TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE

This translation of Dr. Schultze’s monograph on Bornu has been undertaken in the hope that it may be of use and interest to those who, like the translator, cannot read German ‘with their feet on the fender’. The translator’s own knowledge of German is, in fact, almost nil, and the translation has been painfully worried out at odd times with the constant aid of a dictionary. In the work of revision, however, he has had the assistance of Alexander Siemens, Esq., and of various members of his family, who have an intimate knowledge of both English and German; to them the translator wishes to express his most cordial gratitude.[1] The translation is published by permission of Herr G. W. Baedeker, of Essen, owner of the German copyright.

It is not generally realized, even in Nigeria, how ancient and powerful the old Bornu Empire was. In the fifteenth century it was the greatest power in Central Africa and its boundaries extended to Fezzan, the Niger, and practically to the Benue. The Hausas, of whom one hears so much nowadays, were then a congérie of obscure semi-pagan tribes,[2] while the Fulani are, of course, politically speaking, mere upstarts of a century ago. Bornu was never conquered by the Fulani—the only state of any size in Nigeria that was not—and, as regards the Hausas, the Kanuri have always despised them as an inferior race.[3] According to the article on the Azhar Mosque, the great Mohammedan University in Cairo, by K. Vollers, in the Encyclopaedia of Islam now in course of publication, the Kanuri are given as one of the twenty-six great ‘Arwika’, into which the Azhar students are divided, and which seem to correspond roughly to the ‘nations’ in the older German Universities: the Hausas are not even mentioned among the ‘also rans’.

These facts are emphasized because there is a tendency among those who have no close knowledge of Bornu towards the attitude that outside the Hausas or Fulani there is no salvation. It is commonly believed—utterly erroneously—and the statement has even appeared in print, that the Hausa language is generally understood in Bornu. As a matter of fact not 1 per cent. of the Kanuri proper either speak or understand it, and it has made little, if any, progress during the ten years of the British occupation of their country.

No one who knows the Kanuri of the present day would pretend that he is a very admirable or a very amiable creature, or that he is the equal of the Hausa either morally or mentally. He has, however, a history and a social system of his own, as will be seen in the following pages.

The maps in this translation have been printed from the same plates as those in the German edition in order to save expense. They, therefore, do not show the exchange of the small piece of territory on the Shari, known as the ‘Duck’s Bill’, between France and Germany by the recent international agreement. A map of the country involved appears in Macleod, Chiefs and Cities of Central Africa, p. 37.

The references in the foot-notes to the English edition of Barth have been verified for me by Mr. John Arthur. He informs me that the English and German editions vary considerably, and whole paragraphs are sometimes omitted.

The notes in square brackets—thus [ ]—and all the Appendices except No. I have been added by the translator. They naturally refer chiefly to British Bornu, whereas the original author was more interested in German Bornu.

For assistance in giving the English names of the Fauna mentioned in Chapter VI, I have to thank the kindness of various officials of the South Kensington Museum: Mammalia by Mr. J. G. Dollman; Birds by Mr. Ogilvie Grant; Reptilia by Mr. Boulenger, F.R.S.; Fish by Mr. Tate Regan; Insects by Mr. Austin and Mr. F. W. Edwards; Arachnids by Mr. S. Hurst; Worms by Mr. Bell; Mollusca by Mr. E. A. Smith and Mr. G. C. Robson.

I have much pleasure in acknowledging the generous kindness which allows me to print the translation of extracts from the Documents scientifiques de la Mission Tilho appearing in the Appendices. The information contained therein was mostly collected by MM. Tilho and Landeroin.

For information about Denham portraits and relics in Appendix XVII I am indebted to the present representatives of the family, H. M. Denham, Esq., and Captains H. A. and L. S. Denham, grandsons of Admiral H. M. Denham, the explorer’s first cousin.

I have to thank W. P. Hewby, Esq., C.M.G., Resident of Bornu, for several corrections and suggestions, and my brother, S. Landor Benton, for assisting me to read the proof sheets.

P. A. BENTON.

AUTHOR’S PREFACE

I became partly acquainted with the districts of which the present volume treats as a member of the Anglo-German Yola-Chad Boundary Commission in 1903-4.[4] In endeavouring to inform myself with regard to the region then traversed, I found it a great inconvenience that the standard works, which contain descriptions of the former Sultanate of Bornu—works which are comprehensively ponderous—suffer from being very unhandy, and that, owing to the fact of their being published a generation ago, cannot include the latest investigations. Moreover, the literature of the last ten or twenty years on this subject being very scattered, the study of a highly interesting district is rendered unusually difficult. No monograph on it has hitherto existed.

I have now attempted in the present book to comprehend in such a monograph the essentials of the literature already known and of my own observations, which can correct particular errors in zoology and botany and will also deal generally with all lines of inquiry.

I have been most kindly assisted in my work by a whole number of gentlemen, who have helped me with information in the kindred sciences of zoology and botany, who have enabled me to examine the comprehensively ponderous literature, who have answered various questions, or who have simply given me advice and suggestions. They are Drs. Marquardsen and Moisel, Professor Reichenow, Professor Volkens of Berlin, Professor Rein of Bonn, Herr G. Seligmann of Coblenz, Professor Boettger of Frankfurt a/M., Professor Lacroix of Paris, and Professor Aurivilius of Stockholm. It is my pleasant duty to render them herewith my heartiest thanks.

Bonn,
March, 1910.

CONTENTS

I

On more than one ground the country which embraces the districts of the once mighty Central African Sultanate of Bornu, deserves our quite particular interest. Enclosed in the centre of the Sudan and lying on the shores of an inland sea, this highly fruitful and thickly populated district was the first of all the great African water-basins to be known in Europe. For centuries, over the central plateau, two important articles of trade, ivory and human flesh, were up to the middle of the nineteenth century almost the exclusive aim of all expeditions which concerned themselves with the exploration of the dark continent. It was German travellers above all, and amongst them the most scientifically important and authoritative of all African explorers, Heinrich Barth,[5] who brought news to Europe of these remarkable countries, first reported the unheard-of atrocities of the slave-trade in the heart of Africa, and thus gave a fresh impetus to the anti-slavery movement. Scarcely were the main avenues of exploration closed at the end of the nineteenth century than events happened such as these parts of Africa had never seen hitherto—events which the Great Powers of Europe made necessary by their policy of annexation, and the land of Bornu was pushed once more into the foreground of public interest. The end of these events was the present political understanding, which brought large potential empires under the protection of the three chief European Powers. Thus Germany at the present day again claims a share in those lands in which the self-denying and indefatigable activity of her great sons, the explorers Barth, Overweg, Vogel, von Beurmann, Rohlfs, and Nachtigal, had been so valiantly displayed of old, and in the great scientific and economic problems that have still to be solved in the Sudan.

II

As in almost all the kingdoms of the Sudan, so also in Bornu, history has exercised the widest influence on the present extent of the country, on the composition of its population, and on their character. The history of Bornu—accounts of which, beginning from the middle of the sixteenth century, remain in native manuscript chronicles—has been made known to us without any very great gaps by the German travellers Heinrich Barth and Gustav Nachtigal, who made use of already existing Arabic sources and as regards modern times wrote from personal observation.[6] Without their information we should remain to-day in still greater ignorance than as it happens we fortunately are of the recent condition of this Central African empire, owing to the constant shifting of population. This movement had not yet altogether ceased even in very recent times.

The first mention of the name of Bornu is in the Arabic writer Ibn Said,[7] where it appears as an integral part of the empire of Kanem. Later, as the centre of gravity of its rulers was removed to Bornu, the empire also took the name of this country. So when we speak to-day of a history of Bornu, the history of Kanem is to be understood as regards its earlier phases.

The first dynasty (according to Barth 67, according to Nachtigal 64 kings) which ruled the destinies of Kanem, i.e. Bornu, for nearly 1,200 years, traced their origin back to one Sef of Mecca,[8] son of the last Himyaritic king. The period of time during which the first kings of Bornu held sway, beginning almost with the Hegira, differs considerably according to the various chronicles;[9] nevertheless, oral tradition concerning this first dynasty, stretching back for nearly 1,000 years, enables us to distinguish certain fixed epochs, the way in which the Sefs pushed forward their dominion to the southern edge of the middle Sahara, and the period at which the present province of Kanem was included. It seems fairly probable—and several circumstances support this view—that the immigrants halted a long time in Tubu country before pushing farther south-westwards,[10] whereby this tribe became a part and even an essential part of the Kanem nation.

A singular expansion of the empire first appears with the acceptance of Islam under King Hume[11] at the end of the eleventh century. By this step a further advance was secured over the other Central African kingdoms; for it brought with it a proportionately high degree of civilization and culture. Within a hundred years, under King Dunama Dibbalami[12] (in the thirteenth century), the empire was extended over enormous tracts of country and reached as far as Fezzan in the north, the Nile on the east, and the present district of Dikoa[13] on the south. Owing to this, however, the problems of administration also increased,[14] and finally could only be solved by the help of the ‘Nokena’, a sort of Privy Council, but this again imperilled the unity of government. Under this king also discord broke out between the two chief nations of the empire, the kindred races of the Tubu (or Teda) and the Kanuri, which finally for a time led to an embittered struggle, which likewise did not contribute to the solidity of the empire. It is also during the reign of this Dunama Dibbalami that the name Bornu is mentioned for the first time as that of the most southernly province of the empire, by the chronicler who is called Ibn Said.

But the chief possessions of the Sef dynasty still lay to the north of Chad, including the most important, viz. Kanem on the north shore of the great lake. In the next two centuries, whilst the unfortunate civil wars brought an evident shrinkage of power and pointed to an undeniable decay, the dynasty of the Sefs were gradually expelled from Kanem by the kindred stock of the Bulala, from Lake Fittri, their bitterest opponents, and compelled to remove their head-quarters to the southernly and westernly shores of Lake Chad to the country which gave the empire its final designation. Although Kanem was later temporarily reconquered, still Bornu Proper remains henceforward the centre of gravity of the empire. The tribes which had hitherto possessed the newly conquered districts were absorbed in the conquering nation, being naturally influenced by it both in essence and in externals; or they were completely annihilated, like the Sos, who still live in tradition and who, finally drained of their life-blood by their long and obstinate resistance, have left behind in Affade the remains of a civilization peculiar to themselves.[15]

King Ali Ghadjideni ben Dunama,[16] who reigned towards the end of the fifteenth century, was the first to put an end to the causes of the long-standing civil war, which had nearly led to the downfall of the empire, by restricting within proper bounds the power of the twelve ‘Kokenawa’,[17] the members of the ‘Nokena’, who in the course of time had become almost independent princes. He founded on the lower courses of the River Yo the town of Ghasr Eggomo (Birni),[18] which remained the capital of Bornu for the next 300 years and saw the empire reach its zenith. It is very probable also that it was in Ali Dunama’s reign that the famous Leo Africanus visited Bornu, and undertook a description of the land and people after only a month’s stay; his description was evidently coloured by unpleasant personal experiences, and is considered on that account almost worthless; at most the commercial instincts of the Bornu people there depicted may remind us of the reports of later travellers.[19]

The most important of a line of able princes, whom the country was permitted to enjoy during the succeeding period, was without doubt Edriss Aloma (whose date, according to Barth, was 1571-1603),[20] who, according to his conscientious native chronicler Iman Ahmed, left a reputation behind him for unusual energy and circumspection together with great philanthropy and clemency. With an army, the flower of whom already carried fire-arms, he undertook successive campaigns for the strengthening of his power, campaigns which extended from Aïr in the north to Kano in the west and the country of the pagan Margis in the south. With the rulers of Kanem, which had been already reconquered by his predecessor, and which remained a province of Bornu till the end of the eighteenth century, Edriss Aloma had already at the beginning of his reign concluded a treaty of friendship. This treaty was even embodied in duplicate written dispatches, which argues a highly developed system of government. It speaks much for this in general, that the country, some of whose kings performed the pilgrimage to Mecca, was and continued to be in close touch with the politics and culture of Tripoli and Egypt, which at that time had reached its economic zenith. Denham was the first to establish that for the building of the walls of Ghasr Eggomo, the ruins of which he visited, recourse was had to burnt bricks, a material which is now no longer made use of, and he rightly deduced from this a high degree of civilization; on Barth also the remains of the former capital made a similar impression.[21]

The superior ability which the new rulers of the country possessed over the former inhabitants could not remain unnoticed even by such inhabitants themselves. A rich country, bounded on two sides, the north and east, by stretches of sterility or absolute desert, without being protected by any considerable natural impediments, such as standing water, devious river-courses, or inaccessible mountain features, was necessarily exposed to the constant danger of invasion by foreign tribes from outside its jurisdiction. This danger was bound to increase as soon as the cessation of continuous struggles against the hostile nature of the desert, which kept the qualities of mind and body constantly on the stretch, came into effect, and as soon as increasing prosperity and intermixture with peoples of a lower morale produced an evident weakening and modification of the Bornu nation.

Besides the ever-restless Tuareg, who rendered the border districts unsafe until very recent times, the first advance parties of the Fulani, an Hamitic conquering tribe, also showed themselves in the west of the empire towards the end of the sixteenth century. These Fulani, inspired by the ideas of a strict Mohammedanism, were advancing eastwards from Senegal without a halt, and finally established the powerful empire of Sokoto.[22] When, at the beginning of the nineteenth century, the Fulani on their victorious march arrived at the lower course of the River Yo, they met with but a feeble resistance.[23] The Bornu army was beaten within sight of the palace, and the incapable Sultan Ahmed and his chief men were obliged to fly from the capital, which was to a very great extent destroyed by the victors. This happened in the year 1809.

Yet again was there to arise for the empire at this second period of eclipse a saviour, who preserved it from complete annihilation. But this time he did not come from the royal family itself. A man who stood quite apart from them, Faki Mohammed el Amin el Kanemi from Fezzan, who, however, was connected with Bornu by family ties,[24] dared to withstand the invaders together with a handful of devoted adherents, and, as he was successful at the very beginning, he was soon joined by so many patriotically-minded followers—to the number of 200 horse and 2,000 foot—that he was able to bring matters to a decisive issue. By the victorious battle of Ngornu at least the eastern part of Bornu was cleared of the invaders, but they were able, however, to retain Katagum on the west of the empire as a stronghold.

With the help of Mohammed el Amin, Ahmed was then enabled to regain the old capital, though only temporarily. But neither he nor his son, who had entirely lost the confidence of their subjects, possessed such qualities as to restore the prestige of the empire. Willy nilly, in spite of their own secret reluctance and the jealousy of the office-holders, the royal family were compelled to seek the help of Mohammed el Amin, who was the favourite of the nation and in whom it reposed the greatest confidence as its deliverer from a foreign yoke. The influence of this man reached such a pitch that he finally became the real ruler, and was able in 1814 to found a capital of his own, which he called Kuka or Kukawa, after a Kuka-tree[25] which stood on the site of his own house. On this account Barth is quite correct in pointing out that the year 1814 marks the birth of a new dynasty. In spite of being the real ruler and having authority with the people as such, el Amin, with prudent moderation, still only described himself as ‘Sheik’, while leaving all superfluous externals and all pomp to the royal family, now fast becoming ridiculous owing to dwindling power and constantly changing their place of residence in an aimless and helpless fashion. For this reason he sought continually to strengthen his authority with the people by bringing back to their former allegiance the tributary states of Bornu, who had revolted during the period of decay. It was just at this period (1822-4) that the English expedition under Oudney, Clapperton, and Denham[26] appeared and was favourably received by the Sheik; it is to their inquiries that we owe the first reliable information about the country. Thus Denham was a witness of the battle of Ngala between the troops of el Amin[27] and the Bagirmis, which resulted in a victory for Bornu. In spite of the multitudinous following of armed men, which the wide extent of the empire made possible, el Amin had done nothing to put an end to the shadowy royalty of the Sefua. This was reserved for Sheik Omar, who succeeded his father after the latter’s death in 1835. Whilst this same Omar and his troops were busy in the west of the empire bringing the unruly Governor of Zinder to account, the Sefua, assisted by the ruler of Wadai, made use of this favourable opportunity to attempt to regain possession, by force of arms, of their earlier authority. This attempt, however, failed, and the course of the struggle was unfavourable to the old dynasty. The puppet King Ibrahim was put on his trial as a traitor to the country by Omar and executed in 1846. His son Ali, the last of the Sefua, died on the field of battle. Omar thus became undisputed ruler of Bornu. Although, according to general opinion in Bornu, he did not inherit his father’s indispensable energy, still he possessed many excellent private qualities which were of special advantage to the German travellers, who, during his reign and with his assistance and furtherance, were able to continue in so admirable a manner the exploration of the Central Sudan commenced by Denham.

In the year 1851 there arrived in Bornu, via Tripoli, the expedition under Richardson sent out by the English Government; to it were attached the German explorers, Dr. Heinrich Barth and Dr. Adolf Overweg. After the premature death of the leader, who succumbed to fever[28] before reaching the capital of Bornu, Dr. Barth undertook its leadership. From Kukawa, which remained the proper base of operations throughout the whole duration of their stay in the Sudan, the two Germans, but especially Barth—Overweg died in the summer of 1852 at Maduari, on the shores of Lake Chad,[29] which he was the first European to navigate[30]—made longer or shorter journeys in all directions, which extended as far as the Benue in the heart of Adamawa, and which led to the solution of important geographical questions relative to that river. Owing to a lack of sufficient resources of their own, the travellers, like their predecessor Denham, were practically compelled to join in the ‘razzias’, or forays, whose chief object was the capture of slaves, unless they were willing to let slip the opportunity of being able to learn about lands hitherto untrodden. As they were compelled to be passive spectators of these slave-raids, taking no part in them yet subsequently describing them, they found themselves in the position of turning the attention of European civilization to the existing traffic in human flesh and to the barbarities it gave rise to, barbarities which were enacted before their eyes and of the culpability of which their black companions had no perception.[31] The German astronomer also, Dr. Edward Vogel, who was sent out later by the English Government to join the expedition on Petermann’s recommendation, in order to complete their investigations by fixing the position of places astronomically, and who arrived in Kukawa at the beginning of the year 1854, was obliged to make a part of his expedition southwards in the wake of slave-raids. Barth was the only scholar who returned home in safety (1855) from this great Central African expedition, and he was able to leave behind him in a five-volume work the results of his prolonged investigations; his detailed descriptions cannot be superseded in essentials even to-day, so limited is the economic and political revolution occasioned by the events of the end of the nineteenth century. Vogel was less fortunate, being destined to forfeit his life in his attempt to penetrate into Wadai.[32] He was murdered in 1856[33] by order of the sultan of that country. For the result of his investigations, which are of special value with regard to the explanation of the flora, we have only the reports published in Petermann’s Mitteilungen and several of his letters,[34] but these preserve some important conclusions. The uncertainty of the fate of Edward Vogel induced the German traveller, Maurice von Beurmann, to enter on a further investigation from Bornu with regard to what was still unknown. But the same fate befell him as his unfortunate predecessor. In the year 1863 he was strangled at Mao,[35] at that time the capital of Kanem, at the instigation of an officer of the Sultan of Wadai, before ever he reached that country. A few years later, in 1866, Gerhard Rohlfs arrived in Bornu on his journey across the dark continent from Tripoli to Lagos; he only stayed a short time however. The last of the German travellers who visited Bornu during the reign of Omar, and enjoyed his hospitality, was Dr. Gustav Nachtigal. Nachtigal was selected to take to Kukawa the presents which King William of Prussia had decided to send to Omar as a recognition of his great services to German travellers. Starting from Tripoli in the year 1869, Nachtigal reached Kukawa in July, 1870, by a little-known route, passing through districts hitherto untrodden by a white man.[36] After having acquitted himself of his mission he set forth on his travels, choosing, like his predecessor, the capital of Bornu as a starting-point for detailed journeys of inquiry. Thanks to his superior powers of observation and his many-sided interests, which, moreover, lay partly in different directions from those of his predecessor, he was able to supplement most successfully the fundamental results of Barth’s journeys. In order to enlarge his knowledge of the country he had, as his predecessor had pointed out, to join as a spectator in the slave-hunts in the almost inexhaustible slave-reservoir of the districts of the middle Shari and Logone, but he expresses himself in the strongest terms, as did Barth, on the unheard-of atrocities which were committed on these occasions.[37] Finally, during Omar’s reign occurred the visit of the Italians, Matteucci and Massari, who paid a hasty visit to Bornu in 1880, but who were prevented by their untimely end from leaving behind a written account of their discoveries.[38]

There can be no doubt that, out of all the kings, sultans, or sheiks who had hitherto reigned over Bornu, Omar has been delineated for posterity with the most justice and impartiality, thanks to the German travellers who at such various times enjoyed his hospitality.[39] All these are in accordance in declaring that Omar possessed a goodness and philanthropy very unusual for a potentate of the Sudan—for he can scarcely be held responsible for the deeply-rooted cruelty of his troops. These qualities were often displayed towards the German travellers in a fatherly providence, a fact which is very eloquent in view of the selfishness natural to the native. But since this goodness was not coupled with the energy which is quite indispensable in the conduct of African affairs, they foreboded danger to the country. Though Omar stood high in his people’s regard, this was not increased by the artful intrigues of his nearest associates. His own brother, Abdur Rahman, ventured to openly rebel against him and sought to depose him. Omar was compelled in the end, certainly with reluctance, to resolve to allow his brother to be executed.[40] It was fortunate for Omar that for a long time he had a counsellor, whom he inherited from Lamino, the first wearer of the dignity of Sheik, and whom Nachtigal describes as ‘the only man amongst his hangers-on’, a race of men whose days were filled with petty gossip.[41]

The results of Omar’s policy of inaction were bound to show themselves fatally in the border districts and in the provinces only loosely attached to Bornu. In spite of a standing army of 7,000 men permanently mobilized—the old military spirit had long vanished from the rest of the nation—the Tuaregs ventured on the most impudent raids in north-western Bornu; the districts north of the River Yo, which Barth had described as a kind of ‘political quarantine-station’, were thoroughly unsafe.[42] Moreover, the vassal states of Bornu, such as Zinder, proved themselves little to be depended on during the renewed advance of the Fulani,[43] and the speedy rise of the neighbouring kingdom of Wadai meant an ever-increasing danger to Bornu. After the death of Omar in 1881 he was succeeded at short intervals by his sons Abubakr, Ibrahim, and Ashimi, who, however, were not in a position to avert the impending ruin. When, in 1892, the French traveller Monteil visited Bornu, whose sultan at that time was Ashimi, Zinder had long belonged to Bornu only in name, while constant robberies and intrigues on the part of Wadai were the order of the day and remained unpunished.[44]

Such were the relations of Bornu at the end of the eighties of the last century, while far to the east, in the region of the middle Nile, events were preparing which fundamentally revolutionized in the years that followed the whole state of affairs in North Central Africa, and finally delivered the death-blow of the Bornu empire in its old form. When Suliman, son of the notorious slave-raider Zobeir Pasha, after a long and bitter struggle with Gessi Pasha,[45] surrendered to the latter in 1879, Rabeh, one of his most powerful followers, who had urgently dissuaded him from surrender, declared himself independent of him.[46] A great part of Suliman’s following joined Rabeh,[47] and under their new leader soon left the Egyptian Sudan and turned their steps westwards, with Gessi Pasha at first still in pursuit. The flower of Rabeh’s troops consisted of ‘dervishes’, that incomparable material for African soldiery, who gave proofs at the famous battles of Khartoum and Omdurman of such unparalleled courage and contempt of death. With this force, which received constant increases from the army of Slatin Pasha himself, Rabeh conquered by degrees the whole Eastern Sudan; Wadai alone, though it indeed also suffered defeat, was able to maintain independence by means of a compromise concluded with Rabeh. His raids extended southwards as far as Bangasso in the Congo State. Although Rabeh declined all connexion with the Mahdi[48], then at the height of his power, he knew how to make skilful use for his own purposes of the wave of fanaticism let loose by the Dervishes, and probably also of the ideas of the religious sect of the Senussi.[49]

In 1892 began Rabeh’s campaign against Bagirmi, which asked for help from Wadai and even from Bornu, but from the latter in vain. After having vanquished the troops of Wadai, Rabeh in 1893 crossed the Shari and laid waste in a very short time the flourishing towns and districts on both banks of this river. At first Sultan Ashimi took some preliminary steps to ward off the formidable danger from his country. But the Bornu troops, unused to war, who were dispatched against Rabeh, suffered a complete defeat; their commander, Malla Kerim, was by order of the conqueror sewn up in a freshly-flayed bullock hide, and so found a horrible death exposed to the rays of the African sun.[50] Ashimi himself, at the head of his troops, suffered a still more complete defeat not far from Kukawa. He himself fled, but was thereupon killed by his own nephew, Abba Kiari,[51] with whom before this he had had a quarrel of long standing. Abba Kiari then even succeeded in surprising and beating Rabeh in front of the capital, but this victory of the Bornu troops was changed into crushing defeat, owing to their scattering too early in order to plunder the enemy’s camp; their leader was captured and executed. The fate of Bornu was thus sealed. Rabeh’s victory was followed immediately by the destruction of Kukawa, at that time one of the largest towns of the Sudan. Such of the royal family as did not fall into captivity were able to save their lives. Omar Sanda, the eldest son of Ashimi, first sought asylum in Mandara, but during Rabeh’s campaign against that sultan fled from there to Zinder, where he was dependent on the bounty of his former vassal, who now at last had become quite independent. Rabeh now determined to consolidate his influence in the lately conquered districts before pushing his dominion further. He built up the ancient town of Dikoa into a capital, whither flowed all the riches of the Central Sudan, and made it a place which, with its reported population of 100,000 souls, surpassed all other towns in these latitudes from the Senegal to the Nile. The town was surrounded with a strong wall, inside which the conqueror established an impregnable citadel which contained his palace and the barracks, stabling, armoury, and powder magazine for his troops. Everything was arranged with the greatest precision, probably on the example of the English in the Egyptian Sudan. The troops were even regularly drilled,[52] and every Friday a parade of the whole armed force took place, which gave Rabeh an opportunity of assuring himself of the readiness of his forces to take the field.[53] Estimates vary as to the actual numbers of his army, which was distributed between Dikoa and a border garrison on the Shari, but they certainly amounted to at least 20,000 men.[54] The provisioning of these masses of troops, who were encumbered with large additions of women and children, weighed heavily on the districts hardly yet incorporated as a result of the recent campaigns. Moreover, the slave-hunts were an oppressive scourge in the populous districts, which provided women and slaves for the soldiery, who were detested for their imperious dealings. To this was added the fact that Rabeh enforced the legal ordinances of the Koran with a strictness that the population, though very largely Mohammedan, were bound to feel as a sweeping limitation of personal liberty. In quite external matters also Rabeh sought to make his influence prevalent. Foureau mentions as ‘Rabeh’s mark’ (a sort of notched cross on the face forming an enormous raised scar) a kind of tattooing or brand, which the people of two communities, whom the traveller met with, bore on their foreheads.[55] The conqueror’s influence extended even to dress, and in this direction, indeed, with very little compulsion; a sort of shirt with three shield-shaped pieces of cloth sewn on, which is very smart and yet practical for all occasions, has partly displaced the Sudan ‘tobe’, the usual native dress for men.[56]

Of whatever kind the influence of Rabeh and his followers may have shown itself, this much is certain, that their pitiless cruelty, which spared neither pagan nor Mohammedan, drew upon them the deep-rooted hatred of the subjugated peoples, a circumstance which will be of great weight in the occurrences which now follow. While Rabeh on the one side sought to preserve good relations with the border powers in order to keep open the high roads into his country, on the other, his preparations for extending his rule over Zinder and Sokoto struck a blow at this, and were followed in the years 1893 and 1894 by the partition—at any rate on the map—of the Lake Chad countries between the three colonial powers interested, viz. Germany, England, and France. The French, who had already pushed their advance posts into the region of the upper Shari, were the first of the three powers to move, and in a very tentative way to further the practical joining up of their newly acquired possessions within their great African colonial empire. They consequently very soon came into conflict with Rabeh.

In 1897 Gentil, a civil officer of the French Congo, undertook a voyage down the Shari from the region of the upper Ubanghi, in order to bring the Sultanate of Bagirmi under French influence. He met with a far-sighted reception from this Sultan, who hoped to be preserved from the yoke of Rabeh by the arrival of the French. The Léon Blot,[57] the little river gunboat which carried the expedition, penetrated right to the Shari delta unmolested by Rabeh’s garrisons, and returned unmolested also, being greeted everywhere with a friendly reception by the river people.[58] Thereupon Gentil without delay betook himself to Paris, in order to set on foot a big expedition from thence. Meanwhile Rabeh revenged himself for Gentil’s demonstrative reception there by laying waste the whole of Bagirmi. Moreover, the unfortunate French trader, de Béhagle, who was accidentally mixed up in the economic politics of the Chad region, fell a victim to Rabeh’s fury and, by his orders, was hanged in Dikoa.[59] Gentil’s representative Prins only waited for the arrival of the expedition: as soon as it entered the Shari in the summer of 1899 the campaign against Rabeh immediately commenced. Very unfortunately for the French the beginning of the campaign miscarried, for the leader of the advance-guard, Bretonnet, who had greatly under-estimated the enemy’s strength, allowed himself to be misled into making a premature attack. In the battle at Togbao on the Shari, Rabeh directed his troops in person and Bretonnet’s column was completely annihilated; its leader fell and all the rifles and three guns fell into the hands of the enemy.[60]

Hereupon Gentil advanced in person and defeated Rabeh in the autumn of the same year in the desperately contested battle of Kuno; but the heavy losses suffered by his own troops determined him to await in Fort Archambault fresh reinforcements from the Congo. By a fortunate accident two further French expeditions arrived almost simultaneously in the Lake Chad region. At the beginning of December the expedition under Joalland and Meynier coming from Zinder by way of Kanem reached the Shari, but it was not till the beginning of the following year that they effected a junction with Gentil. On the 2nd of November the ‘Sahara Mission’ under the scientist Foureau arrived in Zinder from Asben. In their presence Omar Sanda, the man who had fled to Zinder, was proclaimed—somewhat prematurely—as Sultan of Bornu by his followers.[61] Foureau too thereupon marched via Kanem to the Shari, where he joined Joalland. At this point Major Lamy, who had hitherto been in charge of the escort of the ‘Sahara Mission’, took over chief command of the combined forces, which soon afterwards came into touch with Rabeh’s outposts. On the 3rd of March, 1900, the French succeeded in capturing Kusseri, but they could not strike a decisive blow against Rabeh until the arrival of Gentil. On the very next day after his arrival, on the 22nd of April, the decisive battle was fought,[62] when the French brought into action 800 riflemen armed with modern weapons against the entire fighting force of Rabeh. Whilst the battle was at its height, Rabeh fell;[63] he had taken up his position at the ‘Tata’, or earthwork constructed by his troops. His head was brought into the French camp. But the French had also bought their victory dearly: Lamy was mortally wounded and Capt. de Cointet killed. The enemy fled with headlong speed to Dikoa, which however soon afterwards fell into the hands of the French. Yet even this by no means put an end to the struggle, for the remains of the beaten army rallied under Fadel Allah, Niebe, and Mahmud, the still youthful[64] sons of their fallen leader, of whom Fadel Allah especially gave the French plenty more to do, though the latter had on their side the sympathy and to some extent the assistance of the exasperated natives. Meanwhile Omar was installed as Sultan in Dikoa by Gentil, but was very soon relegated again to banishment for having made attempts on the life of his benefactor. He was then replaced by his brother Garbai.[65] Fadel Allah had shifted the scene of his activities to the River Yedseram, and thus threatened to be a standing danger to the neighbourhood of Dikoa, although the French remained victors in the hard-fought battles which were contested along the river at Issege and Mubi. In spite of the successes of the French, the energetic son of Rabeh managed to again reconquer Dikoa, after having completely defeated the Sultan. The French punitive expedition, which immediately followed, was so energetically conducted that Fadel Allah was obliged to fly to Gujba, far inside English territory. Here he came into touch with the English,[66] under whose protection he put himself, and through whose mediation he hoped to become Sultan of Bornu. The English were favourably disposed towards the suggestions, or rather, the expressed wishes of Fadel Allah on this point,[67] and would certainly have helped him towards their realization, had not events forestalled them. Fadel Allah was killed in renewed fighting with the French, and the question was thus arranged in the simplest and most satisfactory fashion. Above all, the country recovered the tranquillity which it had lacked for so long.

A short time after these events the English attracted Sultan Garbai and his following to that part of Bornu that belonged to their sphere of influence. Thereupon the French put in Omar Sanda, a nephew of the other Omar deposed by themselves, as an opposition Sultan in Dikoa,[68] to prevent that town being depopulated. The part of Bornu situated between the Yedseram and the Shari still remained under the administration of the French garrisons in Dikoa and the places on the latter river. It was not till the arrival of the German expedition under Lieut.-Col. Pavel (1902) that the territory, which had hitherto only been German on the map, was actually brought under the protection of the Empire. After various experiments, the part of Bornu which had fallen to Germany was finally formed into a province under the name of the German Chad Territory, whose administrative head-quarters were established at Kusseri. Such was the position taken up by the colonial powers interested towards the economic investigation and development of the country. The English have certainly had more pressing and important problems to solve in their great Niger Protectorate than the development of Bornu, which is its remotest province; so that our knowledge of the British part of the country has not been substantially increased since Rohlfs’ and Nachtigal’s time.[69] The exact opposite is true of the German part, which is what will be chiefly described in the following pages; for it has been so thoroughly explored in all directions by Germans as well as French in supplement of already existing materials, that very little remains to be done in the geographical department of inquiry. Besides Commissions, which have laid down in actual practice the political boundaries hitherto only theoretical, the country has been traversed by larger or smaller expeditions, who have accomplished valuable economic discoveries. The French have been especially active in seeking to approach the solution of one of the most interesting of geographical questions, i.e. the difficult problem of Lake Chad, a task which has not even to-day been finally and incontestably accomplished.