Berber flag on Las Palmas in the Canary Islands, which were formerly inhabited by the Guanches, an ancient Berber people. The flag is composed of blue, green, and yellow horizontal bands of the same height, and a Tifinagh letter "yaz" or "aza". Each colour corresponds to an aspect of Tamazgha, the territory inhabited by Berbers in North Africa: The "yaz" (ⵣ) symbolizes the "free man", which is the meaning of the Berber word "amazigh", the Berbers' own name for themselves (endonym). It is in red, the colour of life, and also the colour of resistance. The Berber flag thus symbolizes the entire
Northern Berber languages fall into three groups: The eastern boundaries of the North Berber varieties are uncertain. Some linguists include the Nafusi and Ghadames languages, while others do not. Most regard Ghadamès as lying outside of Northern Berber, but the "Ethnologue" does not. There is no authoritative answer as to whether the Northern Berber varieties constitute a language rather than a dialect. Some academics believe that not only Northern Berber but all the Berber languages are dialects of a single language, whereas others come up with much higher counts. At any rate, mutual comprehensibility among the Northern Berber varieties is high, though not