Worksheet

Mud Brick and Cowrie Shells: A Historian's Notebook from the Niger

Grade 7 history: read a historian's field notes from Jenné-jeno, Djenné, Timbuktu and Gao to study Ghana, Mali, Songhai, Mansa Musa and the gold and salt trade.

Grade 7Social StudiesInteractive · Printable

Aligned toHIS.7.3

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1 C3 Framework standard
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11 questions
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Format: Interactive · Printable
Grade: Grade 7
Subject: Social Studies
Question types: Fill in the blank, Multiple choice, Circle the answer, Sorting, Short answer

About this worksheet

What students practice

Students use field notes on sites and objects to explain how Ghana, Mali and Songhai grew rich from gold and salt.
Students explain what Mansa Musa's hajj and Timbuktu's mosques show about Islam and learning in Mali and Songhai.
Students judge what buildings, objects and outsiders' stories can and cannot tell historians.

How to use

Locate Djenné, Timbuktu and Gao on a map of the Niger River before reading, then have students answer on their own and compare the evidence they chose for the last question.

Curriculum

C3 Framework standard covered

HIS.7.3

Describe the West African kingdoms of Ghana, Mali and Songhai, the gold and salt trade, Mansa Musa and Timbuktu.

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Mud Brick and Cowrie Shells: A Historian's Notebook from the Niger

Read field notes from Jenné-jeno, Djenné, Timbuktu and Gao to explain how West African kingdoms grew from trade.

The field notebook

Dr. Fanta Coulibaly is a made-up historian visiting real sites along the Niger River in Mali. Read her notes. Then answer the questions.

Field Notebook: Along the Middle Niger

1Day 1, Jenné-jeno. A low mound of earth near the town of Djenné. Archaeologists who dug here starting in 1977 found that people lived on this spot from about 250 BCE until about 1400 CE. By about 800 CE it was a town of mud-brick houses, and archaeologists estimate that thousands of people lived here. In layers dated well before 800 they found iron tools made nearby and copper ornaments, though no copper is mined anywhere close to this part of the river.

2Day 2, Djenné. The Great Mosque is the largest mud-brick building I have ever seen. The building standing today was rebuilt in 1907 on the site of a much older mosque. Rain wears mud walls away, so each year, before the rainy season, people of the town climb the walls together and spread on fresh mud. Bozo fishing families, Fulani herders and Mande farmers and traders live here today, as their ancestors did.

3Day 3, by boat to Timbuktu. Reviewing background notes. Ghana, which its Soninke people called Wagadu, was the first great trading kingdom; its kings grew rich by taxing gold and salt, and it weakened in the 1100s. Mali rose in the 1200s and took over the trade and the gold fields. Some Arab writers told a story that gold miners and salt traders never met: each side left its goods on the ground and walked away while the other side decided. Most historians think this story shows how little outsiders knew about where the gold came from.

4Day 5, Timbuktu. Mansa Musa of Mali crossed the Sahara on the hajj to Mecca in 1324. He came home with Muslim scholars and, by tradition, an architect from Muslim Spain named al-Sahili. The Djinguereber Mosque was begun here about 1327; it has been repaired and partly rebuilt many times since. Families showed me old handwritten books on law, medicine and astronomy. In the market, men unloaded slabs of salt that camel caravans still carry from the Taoudenni mines, hundreds of miles north in the Sahara.

5Day 8, Gao. Gao was the capital of Songhai, which took Timbuktu in 1468. The Tomb of Askia, a tall mud-brick pyramid bristling with wooden beams, was built in 1495 for Askia Muhammad, who made Songhai larger and supported Islamic scholars. In a small display I saw cowrie shells, once used as money here. Ibn Battuta, who visited Mali in 1352, wrote that its people used cowries, which came from the Maldive Islands in the Indian Ocean. In 1591 an army from Morocco, armed with guns, defeated Songhai.

Based on entry 1, what do the copper ornaments at Jenné-jeno best suggest?

A. People there mined copper from the banks of the Niger River.
B. People there traded with distant places centuries before Mali rose.
C. People there had no iron, so they made their tools from copper.
D. The town was built by traders from the Mali Empire about 1300.

What can a historian learn about medieval Djenné from the Great Mosque standing today?

A. How many people prayed there in the time of Mali
B. A building style and way of upkeep with long local roots
C. The year Islam first reached the town of Djenné
D. The exact shape of the mosque that stood there in the 1300s

Sort each piece of evidence by when it comes from.

The Tomb of AskiaCopper ornaments in Jenné-jeno's early layersIbn Battuta's report on cowrie shellsThe Great Mosque of Djenné standing todayThe beginning of the Djinguereber MosqueSalt slabs the historian saw unloaded in Timbuktu's market

From the time of Mali or Songhai (1200s–1500s)	From an earlier or later time

Camel caravans still carry salt from Taoudenni to Timbuktu (entry 4). What does this best show?

A. A trade pattern from the old kingdoms has lasted for centuries.
B. The salt now comes from mines south of the Niger.
C. Timbuktu now mines its own salt inside the city.
D. Salt was not traded in the time of Mali and Songhai.

Underline the sentence from entry 4 that best shows Mansa Musa's hajj brought new knowledge and skills to Mali.

Mansa Musa of Mali crossed the Sahara on the hajj to Mecca in 1324.He came home with Muslim scholars and, by tradition, an architect from Muslim Spain named al-Sahili.In the market, men unloaded slabs of salt that camel caravans still carry from the Taoudenni mines, hundreds of miles north in the Sahara.

Weigh the evidence

Use the field notes to answer.

How should a historian use the Arab writers' story about gold miners and salt traders who never met (entry 3)?

A. As an exact record of how Ghana's gold was traded
B. As proof that the miners and traders spoke the same language
C. As proof that Ghana's kings owned no gold of their own
D. As a clue to what outsiders did and did not know about the trade

Why would Ghana's kings most likely want to keep the gold fields' location unknown to traders from the north?

A. So the traders would pay more for salt from the Sahara
B. So the traders would bring their salt by boat instead of camel
C. So the trade, and its taxes, kept passing through their land
D. So the traders would settle in the gold fields themselves

Ibn Battuta wrote that people in Mali used cowrie shells from the Maldive Islands as money. What does this detail best show?

A. Mali's own ships sailed to the Indian Ocean to gather shells.
B. Gold was too rare in Mali to use for buying and selling.
C. Goods from the Indian Ocean reached West Africa through trade.
D. Mali had cowries because the shells washed up along the Niger.

The army from Morocco defeated Songhai years after the Tomb of Askia was built.

10.

Most buildings the historian visits are mosques and a tomb. Using entry 2, why might ordinary homes and shops from the 1300s be harder to find today?

A. Mud walls wear away unless people keep repairing them.
B. Archaeologists have not been allowed to dig in Mali.
C. People in Mali lived in tents until the 1900s.
D. Homes were built of stone and carried off to Morocco.

11.

Claim: The kingdoms of the middle Niger were linked to a much wider world. Do you agree? Use evidence from at least two different entries, and explain your reasoning.