2/0 A TROPICAL DEPENDENCY of Spain, in the end of the twelfth century. In this and the succeeding century the armies of Kanem were very powerful, and the kings of Kanem, who maintained constant intercourse with the Hafside monarchs of the Barbary States, were known as Kings of Kanem and Lords of Bornu.

Ibn Said, who wrote in the thirteenth century, is the first Arab to speak of Bornu by its present name, and to define the country lying on the south-western shore of Chad as forming part of the kingdom of Kanem. Ibn Khaldun, having occasion to notice the embassy which has been already mentioned as having been sent by the King of Bornu to the King of Tunis about the year 1257, adds the information that the capital of Bornu was on the same meridian as Tripoli. This fixes for us the fact that since the middle of the thirteenth century there has been no great change in the position of the Bornuese seat of government. At that time a great and successful invasion was made by Bornu of the southern country, now known to us as Adamawa. The thirteenth century would seem to have been a brilliant period of early Bornuese history. In this century the power of Kanem was extended over the Fezzan, and carried as far north as to a place within eight days' march of Augela, and Islam was widely disseminated in the Soudan. It is probably also to this period that the following passage from Sultan Bello's notice must be referred. Speaking of Bornu he says : — *' Fortune having assisted them, their government flourished for some time, and their dominion extended to the very extremity of this tract of the earth. Wadai and Bagharmi, as well as the country of Haussa, with those parts of the province of Bautchi which belong to it, were in their possession. In the course of time, however, their government became weakened and their power destroyed." It is no doubt upon this original dominion over Haussaland that certain shadowy claims of sovereignty on the