ghana

• Ghana Empire


  Also known as Wagadou, located in what is now southeastern Mauritania, western Mali, and eastern Senegal
• Ghana Empire


  • Economic development and eventual wealth was linked to the growth of regular and intensified trans-Saharan trade in gold, salt, and ivory
  • Allowed for the development of larger urban centers
  • Encouraged territorial expansion to gain control over different trade routes
• Believed to be first of at least three great empires that would rise in that part of Africa from the ninth to the sixteenth centuries


  Origins of Ghana Empire
• Camels


  Domesticated by Ghana Empire, helped them in transporting trade materials.
• Taming and training camels


  1. Allowed them to transport valuable goods across the Sahara Desert on a level never seen before

  2. Established long-distance trade networks with North Africa and the Middle East

  3. Massively upgraded the slow and irregular trading networks which existed in the ancient era
• Ghana Empire's trade


  • Mainly traded in gold
  • Also traded iron, copper and ivory, often in return for salt
• Koumbi Saleh


  The empire's capital, actually two cities six miles apart separated by a six-mile road, but settlements between the cities became so dense due to the influx of people coming to trade, that it merged into one
• Koumbi Saleh


  • Most of the houses were built of wood and clay, but wealthy and important residents lived in homes of wood and stone
  • Remained divided after its merger forming two distinct areas within the city
• Ghana Empire


  Lay in the Sahel region to the north of the West African gold fields, and was able to profit by controlling the trans-Saharan gold trade, which turned Ghana into an empire of legendary wealth
• Ghana Empire's government


  • Had a central core region and was surrounded by vassal states
  • Under the king's authority were a number of kings, presumably the rulers of the territorial units often called kafu in Mandinka
• A confederation of Saharan Muslims, the Almoravids, attacked the empire, successfully claiming some of Ghana's cities, and destabilizing desert trade routes


  11th century
• The Almoravids' attack on the Ghana Empire was probably some kind of holy war, and may have led to the empire's conversion to Islam
• The final Lord of Gold was dethroned by a rebel named Sundiata, marking the fall of the Ghana Empire


  1240 CE
• The Capital City of The Ghana Empire is Koumbi Saleh