Fuzzy Wuzzy

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A Hadenodoa warrior
A Hadenodoa warrior

Fuzzy Wuzzy was the term used by British colonial soldiers for the nineteenth century Hadendoa warriors supporting the Sudanese Mahdi. The name "Fuzzy Wuzzy" may be purely English in origin, or it may incorporate some sort of Arabic pun (possibly based on ghazī, "warrior"). It alludes to their butter-matted hair which gave them a "fuzzy" look. Fuzzy Wuzzies are remembered today primarily for a popular English children's rhyme, and for a poem by Rudyard Kipling.

Contents

[edit] Historical background

The Beja people were one of two broad multi-tribal groupings supporting the Mahdi, and were divided into three tribes. One of these, the Hadendoa, was nomadic along Sudan's Red Sea coast and provided a large number of cavalry and jihādiyya (referring to mounted infantry units). They were armed with swords and spears and some of them carried breech-loaded rifles which had been captured from the Egyptian forces, and some of them had acquired military experience in the Egyptian army.

[edit] Children's song

"Fuzzy Wuzzy " is a song written in 1944 by Al Hoffman, Milton Drake and Jerry Livingston. Its chorus is a well-known rhyme:

Fuzzy Wuzzy was a bear
Fuzzy Wuzzy had no hair
Fuzzy Wuzzy wasn't fuzzy, was he?

[edit] The Kipling poem (1890)

Wikisource has original text related to this article:

Kipling's poem Fuzzy Wuzzy praises the Hadendoa for their martial prowess, because "for all the odds agin' you, Fuzzy-Wuz, you broke the square." This could refer to either or both historical battles between the British and Mahdist forces where British infantry squares were broken. The first was at the Battle of Tamai, on March 13, 1884, and the second was on January 17, 1885 during the Battle of Abu Klea. Kipling's narrator, an infantry soldier, speaks in admiring terms of the Fuzzy Wuzzies, praising their bravery which, although insufficient to defeat the British, did at least enable them to boast of having "broken the square" - an achievement which few other British foes could claim.

[edit] Fuzzy Wuzzy Fallacy

The Fuzzy Wuzzy Fallacy is a name for a wargaming theory coined by Richard Hamblen in the September 1976 edition of Avalon Hill's The General Magazine, loosely based on historical records of battles between the British and the Sudanese Mahdi. The Fuzzy Wuzzy Fallacy states that a single soldier with 2× firepower or attack strength is not equal to two soldiers with 1× firepower or attack strength. Instead, the soldier with 2× firepower is actually worth \sqrt{2} of the 1× soldier, if either soldier can be killed in a single hit. This is another form of Lanchester's law.

As a result, tactics and strategy designed around this theory emphasize greater numbers and time, which the speed and mobility of the units in action can effect.

[edit] See also

[edit] External links