In the first two decades of the twentieth century the affairs of northern Somalia were dominated by the politico-religious movement led by Muhammad Abdullah Hassan. The 'Mad Mullah', as he was styled by the British, proved to be an elusive adversary and at one time forced the British to evacuate their Somaliland Protectorate. The Italians too were concerned about the Mullah's dervishes, who disturbed the peace of Italy's two nominal protectorates, the sultanates of Obbia and the Mijertein, and of their colony in southern Somalia. At one time the Italians found a temporary solution to the problem by granting the Mullah the Nogal Territory in northern Italian Somaliland. For the Ethiopians the Mullah's movement posed a threat to their Empire's expansion eastward to the Indian Ocean because of its appeal for support from among the Ogaden Somalis. Although the Mullah's recruits were mostly Darod Somalis, for Somalis of other tribes he was not only the agent of a not always acceptable religious movement, but also the symbol of political revolt against foreign domination of any kind. Today the Mullah is regarded as a forerunner of contemporary Somali nationalism.
The Journal of African History (JAH) publishes articles and book reviews ranging widely over the African past, from the late Stone Age to the present. In recent years increasing prominence has been given to economic, cultural and social history and several articles have explored themes which are also of growing interest to historians of other regions such as: gender roles, demography, health and hygiene, propaganda, legal ideology, labour histories, nationalism and resistance, environmental history, the construction of ethnicity, slavery and the slave trade, and photographs as historical sources. Contributions dealing with pre-colonial historical relationships between Africa and the African diaspora are especially welcome, as are historical approaches to the post-colonial period.
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