Askia Muhammad came home from Mecca 50,000 ducats in debt and more powerful
In 1496 the Songhai ruler Askia Muhammad set off for Mecca with 500 horsemen and 1,000 foot soldiers, founded a hostel for West African pilgrims in Medina, and returned owing 50,000 ducats. The trip still paid off: the titles of hajji and caliph gave him prestige that anchored his rule over West Africa's largest empire.
Born Muhammad Ture around 1443, possibly the son of a sister of King Sonni Ali, he rose to be one of that king's leading generals, though the two often clashed. When Sonni Ali's son Sonni Baru took the throne in 1492, Muhammad rebelled, accusing him of being a poor Muslim. Backed by Timbuktu's scholars, whom Sonni Ali had persecuted, he won the Battle of Anfao outside Gao in April 1493. A popular folk tale says his title Askia came from Sonni Ali's daughters wailing that the throne was not his.
He then expanded the empire from the salt mines of Taghaza in the north to Futa Djallon in Guinea. Some campaigns failed, such as a disastrous invasion of Borgu in 1504, and he bought peace with the Tuareg around Walata, an alliance that protected Songhai control of the salt trade. His conquest of Hausa cities including Katsina brought heavy slave-raiding and taxes.
At home he built an administration unmatched in the region. He split the empire into provinces with appointed governors and set up ministries for finance, justice, agriculture, and waters and forests, filling top posts with relatives. He standardised trade measures, policed caravan routes, organised taxation, based law on sharia and invited North African scholars. Instead of calling up a general levy, he kept a professional army that could campaign far from the Niger. Gao stayed the capital, but Timbuktu grew into a second one.
Old age brought humiliation. His aide hid the fact that the king, now past seventy, had gone blind, and in August 1528 his son Musa forced him to abdicate. A later ruler, his nephew, exiled him to an island in the Niger. From there he plotted with another son, Ismail, who seized power in April 1537 and received the caliph's regalia from his father. Askia Muhammad died in Gao in 1538, reputedly the father of 471 children.
Source: Askia Muhammad I
