So it would seem that the motivation for Manding movement, though on a more individual scale and incidental rather than a systemic trade movement would perhaps be religiously driven. That is since they are primarily Muslim, the Hadj, and on these caravan trips, I believe persons brought wares and items they would sell to finance their passage.
This is a more feasible idea than massive groups of certain people moving in an almost diaspora like movement for trade or other purposes.
The trade interactions within Saharan regions seem to have also been facilitated by other nomadic groups and territorial tribal movements within certain regional boundaries and their interactions. The Manding people are actually numerous tribes or groups situated in numerous West African countries.
Further East, in Saharan regions, there are tribes such as the Hausa, who are well known blacksmiths and metal workers and account for many of the swords and weapons produced and traded through many tribal groups as well as the caravans.
These are my understandings at least, so I will be grateful for any elucidation required of course.
I had forgotten about the pilgrimage element, which I believe was more an incidental factor in the occurrence of disparite weaponry across the continent of Africa, and which may have triggered certain influences in those of varied other regions. This seems to have been the case with the s'boula of Morocco, which appeared in Abyssinia in number enough to have been presumed an Abyssinian weapon and so classified in some references.
Its travel even continued into Zanzibar, where first Demmin (1877) then Burton (1884) thought it to be a Zanzibar weapon.
|