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Kanem-Bornu has already been mentioned as one
of the four great empires of the Sudan which preceded the Empire of
Sokoto. As a Moslem power of long standing, which saw no need for
reform, it naturally became the principal adversary of the Fulani
reformers and so it has a prominent part to play in this history.
The accounts of the origins of the Kanuri (as
the people of Bornu are called) and the Kanembu go back to the
shadowy period of the first millennium and are more than ordinarily
contradictory and confusing. There is no doubt, however, that like
the Hausas they were the products of a mingling of races. The region
round Lake Chad which they inhabited was connected by caravan routes
to both Tripolitania and the Nile Valley from as early as the eighth
century 1
and Arab strains from the east as well as Berber strains from the
north seem to have entered into their makeup. In fact, there is
reason to think that, like the Gobirawa, their ruling classes and
common people had different origins, that the commoners evolved out
of a union of Berber immigrants and Sudanic tribes, and that
subsequently they absorbed another wave of immigrants, this time of
Arab blood, whom they accepted as an aristocracy 2.
Whatever their precise origins, the Kanembu
seem to have emerged as a distinct people two or three hundred years
before the Hausas. Certainly Kanem was mentioned by the historian
Yakubi, writing at the end of the ninth century 3,
and the people are said to have embraced Islam as early as the last
decade of the eleventh century, again two or three centuries sooner
than the Hausas 4.
It was in the twelfth century that Kanem's
expansion began. Under a vigorous ruler the Kanembu extended their
influence southwards to obtain better control of the staples of the
trans-Saharan trade gold, ivory, and of course slaves-and northwards
to prevent the nomads of the desert from plundering their caravans
5. In the following century they pushed their settlements to the
west until the whole northern shore of the Lake was in their grip 6.
Next, dissident members of their ruling family, who had previously
broken away to the east and founded the Bulala Dynasty in the new
kingdom of Gaoga, returned to challenge their authority in Kanem. In
the civil war which followed the Bulala were completely victorious
and in about 1390 7 the
legitimate ruler and the loyalists were
compelled to abandon the capital of Njimi and seek refuge in the new
settlements to the west of the Lake. This shift marked the emergence
of Bornu as a State distinct from Kanem and the Kanuri as a people
distinct from the Kanembu.
During the ensuing period the Mais, as the
Sultans of Bornu were called, gradually rebuilt their strength. In
this they were greatly assisted by their success in winning the
allegiance of the Shuwa Arabs, a fresh wave of immigrants who had
poured into the central Sudan after the destruction of the Christian
kingdom of Nubia, about a century earlier, and settled in fairly
large numbers in the region south of the Lake.
By about A.D. 1430, little more than a
generation after losing Kanem to the Bulala, the Mais of Bornu were
able to establish their hegemony over the Hausa States. At about the
same time the reopening of the caravan route from Egypt to Chad,
again as a result of the extinction of the Christian power in Nubia,
and its extension to the gold bearing districts of Ashanti, must
have brought new trade and wealth to Bornu 8. This was reflected in the decision
of Mai Ali Ghaji, in about A.D. 1488, to build a fine new capital at
Ngazargamu 9.
When Idris succeeded as Mai in A.D. 1503 he
felt strong enough to attempt the reconquest of Kanem. Soon
afterwards, therefore, he led an army round the Lake and a great
battle took place at Garni Kiyala. The Bulala usurper was completely
defeated and forced to retire to the east. His successor later tried
to recover Kanem, but he, too, was defeated and driven back. The
wheel had now come full circle and, instead of Bornu's being a
province in the Empire of Kanem, Kanem. Had become a tributary State
in the Empire of Bornu 10.
But the Bulala, despite the loss of all their western possessions,
refused to submit and from their original base in the east they
continued to harry the Kanuri intermittently for the rest of the
century
11.
Mai Idris was already embroiled in the struggle
with the Bulala when the Songhai army invaded Hausaland in 1513.
This probably explains why he allowed his rights as a suzerain to be
wrested from him by Askia Muhammad and why he and his successors
subsequently made such a poor showing against Muhammadu Kanta of
Kebbi.
Bornu is usually regarded as having reached the
height of its power under Mai Idris Alooma, who reigned from 1571 to
1603. But he too had to expend most of his energy in expeditions
against the Bulala and he did not attempt to reconquer the Hausa
States. In the century that followed his death the Kanuri, no less
than the Hausas, were on the defensive against the Jukuns, and so it
was not until 1734 that they re-established their sway over
Hausaland. But soon afterwards, under the weak
Mai Ali Ajimi, their power declined again 12,
with the result that some of the Hausa States, as has already been
mentioned, were able to throw off their allegiance although others
seem to have remained loyal.
In the organization of Bornu there was a wide
measure of decentralization. The tributary States, as we have
already seen, were left to rule themselves with only Residents
stationed in their capitals to watch over imperial interests. Nearer
home the marches of Bornu proper were ruled by Wardens or Constables
chosen from the ruling family. Their functions were the preservation
of law and order, the conduct of diplomacy with neighbouring
peoples, if necessary through war or punitive expeditions, and the
collection of tax and tribute. The Warden of the West, the Galadima,
had his headquarters at Nguru and from there he wielded his very
considerable authority 13.
Exactly when the first Fulani reached Bornu we
do not know, but it was probably at about the same time as the
arrival in Birnin Konni of Shehu's ancestor, Musa Jakollo, that is
to say in the middle of the fifteenth century 14.
Even if the majority came much later, there is no doubt that by the
beginning of the nineteenth century they had been living among the
Kanuri for generations. Such, then, was the setting of the scene in
Bornu when the jihad began in Hausaland.
The Mai of Bornu, as ruler of the most powerful
Moslem State in the central Sudan, had long been known by the
Islamic title of ‘Commander of the Faithful’. It was natural,
therefore, that as soon as the Mai of the day, Ahmed ibn Ali, heard
that the reformers had conferred this style upon their leader, he
should have sent a peremptory message to Shehu demanding to know by
what right he had accepted the title and taken it on himself to
declare a holy war 15.
In his reply Shehu asserted that the Hausa Chiefs were no better
than infidels and called on the Mai, as he was a good Moslem, to
support the jihad. At the same time he sent an order to the Fulani
in Bornu to stay their hand and accept a peaceful settlement if one
was offered. But the Mai took offence at Shehu's message and instead
of offering peace started preparing for war 16.
When the fighting started in Hausaland it is
unlikely that Gobir and Katsina, having previously renounced their
allegiance, appealed to Bornu for help. Kano, and Daura probably did
so, however, for the Mai seems to have ordered the Galadima to go to
their rescue. But before he could make any effective move he found
that he had his own hands full 17.
At that time there were a number of small
principalities —Auyo, Bedde, Shira, and Tashena— lying between
Bornu and Hausaland. They were under the jurisdiction of the
Galadima and it was there that the reformers now rose against the
authority of Bornu. First of all a pastoral Fulani called Abdure, or
Abduwa, threw off his allegiance and declared for Shehu.
Although he himself died very soon afterwards,
his two sons, Umaru and Sambo, obtained a flag and a commission to
subdue the principality of Auyo. This they very soon did. Next they
took possession of the town of Hadeija, which they enlarged and
strengthened, and from there they proceeded to extend their
authority over the intervening and surrounding towns and villages.
One of these, incidentally, was Garun Gabas,
the only one of the original Hausa Bakwai which had failed to
develop into even a principality. This territory became the nucleus
of the Emirate of Hadeija 18.
Meanwhile, another Fulani, Ardo Lernima, had
also joined the jihad. He lived near Nguru and, before the war, had
been the agent appointed by the Galadima to collect tax and tribute
from the pastoral Fulani in the district. Although the Galadima had
given him a daughter in marriage he declared for Shehu and urged the
Fulani to rise. In the first clash Lernima was defeated, but later,
when he had been reinforced by Sambo of Hadeija and Ibrahim Zaki of
Shira, whom we shall meet again later, he was completely victorious.
The Bornu forces were defeated, Nguru sacked, and the Galadima
killed 19.
The destruction of
Nguru and the consolidation of Hadeija meant
that in the northern sector of Bornu's western frontier the
reformers had been completely successful.
In the central and southern sectors of the
frontier operations were in the hands of three men, all of whom were
Fulani. The first, Ibrahim Zaki, was the son of the Imam of Shira.
His family was influential in the little principality and he himself
had been given a daughter of the Chief in marriage 20.
The second, Gwani Muktar, also came of a family which had been
settled in Bornu for many generations. He himself had studied under
Shehu and indeed had been one of his most gifted pupils 21.
The third, Buba Yero, came from the Lower
Gongola, where his father had settled and taken a daughter of the
local Chief in marriage. He too had studied under Shehu as a young
man and ever afterwards had remained one of his most devoted and
trusted followers. Unlike the other Fulani, however, he had not
waited for the jihad to start before asserting his authority but by
1798 had already made himself master of the greater part of the
valley of the Lower Gongola. When the war came, therefore, he was
already a force in his own right 22.
News of the jihad and of the Mai of Bornu's
reaction to it caused Ibrahim Zaki and Gwani Muktar to renounce
their allegiance and declare for Shehu. They were not yet strong
enough to risk a battle, however, and so at the start they fell back
to the south and joined forces on the Gongola with Buba Yero 23.
Fortunately for them, Mai Ahmed was notoriously feeble and
irresolute. Had he possessed vision and moved with speed, he could
have crushed the local risings of the Fulani before they had become
dangerous or had had the chance of coalescing. He might also have
saved the Hausa rulers of Kano, Daura,
and Zazzau. As it was, however, he did nothing
to help his Hausa vassals or reinforce the Galadima. Even the fall
of Nguru did not stir him out of his lethargy and he tamely
permitted the numerically much weaker Fulani to seize and keep the
initiative.
After the destruction of Nguru and the capture
of Hadeija, the Fulani made their next move against Shira, which
Ibrahim Zaki, whose adopted country it was, invaded and occupied in
1807. The three leaders then met near Damaturu and agreed upon a
concerted plan of campaign 24.
While Ibrahim Zaki attacked Tashena and Buba Yero operated in
south-western Bornu, Gwani Muktar was to drive up through the centre
and try to capture Ngazargamu, the capital 25.
This plan was put into effect in the dry season
of 1807-8, nearly a year after the capture of Katsina and at about
the same time as the final attack on Kano city. It was a complete
success and, on 12 March 1808, Gwani Muktar seized the capital of
the Bornu Empire 26.
Nineteen days previously, Mai Ahmed, who was
old and blind, had abdicated in favour of his son, Muhammad Lefiami.
The new Mai succeeded in escaping from the city and making his way
to the east but, even so, it looked as if the Empire was shattered
and as if the kingdom too might disintegrate. At that moment,
however, a new figure suddenly appeared upon the scene who in his
way was hardly less remarkable than the Fulani leaders and who made
a worthy opponent for them. This was Sheikh Muhammad el-Amin el-Kanemi.
El-Kanemi was the son of Skeikh Ninga, a
well-known scholar and divine of Kanembu origin who had settled in
the Fezzan 27. After Visiting Egypt and making
the pilgrimage to Mecca, El-Kanemi had returned to Kanem and there
established a great reputation for learning and piety. It was to him
that the fugitive Mai now turned for help. El-Kanemi was especially
influential with his own Kanembu, who had the same reputation as
pikemen as the Swiss had enjoyed in Europe a few centuries earlier,
and with the Shuwa Arabs of southern Chad. By mustering these two
elements as a stiffening for the Sultan's
own Kanuri, he was able to turn the tide of war
28.
The easy triumph which the Fulani had enjoyed
in occupying the whole of western Bornu and capturing the capital
seems to have made them over-confident. Certainly, they were
unprepared for El-Kanemi's counter-attack when it was launched in
October 1809. Buba Yero and his followers were in the south,
consolidating their conquests, while in the west Ibrahim Zaki was
occupied in annexing Tashena and merging it with Shira. The blow
therefore fell on Gwani Muktar, whose forces were inadequate to
withstand it. He himself was killed in the fighting and his people
were driven out of Ngazargamu, which the Kanuri under El-Kanemi then
reoccupied 29.
Three or four years of indecisive fighting
followed. In the dry season of 1811-12 the Fulani captured
Ngazargamu for the second time. After this both sides seem to have
realized that the sands and swamps of western Bornu were hardly
worth fighting for. The Kanuri therefore abandoned Ngazargamu for
good and fell back on Lake Chad while the Fulani consolidated their
gains in the south and west 30.
Although the Fulani had failed to crush Bornu,
as before the emergence of El-Kanemi had seemed likely, they had
nevertheless made substantial gains at Boron's expense. In the
north-west Sambo Digimsa had established the new Emirate of Hadeija.
In the west Ibrahim Zaki had welded Shira and Tashena together to
form the new Emirate of Katagum. In the south Buba Yero had carved
the new Emirate of Gombe out of pagan lands over which Bornu had
previously held sway. All these leaders had received flags from
Shehu during the fighting and were now recognized by him as the
rulers of the territory which they controlled.
By 1812, among all the Fulani who had taken the
leading parts in the war against Boron, only the family and
followers of Gwani Muktar were still unrewarded. They had striven
for the greatest prize of all, the whole of western Bornu, and had
lost it. When Gwani Muktar had been killed in the Bornu
counter-attack of 1809, the leadership had passed to his son, Mamman
Manga. For a time he was able to maintain a foothold in southern
Bornu in the Gujba-Damaturu area, but later he was driven out by El-Kanemi.
In recognition of what he and his father had done for the cause,
however, Shehu conferred the title of Sarkin Bornu upon him and
later Bello, when he became Sultan, ordered the Emir of Bauchi to
cede to him the town of Misau together with the country round it 31.
The little kingdom of Misau, which was thus brought into existence,
completed the quarter-circle of Fulani Emirates that now lay round
the western and southern boundaries of Bornu. After eight years of
war the Kanuri were as ready for peace as the Fulani 32.
Although the Mais were still the nominal rulers of Bornu, all
effective power had by now passed to El-Kanemi. It was he who
decided to abandon Ngazargamu and in the space of three years he
first deposed Mai Lefiami and then restored him to the throne 33.
In 1814, after the withdrawal to the region
round Lake Chad, El-Kanemi obtained two concessions from the Mai
which strengthened his position still further. First he was
appointed head of all the Kanembu who had settled to the west of the
Lake and then he was given the land round Kukawa, or Kuka as it
later came to be called, for the purpose of establishing an
administrative headquarters 34.
As no new capital was built for the Mais, who lived at a number of
different places in the neighbourhood, Kuka came to be regarded more
and more as the capital of the kingdom and El-Kanemi as its real
ruler.
So ended the first phase of the struggle
between the new Empire and the old. The peace which came in 1812 was
only an armistice, however, not a genuine reconciliation, and
thirteen years later the war was to be resumed.
Notes
1. Mauny, op. cit. p. 42.
2. Palmer, op. cit. vol. 1, pp.11-12, and Note
12 in Appendix I.
3. Ibid. p. 7.
4. Hogben and Kirk-Greene, op. cit. p. 309.
5. Barth, op. cit. vol. II, p. 279, and
Stenning, op. cit. pp. 27-28.
6. Gazetteer of Bornu Province, 1929, p. 10.
7. Palmer, op. cit. vol. I, p. 17.
8. Mauny, op. cit. pp. 429-37.
9. Gazetteer of Bornu Province, p. 11.
10. Palmer, op. cit. vol. I, p. 17.
11 Ibid. pp. 18-72.
12 Hogben and Kirk-Greene, op. cit. p. 318.
13. Stenning, op. cit. p. 28.
14. K Ch (Palmer, p. 111).
15. Belle, Inf M (Arnett, p. 100).
16. S tenning, op. cit. p. 30.
17. Ibid. pp. 100-1.
18. Ibid. pp. 30-31.
19. Stenning, op. cit. pp. 30-31.
20. Ibid.
21. Alhaji Abukar, op. cit. p. 49.
22. Gazetteer of Vola Province, pp. 12-13.
Confirmed by Alhaji Junaidu.
23. Stenning, op. cit. pp. 31-32.
24. Gazetteer of Bornu Province, p. 18.
25. Stenning, op. cit. p. 32.
26. Gazetteer of Bornu Province, p. 18.
27. Hogben and Kirk-Greene, op. cit. p. 320.
Further back El-Kanemi is said to have been of Moorish descent. See
Denham, Glapperton, and Oudney, Narrative
of Travels and Discoveries in Northern and
Central Africa, London, 1828, vol. II, p. 179.
28. Gazetteer of Bornu Province, p. 20.
29. Stenning, op. cit. p. 32.
30. When Denham visited this area a dozen years
later, he found it almost deserted but studded with the ruins of
former towns. See Travels, vol. 1, p. 348.
31. Gazetteer of Kano Province, pp. 33-34, and
Hogben and Kirk-Greene, op. cit. P. 498. Confirmed by Alhaji Junaidu.
32. Apart from being exhausted by the war, the
Kanuri had reason to be apprehensive of the latent enmity of
Baghirmi and Wadai in their rear. This was soon to lead
to war on their eastern front. See Denham,
Travels, vol. I, P. 456 and vol. II, p. 182.
33. Gazetteer of Bornu Province, p. 21.
34. Ibid.
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