GAO

This article appears in Volume V11, Page 455 of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

Encyclopedia Britannica - Main :: GAG-GEO

GAO , GAO-GAO, or GARO, a town of French West Africa, in the Upper

Senegal

SENEGAL

and Niger colony, on the left bank of the Niger, 400 m. by river below Timbuktu. Pop. about 5000. The present town

dates

DATES

from the French occupation in 'goo; of the ancient city there are scanty ruins, the

chief

CHIEF (from Fr. chef, head, Lat. caput)

being a truncated pyramid, the remains of the tomb With century) of Mahommed Askia, the Songhoi conqueror, and those of the

great

GREAT

mosque. According to tradition a city stood on this spot in very ancient times and its inhabitants are said to have had intercourse with the Egyptians. It is known, however, that the city of which the French

settlement

SETTLEMENT
SETTLEMENT, ACT OF

is the successor was founded by the Songhoi, probably in the 7th or 8th century, and became the

capital

CAPITAL (i.e. capital stock or fund)
CAPITAL (Lat. caput, head)

of their empire. Garo (Ga-rho) appears to have been the correct name of the Songhoi city, though it was also known as Gogo and Kuku (Kaougha).' In the 12th century

Idrisi

IDRISI, or EDRISI [Abu Abdallah Mahommed Ibn Mahommed Ibn Abdallah Ibn Idrisi, c. A.D. 1099-1154]

describes Kuku as
1 There was another city called Kaoka or Gaoga

east

EAST
EAST, ALFRED (1849- )

of Lake Chad in the country now known as Bagirmi. It was the seat of the
a populous unwalled town devoted to commerce and industry; it is possible, however, that

Idrisi

IDRISI, or EDRISI [Abu Abdallah Mahommed Ibn Mahommed Ibn Abdallah Ibn Idrisi, c. A.D. 1099-1154]

is referring not to Gao but to another town somewhat to the southat that period the middle course of the Niger had many prosperous towns along its banks. In the 14th century Gao was conquered by the king of Melle, and its

great

GREAT

mosque was built (c. 1325) by the Melle sovereign Kunkur Musa on his return from a

pilgrimage

PILGRIMAGE (Fr. pelerinage, Lat. peregrinatio)

to Mecca. In the 15th century the Songhoi regained power and Gao attained its greatest prosperity in the reign of Askia. It did not enjoy the commercial importance of Jenne nor the intellectual supremacy of Timbuktu, but was the political centre of the western Sudan for a long period. On the break up of the Songhoi power the city declined in importance. It became subject in 1590 to the Ruma of Timbuktu, from whom it was wrested in 1770 by the Tuareg, the last named surrendering possession to the French. The first European to reach Gao was Mungo Park (1805); he was followed in 1851 by Heinrich Barth, and in 1896 by the French naval lieutenant Hourst. Gao is now the headquarters of a military

district

DISTRICT

. A caravan route leads from it to Kano and Bornu. From Gao upwards the Niger is navigable for over r000 m.
See TIMBUKTU. For the Gao region of the Niger see an article by F. Dubois in L'Afrique francaise (January 1909).

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