A Reconsideration of Wangara/Palolus, Island of Gold

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Periodical article

Title:	A Reconsideration of Wangara/Palolus, Island of Gold
Author:	McIntosh, Susan K.
Year:	1981
Periodical:	The Journal of African History
Volume:	22
Issue:	2
Pages:	145-158
Language:	English
Geographic term:	Mali
Subjects:	long-distance trade gold mining Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups) History and Exploration
External link:	https://www.jstor.org/stable/181579
Abstract:	There is a general consensus among West African historians that the Island of Gold, known to Arab geographers as Wangara and to European cartographers as Palolus, refers to the Bambuk/Bure goldfields. This article examines the evidence for an alternative identification of the Island of Gold with the Inland Niger Delta, where the place name Wangara would be derived from Soninke long-distance traders (Wangara). Many of the details on the Island of Gold provided in the original sources can be shown to apply more convincingly to the Inland Niger Delta than to Bambuk/Bure. Until now, this hypothesis has not received serious consideration, partly because of the belief that the Inland Delta and its most important entrepot, Jenne, did not play a significant role in long-distance trade networkd until the fourteenth century. This is contradicted by archaeological evidence for a major urban centre at Jenne-jeno by 900 AD. Maps, notes.