MONGABAY.COM
Mongabay.com seeks to raise interest in and appreciation of wild lands and wildlife, while examining the impact of emerging trends in climate, technology, economics, and finance on conservation and development (more)
WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
|
|
Sudan
Index
At the same time that the Ottomans brought northern Nubia
into their orbit, a new power, the Funj, had risen in southern
Nubia and had supplanted the remnants of the old Christian
kingdom of Alwa. In 1504 a Funj leader, Amara Dunqas, founded the
Black Sultanate (As Saltana az Zarqa) at Sannar. The Black
Sultanate eventually became the keystone of the Funj Empire. By
the mid-sixteenth century, Sannar controlled Al Jazirah and
commanded the allegiance of vassal states and tribal districts
north to the third cataract and south to the rainforests.
The Funj state included a loose confederation of sultanates
and dependent tribal chieftaincies drawn together under the
suzerainty of Sannar's mek (sultan). As overlord, the
mek received tribute, levied taxes, and called on his
vassals to supply troops in time of war. Vassal states in turn
relied on the mek to settle local disorders and to resolve
internal disputes. The Funj stabilized the region and interposed
a military bloc between the Arabs in the north, the Abyssinians
in the east, and the non-Muslim blacks in the south.
The sultanate's economy depended on the role played by the
Funj in the slave trade. Farming and herding also thrived in Al
Jazirah and in the southern rainforests. Sannar apportioned
tributary areas into tribal homelands (each one termed a
dar; pl., dur), where the mek granted the
local population the right to use arable land. The diverse groups
that inhabitated each dar eventually regarded themselves
as units of tribes. Movement from one dar to another
entailed a change in tribal identification. (Tribal distinctions
in these areas in modern Sudan can be traced to this period.) The
mek appointed a chieftain (nazir; pl.,
nawazir) to govern each dar. Nawazir
administered dur according to customary law, paid tribute
to the mek, and collected taxes. The mek also
derived income from crown lands set aside for his use in each
dar.
At the peak of its power in the mid-seventeenth century,
Sannar repulsed the northward advance of the Nilotic Shilluk
people up the White Nile and compelled many of them to submit to
Funj authority. After this victory, the mek Badi II Abu
Duqn (1642-81) sought to centralize the government of the
confederacy at Sannar. To implement this policy, Badi introduced
a standing army of slave soldiers that would free Sannar from
dependence on vassal sultans for military assistance and would
provide the mek with the means to enforce his will. The
move alienated the dynasty from the Funj warrior aristocracy,
which in 1718 deposed the reigning mek and placed one of
their own ranks on the throne of Sannar. The mid-eighteenth
century witnessed another brief period of expansion when the Funj
turned back an Abyssinian invasion, defeated the Fur, and took
control of much of Kurdufan. But civil war and the demands of
defending the sultanate had overextended the warrior society's
resources and sapped its strength.
Another reason for Sannar's decline may have been the growing
influence of its hereditary viziers (chancellors), chiefs of a
non-Funj tributary tribe who managed court affairs. In 1761 the
vizier Muhammad Abu al Kaylak, who had led the Funj army in wars,
carried out a palace coup, relegating the sultan to a figurehead
role. Sannar's hold over its vassals diminished, and by the early
nineteenth century more remote areas ceased to recognize even the
nominal authority of the mek.
Data as of June 1991
|
|