On 1 January 1200 the plateau of the White and Red Volta, the later heart of the Mossi kingdoms (Ouagadougou, Yatenga's south, Kaya, Koupela, Tenkodogo), is held by its older peoples, whom the Mossi later called the Nyonyose, 'children of the earth': farming villages of the Ninsi, the Kibse (Dogon-related, in the north-west) and others, with the Mande-speaking Bisa in the south-east.
They had no king: each community was led by its lineage heads and by the priest of the earth shrine, the office the Mossi later left in their hands (the tengsoba, 'master of the earth', of Mossi times). No Mossi state stands here in 1200: Izard's chronology begins the reign of Naaba Wubri at Ouagadougou about 1495 and founds Yatenga about 1540, and Fage and Levtzion put Na Nyaghse, founder of Dagomba, about 1480.
Who holds it
- Title
- earth priests and lineage heads
- Since
- not applicable
- Confidence
- low
How things stand that morning
Self-governing farming villages. The traditional 'long chronology' (Delafosse, Tauxier; Wikipedia: Oubri about 1050-1090, Tenkodogo from 1120, the Yatenga revolt about 1170) would put Mossi kingdoms here already; it rests on counting reign lengths in king lists, and modern work (Fage, Levtzion, Izard) shortens it by three centuries or more.
Customs and assemblies
Earth priests and lineage elders; village and ward councils; no central authority.
What the year holds
What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.
- 1200No dated event is recorded.
Where the sources disagree
- Why no realm 'mossi': the earliest datable 'Mossi' are raiders. The Ta'rikh al-Fattash places Mossi incursions into Gao about the mid thirteenth century, the Ta'rikh al-Sudan a Mossi capture of Timbuktu about 1337 (Izard). Boubou Hama's tradition of a Mossi state called Dyamare with its last capital at Rozi in the Dallol Bosso (eighth to twelfth century), then at Minji, then on the Gurma bank, is reported by Izard but rests on oral tradition only. None of this is a defensible state on 1 January 1200.
- fr.wikipedia's Royaumes mossis lists Tenkodogo from 1120, Yatenga from 1333 and Ouagadougou from 1441 while dating Naaba Ouedraogo about 1435-1465: internally inconsistent.
Evidence: Later tradition and the chronology debate summarised by Izard (UNESCO GHA IV, ch. 9). No direct evidence for 1200.
On the map: The edges with the Gurunsi, Gurma and Kurumba are conventions.
Sources and studies
- UNESCO General History of Africa IV (1984): Niane ch. 6, Cissoko ch. 8 (the Songhay), Izard ch. 9 (the Niger bend and the Volta basin), Lange ch. 10
- Mossi Kingdoms (Wikipedia: the traditional 'long' chronology)
- Royaumes mossis (fr.wikipedia)
Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.