Azaghvana E-Book 2003 - Flipbook - Page 89
We do not know whether Leo is referring to the Gwoza hills, but we do know that he is
talking about mountains in Borno. The Gwoza hills as a topographically very prominent
mountain range, reaching with the Zelidva spur deep into the semi-arid plains of Borno, must
have also then been an impressive sight. It was first referred to as such by the German
explorer Heinrich Barth in June 1851 (Barth 1857-II:369), who describes them looking like a
'distant view of the Tyrolian Alps', which is of course an exaggeration. It is however difficult
to imagine that Leo did not refer to them, especially considering that Kirawa, as the then
capital of Wandala which he mentioned, was situated at its northeastern foot. Leo speaks in
another paragraph about the wealth of the king of Borno, and that he traded slaves against
horses, but again, we are not being told where the slaves were captured.
Concerning trade relations between the Gwoza hills and the Wandala of Kirawa, we do not
know for sure whether they existed at the time. Considering that half a century after Leo's
visit, Anania mentions a big mountain near Kirawa as rather rich in iron minerals, we can
perhaps make an informed guess that perhaps iron was produced in the Gwoza hills. We need
to remember here that throughout the 17th century, the Wandala rulers of Kirawa were still
non-Islamic (perhaps with one or two exceptions, which might have induced revolt, as Umar's
case demonstrates). This fact might have also impacted on the security needs of its rulers,
who might well have considered the mountains as a potential security zone for themselves
throughout its early history, but there is no historical proof for such a hypothesis.
The contradiction between Leo's and Anania's accounts can potentially be explained by the
fact that the Wandala rulers of Kirawa of the time might not have shared such views at all, but
that it was an elitist view of a merchant class linked to the Borno empire as an aristocratic
society. They would have been more interested in exchanging slaves against horses in the
context of their long-distant trade interests with Tripoli, while the iron trade of Kirawa was
perhaps more a regional affair. Such an interpretation puts a different historical stance on the
relationship between the hills and plains at that time. It leads us to view the mountains more
as a privileged slave trade exclusion zone, in the interest of the production of iron. It would
also make the Gwoza hills the earliest interaction zone between early state formation in our
region, including the whole of the northern Mandara Mountains. None of these connections
were very important for Leo, even though he visited Borno, while Anania did not.
There was also the DGB complex, which coincides, according to our Table of
Contemporaneity, under King Aguwa Fagula of Kirawa with the beginning of a more arid
period. We can see that the Lake Chad water levels fell about 3m in 75 years between 1500
and 1575, before they suddenly rose about 6m again over only 50 years to an unprecedented
high by 1625. Over the whole of those 50 years, between 1600 and 1625, our subregion
experienced the sharpest rise, with 4m over only 25 years. According to our table, Leo's
account from 1529 coincides with the beginning of that arid period, with a water level of
282m in 1525, while Anania's account was published 50 years later, shortly before it ended
again at 282m. Also, Ibn Furtu's account from 1576 falls into that arid period, actually when
the water level was, with 280m, at it's lowest, and so does, as already mentioned, the short
rule of the brother of 'Umar' as 'pagan usurper', resulting in the siege of Kirawa by Idris
Alauma.
We wonder whether, during this period, sorghum as tribute payment for the Wandala was an
issue in the Gwoza hills, and whether Umar's brother, the 'pagan usurper', was a ritual
representative in the context of the DGB sites. If that was the case we perhaps need to think of
it in the form of a revitalisation period. When we look at the time between the first extreme
draught about a hundred years earlier, we recognise that there was about half a century of a
wetter period with 283m lake levels in between those two arid periods. That wetter period
lasted no longer than the two arid periods, and had at its maximum, during the late 15th
century for about 25 years, no more than 3m difference in terms of a rising water level. We
tend to think that by then the DGB sites might have remained less active as ritual sites, but the
practice of intensive sorghum cultivation and associated manure production would have most
likely spread into the Gwoza hills in the meantime.
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