The Songhai Slave Soldier System That Built an Empire

The Songhai Empire: Africa's Powerful Forgotten Kingdom — Fexingo History · Apr 30, 2026 · 5m · transcript

Long before the Mamluks or the Janissaries, the Songhai Empire relied on a military caste of slave soldiers called the Koyam or Tyeddo. This episode tells the story of how Sonni Ali and the Askia dynasty used enslaved warriors—often captured from the Mossi, Gurma, and Hausa—to build the largest standing army West Africa had ever seen. We look at the kondo system of military slavery, where boys were taken young, converted to Islam, trained in cavalry and archery, and given elite status even as they remained legally property. Lucas and Luna explore the contradictions: these slave soldiers could…