TRADE COMES TO DJIMINI, A REGION FROM THE BACK OF BEYOND

RIPPLES FROM TRANS-SAHARAN TRADE
FINALLY REACH IT TOWARD 1700

The exhange of salt for gold and slaves
triggers a series of repercussions

Fourteenth-century map

• A universal scenario:
Exchanges first strengthen 
the existing social system, 
then transform it

Early trade is in luxuries, which alone bear the cost of transport. Local authorities are delighted to get them, and use them to strengthen their control.

But merchants need supplies, and animals, water bags, ropes, sandals. The original authorities cannot handle such requests, and a new elite grows up to manage them. With its wives, children and servants it must be supplied as well. Agriculture and crafts develop.

The initial transactions take second place.

 -- As shown by the late anthropologist, Claude Meillassoux.

• Traders they move south,
for gold and slaves
and a new product -- kola nuts

Internet

Small and light, they are used as dyes and because chewed, they lessen thirst and create a light euphoria. 

• They establish outposts,
whose leaders control the routes.
One of these settlements becomes
the Islamic center of Kong

Du Niger au Golfe de Guinée par le pays de Kong et le Mossi (1887-89) by Captain Louis Gustave Binger, 1892

  

A Kong mosque

A"mad" ruler of Kong shoots into the market.

Likely translation:
When growth brings challengers,
he uses violence to keep them under control.

He is overthrown.

The victors open the routes
and arrive in Djimini toward 1710.

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