Did Yandoto last 1,000 years?

BackgroundOnce upon a time Yandoto had been a famous university town, just as Timbuktu was, attracting scholars from  the central sudan, as well as from further afield. Mohammed Bello in his Infaqul  Maisuri  describes Yandoto as a ‘university town.’ Various accounts indicate that Umaru Dallaji, the first Fulani Emir of Katsina, was  a scholar from […]

Background
Once upon a time Yandoto had been a famous university town, just as Timbuktu was, attracting scholars from  the central sudan, as well as from further afield. Mohammed Bello in his Infaqul  Maisuri  describes Yandoto as a ‘university town.’ Various accounts indicate that Umaru Dallaji, the first Fulani Emir of Katsina, was  a scholar from Yandoto, as  well as Sambo Dan Ashafa, the  founder of Gusau. Korau, who  founded a dynasty in Katsina, after overthrowing Sanau,  Sarkin Katsina, hailed from Yandoto. There are countless others too, including a remarkable coterie of female scholars, who were equally renowned in the central and western  sudan. Today, a cluster of Baobab trees can be seen in the abandoned settlement of Yandoto. The trees are quite massive and green in  the season, and the branches are  awesome in size, not  to talk of the tree  itself. Then there is Yandoton Daji. This   is  another community, which lies just down the road.It came into being following the collapse of Yandoto itself  in 1806.
Yandoto, 1,000 years?
But it is Yandoto which suffered collapse in the 19th century, that is the subject of this article. There are no records on the early history of the community,and most of the existing records on Yandoto date from the 19th century. Some scholars are of the opinion that Yandoto was well over 1,000 years old, by the time it collapsed in the 19th century. Sanusi  Gusau, Director Monuments, History   Bureau, Gusau, is one of the  scholars  who shares this view,   and  he says “One tradition states that Yandoto was founded soon after the  great flood which occurred at during the time of Noah. It holds that Yandoto was founded immediately after the flood occurred.”
He also refers to the arrival of Korau in Katsina,and explains that it can be used to make a point about  the age of Yandoto. His words “One other evidence is that relating to Korau who established a dynasty in Katsina, and this event has been put at the year 1450. It is thought that Yandoto must have attained  a certain level of development, for Korau to  have travelled up to Katsina and supplanted Sanau, the King of Katsina through a wrestling match. This clearly shows that people had been living in Yandoto for a very considerable period,  before Korau established  a dynasty at Katsina.”

Yusuf Adamu of the Department of Geography, Bayero University Kano thinks that Yandoto should be at least 1,000 years old. Yusuf Bala Usman in his The Transformation of Katsina 1400-1883 says of Yandoto “We do not know when Yandoto was built. It did not become incorporated  into the Kingdom of Zamfara and was not directly involved in the upheavals that accompanied the collapse of that kingdom in the mid -eighteenth century.” (P.47).
Centre of trade
Sanusi Gusau  says that Yandoto had, in addition to being a centre of learning, was also  a centre of commerce. According  to him “It was also a centre of commerce, and was linked to the Trans -saharan trade  routes, which actually passed through Yandoto. The famous Gonja trade in Kola nuts  was connected to Yandoto, because the trade route  conveying these Kola nuts passed through the town. It was also  in a strategic position, where trade  and commerce coming from the Arab world, would now have a connection to the hinterland.”

He says that at a point Yandoto had risen so highly in trade and commerce, that it replaced the position of Kano in terms of commerce. On the age of the settlement, he states “It is over a thousand years old.As  a town it is well over a thousand years old, but  a bit less than this  as an  Islamic centre.”
We know little
Yusuf Adamu  commenting on  Yandoto adds “We don’t know a lot of things about Yandoto. It had been in existence for a long time. There had also been a long relationship between Zamfara and Katsina. But we don’t know much about Yandoto, and much of what we know stems from the time of the 1804 Jihad.” He too  adds that Yandoto had been a centre of learning just as Timbuktu had once been. His  words “Most scholars who had been educated in the pre jihad period, learnt at Yandoto.”
Before Hausa states emerged
S.A Albasu writing in Islamic Learning and Intellectualism in Katsina outside the Birni: The  Yandoto Experience  states “According to one such tradition  Yandoto was founded long before the emergence of Hausa states. Another tradition went further to state that Yandoto was founded before the birth of Jesus Christ and was among the first one hundred and seventy settlements created by God.” Albasu adds that the existence of walls and dye pits at Yandoto seem to support its ancient origin.
 Female scholars
Sanusi Gusau, in his thesis titled The Yandoto Factor in Hausa Land  Before 1806  also comments on the scholars of the community. His words ‘Other scholars  have now been identified to include Sheikh Muhammad Al-Barbari who was said to have come from Borno to Yandoto in the course of his missionary tours. He was said to have lived first in a small settlement near Kano before  moving to Yandoto.

This scholar was reputed for his  mastery of Arabic Nahawu (Grammar)  and many facets of Islamic Knowledge. He was reputed to have corrected  many works in ‘Siba  al wai,’ a  highly regarded work in Arabic (p.23). He also  sheds light  on the female scholars in Yandoto. His  words “Al-Barbari for example had a daughter, who though crippled  was known to have mastered ‘Muqamathul Alkhariri’ and engaged in discourse  often from morning to evening. This lady scholar conducted interviews on prospective students that were aspiring to be admitted into ‘Al-Barbari’s’ school. Amongst the conditions for admitting prospective students into ‘Al-Barbari’s’ school was that a student must be able to narrate the whole of ‘Sabih  al Bukhari and Sahih al-Muslim’ with   their chain of narrators or ‘Isnads’.”
Help from Archaeology
K.T. Odofin, an Archeaeologist with the Department of Archaeology, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria  in  a joint paper titled ‘A Preliminary  Report On An Archaeological Survey Of Yandoto Abandoned Settlement, sheds light on the community that once flourished at Yandoto.’ In the course of the reconnaissance survey, we were able to roughly determine the site of the abandoned settlement of Yandoto. The reconnaissance survey carried out indicated that the abandoned settlement was fairly large, about 1.6 sq km in size. This perhaps lays credence to the various accounts which identify Yandoto site as an acclaimed Islamic centre of learning.”

He also makes another insightful comment on pottery production at Yandoto.  
His  words “Evidence of pottery production, iron smelting and dyeing activities at the site indicates awareness and ability of inhabitants of Yandoto site to exploit resources of their natural environment for their benefits. It also indicates how diversified the technologies of the people were at the time Yandoto abandoned settlement was occupied.” (p.18). The Jury is still out as to whether Yandoto was a thousand years old as a town by the time it collapsed in the 19th century. However, it was of such an advanced development, that it  yielded a crop of formidable Islamic scholars, whose stirring example shaped life and learning in western and central Sudan quite considerably.