Latest / The Songhai Empire: Africa's Powerful Forgotten Kingdom — Fexingo History
Songhai's Unconquered City: The Siege of Timbuktu 1591
When the Saadian army crushed Songhai at Tondibi in 1591, Timbuktu should have fallen easily. Instead, the city's scholars and qadis mounted a remarkable resistance — not with weapons, but with law, negotiation, and sheer intellectual defiance. This episode follows the weeks after Tondibi, when Timbuktu's elites, led by the qadi al-Aqib ibn Mahmud ibn Umar, refused to surrender, demanded terms from Judar Pasha, and ultimately preserved the city's libraries and universities. We explore the siege that wasn't a siege, the negotiations that saved Sankore, and the moral…
The skinny
The skinny isn't ready yet — notes appear once the transcript is processed.