Itto, My Great Grandmother — The Legend of The Atlas

The story of a mother, healer, and lone wolf

AI mage of an Amazign woman (Indigenous to North Africa) with tribal Amazigh face tattoos — licensed via Freepik Premium

My mother’s hands are rough and callused from the love she gives and the lives she carried all these years.

My grandmother, even as she forgot the names and faces of her daughters, she kept a palm balanced against their backs, steadying their steps and guiding their paths.

Her own mother’s hands were always there, guiding her. They were hands that held tight and sheltered against the storm. Hands that stitched and mended, wrapped and bound, tucking away precious things inside ragged tents.

When famine struck the land and war took husbands and homes, my great-grandmother Itto carried her children on her back and set up a tent.

Deep within the chilling Middle Atlas Mountains of Morocco, an Amazigh woman lived in solitude with her two toddlers, where the blades of tribal insurgents and the boots of French colonizers could not reach.

It was her against hunger. It was her against darkness. It was her against the long nights and lurking beasts.

By day, she cut plants from the mountainside and gathered wild herbs and roots; anything edible to keep her and her children alive.