of the Gao Region of northeastern Mali. They speak the Northern Songhai language Tadaksahak. Many also speak Western Tawallammat Tamajaq language, the Tuareg language of southern Gao.Daoussahak appears to be the most common transliteration of the collective name among French and English academics.

The Idaksahak are a former dependent faction of local Tuareg Iwellemmeden, formerly serving as maraboutic (religious experts) and livestock minders for higher caste Tuareg factions. Despite this history, they predated the Tuareg in the region, and even the Songhay Empire, from which they took their language. They are still sometimes referred to as a tewsit (clan) of the Iwellemmeden Tuareg. The Idaksahak, like the related Igdalan "were among the first Berbers to migrate to sub-Saharan Africa, sometime between the 8th and 9th centuries" and were among the first Muslim groups in the area.

The Daoussahak remained detached from, and sometimes in conflict with, French colonial rule as late as the 1950s. They were among the first of the rebels who rose against the Malian government in the 1963-64 rebellion, an insurgency which was met with brutal suppression across the north of the country. Daoussahak men also formed armed groups during the 1990s rebellion. The Popular Liberation Front of Azawad(1991-1993) and the later splinter group the National Liberation Front of Azawad (1993) contained fighters drawn from the Daoussahak, the later being majority Daoussahak.

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