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Article: Country profile: Mali.
- Article from:
- New Internationalist
- Article date:
- January 1, 1997
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1997 New Internationalist Magazine. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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A TRIP TO MALI, it is commonly said, is a trip to history. The country is at the heart of West Africa's history and culture, the cradle of three of the greatest medieval African empires: those of Ghana, Songhai and Mali. Today, two cities in particular are reminiscent of the country's illustrious past: Timbuktu and Djene.
Timbuktu rose from the sands well before Arab explorers came in the ninth century and was for hundreds of years one of Africa's most prosperous cities - its university, for example, was in the fourteenth century as advanced as that in Oxford. Its twin, the river city of Djene, is known as the most beautiful city of the Sahel region: its Great ...