Dihya Tadmut - the Kahena warrior queen

Dihya or Damya, nicknamed Dihya Tadmut, also known as Kahina or Kahena, is one of the first warrior queens in history, but also the symbol of Amazigh resistance to Muslims. The nickname Kahena has several meanings in Arabic, Hebrew or Greek. In Arabic, Kahena refers to a fortune-teller or witch, which is pejorative for some interpretations. In Greek, Kahena is derived from Karina which means to be pure. In Hebrew the word is close to Cohen who has a sense of priest. (In French, the name Corinne has the meaning of being pure). The presence of two of the six former Cohanim necropolises in North Africa that were in Biskra and Bone could be linked to the Kahena family. The conquest of North Africa is decided by the head of the Umayyad dynasty, Muawiya. At the dawn of the invasion, the political and administrative unity of the eastern and central Tamazgha (the Aures, currently east of Algeria and west of Tunisia) was largely achieved by Kusayla, leader of the resistance to the Muslim Conquest of the Maghreb (reign from 660 to 686). Kusayla, converted to Islam, conflicts with Oqba Ibn Nafi Al Fihri, General of the Umayyad army.

Upon her death in 686, Dihya took the lead in the resistance. She came from the tribe of Djerawa, a zenete Amazigh tribe of Numidia, according to Arabic chroniclers in the Middle Ages. As only daughter, she was elected or named by her tribe after her father's death. Dihya appealed to many tribes in eastern and southern North Africa to unleash the war against the Umayads. She defeated twice the great army of the Umayyads thanks to the contribution of the riders of Banou Ifren.

It reigns throughout Ifriqiya for five years. Defeated in 693 by Hassan Ibn in N'uman in the last battle against the Umayyads, she took refuge in the Amphitheater of El Jem. She is finally taken prisoner, then decapitated at a place called Bir El Kahina. The Umayyad army chiefs send his head in trophy to the caliph Abd al-Malik in Syria. Dihya will be the only woman in history to fight the Umayyad empire. The Umayyads ask the Zenetes to provide twelve thousand fighters for the conquest of Andalusia as a condition for the cessation of the war.