MALI.—The Extinction of Ghánah.

The catastrophe which caused the disappearance of Ghánah from the political horizon of Negroland, is not distinctly described by any of the Arab historians. Nevertheless, so much light is thrown on the circumstances attending the extinction of that kingdom, in Ibn Khaldún’s sketch of the history of Málí, as may enable us to trace the course of those early events with tolerable precision. The statements of that valuable author shall be here given in his own words[108]:—

“When the conquest of the West (by the Arabs) was completed, and merchants began to penetrate into the interior, they saw no nation of the Blacks so mighty as Ghánah, the dominions of which extended westward as far as the Ocean. The King’s court was kept in the city of Ghánah, which, according to the author of the Book of Roger (El Idrísí), and the author of the Book of Roads and Realms (El Bekrí), is divided into two parts, standing on both banks of the Nile, and ranks among the largest and most populous cities of the world.[109]

“The people of Ghánah had for neighbours, on the east, a nation, which, according to historians, was called Ṣúṣú; after which came another named Málí; and after that another known by the name of Kaúkaú; although some people prefer a different orthography, and write this name Kághó. The last-named nation was followed by a people called Tekrúr.[110] The people of Ghánah declined in course of time, being overwhelmed or absorbed by the Molaththemún (or muffled people—that is, the Morabites), who, adjoining them on the north towards the Berber country, attacked them, and, taking possession of their territory, compelled them to embrace the Mohammedan religion.[111] The people of Ghánah, being invaded at a later period by the Ṣúṣú, a nation of Blacks in their neighbourhood, were exterminated, or mixed with other Black nations.

“As to the people of Málí, they surpassed the other Blacks in those countries in wealth and numbers. They extended their dominions, and conquered the Ṣúṣú, as well as the kingdom of Ghánah in the vicinity of the Ocean towards the west. The Mohammedans say, that the first King of Málí was Baramindánah. He performed the pilgrimage to Mekkah, and enjoined his successors to do the same.[112]

“But the great King of Málí who conquered the Ṣúṣú, and took their country, was named Mári Jáṭah, which means, in the language of that country, Amír Lion, for Mári signifies an Amír, or prince of the blood royal, and jáṭah means a lion. These people also style the relatives and connexions of the royal family Tikin.[113] We were not able to learn anything further respecting this king, and cannot therefore give his genealogy. Nevertheless I was informed that he reigned five and twenty years.

“He was succeeded by his son Mansá Walí—that is, Sultan ʿAlí—who was one of the greatest kings that ever reigned over the people of Málí. He performed the pilgrimage to Mekkah in the reign of the Sultan Ez̤-Z̤áhir Bíbárs.[114] To him succeeded his brother Walí; after whom came another brother, named Khalífah, who was insane, and amused himself with shooting arrows at his subjects. They rushed on him one day and killed him.

“After him came Abú Bekr, who was descended from Mári Jáṭah in the female line. The people of Málí, following in this respect the custom of the ʿAjem (strangers), among whom the sisters and sisters’ sons succeed to the inheritance, chose him for their king. We have not been able to learn his lineage, nor the origin of his father.

“Abú Bekr was followed by a freedman named Sákúrah, who usurped the throne.[115] This king made the pilgrimage to Mekkah, during the reign of Almalik Annáṣir; but on his return was killed at Tájúrá. The empire was increased, under him, by the subjugation of other Black nations. It was in his time that the people of Málí made the conquest of Kaúkaú, and added it to their dominions, which already extended from the Ocean and Ghánah in the west, to the country of Tekrúr in the east. Some, however, maintain that the conquest of Kaúkaú was made later. Hájí Túnis, interpreter of Tekrúr, says that the conquest of Kaúkaú was achieved by a general of Mansá Músa, whose name was Saghminḥuh.

“After Sákúrah the kingdom reverted to the posterity of Mári Jáṭah, and Mansá Músa, son of Abú Bekr, ascended the throne. He was an excellent prince, and performed the pilgrimage in 724. The number of people employed to carry his baggage and provisions amounted to 12,000, all dressed in tunics of figured cotton, or the silk called El-Yemení. The Hájí Túnis, interpreter of this nation in Káhirah (Cairo), said that Mansá Músa brought with him to Egypt no less than 80 loads of Tibar (gold dust), each weighing 300 pounds. He brought the whole on camels, though in his own kingdom camels are not used, baggage being there carried on the backs of slaves.[116] Mansá Músa, on his return, conceived the idea of building himself a fine palace. Abú Iṣḥaḳ showed him a model, and erected the edifice, with plaster and all kinds of ornaments, for which he received 12,000 mithḳáls of gold. Mansá Músa maintained an intimate and friendly correspondence with Sultan Abú-l-Ḥasan, of Al-Maghreb, and reigned twenty-five years.

“On his death the empire devolved on Mansá Maghá—that is, Sultan Mohammed, for in their language Maghá signifies Mohammed. He died after a reign of four years, and was succeeded by Mansá Suleïmán, son of Abú Bekr, and brother of Musá, who reigned twenty-four years. After him came his son, Mansá Ibn Suleïmán, who died nine months after ascending the throne. Then followed Mári Jáṭah, and Mansá Maghá, son of Mansá Músa, and reigned fourteen years. He (Mári Jáṭah) was a wicked and dissolute prince. He sent an embassy to Abú Selím, son of Abú-l-Ḥasan, Sultan of Al-Maghreb (the West), which embassy arrived in Fez in the year 762; and among other presents which came with it, were some very tall animals called Zeráfah (camelopards), as high as obelisks, and strange in the land of Al-Maghreb.

“Abú Abdullah Mohammed Ibn Wásúl, a native of Sijilmésah, and who inhabited for a long time the city of Kaúkaú, in their country (i.e. in the empire of Málí), where he performed the duties of Cadhi, told me, when I met him in 776, much more respecting the kings of that country than I can relate. He said that this Sultan Jáṭah was the worst king that ever existed; that he wasted the treasures, was on the point of destroying the palace erected by his ancestors; and that he even sold to certain Egyptian merchants, for a trifling sum of money, a huge mass of native gold, weighing 20 cwt., and preserved among other curiosities in the royal treasure. Providence, however, punished him; for he was afflicted with a disease very common in those countries, and the ravages of which are particularly frequent among the higher classes. It begins with a kind of lethargy or stupor, which renders the sufferer insensible during the greater part of the day. After lingering two years under this incurable malady, Jáṭah died in 775.[117]

“The people of Málí chose his son Músa to succeed him. He was a just prince, but was overpowered by his wazír Mári Jáṭah, who threw him into confinement, and usurped all the powers of sovereignty. This Wazír has made some conquests towards the east. Passing the limits of Kaúkaú, he arrived at the stations or fixed habitations in the land of Tekaddá, which is behind the country of the Morabites; but he has since restored that territory to its own Sultan. Tekaddá is seventy days from Wergelán towards the south-west; the road of the pilgrims (from Kaúkaú to Egypt) passes through it. Sultan Músa is on friendly terms with the rulers of Záb and Wergelán.”[118]

Ibn Khaldún further relates, that, after having written the preceding historical sketch, he learned that Mansá Músa died in 789, and was succeeded by his brother Mansá Maghá. He being killed a year after, the vacant throne was seized by Ṣanadaki, who had married Músa’s mother, and whose name means Wazír.[119] But this usurper was deposed in a few months by a descendant of Mári Jáṭah. A prince named Maḥmúd, who came from the country of the Infidels in the interior, and who was descended from Mansá Kú, son of Mansá Walí, son of Mári Jáṭah the First, was king of Málí in A.H. 792.

It is stated in the foregoing extract that Ghánah merged in the empire of the Morabites, an event which may be assigned, with much probability, to the year of the Hijra 469, when the Mohammedan faith was forcibly imposed on the pagan nations of Negroland contiguous to the Western Desert.[120] But the Morabites, bred up in a wild life, and under a loose patriarchal authority, cannot be supposed to have thought much of social or political organization. It is likely that they extended their dominions without propagating a form of government, and that the kingdom of Ghánah remained little changed by the loss of its independence. In the time of El Idrísí, or a little before the year of the Hijra 548, it was ruled by a descendant of Abú Táleb—that is, by a Zenágah—and this state of things continued probably half a century longer.[121]

But towards the interior, or south from Ghánah, were the following nations, viz.:—the Ṣúṣú, Málí, Kaúkaú or Kághó, and Tekrúr. In arranging these nations all eastward from Ghánah, Ibn Khaldún showed a very imperfect conception of the geography of Negroland, and particularly of its comparative geography. Though the name Tekrúr may have belonged in his time to a country beyond Kághó, or south-eastwards from Ghánah, yet it certainly designated a kingdom south-westwards from that capital in the period anterior to the rise of Málí. The Ṣúṣú at present occupy a maritime district comprising the basin of the river Scarcies, wherein they have been established at least three centuries. Their language would favour the supposition that they are remotely connected with the Mandingoes. The people of Málí were certainly of the latter race; and it is probable that they and the Ṣúṣú were kindred tribes, who, like the Manes and Mosí of later times, issued from the interior; or—if for the sake of preciseness we may in this instance hazard a conjecture—from the country lying between Kong, Bergú, Ghúrma, and Dahómy.[122] The precise dates of the invasion of Ghánah by the Ṣúṣú and the people of Málí are not given by Ibn Khaldún. We are informed, however, that Mansá Suleïmán, a prince bearing a Mandingo title, founded Tomboktú in A.H. 610; and since he is not included in the list of the kings of Málí, we are warranted in considering him a king of the Ṣúṣú, whose conquest of Ghánah must therefore have taken place between the years 548 and 610 of the Hijra, probably not long anterior to the latter date.

From the dynasty of the Ṣúṣú, then, dates the importance of Tomboktú:[123] but their empire did not continue long. The reign of Mári Jáṭah, the conqueror of the Ṣúṣu, probably commenced about the year 630; and with the kings of Málí begins a connected historical record.

It is worthy of observation, that the conquests here related proceeded in the direction of wealth and commerce, and stopped where these allurements terminated. Ghánah and Tomboktú appear to have remained for a long time the furthest bounds of the empire of Málí. Eighty years elapsed before Kághó was annexed to that empire; and as many more before the passion for conquest led Ṣanadaki to invade Tekaddá, a worthless possession, which was soon abandoned. Thus the Great River formed for many hundred miles the boundary of the empire of Málí, that is, of the Mandingoes, who are still extensively spread over the same ample region, and who chiefly uphold its trade, industry, and civilization. It is evident that Ghánah, conquered by the Ṣúṣú, the founders of Tomboktú, and annexed to Málí eighty years before this empire extended to Kághó, was the frontier of Negroland facing Sijilmésah, and consequently the tract wherein Tomboktú now stands. Nor is it difficult to explain why the kingdom of Ghánah disappeared from the political horizon in the course of these events; for the conquerors had, with a new language, a form of government capable of absorbing all foreign and inferior titles, and of establishing its own in their stead. The title Ghanah, therefore, was superseded by that of Mansa.—The principal events recorded in the history of Ghánah, and the succession of the Kings of Málí, shall be here repeated in a tabular form, and arranged chronologically; the date subjoined to each reign being, as far as can be ascertained, that of its commencement.

A.H. A.D.

Ghanah (properly the King’s title) deprived of Aúdaghost in 446 1054

Still independent in 460 1067

Compelled by the Morabites to relinquish Idolatry and embrace the Mohammedan faith 469 1076

Ruled by a descendant of Abú Táleb (i.e. one of the Zenágah nation) 548 1153

Ṣuṣu. Ghánah conquered by the Ṣúṣú.

Tomboktú founded by Mansá Suleïmán 610 1213

N.B.—The title Ghánah superseded by that of Mansá.

Mali. Mári Jáṭah conquered the Ṣúṣú, and reigned 25 years.

Mansá Walí (son of the preceding) performed the pilgrimage to Mekkah in the reign of Bibárs 658-75 1259-76

Mansá Walí (brother of the preceding).

Mansá Khalífah (another brother).

Mansá Abú Bekr (descended from Mári Jáṭah in the female line).

Sákúrah, a usurper, went to Mekkah in the time of Almalik An-Nasír, and therefore subsequent to 710 1310

(The conquest of Kaúkaú is ascribed by some to the reign of Sákúrah, by others to that which follows.)

Mansá Músa (son of Abú Bekr) performed the pilgrimage in 724 1324

Mansá Maghá (son of the preceding) reigned 4 years 732 1331-2

Mansá Suleïmán (son of Abú Bekr) reigned 24 years 736 1335-6

He was visited by Ibn Baṭúṭah in 753 1352

Mansá Ibn Suleïmán (son of the preceding) reigned 9 months 760 1359

Mansá Jáṭah (son of Mansá Maghá) ascended the throne in 761 1360

and reigned 14 years.

Mansá Músa (son of the preceding) reigned 14 years 775 1373

His Wazír, Mári Jáṭah, usurped the sovereign power, and conquered Tekaddá, which was soon after relinquished.

Mansá Maghá (brother of the preceding) 789 1387

Ṣanadaki, (i.e. the Wazír) and another usurper.

Maḥmúd, a descendant of Mári Jáṭah the first, was king of Málí in 792 1390

The position of all the places mentioned in the preceding historical sketch, may be satisfactorily ascertained from the narrative of Ibn Baṭúṭah, who visited Negroland about half a century earlier than the date of Ibn Khaldún’s history, and whose remarks throw a valuable light on the geography and social condition of the countries then known under that denomination. A succinct account, therefore, of his journey into Negroland shall be here given, for the sake of the elucidations derivable from it.