Fur

Language family: Fur (Nilo-Saharan)

The people after whom Darfur ("land of the Fur") is named, traditionally centred on the mountainous Jebel Marra massif. The Fur built a sultanate that, by the late 16th century, had adopted Islam and Arab dress under Sultan Suliman Solong, while Fur society retained its own language and distinctive mountain terrace farming. Fur communities are historically agricultural, growing grains, cotton and fruit in the temperate mountain climate. Long-running tension between Fur farmers and nomadic Arab herders escalated into the Darfur conflict that began in 2003.