Ghana

Ghana, or Wagadu, was a Soninke kingdom centered on Koumbi Saleh at the edge of the Sahara. Once wealthy from taxing salt and gold caravans, by 1337 it survived as a vassal of Mali.

Around 1340 the writer al-Umari recorded that Ghana's ruler alone among Mali's subject kings retained the title malik. Koumbi Saleh was abandoned in the fifteenth century.