This volume covers five hundred years of history, beginning with the writings of travelers Ibn Battuta, Leo Africanus, Mungo Park, Heinrich Barth, René Caillé, and Mary Kingsley, as well as many others. Religious wars are described by chroniclers such as Abd Allah ibn Muhammad and Al-Kanami, Sire Abbas Soh, and Ahmadu Hampate Ba. The trans-Saharan and cross-Atlantic slave trades are a central concern of the book and the French and British colonial periods are also scrutinized. Modern times are examined in the texts of Nnamidi Azikiwe, Léopold Senghor, Sékou Touré, and Kwame Nkrumah. Special emphasis is placed on original African texts about political traditions, independence movements after WWII, the law, and other themes of social and political history. The African History in Documents series also features: Volume II: Eastern African History Volume III: Central and South African History