Timbuktu

Timbuktu is a city in Mali, about 20 kilometres (12 miles) north of the Niger River. It is the capital of the Tombouctou Region, one of the 19 administrative regions of Mali. The 2023 census counted around eighty-four thousand people living there. For other uses, see Timbuktu (disambiguation).

People lived in the area long before the city existed. Archaeologists have found evidence of early settlements there. Later, in the medieval period, the city became known for its Islamic scholarly and trade importance. Timbuktu began as a seasonal settlement and became a permanent town early in the 12th century.

Trade routes changed, and Timbuktu grew rich after a visit by Mansa Musa around 1325. Its useful location helped it trade in salt, gold, and ivory. It became an important Islamic city on the Saharan trade route and attracted many scholars and traders. Early in the 14th century, it became part of the Mali Empire. In the first half of the 15th century, the Tuareg people controlled the city for a short time. In 1468, the growing Songhai Empire took over the city.

In 1591, a Moroccan army defeated the Songhai and made Timbuktu its capital. The new rulers set up a ruling class called the Arma. After 1612, the Arma became almost independent of Morocco. During its golden age, the city's scholars and trade connections supported a busy book trade. Together with the campuses of the Sankoré Madrasah, an Islamic university, this made Timbuktu an important centre of learning in Africa. Writers such as Shabeni and Leo Africanus wrote about the city. Their stories made people in Europe curious, and the city's reputation changed from rich to mysterious.

After its golden age, the city slowly declined for a long time. Different groups governed it over the years. The French took over Mali in 1893, and French rule lasted until the country became the Republic of Mali in 1960. In recent years, Timbuktu has faced threats from extremist groups, and some of its cultural sites were destroyed. Local and international groups have worked to protect the city's heritage. However, the city's population has become smaller because of these recent problems.

Toponymy

The spelling of Timbuktu has changed a lot over the centuries. It appeared as Tenbuch on the Catalan Atlas in 1375. In 1447, traveller Antonio Malfante wrote Thambet in a letter, and Alvise Cadamosto used the same spelling in his Voyages of Cadamosto. Later, Heinrich Barth wrote Timbúktu and Timbu'ktu. The French spelling 'Tombouctou' often appears in international reference books. The German spelling 'Timbuktu' and its variant 'Timbucktu' came into English, and the first has become widely used in recent years. Major English-language works used 'Timbuctoo', which scholars consider the correct English form. 'Timbuctou' and 'Timbuctu' are sometimes used too.

The French have used 'Tombouctou' for more than a century. Other spellings, such as 'Temboctou' used by explorer René Caillié, are rarely seen. The toponymy of Timbuktu is still debated, and at least four possible origins for the name have been suggested. Leo Africanus and Heinrich Barth believed it came from two Songhay words. Leo Africanus linked it to a town founded in 1213 or 1214 by Mansa Sulayman. Barth thought the name meant a hollow in the sand. He said that if it were a Tamashek word, it would be spelled Timbuktu. He also noted a similar Persian word meaning "where the sun sets." Malian historian Sekene Cissoko suggests a different etymology. He says the Tuareg founders gave it a Berber name meaning "place covered by small dunes." In his 17th-century Tarikh al-Sudan, Abd al-Sadi told of a woman called Tinbuktu, whose name meant "lump." The place where she camped was named after her. French Orientalist René Basset suggested a root from Zenaga, meaning "to be distant" or "hidden." Which theory is right depends on who the first founders were. As recently as 2000, archaeological research had not found remains from the 11th or 12th century within the modern city. This is because metres of sand have buried them and are hard to dig through. Without consensus, the origin of the name remains unclear.

Prehistory

Like other old West African towns, such as Djenné (Jenné-Jeno), Gao, and Dia, Iron Age settlements have been found near Timbuktu. These settlements are older than the town's traditional founding date. Thick sand covers the town itself, so it is hard for archaeologists to dig there. In the land around the town, however, broken pieces of pottery can be seen on the surface. In 1984, Susan and Roderick McIntosh explored the area and found several Iron Age sites along the el-Ahmar, an ancient wadi system a few kilometres east of the modern town.

An Iron Age tell complex about nine kilometres southeast of Timbuktu, near the Wadi el-Ahmar, was dug up between 2008 and 2010 by archaeologists from Yale University and the Mission Culturelle de Tombouctou. The results suggest the site was first lived in during the 5th century BC. It did well through the second half of the 1st millennium AD, and then it eventually collapsed sometime in the late 10th or early 11th century AD. The Maghsharan Tuareg are credited with founding Timbuktu.

History

Main article: History of Timbuktu

Timbuktu has a reputation in the Western world as an exotic, mysterious place. But long ago, it was a well known trading city and a place of learning. Its golden age came under the Mali Empire in the 13th and 14th centuries. The Malian ruler Mansa Mūsā made the city famous by inviting scholars from across the Islamic world to live and teach there. These scholars studied Islamic subjects, history, law, science, and medicine. Mansa Mūsā also made Timbuktu and the Mali Empire known to the rest of the world through his Hajj. Europeans did not reach the city until much later, because the journey was long and difficult. This helped give Timbuktu its reputation for mystery.

Timbuktu became wealthy from local gold and salt mining and from the trans-Saharan slave trade. It was near the edge of the Sahara Desert, and it sat on trade routes between North, West, and Central Africa. This helped it become a place where many different cultures met. After the Mali Empire declined and the Songhai Empire rose, the city continued to thrive until Moroccans invaded the Songhai Empire in 1590. They began to control Timbuktu in 1591, after the Battle of Tondibi. In 1593, many of its scholars were killed or forced to leave. Trade also slowed as new sea routes across the Atlantic opened. In the 1890s, Timbuktu became part of the French colony of Sudan. It stayed under French control until Mali became independent in 1960. Today, far fewer people live in the city than in its medieval peak, and it depends heavily on government help. Since 2020, Mali has been run by a military junta. On 8 August 2023, Jama'at Nasr al-Islam wal Muslimin (JNIM), a group allied with al-Qaeda, placed Timbuktu under a total blockade. This made food and other goods much more expensive and hard to find, and many people fled the city and nearby areas. The siege began after the MINUSMA mission of the United Nations left Mali during the Mali War. It is still ongoing.

See also: Siege of Timbuktu

Geography

Timbuktu is on the southern edge of the Sahara. It is about 15 km (9½ mi) north of the main channel of the River Niger. Sand dunes surround the town, and sand covers its streets. The port of Kabara is 8 km (5 mi) south. A 3 km (2 mi) canal links it to an arm of the river. The canal had filled with mud, but in 2007 it was cleaned out as part of a project paid for by Libya.

Each year the river floods after heavy rain falls in the far upper parts of the Niger and Bani rivers. These rivers start in Guinea and northern Ivory Coast. The rain is heaviest in August, but the floodwater takes time to travel through the Inner Niger Delta. The flood peaks in September at Koulikoro, 60 km (37 mi) downstream from Bamako. In Timbuktu, the water stays high longer and usually peaks at the end of December.

Maps made by Heinrich Barth in 1857 and Félix Dubois in 1896 show a small creek west of the town. Between 1917 and 1921, during the colonial period, the French made people work very hard to dig a canal linking Timbuktu with Kabara. The canal later filled with sand. It was dug out again in 2007, so Timbuktu is connected to Kabara again when the river floods. Kabara can serve as a port only in December and January, when the river is at its highest. At lower water levels, boats stop at Korioumé. A paved road of 18 km (11 mi) links Korioumé to Timbuktu.

Timbuktu has a hot desert climate (BWh) according to the Köppen Climate Classification. Most of the year is extremely hot and dry. Most rain falls between June and September because of the West African Monsoon. The difference between day and night temperatures is greater in the dry season than in the wet season. In the hottest months, April, May and June, average daytime highs go above 40 °C (104 °F). In the mildest months, December, January and February, average highs do not drop below 30 °C (86 °F). During these winter months, a dry, dusty trade wind blows from the Saharan Tibesti Region south toward the Gulf of Guinea. The wind picks up dust that makes it hard to see far, in what is called the "Harmattan Haze." When the dust settles in the city, sand builds up, and the land is at risk of turning into desert.

Economy

Timbuktu became rich because it stood at the southern end of an important trade route across the Sahara desert. Today, the main goods still carried across the desert are blocks of rock salt from the Taoudenni mining centre, about 664 km (413 mi) north of Timbuktu. Until the second half of the 20th century, most salt went by large camel caravans called azalai. Now trucks usually carry it, and boats take it from Timbuktu to other towns in Mali. Between the 12th and 14th centuries, many people from Bono, Tuaregs, Fulanis, and Songhais came to the city to trade, to find safety, or to study. By the 1500s, about 50,000 people lived there. Rain alone is not enough for farming here, so crops are watered with river water from the River Niger. Rice is the main crop, and most of it is now grown in large irrigated areas south of the town.

Most tourists visit between November and February, when the weather is cooler. For many years, the town earned money from a CFA 5,000 tourist tax, from handicrafts, and from local guides. Starting in 2008, al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb began taking groups of tourists in the Sahel region. In January 2009, four tourists were taken near the Mali–Niger border after a festival at Anderamboukané, and one of them was later killed. Many countries then told their citizens to avoid travel far from Bamako, and the number of tourists dropped sharply. In 2010, the Festival in the Desert was moved from Essakane to the edge of Timbuktu. In November 2011, armed men attacked a hotel in Timbuktu. One tourist died, and three others were taken. On 1 April 2012, one day after Gao was taken, Timbuktu was taken from the Malian army by Tuareg rebels of the MNLA and Ansar Dine. Five days later, the MNLA declared the region independent as Azawad. No country recognized it, and it fell apart on 12 July. In January 2013, French and Malian soldiers began to win the city back. The armed groups had already left for the north after setting fire to the Ahmed Baba Institute, which held many important old books. Many of these books had been moved to safety first. In March 2013, rebels slipped into Timbuktu and set off a bomb at a checkpoint near the airport. Fighting ended on 1 April, when French warplanes helped Malian forces push the last rebels out of the city centre. On 2 June 2025, militants attacked a military base near the city. Officials later said that attackers were still in the city.

Early accounts in the West

Stories about Timbuktu's wealth helped spark European exploration along the west coast of Africa. One of the most famous accounts comes from Leo Africanus. He was born as El Hasan ben Muhammed el-Wazzan-ez-Zayyati in Granada in 1485. His family had to leave after the reconquest of Spain in 1492, and they settled in Morocco. He studied in Fes, travelled with his uncle, and visited Timbuktu. As a young man, he was captured by pirates and given to Pope Leo X. The Pope freed him, baptized him, and asked him to write a survey of Africa in Italian. His writings, called Descrittione dell' Africa, taught Europeans most of what they knew about the continent for centuries. He described Timbuktu when the Songhai Empire was at its height. He wrote about its rich king, its gold, its thousands of horsemen, and its many learned men. He also wrote that salt was very scarce, because it was carried from Tegaza. He said the king had a rich treasure of gold ingots and coins.

About 250 years after Leo Africanus' visit, the city had seen many rulers, and its government had become unstable. During the rule of the Hausa, a 14-year-old boy named Shabeni visited Timbuktu with his father. Shabeni came from Tetuan, on Morocco's north coast. Later he became a merchant and made a pilgrimage to Mecca, becoming a hajji. While he was returning from a trip to Hamburg, his ship was captured. He was later taken to Ostend in Belgium in December 1789. He was released and eventually landed in Dover, England, where his story was written down. Shabeni also gave us an idea of the city's size in the late 18th century.

Arts and culture

Timbuktu has three well-known mosques. The Djinguereber Mosque was built in 1327 under Mansa Musa. The Sankoré Madrasah, also called the Sankoré Mosque, was built in the 14th and 15th centuries. Its libraries held thousands of old handwritten books. The Sidi Yahya Mosque was founded in 1400.

The city's best-known cultural event was the Festival au Désert. It was held every January in the desert, 75 km from the city, until 2010. The festival celebrates the peace treaty that ended the Tuareg rebellion. Each January, a week-long festival called Mawloud celebrates the birthday of Muhammed. The city's most treasured manuscripts are read aloud to the public. Since 2015, Timbuktu has also hosted the Living Together festival in the winter.

In December 1988, the World Heritage Committee chose parts of Timbuktu's historic centre for the World Heritage list. The mosques were chosen because they helped spread Islamization in Africa. They also showed a Golden Age of culture and learning during the Songhai Empire, and they were built using traditional methods.

In 1990, the sites were placed on the List of World Heritage in Danger. They stayed on that list until 2005. In 2012, after the Battle of Gao and Timbuktu, the sites were added back to that list. That year, the group Ansar Dine damaged several shrines, including the tomb of Sidi Mahmoud. The group said it would destroy all the shrines in the city. It believed they were idolatry, which is a sin in Islam. These acts were described as serious crimes. UNESCO then created a special fund to protect Mali's World Heritage Sites.

Further information: Islamist destruction of Timbuktu heritage sites

Education

If the University of Sankore ... had survived the ravages of foreign invasions, the academic and cultural history of Africa might have been different from what it is today.

— Kwame Nkrumah at the University of Ghana inauguration, 1961

Timbuktu was a major centre of Islamic learning from the 13th to the 17th century. This was especially true under the Mali Empire and the rule of Askia Mohammad I. The city grew quickly and attracted scholars from nearby Walata, which is today in Mauritania. Its golden age in the 15th and 16th centuries helped learning in religion, arts and science grow. Books were treasured. Many were written because of an active trade with the Islamic world and strong support from Askia Mohammed. Students learned in small schools called madrasahs, which were a bit like early European Medieval university models. Three of these schools, Djinguereber, Sidi Yahya and Sankore, are now known as the University of Timbuktu. Wealthy families such as the Aqit and Bunu al-Qadi al-Hajj families supported these religious schools. The basis of Islamic law came from North Africa, but West African scholars also made their own progress. Ahmad Baba al Massufi is considered the city's greatest scholar.

Wars forced many scholars to leave their homes. In 1468–1469, many went to Walata when Sunni Ali's Songhay Empire took the city. During an invasion from Morocco in 1591, scholars had to flee again. This system of learning lasted until the late 19th century. Later, Islamic education faced many difficulties. These included the French occupation, droughts in the 1970s and 1980s, and Mali's civil war in the early 1990s.

Over many centuries, a very large number of manuscripts were collected in Timbuktu, including copies of the Quran. Many were hidden or buried, which helped them survive when the city declined. Today they are kept in several libraries, including the Ahmed Baba Institute, Mamma Haidara Library, Fondo Kati, Al-Wangari Library, Mohamed Tahar Library, Maigala Library, Boularaf Collection, and Al Kounti Collections. In 2003, these libraries held a very large number of manuscripts. The manuscripts are still at risk of damage and theft. Two Timbuktu Manuscripts Projects have worked to protect them. In January 2013, rebel forces destroyed many manuscripts before leaving the city. Librarian Abdel Kader Haidara and local people, working with the group SAVAMA-DCI, saved most of these manuscripts. Many were moved to safety, and many of them were still in Bamako in 2022.

Language

Bambara is the lingua franca of Mali, but most people in Timbuktu today speak Koyra Chiini. This is a Songhay language that is also used to help people from different groups talk to each other. Before the Tuareg rebellion of 1990 to 1994, about 10% of people spoke Hassaniya Arabic and about 10% spoke Tamashek. About 80% spoke Koyra Chiini. Tamashek was spoken by both the Ikelan and ethnic Tuaregs. After many Tuaregs had to leave the city following the rebellion, fewer people used Tamashek, so Koyra Chiini became even more common.

Arabic came to the region with Islam in the 11th century. It was mainly used by scholars and for religion, similar to how Latin is used in Western Christianity. Bambara is spoken by the largest ethnic group in Mali, the Bambara people, but it is mainly found in the south of the country. As roads and transport improved, connecting Timbuktu to bigger cities in southern Mali, more people began using Bambara in the city. This continued at least until Azawad became independent.

Infrastructure

Mali has no railways except the Dakar-Niger Railway. It stops at Koulikoro, which is far from Timbuktu. Most people reach Timbuktu by road, by boat, or by plane. Planes have flown there since 1961.

When the Niger River is high, from August to December, passenger ferries run by Compagnie Malienne de Navigation (COMANAV) travel about once a week between Koulikoro and Gao, which is downstream. Large motorboats called pinasses also travel up and down the river. These are pirogues with motors. They can be chartered or used by the public. They also need high water.

Both ferries and pinasses arrive at Korioumé, Timbuktu's port. A paved road of 18 km (11 mi) links Korioumé to the city centre, passing through Kabara. In 2007, a Libyan funded project reopened access to Kabara, the city's old port. Workers cleared a canal about 3 km (2 mi) long that had filled with mud. The canal connects Kabara to an arm of the Niger River. Now ferries and pinasses can reach the port when the river is very full.

Timbuktu has few good road connections to the rest of Mali. Only dirt roads lead to nearby towns. The roads south of the Niger River are no better, even though ferries cross the river at Korioumé.

A new paved road is being built between Niono and Timbuktu. It runs north of the Inland Niger Delta. The 565 km (351 mi) road will pass through Nampala, Léré, Niafunké, Tonka, Diré and Goundam. The first part, 81 km (50 mi) from Niono to the small village of Goma Coura, is finished. The Millennium Challenge Corporation paid for it. This part will help the Alatona irrigation system of the Office du Niger. The next part, 484 km (301 mi) from Goma Coura to Timbuktu, is being paid for by the European Development Fund.

Timbuktu Airport used to be served by Air Mali. Its flights went to Bamako, Gao and Mopti. The airline stopped flying in 2014. The airport has a 2,110 m (6,923 ft) runway. It runs in a 07/25 runway orientation, and it is paved and lit. As of July 2023, Sky Mali flies to the airport from Bamako using Boeing 737 aircraft.

Notable people

• Ali Farka Toure (1939–2006) was a musician who helped make desert blues popular.
• Ahmad Baba al-Timbukti (1556–1627) was a writer, scholar and thinker from the Sanhaja Berber people.
• Abdul Rahman Ibrahima Sori (1762–1829) was a prince and Amir (commander). He was taken from his home, treated very badly, and sent to the United States in 1788.
• Mahamane Alassane Haidara (1910–1981) was a politician who was elected to the French Senate in 1948.
• Souheil Ben-Barka (born 1942) is a Moroccan film director, screenwriter and film producer.
• Cissé Mariam Kaïdama Sidibé (1948–2021) was a Malian politician. She was the first female prime minister of Mali.
• Alphadi (born 1957) is a Nigerien fashion designer known as the "Magician of the Desert".
• Halima Cissé (born 1996) is a mother who gave birth to the only nonuplets known to have survived birth.

In popular culture

Much of the gold sent to Europe in the 1600s and 1700s came from Timbuktu. Because of this, the city has long been seen as a mysterious, hidden place. Many people in Europe and North America still see it this way. In a 2006 survey of 150 young Britons, 34% did not believe the town existed, and 66% thought of it as "a mythical place." In Western culture, Timbuktu is also often used to stand for any faraway place. This idea grew from the excitement that legendary tales, especially Leo Africanus's Description of Africa, brought to Europe. Arabic sources focused mainly on richer cities in the Timbuktu region, such as Walata and Gao. In West Africa, the city has an image that has been compared to Europe's view of Athens. So the picture of Timbuktu as the height of distance and mystery is a European one. Stories of great riches encouraged travellers to visit the hard-to-reach city. The famous French explorer René Caillié described Timbuktu as "a mass of ill-looking houses built of earth." Over time, the city became known less for its gold and more for its location and mystery. English dictionaries have used Timbuktu to mean any faraway place since at least 1863.

Timbuktu also appears in other works. It is a key setting in Scales of Gold, a book in Dorothy Dunnett's House of Niccolo series of historical novels. The city also shapes the story through Umar, a man from Timbuktu who is taken to Europe as a slave under the name Loppe. Umar becomes friends with Nicholas, the series' main character. Timbuktu has appeared in Disney films several times in a similar way. It often appeared in Donald Duck comics, where it was often used as a hideout. It is also featured in The Aristocats, where the butler Edgar plans to send the cats there but ends up being sent there himself. That film wrongly places Timbuktu in French Equatorial Africa, when Mali was actually part of French West Africa. The musical Timbuktu! opened on Broadway on 1 March 1978. It has lyrics by George Forrest and Robert Wright, music by Borodin, and a book by Luther Davis. It retells Forrest and Wright's musical Kismet but moves the story to mid-14th century Timbuktu. The cast included Eartha Kitt, William Marshall, Gilbert Price, Melba Moore and George Bell. Geoffrey Holder directed, choreographed and designed the costumes.

Twin towns – sister cities

Timbuktu is twinned with these places:

• Chemnitz, Germany
• Hay-on-Wye, Wales (United Kingdom)
• Kairouan, Tunisia
• Marrakesh, Morocco
• Saintes, France
• Tempe, United States