Question

What did the West African empires control by controlling the trade routes of the Sahara caravan trade?

Select the best answer from the choices provided.
the Sahel region
the trade and price of goods
the flow of religion and ideas in West Africa
All answers are correct.

Answer 1

@Jeneshisu @sarhamby1227

Answer 2

idk I'm sorry

Answer 3

@yoongibear

Answer 4

im not very good with history and i don't know much about west african empires or africa in general. i'll try to help but it might take me a minute.

Answer 5

so

Answer 6

there were 3 great empires, right?

Answer 7

idk

Answer 8

i will check

Answer 9

those three empires controlled the Sahel region over 900 years

so i believe the answer is A

Answer 10

but then again, im not good at history xD

Answer 11

lets work together i help u u help me on this guestions

Answer 12

i will search

Answer 13

okie c'x

Answer 14

this is what i found The region may be divided into several broad physiographic regions. The northern portion of western Africa is composed of a broad band of semiarid terrain, called the western Sudan, stretching from the Atlantic Ocean on the west to the area of Lake Chad on the east, a distance of about 2,500 miles (4,000 km). It is largely a plateau of modest elevation and borders the Sahara (desert) on the north and the Guinea Coast forests on the south. Rainfall in this region ranges from less than 10 inches (250 mm) in its arid northern reaches to about 50 inches (1,250 mm) in the south. The flora of the western Sudan consists of the scrub vegetation of the transitional zone known as the Sahel in the north and a mix of tall trees and high savanna grasslands in the south. Lying south of the western Sudan are the Guinea Coast equatorial forests, which flourish along the Atlantic coast and extend inland for about 100 to 150 miles (160 to 240 km).

Answer 15

so far

Answer 16

i think its c

Answer 17

The civilizations of Africa developed differently from those in the rest of the world. The differences were partly because of the continent's rich geography. As the second-largest continent in the world, Africa has many different geographic zones. It is also three times the size of the United States.
It is no surprise that such a large continent has multiple climates and various temperatures. In the north and south of Africa, there are the coastal zones. The coastal zones are near the ocean and are covered with farmland and rocky terrain. Toward the north and in the center, lies the huge Sahara Desert. The smaller Kalahari Desert is in the south. These regions are hot and dry with almost no rainfall. Farther inland is a large grassland known as the savanna, which is full of many types of plants and animals. The savanna makes up more than 50 percent of the African continent. Finally, near the equator is a hot, humid, plant-filled jungle that experiences heavy rainfall.
topographical map showing Africa’s climate regions
A topographical map of Africa’s climate zones resembles a slice of layer cake. The rocky regions are shown in purple, the deserts are in yellow, the dry grasslands are in orange, and the jungle is in green.
The Sahara dominates most of northern Africa. It is the largest desert in the world. It is almost the size of the United States. The Sahara is so large that it divides Africa into two regions: North Africa (north of the Sahara) and sub-Saharan Africa (south of the Sahara).
To get around such a large continent, people needed to use rivers. Because the rivers were used to navigate the area, most of the major West African empires developed around them. Major empires developed around the Senegal River, the Gambia River, and the Niger River.
In the dry lands of the Sahel, or the land south of the Sahara, the rivers were especially important. Good farmland was scarce in these regions. When an empire had control of a river, it could grow more food to feed its people and expand its territory.
the Sahara in North Africa as seen from space
A view from space shows the clear contrast between the dry, sandy Sahara and the Sahel, which supports more plant life.
Trade Encounters
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Just as controlling river routes was important in Africa, so was controlling trade routes on land. Though sub-Saharan Africa and Europe were far away from each other, trade connected the two regions. For many years, traders crossed the route between Europe and Africa by desert caravan. The traders used camels to make the weeks-long journey across the desert between North Africa and West Africa. Because these routes were long and dangerous, the goods they carried between Europe, Africa, and the Middle East needed to be worth the trip. If the goods were sold for a high price and the traders made a lot of money, the dangerous trip was worthwhile.
men riding camels across a desert
Camel caravans frequently cross parts of the desert in Niger.
When traders traveled across North Africa, they had to pay heavy taxes and tolls to the local authorities. As a result of collecting these taxes, the cities and empires of West Africa located along these trade routes became wealthy. Soon, the remote West African empires south of the Sahara became rich.
Culture and Religion
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Have you ever heard someone say "the gods must be angry" when the weather is bad or someone gets bad news? In West Africa, many people believed in animism, the belief that gods and spirits control things in the world. For example, if a violent storm happened, it was because the gods were angry. Dead relatives were also believed to have spirits that remained behind. Because everything had a spirit, people thought they were related to animals and to all forms of nature.
mosque in Larabanga, Ghana
Islamic architecture adapted to traditional African building styles, as seen in this mosque in Larabanga, Ghana.
Islam, which spread from the Middle East to Africa, came to North Africa around 700 CE. As traders moved to West Africa, they brought the Islamic religion with them. After Islam came to West Africa, this remote region grew into a center for learning and religious education.
Think About It

Why would a society where people rely heavily on growing food crops want to practice animism?
Because many African cultures had no written language, oral tradition became important for passing down stories. Stories were told by one generation to the next, because people could not learn their history through reading. Griots, or storytellers, spent their early lives learning about their tribe's history and culture from their elders. Later in life, they told these stories to younger people in the culture. Sometimes these stories were set to music.
Through oral tradition, Africans learned about history, heroes, and stories. However, because African cultures relied on oral tradition to pass down stories, less is known about African history than about other cultures in the world. Oral history has made researching African cultures much harder for historians.
man in African robes plays instrument
Griots sometimes play the kora, a type of African harp, while reciting stories.
Practice 6-1
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Directions:
Answer the following questions by selecting the correct answer from the list provided.
Begin Quiz
Kingdoms of West Africa
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West Africa featured three major kingdoms. The first rose to power more than 1,000 years ago. While European countries were still facing war, disease, and famine during the Middle Ages, these African empires were in a time of prosperity. Many of these cities developed in a region known as the Sahel. This area was south of the Sahara but still north of the West African coast.
Ghana
The Ghana Empire rose to power around 900 CE. The empire was the home of the Soninke people, but their leader was called Ghana, which means "war chief." The Soninke were warriors who were originally from the Sahel. They conquered many of their neighbors. By ruling the Sahel region, they also controlled the trade caravans that moved through the Sahara. Controlling this trade allowed the Ghana Empire to become wealthy.
Because the Ghana Empire controlled the trade routes, it held the most power in the region. The trade routes also brought the Ghana Empire into contact with Islamic traders from the Middle East. Along with their goods, the Islamic traders told many Africans about their religion. Soon their Islamic religion became a major religion in the Ghana Empire and in the Mali and Songhai empires that followed it. In the 20th century, many African Americans looked to Islam as a source of strength and pride for their community.

Mali
When the Ghana Empire broke up, smaller groups began fighting over the old empire. One group, the Mandinka, created an even more powerful West African empire: the Mali Empire. Like the Ghana Empire before it, the Mali Empire was built on trade.
King Mansa Musa
Mansa Musa, one of the most famous leaders of the Mali Empire, was reported to be extremely wealthy.
The Mali Empire grew because of two strong and wise leaders. The first was King Sundiata, who expanded the empire in the 1200s. The next great leader, Mansa Musa (mansa means "emperor" in Mandinka), came to power in the 1300s. Mansa Musa captured the city of Timbuktu. Under Musa's rule, the Mali Empire reached its greatest power. Musa's control of trade routes led the empire to prosperity. The empire also became the center for learning and culture in West Africa.
Think About It

While the trade routes across the Sahara were used for hundreds of years, only a small number of traders made each trip. As a result, few people actually saw the cities of Africa. Many Europeans who had never been to Africa heard stories about the great wealth there. Over time, the African empires became more myth than reality. While there was a real Timbuktu, the name Timbuktu also came to symbolize a faraway place that did not exist. Many Europeans thought that the stories about the city's tremendous wealth and its isolated location made it seem like it was not real.
Can you think of a similar example from your own life when a rumor about something people had yet to experience made that thing seem bigger or better than it was?
Songhai
As the Mali Empire fell apart, a new group came into power. By the 1400s, the Songhai Empire became the main power in West Africa. The Songhai Empire centered on the Niger River in West Africa. Eventually, it grew to twice the size of the Mali Empire. Many in the Songhai Empire were strongly devoted Muslims, yet the empire accepted traditional religions.
Though it was the largest of the three main empires, the Songhai Empire had collapsed by the 1600s because of war and outside invasions. The collapse of this empire was similar to the fall of the Mali and Ghana empires.
Today, the empires of Ghana, Mali, and Songhai are not well studied in American schools. However, they are examples of advanced African empires that were peaceful and rich at a time when many European countries were still unsafe and often at war. Later, these empires were a source of pride to African Americans, who were regarded as inferior for much of American history.
Benin
king of Benin marches with warriors
The Oba of Benin, at center on horseback, was the head of a feudal-style society in Benin.
South of the Songhai Empire, in what is now Nigeria, lived the Edo and Yoruba people of West Africa. They farmed and had an organized society where regional kings ruled over lower-ranking princes. This system was like feudalism in Europe. By the 1300s, the Edo people were united under a single strong ruler, or oba, which means "king." By the 1400s, Oba Ewuare the Great of the Benin Empire had turned the capital into a fortress city and expanded the empire.
metal sculpture of two warriors
The Edo and Yoruba were known for making metal sculptures. Their metalwork and their impressive cities attracted European traders.
Practice 6-2
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Directions:
Answer the following questions by selecting the correct answer from the list provided.
Begin Quiz
Enslavement
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Imagine if someone told you what to do all of the time. What if that person could punish you when you did not obey? Sadly, many people in history have suffered this fate. When people are enslaved, they lose their right to make choices and are forced to follow another person’s orders.
Slavery in West African Society
Long before Europeans first sailed to West Africa, enslavement was part of African culture. At times, Africans were enslaved through war. Warriors and villagers of a defeated tribe would be taken as a prize by the winners. Some kingdoms even launched raids with the purpose of capturing people to enslave. Some enslaved people were kept in West Africa, while others were sold to caravan traders. These enslaved Africans would be taken north to the Middle East and Europe. Wherever they went, most enslaved people would never see their homes or their families again.
merchant marches alongside captured African adults and children who are tied to each other
Men, women, and children were swept up by the slave trade in Africa.
Though African enslavement was a negative practice, not all enslaved people were treated badly. Sometimes, enslaved people could rise to important positions in society. They could become assistants or advisors to leaders or even armed bodyguards.
Since family was important in African culture, some enslaved people bonded with the families who purchased them. Some enslaved people were treated as relatives or were allowed to purchase their own freedom or their children's freedom. In these homes, enslaved females typically did household chores, prepared food, or sewed. Men farmed and did physical labor. Other times, a single enslaved person did a specific task or trade.
The European Slave Trade
European merchants kneel in front of an African king.
Europeans traders came to Africa to build trade relations. Here, traders are shown kneeling with respect before the King of Bakongo.
As early as the 1440s, Portuguese sailors began taking enslaved Africans to Europe. These Africans sold for high prices to wealthy people who wanted to use them as servants. Europeans were curious about these people who looked, spoke, and acted differently. Soon, about a thousand slaves were taken to Portugal every year.
Forty years after they started importing slaves, the Portuguese traders landed in the Benin Empire. The trade route to Benin was the first major trade route between Europe and Africa. Soon, other European traders were sailing to Africa too. At first, the Portuguese and other Europeans wanted mostly exotic goods like spices, oil, gold, and ivory from elephants. These goods were cheap in Africa but expensive in Europe. The goods were expensive because they could only be brought in by the trans-Saharan caravans. But if Europeans brought the goods in by ship rather than by caravan, more goods could be sold at cheaper prices. In this way, the traders could get rich.
Even as they explored other continents, the Portuguese realized the value of trade with Africa, especially the trade of enslaved workers. During the late 1400s, the Portuguese first started using enslaved Africans to harvest food crops in the islands of the Azores and Cape Verdes, located in the Atlantic Ocean. On these islands, Europeans saw that by using enslaved labor they could increase profits on their plantations, or farms.
large coastal fortress
For Europeans, the slave trade became so important they built fortresses to protect their slave-trading posts. U.S. President Barack Obama visited one such fortress in Ghana.
Soon, traders from Spain, England, France, the Netherlands, and Sweden were involved in the African slave trade. Though traders still traded other goods, the slave trade quickly became the most profitable trade for Europeans. As profits increased, the number of captured Africans did too. As the slave trade grew, local slave catchers and kings captured more people to sell. However, European countries that were engaged in the slave trade were not interested in bringing enslaved Africans home as servants. Now the European colonies in the Americas wanted to use enslaved Africans as cheap labor.
Most enslaved people were forced into hard labor, such as harvesting sugar crops. Many also lived and worked in extreme heat. These enslaved Africans would go on to be the forefathers of African Americans in the United States.
Take A Closer Look

The process of being captured and taken into enslavement was a scary and uncertain one. While many people did not know what was happening, some knew a horrible life of enslavement awaited them. An account from well-known enslaved African Olaudah Equiano, a man who later gained his freedom, is described in the following passage:
portrait of Olaudah Equiano
Olaudah Equiano was a formerly enslaved African who wrote about his experiences after he gained his freedom.
"Generally when the grown people in the neighbourhood were gone far in the fields to labour, the children assembled together in some of the neighbours' premises to play; and commonly some of us used to get up a tree to look out for any assailant, or kidnapper, that might come upon us; for they sometimes took those opportunities of our parents absence to attack and carry off as many as they could seize. …One day, when all our people were gone out to their works as usual, and only I and my dear sister were left to mind the house, two men and a woman got over our walls and in a moment seized us both, and, without giving us time to cry out, or make resistance, they stopped our mouths, and ran off with us into the nearest wood. Here they tied our hands, and continued to carry us as far as they could, till night came on, when we reached a small house where the robbers halted for refreshment, and spent the night. We were then unbound, but were unable to take any food; and, being quite overpowered by fatigue and grief, our only relief was some sleep, which [eased] our misfortune for a short time."
After reading Equiano's words and his description of being captured, do you think this kind of enslavement was rare or common in this part of Africa? What part of the passage helps you reach this conclusion? Do the people who captured Equiano and his sister seem afraid of being caught?
Practice 6-3
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Directions:
Answer the following questions by selecting the correct answer from the list provided.
Begin Quiz
Lesson Review
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Africa is a continent with a long and rich history. In particular, West Africa has seen the rise and fall of many great empires. Because of Africa’s oral tradition, historians know less about African history than about some other cultures. However, it is known that the empires of West Africa were advanced and wealthy when Europe was still in the Middle Ages.
When Europeans arrived in West Africa, they saw opportunities for trade. But they also saw opportunities to force enslaved Africans to perform manual labor in far-off colonies. That unfortunate trade, which enslaved millions of Africans, is also the reason many African Americans still have a strong interest in the history and culture of Africa today.
Printable Homework
Homework

Answer the following questions
Imagine you are a tribal king in the Benin Empire and Portuguese traders have arrived seeking gold. They have goods that you want for your people and yourself, but you have heard they enslaved other Africans. List the possible advantages and disadvantages to trading with the Portuguese traders. Then write a paragraph explaining your decision about whether to trade your gold with the Portuguese traders.
How did the rule of Mansa Musa affect the culture of the Mali Empire?
thats what the teacher gave me

Answer 18

jeez, did you copy and paste a whole online txt book XD

Answer 19

maybe

Answer 20

and yes there r 3 empires

Answer 21

ik c'x

Answer 22

Songhai, Ghana, and Mali, right?

Answer 23

yes

Answer 24

we both need help x'D

Answer 25

brb

Answer 26

still no answer?

Answer 27

@tylerocks01 u there?

Answer 28

UGH srsly boi

Answer 29

yes