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Talk:Wassoulou Empire

Wiki Education assignment: Aid, Arms, and Armies - The Politics of Intervention in Africa

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 2 February 2023 and 8 May 2023. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): PSCI226 (article contribs). Peer reviewers: Reesedog15, Mahaletn.

— Assignment last updated by ProfWellman (talk) 20:08, 13 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]


The re-organizations, additions, and added citations to this page aim to give a more complete and easy to follow overview of the Wassoulou Empire.

Name

I have yet to find a good source that uses the term 'Wassoulou Empire' for Samory's state, and I have found some that say that it did not have a name. Mostly the internet is full of blogs and websites that appear to have taken their information from Wikipedia. When this page was created there was no source for the name, and I'm worried that Wikipedia may have seeded this name into the world without any actual evidence that it's real.

I will continue to look into this, but unless there is a reputable source from before this page's publishing date that uses the name 'Wassoulou Empire' we may need to move the page to 'Samory's Empire' or something. Catjacket (talk) 23:07, 22 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

This book explicitly states that Samori's empire did not have a name on page 123.
Yves Person, who is probably the authority on Samori, said this: "Gallieni (1885, p. 597-599) est le premier à donner quelques renseignements sur le Wasulu qu'il distingue parfaitement des états de Samori (appelés à tort Morébélédougou). Ceci rend impardonnable la confusion opérée cinq ans plus tard par Péroz, confusion qui a malheureusement connu la plus large diffusion." Translation: "Gallieni is the first to give information on Wassulu, which he clearly distinguishes from Samori's lands (incorrectly called Morebeledougou). This makes the confusion wrought five years later by Peroz unpardonable, a confusion that unfortunately has been very widely disseminated." He is apparently referring to this book, where Peroz calls Samori's empire 'l'empire Ouassoulou'.
It seems to me that most reputable sources (from Person on down to Encyclopedia Britannica) do not use the name 'Wassoulou Empire'. Wikipedia's use of it has helped spread and magnify the mistake. I think we should change the name of the article, but I'm not sure to what.
I would like your input please @HetmanTheResearcher @Kowal2701 . Catjacket (talk) 08:08, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the ping, some reputable sources use "Wassoulou empire":
Sources for Samory's empire (or Samori):
Kowal2701 (talk) 13:41, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Btw here's the full text for Shillington's Encyclopedia of African History, it's a great source Kowal2701 (talk) 13:45, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for finding those. I think they kind of prove my point tho. The sources that use 'Wassoulou Empire' are not the ones that are actually about Samori Toure, but are instead about art or post-independence governance or whatever and just use the term because it's in the air. The historians of the period use 'Mandinka Empire' or something else, presumably because they understand that the term is at best confusing (with Wassoulou) and at worst straight-up wrong. Is the fact that 'Wassoulou Empire' is widely, if incorrectly, used a good enough reason to keep it? I would say no. Catjacket (talk) 14:06, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Idk, there really aren’t any reputable sources from the last decade using Samory’s empire though. Although I’d be fine with changing it to that. Mandinka empire is far too confusing imo, and should probably be a disambiguation page Kowal2701 (talk) 14:11, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not sure I agree, since there is some support in the sources for 'Mandinka Empire', and it's clearly distinct from Bambara/Segou and the Mali Empire. I personally prefer 'Samorian Empire' or (almost as good) 'Samorian State', but I haven't seen that term used much in the literature.
I will officially propose a move so we can do this by the book, and anyone can put in feedback. Definitely wanna wait for @HetmanTheResearcher since he added some of the alternative names to this article. Catjacket (talk) 14:34, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I did post one below. Another one (if allowing 2008 as still being a recent source) would be History, Memory and the Legacy of Samori in Southern Mali, C. 1880-1898 by Brian J. Peterson, who uses "Samorian state" and "Samorian empire" interchangeably, although does not seem to make the second word in each uppercase. HetmanTheResearcher (talk) 19:01, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yves Person is an excellent source, if dated. There are more recent sources which explicitly do claim an official name such as Commerce and Colonialism in the Regalia of the Samorian State (2020) by Angie Epifano. She states on page 40:
"Throughout this article I use the term “Samorian State” to refer to the empire ruled by Touré. The Samorian State is also sometimes known as the State of Samory, the Samorian Empire, the Wassoulou State, and the Wassoulou Empire. In oral histories, my interlocutors most often referred to Touré’s empire as the Wassoulou State. Here, I choose to use the nineteenth-century term “Samorian State” to avoid contemporary connotations."
Based on this, Samorian State appears to be the most common name in literature while Wassoulou State would best fit an official name if we accept Epifano's mention here as valid. I agree with you though that "Wassoulou Empire" is a Wikipedia invention, likely added in without a source early in the history of this page (there is no way Epifano's work could have been the source for this given it was added years before her work was published.) HetmanTheResearcher (talk) 18:54, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'm sympathetic to the argument against Wassoulou, but if recent sources and locals use it, then I don't think we should be changing it. But looking at ngrams it does appear we popularised the use of it. Samori's empire, Wassoulou Empire, and Samorian state all have peaks at similar heights in the last few decades, so you can make arguments for all three. Kowal2701 (talk) 19:17, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Ideally I want "Empire" changed to "State" per Epifanio's argument. If locals use the latter term instead of the former along with recent sources, we should be using that. Meanwhile, I "Wassoulou" kept either way.
A change to "Samorian State" or "Samorian Empire" would see more support when looking at primary sources [1], [2], [3] but given the severe biases involved with such sources they should take a backseat to secondary sources. At best we could use these if we don't find consensus in secondary sources on any of the names you mentioned. HetmanTheResearcher (talk) 21:14, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I think either 'Samorian State' or 'Samorian Empire' is the move. Epifano was talking to people on the ground who used 'Wassoulou State' and still chose to go with 'Samorian State'. Her argument about contemporary connotations is sound and proves that confusion is a problem. I also don't want to default to unnamed oral historians, especially since Person mentioned in the 1960s that 'Wassoulou' had already at that point become well-known despite the fact that it's incorrect. The fact that village elders use it in the 2010s, over 100 years after Peroz first (and apparently incorrectly) popularized it, does not prove that 'Wassoulou State' was the official name.
Between the two, I prefer 'Samorian Empire' because it was in fact an empire and not merely a Mandinka state, but 'Samorian State' is also fine.
I think it's clear that we're not going to find a scholarly consensus on any one name, probably because there was no official name for the state. We need to choose between the ubiquity of 'Wassoulou' and the more correct, but less common, 'Samorian State' or 'Samorian Empire'. Considering the fact that Wikipedia likely has played an important role in popularizing the less-correct name, I vote for the latter. Given what we know, keeping 'Wassoulou Empire' probably violates WP:CIRCULAR. Catjacket (talk) 21:44, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'm fine with "Samorian". I personally prefer "State". While Samori did very blatantly engage in empire-y activities I'm concerned that calling this entity an "Empire" will give a false impression that this "Samorian Empire" was an official name when we both know it's not (this issue likely exists with other Wikipedia articles as well). There's also other West African states of the 19th century which engaged in similarly aggressive expansion campaigns but do not have the title "Empire" on their page, the Sokoto Caliphate being the first which comes to my mind.
Given this discussion a separate section could be made explaining the various names given to this entity with the sources provided in this talk page as references. HetmanTheResearcher (talk) 23:36, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
From what I know of the Sokoto Caliphate, that was its official name. If anything it seems to me that states in West Africa tend to be called empires when they shouldn't be rather than vice versa (e.g. Massina Empire) or that we attach the term 'empire' to entities that act more as confederations (Jolof Empire, Kaabu Empire). For this case, where it's definitely an empire, we should not be afraid to use the term.
I will absolutely be drafting a 'name' section at the top of the article that summarizes the various issues we've discussed here once the move is made. Will ping you when it's up so you can make any necessary adjustments. Catjacket (talk) 08:31, 24 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Sure, I'll check when you've finished your work to make any further improvements. HetmanTheResearcher (talk) 09:39, 24 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Requested move 23 February 2025

Wassoulou Empire → Mandinka Empire – See discussion above. The most specialized and well-attested sources in the literature use 'Mandinka Empire' or alternatives such as 'Samorian State', or 'Samorian Empire'. 'Wassoulou Empire' is a misnomer with no historical foundation and creates confusion with Wassoulou, so I believe keeping the current name is the worst option. Catjacket (talk) 14:54, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

- Oppose Mandinka Empire per Kowal2701. Per the discussion above I Support "Samorian Empire" or "Samorian State" HetmanTheResearcher (talk) 09:51, 24 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Kowal2701 (talk) 16:01, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think your sources make for much of a defense of Wassoulou. The recent reputable sources you cite offer at best lukewarm support for 'Wassoulou', and in some instances provide further evidence that it's not the best term. The Encyclopedia of Empire calls it 'Wassalou (Mandinka)' in the title, then uses Mandinka in every instance in the body of the text. The oxford handbook of peace history uses 'Wassoulou', but the only source that the author has for Samory-related content does not use 'Wassoulou'. Probably another instance of Wikipedia seeding the term and the author assuming it was correct. The Encyclopaedia of Historical Metrology, Weights, and Measures is hardly a specialized source, and uses it in passing. I can't find the full text to African Nationalism, but it appears to be only a reference to Sekou Toure's use of Samori's memory rather than a discussion of the empire itself.
Your examples against the Mandinka empire are valid, so I'll concede that point. Luckily it's all resolved if we go with 'Samorian Empire' or 'Samorian State', which resolves all the concerns abouts confusion and better matches the secondary literature. Catjacket (talk) 21:24, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Given the ngrams results given in the above discussion, if it needed to be changed I’d be more inclined to support Samori's empire as that has historically had a lot of support (used by both the Cambridge History of Africa and General History of Africa) and still gets decent support. Similar to Tippu Tip's state Kowal2701 (talk) 21:31, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Correct me if I'm misunderstanding Ngrams, but isn't that just counting instances of the phrase? It doesn't mean that the authors are claiming that as the name of the state, just that they use the phrase 'Samori's empire' a lot, in the same way that you could say 'Charles's kingdom' instead of using the technical term 'United Kingdom'. Catjacket (talk) 21:48, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Titles don’t have to be a proper name, for instance titles with a lowercase "kingdom" or "empire" aren’t proper names (WP:SENTENCECASE) Kowal2701 (talk) 10:30, 24 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I didn't mean proper names as a grammatical category, I meant official. Taking Tippu Tip's state as an example, without knowing anything about the sources, I would argue that 'Sultanate of Utetera' would be a better name. Likewise 'Timurid Empire' is better than Timur's Empire, Gallic Empire is better than 'Postumus's Empire', etc. Assigning possession of an empire to one person in the name pre-supposes that the state does not survive the individual, which may be the case in reality but is not intrinsic to the entity. Calling it 'Samori's empire' raises the question of why we even have a separate page instead of just folding it into Samori Ture, like for Rabih az-Zubayr. Catjacket (talk) 13:07, 24 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Unfortunately official or native names don't carry any extra weight according to policy, see WP:Official name. WP:Common name usually rules in RMs, such that if the UK were called "Charles' kingdom" most often in RSs that's the name we'd probably have regardless of its stupidity. Regarding having separate articles for ruler and state, it sort of depends what RSs do, whether they talk about the state enough to warrant an article or make it personal when writing its history. Also whether there's enough content for Government, Religion, Economy, Society and culture sections in a state article. For example, regarding the 19th century Chagga empire led by Orombo, there's very little on the state itself, and sources focus on Orombo, so it wouldn't make sense to have an article on the state. Since Tippu Tip's state only has a brief history section, it should probably be merged. Kowal2701 (talk) 15:43, 24 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Quelle: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Wassoulou_Empire