Sao civilisation

The Sao civilization (also called So) flourished in Central Africa from the 2000 BC, to as late as the 16th century AD. The Sao lived by the Chari River basin in territory that later became part of Cameroon and Chad. They were the earliest civilization to have left clear traces of their presence in the territory of modern Chad and Cameroon. Sometime around the 16th century, conversion to Islam changed the cultural identity of the former Sao. Today, several ethnic groups of northern Cameroon and southern Chad, but particularly the Sara and Kotoko, claim descent from the civilization of the Sao.

Origins

The Sao civilization is hypothesized to have descended from the earlier Gajiganna culture of Lake Chad, which dated from about the 18th to the 9th century BCE, eventually taking Sao form between the 11th and 4th centuries BCE, such that, by the end of the first millennium BCE, Sao presence was well established around Lake Chad and near the Chari River. The city-states of the Sao reached their apex sometime between the ninth and fifteenth centuries CE.

Although some scholars estimate that the Sao civilization south of Lake Chad lasted until the fourteenth or fifteenth century, the majority opinion is that it ceased to exist as a separate culture sometime in the 16th century after the expansion of the Bornu Empire. The Kotoko are the inheritors of the former city states of the Sao.

Culture

A widely accepted theory is that the Sao were indigenous inhabitants of the Lake Chad basin and that their ultimate origins lie south of the lake. Recent archaeological research indicates that the Sao civilization developed indigenously from earlier cultures in the region (such as the Gajiganna culture, which began at around 1,800 BCE and began to build fortified towns by about 800 BCE), gradually increasing in complexity. Sites like Zilum of the Chad Basin are examples of this.