تاريخ الفتاش (Timbuktu Chronicles 1493-1599)

"You mean they drank blood a long time ago, in the days long past?" I asked.

"No. It happens even today. There are sorcerers who often make such sacrifices." I remained skeptical, but his words caused the village to take on a sinister hue. We passed an old woman, who did not return our greeting but hid her eyes under her veil. It did not seem to be a friendly place, but I could not escape the feeling that I was being conned. We greeted the chief of the village, who scolded my guide for not formally asking permission to enter. No one seemed happy to see us.

As we scaled the Rose Dunes, just outside the village of Quema, my guide hurriedly mumbled prayers from under his breath. He told me that sometimes whites liked to spend the night camping at this place, but whenever they did so, he always left them alone. He would never spend the night in this place, not for any amount of money. Tuaregs would pitch a tent almost anywhere if there is a sand dune close by, but they would never pitch a tent at the Rose Dunes. Tuaregs won't come near this place.

"Why not?" I wanted to know. "What is so spooky about it?"

"This is the place where sorcerers gather at night," he told me. "They come here in the nights after midnight. They come from as far as Timbuktu, from Mauritania and Morocco. They sometimes assume the form of birds and will fly the same night to come to this place. The sorcerers hold their councils here. Many strange things happen at Quema. It is an evil place. I would never be here after dark."

All the same, it was a beautiful site with a lovely view of Gao. The Rose Dunes sloped in a gentle incline, making them easy to scale. From the summit, I could see across the Djoliba and into the city of Gao. Unexpectedly, Muhammad told me that he could arrange a possession ceremony for me, but it would be very expensive. I would have to pay the chief of Quema, sacrifice a few animals, arrange for musicians to perform, and it would be extremely dangerous. Once evil spirits were released in the night, there would be a certain danger: The evil spirits would tell me my name, my father's name, my grandfather's name, even my great-grandfather's name. They would know certain things about me. They would know why I had come to Gao, what I wanted from them, and more. All of this would be frightening for me, and, of course, it would not be cheap. It would cost about three hundred U.S. dollars.

I felt like I was being offered a cut-rate deal on Songhay sorcery. I declined the offer. On the pinasse back, I became lost in thought as Muhammad prattled on about the Askiya Muhammad. Even here in the heart of Songhay sorcery, my guide's version of the history of the Askiyas was strikingly different from that of the griots (traditional West African oral historians/storytellers) of Niger, the version recorded by Thomas Hale. My guide had never before heard the name "Mamar Kassaye" applied to the Askiya Muhammad, as he is called by the griots, but he told me in great detail the story of how the Askiya Musa disgraced himself by exposing his genitals to the assembly of Songhay people, after his father cursed him for banishing him to live in Quema, and for sleeping with his father's wives. This clearly was an abomination, so the father of the Askiya Musa cursed his own son, and the humiliated son was as good as finished after his father bestowed his curse upon him.

For Muhammad, the moral of this story was that the son should always do exactly what his father tells him. He should always treat his father with respect. The child with the blessing of the father will experience great personal happiness and good fortune. The child without his father's blessing will be destined for a life of total misery. What happened to the Askiya Musa is therefore an allegory of how all of us should treat our own fathers. We must never usurp their authority. We must obey our parents in all things.

"But what the Askiya Musa did to the Askiya Muhammad was fairly extreme, don't you think?" I ask. "He banished a blind and disabled old man to a wicked island filled with serpents and poisonous insects. Then, he slept with his father's wives. These are extreme acts. It makes me wonder why the Askiya Musa may have treated his old father in such a brutal way. Did he have a..."