Fuzzy Wuzzy was the term use 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.