Page 64 - Art In The Age Of Exploration (Great Section on Chinese Art Ming Dynasty)

THE ART OF WESTERN AFRICA

IN THE AGE OF EXPLORATION

Ezio Bassani

T

It was from
European maps
that point on that
J.he
. he age of European maritime expansion
money
than any other merchandize."
more
coincided with an extraordinary period in the began to include Mali as a place name. On the written bookes out of Barbarie, which are sold 5
for
history of west African art. The brass sculptures 1339 world map of Angelino Dulcert, a Genoese If Timbuktu was the gateway to the Sahara,
cast in Benin (cats. 60-65) are the most famous mapmaker active in Mallorca, "rex Melli" iden- Jenne on the inland delta of the Niger was the
of the works produced at this time, but that tifies the figure of an enthroned king, and on center to which were brought the continent's
kingdom was by no means the only major the Catalan Atlas of 1375 (cat. i), drawn by products — gold, ivory, skins, pepper, kola,
center of artistic creativity in this part of the another Mallorcan, Abraham Cresques, "Musse rubber—to be exchanged for goods from the
continent, as the works included in this exhi- Melly" (that is, Musa of Mali) is identified by North: fabrics, salt, glass beads, iron, copper,
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bition indicate. Moreover, the late fifteenth name. Mali's empire at its peak in the mid- and manuscripts. In 1943 the French archaeolo-
century also marked the first direct contact fourteenth century extended from the capital of gist Theodore Monod brought to light, in the
between sub-Saharan Africa and Europe, as the Niani in the upper Niger valley westward to the vicinity of Jenne, along with numerous other
Portuguese sailed down the west African coast coast, and eastward along the Niger valley to archaeological finds, a terra-cotta human figure.
on the route that was ultimately to take them the borders of Hausaland. Its government was In the course of the following years, other terra-
to India in 1498. An early consequence of this much admired by the famous traveler Ibn Bat- cottas were found between Jenne and Mopti, in
encounter was the creation of the remarkable tuta of Tangier, who visited the area in 1352- the triangle defined by the courses of the Bani
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corpus of works known as Afro-Portuguese 1353. By the next century, however, its power and Niger Rivers, and in a few sites farther
ivories (cats. 68-78), created for trade with was in decline. The vassal states of Mali south, in the environs of Bamako. The corpus of
Europe. included the strategically located kingdom of terra-cottas from the inland Niger delta region
c
Songhay, which in the reign of Sonni Ali of Mali is often called Jenne, after the site of the
(c. 1464-1492) was finally able to defeat the first discoveries, and those from around Bamako
Mali emperor of Mali and begin to create an empire are often called Bankoni, after the village in
The successive empires of Ghana, Mali and of its own. The Songhay empire ultimately which they were first found.
Songhay, on the south flank of the Sahara, were became even greater than that of Mali. For the most part the terra-cottas are human
c
inland civilizations. All their important cities — Sonni All's successor, Askiya Muhammad figures portrayed in different positions, some
Niani, Walata, Jenne, Mopti, Timbuktu, Gao — (1493-1528), who overthrew the former's son apparently depicting mother and child, others
were located in the interior of the continent, to establish the Askia dynasty, was a faithful horsemen (cat. 58), and others representations
and their connections with North Africa and Muslim (like Mansa Musa he made a pilgrim- of serpents. According to the results of thermo-
the Mediterranean were through the caravan age to Mecca in 1495-1497) and an enlightened luminescence testing, the terra-cottas were pro-
routes that had long crisscrossed the desert. and tolerant ruler. He permitted the populations duced over a long period of time, stretching
The initial nucleus of Mali was a small king- of his empire to preserve their traditional reli- from the tenth to the sixteenth century. 6
dom of Mande population that took shape in the gions. As the emperors of Mali before him Morphologically they differ a good deal among
region of the present-day Guinea following the had already done, he encouraged an influx of themselves, and stylistically they can be divided
dissolution of the empire of ancient Ghana at learned Muslims from North Africa and the into two large groups based on the principal
the end of the eleventh century. It was only Middle East into his domains, promoting cul- sites of the diggings: one from the Jenne-Mopti
around 1230, with the reign of the legendary tural exchange and the formation of a lively and region, the other from the Bamako region. The
emperor Sundiata, that Mali began to make its complex civilization. Timbuktu, at the bend of figures in the second group are characterized by
mark as a great power. Because its ruler (known the Niger River, became one of the most impor- an exceptional elongation of the trunk and
as Mansd, or king) controlled the gold of tant marketplaces of sub-Saharan Africa. It was limbs.
Bambuk and Bore and the trans-Saharan trade, not only the point of arrival and departure of In the absence of archaeological data for most
he accumulated vast wealth. The empire's elite caravans to and from Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, of the terra-cottas, however, definitive elements
soon adopted Islam as its religion. The ruler's Libya, and Egypt, but also a great center of for making stylistic distinctions are still limited.
fame spread throughout the Arab world and Islamic culture, said to house as many as 180 For the same reason we remain uncertain, at
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reached Europe after the spectacular pilgrimage schools of Koranic learning. Leo Africanus, a present, of the function of these works and of
to Mecca undertaken in 1324 by Mansa Musa, learned and wide-ranging Arab traveler who had the culture within which they were created. 7
with an imposing escort of courtiers and serv- converted to Christianity, wrote about 1523 that The ruling elite in this area had adopted Islam
ants and a seemingly limitless supply of gold at Timbuktu there are "great store of doctors, and clearly would not have used representations
that was used for both expenses and gifts, in judges, priests, and learned men, that are boun- of the human figure in religious ceremonies,
such measure as to make the value of the pre- tifully maintained at the king cost and charges. although traditional religious practices contin-
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cious metal plummet in the markets of Egypt. 1 And hither are brought divers manuscripts or ued to be tolerated. The reports of the Arab
EUROPE AND THE MEDITERRANEAN WORLD 63