Daju king

Who he is

Title

King of the Daju (the royal title was probably bugur)

Since

Not pinned

Confidence

low

The Daju traditions give a king list without dates: the first king Gitar or Kosbur, a later 'Umar Kassifuroge, and the last, Ahmad al-Daj, a tyrant who fled to Dar Sila when the Tunjur took power (late fifteenth century in Balfour Paul's view, early eighteenth in the Dar Sila tradition). Arkell put a move of the Daju capital from Jebel Gadir in Kordofan to Jebel Marra about 1100, after a Nubian attack; that date is his guess. No king can be placed on 1 January 1200.

What it holds

• The southern Jebel Marra
• Tribute from neighbouring peoples

Allies and rivals

The Fur; the Zaghawa; the Nubians.

How things stand that morning

Not documented.

Wealth

Cattle, grain, tribute.

Where the sources disagree

Evidence: Tradition only.

On the map: The royal core only.

Primary sources for Daju

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

• The Book of Geography, Ibn Said al-Maghribi (Ali ibn Musa ibn Said) (about 1250 to 1275). Written two generations after 1200 but drawing on the travels of Ibn Fatima, a merchant who had been in the Sudan, Ibn Said gives the first clear picture of Kanem as an empire: the mai Dunama Dibalemi (reigned about 1210 to 1248), his capital Njimi, his Muslim subjects and his reach to the Fezzan, Tajuwa and the Zaghawa, with the Sao and other peoples on his borders. Read online