254 
TRAVELS IN AFRICA. Chap. XXIX. 
2. Two other still shorter lists of the Bornu kings. 
3. A detailed history of the first twelve years of 
the reign of the king Edrls Alawoma, consisting of 
two parts, in my copy one of 77 and the other of 145 
pages, and written by a contemporary of the above- 
mentioned king, the imam Ahmed, son of Sorry a. Of 
this very interesting and important history a copy 
was forwarded by the late vizier of B6rnu, Haj Beshir 
ben Tirab, at my urgent request*, to Her Britannic 
Majesty's Government, and is now in the Foreign 
Office ; another copy I myself have brought back. 
4. A few facts regarding the history of this coun- 
try, mentioned by Arabic writers, such as Ebn Said 
(a.d. 1282), Ebn Batiita (a. d. 1353), Ebn Khaldiin 
(a.d. 138^), and Makrizi (about a.d. 1400), Leo 
Africanus (a. d. 1528). 
5. A short document containing information about 
embassies sent to Tripoli by some B6rnu kings, and 
published in the " Bulletin de la Societe Geogra- 
phique de Paris," 1849, 252. ff. 
I now proceed to inquire into the character of the 
first of these documents, which is the only one among 
them comprising the whole history of Bornu, and 
which therefore forms the basis of our tables. The 
most momentous question is, — upon what authority 
this document rests, and when it was compiled. 
As for the first point, I have been assured by Shitima 
* See a letter of mine from Kukawa, Nov. 20. 1852, addressed 
to Chevalier Bunsen, and published in Petermann's Mittheilungen, 
1855, p. 7. 
