260 book reviews

R.J. McIntosh, S.K. McIntosh and H. Bocoum The Search for Takrur: Archaeological Excavations and Reconnaissance along the Middle Senegal Valley, New Haven / London, 2016, Yale University Publications in Anthropology. 578 pages ISBN 978-0-913516-29-4.

The Search for Takrur: Archaeological Excavations and be used interchangeably leading to a confusing inflation. Reconnaissance along the Middle Senegal Valley, edited by Precisely, two large mound-clusters or settlement com- R.J. McIntosh, S.K. McIntosh and H. Bocoum, presents the plexes, Cubalel and Siwre, 30km apart, were the main focus results of fieldwork from 1990 to 1993 in northern Senegal of the excavation program, with the addition of Walalde along the Middle Valley. The manuscript was submitted and the iron smelting site of Juude Jaabe and Sincaan. in 2012 and the book published in early 2017. It provides The rigorous excavation protocols carried out at extensive information and detailed data on the sites ex- Cubalel and Siwre are reported in chapters 4 and 5. The cavated in what can be called the heartland of Takrur: to- presented data include the location and layout of the se- day’s Fuuta Tooro. The book, with 578 pages, 253 figures, lected probes, detailed descriptions of sedimentary se- 93 tables, 7 appendixes, references list, and an index, is quences and profiles drafts, and the description and drafts organized into 14 chapters. of the recorded archaeological features and installations. The logic of the argument is structured in four parts. The chronological range of the sites under investigation is Part 1, chapters 1 to 3, presents the research project, its his- bracketed between 40 BC-AD 237 and AD 973-1208. tory, and the adopted field methodology. Part 2, chapters 4 Pottery, as sherds and complete and/or almost com- to 9, addresses the results from the excavated sites and the plete vessels, is the dominant material recorded in the material culture. Chapter 8, “Iron working in the Middle excavated probes. The recovery and analytical techniques Senegal Valley” (pp. 191-280), the longest chapter of the used to make sense of the ceramic material of Cubalel volume, raises particularly interesting issues that deserve and Siwre are presented in the bi-lingual Chapter 6. The scrutiny. Part 3, chapters 10 to 12, examines the different recorded pottery assemblages are sub-divided into seven components of the subsistence systems. Finally, Part 4, successive phases, with interesting variations between chapters 13 and 14, shift back to a regional scale to engage Cubalel and Siwre. Phase IA pottery appears exclusively in patterns of site location and shifts in settlement. the earliest level at Cubalel, while Phase IB and II wares From the outset, the authors note that “either Silla are evident at Cubalel and Siwre, Phase IIIA and IIIB ves- or Takrur has been dwarfed by the attention focused on sels exclusively at Cubalel, and Phase IV and V pottery ex- Ghana” (p. 1). The Middle Senegal Valley research project clusively at Siwre. is accordingly framed as a correction to this situation, with The small finds described in Chapter 7 include excavat- the well-known Jenne-Jeno project as the yardstick to rep- ed specimens and surface items made of clay, metal, bone, licate in the field: “We wanted to know whether Takrur, shell, and stone. The fired clay objects include pendants, like Jenne-Jeno was the product of long-term develop- beads, spindle whorls, net-sinkers, figurines, statuettes, mental processes with local roots that gradually became spoons, ladles, and tobacco pipes. There are 58 metal ob- integrated into wider, ultimately global, networks of rela- jects: 3 alloyed copper artefacts and 55 iron objects and tions” (p. 4). The explicit priority of the Middle Senegal slag. Bone and shell are represented by a few beads and Valley research was, on the one hand, “the development of pendants. Finally, 30 stone objects, predominantly in- a reliable chronological framework for human settlement” clude equipment for hammering, pounding, and grinding. (p. 4) and, on the other hand, the generation of “data that In addition, one carnelian bead and one ground axe were could meaningfully be compared with Malian data” (p. 16). documented in the research. The project was implemented in distinct steps. The Chapter 8 presents the results of field and laboratory project was launched from November 1990 to May 1991 analyses of iron production. Data were collected from 3 with the excavation of seven probes at Cubalel, three sites: Juude Jaabe (14 furnaces), Sincaan (6 furnaces), and probes at Siwre, and the excavation of an iron smelting fur- Sincu Bara (2 furnaces). The project analysed sixty-one nace at Juude Jaabe. The second phase of fieldwork took specimens of slag, ore, and bloom and dated sixteen asso- place from December 1992 to January 1993, with the exca- ciated radiocarbon samples. The research protocol brings vation by I. Thiaw of two additional probes at Cubalel and to light technical information about the iron smelting the investigation of iron smelting and forging furnaces at processes via the data obtained by Alioune Diop during Sincaan and Juude Jaabe by H. Bocoum and D. Killick. All his doctoral field research in 1999. He sunk an excavation in all a total of 12 units of various sizes – the largest 10m × probe at Walalde – near Siwre – and revealed “[an] unex- 6m – were excavated at ten sites. “Probe” and “site” seem to pectedly early occupation of the Middle Senegal Valley by

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���7 | doi 10.1163/21915784-12340015 Downloaded from Brill.com09/30/2021 01:34:24AM via free access book reviews 261 iron-using peoples, with ten radiocarbon dates between goat are predominant species from the Initial settle- 2200 and 2600 BP” (p. 268). ment stage. Medium to small antelopes, like reedbuck The Walalde occupation sequence consists of three as- (Redunca redunca), kob (Kobus kob), and red fronted ga- pects: an Initial occupation from 800-550 cal BC; a Middle zelle (Gazella rufifrons) were the most frequently hunted occupation dated to 550-400 cal BC; and the final occu- animals. Dog (Canis familiaris) is frequent through the pation from 400-200 cal BC. Evidence for iron production sequence as is guinea fowl (Numida maleagris) of an un- appears throughout the sequence. The results of the anal- certain status, but very likely wild. Donkey (Equus asinus) ysis of iron artefacts and slag from the Initial occupation is present AD 0-200 and camel (Camelus dromedarius) ap- produced two interesting results. First, iron workers “were pears before or around AD 400 at Siwre. Seventy-five per- able to maintain a temperature of at least 1200oC, the min- cent of the 3,800 fish bones from Cubalel and Siwre were imum needed to produce fluid slag of this composition” identified, representing twenty two fish taxa. Three taxa (p. 269). Second, the composition and microstructure of predominate: catfish (Clariidae), squeakers (Synodontis), the slag “are quite similar to those [….] from Juude Jaabe, and Nile perch (Lates niloticus). For fish, there is neither a but this is at least 1,600 years older” (p. 369). Any reference noticeable diachronic trend nor a significant variation in to Walalde early iron metallurgy then disappears from species composition by site. The evidence for subsistence the remainder of the chapter. At points, the chapter’s au- indicates mixed farming communities which practiced thor suppresses the results of his own material analyses fishing, hunting, and the opportunistic use of wild plants (e.g., pp. 270 and 272). Curiously, he also does not make and animal resources. a single reference to other research on iron metallurgy Chapters 13 and 14 synthesize the data obtained. The in West Africa outside of the Middle Senegal Valley and focus on the sub-regional survey enables the rendering of Mauritania. settlement dynamics and site-location strategies in the The volume’s authors devote Chapter 9 to the descrip- Cubalel study area. Accordingly, Walalde – the unexpected tion and analysis of copper and alloyed copper artefacts early site dated to the first half of the first millennium BC – retrieved in the sites under investigation. One hundred is unique and stands alone. Phase I at Siwre and Cubalel and five such items were collected: 9 from Siwre, 53 from follows, and consists of small sites on the Senegal River Cubalel, and 43 from Sincu Bara. Thirty-five of these spec- banks. Phase II-III witnessed an increase in the number imens contained enough intact metal to be submitted of sites, with significant sites clustering in the vicinity of for chemical analysis. Twenty of these objects are from the Lao-Barangol Channel. Finally, Phase IV-V features Cubalel, seven from Sincu Bara, and eight from Siwre – 25 site aggregation along with the intensification of iron pro- surface finds and ten subterranean archaeological speci- duction. The overview and conclusion recapitulates and mens. The studied artefacts are shown to belong to two synthesizes the volume, addressing site formation, sub- categories: 1) “pure” or arsenical copper and 2) alloyed sistence economy and material culture, landscape, settle- copper. The former metal very likely originated from West ment, and climate change. The chapter concludes with a Africa, possibly from the Akjoujt Region in Mauretania. comparison of the Middle Senegal Valley and the inland The latter variety resulted from recombination of copper Niger Delta. However, one might have expected a compar- of diverse origins, including North Africa through trans- ison with research on the emergence of Ghana, as “either Saharan trade. Silla or Takrur has been dwarfed by the attention focused Chapters 10 to 12 engage the floral and faunal evidence on Ghana” (p. 1). of human subsistence. Throughout excavations, excava- The Search for Takrur, edited by R.J. McIntosh, tors systematically collected flotation samples; 128 sam- S.K. McIntosh, and H. Bocoum is an important contri- ples in total. Of these, 105 were analysed which yielded 49 bution to the West Africa archaeology library. It is a re- different plants of four types: 1) cultivated grasses, 2) trees source book crafted by competent and respected scholars. and shrubs, 3) wild grasses, and 4) other wild plants. Millet However, by engaging other directly relevant cases and (Pennisetum glaucum) and fonio (Digitaria sp.) were the scholarship in West Africa, the authors might have made a staple crops. Other plants, like the baobab (Adansonia more balanced comparative work. digitata) and Ziziphus sp. were exploited on a consis- tent basis. The plant remains provide a picture of grain- Augustin F.C. Holl farming communities who made use of the relatively Department of Anthropology and Ethnology, Xiamen favourable conditions of the Senegal Valley. University, Xiamen, Fujian, China The faunal remains collected at Siwre and Cubalel to- [email protected] tals 87 kg, a remarkably large sample. Cattle, sheep, and

Journal of African Archaeology 15 (2017) 257-265 Downloaded from Brill.com09/30/2021 01:34:24AM via free access