Although now the date of the Guanches (guanches) is being used, speaking of all the first inhabitants of the archipelago, originally, the name referred only to the inhabitants of Tenerife. The word guanchinet in the language of its inhabitants most likely meant a man (guan) from Tenerife (net), Apart from the Guanches, the Canary Islands inhabited the Canarios before the arrival of the Spanish conquistadors (Gran canaria), Bimbaczów (Iron), Mayans (Fuerteventura and Lanzarote), Gomers (slingshot) and Benahoaryci (The Palm).
You could say, that the first inhabitants of the archipelago stopped in development during the Stone Age. Guanches lived in natural or carved caves, and there, where it was not possible, they built small round stone houses. They worked mainly in agriculture, hunting and breeding goats, which provided them with meat and skins for clothes. The basis of the food of the Guanches was goat meat and gofio, a kind of flour prepared from roasted barley – Interestingly, both of these products are present in Canarian cuisine to this day.
The Guanches are an example of a typical class society. The islands were divided into smaller kingdoms ruled by rulers known as mencey or guanarteme. Depending on the island, they were elected by the council or inherited power from their fathers. All decisions were made by the ruler in consultation with a council composed of tribal aristocrats. They owned land and livestock. The position of women in the Guanche society was interesting – despite obvious patriarchy, women were allowed to have many husbands, was inherited from the mother, and men could not look or speak to women without their permission.
Little is known about the religion of the first inhabitants of the islands, otherwise, that they believed in some supreme deity, called Alcorac in Gran Canaria, Achaman in Tenerife, Eraoranhan in Hierro and Abora in La Palmie. In addition, in Tenerife, people believed in the sun god Magec and his eternal adversary, the demon Guayot, the lord of hell, which was located under the Teide volcano. The Guanches mummified their dead.
Only a few toponyms and rock carvings found on some islands have survived from the Guanche language. It is true that the language of symbols has not been deciphered so far, but it is combined with the Berber languages.