century. Until then, Muslims were hardly to be met with except
at Kano, and here they were not numerous. It is to the mystic
zeal and the warlike fanaticism of a Tukulor marabout, a native
of the Futa-Toro, that this important region of Africa owes its
invasion by Mohammedanism.
In 1801, the sheik Ousman the Torodo, son of one named
Mohammed called Fode or Fodio^13 , that is to say “the savant”,
having learned that difficulties had arisen between the Fulani
shepherds of the Gober and their Hausa patrons, profited by this
circumstance to preach a holy war against the inhabitants and their
neighbours. Siding with the Fulani, who had the common bond of
language with him and his people, he raised an army among the
unemployed warriors of the Futa-Toro, the Massina, the Liptako and
the Songhoy, and started out on the conquest of the Hausa. He
succeeded in his enterprise and founded an empire, with Sokoto as
its capital and its suburb of Wurno as the princely residence, an
empire which was not long in including all the Hausa kingdoms, a
part of the Adamawa, the Nupe, the Kebbi and, in the bend of the
Niger, the Liptako. He even invaded Bornu, but was driven away
in 1810 by the Kanemi, who will be spoken of further on. The sheik
Ousman died about 1815 following a paroxism of mystic mania.
His brother Abdullahi took command of the western provinces of the
empire, with Gando as the capital; the Adamawa formed an
almost independent State; as for the larger part of the provinces
conquered by Ousman, they passed under the domination of his
son Mohammed Bello (1815-1837).
The beginning of this prince’s reign was devoted to a struggle without
respite against the Zanfara, the Gober, the kingdom of Katsena and
the Kebbi, who refused obedience to the son as they did to the
brother of Ousman, and whose inhabitants had abjured Islam almost
immediately after they had been forced to accept it. In fact, all the
Hausa revolted against Tukulor domination and the Tuareg of the Aïr
Mountains and of Damerghu made a pact with the rebels. Soon the
Kanemi gave his aid and furnished them contingents sent by the
Wadai and the Bagirmi; then he himself departed on a war against
Mohammed Bello. The latter dispatched two armies against his
enemy, one commanded by Yakuba, king of the Bauchi, the other by
Ya-Mussa, king of Zaria. The latter took flight with his contingents at
the first contact with the master of Bornu, but Yakuba, after two hard
combats, put the Kanemi to rout and saved the Sokoto Empire.Mohammed Bello, who was a mediocre enough warrior and had
no fondness for fighting in person, was a distinguished man of
letters. He composed a number of poems and prose works in
Arabic, some religious, others historical, protected the learned,
received with respect the English explorer Clapperton (1828) and
was notable for a rigorous control of the acts of his magistrates
who feared his investigations and his censure. His brother and
successor, Atiku (1837-1843), distinguished himself especially as
a great enemy of the dance and of music and proscribed all
amusements. Gober and the Kingdom of Katsena revolted anew
under his reign against the excesses of the Tukulor princes who
were installed as residents in the vassal provinces.Ali, son of Mohammed Bello, reigned from 1843 to 1855, in the
midst of continual revolts of his pretended subjects who, notably in the
Gober and the Kebbi, persistently refused to adhere to Islam. The five
Tukulor sovereigns who came after him – Ahmadu (1855-1866),
Aliun-Karani (1866-1867), Ahmadu II (1867-1872), Bubakar
(1872-1877), and Meyassu (1877-1904) – were incapable of
governing an empire so vast and so badly organised, which fell to
pieces like a house of cards in 1904, by the single fact of the
occupation of Sokoto by the British troops of Sir Frederick Lugard.TThhee EEmmppiirree ooff BBoorrnnuu
To the east of the Hausa, on both sides of Lake Chad, lives a
population whose domain to the west bears the name of Bornu
and to the east that of Kanem. This population is related by its
origin and language to another, dispersed across immense terri-
tories, for the most part desert, that of the Teda or Goran; these
two groups meet at the Kawar (oasis of Bilma), at the Tibesti or Tu
or region of Bardai (whence the name of Tibbu or Tubu and of
Bardoa given to the Teda of this region), at the Borku or Daza, in
the Ennedi (where they take the name of Anna and are called
Bedeyat by the Arabs), in the Kabga or Kapka, north of the
Wadai (Gaoga of Leo the African), finally in the Zaghawa, situ-
ated to the north of Darfur between the Ennedi and the Nile. These
Teda were divided into a great number of tribes, some nomads,
others sedentary, some Muslim, others pagan, some frankly Ne-
groes, others more or less mixed with white blood. The family of
the first sovereign of the Kanem – Bornu of whom tradition
preserves the memory, probably belonged to this people. He was
a prince who is given the name of Saefe or Sefu, from which the
Muslims have not hesitated to make Seïfullahi “the sabre of God”,
although fully recognising that he was no Muslim; neither did they
hesitate to assimilate him to Seïf ben Dzu-Yezen, the last Himyarite
king of Yemen.Mask (Chokwe).
Wood and plant fibres, height: 22cm.