SpringerLink
Log in

Islam in Sub-Saharan Africa, 800–1900

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
The Palgrave Handbook of Islam in Africa

Abstract

The chapter presents the history of Islam in sub-Saharan Africa from the eighth century to the end of the nineteenth century, on the eve of the generalization of colonial rule. Islam is considered both from a chronological and from a regional aspect. The chapter deals with the patterns of conversion to Islam among the different groups and offers insights on the content of Islamic African culture and literature.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution

Subscribe and save

Springer+ Basic
EUR 32.99 /Month
  • Get 10 units per month
  • Download Article/Chapter or Ebook
  • 1 Unit = 1 Article or 1 Chapter
  • Cancel anytime
Subscribe now

Buy Now

Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 189.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 249.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free ship** worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 249.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free ship** worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Abitbol, Michel. Tombouctou et les Arma. De la Conquête Marocaine du Soudan Nigérien en 1591 à l’Hégémonie de l’Empire Peulh du Macina en 1833. Paris: Maisonneuve et Larose, 1979.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ba, Amadou Hampâté, and Jacques Daget. L’Empire Peul du Macina (1818–1853). Paris: Mouton, 1956.

    Google Scholar 

  • Barry, Boubacar. La Sénégambie du xve au xixe s. Traite Négrière, Islam, Conquête Coloniale. Paris: L’Harmattan, 1988.

    Google Scholar 

  • Batran, Abdul-Aziz. “The Kunta, Sīdī al-Mukhtār al-Kuntī, and the Office of Shaykh al-Tarīqa’l-Qādiriyya.” In Studies in West African Islamic History, volume 1, The Cultivators of Islam, edited by John Willis, 113–146. London: Frank Cass, 1979.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bohas, Georges, Abderrahim Saguer, and Ahyaf Sinno, trans. Le Roman d’Alexandre à Tombouctou. Histoire du Bicornu. Arles: Actes-Sud, 2012.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bondarev, Dmitry. “Multiglossia in West African Manuscripts: A Case of Borno, Nigeria.” In Manuscript Cultures: Map** the Field, edited by J. B. Quenzer, D. Bondarev, and J.‐U. Sobisch, 113–155. Berlin; Boston: De Gruyter, 2014.

    Google Scholar 

  • Botte, Roger. “Les Rapports Nord-Sud, la Traite Négrière et le Fuuta Jaloo à la Fin du xviiie Siècle.” Annales ESC XXLVI, no. 6 (1991): 1411–1435.

    Google Scholar 

  • Boyd, Jean and Beverley Mack. One Woman’s Jihad: Nana Asma’u, Scholar and Scribe. Indiana: Indiana University Press, 2000.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brenner, Louis. The Shehus of Kukawa: A History of the Al-Kanemi Dynasty of Bornu. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1973.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. Controlling Knowledge: Religion, Power, and Schooling in a West African Society. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2001.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brown, William A. The Caliphate of Hamdullahi, ca 1818–1864: A Study in African History and Tradition. PhD diss. University of Wisconsin, Madison, 1969.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cissoko, Sékéné. Tombouctou et l’Empire Songhay. L’Épanouissement du Soudan Nigérien aux xve-xvie Siècle. Dakar: Nouvelles Éditions Africaines, 1975.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cleaveland, Timothy. Becoming Walata: A History of Saharan Social Formation and Transformation. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 2002.

    Google Scholar 

  • Delafosse, Maurice and Octave Houdas. Mahmoud Kati, Tarikh El-Fettach ou Chronique du Chercheur pour Servir à l’Histoire des Villes, des Armées et des Principaux Personnages du Tekrour, Traduction Française de O. Houdas et M. Delafosse. Paris: Leroux, 1913.

    Google Scholar 

  • Devière, Rémi. Du lac Tchad à La Mecque, le Sultanat du Bornou et son Monde (xvie-xviie siècle). Paris: éditions de la Sorbonne, 2017.

    Google Scholar 

  • Diallo, Thierno. Les Institutions Politiques du Fouta Dyalon au xixe siècle. Dakar: IFAN, 1972.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gomez, Michaël. Pragmatism in the Age of jihad: The Precolonial State of Bundu. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. African Dominion: A New History of Empire in Early and Medieval West Africa. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2018.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hall, Bruce. A History of Race in Muslim West Africa, 1600–1960. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011a.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. “How Slaves Used Islam: The Letters of Enslaved Muslim Commercial Agents in the Nineteenth Century Niger Bend and Central Sahara.” Journal of African History, 52 (2011b): 279–297.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hall, Bruce and Charles Stewart. “The Historic ‘Core curriculum’ and the Book Market in Islamic West Africa.” In The Trans-Saharan Book Trade, Manuscript Culture, Arabic Literacy and Intellectual History in Muslim Africa, edited by Graziano Krätli and Ghislaine Lydon, 110–174. Leiden: Brill, 2011.

    Google Scholar 

  • El-Hamel, Chouki. La Vie Intellectuelle Islamique dans le Sahel Ouest-Africain (XVIe au XIXe siècles): Une Étude Sociale de l’Enseignement Islamique en Mauritanie et au Nord du Mali avec Traduction Annotée de Fath ash-shakūr d’al-Bartilī al-Walātī (mort en 1805). Paris: L’Harmattan, 2002.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hiribarren, Vincent. A History of Borno: Trans-Saharan Empire to Failing Nigerian State. London: Hurst and Oxford University Press, 2017.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hiskett, Mervyn. “An Islamic Tradition of Reform in Western Sudan from the 16th to the 18th Century.” BSOAS, 25 (1962): 577–596.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. The Sword of Truth: The Life and Times of the Shehu Usuman dan Fodio. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1973.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hunwick, John. Shari‘ya in Songhay: The Replies of al-Maghili to the Questions of Askia al-Hajj Muhammad, Edited and Translated with an Introduction and Commentary. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. Timbuktu and the Songhay Empire: Al-Sadi’s Tarikh al-Sudan Down to 1613 and other Contemporary Documents. Leiden: Brill, 1999.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hunwick, John and Fatima Harrack. Miʻrāj al-Ṣu‘ud: Aḥmad Bābā’s Replies on Slavery. Rabat: Université Mohammed V. Institut d’Études Africaines, 2000.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hunwick, John and Sean O’Fahey, eds. Arabic Literature of Africa. Leiden: Brill, 1994.

    Google Scholar 

  • Jeppie, Shamil and Souleymane Bachir Diagne, eds. The Meanings of Timbuktu. CODESRIA/HSRC, 2009.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kamara, Shaykh Muusa. Florilège au Jardin de l’Histoire des Noirs, Zuhûr al Basâtin (v. 1925). 1. L’Aristocratie Peule et la Révolution des Clercs Musulmans (Vallée du Sénégal). Trad. Saïd Bousbina, dir. Jean Schmitz, Paris: CNRS Éditions, 1998.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kane, Ousmane O. Beyond Timbuktu: An Intellectual History of Muslim West Africa. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2016.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lange, Dierk. Le Diwan des Sultans du (Kanem-) Bornu: Chronologie et Histoire d’un Royaume Africain. Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1977.

    Google Scholar 

  • Last, Murray. The Sokoto Caliphate. London: Longman, 1967.

    Google Scholar 

  • Levtzion, Nehemia. Ancient Ghana and Mali. London: Methuen, 1973.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. “Abd Allāh b. Yāsīn and the Almoravids.” In Studies in West African Islamic History, volume 1, The Cultivators of Islam, ed. John Willis, 78–112. London: Frank Cass, 1979.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. Corpus of Early Arabic Sources for West African History. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991.

    Google Scholar 

  • Levtzion, Nehemia and Randal Pouwels, eds. The History of Islam in Africa. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2000a.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. “Introduction.” In The History of Islam in Africa, 1–20. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2000b.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lydon, Ghislaine. On Trans-Saharan Trails: Islamic Law, Trade Networks, and Cross-Cultural Exchange in Nineteenth-Century Western Africa. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mahibou, Sidi Mohamed and Jean-Louis Triaud. Voilà Ce Qui Est Arrivé. Bayān Mā waq‘a: Plaidoyer pour une Guerre Sainte en Afrique de l’Ouest au XIXe siècle, d’Al-ḥājj ‘Umar al-Fūtī. Paris: CNRS Éditions, 1983.

    Google Scholar 

  • Martin, Bradford. Muslim Brotherhoods in 19th century Africa. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1976.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mauny, Raymond. Tableau Géographique de l’Ouest Africain au Moyen-Age, d’après les Sources Écrites, la Tradition et l’Archéologie. Dakar: IFAN, 1961.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mazrui, Alamin and Ibrahim Shariff. The Swahili: Idiom and Identity of an African People. Trenton, NJ: Africa World History, 1994.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mcintosh, Roderick and Susan Mcintosh. “The Inland Niger Delta before the Empire of Mali: Evidence from Jenne-Jeno.” The Journal of African History 22, no. 1 (1981): 1–22.

    Google Scholar 

  • Médard, Henri. Le Royaume du Buganda au xixe Siècle, Mutations Politiques et Religieuses d’un État d’Afrique de l’Est. Paris: Karthala, 2007.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mommersteeg, Geert. Dans la Cité des Marabouts: Djenné, Mali. Brinon: Grandvaux, 2009.

    Google Scholar 

  • Monteil, Charles. Une Cité Soudanaise: Djenné, Métropole du Delta Central du Niger. Paris: Société d’Éditions Géographiques, Maritimes et Coloniales, 1932.

    Google Scholar 

  • Moraes Farias de, Paulo. Arabic Inscriptions from the Republic of Mali, Epigraphy, Chronicles and Songhay-Tuareg History. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ngom, Fallou. Muslims beyond the Arab World: The Odyssey of ʿAjamī and the Murīdiyya. New York: Oxford University Press, 2016.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ngom, Fallou and Mustapha H. Kurfi, eds. ʿAjamization of Islam in Africa. Islamic Africa, Volume 8: 1–2, October 2017.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ngom, Fallou and Eleni Castro. “Beyond African Orality: Digital Preservation of Mandinka ʿAjamī Archives of Casamance.” History Compass (2019). https://doi.org/10.1111/hic3.12584.

    Google Scholar 

  • Niane, Djibril. Soundjata ou l’Épopée Mandingue. Paris: Présence africaine, 1960.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. Le Soudan au Temps des Grands Empires. xie-xvie Siècle. Paris: Présence Africaine, 1975.

    Google Scholar 

  • Nobili, Mauro. Sultan, Caliph, and the Renewer of the Faith: Ahmad Lobbo, the Tarikh al-fattash, and the Making of an Islamic State in West Africa. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020.

    Google Scholar 

  • Nobili, Mauro and Mohamed Shahid Mathee. “Towards a New Study of the So-called Târîkh al-Fattash.” History in Africa, 2 (2015), 37–73.

    Google Scholar 

  • Nobili, Mauro and Andrea Brigaglia. The Arts and Crafts of Literacy: Islamic Manuscript Cultures in Sub-Saharan Africa. Series: Studies in Manuscript Cultures 12. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter, 2017.

    Google Scholar 

  • Norris, H. T. “Muslim Ṣanhāja Scholars of Mauritania.” In Studies in West African Islamic History, volume 1, The Cultivators of Islam, edited by John Willis, 147–159. London: Frank Cass, 1979.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ogorodnikova, Darya. “Exploring Paratexts in Old Mande Manuscripts.” In Tracing Manuscripts in Time and Space through Paratexts, edited by G. Ciotti and H. Lin, 1–34. Berlin; Boston: De Gruyter, 2016.

    Google Scholar 

  • Palmer, Herbert R. “The Kano Chronicle.” Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 38 (1908), 58–98.

    Google Scholar 

  • Person, Yves. Samori: Une Révolution Dyula. Dakar: IFAN, 1968.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. “Samori and Islam.” In Studies in West African Islamic History, volume 1, The Cultivators of Islam, edited by John Willis, 259–276. London: Frank Cass, 1979.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pouwels, Randall L. Horn and Crescent: Cultural Change and Traditional Islam on the East Africa Coast (800–1900). Cambridge: Cambridge University. Press, 1987.

    Google Scholar 

  • Reichmuth, Stefan. Islamische Bildung und Soziale Integration in Ilorin (Nigeria) seit ca. 1800. Munster: Lit, 1998.

    Google Scholar 

  • Robinson, David. Chiefs and clerics: Abdul Bokar Kan and Futa Toro, 1853–1891. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1975.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. The Holy War of Umar Tal. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. Muslim Societies in African History. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rodney, Walter. “Jihad and Social Revolution in Futa Jalon in the Eighteenth Century.” Journal of the Historical Society of Nigeria, 4, no. 2 (June 1968): 269–284.

    Google Scholar 

  • Saad, Elias. Social history of Timbuktu: The Role of Muslim Scholars and Notables, 1400–1900. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983.

    Google Scholar 

  • Salvaing, Bernard. “À propos d’un Projet en Cours d’Édition de Manuscrits Arabes de Tombouctou et d’Ailleurs.” Afriques [Online] December 25, 2015. http://journals.openedition.org/afriques/1804.

  • Sanankoua, Bintou. Un Empire Peul au xixe siècle. La Diina du Maasina. Paris: Karthala, 1990.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sanneh, Lamine. The Diakhanké. London: International African Institute, 1979.

    Google Scholar 

  • Seydou, Christiane. “ Trois Poèmes Mystiques Peuls du Foûta-Djalon.” Revue des Études Islamiques. XL no. 1 (1972): 142–185.

    Google Scholar 

  • Smith, H. F. C. “A Neglected theme of West African History: The Islamic Revolution of the 19th century.” Journal of the Historical Society of Nigeria, 2, no 2 (1961): 169–185.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sow, Alfâ I. La Femme, la Vache, la Foi. Paris: Julliard, 1966.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. Le Filon du Bonheur Éternel, par Tierno Mohammadou Samba Mombéyâ. Paris: Armand Colin, 1971.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sperling, David and Jose Kagabo. “The Coastal Hinterland and Interior of East Africa.” In The History of Islam in Africa, edited by Nehemia Levtzion and Randal Pouwels, 273–302. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2000.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stewart, Charles. Islam and Social Order in Mauritania: A Case Study from the Nineteenth Century. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1973.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tamari, Tal. “Notes sur les Représentations Cosmogoniques Dogon, Bambara et Malinké et leurs Parallèles avec la Pensée Antique et Islamique. ” Journal des Africanistes, 71, no. 1 (2001): 93–111.

    Google Scholar 

  • Trimingham, John. Islam in West Africa. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1959.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ware, Rudolph T. The Walking Qur’an: Islamic Education, Embodied Knowledge and History in West Africa. Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press, 2014.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wilks, Ivor. Forests of Gold. Athens: Ohio University Press, 1993.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. “The Juula and the Expansion of Islam into the Forest.” In The History of Islam in Africa, edited by Nehemia Levtzion and Randal Pouwels, 93–116. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2000.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wilks, Ivor, Nehemia Levtzion, and Bruce Haight, 1986. Chronicles from Gonja: A Tradition of West African Muslim historiography. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zehnle, Stephanie. A Geography of Jihad. Sokoto Jihadism and the Islamic Frontier in West Africa. Berlin: De Gruyter, 2020.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zouber, Mahmoud. Ahmad Bâbâ de Tombouctou (1556–1627): Sa Vie et son Oeuvre. Paris: Maisonneuve et Larose, 1977.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Nantes, Nantes, France

    Bernard Salvaing

Authors
  1. Bernard Salvaing
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Bernard Salvaing .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Boston University, Boston, MA, USA

    Fallou Ngom

  2. Bayero University, Kano, Nigeria

    Mustapha H. Kurfi

  3. University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX, USA

    Toyin Falola

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2020 The Author(s)

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Salvaing, B. (2020). Islam in Sub-Saharan Africa, 800–1900. In: Ngom, F., Kurfi, M.H., Falola, T. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Islam in Africa. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-45759-4_2

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation