Page 73 - 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

because he had a spy living in Gao for several years. Al-Mansur used
Askia Ishaq II’s challenge as an excuse to send an expedition to attack
Songhay.

Timbuktu Chronicles

and Tombstones

during the 16th century when the songhay relied on oral tradition for a lot of their informa-
Empire was at the height of its power, tim- tion, and that they were reconstructing song-
buktu was a great center of learning. there hay history in defiance of moroccan rule.
were many schools teaching the Quran and another important source of information
authors writing books in arabic. after song- about muslim ruling dynasties and other mus-
hay was conquered in 1591, timbuktu and lims of songhay is a large collection of inscrip-
other cities were administered by moroccan tions, mostly in arabic, written on tombstones.
officials called arma. several cemeteries have been found in the
in timbuktu there were muslim schol- ancient cities of the old songhay territories.
ars of soninke descent who wanted to defy the earliest of the tombstones dates from
their conquerors by recalling the glories of about 1013. it is from a site called Essuk, which
the songhay Empire. their writings are still was in the medieval commercial town of tad-
among the most important sources for the makka, north of Gao in the sahara desert.
history of songhay. the cemetery near the village of saney,
two 17th-century timbuktu historians which is about five miles from Gao, contains
who traced their own ancestors to the Ghana royal tombstones from around the begin-
Empire described the various government ning of the 12th century. some of the saney
offices in the songhay Empire, named some tombstones are made of spanish marble. one
of the important men who held them, and of them marked the grave of abu abdullah
described some of their deeds. they were abd muhammad, who died in 1100. in arabic, the
al-rahman al-sadi (b. 1594), who wrote Tarikh name Abdullah means “slave of God,” signify-
al-Sudan (chronicle of the sudan) in about ing someone who is a devout muslim. so, from
1656, and ag mohammed ibn al-mukhtar, the tombstones we know that by this time the
who wrote Tarikh al-fattash (chronicle of the kings and dignitaries of the land were devoted
searcher) around 1665. muslims, that their trade network extended all
when studying these chronicles, however, the way to spain, and that they were wealthy
it is important to remember that the authors enough to import expensive spanish marble.

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