Songhai

Songhai is the dialect chain of the middle Niger bend, spoken from Gao and Timbuktu downriver to Niamey and the Benin border. Its kinship with the Saharan languages is disputed, some linguists treating it as an independent family.

Before the 900s horse-riding Songhay speakers imposed their speech on peoples of the river; a kingdom at Gao is attested from the 1000s. Conquered by Mali in the late 1200s, Gao broke away as Mali weakened. Under Sonni Ali, the empire seized Timbuktu in 1468 and Djenné in 1475, carrying the language across the Sahel as a trade lingua franca.

Under Askia Muhammad I, a few Songhai poems and letters were written in Arabic script at Timbuktu. Judar Pasha destroyed the empire at Tondibi in 1591; the elite withdrew to Dendi, while Songhai lived on as the everyday and market speech of the Niger bend.