4.2.4. TRADERS AND TEXTILES COME TO DJIMINI

TRADERS FROM KONG (THE DYULA) TRAVEL OVER RELATIVELY SHORT DISTANCES WITH LITTLE CAPITAL OR ORGANIZATION 

 Zoom

Dyula, 1905

Their gains are slight in comparison with those of the Soninke and Hausa, long-distance traders whose networks, capital and profits are greater.  So are their ambitions. 

Adapted from a Stock map

De Saint-Louis à Tripoli par le Chad by Lt.-Col. P.L. Monteil, 1895/ zoom

Hausa transporting kola

"Large sums are expended by the natives upon this luxury

which has become to them as necessary as coffee or tea to us. 

The import of this nut into Kanó, comprising certainly more than five hundred ass-loads every year, the load of each, if safely brought to the market — for it is a very delicate article, and very liable to spoil — being sold for about 200,000 kurdí, will amount to an average of from eighty to one hundred millions. Of this sum, I think we shall be correct in asserting about half to be paid for by the natives of the province, while the other half will be profit."

-- Travels and Discoveries in North and Central Africa by Heinrich Barth, 1855, II, p.131. Underlining mine. 

 

P.120

Kano, "this glorious panorama"

Detour: 

Heinrich Barth's account 

of his travels in the Sahara and Sahel (in 1849-1851)... 

is exceptionally detailed and thoughtful. He was intellectual, engaged in long discussions with erudite Muslims in Arabic, Hausa, Fulani or Kanuri ; kindly, giving treats to a beloved camel; not racist, finding dark skin "almost essential to female beauty."

It is readable on the web: Here is volume II.

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The Hausa from what is now Northern Nigeria trade over the longest distances and are the most wealthy and formidable. Barth writes of textile production in their city of Kano:

P. 129

"The great advantage of Kanó  is that commerce and manufactures go hand in hand, and that almost every family has its share in them. There is really something grand in this kind of industry, which spreads to the north as far as Múrzuk, Ghát, and even Tripoli; to the west, not only to Timbúktu, but in some degree even as far as the shores of the Atlantic."

-- P. 126.

Photos of 1910 show its importance:

Zoom / first picture of series

Fourteenth photo

They introduce weaving from their village of Marabadiassa: "Maraba" means "people of the east," that is, Hausa. 

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Textiles are easy to produce and transport, and the market for them is inexhaustible.* They lead to seeking dyes and dye stabilizers, beget new sources of capital and bring the emergence of weavers, dyers, clothiers and embroiderers.

* For their role in the La Goutte d'Or neighborhood in Paris, please click. 

They reveal status

and bring social transformation.

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Next,

4.2.5. 

Classless communities that elders lead