e - CIFAS

a
GOVERNMENT IN ZAZZAU
an average density of 60 per square mile, but this density varied
widely throughout the area. However, with such a relatively low
over-all population density, arable land has little commercial value,
except on the immediate outskirts of the large settlements. With
this: low population density we find a system of land tenure under
which rights of use and occupancy now have priority over other
rights of ownership.l In pre-British days the rulers of Zaria
sought to increase this population by acquiring slaves for £ann
production. Of the present population of the Kingdom, about 60
per cent. are Muhammadan Hausa and Fulani, while the rest are
members of some thirty or more tribes who are distinguished as
'pagans' (arna) from the surrounding Muslims and Christians.
Excluding the few settlements of non-Islamized Hausa lmown as
Maguzawa in Northern Zaria, the entire pagan population occu~
pies areas in the southern and western half of the territory which
has heavier rainfall and denser woodland than the more open and
cloee1y 8ettled north peopled by Muhammadans. Throughout this
area of predominantly pagan population the Hausa are found in
enclaves, walled towns, or open viUages, which are the foci of
eoonomic, political, and administrative life in their respective
areas. Some of these Hausa enclaves are centuries old, others are
of recent foundation. Throughout the territory one also encounters
cattle-camps in the bush where the nomad Fulani
pastoralists tend their large-horned herds in the course of
migratory cycles which follow the movement of the seasons and
8eCk to avoid the tsetse fly."
This large area and variegated population is: now administered
as a single unit under the Fulani Sarnn Zazzau (ruler ofZaria, or
Emir, in the language of the Nigerian Government). Until 1950
he was directly responsible to the Government of Nigeria through
the senior local officers ofthe British Administration. the Resident,
and the Divisional Officer. ~
Before the British established their rule in Northern Nigeria
the beginning of this century, the Fulani had ruled Zaria by .
of conquest for almost a hundred years; and before the ~, .
conquest Zaria was a Habe kingdom, the southernmost of Seven
independent but closely related Rausa states, whose origins are
lost in antiquity.
For present purposes three critical events may be regarded Il8
1 See Cole, 1949- I See Stenning, )9.5'1 and )959.
INTRODUCTION 3
roarking eras in the development of Zazzau: (I) the introduction
',of Islam, c. 14561; (2) the conquest of Zaria by the Fulani in 1804;
':.(3) the incorporation of Zaria into the Protectorate of Northern
'Nigeria by Lugard in 1900. A fourth era began in 1951 with the
~'promulgationof the Macpherson constitution for the federation of
Nigeria, and with the development of responsible government
based on elections. However, as our study will not be concerned
with developments after 1950, no discussion of this new constitution
and its consequences will be attempted here.
Islamic influences reached Zaria, the capital of Zazzau, from the
north by way of the Habe states of Kano and Katsina, to which
also came camel caravans with salt and other products from the
Sahara and beyond, returning with grain, slaves, leather, cloth.
etc. In view of the number of pagan Hahe kings who ruled at
{ Zaria between 1486 and 180{. when the Fulani expelled the Habe
dynasty, it seems that Islamic prose1ytization at first made slow
headway in Zazzau. At this period the principal bond8 between the
seven Habe kingdoms, including Zazzau, and the more thoroughly
Is1amized populations of the Western Sudan, were commercial
and political rather than religious. But eventuaUy, in the early
nineteenth century, peaceful proselytization gave way to force.
Nomadic, semi-nomadic, and settled Fulani groups differing
6harply from the sedentary Hausa in physical and cultural features,
and led by a group of militant Fulani mallams (religious leaders
and Islamic scholars), then conquered all the Hausa 8tates in
turn, beginning with Daura, the oldest; these Habe kingdoms
were then incorporated into an expanding Fulani empire under
the leadership and control ofOthman Dan Fodio, the Fulani leader
who was thereafter known as the Sarkin Musulmi (Chief of the
M..lim8).
When the Fulani attacked Zazzau in 1804> the reigning Habe
king, Makau, fled southwards with certain followers to Zuba, and
managed to resist Fulani attacks from that place. Makau's successors
consolidated their position and established an independent
Habe state later known as Ahuja in this area, the population of
which had previously owed allegiance to them as rulers of Zazzau.
This Habe kingdom 8urvived until the arrival of the British,
despite severe Fulani attacks, and the kings of Ahuja to this day
8tyle themselves 'rulers of Zazzau', adhering to the distinctive
! Arnett, (909.