ABSTRACT
The account of the Kunta, given below, is based on a note written by Sidi Mu~ammad al-khaHfa b. Sidi al-Mukhtar al-Kuntl (d.2nd ShawaI, 1241 II Oth May 1826). The work is entitled, al-Risalat al-Ghalawiyyat; and was wrongly credited by Marty and Hamet2 to a certain "Baye ould Sidi Amor, de Teleya ... "3 Marty and Hamet went on to give the work the title, "Ta 'rikh Kunta". There can be no doubt that the treatise comprises the most detailed record of Kunta origin, dispersal, and history which has hitherto come to light. Moreover, a good deal more information has now been collected which will make possible the revision and expansion of the Ta'rikh written by Mukhtar al-Kunti's son, Sidi
Mu~ammad al-KhaHfa. The name "Kunta" (sometimes pronounced "Kinata"), which is applied to this
widely-dispersed ethnic group, is nothing more than the nisba given to Sidi Mu~ammad al-Kunti b. Sidi 'Ali b. Ya~ya b. 'Uthman b. Duman ['Umar] b. Yahs ['Abd Alhlh] b. Shakir b. Ya'qub b. al-'Aqib b. 'Uqba al-Mustajab b. Nafi'. He was the son ofSidi 'Ali and his spouse, the daughterofMu~ammad 'Alim b. Kunta b. Zam, the leader of the ~anhaja 'Abd-u-ka\. Following the custom which was frequently practiced amongst Saharan Arabs,4 Sidi Mu~ammad inherited the name of his maternal grandfather. Hence, it is this ~anhaja name that Sidi
Mu~ammad's descendants adopted and still bear to the present day. The Kunta are neither a "tribe" nor a confederation,S but rather family
groupings "living under the same tent" (ahl ai-bait), who have acquired a great religious reputation, considerable wealth, and have dispersed throughout the region between the Atlantic Ocean, the Moroccan Sahara, the Tafilalit, the Tuwat, the oriental massif of the Ahaggar, the Niger and the Senegal. A Kunta family (tent) is even believed to be existing today in the J:lijaz.6
