(NOE) Trans-Saharan Trade Routes and Cultural Connectivity Lesson

Trans-Saharan Trade Routes and Cultural Connectivity Lesson

The Empire of Mali and Sundiata, the "Lion Prince"

Mali, along the Senegal and Niger Rivers, was formed among the Malinke peoples, who broke away from Ghana in the thirteenth century. Ruler authority was strengthened by Islam. Agriculture, combined with the gold trade, was the economic base of the state. The ruler (mansa) Sundiata (d. 1260) receives credit for Malinke expansion and for a governing system based on clan structure. Sundiata's successors in this wealthy state extended Mali's control through most of the Niger valley to near the Atlantic coast. Mansa Kankan Musa's pilgrimage to Mecca during the fourteenth century became legendary because of the wealth distributed along the way. He returned with an architect, Ishak al-Sahili, who created a distinctive Sudanic architecture using beaten clay.

 

The Songhay Kingdom

The Songhay people dominated the middle reaches of the Niger valley. Songhay became an independent state in the seventh century. By 1010, the rulers were Muslims and had a capital at Gao. Songhay won freedom from Mali by the 1370s and prospered as a trading state. An empire was formed under Sunni Ali (1464-1492), a great military leader, who extended rule over the entire middle Niger valley. He developed a system of provincial administration to secure the conquests. Sunni Ali's successors were Muslim rulers with the title of askia; by the mid-sixteenth century, their state dominated the central Sudan. Daily life followed patterns common in savanna states; Islamic and indigenous traditions combined. Men and women mixed freely; women went unveiled and young girls at Jenne were naked. Songhay remained dominant until defeated by Moroccans in 1591. Other states that combined Muslim and pagan ways rose among the Hausa of northern Nigeria. In the fourteenth century, the first Muslim ruler of Kano made the Hausa city a center of Muslim learning. Along with other Hausa cities, Kano followed the Islamic-indigenous amalgam present in the earlier grasslands empires. Traders and other Muslims widely spread influences, even in regions without Islamic states.

 

The Swahili Coast of East Africa

A series of trading ports, part of the Indian Ocean network, developed along the coast and islands between the Horn of Africa and Mozambique. Town residents were influenced by Islam, but most of the general population remained tied to traditional ways.

 

The Coastal Trading Posts

Bantu-speaking migrants had reached and mixed with indigenous Africans early in the first millennium C.E. Immigrants from Southeast Asia had migrated to Madagascar from the second century B.C.E. With the rise of Islam, individuals from Oman and the Persian Gulf settled in coastal villages. By the thirteenth century, a mixed Bantu and Islamic culture, speaking the Bantu Swahili language, emerged in a string of urbanized trading ports. They exported raw materials in return for Indian, Islamic, and Chinese luxuries. As many as 30 towns flourished, their number including Mogadishu, Mombasa, Malindi, Kilwa, Pate, and Zanzibar. From the thirteenth to the fifteenth century, Kilwa was the most important. All were tied together by coastal commerce and by an inland caravan trade.

 

The Mixture of Cultures on the Swahili Coast

The expansion of Islamic influence in the Indian Ocean facilitated commerce. It built a common bond between rulers and trading families and allowed them to operate under the cover of a common culture. Apart from rulers and merchants, most of the population, even in the towns, retained African beliefs. A dynamic culture developed, using Swahili as its language, and incorporating African and Islamic practices. Lineage passed through both maternal and paternal lines. There was not a significant penetration of Islam into the interior.

 

In-Depth: Two Transitions in the History of World Population

Even though determining the size and structure of historical populations is very difficult, their study has become a valued tool for better understanding the past. Demographic research presents an opportunity for uncovering aspects of the politics and economy of past societies. Regular census taking became common only in some societies during the eighteenth century. Until then, the human population grew slowly, increasing as agriculture and other discoveries opened new resources. By 1750 C.E., the earth had about 500 million inhabitants. Pre-modern economies maintained a rough equality between births and deaths, with most individuals not reaching the age of 35. Since 1750, with the onset of the Industrial Revolution and other developments, a demographic transition, occurring first in Europe, sent world population to more than five billion at the end of the twentieth century.

 

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