GHANA AND TIMBUCTOO 115 of Timbuctoo under the Songhay dynasty, a very important chapter of Soudanese history was to intervene. This was the rise of the kingdom of Melle, the first of the black Mohammedan native states to be recognised on terms of equality by the other Mohammedan kingdoms of North Africa. It was the conquest of Ghana by Melle which really put an end to the independence of Ghana, and merged its history in that of the more civilised empire.

We have seen that at the end of the eleventh century, when Ghana submitted to the vengeance of Abou Bekr, Melle was but a town of second-rate importance in the bend of the Niger. A place of more distinction mentioned by El Bekri was Tekrour. Whether the Tekrour of El Bekri was identical with Jenne, a town of which the history is famous, and which was founded by Songhay pagans about the year 800 of our era, I leave for the more learned to decide. There are grounds for believing that this may have been the case ; but '* Tekrour," of which the literal meaning is "black," is one of the names that create confusion in the history of the Soudan. It has evidently been applied at different periods to different peoples. However this may have been, Ghana was at a period subsequent to the Almoravide conquest attacked and apparently for a time overwhelmed by the neighbouring black kingdom of Tekrour. In the earlier period of its history, Ghana had ruled over the Wangara. When Idrisi speaks of it in the middle of the twelfth century, though still the greatest of black kingdoms, with a trade extending to Egypt, North Africa, and Spain, its territory' had apparently diminished, for Idrisi describes it as limited on the east by the territory of the Wangara, — whom he calls also by the alternative name of Mandingoes — and they, instead of forming part of the kingdom, were only tributary. Ibn Khaldun says that before the rise of Melle, Ghana was conquered by the Su-Su. The Su-Su, as they now exist, are of Mandingo origin. It is therefore possible that the Wangara, once the subjects of Ghana, became its rulers. No historian, however, dwells