Ahmad al-Maqur

Ahmad al-Maqur is the founder-ancestor of the origin legend that binds together the Tunjur, Kunjara and Keira ruling lines of Darfur. In the standard telling a wandering Arab of noble descent, lamed in the leg or heel, arrives from the north as a penniless stranger at the court of a Fur chief; his wisdom in settling disputes wins him the chief's favour and, in one widespread version, the chief's own repudiated wife, a daughter of the ruling house. From this union the royal line descends. Traditions assign him sons who become eponyms of peoples and dynasties: Ahmad Kunjar, ancestor of the Kunjara section of the Fur from whom the Keira sprang, and Musa, who carried the line west to found rule in Wadai. His epithet al-Maqur, 'the hamstrung', is itself woven into the tale as the mark of an old wound. Scholars read the legend as a charter that grafts an Arab and Islamic pedigree onto an older indigenous kingship; the several oral versions disagree over which chief received him and which woman bore his heirs, and the same charter is claimed, with variation, by neighbouring dynasties.

Children

• Daali
• Ahmad Kunjar
• Musa
• Shau Dorshid

Domains

• ancestry lineage
• kingship

Powers

• brings kingship and custom to Darfur

Epithets

• al-Maqur — the hamstrung / the maimedH. A. MacMichael, A History of the Arabs in the Sudan (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1922) (secondary)
• the Wise Stranger — the wise strangerR. S. O'Fahey, The Darfur Sultanate: A History (London: Hurst, 2008) (secondary)

Relations

• child: Ahmad KunjarR. S. O'Fahey and J. L. Spaulding, Kingdoms of the Sudan (London: Methuen, 1974) (secondary)
• child: MusaR. S. O'Fahey and J. L. Spaulding, Kingdoms of the Sudan (London: Methuen, 1974) (secondary)
• child: DaaliR. S. O'Fahey, The Darfur Sultanate: A History (London: Hurst, 2008) (secondary)
• child: Shau DorshidR. S. O'Fahey, The Darfur Sultanate: A History (London: Hurst, 2008) (secondary)

Sources

• In the dynastic charter legend a wandering Arab, Ahmad al-Maqur, arrives at the court of a Fur chief, marries into the ruling line and becomes the ancestor of the Kunjara and Keira dynasties.: R. S. O'Fahey and J. L. Spaulding, Kingdoms of the Sudan (London: Methuen, 1974) (secondary); H. A. MacMichael, A History of the Arabs in the Sudan (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1922) (secondary)
• Tunjur and Fur traditions name his sons, among them Ahmad Kunjar, eponym of the Kunjara, and Musa, who passed westward to Wadai.: R. S. O'Fahey, The Darfur Sultanate: A History (London: Hurst, 2008) (secondary)