riffis

Updated: May 17, 2025

The dialect which they speak is called Shillah: the Riffis at Tetuan spoke Shillah among themselves, but soon picked up Arabic of a sort, and a little Spanish. The Arab differs in every respect from the Berber. One of the finest types among mankind, he has a tall, spare frame, aquiline nose, fine eyes. He is kind, hospitable, dignified, abstemious, a poet, a gentleman, and a horseman.

Isabel Savory - In the Tail of the Peacock

The Riffis are therefore a moral people: a man has but one wife; the women do not veil, and yet familiarity is not tolerated between the sexes; a young man will go out of his way to avoid passing close by a young woman whom he sees in the distance, lest he be suspected of behaving lightly to her.

Isabel Savory - In the Tail of the Peacock

To explore the unknown Riff country would be interesting indeed. No book has been written upon it except from hearsay, and no European has penetrated across its length and breadth. The Riffis want no foreign interlopers among their sacred hills, and would "knife" the first who showed his face.

Isabel Savory - In the Tail of the Peacock

And yet the Sus is comparatively close to Mogador, with which it trades; mules from the Sus were always in the Mogador market; camels were coming in every week with wool, camels' hair, goat-skins, hides, beeswax, a little gold dust, ostrich feathers, gum-arabic, cattle, and all the produce of the Sahara; while the Berbers from the Sus were interesting above any Riffis or tribesmen with whom we had hitherto met.

Isabel Savory - In the Tail of the Peacock