- Also spelled:
- Mohammed I Askiya
- Also called:
- Askia Muḥammad or Muḥammad Ture
- Original name:
- Muḥammad ibn Abī Bakr Ture
- Ture also spelled:
- Towri or Turée
- Died:
- March 2, 1538, Gao, Songhai empire
- Founder:
- Askia dynasty
- House / Dynasty:
- Askia dynasty
Muḥammad I Askia
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Who was Muḥammad I Askia?
Muḥammad I Askia, who died March 2, 1538, was a West African military leader and statesman. In 1493, he seized the throne of the Songhai empire, expanding it through a series of conquests. He established Islam as the official religion, which later contributed to the conquest of Songhai by Moroccan Muslims.
To put his realm in order, Muḥammad took al-Maghīlī, a Moroccan reformer, as an advisor. In 1496, he made a famous pilgrimage to Mecca and consolidated and enlarged Songhai upon his return. Between 1498 and 1502, he was victorious over the Mossi of Yatenga and the inhabitants of the Aïr. He was deposed in 1528 by his son, Askia Mūsā.
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What empire did Muḥammad I Askia rule?
Muḥammad I Askia, who ruled from 1493 to 1528, was a West African statesman and military leader who expanded and strengthened the Songhai empire. The Songhai empire was a great trading state of West Africa centered on the middle reaches of the Niger River in what is now central Mali.
Under Muḥammad I Askia, the Songhai empire extended west to the Atlantic coast and east into what is now Niger and Nigeria. He set up an efficient administration, dividing Songhai into provinces, each under a governor. He also established a standing army and a fleet of war canoes.
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How did Muḥammad I Askia become the ruler of the Songhai Empire?
Muḥammad I Askia, a West African statesman and military leader, founded the Askia dynasty and expanded the Songhai Empire. After the death of Sonni ʿAlī, the ruler who had solidified the Songhai empire, Muḥammad tried to wrest power from Sonni ʿAlī’s son, Sonni Baru. In February 1493, Muḥammad's forces were victorious in the Battle of Anfao. After conquering the enemy, Muḥammad assumed the title of Askia. He then set up an efficient administration, dividing Songhai into provinces each under a governor.
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What important changes did Muḥammad I Askia make to the Songhai Empire?
Muḥammad I Askia, who ruled the Songhai empire from 1493 to 1528, significantly strengthened and expanded the empire through military conquests and administrative reforms. He implemented an efficient administration by dividing Songhai into provinces, each governed by an appointed official. Additionally, Muḥammad I Askia established a standing army and a fleet of war canoes, commanded by a general and an admiral. He also created positions such as director of finance, justice, and agriculture. Islam was established as the official religion.
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How did Muḥammad I Askia promote learning and religion in his empire?
Muḥammad I Askia, also known as Askia the Great, strengthened and expanded the Songhai empire, using Islam to promote unity and learning.
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Religious Unification He established Islam as the official religion, which helped to unify the empire under a common faith, though this decision later had negative consequences.
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Pilgrimage to Mecca After returning from his pilgrimage to Mecca, he became a deeply converted Muslim and consolidated Islamic practices within his empire.
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Support for Muslim Scholars Askia I used the scholarly elite as legal and moral counselors, which helped promote Islamic learning and education.
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Promotion of Islamic Propaganda He supported Muslim scholars who spread Islamic teachings, further reinforcing Islamic influence throughout the region.
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What is Muḥammad I Askia’s lasting impact on West African history?
Muḥammad I Askia, who ruled the Songhai empire from 1493 to 1528, significantly expanded and strengthened the empire through military conquests and exemplary organization. He implemented administrative reforms by dividing Songhai into provinces, each governed by an appointed official. Additionally, Muḥammad established a standing army and a war canoe fleet.
Beyond military and administrative accomplishments, Askia fostered indirect Islamic propagation, enabling Muslim scholars to enter regions that were previously inaccessible. His establishment of Islam as the official religion for the nobles, however, later justified the conquest of Songhai by Moroccan Muslims. For centuries to come, neighboring African leaders modeled themselves and their states after Muḥammad and the Songhai empire.
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Muḥammad I Askia (died March 2, 1538, Gao, Songhai empire) was a West African statesman and military leader who usurped the throne of the Songhai empire (1493) and, in a series of conquests, greatly expanded the empire and strengthened it. He was overthrown by his son, Askia Mūsā, in 1528.
Rise to power
Both Muḥammad’s place and date of birth are unknown. For a long time, he was thought to be a Silla (a Tukulor clan of Senegal) or a Touré of Soninke origin, but it now seems that his name, as spelled in Arabic by 18th-century Timbuktu chroniclers, was Muḥammad al-Ṭūrī, or Muḥammad of the Toro (Fouta-Toro of Senegal). It is thus believed that he was probably of Tukulor origin, from a Senegalese family that had settled in Gao. The name of his clan was probably Kan, or Dyallo. Oral tradition, however, which is still very much alive, makes Mamar (Muḥammad’s popular name) out to be Sonni ʿAlī’s nephew, his sister Kasey’s son by a jinni, a supernatural being.
After the death of Sonni ʿAlī, the ruler who had solidified the Songhai empire from 1464 to 1492, Muḥammad tried, as early as February 1493, to wrest power from Sonni ʿAlī’s son Sonni Baru, who had been elected by acclamation on January 21. In the Battle of Anfao on April 12, 1493, Muḥammad’s forces, though inferior in number, were victorious. Traditional religions tinged with the esoteric Songhai Islam of the Sonnis gave way to an Islamic state whose civil code was the Qurʾān and whose official writing was Arabic. After conquering the enemy, Muḥammad assumed the title of Askia (or Askiya) in order to ridicule, it is said, the daughters of the fallen Sonnis who said of him a si tya, or “he will not be.” The name Askia became the name of the dynasty that he founded and the name of its leaders.
While Sonni ʿAlī had been a warrior, Muḥammad was above all a statesman. He set up an efficient administration of the regions conquered by his predecessor. He began by dividing Songhai into provinces and placed each under a governor. A standing army and a fleet of war canoes were organized under the command of a general and an admiral. Moreover, Muḥammad created the positions of director of finance, justice, interior, protocol, agriculture, waters and forests, and of “tribes of the white race” (Moors and Tuaregs who at that time were vassals of the Songhai and furnished them with squadrons of dromedary-mounted troops). All these officials were for the most part chosen from among the nobles and were brothers, sons, or cousins of Muḥammad.
Organization of the Songhai empire
This exemplary organization of an African state was completed by a religious organization. Although a faithful believer, Muḥammad was not very well informed in matters of religious orthodoxy and therefore took as an adviser the Moroccan reformer al-Maghīlī, persecutor of the Jews of Touat, to help him put his realm in order, in particular to recover the possessions belonging to the descendants of the defeated Sonnis and to subservient groups not converted to Islam. Establishing Islam as the official religion of the nobles was without doubt the only error of this statesman. From then on, it was no longer a popular religion but an imported one that later was to justify the conquest of the Songhai by Moroccan Muslims.
And yet it was to receive the necessary counsel directly from “God’s House” that in 1496 Muḥammad undertook a pilgrimage to Mecca. This pilgrimage has remained famous as much for the pomp with which it was carried out as for the marvelous tales to which it gave rise. The chronicler Mahmud Kati, who accompanied Muḥammad, wrote in Taʾrīkh al-fattāsh that the jinn of Mecca had had Muḥammad named caliph and had told him what his rights were over the former vassal groups of the Sonnis. By the time he returned in 1497 or 1498, he was a leader deeply converted to Islam. Next he would proceed to consolidate and enlarge Songhai.
Militarily he met with uneven success. Although between 1498 and 1502 he was victorious over the Mossi of Yatenga and the inhabitants of the Aïr (Niger), a few years later (1505–06) he undertook an unsuccessful campaign against Borgu (the present boundary region of Niger and Nigeria). And similarly, although during 1507 and 1514 he reduced the insurgent Fulani factions in Senegal and the Bornu factions near Agadez, one of his lieutenants, the Karta of Kabi, revolted against him in turn and, despite his efforts during 1516 and 1517, remained independent. As an organizer of an effective administrative system he was more successful.
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During the course of his lengthy sojourns in the capital, Gao (1502–04 and 1506–07), he set up with rare talent the system of tithes and taxes, the regulation of agriculture and fishing, and the recruitment and training of his administrators and governors.
The extent of the Songhai empire of this period remains conjectural. Sadi, the Timbuktu chronicler, has said that the territory that Muḥammad conquered “by fire and sword” extended west as far as the Atlantic Ocean, northwest to the salt mines of Teghaza (on the northern border of present-day Mali), southwest as far as Bendugu (Segu), southeast to Bussa, and northeast to Agadez. It is certain that the influence of Songhai during Muḥammad’s time was considerable and extended even beyond these boundaries. All the surrounding states, whether allies or enemies, experienced its civilizing ferment.
This influence was reinforced by an indirect, though nonetheless profound, Islamic propaganda. Muslim scholars went into areas they would not have been able to penetrate without the Gao ruler’s support. And for several centuries to come, the small African states and the neighbouring leaders would take as their model the Islamic empire of Songhai and its prestigious leader, Muḥammad. Even today, according to oral tradition, Muḥammad appears as a jinni, who either took after his father or after those with whom, by a special gift, he was able to consult during his pilgrimage to Mecca.