Ma'adin Ijafen

Ma'adin Ijafen is an archaeological site in an area of dunes in the Sahara in eastern Mauritania. It was first discovered in the early 1960s by the French explorer Théodore Monod.[1][2] Monod followed up on information provided by local hunters, searching for evidence to confirm the magnitude of the historical trans-Saharan copper trade.[1] 450 mi (720 km) into the desert, he located bundles of cowrie shells and ingots of brass wrapped in ropes and matting and hidden in the sand.[1][2]

The site was originally thought to be the site of a caravan wreck, but Monod believed that the valuables had been hidden intentionally, either by the travellers seeking to prevent a bandit attack, or by bandits hoping to retrieve the items later. It is unclear where the caravan originated from, or what prevented the treasure from being retrieved.[3]

Analysis
Milled cowrie shells of the type used for currency

All told, Monod recovered 2,085 brass ingots of approximately 29.5 in (75 cm) in length, weighing up to 1 lb (0.45 kg) each.[4] They were tied up in bundles of 100 ingots each.[4] He believed that each camel in a caravan could carry four bundles, or 400 lb (180 kg) all together.[1] The entire hoard weighed approximately two tons.[5]

Analysis of the ingots indicates that they are a brass alloy of approximately 80% copper with 20% zinc.[6][7] They have been dated to approximately the 11th–12th centuries CE.[5][8][9] Analysis of the lead isotopes in two of the ingots found that the metal in the ingots was consistent with ore from northwest Europe, indicating that the metal had possibly come to Africa from Europe.[10]

The cowrie shells have been subject to much less inspection than the ingots, but are presumed to have originated in the Maldives.[2]

Further reading
  • Monod, Theodore. "Le Ma'den Ijafen: une épave caravanière ancienne dans la Majabat al-Koubra." Actes, 1er Colloque Internationale d'Archéologie Africaine (Fort-Lamy, 1966). 1969.

References
  1. Herbert, Eugenia W. (2003). Red Gold of Africa: Copper in Precolonial History and Culture. Univ of Wisconsin Press. ISBN 9780299096045.
  2. Christie, A. C.; Haour, A. (2018-08-01). "The 'Lost Caravan' of Ma'den Ijafen Revisited: Re-appraising Its Cargo of Cowries, a Medieval Global Commodity" (PDF). Journal of African Archaeology. doi:10.1163/21915784-20180008.
  3. Lydon, Ghislaine (2009-03-02). On Trans-Saharan Trails: Islamic Law, Trade Networks, and Cross-Cultural Exchange in Nineteenth-Century Western Africa. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521887243.
  4. Garlake, Peter S. (1978). The Kingdoms of Africa. Elsevier-Phaidon.
  5. Childs, S. Terry; Killick, David (1993). "Indigenous African Metallurgy: Nature and Culture". Annual Review of Anthropology. 22: 323. JSTOR 2155851.
  6. McIntosh, Susan Keech (1995). Excavations at Jenné-Jeno, Hambarketolo, and Kaniana (Inland Niger Delta, Mali), the 1981 Season. University of California Press. p. 389. ISBN 9780520097858.
  7. Childs, S. Terry (1994). Society, Culture, and Technology in Africa. UPenn Museum of Archaeology. ISBN 9781931707053.
  8. Flight, Colin (1973). "A Survey of Recent Results in the Radiocarbon Chronology of Northern and Western Africa". The Journal of African History. 14 (4): 544. JSTOR 180899.
  9. McIntosh 1995, p. 388.
  10. Willett, Frank; Sayre, Edward V. (2006). "Lead Isotopes in West African Copper Alloys". Journal of African Archaeology. 4 (1): 67. JSTOR 43135392.

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