VCU The Impacts of Ecology and Geography on West African People Discussion

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In what ways has geography and Ecology Shaped and Impacted the precolonial West African Peoples and Societies.  Give specific examples to support your conclusions/assertions, arguments.

SOURCES:  DO NOT USE OTHER SOURCES (Published Chapters or articles, internet sources, etc.)- The Plagiarism Tool Will Bring Them Up. 

You MUST use the following Sources for the paper.

1]. The Chapter on Ecology and Culture in West Africa by Webb, Jr.

2]. Basil Davidson, Text, Chapters 1, 2, 3.

3]. The Chapter on West African Geography.


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In what ways has geography and Ecology Shaped and Impacted the precolonial West African Peoples and Societies. Give specific examples to support your conclusions/assertions, arguments SOURCES: DO NOT USE OTHER SOURCES (Published Chapters or articles, internet sources, etc.)- The Plagiarism Tool Will Bring Them Up. You MUST use the following Sources for the paper. 1]. The Chapter on Ecology and Culture in West Africa by Webb, Jr. 2]. Basil Davidson, Text, Chapters 1, 2, 3. 3]. The Chapter on West African Geography. When Grading I will check the following: A]. Organization: Paragraph, transitioning etc. from one paragraph to the next; one them to the next, etc. B]. Critical Thinking: Analyzing the readings-dissecting and asking relevant questions of your sources and answering them with verifiable evidence. c]. Content: How well you have articulated the themes. d]. Stylistics: Citation format, Bibliography, grammar, spelling, mechanics, etc. PAPER SPECIFICATIONS: HOW TO CITE USING CHICAGO MANUAL OF STYLE: When in word document, Click on References- a page will open and you will see Endnotes and Footnotes. There is a chevron - for how your Footnotes or Endnotes should be labelled. Select Numbers (1, 2, 3, forward ) NOT Roman Numerals. Then when you need to enter a source, Click on either Endnotes or Footnotes (Use only one- not both). As you enter a footnote or endnote, they run as 1, 2, 3, 4, until the end of your paper. Numbers do not repeat themselves. For example, you cannot have Footnote 1 on page 1, and Footnote 1 on page 2, Footnote 1 on page 3, etc. unless you are entering the notes manually (which is not acceptable). You must, however, read the actual Manual to be sure on how to enter the citation information (how to cite a book, an article in an edited work/book, an article in a journal, a newspaper, an oral interview, Internet sources, etc.). I have attaches Chicago Manual of Style in the syllabus and in several other locations. Chicago no longer uses Ibid. See link for Chicago on Syllabus and on the Course Modules. BIBLIOGRAPHY: The Sources you have used to compile the paper. The Chicago Manual of Style will also show you how to compile a Bibliography/References [All Sources used to write a paper, always written alphabetically beginning with the last name of the author. What students label as Works Cited is a misleading phrase. NOTE: If you do not have a Footnote or Endnote where you direct me to a specific source you are using on a specific page and find the information you have written, then you have no citation, which is Plagiarism. Penalty for Plagiarism is 0% on the assignment. Thank you. Chapter 1 Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. A Very Long History Overleaf A rock painting from Tassili n'Ajjer, Sahara,depicting a horse and two-wheeled chariot. (Werner FormanArchive and Musee Bardo, Algiers) Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:10:13. Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:10:13. Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. A Very Long History We know from scientific evidence and calculation that Africa is among the oldest of the world's continents,and that it was there that humanity first evolved before spreadingout acrossthe world. Through countlessforgotten centuries,modernAfrica's remote ancestorsdevelopedall the variations of appearance,of skin colour, of ways and beliefs in everyday life. However ancient in its origins, much of this story is new in our western world of today. Up to quite recentyears, the world knew little or nothing aboutAfrica's extraordinaryhistorical development.It has beenmistakenly believedthat the peoplesof Africa have had no history of their own development. Therefore,it was said and widely believedthat Africa's peoplesmust somehowbe inferior in their nature and capacitiesto other peopleswho do have that kind of history. This false belief has been one of the basesof the myths and misunderstandingsof various kinds of racism. Especiallythrough the pasthalf-century,the progressof modernscholarship and researchhas underminedall such myths, and has brought to light the realities underlying human evolution. This notable progresshas been rightly hailed as one of the great liberating influences of our time. New sources of knowledge have made this progress possible. Scientific archaeologyis one of these new sources.A fresh look at old books and records is another. A third, no less important, has been finding out what Africans think or rememberabouttheir past development. This book is therefore about the political and social history, in precolonial times, of the vast and famous region of Africa known by historical and conventionalusageas West Africa. Coined in Europe by Europeans, this old regional name has no exact geographicalmeaning. It is simply a handy term for all the lands (and the offshore islands) betweenabout 20° of latitude north of the equator down to the West African coast, and eastwardto about 15° of longitude. Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:10:13. 3 West Africa before the Colonial Era: A History to 1850 0 1500 km Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. .MatJ .1 . 1 W cst Africa. In another summary and familiar usage, the huge area known as West Africa is south of the SaharaDesert, although here again there is no exact meaning, for where does the Saharabegin and end? The old Arab geographershad more logic when they coined a namefor the broad belt of territory where the true desert of the Sahararuns into and enclosesthe beginning of the grasslandplains: they called it the Sahel, and this term, meaning 'shore', is still sometimesused today. In this quite arbitrary but generalway, all the lands of North Africa, meaningthose borderingon the Mediterraneansea, are omitted, although these have had countlesslinks with West Africa since desert travel first beganseveralthousandyears ago. Eastward,the old label again runs into 4 Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:10:13. R. ac Sa 240 CM Kong R Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:10:13. 300 ife 600 km 240 CM 240 CM Beme 240 CM 240 CM Old Oyo R.i in iall, vt'&ctatioju .md Africa and ariMs jlUvfril affected In t?*c tsc Hies flies in Wcsi West AJricd. 0 1: *i: *,r- r 120cm 240om cm 360 cm 623 cm abnb hhsk i 2!)(Jfrt / 2tW ( _om! 4$(J(Jfrt AnI1i\J4J ml*1! Rain forest Flaih tee.t Total affectedI:Jy byDl. tse testil. flies r *! area ar.affeelaff g ne if,;: , n- mm Jenne Timbuktu ge A'lti/* 1,2 Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. i .N Lake Chad iger R.N KarK> N Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. West Africa before the Colonial Era: A History to 1850 trouble, for where does West Africa end and East Africa begin? Convention disagreeswith itself here, and compromisesometimesawardsimportant countriessuch as Camerounto West Africa, and sometimesnot. No doubt these definitions will continue to change as history proceedsalong its way. The famous West Africa news magazine,now in its sixth decadeof publication, still moves with the times and already does homageto relatively new pan-African loyalties and interestsby allocating weekly sections to other African regions. But for our historiographical needsit will be best to stay with the old definitions of West Africa while recognizingtheir limitations. While geographicaldefinition remains fuzzy and illogical, that is not true of its temporal application. What we are concernedwith in this book is not the whole of West African history but with large and important periods before about AD 1850: before, that is, the onset of the European imperialist invasions and dispossessionsof the nineteenthcentury. For a while, after those invasions, Africans were dispossessedof the right and possibility of making their own history. This impact of the outside world, meaning essentially Europe and North America, was profound and enduring. Intentionally or not, it carried Africans into a world greatly different from their own world of precolonial times. Yet that old African world retainedits influence and value, for Africans are the children of their past as much as any other branch of humanity. In the caseof West Africa, accordingly,it can make no senseto study the situation and events of today without first understandingthe long and eventful centuriesthat came before the colonial dispossessions. This is why the history in this book has a necessarilypowerful value for understandingthe history of today. Its long and wonderfully varied record opensthe doors on centuriesof pastachievement.The story of West Africa in historical terms has formed a central part in the taming of this enormousand difficult continentfor the benefit of humankind.But for the Western world in particular, the story of West Africa has a very special significance. For it was from West Africa that the ancestorsof most of America's black peoplecame acrossthe Atlantic Oceanto settle and work in the New World. While addressingthe history of West Africa in the centuriesbeforethe Europeaninvasionsand dispossessions of the nineteenthcentury, it will be helpful to standback from recentcenturiesand consider,briefly, the distant origins and remotebeginningsof humanityin this grandly productiveregion. How many people, and how did they live? Taking Africa as a whole, and summarizinga massof more or less scientific data, we can say that the whole humanpopulationof Africa during the 6 Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:10:13. Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. A Very Long History Early Stone Age - up to, say, about 50,000 years ago - had managedto grow in size to perhaps200,000persons.No matterwhat the exactnumber may have been- and the figure here derives from various calculationsor guessesas to the numbers of humanscapable of self-sustainmentbefore the times of any systematicagriculture - humanity remainedrare and its stability more than fragile. The total is only an estimate,but useful. Theserare communities,spreadacrosstheir vast continent,nonetheless survived and, very gradually, set about the challengeof taming their lands for human advantage.They left few or no recordsof their presence outside the narrow scope of archaeologicalremains, but our scientific linguists of today consider from their researchesthat these early peoples developed several distinct 'mother tongues' which, in time, became the 'distant parents'of Africa's principal languagegroupings, of which three - namely, Congo-Kordofanian,Nilo-Saharanand Afro-Asiatic - were to acquire dominant significanceand developmentalvalue. But they acquired this significance and value in a very distant past. Most West African languagesseparatedfrom their 'parents'an immensely long time ago. Emphasizingthis 'time-depth'in a memorablelectureof 1964, the American specialist,Robert G. Armstrong, opined that 'the language ancestralto the Niger-Congofamily of languages',sometimesreferred to as Congo-Kordofanian,'cannot have been spokenmore recently than ten thousandyearsago'.1This indicatesjust how ancientis the processof diversification in African languagegroups. As these early peoples multiplied and spread across the untamed lands,they increasedin numbers;and as they increasedin numbers,so also did their cultures begin to vary and endlesslydivide into new identities. So the scientific linguists tell us, if with due warnings against the dangersof oversimplification,that by the time Africa was enteringthe Late StoneAge, around 3,000 years ago (and none of these numbers must be taken too literally), there were in Africa perhapsthree to four million people speaking 37 distinct African languages;and, of these, half or more inhabited West Africa south of the SaharaDesert. All these various communities,however divided by the processesof cultural diversification, may be reasonablysaid to have evolved broadly commonways of life in a multitude of local variants dictated by a correspondingmultitude of ecologicalnecessities.The so-called'ethnic' hostilities or outright conflicts of our own time (or indeedany other time) have been the product of one or other rivalry for some real or imagined local gain. That is why the majority of such conflicts have been short-lived and eventually resolved. It remains, at the same time, that territorial 'safety and possession'becamefactors of generallypersuasiveinfluence even if frontiers 1 R.G. Armstrong, The Study of West African Languages(Ibadan University Press,1964). Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:10:13. 7 Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. West Africa before the Colonial Era: A History to 1850 betweencommunities- and eventuallybetweenorganizedstateformations - remained in the forefront of consciousness.One needs also to bear in mind, in consideringall suchmatters,the binding force of ecologicalhazards and barriers in the form of tropical forests, deserts,and the like. And so it continued as Africans improved their skills and farming under sub-tropicaland tropical conditions;and the great project of taming Africa for human benefit went forward in gradual but stubbornsteps.The next greatadvancein the masteringof Naturecameafter about600 BC, with the developmentand spreadof the basic technologiesof metal production and the forging and smithing of metal tools, notably in iron. In West Africa this crucial forward step was well installed in severallocalities - one, for instance,in the Benuevalley (of modernNigeria), and anotherin the upper regions of the Niger river - and the developmentof metal technologycontinued with the local evolution of types of forced-draughtfurnace and the comparabletechnologiesof forging and smithing iron. At the same time, populationnumbersand their diversification into different cultural and linguistic groupingscontinuedas before. The whole grandproject of populating and inhabiting this 'empty continent'had long since becomeone of the outstandingsuccessesscored by humanity in theseearly stagesof growth. Progressin African metallurgical skills, locally invented and locally developed, continued after about 600 BC through centuries labelled by historiansas the African Iron Age; and it is this Iron Age that has given us the bulk of the historiographical record we examine in this book. The whole period of the Iron Age, continuing in one or other degreeof innovation until very recent times, is immenselyrich in its human drama, while the conquestof Nature moved from one stageto another,with successive generationsbuilding, againstwhateversetbacksand disasters,on the cultures of their ancestralforebears.And it is in this complex but nonetheless coherentand understandableprocessof diversification from common origins that we shall be able, with patient research,to perceivethe origins of Africa's self-civilizing achievement,and come to grips with the cultural values of Africa's self-evolvedhistoriography. Here is where we can find the keys to elucidating otherwiseopaque questionsof mood and temper, or trace the source and spur of African attitudeswhich, for instance,have stubbornlycombineda firm respectfor precedent- for 'what our parentsdid before us' - with the restless,onwardshifting readinessfor experimentthat has markedall pioneers,everywhere, who have pushed 'beyond the known frontier' to where anything may becomepossibleas long as humancourageand endeavourare readyto make it so. The recordsof African history - of West African history in our study here - are copious and insistenton the side of customand convention;but they are also strong on the side of new initiative. The rules for successful community life, we see,are there and are well recognized.But the changes and chancesof fate may at any time overturn them; and then a person 8 Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:10:13. A Very Long History must be ready to changecourseor shift response,no matter what the precedentsmay say or the traditional customsmay advise. Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. Ideas and beliefs Among the keys we can use to understandthe ideas of ancient peoples are thoseof religious or spiritual belief. Modern historiography,nourished by a vast quantity of scholarly researchinto the ethnographyof ancient peoples,has recognizedthe centralimportanceof their conceptsof spiritual power. This is difficult and controversialgroundto cross.But we can take, for a safe guide, the nature of these ancient and evolving communitiesas they grew out of the mysteriesof the Stone Age, came to grips with the realities of food production (as distinct from mere food collection) in the Iron Age, and built new kinds of community. What emergesfrom the recordsof research,centrally, is that all these peoplesawardedsupremepower to an idea of God as controlling everything and everyone,but doing this indirectly through subordinatespiritual powers.From this governingconceptthey derived- in a multitude of various ways of explanation-a ruling morality for everyday life: the power of God, they held, would always reward right behaviour and punish wrong behaviour. And from this morality they went on, again in a multitude of different elucidations,to conceivethe instrumentsthat spiritual power might use in fashioningrewardsand punishments.Theseinstrumentswere largely those of magical or quasi-magicalpower: the power of sorcery or witchcraft. Here once more is a subject of great complexity. The central fact is that the all-compelling morality of thesestructuresof behaviourrested in its ability to reward good social behaviourand to punishthe opposite;and thesepowerswere exercisedaccordingto well-understoodrules and maxims. These ideas and beliefs, as we shall see, went together with inbuilt expectations,hopeful or otherwise, as to how people would behave in practice. When the Barotse of the Upper Zambesivalley, far into central Africa, createdtheir rules for social behaviourthey very carefully allowed for the conviction that personswith power over other people- chiefs and the like - would abuseor misusethis power unlesspreventedfrom doing so. They accordinglycounterposedeachpower-positionwith anotherdesigned to limit the damage.The notion that pre-colonial society was a kind of free-for-all in which any person with power could exerciseit in any way that he or she might wish is denied in our records; and the case of the Barotse, so well studied by Max Gluckman and his colleagues,affords obvious and yet by no meansunique evidenceof this.2 2 Notably in M. Gluckman,The Ideas in BarotseJurisprudence(Yale University Press,1965). Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:10:13. 9 West Africa before the Colonial Era: A History to 1850 We can think of pre-colonialAfrica's humanity, in short, as occupying a kind of spiritual battlegroundbetweenthe ideas of Good and Evil. And in all this we have to make some effort to imagine the state of mind of pioneeringpeoples,migrating ever more distantly into unknownterritories, as they met the difficult challengesof survival and development,and devisedtheir practical and spiritual responsesto them. Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. Climatic changeand disaster Meanwhile, through early centuries,somepoints of decisivechangecan be perceived.Early forms of civilization took shapein the spaciousand wellwateredgrasslandsand prairies of what afterwards- from about 2000 Be onwards - were to becomethe arid wilderness of the SaharaDesert we know today. These prairies becamethe focus of a New Stone Age that developedin the fifth and fourth millennia before the Christian era. The high point of this developmentsaw the emergence,in about 3500 Be, of the splendid kingdoms of ancient Egypt. But this whole epic of civilizing developmentin Egypt was accompanied by a climatic disasterwhich had great consequences for the wider developmentof Africa itself. From about 2000 Be there came a gradual changein the climate of the whole of this part of the world. From being a vast region of good rainfall and wide rivers flowing all the year round, the grasslandplains of what is now the SaharaDesertplungedinto a fatal and soon permanentdryness.The rains failed, the rivers dried up, the pastures turned to sandand stone.The peoplesof theseprairies were forced to find new homes,some to the north of the Saharaand others to the south. To the north of the desert the land of the Pharaohs,who ruled Egypt, continued to prosperand make progress.In scienceand arts this splendidcivilization outmatchedall rivals. The tragedy for Africans was that the huge, harsh desertsof the Saharalay betweenEgypt and the rest of Africa. Yet the 'cut-off' betweennorthern Africa and the vast lands to the south of the SaharaDesertnever becamecomplete.As we shall see,nomad travellers and traderscontinuedto find their way acrossthe Sahara.Their chief trails becamewell known, even though great courageand endurance were required in order to use them. One of thesechief trails, the western one, joined Morocco in North Africa to the grasslandsof the western Sudan. This was not the country we know nowadays as the Sudan, in north-easternAfrica. In Arabic, ever more widely used in North Africa after the Muslim Arab conquestsof the seventhcentury AD, the country south of the Saharawas simply the Bilad as-Sudan,'the SouthernCountry'. Another famous trail, much further to the east,led from what is now Tunisia acrossthe Hoggar mountainsto the middle reachesof the River 10 Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:10:13. A Very Long History Niger. Wells were dug along these trails; villages and towns sprangup in the oasesthat wells made possible.Here in theseoases,once again, farming becamepossible,and some fruits could flourish, such as dates.Meanwhile, methodsof transportimproved and the horse or donkey gave way to the camel from Arabia, widely usedfor deserttravel and transportfrom about 2000 years ago. Having broaderfeet, the camel could move better over sand, and it could walk much further without water than the horse. Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. Farming and the beginning of the Iron Age Meanwhile the peoplessouth of the Saharacontinuedto developand grow in number, as we know from archaeology.And these early peoples,very simple in their lifestyles as they may have been, possessedthe keys to the future. They had already discoveredhow to grow food, as well as merely collecting or gatheringedible plants. Now, severalcenturieslater, camethe next greatdiscovery.And this development- or seriesof relateddiscoveries - was to presideover the birth of the world we know today. As we have seen,they developedand exploited the use of metals,but above all of iron, for the making of tools and weapons. They initiated what historians, looking back on its achievements,have called the Iron Age. The Ancient Egyptians had made bronze but not iron (save in very small quantities). Now it was found in the grasslandcountries south of the Saharathat iron ore was plentiful, and ways of smelting of the ore to obtain the iron from it were developed.Then new inventionsor skills were usedto forge the iron into tools. Gradually, archaeologistshave pinpointed the places where the African metal-workers of the Iron Age developed their inventions. One of thesecentresof early iron-making was at Meroe on the Middle Nile river. At that time, around 500 Be, Meroe was the capital of a powerful kingdom - the kingdom of Kush. Another was in the region of the confluenceof the Niger and Benue rivers, in Nigeria. Here was the centre of the Nok Culture, so named by archaeologistsfrom its people'sskill in making clay sculptures. Other such centres of early iron-making have been traced to other parts of West Africa, but also right acrossthe grasslandbelt of country to easternand then to southernAfrica. The surprising truth is that once the necessarytechnologieshad been developedand used, these technologies passedfrom one Late StoneAge people to anotherin the courseof only a few centuries.Inventing and adaptingthese technologies,African peoples of long ago were able to masterthe harshwildernessof their continentand make it fit for human settlementand even for prosperity. This 'taming of a continent' through centuriesof early human developmentcomposed,in the courseof time, one of the grand achievementsof early history. In that Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:10:13. 11 West Africa before the Colonial Era: A History to 1850 Th8 Nok CuitUtU N R Ni r ge Kagara ger Nor Kagara R Niger I mm R Ni Kagara Jt§ : i i i ii i Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. Map 1.3 The Nok peoplelived in the areashown, and fragmentsof their work, in the shapeof clay figures and other objects,have been found at the placesmarked. period, Africans stood at the forefront of progress,and only the ancient Chinesecame near them. The revolutionary importanceand value of iron - far tougher than the bronzethat Ancient Egypt had made and used- were so great that the reasonsfor this value need some thought. A first reason was that it gave West Africans better weaponsand tools. Iron-pointed spearswere more useful than sharp sticks or stones. Iron-headedhoes, probably invented some time after iron-pointed spears,were better than stone or wooden ones. Iron-headedaxes could fell trees and shapewood much better than stone or bronze axes. These improvementsin equipment made it possible to grow a lot more food. Having more food, peoplelived betterthan before.They became more numerous.But more people neededmore farming land. Here lay a secondreasonwhy iron was important, and why its use markedthe opening of a new stageof development.With iron spearsand iron tools, Africans 12 Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:10:13. Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. A Very Long History could attack some of the great natural barriers of their continent. They could penetratethe deepforests,opennew trails, defendthemselvesagainst wild animals,and generallymove aboutwith more safety.Thereare grounds for thinking that the Early Iron Age people of West Africa sent out many groups of wanderers,of migrants who moved from one homeland to a new one, through the forests of the Congo Basin and other distant lands. Iron also brought, from about 600 Be onwards,a new sourceof military power. Those who first learnt to use it were able to rule their neighbours, especiallyif they also succeededin keepingthe secretsof its making to themselves.Strongerpeoplesbeganto rule weaker peoples. And as people grew more numerous,there came a need to find new ways of ensuring law and order. Little by little, many peoples in West Africa began forming themselvesinto states. Men began to feel the need for organizedgovernment,and in this respectthe great Egyptian precedent was again of new importance. There were various reasonsfor this. With iron tools there could be more and better farming. With more farming there began to be enough food to maintain specialistswho worked at making tools, weaponsand other hand-madethings. This division of labour encouragedtrade, at first local and then long-distance,by producing a wide rangeof goods.All this, together with the growing size of populations, required more complex forms of political organization. Early stateswere simple in their governmentcomparedwith thosewe know today. Somewere ruled by a single chief or king and his counsellors. Others were governedby a council of chiefs or elders. Others again were formed by several neighbouringpeopleswhose chiefs were bound in loyalty to one another. Elsewhere,at the same time, there were people who found it better to get along without any chiefs. Traditional groups such as clans, families descendedfrom commonancestors,or age-setsof people born at about the sametime, had influence in theseearly states,as in later times, becausethey could underpina systemof law and order. Of courseit is important to rememberthat no one kind of state or community is more to be admired than another. A people with a strong central government was not necessarilymore intelligent than anotherpeople who had no such government.The reason why there were different kinds of states, some with kings and some without, was that people lived under different conditions and faced different problems.They had to solve theseproblemsin different ways. The possibilities of trade were important in deciding what kind of stateswere formed. Most peopleswho lived on the main routes of developing trade tended to form themselvesinto stateswith a central king or government.One important reasonfor this was that taking part in longdistancetrade called for the kind of united decisions,especiallyon conditions of purchaseand sale of goods,that a king or centralgovernmentcould Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:10:13. 13 West Africa before the Colonial Era: A History to 1850 Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. besttake. But other peopleswho lived far off theseroutes,and so had little interestin trade, tendedto acceptmuch looser forms of rule. They carried on living by the old family and clan customs of earlier times. All this belongsto the history of Africa's Iron Age, beginningin about 600 Be and continuing down to the threshold of modern times. At this point the records of archaeologyand of surviving tradition becomesufficient to enable outlines of history to be written; and we see the gradual unfolding of early West African social structures.The general frameworksof that society becomeever more clear. West Africans are seen to have been living, from some 2,000-3,000years before the present,in recognizablydistinct cultural groupings. They evolved forms and ideas of self-governmentthat are clearly ancestralto those of later historical times, and evento thoseof today. As we shall seefrom the recordsthat historians have been able to refine and assemble,West African life has long ceased to be predominantlyrural. Early settlementsdevelopednetworks of neighbouring villages or hamlets, while in some naturally advantagedregions, such as the confines of the broad valley of the great Niger river, village settlementsgrew into towns. There is plenty of evidencethat these early towns had strong, coherentintercommunication,but the crucially developmental arts of writing, and thus of non-oralinterchange,would appearonly in later centuries,and then outsidethe influence of Ancient Egypt, through borrowing from Arabic-speakingneighbours. All this has composeda rich and complex record. Our book here attemptsto portray and explain some of the principal and decisive phases or stagesof this West African history, concentratingon its main features while conveying some of its centrally decisive initiatives. 14 Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:10:13. Chapter 2 Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. The Emergence of Trading States and Empires Overleaf Terracottahead from the Nigerian Nok culture, which flourished more than 2000 years ago. (Werner FormanArchive) Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:13:31. Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:13:31. Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. The Emergence of Trading States and Empires As we leave the beginningsof our history, sourcesof historical information steadily improve and widen, partly from the recording work and skills of the archaeologistsof the past 100 years, and partly from the uneven but importantrecordsof Arab or Arabic-writing scholarssince aboutthe eighth century AD (the second century of the Islamic era). The pace of human developmentcan be seento quicken. A vivid picture of developmentover a long period of time begins to be available. What has to be held centrally in mind is that this gradual mastering of a huge and often naturally hostile continent was a notable success.By the early centuriesof the first millennium AD, African farmershad developed their techniquesof tropical agriculture with repeatedsuccessand innovation, including important advancesin ferrous technology. They had also developeda correspondinglyappropriaterange of cultural conceptsthat could and did reinforce the self-confidenceand senseof corporatesurvival among these pioneeringpeoplesin lands never yet occupiedby humanity. All this enabled them, often with success,to meet new challengesfrom Nature and from the problems of living in community. BetweenaboutAD 800 and 1600, or thereabouts,West African communities grew more numerous,developednew and more effective ways of enforcinglaw and order, and evolvednew ways of self-government.Emerging cities grew in size and number, and in the wealth they could use and command.Specializedskills evolvedwith new kinds of craftspeople,politicians, priests, writers and men of learning. With their export and import tradesservicing wider areas,trading cities and statesgrew into a valuable and much admired network of commercethat reachedacrossthe whole of westernAfrica and crossedthe Mediterraneanto southernEurope. The wider world beganto hear about West Africa and its peoples. Thesepeopleswere the forebearsof those that live there today. Differing amongthemselvesin languages,customsand beliefs, they nonetheless Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:13:31. 17 Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. West Africa before the Colonial Era: A History to 1850 all sharedthe samekind of history becausethey also sharedthe samekind of country: rolling plains or prairies dotted here and there with great baobabtrees or shoulder-highthorn bushes,and watered by several big rivers, the greatestof which is the Niger, and their tributaries. The namesof thesepeoplesremainwell known in West Africa today, if otherwise much forgotten: the lordly Soninke along the banks of the Senegalriver, the ingeniousMalinke and their dyula specialistsin the arts of trade, the devoutly independentDogon on their hillside cliffs, the warrior Akan and their Y oruba and Igbo and other neighboursof the coastal forests,and, still famous,the Wolof of the far westernlandsof Takrur, who, later on, first had to outface and out-manoeuvrethe incoming Portuguese and other seafaringEuropeansbringing, as thesedid after about AD 1500, the perils and brutalities of an entirely new Atlantic trade in the export of African captivesforced to serve as slaves. All are present on our journey through this history of half a continent: priests and farmers, singers of heroic ballads, namelessmen and women grappling with the demandsand dangersof building new societies where none had existed before. Much of their hopesand deedscannot be told here, for the story would be too long. As the Imam Ibn Fartuasaid of the deedsand hopes of the unforgotten Mai Idris Alooma, sultan of the famous kingdom of Kanem four centuriesago: 'We have mentionedvery little, passingover much from fear of being lengthy and verbose.But the sensiblereaderwill understandthat beyond the streamthere is the sea.'l These peoples had their own names for their countries. The word 'Sudan'cameinitially from the Arab or Egyptian tradersin theselands. It came into general use when the Berber-speakingpeoplesof North Africa began to adopt Arabic after the Muslim conquestsin the eighth century AD. For them the grasslandssouth of the great desertbecamethe Bilad asSudan,the Country of the Blacks; we call them the WesternSudan.These trading Berberswere intensely interestedin the unknown country beyond the empty plains of the Sahara.They sent down trading expeditionsand went into partnershipwith peoplesof the west. In the courseof time, leading peoplesbeyond the Saharabecamestrong enoughto form large states and even empires. Little was known or understoodin Europe about this process of African state-formation.It was believed by Europeanhistoriansthat nothing new was done in distant Africa unless it was brought by Europeans and their inventions. So it was thoughtthat the big empiresof the Western Sudanowed their origins to the tradersof North Africa, who in turn had taken their progressfrom the tradersof Europe. Modern archaeologyhas shown these ideas to have been wrong. In 1977 excavationsby the US j Ahmad ibn Fartua,History of the First Twelve Years of Mai Idris Alooma (aboutAD 1575), trans. and ed. by H.R. Palmer (Lagos, Nigeria, 1926). 18 Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:13:31. Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. The Emergenceof Trading Statesand Empires archaeologistsSusanand Roderick Mcintosh at the site of an ancient city called Jenne(now within the new republic of Mali) showedthat this city, today a humble town on a tributary of the great River Niger, had become a settlementof iron-making and iron-using people as early as the third century Be, long before any such activity and enterprisewas thought to have existedthere. This settlementat Jennegrew and prosperedacrossten centuries; above all, as the evidence of the Mcintosh excavationsamply demonstrated,as a centreof inter-regionaltrade acrossthesewide grasslands. It evolvedits own internal dynamic of civilizing development,in other words, long before the traders from North Africa had brought their influence. Jennereachedits greatestearly developmentafter AD 750, by which time the housingwithin its walls coveredmore than 33 hectares,a considerable size for an urban settlementof those times.2 At about the sameperiod, notably in the 1960s,archaeologistswere able to show that metal-makingpeoples of the Lower Niger region had also developedstableand importanttradesin bronzeand copper,and then in iron, much earlier than Europeanshad previouslythought possible.This was confirmed by startling resultsfrom excavationsundertakenby the British archaeologist,ThurstanShaw, and publishedby him in 1970.3 Bronze vesselsof a wonderful ingenuity and technicalskill were found to datefrom as early as the ninth century AD, showing once again that these trades, and their many consequences, were the product of unknown early cultures dependenton the regional stimulus of strongly local development. From these early times, gold and ivory had been the West African productsmost in demandby the Berber traderswho were still able to cross the Saharaafter its desertificationbecamesevere.Trans-Saharantrade in these itemshelped to build the comfort and splendourof Phoenicianand Roman cities on the Mediterraneancoast, such as Carthage,Leptis and Sabratha.But the big and continuousexpansionin the trans-Saharanlongdistance trade came after the Muslim conquestsof North Africa which took place in the eighth century AD. This was a tradeto everyone'sadvantage.The peoplesof West Africa, for example,had one great needwhich the peoplesof the Sahara,or those beyondthe Sahara,could help to supply. This was salt. It is probably true that salt was no less valued by the peoplesof West Africa than gold was by the peopleswho lived to the north of the desert. So the basis of trade betweenWest Africa and the Berbers of the Saharaoaseslay in the exchangeof salt for gold. But this was only the basis of trade.The whole systembecame,with time, much wider, for the Saharan Berberssold the goodsthey boughtfrom West Africans to the Arab traders R.J. and S.K. McIntosh, 'The inland Niger delta before the empire of Mali', Journal of African History 22 (1981), p. 1. 3 ThurstanShaw, Igbo-Ukwu (EasternNigeria) (London, 1970). 2 Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:13:31. 19 West Africa before the Colonial Era: A History to 1850 Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. of North Africa, and the tradersof North Africa in due coursesold them againto Europeansand Asians. Europeanand Asian goodseventuallycame down into West Africa by the samemethodsof exchange. Many other items were tradedbesidesgold and salt. West Africa, for example,also neededcopper,silks, and more metalware(such as pots and pans and swords) than West Africans could make themselves.West Africa also supplied ivory and kola nuts. Both sides bought a few slaves. All this trade helped in the founding of cities. Most of these cities were especiallyconcernedwith the trade acrossthe Sahara.They beganas small trading settlements,but grew bigger as more traderscameand went. They becamecentresfor craftsmenwho worked in leather,wood, ivory and metals. Then city governmentswere needed,as well as men trained to be put in chargeof keepingaccounts,of maintaininglaw and order, of looking after the safety of citizens. Then the rulers of thesecities beganto extend their power to ever wider regions of the neighbouringcountryside.Gradually the cities grew into states,and the statesgrew into empires. This long historical process, from trading settlementsto trading empires,also occurredto the north and eastof the Sahara.Trading settlementsand cities also appearedin the stony lands of the Saharaitself. These were Berber cities. Some of them are alive to this day: Agades, Ghat and Murzuk, for example.Others,like Walata and Tichitt, still exist but have lost their wealth and importance. Others again, such as Audaghost and Sijilmasa, have entirely disappeared. The same processof city-founding and empire-buildingwent on in the grasslandsto the south of the Sahara.Here, too, someof the old cities of the Western and Central Sudan have disappeared,while others, like Timbuktu, Gao and Jenne,are still there. And the main businessof these old cities of the Sudanwas also to conduct the trade that came and went acrossthe Saharaand was fed by the wealth of West Africa. Perils of the Sahara It was always hard and dangerousto conduct this trade. The Moroccan traveller Ibn Batuta has left a vivid description of how he crossedthe desertin 1352. He tells how he travelled down from Fez to Sijilmasa,then one of the greatest of the market-centreson the northern side of the Sahara.There in Sijilmasa he purchasedfour months' supply of food for his camels. Togetherwith a company of Moroccan merchantswho were also travelling to the WesternSudan,Ibn Batuta journeyedon to Taghaza, a principal salt-producingcentre of the great desert. At Taghaza,he tells us, 'We passedten days of discomfort, becausethe water there is bitter and the place is plaguedwith flies. And there, at Taghaza,water supplies are 20 Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:13:31. The Emergenceof Trading Statesand Empires laid on (by the caravan captains) for the crossing of the desert that lies beyond it, which is a ten nights' journey with no water on the way except on rare occasions.'Ibn Batuta continues: We indeed had the good fortune to find water in plenty, in pools left by the rain. One day we found a pool of fresh water between two rocky hills. We quenchedour thirst at it, and washedour clothes. At that time we used to go aheadof the caravan,and when we found a place suitable for pasturagewe would graze our beasts. We went on doing this until one of our party was lost in the desert; after that I neither went aheadnor lagged behind. We passeda caravanon the way, and they told us that some of their party had becomeseparatedfrom them. We found one of them dead under a shrub, of the sort that grows on the sand, with his clothes on and a whip in his hand... Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. Many brave men died on those harsh trading journeys. The trade continued in spite of all the dangers and difficulties. It broughtmany changesto all the peopleswho had a part in it. This was the trade that shapedthe growth of statesand empiresin the WesternSudan, foremost among which was Ancient Ghana. Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:13:31. 21 Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. This pageintentionally left blank Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:13:31. Chapter 3 Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. Pioneers in Ancient Ghana Overleaf Ornamentalheadpendantin brass,depicting anotherearly West African sculptural skill. (© Copyright The British Museum) Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:14:14. Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:14:14. Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. Pioneers in Ancient Ghana As the McIntosh excavationsat Jennehave revealed,West Africa's trading statesin early times arosefrom a long and slow unfolding of farming and businessdevelopment.But the origins of that developmentare lost to us in the mists of time. Only with the adventof written recordscan we begin to see through thesemists that hide the distant past. Written records of detailed value begin, for West Africa, with the work of highly educatedscholarsand travellers who were mostly of Muslim Spanishorigin. Of these, the most useful for our subject here was a writer and researcherof Cordobain the old Muslim Spanishkingdom of al-Andalus(nowadaysAndalusia).This was Abu Ubayd al-Bakri. For much of his long life, this remarkableman worked and wrote in the wealthy and comfortable city of Cordoba and its near neighbour Almeria. He seems never to have travelled very far himself, but with great determinationwas always collecting and checkinginformation from others who did. What al-Bakri especially wanted to know was how people lived in the then hidden lands of the Western Sudan beyond the wastes of the SaharaDesert,information always difficult to get and then almost entirely unknown to Europeans.Happily for us, what al-Bakri learned about the Western Sudan and its peopleswas set forth by him in a book of prime historical value, The Book of the Routesand Realms(in Arabic, al-Bakri's language,Kitab al-Masalik wa'[ Mamalik), which was completedby him in Cordoba in AD 1068. Historians will not fail to note that this was just two years after the invasion of Saxon England by the Normans of France. So the written history of England, substantially,can be said to have begun around the same time as the written history of the Western Sudan. Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:14:14. 25 West Africa before the Colonial Era: A History to 1850 Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. The land of gold The earliestof West Africa's big stateswas namedWagadu,known to the Berber traders of the Saharanmarket centres as Aoukar. But the world cameto know it by the title of its king, which was Ghana.North African and other writers in Arabic beganto mention this importantstateof Ghana during the eighth century AD. Soon after 770, al-Fazari wrote of it as 'the land of gold'. In about 830 al-Kwarizmi marked it on a map. And with al-Bakri, writing two centurieslater, the picture becomesbrilliantly clear. The heart of this old and famous kingdom lay in its market centres. Their position, commercially,was a strong one. They stood at the southern end of important caravanroutes from North Africa acrossthe Sahara.But they also stood at the northern end of other trading routes which came, northward, from the gold-producingregion of the Western Sudan. Their businessmencould obtain gold and ivory from their southernneighbours, and sell thesegoodsto trans-Saharanand North African businesspartners. Being powerful in trade,they neededto be powerful in governmentas well. Their kings succeededin this. Other, althoughsmaller, trading statesarosealongsideGhana,which we shall call Ancient Ghanato distinguishit from the quite different modern republic of Ghana.By this time generally,many peoplesin West Africa had advancedthrough early stagesof civic development.They and their neighbours built the trading systemsof West Africa, whether here in the grassland country or, southward,in the kingdoms of the West African forest belt near and along the coast. Theseforest kingdoms we shall visit a little later. Meanwhile, Ancient Ghanagrew in wealth and strength. The people who built Ancient Ghana were the Soninke, whose far descendantslive in the modern republic of Senegal.The Soninke certainly built an effective state before AD 773, the date of the first North African referenceto it. It is possiblethat they were traders in this region in very distant times. A tradition recordedin the Tarikh as-Sudan,an important history book that was written in Timbuktu in about AD 1650, says that there were 22 kings of Ghanabefore the beginningof the Muslim era (AD 622) and 22 kings after that. If this were true, it might place the origins of the Ghanakingdom in about AD 300. By 800, in any case, Ghana had become a powerful trading state. Called Wagadu by its rulers, the name of Ghana came into general use becauseof one of the king's titles, ghana or war chief.! Each succeeding king was known by his own name,and also by the title of ghana. Another There are various reasonswhy the modern state of Ghana,though situatedfar away from Ancient Ghana, has the same name. The most important is that the modern founders of Ghanawished to celebratethe independenceof their country - formerly the British colony of the Gold Coast- by linking their new freedom to the glorious traditions of the past. 1 26 Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:14:14. Pioneers in Ancient Ghana of his titles was kaya maghan.This means'lord of the gold', becausethe king controlled the export of that preciousmetal. Nothing is known about the political methodsor history of Ghana under its early kings. What probably happenedwas that heads of large 2 families or descent-lines amongthe Soninke,encouragedby the needsand opportunitiesof the trade in gold and other goods with Berber merchants of the Sahara,saw an advantagein having a single ruler, so they electeda king from amongthemselves.This king's duty was to organizethe tradeand keep good relations with the Saharantraders, as well as acting as senior religious leader and as representativeon earth of the 'founding ancestors' of the Soninkepeople.In this way the king gatheredpower. He controlled the trade within Soninke territory. He made gifts and gave rewardsto all who servedhim. Next camean expansionof Soninkepower over neighbouringpeoples who were also busy with trade: the wider the territory the Soninke could control, the more prosperousthey would be. By 800, the king of Ghana was able to make lesserkings or chiefs obey his laws and pay him taxes. And so the king's wealth increased.With more wealth, he also had more power. He could commandthe servicesof many descent-lines.He could raise big armies. He could employ large numbersof messengersand other servants.He could pay for the needs of a growing empire. All this we know from al-Bakri's careful account. Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. The achievementof Ghana With the Arab conquestsfrom Arabia in the seventhand eighth centuries, North African rulers and peoples beganto acceptconversionto the new religion of Islam, putting behind them the memory and many of the religious beliefs of their aboriginal cultures, including the Coptic Christian beliefs that had come to them, initially, from Byzantium. Whether by forced or voluntary conversion,Islam now increasinglyheld sway, although it would still be many centuries before Islam would become a majority religion. Becoming Muslims in the ninth and tenth centuries, many of the Saharanlong-distancebusinessmenbeganto be madewelcome at the capital town of the reigning emperorof Ghana.But here there was no forced 2 This term will be used often in these pages.A descent-lineor lineage means just what it says: a line of family descent,through fathers or through mothers,which links one generation to another,and goes on for severalor for many generations.This meansthat all the successive membersof a descent-linelook back to the same'founding ancestors'.Nearly always,they reveredtheseancestorsas personsof great authority and power in the world of the spirits. Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:14:14. 27 Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. West Africa before the Colonial Era: A History to 1850 conversionto Islam. There beganinsteada long, slow processof cultural adjustmentto new realities, with the growing influence of Islam being of courseamongthese.This emperorheld fast to his ancestralbeliefs, drawn from the ancient culture of the Soninke and their neighbours; but the advantagesof the long-distanceand trans-Saharantrade easily persuaded him to allow the Muslim visitors to build and inhabit a town of their own. The 'town of the Muslim traders'was 10 kilometres away from the emperor'sown town with its surroundingsettlements.While the latter were built in the traditional materials of West Africa - hardenedclay, thatch, and woodenbeams- the most successfulMuslim traderspreferredto build their housesin stone,accordingto their own customsin North Africa. It is not known exactly where the capital was when al-Bakri wrote his book. In the course of Ghana'slong history, the king's capital was undoubtedly moved from one place to another. But we can add a good deal to alBakri's picture by studying the remainsof Ghana'slast capital, which lay at Kumbi Salehabout 320 kilometres north of modern Bamako.Here too therewas a town where the king of Ghanalived, and anothertown nearby where the Muslim tradershad their housesand stables.At the height of its prosperity, before AD 1240, this city of Kumbi was evidently the biggest West African city of its day, and had as many as 15,000 inhabitants or even more. So long as they obeyedthe laws of Ghana and paid their taxes, the traders from the north were sure of safety and hospitality. This was a partnershipin long-distancetrade that went on for a very long time. Its safety dependedon the strength of the emperor and his government. AI-Bakri has left us a descriptionof all that. King Tunka Manin, he wrote, 'is the masterof a large empire and of a formidable power'. So powerful was this king that he could put over '200,000 warriors in the field, more than 40,000 of them being armed with bow and arrow'. This was surely an exaggeration:the real strengthof the Ghanaarmies, as we know from other North African sources,camefrom their power in iron-pointedspears. Working from eyewitnessaccountswhich he had receivedfrom Muslim travellers,al-Bakri describedthe pomp and majestyof King Tunka Manin: When the king gives audienceto his people, to listen to their complaintsand to set them to rights, he sits in a pavilion around which stand ten pagesholding shields and gold-mountedswords. On his right hand are the sons of the princes of his empire, splendidly clad and with gold plaited in their hair. The governor of the city is seatedon the ground in front of the king, and all around him are his counsellorsin the same position. The gate of the chamberis guardedby dogs of an excellent breed.Thesedogs never leave their place of duty. They wear collars of gold and silver, ornamentedwith metals. 28 Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:14:14. Pioneers in Ancient Ghana The beginning of a royal meeting is announcedby the beating of a kind of drum they call debao This drum is made of a long piece of hollowed wood. The people gather when they hear its sound... These old splendourswere long rememberedamong the peoples of the Western Sudan. As many as 600 years after al-Bakri, a writer from Timbuktu called Mahmud Kati entertainedhis readerswith the stories of those ancient days. In his valuable history book, the Tarikh al-Fattash, he tells how a certain king of Ghanaof the seventhcentury,called Kanissa'ai, possessed1,000 horses, and how each of these horses 'slept only on a carpet, with a silken rope for halter', and had three personalattendants, and was looked after as though it were itself a king. Theseold legends,magnified and embroideredwith the passingof the years,also tell how the kings of Ghanausedto give great banquetsto their subjects,feeding 10,000 people at a time, and dispensinggifts and justice to all who came. Such stories give an idea of the greatnessof Ghana's reputationin the years of its power. Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. Governmentof the empire With the growth of Ghana, and of other states like Ghana, the peoples of West Africa were inventing new methodsof living together,of governing themselves,of raising money to pay for government,and of producing wealth. Theseways neededa single strong authority or governmentwhich could rule over many lesserauthoritiesor governments.This centralauthority or governmentcould only, in the thought and customsof the times, be a king.3 In states like Ancient Ghana, the power of government increased still further. Important kings becamekings over lesserkings. They became what are called emperors. At the heart of the explanation of why this happenedtherewas the growth of internationaltrade. Occupyingthe lands to the north of the upper waters of the Niger, the old Ghana rulers and their peopleenjoyeda position of great power and value. Their towns and trading settlementsbecamethe middlemen betweenthe Berber and Arab tradersof the north and the gold and ivory producersof the south. It was this middlemanposition which made Ghanastrong and prosperous.It was this that gave its rulers gold and glory. It was this that paid Today, of course, a central governmentcan be many things besidesa king. In fact, kings have almost disappearedfrom the modernworld. They have disappearedbecausethe stageof social organization, which required kings in the old days, requires them no longer. People have invented better ways of self-government. 3 Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:14:14. 29 West Africa before the Colonial Era: A History to 1850 for its armies, and made its civilization shine with a light whose dazzling brilliance we can still glimpse in the writings of al-Bakri. Little by little, the peopleof Ghanaand their rulers felt the needfor a strong governmentnot only over themselves,but also over their neighbours,so that they could ensurepeaceand order throughouta wide region of the Western Sudan. Only in this way could they make the best use of their middleman position. And at the sametime as they felt this need, they also had the chance of realizing it. They were skilled workers in iron. They were able to use iron weaponsagainstneighbourswho generally did not have any. Their systemof governmentexpandedwith their successin trade. As it expanded,it becamemore complicated.A king and his counsellorscould rule over a small country. They could not rule over a large one unlessthey could also rule through lesserkings and counsellors.Even with the swift horsesof the WesternSudan,a king's orders would have gone too slowly through the land, and would not have beenobeyed.So the king of Ghana neededgovernorswhom he could place in chargeof distant provinces. In this way there grew up a number of lesser governments,under lesser kings or governors.These gave loyalty and paid taxes to a central government.Comparedwith what we have today, all this was a simple and crudesort of government.Ordinary folk ran many dangers.They were often bullied or plundered. But the growth and conduct of trade over a wide region meant peaceand security over this region; and many people could benefit from this. The formation of Ghana and its growth into a large empire marked an important stagein social development. Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. Revenueand wealth of Ghana Before leaving this subjectwe should look a little more closely at how the emperorsruled, maintainedtheir public services,and met the expensesof keeping law and order. For they establishedways of governmentwhich appearedagain and again, afterwards,in the grasslandcountries of West Africa. Where did King Tunka Manin and the kings who ruled before him find the wealth to pay many soldiers, and to feed and arm them? Where did they get the meansto make rich gifts to strangersfrom other lands? Questionslike these take us back to the economic system of the Ghana empire. And it is al-Bakri, once again, who gives us answers.He explains how the rulers of Ghanaused their control of the long-distancetrade. The ruler of Ghana,al-Bakri tells us, had two main sourcesof revenue,4 of wealth with which to pay for government.These were taxes of two 4 'Revenue'meansthe money or other kinds of wealth that governmentsget from taxes. 30 Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:14:14. Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. Pioneersin Ancient Ghana kinds. The first of these was what we should today call an import and export tax. This tax consistedof sums of money (or more probably their equal in goods) which tradershad to pay for the right to bring goods into Ghana, or to take other goods out of the empire. 'The king of Ghana', wrote al-Bakri, 'placesa tax of one dinar of gold on eachdonkey-loadof salt that comes into his country'. But he also 'places a tax of two dinars of gold on each load of salt that goes out'. Similar taxes, higher or lower in value as the casemight be, were applied to loads of copper and other goods.5 The secondkind of tax was what we should call a production tax. It was applied to gold, the most valuable of all the productsof the country. 'All piecesof gold that are found in the empire',saysal-Bakri on this point, 'belong to the emperor'. But this regulation was more than a means of collecting royal wealth. It was also a way of keeping up the price of gold. For if the emperor had not insisted on taking possessionof all pieces of gold, al-Bakri explains,then 'gold would becomeso abundantas practically to lose its value'. Ancient Ghana, in short, adopted the monopoly system that is employedto this day for anotherpreciouscommodity, diamonds.Most of the diamondsof the world are mined by a handful of big companies.These companieswork hand-in-handwith each other. They have agreedamong themselvesnot to put all the diamondsthey mine on the market. If they did, they would drive down the price, for diamondswould then ceaseto be scarce;and what is not scarceis not expensive.Instead,the diamondcompaniessell their diamondsin small quantities,accordingto the demandfor them, so their price stays high. The old emperorsof Ghana did much the samewith their piecesor nuggetsof gold. They were able to do this becauseof Ghana'sstrongtrading position. West African gold was importantto Europeas well as to North Africa and the Near East. In earlier times Europeanshad obtained the gold they needed,whether for money, ornaments,or the display of personalwealth, from mines in Europe or in western Asia. These mines were becoming worked out at about the time of the rise of Ghana.Where else could Europeansand North Africans obtain gold? Only, as history shows,from West Africa. And so it cameabout that the gold usedin North Africa and Europe was largely supplied,centuryafter century,by the producersof West Africa. Even kings in distant England had to buy West African gold before they could order their craftsmento make coins in this precious metal. It was on this steadydemandfor gold that the statesand empiresof the Western Sudanfounded their prosperity. 5 The dinar was a gold coin of North Africa. Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:14:14. 31 West Africa before the Colonial Era: A History to 1850 Ghanabeganthe trade in gold. As time went by, other peoplesbegan to copy Ghana'ssuccess.When Ghanadisappearedin the thirteenthcentury AD, its place was eventually taken by another great empire built on the same foundations and by much the same methods.This new empire was called Mali. It carried the progressmade under Ghanato a new level of development. Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. The fall of Ghana: the Almoravids But a long period of confusion came betweenthe fall of Ghana and the triumph of Mali. After about 1050, Ghana began to be invaded by Berber warriors from the north-west, from the MauretanianSahara.These Berbers were driven by troublesof their own, mainly poverty, into striving for a sharein the wealth of more prosperousneighbours.Soon after AD 1000 they began to look for a new meansof livelihood. The solution they found, as so often in history, took a religious form. There arose among them a devout and very strict Muslim leader called Abdullah Ibn Yasin. He establisheda centre of religious teaching,called a hermitage.He and those who followed him becameknown as the people of the hermitage,al-Murabethin,or the Almoravids. Gradually, Ibn Yasin brought the Berber communitiesof the far western lands under his influence.At the sametime his missionariesset aboutthe task of convertingthe rulers of those statesin far westernAfrica whom they could reach, especially in Takrur (or Futa Toro), and in this they had some success.In 1056, moving northwardsinto Morocco, the Almoravids capturedthe great city of Sijilmasa, the main northern trading centre for West African gold. From there they went further to the north, conqueringthe rest of Morocco. Then they crossedthe Straits of Gibraltar and took over al-Andalus, or Muslim Spain. A southern section of the Almoravid movementmeanwhile moved against Ghana. Its leader, Abu Bakr, put himself at the head of a Berber confederation,madean alliance with the peopleof Takrur, whom we shall discuss in a moment, and waged a long war against Ghana. In 1054 he took the city of Audaghost.In 1076, after many battles, the Almoravids seizedthe capital of the empire. But these invaders, like others after them, could not hold the West African lands they had taken. There was much resistance.There were many revolts. Abu Bakr was killed while attempting to suppressone of these in 1087. By this time, however, the Ghanaempire had fallen apart. Its last kings had authority over only a few of its former provinces,and we know almost nothing about them. Great changeswere on the way. 32 Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:14:14. Pioneers in Ancient Ghana Into Spain wm 0 MOROCCO 300 600 900 1200 km Man&keah '..Sijilmasa Main invasions by the Almoravid expansion Gold bearing areas of Wangara and Boure R. Ni ge r -.... Takrur r ige R.N Audaghost GHANA Diara Wanqara Boure Futa Jallon Kanqaba Map 3.1 The Almoravid invasions. Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. The statesthat succeededGhana In this time of confusion, set in motion by the Almoravid Berbersbut soon bringing other peoples into action, the Ghanaempire broke up, and some smaller statestried to build small empiresof their own. One was the state of Takrur. Another was Diara. A third was Kaniaga. In some of these, a new name now enters on the scene, that of the Peul (or Pull o in the singular) whom in English we call Fulani (or Fulah in the singular). These Fulani were to make severalbig contributionsto West African history. The biggest of these will be described later on. Meanwhile we should note that the Fulani were and are a West African peopleof a somewhat different physical stock from most of their neighbours, but who spoke (and speak) a languagerelated to the languagesof Senegal. They seem to have originated in the lands that lie near the upper watersof the Niger and Senegal rivers, and to have sharedtheselands with peoples like the Soninke who played a leading part in the formation of Ghana.They appearto have begunas cattle-keepingfarmers,which is what many of them remain to this day. When Ghanasufferedthe blows of Abu Bakr and his armies,the Fulani of Takrur (in the northern part of modern Senegal)becameindependent. Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:14:14. 33 West Africa before the Colonial Era: A History to 1850 They in turn set out upon the road of conquest.After aboutAD 1200 they took control of the kingdom of Diara, once a province of Ghana. Their most successfulleader, whose name was Sumanguru,seizedKumbi Saleh, then the capital of Ghana,in about 1203. Meanwhileother Fulani andallied peoplesbecamepowerful in anotherold Ghanaprovince, the kingdom of Kaniaga. But this new attemptat building an empire out of the ruins of Ghana met with no better fortune than the Berber efforts led by Abu Bakr. Two developmentsbrought Sumanguru'senterprise to defeat. The first was that the Muslim traders of Kumbi Saleh, Ghana'slast capital, rejected Sumanguru'soverlordship.For reasonsthat were no doubt partly religious and partly commercial,they left Kumbi Saleh and travelled northward,to form a new trading centreat Walata, far beyondthe reachof Sumanguru's soldiers. Secondly, and more important, in about 1240, Sumanguruwas challengedby the Mandinka peopleof the little stateof Kangaba,near the headwatersof the River Niger. The two armies fought each other at a famous battle, which is still remembered.Sumanguruwas defeatedand killed. His chiefs and generalsretreatedto Takrur. Sumanguru'sdefeat openeda new chapter in history. For the little state of Kangabawas the heart and core of the future empire of Mali. It was to be the Mandinka peoplewho would now bring peaceand order to wide regions of the WesternSudan. Copyright © 1998. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved. Summaryof Ghanadates Some time after AD 300 Origins of Ghana. Soon after 700 New trade begins with Muslims of North Africa and Sahara. About 1050 Ghanaat height of its power. AI-Bakri describesKing Tunka Manin (in 1067). Beginning of Almoravid invasion. 1054 Almoravids captureAudaghost,one of Ghana'simportant trading towns. 1076 Almoravids capture Ghanacapital (probably Kumbi Saleh). About 1203 Sumangurutakes Kumbi Saleh. About 1240 End of Ghanaempire. 34 Davidson, Basil. West Africa Before the Colonial Era : A History To 1850, Taylor & Francis Group, 1998. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vcu/detail.action?docID=1829411. Created from vcu on 2021-11-10 13:14:14. Ecology and Culture in West Africa, James L. A. Webb, Jr/  In Emmanuel Akyeampong, Themes in West African History (Ch. 2)  Webb looks at ecological zones in West Africa:  1. Arid grasslands on the Saharan edge- Sahel only animals and plants that have adapted to the very arid conditions can survive here.  2. The Savanna to the south- grasslands  The woodlands to the south  3. Green rainforests north of the Gulf or Guinea. Ecology and Culture in West Africa, James L. A. Webb, Jr/  Argues that the environment did not determine the way of life in West Africa. That, pioneers in West Africa innovated and adapted to their environment.  Identifies major innovations:  1. Tool-making- - clearing, clothing, shelter, storage containers, and weapons.  2. The use of fire- cooked meat, fish , and plants. Ecology and Culture in West Africa, James L. A. Webb, Jr/  West Africa has diverse faun and flora .  Region characterized by presence of micro parasites-  1). The Tsetse fly- causes a disease called Trypanosomiasis (African sleeping sickness).  2). Malaria  These two disease influenced human settlement patterns and culture.  Sleeping sickness is endemic throughout the rainforests, woodlands, and grasslands.  Control-burning bush, habitat for the tsetse fly – the carriers of the disease. (p. 37) Ecology and Culture in West Africa, James L. A. Webb, Jr  Malaria dominant in all West African ecological zones:  From the Sahel to the rainforests.  Humans evolved genetic defense  1). Duffy antigen.  2). Sickle-cell- which provide some immunity to the disease.  Downsize- it causes sickle-cell anemia in humans Ecology and Culture in West Africa, James L. A. Webb, Jr  The First Era  Agricultural innovation-  Initially, pioneers dug up tubers- they choose the best and developed a genetically modified yam.  6000BCE, They started planting these yams, 1dts millennium BCE, the white and yellow Guinea yams became staple food crop (p/ 39). Ecology and Culture in West Africa, James L. A. Webb, Jr. In the Sahel and Savanna  4th-3rd Millennium, Experimentation with wild grasses led to the development of millet and sorghums and wild rice.  Domestication of these crops let to population growth.  Beginning of 1st millennium CE, West African societies well settled.  In the millennium before the common era, new changes occurred:  The camel replace the horses and oxen as principal beast of burden in North Africa (300-600 CE). Ecology and Culture in West Africa, James L. A. Webb, Jr. o By 800 CE, camel caravans were regularly travelling across the Sahara (p. 43). o The main goods exported were gold and captives. o Social and political organization followed to organize gold mining, and the use of force to protect these goods. o This led to growth of empires: o Ghana (c.800-1240) o Mali (1240-1464) o Songhay (1464-1591) o Political violence resulted from wars to capture slaves. Ecology and Culture in West Africa, James L. A. Webb, Jr. Introduction of Islam o In the 7th and 8th centuries Islam became important. o Islam conducive to trade. o Brought Islamic learning. o Code of Conduct and Belief System. Ecology and Culture in West Africa, James L. A. Webb, Jr.  The Atlantic Influence  Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade involved slaves.  West African societies had evolved to fill the labor shortage.  Societies divided into dependents and slaves.  In the Trans Saharan Trade, slaves were exchanged for horse, steel (used to make weapons and farming implements.)  TASL had significant political impact: Ecology and Culture in West Africa, James L. A. Webb, Jr.  1). Political impact- states base don slave trade.  2). Military growth- Sell slaves for firearms.  3). Insecurity.  4). Human suffering. Good effect of TASL  1). Transfer of New World crops with very high caloric yields – corn (maize), cassava (manioc), peanut (groundnuts), and potato. Ecology and Culture in West Africa, James L. A. Webb, Jr.  After 1830s, slave trade abolition of the TASL, coastal communities now planted vegetable oil, crops such as the peanut, palm-kernel, and palm oil.  Led to new gendered division of labor. Men controlled the cash crops- vegetable crops. Women specialize din the grain food crops Ecology and Culture in West Africa, James L. A. Webb, Jr.  Colonial Era  Railways and roads constructed to extract crops from the interior.  Some of the crops depleted soil fertility- cotton in the Sahel, cocoa in Ghana etc.  Benefits  1). Flow of incomes.  2). Introduced European paper currency- replaced cowrie shells and brass manila currencies.  3). Adoption of global consumerism. Ecology and Culture in West Africa, James L. A. Webb, Jr.  Colonial economies practiced pseudo-scientific racisms-  Which assume the inferiority of Africans.  They sought to introduce market forces or use of coercion in agriculture.  Desertification of the Sahara blamed on destructive human land use practices.  After WWII, the British, French and later their international partners joined forces to construct large storage dams on major West African rivers: Ecology and Culture in West Africa, James L. A. Webb, Jr.  Senegal, Niger, Volta.- water for irrigation and HEP.  Policy adopted “top down”, where Africans were ignored.  Outside “development experts” poured in.  Loss of Global Wildlife habitats  Africans blamed for deforestation  Opening up new land due to population growth.  NGOS, moved in to protect wildlife – World Wildlife Fund for Nature. Ecology and Culture in West Africa, James L. A. Webb, Jr.  In Central Africa Republic, they established a police force to protect wildlife from forest people. –who were thought to be ecologically destructive.  20/21 centuries  Transformation resulting from growth of urban centers.  Railways and roads constructed to move export crops.  Rural-Urban migration- which increased when West African governments begun subsidizing imported food crops for urban population. Ecology and Culture in West Africa, James L. A. Webb, Jr.  Farmers had no incentives to grow food crops for urban settlers  Some moved to cities.  Impact of Urbanization.  1). Children born in cities have no knowledge of rural ways of life and ecology.  2). Rice flows in from South east Asia,  4). Clothes woven on looms in England, East Asia, and North America.  5). Watch TV- that foods them with new socio-cultural messages.  6). Globalization of West Africa.
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The Impacts of Ecology and Geography on West African People

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The way of life of West African people before precolonial period ways majorly shaped
by geography and ecology because during the stated period people adapted to the environment
and they grew and innovated different things to meet the emerging needs that were presented by
the environment. For example, some of the major innovation experienced during the period were
tool making, and use of fire. In the stated period West Africa was characterized by fauna and
flora that was highly diverse and the people in this region had to innovate ways to utilize the
stated resources1. In this case, Malaria and Tsetse fly were a major menace for the people and
they influenced the manner in which people settled in...


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