CHAPTER XXVII THE HAUSSA STATES With this slight indication that the native traditions of the Soudan are not without some foundation in recorded history, we may return to what should be the surer if narrower ground of local chronicles. Unfortunately, in approaching the history of Haussaland and Bornu, we are met in both cases by the fact that their records were purposely destroyed at the beginning of the nineteenth century by Fulani conquerors in Haussaland, and by the new dynasty of the Kanemyin in Bornu. The new rulers had in both instances the same object, to obliterate as far as possible the trace of their predecessors, and they have been so far successful that the materials of local history which have survived are extremely scanty. A few manuscripts have, however, escaped the general destruction. Dr. Earth found one in Bornu which gives a brief and dry chronicle of the kings of Bornu from a very early, though undated period. There is one containing a chronicle of the history of Katsena. The Niger Company obtained in Kano a manuscript as yet only imperfectly translated, which gives in similar brief fashion a chronicle of the reigns of forty-two kings of Kano. Dr. Robinson found in Zaria another, though more modern manuscript, giving some account of a period of the history of Zaria. We have also, though from a tainted source, native notes on the history of the Haussa States. Sultan Bello, the commander of the victorious Fulani, while he permitted and presumably encouraged the destruction of the Haussa records, so far showed his appreciation of the importance of history as to compile from his own study of documents 236