Dambazawa — The Tribes of the Fulani · Pre-Order (Ships ASAP)

Plate III · KANO · The Tribes of the Fulani

Every movement needs its treasury. The Dambazawa were the wealthy cattle-owning house of the Kano Fulɓe who put their herds behind the jihad — tradition remembers them as chief financiers of the campaign that took the city in 1807. Wealth counted in cattle, spent on a cause, repaid in standing that endures in Kano to this day.

The plate is a treasury count: rows of cowrie marks — the currency of the old markets — with three counted out in rust, the share given to the cause.

Survey-plate artwork on heavyweight cotton. Front: the Dambazawa plate. Back: PL. 0, the Fulɓe mark — the zebu ringed by sixteen clans.