Trans-Saharan trade

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Trans-Saharan Trade requires travel across the Sahara (north and south) to reach sub-Saharan Africa from the coast of North Africa, Europe, to the Levant. Although there are from prehistoric times, the peak of trade extended from the 8th century to the beginning of the 17th century.

The Sahara once had a very different environment. In Libya and Algeria, from at least 7000 BC, there are grazing, sheep and goat grazing, large settlements and pottery. Cattle were introduced to Central Sahara (Ahaggar) from 4000 to 3500 BC. Incredible stone paintings (dated 3500 to 2500 BC), in places that are now very dry, describe vegetation and animal presence somewhat different from modern expectations.

As a desert, the Sahara is now a stretch of animosity that separates the Mediterranean economy from the Niger Valley economy. As Fernand Braudel points out that crossing such zones (especially without mechanical transport) is only beneficial when exceptional circumstances lead to expected benefits exceeding costs and hazards.

The trade, started around the year 300 AD, was done by a camel caravan. According to Ibn Battuta, the explorer who accompanies one of the caravans, the average size per caravan is 1,000 camels; some caravans as large as 12,000. The caravans will be guided by highly paid Berber people who know the desert and can ensure a safe journey from their desert wanderers. The survival of the caravan is precarious and will depend on careful coordination. The runner will be sent forward to the oasis so water can be sent to the caravan when it is still a few days away, because the caravan can not easily carry enough for a full journey. In the middle of the 14th century Ibn Battuta crossed the desert from Sijilmasa through a salt mine in Taghaza to the Oualata oasis. A guide was sent to the front and water was taken in a four-day journey from Oualata to meet the caravan. Culture and religion are also exchanged on the Trans-Saharan Trade Line. These colonies eventually adopted the language and territory of the state and became absorbed into the Muslim population. These colonies are being discussed in the book E.W.Bovill is a Christian captive who was brought to Africa as a slave and eventually they converted to Islam and became part of the Muslim population. Like some others in Africa, there are some benefits to being a part of the Muslim population. During the Muslim control of some West African countries during this time there was a non-Muslim tax and many converts so they did not have to pay the taxes and also for Christian slaves, it was against the Islamic religion to have slaves so that was one way to get their freedom.

Video Trans-Saharan trade

Perdagangan trans-Sahara awal

The ancient trade stretches across the northeast corner of the Sahara in the Naqadan era. The Egyptian Muslims in the Naqada I period were traded with Nubia in the south, the Western desert oasis in the west, and the eastern Mediterranean cultures to the east. Many trade routes go from oasis to oasis to supply food and water. These oases are very important. They also imported obsidian from Ethiopia to form knives and other objects.

The land route through Wadi Hammamat from the Nile River to the Red Sea is known as early as predinastik; images depicting Egyptian reed boats have been found along paths dating 4000 BC. Ancient cities dating from the First Dynasty of Egypt appear along the intersections of the Nile and the Red Sea, testifying to the ancient popularity of the route. It became the main route from Thebes to the Red Sea port of Elim, where travelers then moved to Asia, Arabia or the Horn of Africa. The recordings documented knowledge of the route between Senusret I, Seti, Ramesses IV and also, later, the Roman Empire, mainly for mining.

The Darb el-Arbain trade route, through Kharga in the south and Asyut in the north, is used as early as the Old Kingdom for transportation and trade in gold, ivory, spices, wheat, animals and plants. Later, the Ancient Romans would protect the route by lining it with fortresses and small outposts, some keeping large settlements complete with cultivation. Described by Herodotus as the path "passed... within forty days", it was then an important land route that facilitated trade between Nubia and Egypt, and came to be known as Forty Days Road. From Kobbei, 40 km (25 mi) north of al-Fashir, route through the desert to Bir Natrum, another oasis and a salt mine, to Wadi Howar before proceeding to Egypt. The Darb el-Arbain trade route is the easternmost route of the central route.

The westernmost route of the three main routes is Ghadames Road, which flows from the River Niger in northern Gao to Ghat and Ghadames before ending in Tripoli. Next is the easiest of the three routes: Jalan Garamantean, named after the former ruler of the land he passed and also called the Bilma Path. The Garamantean Road passes the southern desert near Murzuk before turning north to pass between Alhaggar and Tibesti Mountains before reaching the oasis at Kawar. From Kawar, the caravan will pass through the great Bilma dunes, where rock salt is mined in large quantities for trade, before reaching the savanna north of Lake Chad. This is the shortest route, and the main exchanges are slaves and ivory from the south for salt.

The western route is Walata Street, from the River SÃÆ' Â © nÃÆ' Â © gal, and the Taghaza Line, off the Mali River, which has the northern end of the large trading center of Sijilmasa, located in Morocco in the north of the desert. The growth of the city Aoudaghost, founded in the 5th century BC, is stimulated by its position on the southern tip of the trans Sahara trade route.

To the east, three ancient routes connect south to the Mediterranean. The Shepherds in Fezzan from Libya, known as the Garamantes, have controlled this route since 1500 BC. From their capital at Germa in Wadi Ajal, the Garamantean Empire raided north to sea and south to the Sahel. In the 4th century BC, the independent city-state of Phoenecia had expanded their control over the territories and routes once owned by Garamantes. Shillington stated that existing contacts with the Mediterranean received additional incentives with the growth of the port city of Carthage. Established c. 800 BC, Carthage became a terminal for gold, ivory, and West African slaves. West Africa receives salt, fabrics, beads, and metal items. Shillington proceeds to identify this trade route as a source for West African iron smelting. Trade continued into Roman times. Although there is a Classical reference for direct travel from the Mediterranean to West Africa (Daniels, p.Ã, 22f), most of this trade is conducted through intermediaries, inhabiting the area and being aware of the way through drying land. The Legio III Augusta then secured this route on behalf of Rome in the 1st century, guarding the southern border of the empire for two and a half centuries.

Maps Trans-Saharan trade

Camel recognition

Herodotus has spoken of the Garamantes who hunted the Ethiopian Troglodytes with their chariots; this account is attributed to the depiction of horses drawing trains in contemporary cave art in southern Morocco and Fezzan, which gives the theoretical origins that Garamantes, or some other Saran, have created a train route to provide Rome and Carthage with gold and ivory. However, it has been argued that no horse skeleton was found to originate from the earliest period in the region, and horse-drawn carriages may not be vehicles for trading purposes due to their small capacity.

The earliest evidence for a domestic camel in the region dates from the 3rd century. Used by Berber people, they allow more regular contacts across the width of the Sahara, but regular trade routes did not develop until the beginning of the West African Islamic conversion in the 7th and 8th centuries. Two major trade routes were developed. The first ran through the western desert of modern Morocco to Bend Niger, the second from modern Tunisia to the Chad Lake area. This stretch is relatively short and has an essential network of occasional oases that make up routing as inevitable as pins in the map. Further east of Fezzan with its trade routes through the Kaouar valley to Chad Lake, Libya is bypassed for its lack of oases and fierce sandstorms. The route from Bend Niger to Egypt was abandoned in the 10th century because of the danger.

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Trans-Saharan Trade in the Middle Ages

The rise of the Ghanaian Empire, now called Mali, Senegal, and southern Mauritania, paralleled the increase in trans-Saharan trade. The Mediterranean economy lacks gold but can supply salt, which is picked up by places like the African salt mines in Taghaza, while the West African countries like Wangara have a lot of gold but need salt. Trans-Saharan slave trade is also important because large numbers of Africans are sent to the north, generally to serve as domestic servants or concubine slaves. West African countries imported highly trained slave soldiers. It is estimated that from the 10th to the nineteenth century some 6,000 to 7,000 slaves were transported north each year. Perhaps as many as nine million slaves were exported along the trans-Saharan caravan route. Several trading routes became established, perhaps most importantly ending up in Sijilmasa (Morocco) and Ifriqiya in the north. There, and in other North African cities, Berber merchants have increased contacts with Islam, encouraged conversion, and in the 8th century, Muslims traveled to Ghana. Many people in Ghana converted to Islam, and it seems the Imperial trade got the privilege as a result. Around 1050, Ghana lost Aoudaghost to Almoravids, but a new gold mine around the Bure reduced trade through the city, instead benefiting Malinke in the south, which later established the Mali Empire.

Unlike Ghana, Mali is a Muslim empire since its inception, and beneath it, the gold-salt trade continues. Other, less important trade items are slaves, southern kola peas and slave beads and shells from the north (for use as currency). It's under Mali that the big cities in Niger's corner - including Gao and Djennà © - are engined, with Timbuktu particularly known throughout Europe because of its great wealth. An important trading center in southern West Africa developed in the transition zone between forests and savannas; examples include Begho and Bono Manso (now Ghana) and Bondoukou (in Ivory Coast now). Western trading routes continue to be important, with Ouadane, Oualata and Chinguetti being the main trading hubs in what is now Mauritania, while the town of Tuareg in Assodà © Å © and then Agadez grew up around the more eastern route in what is now Niger.

The eastern trans-Sahara route leads to the development of the long-lived Kanem-Bornu empire and the kingdoms of Ghana, Mali, and Songhai, based in the Chad Lake region. This trading route is somewhat less efficient and just becomes very well known when there is turbulence in the west as during the conquest of Almohad.

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Decline in trans-Saharan trade

The Portuguese journey around the coast of West Africa opened up new avenues for trade between Europe and West Africa. At the beginning of the 16th century, European trade bases, "Factories" were established on the coast since 1445, and trade with wealthier Europeans became very important for West Africa. North Africa has declined both in political and economic interests, while the Sahara crossing remains long and dangerous. However, a major blow to trans-Saharan trade is the Battle of Tondibi from 1591-92. Morocco sent troops across the Sahara and attacked Timbuktu, Gao and several other important trade centers, destroying buildings and property and driving out leading citizens. This trade disruption led to a dramatic decline in the importance of these cities and the resulting hostilities significantly reduced the trade.

Despite the decline, trans-Saharan trade continues. But the trade route to the West African coast became easier, especially after the French invasion of the Sahel in the 1890s and the construction of railroads into the interior. The railroad from Dakar to Algeria via Niger's bend was planned but never built. With the independence of countries in the region in the 1960s, the north-south route was cut off by national boundaries. The national government was hostile to Tuareg nationalism and therefore made several attempts to defend or support trans-Saharan trade, and the Tuareg Rebellion of the 1990s and the Algerian Civil War further disrupted the route, with many roads closed.

Most traditional caravan routes do not have camels, but the shorter Azalai route from Agadez to Bilma and Timbuktu to Taoudenni is still organized - if used lightly. Some Tuareg members still use traditional trade routes, travel frequently 2,400 km (1,500 mi) and six months from each year by camels crossing Sahara trade in salt brought from desert hinterlands to communities on the outskirts of the desert.

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The future of trans-Saharan trade

The African Union and the African Development Bank supported the Trans-Saharan Highway from Algiers to Lagos via Tamanrasset aimed at stimulating trans-Saharan trade. The route is paved except for the 200 km section in northern Niger, but border restrictions still impede traffic. Only a few trucks carry trans-Saharan trade, especially fuel and salt. Three other highways across the Sahara are proposed: for more details see Trans-Africa Highway. Constructing highways is difficult due to sandstorms

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See also

• Trans-Saharan Highway
• Subpluvial Neolithic

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References

Note

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Further reading

• Albert Adu Boahen, English, Sahara and Western Sudan 1788-1861. Oxford 1964
• Edward William Bovill, Moorish Gold Trading (Princeton: Markus Wiener, 1995) ISBNÃ, 1-55876-091-1
• Donald Harden, The Phoenicians, Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1971 (1962)
• Kevin Shillington (eds), "Tuareg: Takedda and trans-Saharan trade" from Encyclopedia of African History , Fitzroy Dearborn, 2004, ISBNÃ, 1-57958-245-1
• B.H. Warmington, Carthage, Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1964 (1960)
• M'hammad Sabour and Knut S. VikÃÆ'¸r (eds), Ethnic Encounter and Cultural Change , Bergen, 1997, [3] Google Cache Last Retrieved Jan.2005.
• Ross, Eric (2011). "A historical geography of trans-Saharan trade" (PDF) . In KrÃÆ'¤tli, Graziano; Lydon, Ghislaine. Trans-Saharan Book Trade: Manuscript Culture, Arabic Literacy and Intellectual History in Muslim Africa . Leiden: Brill. pp.Ã, 1-34. ISBN 978-90-04-18742-9.
• Trans-Saharan Gold Trade 7th-14th Century from Museum of Modern Art
• Lagha Chegrouche \ E, "GÃÆ' Â © opolitique transsaharienne de l'ÃÆ' Â © nergie", in Revue GÃÆ'Â © opolitique N Â ° 108, 2010
• Lagha Chegrouche, "GÃÆ' Â © opolitique transsaharienne de l'ÃÆ' Â © nergie, le jeu et l'enjeu? in Revue de l'ÃÆ' Â © nergie, Etude, 2010

Source of the article : Wikipedia