Fihroun

(1885-1916)

   Amenukal of the Ouilliminden, who led a revolt against the French from 1912 to 1916. In 1914, he joined the Grand Sanusiyya call for jihad in Fezzan; he was arrested in October of the same year and sentenced to 10 years of imprisonment and 20 years of exile and exiled to Timbuktu. He skillfully managed to escape from prison in Gao and then organized a jihad against the French. He marched on Filingue, an important market and Hausa town, but his assault was short lived, as the French forces crushed his siege, and Firhoun died in 1916. After his death, the people of Aïr would revolt under the direction of another Tuareg supreme chief, Kaoucen.