marabouts

Noun

marabout (plural marabouts)

1. A Muslim holy man or mystic, especially in parts of North Africa.
   • one of their principal targets was the marabouts – or holy men and leaders of mystic orders – whom they accused both of corrupting the faith by their espousal of mysticism and of being the ‘domestic animals of colonialism’.1977, Alistair Horne, A Savage War of Peace, New York: Review Books, published 2006, page 38
2. The tomb or shrine of such a person.
   • Climbing one on his second day lost, Prosperi spotted a disturbance to the view. “I was convinced it was somebody’s home or a holy man’s shrine.” But the shrine, or marabout, was empty. The only holy man was in a sarcophagus.2023 July 4, Paula Cocozza, “I was lost in the desert for nine and a half days – and sustained myself with raw bats and urine”, in The Guardian, →ISSN