Page 113 - Empires of Medieval West Africa

E m p i r E s o f m E d i E v a l w E s t a f r i c a

up a large part of the population of the Songhay Empire. The people of
entire towns and regions might be considered captive slaves if their city
was conquered by Songhay armies. As slaves, they could be sold or sent
anywhere. If they were farmers or craftsmen, however, they might not

A Mix of Cultures

when describing societies that were part of lims. their ancestors in the Ghana Empire
the great medieval empires, it is essential were among the first western sudan popula-
to remember that individual cultures cannot tions exposed to islam. they prefer to live in
be separated out as if they lived by them- towns and cities, where many of them are in
selves. when the songhay lived in a par- business.
ticular region, they were not (and still are not) other people of mali who can be seen
the only people there. towns and cities of mingling with songhay in the ports and mar-
the Niger Bend and inland delta are popu- kets of urban centers include moorish and
lated by a great mix of cultures. in addition tuareg nomads of the desert, Bozo fish-
to songhay, there are also mande peoples, ers and ferryboat men, somono and sorko,
including maninka, Bamana, and dyula. all who also specialize in watercraft, and fula
three of these groups speak similar dialects cattle herders. out in the countryside there
of the same basic mande language. are multi-ethnic villages that contain two or
in early times, one distinction between
the maninka and the Bamana was that many more of these societies. in Niger and North-
maninka were muslims, while the Bamana ern Benin, the songhay share communities
kept their traditional religious practices. the with cultures native to those areas.
dyula, who now live mainly in Northern côte in a large town or city, each culture group
d’ivoire, were long-distance traders in gold. will have its own neighborhood. Each of
they exported this gold to the Ghana Empire these neighborhoods has a lineage head, or
for the trans-saharan trade. the dyula con- chief, who is probably the oldest male of a
tinued their gold trading in the mali and family that is known to descend from a dis-
songhay Empires. But by at least the 15th tinguished ancestor. He represents his neigh-
century, they had also become muslims. borhood in a council of notables headed by a
people of soninke ancestry are also chief, who very likely traces his ancestry to
mixed with the songhay, and are also mus- the songhay Empire.

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GEP-West Africa_FNL.indd 112 10/19/09 11:07:27 AM