ABSTRACT
West Africa is generally understood to comprise the countries and cultures between the Atlantic Ocean and the southern edge of the Sahara, from Mauritania across to Lake Chad, and southwest to the Atlantic Ocean along the southern border of Cameroon. This area incorporates the territory of the once great kingdoms of the Western Sudan (old Ghana, Songhai, and Mali) as well as the formerly powerful kingdoms of the forests, such as the Ashanti Federation, the Yoruba city-states, and the Benin Kingdom. In large part due to the trans-Saharan trade between North Africa (and, by extension, Europe and the Middle East) and the forests of West Africa, these kingdoms experienced large populations and great wealth long before Europeans reached the coast in the early fifteenth century. Trade routes shifted, and trade goods changed, after European contact. Soon the cruel traffic in African slaves dominated commerce, and the great cities of the Sahel, such as Timbuctu, Gao, Kong, and Kano, diminished in importance. As European powers consolidated their gains, capital cities developed along the West African coast. Broadly speaking, a north-south divide (too often a poorer-richer, Muslim-Christian divide as well) continues to plague the countries of West Africa, as all attempt to adjust to a new age of exploitation.
