father, but after his maternal uncle; and the sister’s son always
succeeds to property in preference to the son: a custom I witnessed
nowhere else except among the infidel Hindoos of Malabar.” (Lee’s Ibn
Baṭúṭah, p. 234.)]
[Footnote 80: “Of all people the Blacks debase themselves most in
presence of their king.... When the Sultan addresses one of them, he
(who is addressed) will take the garment off his back and throw dust
upon his head” (Lee’s Ibn Baṭúṭah, p. 240). The ceremonial of Tomboktú
(Leo, pt. VII. c. 5), and that of Ghánah (Not. et Extr. p. 644), are
described in nearly the same terms.]
[Footnote 81: Proc. of Afr. Assoc. I. p. 149. Though Clapperton says
little of the laws or government of Houssa, yet his narrative discloses
the subdivision of power in that country. The people there have never
been trained up under a paramount tyranny.]
[Footnote 82: Makrízí (Quatremère, Mémoires sur la Nubie, tom. I. p. 28;
Burckhardt’s Travels in Nubia, p. 456) relates of the court of Kánem,
and Ibn Baṭúṭah of that of Bornú, the ceremony of audience, as it was
witnessed in the latter place by Denham (I. p. 231).]
[Footnote 83: Caillié saw (Voy. II. p. 253) a line of hills of red
sandstone without any vegetation, on the left bank of the river, about
forty miles south of the lake; and, at an equal distance north of it,
sand hillocks bordered the stream (p. 266). It is explicitly stated by
Marmol (III. fol. 15 v), that Jenni had all the trade of the Zenágah,
the Brebísh, the Ludayas, and the Arabs of Arguin. But he erred in
supposing that the conflux of Arabs and Berbers from the shores of the
Ṣaḥrá to that city was owing to its western position. It was rather due
to the character of the intervening country, which may be called a fine
desert.]
[Footnote 84: It is plain, from Scott’s narrative (Edinb. Phil. Jour.
vol. IV. p. 45), that the level desert continues, without any change,
save in the frequency of brackish rills, to the very shore of the lake;
southwards from which the country seemed uninhabited; but a little to
the north was the town of the Orghebets, in which the dwellings were
constructed of canes and bamboos.]
[Footnote 85: “_Gualata_, que otros llaman _Ganata_.” Marmol, III. fol.
21 v. It is hardly necessary to observe, that, in the orthography of
Southern Europe, Gualata represents our Walata: “_Gualata_ o _Ganata_,”
(I. fol. 17.) “Vled Vodey andan en los desiertos que estan entre Iguaden
y _Ganata_; son señores de Iguaden, y el Rey Negro de _Ganata_ les paga
cierto tributo,” &c. (I. fol. 39.) “Alarabes llamados Udaya, y por otro
nombre Vled Vodey, que moran el desierto de Lybia que está entre esta
poblacion (Guaden) y _Gualata_ reyno de negros.” (III. fol. 3.) “En
Gelofe, Geneúa, Tombuto, Meli, Gago y _Ganata_, hablan una lengua
llamada Zungay.” (I. fol. 44.) This last sentence is taken from Leo (pt.
I. c. 11), who, however, writes Gualata. Marmol, in his first volume,
seems to prefer Ganata, but, in the third, he generally follows Leo with
little deviation. When Ali Bey (Badia) speaks of caravans going “from
Sús and Táfílélt to Ghánah and Tomboktú,” (Travels in Barbary, &c. I.
45,) does he inadvertently mix ancient with modern times—his reading
with his recent intelligence?—or does he mean by Ghánah, Ghanata, that
is, Walata? What was surmised in Note 6 respecting the predominance
gained by the analogies of the Berber language over those of the Arabic,
and the change of the contingent t̤ into the absolute t, seems confirmed
by the MS. extract of El Bekrí published in the Rec. de Voy. II. That
MS., however inferior in other respects, is yet good authority on the
subject of the relation subsisting between ancient Arabic and Moorish
orthography; and we find that it writes Ghánat, Sámat, and Ṭáḳat, for
Ghánat̤ or Ghánah, Sámat̤, Ṭákat̤, &c.]
[Footnote 86: “It appears singular that the country immediately to the
eastward of Timbuctoo as far as Kashna should be more imperfectly known
to the Moorish traders than the rest of central Africa” (Quart. Rev. No.
45, May 1820, p. 234.) The reviewer, however, errs in ascribing the
obscurity which involves that tract to the wars of the Fellatah. But the
fact is, that between Tomboktú and Houssa passes the line of demarcation
separating what may be called the two commercial provinces of Negroland,
which depend on the two great roads (from Fezzán and Táfílélt), and have
little communication with each other on their northern frontiers.
Besides, the interposed desert supports a formidable population of
Tawárik.]
[Footnote 87: The Arab geographers, unable to form an exact conception
of the country westward of Ghánah, diminished the distance between that
place and the ocean. El Idrísí makes the distance between Silla and
Aúlíl to be sixteen days’ journey (Rec. de Voy. V. p. 11); but Abulfedá
sets Ghánah only four degrees eastward of the ocean (Reiske’s Trans. in
Büsching’s Mag. V. p. 354). In like manner Leo (pt. VII. c. 3) says that
the kingdom of Jenni, extending 250 miles along the river, reaches the
ocean; and he supposes Walata to be only a hundred miles from the sea
shore. As he was copied in all his errors, our maps of the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries uniformly placed Tomboktú too far westward.]
EL IDRISI COMPARED WITH EL BEKRI.
MAGHRAWAH.
The account of Negroland contained in the foregoing pages is drawn
altogether from El Bekrí. So much does his description of Ghánah and the
adjoining countries excel in copiousness of detail as well as in
clearness, that in all the Arab writers succeeding him, there is hardly
a single new particular worth adding to it. Some of these writers,
nevertheless, are much better known than El Bekrí; and one of them, El
Idrísí, whose work, entitled ‘The Amusement of one desirous of knowing
all the Countries of the World,’ was composed about the year 1153, has
been long regarded as the first authority on questions relating to the
geography of Central Africa. It will be worth while, therefore, to set
these two authors side by side, and to compare them carefully, so that
we may be able to choose between them when they disagree, and to
determine whether the later of the two improved on his precursor.
The first peculiarity of El Idrísí that strikes the attentive reader, is
his general reduction of distances in the desert. He begins to contract
even in the vicinity of Atlas, and makes Sijilmésah to be only thirteen
days distant from Wád Nún; whereas these places must be at least twenty
good journeys asunder.[88] But to confine ourselves to the consideration
of the principal dimensions of the Ṣaḥrá, we may recal the statement of
El Bekrí that Aúlíl was a two months’ journey distant from Wád Nún,
going along the shore. Now from Sijilmésah to Aúlíl, which was a greater
distance, is reckoned by El Idrísí to be a journey of only forty days.
This supposes (since Arguín is exactly 900 miles from Sijilmésah) a rate
of 22½ geographical miles a day in a straight line—a rate far exceeding
what is practicable on a journey of such a nature and extent.[89] Nor
can El Idrísí have here the benefit of any objection to the hypothesis
which places Aúlíl at Arguín, since he informs us that Aúlíl was one
day’s sail from the mouth of the river called the Nile of the Blacks, by
which he must be understood to mean the Senegal. But the mouth of this
river is at least two days’ sail from Arguín; so that to make that
author consistent with himself, it must be allowed not only that Aúlíl
was in the Bay of Arguin, but also that his numerical expressions of
distance are, in this instance, too low.[90] In like manner he reduces
the distance between Sijilmésah and Silla to forty days; and that from
Wád Nún to the latter place to thirty-two days,—viz. seven from Nún to
Arkí, and thence twenty-five to Silla; his estimate in each case being
less than two-thirds of the reality.[91]
But the same author’s reduction of the longitudinal dimensions of the
Great Desert is still more remarkable. Instead of a journey of two
months between Aúlíl and Silla, as may be inferred from El Bekrí, whose
measures of distance accord strictly with the results of modern inquiry,
El Idrísí separates those places by a distance of only sixteen days.
Again, he makes Aúdaghost to be but a month from Aúlíl, and twenty-five
days from Jermah in Fezzán; so that from the latter place to the shores
of the Atlantic, the desert should be crossed in fifty-five days, or
less than half of the time actually required for that journey.[92]
Again, he states Kúghah to be a month from Dongolah, and six weeks from
Ghánah (though the genuineness of the text is here liable to suspicion);
and consequently he reduces the whole distance between Dongolah, or the
Nile in the east, and the Atlantic Ocean in the west, to a journey of
three months and a half, which is not more than a moiety of the true
distance.[93]
The incorrectness of El Idrísí exemplified above, cannot be explained
away by supposing that he made use of a large scale of measures, or a
conventional day’s journey of great length. His contraction of space is
not sufficiently uniform to sustain that plea: it operates chiefly on
the uninhabited country. Like modern geographers, he seems to have had
an invincible dislike to large blanks in a map; and among the expedients
to which he had recourse for the purpose of filling them up, was the
common one of dilating as much as possible the contiguous inhabited
countries. A perfect illustration of this remark is afforded by his
description of the course of the Great River in the vicinity of Ghánah.
It has been seen that El Bekrí places the capital of Ghánah not
immediately on the Great River, but at a distance of perhaps three days’
journey from it. But Ṣínghánah, with which place he begins his
description of Negroland, is described by him as standing on both banks
of the river, and having Tekrúr on the south-west. Now in El Idrísí’s
geography there is no mention made of Ṣínghánah, but its description is
transferred to Ghánah, which is made to stand on both banks of the
river, and to have Tekrúr on the south-west. The distance of twenty
days, according to El Bekrí, between Silla and Ghánah, is increased by
El Idrísí to twenty-four days. The former of these writers thus
describes the route eastward and along the river from Ghánah. First,
five days to Rás el má, then six days through the country of the Merásah
to Tírḳa, where the river turned southwards, and three days further
along its banks, to the country of the Seghmárah, which commenced,
therefore, at the distance of fourteen days from Ghánah. The same course
is thus described by El Idrísí:—From Ghánah, six or eight days to Tírḳa;
six more to Merásah; and another six to Seghmárah: so that the fourteen
days of his author are here increased to eighteen.[94]
In accordance with the construction given above to El Bekrí’s route from
Ghánah to Ghaïárú, El Idrísí makes the portion of the river therein
mentioned to form a part of its course below Seghmárah. But the manner
in which the latter writer puts together his materials in this place
demands attentive consideration. The following are his details of
distance and bearing:—
From Samghadah (Sámaḳanda) to Seghmárah, 8 days.
From ditto to Kúghah, _eastwards_, 10
From ditto to Gharbíl (Ghúntil), 9
From Seghmárah to Gharbíl, _southwards_, 6
From Gharbíl (Ghúntil) to Ghanárah (Ghaïárú), _westwards_, 11
From Ghánah to Ghanárah, 11
Thus it appears that El Idrísí makes the river flow first north-eastward
from Silla to Ghánah; then eastwards to Seghmárah; then southwards to
Ghúntil, and finally westwards again to Ghaïárú.
The Sámaḳanda of El Bekrí, which was four days from Ghánah, and his
Kúghah, fifteen days from the same capital, and nine from Anbárah,
(which appears to have been near Sámaḳanda,) are evidently the Samghadah
and Kúghah of El Idrísí. This writer agrees with his predecessor in
making the river flow, first north-eastwards from Silla to Ghánah, then
eastwards, and then southwards. So far he seized with some felicity the
idea of the general winding of the river. But his turning it westward
from Ghúntil can be explained only by supposing that he misunderstood
his authority. El Bekrí says, that opposite to the Seghmárah, whose
territory extended from the Great River to Tádmekkah, was Kaúkaú. And
again, he remarks, that the road to the country of the Remrem went
westwards along the river from Kaúkaú. Now this last passage furnishes
the explanation of the westward course which El Idrísí has given to the
river, if we suppose that he confounded for a moment Kúghah with Kaúkaú.
[Illustration: _The River according to El Bekrí._]
El Bekrí mentions Bersana after Ghaïárú; and accordingly El Idrísí sets
this place, under the altered name of Berísa, due west of Ghaïárú, and
on the Great River, half way between Silla and Ghánah. The series of
names which the latter found in his author he thus arranged in a circle,
under the influence of misconception, so as to make it terminate in
itself. But the artificial division of climates, by severing Berísa from
the group of names to which it originally belonged, fortunately obviated
the ready exposure of so absurd a concatenation.[95] The Malilo and Daúr
or Daú of El Bekrí are evidently the Malel and Daú of El Idrísí; and in
consequence of the same mistake which placed Berísa on the river between
Ghánah and Silla, they are brought into the neighbourhood of the latter
place. Their character, too, is as much misrepresented as their
position. Instead of being countries of some extent and importance, they
become, in the pages of El Idrísí, only towns of Lemlem, the wretched
inhabitants of which, possessing but few camels, wander over deserts
destitute of water;—a picture of Negro poverty, more likely it must be
confessed, to originate in the imagination of an Arab, than in the
physical character of the country south of the Great River.
[Illustration: _The River according to El Idrísí._]
From El Idrísí’s delineation of the Great River we may return with
advantage to consider the position assigned by him to Aúdaghost. That
town was, according to him, thirty days from Aúlíl, thirty-one from
Wergelán, and twenty-five from Jermah. The short distance of fifty-five
days herein allowed between Aúlíl and Jermah, will not admit of being
applied to a circuitous route. The distance from Wergelán, therefore,
which is relatively long, and by reaching far southwards has the effect
of elongating the preceding line, must be supposed to be circuitous. And
this is a well-founded supposition, inasmuch as the road from Wergelán
to Aúdaghost must have passed through Twát, and probably also by
Wanzamín. Now the point which satisfies the conditions of distance
specified above, and at the same time best eludes surrounding
difficulties, will be found to be not far from the 20th parallel of
north latitude, and the 1st meridian of east longitude, or about 120
miles east of the position assigned to Aúdaghost in our map. Thus it
appears that El Idrísí’s statements respecting the position of
Aúdaghost, do not, when taken together, lend the slightest countenance
to the hypothesis which makes that place identical with Aghades. For
that position, deduced in the strictest possible manner from the
assigned conditions, still leads to the conclusion that Ghánah was
situate on the northern bend of the river of Tomboktú. But since we
likewise learn from the same writer, that it was situate on the western,
and not the eastern portion of that northern bend, we have no
alternative but to correct his distances with respect to the angle of
the river, and to remove Aúdaghost further west, so as to place it
exactly half way between Aúlíl and Jermah; the correction, in this case,
amounting to only a twenty-second part of the whole distance between
those places.
It would be running into needless digression to point out all the
contradictions in which El Idrísí involves himself by reducing distances
so as to fit them to the frame in which he combines his information, or
by expanding details so as to distribute them more equally. It will be
here sufficient to have shown that he learned the course of the Great
River from El Bekrí, yet that he did not copy his author faithfully, but
took liberties with him, which are rendered more conspicuous by the
incongruities into which they lead him. He contracts the Desert, spreads
out the River; makes Silla on one side only sixteen days distant from
the Ocean, and Kúghah, near Seghmárah, on the other, only a month from
Dongolah. He wholly misunderstands the account of the lower portion of
the river, and by turning the stream westward, he falls into glaring
inconsistencies. In conclusion, whatever is reasonable in El Idrísí’s
account of Ghánah and its vicinity, is taken from El Bekrí, and nearly
all of it which is not taken from El Bekrí is absurd. Nevertheless, his
statements, when carefully analysed and freed from misconceptions,
plainly indicate that Ghánah was situate near that part of the Great
River where Tomboktú now stands.[96]
The only novelty worth notice in El Idrísí’s account of Western
Negroland, is his statement respecting the river of Ghánah, which he
informs us was navigable in large boats, and flowed into the ocean. Its
mouth was one day’s sail from Aúlíl. The river flowing into the ocean
near the Bay of Arguin, where it has been shown that the isle and salt
mine of Aúlíl were situate, is obviously the Senegal. The short distance
of one day’s sail, allowed by the Arab geographer in this case, is in
just proportion with all his other measures affecting the area of his
map.[97] He supposed the Nile of Ghánah, or Great River of the Interior,
to unite with the Senegal, and to run westwards into the ocean. Nor is
there any rashness in ascribing to him so great a misconception. Leo
Africanus makes a precisely similar statement respecting the river of
Tomboktú. Having navigated that river from Tomboktú to Jenni, the latter
author affirms most positively that it flows westward to the ocean. The
only excuse that can be offered for Leo’s mistake is, that the part of
the river with which he was practically acquainted, has little current,
and shows no diminution of magnitude as it is ascended; to a careless
observer, therefore, it presents nothing capable of controlling
speculation, or guiding to a correct inference respecting the course of
the stream. Higher up, the hypothesis was less tenable, and so Melli was
placed on a branch of the river. Being biassed by the early Arab
writers, particularly El Idrísí, Leo zealously adopted their erroneous
opinion, which being repeated by De Barros and other writers on African
geography, continued in vogue till the middle of the last century, or
nearly six centuries after it was first promulgated.[98] El Idrísí
states that salt was carried from Aúlíl to the mouth of the Nile, one
day distant, and then up that stream to Silla, Ghánah and Kúghah. Modern
authorities, on the other hand, have reported the Senegal to be
navigable up to Jenni (two days from Silla), Tomboktú and Gago, at which
point their information always terminated. And herein is another point
of resemblance between Ghánah and Tomboktú; inasmuch as they hold
similar positions in the hypothetical system, connecting the Senegal
with the Great River of the Interior.[99]
The Western Desert is represented by El Idrísí with the changed aspect
consequent on the movement of the Morabites. The Lumtúnah had gone
northwards to Morocco, and the Benú Goddálah, to whatever quarter they
had migrated, were no longer predominant in the south-western portion of
the Ṣaḥrá. The inhospitable tract extending between the desert of Tíser
and the Ocean, is named by El Idrísí Kamnúdíyah, the chief town of which
was half way between Silla and Arkí. South of Kamnúdíyah, he places a
country, the name of which, vitiated by copyists, occurs under a great
variety of forms, as, for example, Maghráwah, Meghrárah, Meghzárah, &c.
Of these readings, the first alone admits of a satisfactory explanation,
and shall therefore be here adopted.[100] Maghráwah lay to the west of
Ghánah, and as it extended from Aúlíl, on the sea shore, to Silla and
Tekrúr inclusively, it also embraced a territory lying to the south of
that State.[101] The country named by El Idrísí Maghráwah is therefore
obviously the same which a century earlier had been occupied by the Benú
Goddálah, and the change of its name may be naturally ascribed to the
revolution which carried away the latter people with the hordes of the
Morabites. The Arab historians are silent with respect to those who took
the place of the Benú Goddálah; but the want of information may be in
this instance supplied by a very probable conjecture.
When the Morabites, having subjugated Sús, Darʿah, Sijilmésah, and the
province wherein they afterwards founded Morocco, still continued to
press northwards, they met with a vigorous resistance from the
Maghráwah, who had long ruled over Fez and its dependencies, and who now
united with the Miknésah and other Zenátah tribes to oppose the
invaders.[102] The victory fell to the Morabites, who entered Fez in
triumph in A.D. 1067. But, grown negligent through continual success,
they were soon after taken by surprise, overpowered, and expelled. Their
enthusiasm, however, was not to be subdued by slight reverses; they
returned to the struggle, and again entered Fez in 1069, slaughtering,
it is said, 20,000 of the Maghráwah, whose sway in the west thus
terminated, after a continuance of just a century.[103]
Of the fortunes of the defeated tribes, there is nothing recorded; but
the general tenor of the history of Barbary justifies the supposition
that they betook themselves to the desert.[104] In 1084, Yúsef ben
Táshifín, the Amír or chief of the Morabites, sent messengers into the
Ṣaḥrá, to the Lumtúnah, Goddálah, and Masúfah, announcing to them that
he possessed extensive territories, well watered, which he was ready to
bestow on the first comers; “and in a few days,” says the historian,
“the whole land of Maghreb [Western Barbary and Morocco] was filled with
colonists from the Lumtúnah and the other tribes of the desert.”[105] It
is manifest that the Maghráwah, and their adherents, must have deserted
the fine country around Fez, before the half-wild tribes of the Ṣaḥrá
were called in to occupy it; and it is probable that, in the course of
revolution, they stepped into the place of the Benú Goddálah soon after
the latter had accepted the invitation sent to them to fill the vacancy
left by the expelled tribes. Thus we are led to conclude, that the
territory of the Benú Goddálah passed into the possession of the
Maghráwah at a period subsequent to, and probably not far removed from,
the year 1084.