Ghana Empire

The Ghana Empire, known to its own Soninke people as Wagadou, was a West African state that flourished from around the sixth to the thirteenth century in territory spanning parts of modern Mauritania, Senegal and Mali, well to the northwest of the modern country that later took the name Ghana at independence. The empire grew wealthy by controlling and taxing the trans-Saharan trade routes that carried gold from sources further south to salt and goods from North Africa, and Arab geographers described its capital, Koumbi Saleh, as a large and prosperous trading city with separate quarters for the Muslim merchant community and the king's own royal court. Ghana's rulers, who did not themselves convert to Islam until later in the empire's history, commanded a large army and were renowned among Arab writers for their wealth, reportedly measured partly in gold. The empire declined from the eleventh century under pressure from prolonged drought, loss of control over trade routes, and the rising power of neighboring states, and its remaining territory was eventually absorbed into the Mali Empire during the thirteenth century.