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The Songhai Empire, 1375–1591
The Songhai were closely related to
the Mandé and together they were
dominant in the Songhai empire. It
was from one of Mali’s former
conquests, Gao, that the last major
empire would emerge. Although
Gao had been occupied by a Songhai
dynasty prior to being conquered by
Mansa Musa’s forces in 1325, and
was its capital city, it was not until
much later that the Songhai empire
would emerge. It began to rise in
1464 when it conquered much of the
weakening Mali empire’s territory,
including the cities of Timbuktu and
Djenné, reaching its zenith under the
Askia dynasty (1492–1592), its first
ruler having been the devoutly
Muslim Mohammed Touré, known
as Askia the Great.
As with all empires, Songhai
eventually declined. Mansur of
Morocco, wishing to take control of
the gold trade, sent a force armed
with guns against Songhai’s more
primitive weapons; but governing so
vast an empire began to prove
irksome for the Moroccans, causing
them to relinquish control of the
region, leaving it to splinter into
dozens of smaller kingdoms. Other
states formed, but were not
comparable with the empires; the
Wolof established themselves in
what is now Senegal, and the Hausa
created important city states.
Eminent Arab geographers and
historians, as well as African
scholars, wrote of the empires of
Ghana, Mali, Songhai and Kanem
Bornu, and spoke of the famous
trade routes used by these peoples,
describing Ghana, as early as the
11th century, as a highly advanced
and prosperous society.
The Hausa City State
The 14 Hausa kingdoms or states,
comprising the “Hausa Seven” and
the “Bastard Seven,” were located in
what would become northern
Nigeria, emerging in the 13th
century as vibrant trading centers in
competition with Kanem-Bornu and
Mali. Except for minor alliances,
they functioned independently, and
being rivals were never centralized
into a single state. Enriched by a
further eastward shift in trade, they
blossomed in the late 1500s, and
cities like Kano, Katsina, and Zinder
remain important centers of trade.
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