What did the original Berbers look like? – Part 3

The Berber populations nearer the Mediterranean coast were probably Caucasoids. There is little doubt that they came from the Middle East, and they have occupied the region since the Neolithic or even earlier. Experienced sailors like other Neolithic peoples, they colonized the Canary Islands. When the Spaniards conquered these islands in the fifteenth century, they found a distinct population with some blond-haired and blue-eyed people -traits that are still evident among some Berbers in Morocco. They spoke Guanche, an Afroasiatic Berber language. By the time the Spanish arrived, they had lost the ability to sail.

Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza, Genes, Peoples and Languages, Penguin, 2001, p. 122

How much Rh- blood did the original Berbers carry?

Like all other Berbers, the Riffians include standard Mediterraneans in their tribal populations. Among these Mediterraneans the incidence of elements of blond hair and blue eyes is a bit higher than the usual twenty-five percent. I attribute the slight excess to several factors : isolation in a cloudy and cool mountain habitat and mixture with an older strain. Concentrated in the more isolated tribes in the central Rif, the older strain is characterized by individuals of stocky build, with large heads, broad faces, low orbits, large teeth, and broad noses. While variable in pigmentation, these individuals, who look like Irishmen, run to red hair, green eyes, and freckles. They cannot be explained by any historical invasion of North Africa, real or fancied; the bones of their preagricultural ancestors have been excavated from North African soil in sufficient quantity to confim the local antiquity of the genes which produces them. A broad head, a wide face, a snub nose, freckles, and other individual traits derived from this racial combination may be seen in other Riffians and in other Berber populations. Green eyes, for example, are common among the Middle Atlas Beraber (as anyone who was with the Goums in the last war may remember). Fair hair has been recorded from the Kabyles in Algeria, but actual statistical work shows them to be almost entirely Mediterranean with only a slight excess of blondism.

Carleton S. Coon, Caravan – The Story of Middle East: The Story of Middle East (1951), Read Books, 2007, p. 163

Some ancient Egyptians were natural blondes

Grey eyes and Rh- Berbers

What did the original Berbers look like? – Part 2