ABSTRACT
The general policy of every Pasha was to satisfy at all costs the avarice of the troops on whom he depended for his position and the opportunities it gave for personal gain. The first part of the Tarikh, which covers the history of the rise of the Songhai empire and the early years of the Moorish occupation, was compiled from various sources and is very dull reading. In the second part of the Tarikh, Es Sadi describes events under the later Pashas in which he himself frequently played an important part. Timbuktu remained the Moorish capital and the seat of the Askias of the North who succeeded each other nearly as frequently as the Pashas. From the year 1618, when Mulay Zidan finally washed his hands of the Sudan, the Moorish troops on the Niger became absolute masters of their own destiny.
