Gao Gao , or Gawgaw/Kawkaw, is a city in Mali and the capital of the Gao Region. The city is located on the River Niger, east-southeast of Timbuktu on the left bank at the junction with the Tilemsi valley. For much of its history Gao was an impor ...

Niger River The Niger River ( ; ) is the main river of West Africa, extending about . Its drainage basin is in area. Its source is in the Guinea Highlands in south-eastern Guinea near the Sierra Leone border. It runs in a crescent shape through ...

Mali Mali (; ), officially the Republic of Mali,, , ff, 𞤈𞤫𞤲𞥆𞤣𞤢𞥄𞤲𞤣𞤭 𞤃𞤢𞥄𞤤𞤭, Renndaandi Maali, italics=no, ar, جمهورية مالي, Jumhūriyyāt Mālī is a landlocked country in West Africa. Mali ...

Songhai people The Songhai people (also Ayneha, Songhay or Sonrai)'' are an ethnolinguistic group in West Africa who speak the various Songhai languages. Their history and ''lingua franca'' is linked to the Songhai Empire which dominated the western Sahel in ...

Zarma people The Zarma people are an ethnic group predominantly found in westernmost Niger. They are also found in significant numbers in the adjacent areas of Nigeria and Benin, along with smaller numbers in Burkina Faso, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Togo, and Suda ...

Niger ) , official_languages = , languages_type = National languages

Oral history and the ''Tarikh al-Sudan''

Al-Sadi's seventeenth century chronicle, the ''

Tarikh al-Sudan The ''Tarikh al-Sudan'' ( ''Tārīkh as-Sūdān''; also ''Tarikh es-Sudan'', "History of the Sudan") is a West African chronicle written in Arabic in around 1655 by the chronicler of Timbuktu, al-Sa'di. It provides the single most important primary ...

'', provides an early history of the Songhay as handed down by oral tradition. The chronicle reports that the legendary founder of the dynasty, Za Alayaman (also called Dialliaman), originally came from the

Yemen Yemen (; ar, ٱلْيَمَن, al-Yaman), officially the Republic of Yemen,, ) is a country in Western Asia. It is situated on the southern end of the Arabian Peninsula, and borders Saudi Arabia to the Saudi Arabia–Yemen border, north and ...

and settled in the town of Kukiya. The town is believed to have been near the modern village of Bentiya on the eastern bank of the

Niger River The Niger River ( ; ) is the main river of West Africa, extending about . Its drainage basin is in area. Its source is in the Guinea Highlands in south-eastern Guinea near the Sierra Leone border. It runs in a crescent shape through ...

, north of the Fafa rapids, 134 km south east of Gao. Tombstones with Arabic inscriptions dating from the 14th and 15th centuries have been found in the area. Kukiya is also mentioned in the other important chronicle, the ''

Tarikh al-fattash The ''Tarikh al-fattash'' is a West African chronicle written in Arabic in the second half of the 17th century. It provides an account of the Songhay Empire from the reign of Sonni Ali (ruled 1464-1492) up to 1599 with a few references to events ...

''. The ''Tarikh al-Sudan'' relates that the 15th ruler, Za Kusoy, converted to Islam in the year 1009-1010 A.D. At some stage the kingdom or at least its political focus moved north to

Gao Gao , or Gawgaw/Kawkaw, is a city in Mali and the capital of the Gao Region. The city is located on the River Niger, east-southeast of Timbuktu on the left bank at the junction with the Tilemsi valley. For much of its history Gao was an impor ...

. The kingdom of Gao capitalized on the growing

trans-Saharan trade Trans-Saharan trade requires travel across the Sahara between sub-Saharan Africa and North Africa. While existing from prehistoric times, the peak of trade extended from the 8th century until the early 17th century. The Sahara once had a very d ...

and grew into a small regional power before being conquered by the

Mali Empire The Mali Empire ( Manding: ''Mandé''Ki-Zerbo, Joseph: ''UNESCO General History of Africa, Vol. IV, Abridged Edition: Africa from the Twelfth to the Sixteenth Century'', p. 57. University of California Press, 1997. or Manden; ar, مالي, Māl ...

in the early 13th century.

Rulers of the Za dynasty as given in the ''Tarikh al-Sudan''

These names with their diacritics are as given in the translation by

John Hunwick John Owen Hunwick (born 1936, Chard, Somerset, England, died 1 April 2015 in Skokie, Illinois, United States) was a noted British professor, author, and Africanist. He has published several books, articles and journals in the African Studies field ...

. The surviving Arabic manuscripts differ both in the spelling and the vocalization of the names. #AlayamanHunwick 2003 on page 3 writes this name as Alayman. This appears to be a typographical error as on pages 5 and 6 and elsewhere the name is spelled Alayaman. #Zakoi #Takoi #Ikoi #Kū #ʿAlī Fay #Biya Kumay #Bī/Bay #Karay #Yama Karaway #Yuma Dunku #Yuma Kībuʿu #Kūkura #Kinkin #Kusoy #Kusur Dāri #Hin Kun Wunka Dum #Biyay Koi Kīma #Koy Kīmi #Nuntā Sanay #Biyay Kayna Kinba #Kayna Shinyunbu #Tib #Yama Dao #Fadazaw #ʿAlī Kur #Bēr Falaku #Yāsiboy #Dūru #Zunku Bāru #Bisi Bāru #Badā

Notes

References

* * Link is to a scan on Gallica that omits some photographs of the epigraphs.

Rulers of the Za dynasty as given in the ''Tarikh al-Sudan''

See also

Notes

References

Further reading