Africana Periodical Literature 
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 Periodical article |
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| Title: | Gold Mining and Jula Influence in Precolonial Southern Burkina Faso |
| Author: | Werthmann, Katja |
| Year: | 2007 |
| Periodical: | The Journal of African History |
| Volume: | 48 |
| Issue: | 3 |
| Period: | November |
| Pages: | 395-414 |
| Language: | English |
| Geographic term: | Burkina Faso |
| Subjects: | gold mining Lobi Dyula political history social history History and Exploration Development and Technology Economics and Trade Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups) Agriculture, Natural Resources and the Environment |
| External link: | https://www.jstor.org/stable/40206587 |
| Abstract: | The 'Lobi' region in what is today southern Burkina Faso is frequently mentioned in historical accounts of gold mining in West Africa. However, little is known about the actual location of the gold mines or about the way gold mining and trade were organized in precolonial times. This article points out that some previous hypotheses about precolonial gold mining, trade and the sociopolitical organization of this region - notably that gold mining and trading were directly controlled by the 'Mande-Jula' from Kong - are flawed, partly because 'Lobi', as the name for both the region and its inhabitants, is misleading. In fact, the references to 'Lobi' merge two distinct gold-producing zones along the Mouhoun river, about 200 km from each other. The present-day populations of southern Burkina who have settled there since the eighteenth century do not know who was mining gold prior to their arrival, and many of them have not been involved in gold mining at all due to conceptions of gold as a dangerous substance. Notes, ref., sum. [Journal abstract] |
