Chap. LVII. FU'LBE IN SIXTEENTH CENTURY, 151 
lowed, for a certain period, to use it. Whether it 
be true, as the Fellani-n-Hausa assert, that Ivanta, 
the founder of the homonymous dynasty of Kebbi in 
the very beginning of the sixteenth century was 
originally a slave of a party of Fulbe settled in the 
country, a fact which, if confirmed, would prove 
the early settlement of the tribe in this country, 
I am unable to decide, although it is certainly true 
that in the course of the sixteenth century the Fulbe 
became strong enough, in the regions on the east 
side of the Fsa or Kwara, to exercise a great influence 
in the struggles which ensued between the successors 
of the first Kanta, while it was a chief of their 
tribe, the ruler of Danka, or Denga, who, according to 
A'hmed Baba *, first began his predatory incursions 
into the Songhay territory, laying waste the fertile 
and once extremely populous region along the lias el 
ma. It is thus explained how, even in the beginning 
of the seventeenth century, Fulbe tribes were settled 
in several places of Bagirmi.f 
But just on account of the vastness of the region 
over which they were scattered, were these people, 
while pursuing only their own local interest, powerless 
even in these loosely-connected and almost crumbling 
kingdoms, where they had found a new home, with 
the exception of Baghena, where they appear to have 
formed a nucleus of greater strength, but destitute 
of any religious impulse. 
* A'iimed Baba, J. L. O. S. vol. vi. p. 550. 
f See Vol. III. p. 433. 
L 4 
