ABSTRACT
The association of those called the Wangara with the interior gold trade of West Africa was one known in medieval times. Pacheco Pereira had undoubtedly obtained some account of transactions between Wangara traders and Akan producers. In the late fifteenth century, the Portuguese established posts on the southern shores of the Akan country, so challenging the monopolistic position which the Wangara had hitherto enjoyed in the gold trade. This chapter presents the struggle for the Akan trade in the sixteenth century between Portuguese and Malian interests. Bitu, then, where Wangara merchants did business with Akan producers, was a frontier town, and it was as such that it figured in the geographical consciousness of the Muslim scholars of the Western Sudan. The Wangara did business with the Akan, or To, at Bitu, 'Bahaa', and 'Banbarranaa', but it was Bitu that became known throughout the Western Sudan, and beyond, for its supplies of gold.
