MILLENARIAL UPHEAVALS SWEEP THE SAVANNAH
This page and the next summarize Aubin, pp. 457-94
An early movement begins in Futa Toro, the alluvial plain of the Senegal River, then moves to the Middle Niger where it establishes a theocracy.
(In 1854)
Factors that make Futa Toro distinct:
- Its alluvial plain produces two harvests a year and cattle-raising gives its Toucouleur population a sense of private property unusual for the time. Many become traders.
- The French outpost of Saint-Louis stimulates grain sales as its population grows.*
View of Saint-Louis from the Sea, undated / zoom
That is especially true after 1830 when the July Revolution in Paris ushers in the Industrial Revolution.That leads to a greater demand for hides and peanuts, which are used for diesel fuel, pharmaceuticals, soap, and fertilizer. As well, with the Atlantic slave trade at its height more slaves and slave-ship crews must be supplied.
Inauguration of the bridge on the right in the 1850's.
* *
Points of sale along the Senegal multiply. Some workers and servants save their salaries and become merchants, but many people lose their lands and points of reference.
Much later (toward 1880) but same principle.
- An early millennial movement deepens social cleavages by letting almamies (Muslim leaders), many of whom are involved in commercial production and long-distance trade, control communal landholdings and impose tithes, which they often keep.
-- Aubin pp. 465-6, n.109-116.
- Toucouleur prophets appear from the 1770's. In 1830, one of them preaches "the spirit of pillage and devastation" against infidels and "an army of saints [...] ready for martydom [...] grows from village to village [...] with prayer-beads in hand, heads shaved, marches before him [...]".
-- Abbott P.D. Boilat,
Esquisses sénégalaises,1853, p. 411.
Esquisses sénégalaises,1853, p. 411.
- In the 1840's bands of ragged marauders threaten a traveller's boat.
-- Anne Raffenel,
Voyage en Sénégambie occidentale, 1846, I, pp. 38-9, 47, 177-8, 267-8.
In 1851 al-hajj Umar Tall, a Toucouleur merchant, scholar and rare West African to have been to Mecca, calls for a society based on divine law.
1860 / zoom
His followers include one fourth of the Toucouleur population
and subordinates from other ethnic groups: peasants who have lost their lands, slaves and lineage minors.
-- Dakar archives, 1880.
- They hope for lands and booty, and the collapse of their former communities predisposes them to accept a new one.
- Those armies contrast with royal ones: Pursued, surrounded, they did not change their regular pace and let themselves be killed rather than flee."
-- Dakar archives, 1880.
Vue de l'armée du Futa Toro en marche, 1820 (in account of the explorer Mollien, Gallica) / zoom
The authorities resist. Sign of their strength — there are no markets.
-- Raffenel I, 233.
Umar leads his following to the Niger.* * *
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