Ibrahim al-Koni - Anubis - A Desert Novel

Beauty is the nobility of the body. Nobility is the beauty of the spirit.

Poverty that reforms us is nobler than riches that corrupt us.

Poverty that reforms us enriches us. Wealth that corrupts us impoverishes us.

The god we love we do not fear. The god we fear we do not love.

Freedom is the desert’s water, and water is the body’s freedom.

Language use exhausts the spirit just as the appetites exhaust the body.

If we cannot discover something to do with our time, time discovers something to do with us.

Man does not find time to spend money, since he is so preoccupied with making it. Woman does not find time to make money, since she is so preoccupied with spending it.

A tomb in the desert is everlasting sleep in a paradise of nonexistence.

Woman hears us, even if she is not paying attention, when we praise her. Woman does not hear us, even if she is paying attention, when we offer her counsel.

Water is blood that has lost its true color.

Wealth we give away is wealth that serves us. Wealth we retain is wealth we serve.

Anyone who fights in defense of a sanctuary is victorious even in defeat. Anyone who fights in defense of an idol is defeated even in victory.

The virtue of wealth is that it frees us from our need for wealth. The vice of wealth is that it cannot free us from death.

It is our hopes that slay us, not our derring-do.

Through memory the dead live. Through forgetfulness, the living die.

The creator vanishes with the death of his creation. The creation becomes eternal through the creator’s death.

The desert has existed and will continue to exist. There was a time when we did not exist; eventually we will cease to exist.

We should hide our misery and our happiness. We hide our misery for fear our enemies will gloat. We conceal our happiness for fear our friends will gloat.

Amahaghand Amazegh: The singular forms, respectively, of Imuhagh and Imazeghen, which are names the Tuareg use for themselves. Both words mean dispossessed, plundered, lost, and noble.

Amnay: Seer, priest, diviner, and divine creature.

Anubi (Anubis): Son of an unknown father.

Anubis: In ancient Egypt, Anubis was the illegitimate son of Osiris, who accidentally cohabited with Nephthys, the wife of his brother Seth. She gave birth to Anubis, who became the god who attended the dead in the netherworld.

Ara: A word of contrasting meanings in Tuareg: either son or grandfather, offspring or progenitor.

Asaho: The constellation Canis Major or the star Sirius in it. Also known as Sau.

Azzka: In the ancient language, a tomb or dwelling, now used for a city.

Ba: The father, spirit, the nonexistent.

Hur: ‘Guardian’ in Tuareg, equivalent to the ancient Egyptian Horus.

Imazeghen: See Amahagh.

Imsikni: Marker, statue, or road sign.

Imuhagh: See Amahagh.

Iyghf: Head or intellect.

Iyla: The master, the existent, God.

Ma: The mother, mouth, cavity, water, natural characteristics, nature.

Ragh:The flaming, the yellow, the golden, the sun, the lord.

Sau: See Asaho.

Tin Hinan: Legendary matriarch of the Tuareg, a queen and priestess.

Wa: A child, birth, the existent.