Upper Senegal and Niger, Vol. 2

regions from which gold dust comes. If Ghana did not exist, access to these regions would not be possible. It is in fact placed at the point of separation of Barbary (Gharb) from the land of the Negroes (Bilād-es-Soudān)." Elsewhere, the same geographer speaks to us of Ghana as being "at the extreme limit of the land of the Negroes." Nothing can indicate to us more clearly that Ghana was to the north of the Sudan proper and even separated from it by a desert zone that corresponds exactly to the zone separating Oualata from Goumbou. Speaking—in the entry for et-tibr (gold dust)—about the way in which journeys were undertaken with a view to acquiring gold, Yakout says that merchants coming from the Maghreb must renew their water supply once they arrive in Ghana, given that they have to cross, to the south of this city, "a desert where burning winds reign that dry up the water by penetrating the waterskins. Therefore, one must adopt a new mode of transport and conservation of water in this desert. For this, one chooses lean or lightly loaded camels that one leaves thirsty for a day and a night before bringing them to the watering hole, and one then waters them twice in succession until their stomach is swollen. The camel drivers push them in front of them and, when the skins are empty and one needs water, they slaughter one of these camels and one drinks the liquid contained in its stomach. Then the journey continues and, each time that one has need of water again, one resorts to the same process and also fills the skins with this liquid. It is thus that one can, without too much fatigue, continue the journey until the approaches to the place where one must meet with the Blacks who possess gold dust." After that, it seems very difficult to me to place Ghana in the vicinity of Segou, as one has sometimes believed one could do.

Ibn-Saïd, who was a contemporary of the destruction of Ghana (1), assigns this city an astronomical position which, considered in isolation, is absolutely implausible. He places it at 10°15' North latitude and 29° longitude planimetri-

(1) He died in 1286, and Ghana was destroyed around 1240 by Sundiata.