4.4. GROWTH AND CONFLICT

4.4. MENU:  GROWTH & CONFLICT

DISORIENTED MASSES DRIVE MOVEMENT THAT SWEEP THE SAVANNAH

(ESPECIALLY IN THE SECOND PART OF THE 19TH CENTURY) 

They bring theocracies, which use intensive slave labor to supply expanding markets.  

Turmoil takes place in much of the light green zone.

In brief 

• Storms in preparation

• An explorer is taken for the messiah   

• "Everywhere the humble show the masters their teeth"  
• 
  
• A theocracy amps up growth

• Then contains it

*     *     *

Next,  

4.4.1. 

Storms in preparation

4.4.1. STORMS IN PREPARATION

 

COMPARING EXPLORERS' OBSERVATIONS OF BORNOU AND LOGONE (IN NORTHERN NIGERIA) OF 1825 AND 1826 SHOW GROWTH AND FAILURE TO CONTAIN IT

 -- Narrative of Travels and Discoveries in Northern and Central Africa in 1821, 1822, 1823
by Captain Hugh Clapperton, 1826

-- Travels and Discoveries in North and Central Africa by Heinrich Barth,1855

In Bornu a revolution has overthrown the oldest authorities but remains archaic, and in Logone there is no political change at all. 

*     *

Background: Central Saharan trade routes lead to the kingdom of Kanem, which is much like that of Songhay. 

 Zoom

Saharan trade routes toward 1400

Zoom

The king is white: the map's creator invents, because he knows even less about the central route than that to the west, where the king holding the gold nugget is Black.  

Bornu is at the epicenter of Boko Haram now.

Trade routes through the central Sahara lead to Bornu, a kingdom that resembles those of western savannah in medieval times. 

 *    *

Bornu toward 1825:

(The shortened name used for Kanem-Bornu )

• The economy is comparable to that of 15th-century France. This horseman resembles a knight:

Zoom

Clapperton's narrative

• A theocratic ruler becomes head of the 1000-year-old kingdom. He is stronger than the former obese kings, but constraints still hem him in:

Shehu al-Hajj Muhammad al-Kânemi, Clapperton / zoom

White robes represent saintliness and being the representative of God strengthens authority...

Zoom

But the giant turban hampers movement and the barrier isolates.  

*     *

  

Logone, a state south of Bornu so farther from Saharan trade, changes more slowly, and in 1825 has kept traditional restraints on growth:

• To keep the mission from seeking supplies from local producers the king offers the mission far more supplies than it can consume.

• Clapperton sees an iron for the first time and gives it a rare illustration:

Zoom 

 

• Commerce expands and power grows. Weaving and dyeing appear at about the time that commercial people overthrow the king of Kong and open the routes to the south (toward 1800). Chieftaincies unite and the king becomes nominally Muslim, a sign of strength since it brings the claim that power comes from God. 

*     *

In Bornu a generation later...

• Barth finds that a revolution has defeated the oldest nobility, the descendants of the men with the huge turbans.

• Cowry use follows that revolution. 

While in Logone...

•  Commercial production expands:

Cotton is grown, "weaving and dyeing are here carried on to a considerable extent, new land is being cleared, a market is "fairly active," and "field-hand villages" grow up during the rainy season. (Bolding mine)

• Cotton bands have replaced the iron money : they are a divisible currency, though less so than as cowries (one band = eight cowries).   

• The government stays the same: The ruler receives Barth behind a curtain and provides him with enough supplies for a hundred people.

The economy is developing 
 but authority is unchanged:
For now.

*     *     *

Next,
4.4.2.
 An explorer is taken for the messiah

4.4.2. AN EXPLORER IS TAKEN FOR THE MESSIAH

ON HIS WAY TO EXPLORE BAGIRMI BARTH UNWITTINGLY BEHAVES AS AN AGITATOR AND AUTHORITIES ARREST HIM 

Bagirmi officials think he will "upset the kingdom" should he arrive in the absence of the sultan, who is on a slaving expedition. He is confined for 18 days, four of them in irons. The sultan eventually lets him leave but forbids him from exploring Bagirmi: that is, "Get out of here and don't come back."

*    *

Barth has involuntarily attracted followers by...

• Giving away so much wealth (in needles) that he is called "the needle prince:" Hand-outs are meant to gain partisans.

• Sharing provisions of the Logone ruler with a caravan leader, and so acting like a king. 

• Sitting on a carpet until he learns that it is a prerogative of kings.   

• Appearing to have supernatural powers. 

• When thunderclouds disperse as he leaves his hut, he is called "king of the high regions." Then he stays in his hut as much as possible, inaccessibility adding to his aura.

• Distributing medicines sparks belief in his magic: On his expulsion, crowds follow him "all the way from Bagirmi" to obtain them.

As well, white people are entirely unknown. Barth's unusual appearance instantly sets him apart.

*    *

The crowds themselves, which seem to spring up out of nowhere, reveal a destabilization that comes from economic growth that rulers like the king of Logone are too archaic to control.

In medieval Europe millennial movements begin at the end of the 11th century in places where commerce expands (the Rhine valley, parts of northern France and Belgium and later, in large parts of Europe). There are no records of such turmoil in regions where there is little economic growth. 

                                                                                 -- The Pursuit of the Millenium, the classic study of

 European revolutionary messianism by Herman Cohn, 1957, p. 22 et seq.

The African crowds foreshadow the mass movements that soon sweep the savannah.

Kanembu warriors, "Le Tour du monde," ed. Elysée Reclus, 1885

(The Kanembu: a Bornu population)

A messianic leader? Vigorous and unencumbered, riding a white steed, a disciplined infantry (more coming)... .

 *    *

When sources of income are lost the old ways are irretrievably shattered, social ties dissolve and ancestral beliefs no longer reassure.

People may then seek leaders

who are outside the norm —

 in Africa a European explorer. 

And in the U.S., Trump.

*     *     *

Next,

 4.4.3. 

"Everywhere the humble show the masters their teeth"

4.4.3. "EVERYWHERE THE HUMBLE SHOW THE MASTERS THEIR TEETH" -- Dakar archives, 1857

This page and the next summarize Aubin, pp. 457-94

AN EARLY MOVEMENT BREAKS OUT IN FUTA TORO, THE SENEGAL RIVER'S ALUVIAL PLAIN  

It fails, but moves to the Middle Niger where it establishes a theocracy  

(In 1854)

* The first movement and first theocracy appear in Hausa country (the Caliphate of Sokoto in Northern Nigeria, at the start of the 19th century), the region where growth was strongest. I chose the movement in Senegal, however, because of the number of French documents. The basic evolution is comparable.

What made 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 colony of Saint-Louis, at the mouth of the Senegal River, stimulated grain sales for its growing population* and for slaves and slave-ship crews with the Atlantic slave trade at its height.
  

* In the 1780's 6,000; in the 1850's 15,000.

View of Saint-Louis from the Sea, undated / zoom

• The Revolution in Paris of 1830 ushered in the Industrial Revolution in France and so demand for hides to make shoes and other leather goods for urban populations and for peanuts, used for soap, fertilizer and greasing machines. 

 Zoom (among other pictures)

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. 

The mission between Matam and Bakel (outposts along Senegal River) in Voyage au Soudan français by Commdt. Gallieni, 1885 

Much later, 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 martyrdom grows from village to village with prayer-beads in hand, heads shaved, marches before him". 

-- Abbott P.D. Boilat, 
Esquisses sénégalaises,1853, p. 411, slightly shortened

• 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.

The Futa Toro army on the march, 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.

*      *      *

 Next,

4.4.4. 

A theocracy amps up growth

4.4.4. A THEOCRACY AMPS UP GROWTH

MUSLIM LAW ENCOURAGES COMMERCIAL PRODUCTION

So the most dynamic traders of the Middle Niger back the theocracy of al-hajj Umar. 

(The Toukoulor Confederation of Ségou, 1861-1890)

The capital is the town of Ségou.

 It...

• Imposes private ownership of land.

When Umar and his crowds arrive, communal property is at the heart of local Muslim as well as animist social structure. Islamic law demands division among heirs — which means private property  — and the regime sends soldier-backed judges enforce it.

By the 1890's all territory in the densely-populated Ségou area is privately held, and produces millet for fifty local markets.

Communal organization is gone.

-- Dakar archives, 1895.

• Uses "holy wars" to free land for production and seize labor: The next chapter says more.

*     *

Such transformation demands authority: "He said he was a mere soldier of Mohammed, but that gave him infinitely more power than that of the usual king."  

 -- An official mentioned in Dakar archives, 1887, 
citing Amadou Tall, Umar's son and successor

 Al-hajj Umar Tall, drawing of the time, source unknown

The robe and headdress do not encumber and steps rather than a barrier emphasize grandeur. 

  

• The ruler selects his heir and transmits his wealth to him.

Along the Senegal and Niger, succession that passed from brother to brother ensured short reigns and prevented a single dynasty from accumulating wealth. But now the leader possesses "baraka" (divine grace), and conveys it to his chosen heir.

Umar chooses his son Amadou, who also appoints his successor.

• Amadou keeps treasure. 

When his father's followers accuse him of "stinginess" —  the usual complaint when a king does not share  — he hires soldiers of his own.

He takes 20 camel-loads of gold (500 kilos) on campaign and the French find gold jewels valued at 300,000 francs buried in the palace.

-- Aubin p. 476, notes 161, 163, 164.

*    *

Doctrine is adapted to practical needs: 

• Ségou becomes a pilgrimage destination equal to Mecca, reinforcing the theocracy. 

• Amadou has 800 wives, which lets all groups hope that a son will come to power.

-- Mecca: Paul Soleillet, 
Voyages et découvertes dans le Sahara et dans le Soudan, 1887, p. 233. 

-- Wives: Lt. de vaisseau Mage,
 Voyage dans le Soudan occidental, 1868, p. 408

1920's postcard

To understand why mass philosophies take hold,

set them in their economic contexts

and observe the practical effects of applying them.

*     *     *

Next,

4.4.5.

Then contains it

•