The Mandingo turn to Islam and go on to build Mali

Leo Africanus dated the conversion of the Mandingo to Islam to about 1050. The first of their rulers to adopt the faith is said to have been converted by an Almoravid prince, the uncle of Sultan Yusuf ibn Tashfin, who founded Marrakesh. The Mandingo held a large stretch of the western Sudanese plateau, and their language and physical type set them apart from their neighbours. They had long intermarried with the Peul and with Arab and Berber invaders whose influence runs through the whole Niger basin, which is why travellers called them red men. Ethnographers who dealt with them called them intelligent, industrious, proud and courteous. Out of this population came the empire of Mali, which held together for close to six centuries and had its best years between the eleventh century and the seventeenth. Its rulers made the pilgrimage to Mecca like other Muslims, and several used the journey to recruit scholars and administrators to bring home.