Liptako is an historic region of West Africa. It today falls in eastern

Burkina Faso Burkina Faso is a landlocked country in West Africa, bordered by Mali to the northwest, Niger to the northeast, Benin to the southeast, Togo and Ghana to the south, and Ivory Coast to the southwest. It covers an area of 274,223 km2 (105,87 ...

, southwestern

Niger Niger, officially the Republic of the Niger, is a landlocked country in West Africa. It is a unitary state Geography of Niger#Political geography, bordered by Libya to the Libya–Niger border, north-east, Chad to the Chad–Niger border, east ...

and a small portion of southeast central

Mali Mali, officially the Republic of Mali, is a landlocked country in West Africa. It is the List of African countries by area, eighth-largest country in Africa, with an area of over . The country is bordered to the north by Algeria, to the east b ...

. A hilly region beginning on the right back of the

Niger river The Niger River ( ; ) is the main river of West Africa, extending about . Its drainage basin is in area. Its source is in the Guinea Highlands in south-eastern Guinea near the Sierra Leone border. It runs in a crescent shape through Mali, Nige ...

, Liptako is usually associated with the Liptako Emirate, an early 19th-century

Fulani The Fula, Fulani, or Fulɓe people are an ethnic group in Sahara, Sahel and West Africa, widely dispersed across the region. Inhabiting many countries, they live mainly in West Africa and northern parts of Central Africa, South Sudan, Darfur, ...

Islamic Islam is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the Quran, and the teachings of Muhammad. Adherents of Islam are called Muslims, who are estimated to number Islam by country, 2 billion worldwide and are the world ...

state, founded by Brahima Saidu. A modern remnant of the emirate continues to exist as a

non-sovereign monarchy A non-sovereign monarchy, subnational monarchy or constituent monarchy is one in which the head of the Monarchy, monarchical polity (whether a geographic territory or an ethnic group), and the polity itself, are subject to a temporal authority h ...

. The current emir, Ousmane Amirou Dicko, lives in Dori. With the semi nomadic Fula, the main historic population of Liptako are the Gourmantche, a minority population in each of the three nations, as well as the Mossi and Songhai. The other common name for the region, Liptako–Gourma, is a reference to the Gourmantche people. Modern Liptako, most of which falls in 10 to 19 provinces of Burkina Faso, along with Niger's Tera Department and Say Department, and small parts of Mali, is a hilly and in parts sparsely populated area. As elsewhere, the Fula population, known as the "Liptaako" or Liptako Fula, are historically supported by semi-nomadic cattle raising and trade. Say, a nearby Niger River trade center, regionally dominant in the 19th century, relied in part on Fula trade routes through Liptako. In the late 20th century,

gold Gold is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol Au (from Latin ) and atomic number 79. In its pure form, it is a brightness, bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile metal. Chemically, gold is a transition metal ...

and other minerals were discovered here, leading to the 1970 creation of the Liptako–Gourma Authority: a regional zone focused on the promotion of the area's mineral, energy, hydraulic, and agricultural resources. The zone covered by the authority covers an area of 370,000 km², broader than the historic Liptako, including 19 provinces of Burkina Faso, 4 administrative regions of Mali, and two

Regions In geography, regions, otherwise referred to as areas, zones, lands or territories, are portions of the Earth's surface that are broadly divided by physical characteristics (physical geography), human impact characteristics (human geography), and ...

and an urban community of Niger. Major towns in Liptako include Diagourou, Téra in Niger, and Dori,

Koala The koala (''Phascolarctos cinereus''), sometimes inaccurately called the koala bear, is an arboreal herbivorous marsupial native to Australia. It is the only Extant taxon, extant representative of the Family (biology), family ''Phascolar ...

and Aribinda in Burkina Faso.Martin B.Klien (reviewer) Irwin, Paul. - Liptako Speaks. History from Oral Tradition in Africa. Cahiers d'études africaines, 1984, Volume 24, Issue 96, pp. 511-512

References

{{Coord, 17.20466, -2.413394, display=title Geography of Niger Geography of Mali Geography of Burkina Faso Regions of Africa Emirates of the Sokoto Caliphate

See also

References