For the nomadic Tuareg people, Agadez is less of a settlement than a resting spot — it represents the one anchor to the roving tribes but never a solidified capital, a humble place to escape from the fatiguing journey across the dune.

A barren patch of land just like the rest of the Aïr Mountains, Agadez's importance stemmed from its early role in the medieval trans-Saharan trade, where merchants often had to trek across the West to other Muslim kingdoms in the North. Never a hospitable location for travelers, the Berber tribes of the region decided to carve out a trade route of their own along the eponymous city, which developed into a sultanate as its influence as a salt trading passage grew to encompass nearby lands. Its sparse population and central position in the Sahara made it a constant target of foreign kingdoms for a long time, from the Songhai to the Ottomans and eventually the French imperials. However, for the most part, Agadez was always independent in its operation. Traditionally led by a confederation of slaveholding ethnic chieftains, most regional powers that took over left the town an autonomous tributary.

Following the collapse of the Third French Republic, the nomads of the Aïr Mountains once again returned to pastoralism. Still following the tradition of kinship amongst their own, they are now free from the overlords that the land fell under for hundreds of years. What welcomed them, however, was not a taste of liberty — as the barren soils of the Sahara cannot survive without the burden of immense poverty. Agadez is barely sustained by trickling caravans nowadays, full of refugees across the desert and without a sustainable economy, the powderkeg is kept together by nothing but faith in the wise sultan.