TheSahelian kingdoms were a series of centralized kingdoms orempires that were centered on theSahel, the area of grasslands south of theSahara, from the 8th century to the 19th. The wealth of the states came from controlling the trade routes across the desert. Their power came from having largepack animals likecamels andhorses that were fast enough to keep a large empire under central control and were also useful in such kind of battle. All of these empires were also quite decentralized with member cities having a great deal of autonomy.
The Sahel states were limited from expanding south into theforest zone of theBono andYoruba as mounted warriors were all but useless in the forests and the horses and camels could not survive the diseases of the region.
There were integrated kingdoms and empires, with substantial cities and significant towns; and less organised territories with large scattered populations. People practised agriculture, stock-rearing, hunting, fishing, and crafts (metalworking, textiles, ceramics). They navigated along rivers and across lakes, traded over short and long distances, and used their own currencies.
The first major state to rise in this region was theGhana Empire. Established in c. the 3rd century, it was centered in what is todaySenegal andMauritania. Ghana grew wealthy through thetrans-Saharan trade routes linkingAoudaghost withTahert andSijilmasa in north Africa following the introduction of thecamel to the western Sahel in the 3rd century AD. Ghana was the first to benefit from the introduction of pack animals byWolof traders. Ghana dominated the region between the 3rd century and the 13th century. Smaller states in the region at this time includedTakrur to the west, theMalinke kingdom of Mali to the south, and the Songhai centred onGao to the east.
When Ghana collapsed in the face of invasion from theAlmoravids and conquest by theSosso Empire; after 1235, theMali Empire rose to dominate the region, which traded withBono state at the far south. Located on theNiger River to the west of Ghana in what is todayNiger andMali, it reached its peak in the 1350s, but had lost control of a number of vassal states by 1400.[1]
The most powerful of these states was theSonghai Empire, which expanded rapidly beginning with kingSonni Ali in the 1460s. By 1500, it had risen to stretch fromCameroon to theMaghreb, the largest state in African history. Its territory diminished to cover only theDendi province in 1591 as a result of theinvasion by theSaadi Dynasty ofMorocco. The empire collapsed in 1901 when the French deposed the last askia.
Far to the east, onLake Chad, the state ofKanem-Bornu, founded as Kanem in the 9th century, now rose to greater preeminence in the central Sahel region. To their west, the loosely unitedHausa city-states became dominant. These two states coexisted uneasily, but were quite stable.
In 1810, theSokoto Caliphate rose and conquered the Hausa, creating a more centralized state. It and Kanem-Bornu would continue to exist.
Carte des peuplades du Sénégal de l'abbé Boilat (1853): an ethnic map of Senegal at the time of French colonialism. The pre-colonial states of Baol, Sine and Saloum are arrayed along the southwest coast, with the inland areas marked "Peuple Sérère".
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