Timbuktu and the Songhay Empire
“Timbuktu is a town inhabited by people of various races, but the greater part is made up of Whites, such as Arabs; they are subject to the king of Gao. This town is the entrepot for all goods in transit…
A branch of the Zagawa Berbers called Beni Sefi created Kanem-Bornu
“Kanem-Borno, a former Muslim kingdom located northeast of Lake Chad, was created by a branch of the Zagawa people called Beni Sefi, with the likely collaboration of the Tubu, around the year 800. While Kanem is part of Chad today,…
Zaghawa and Sadrata Berbers ruled Kanem in 900 A.D.
These regions have since the eighth century A.D. been a stronghold of Moslem unorthodoxy–a remote area where the Zenatian Berber tribes, who embraced the doctrines of the Kharijites or “seceders” from the Khalif Ali at the battle of Siffin, have…
Islam in the African-American Experience
“Mervyn Hiskett describes the Islamic lands of West Africa as the area commonly referred to as “the west and central Sudan”…extending from the desert scrub in the “north” to the southern edge of savanna in the south. From west to…
American Colonization Society: The Bornu People were of Berber Origin
“At this period his territory did not extend to the northern bend of the Niger, which was occupied by Berbers. Jenne, the town which M. Dubois describes in his interesting book on “Timbuctoo the Mysterious” as still at the present…