The Chronicles of Two West African Kingdoms

Mauro Nobili is a historian of pre-colonial and early colonial West Africa. His research examines the political and intellectual history of Muslim societies in the region from the late Middle Ages to the early colonial period, focusing specifically but not exclusively on modern-day Republic of Mali. Through his research, he has worked in several archives of Arabic manuscripts in West Africa (Mauritania, Mali, Senegal, Nigeria, Ghana, and Cote d'Ivoire), in Europe (France and Denmark), and in the United States, as well as in colonial archives in Britain (Foreign Office, the National Archives) and Germany (Staatsbibliothek, Hamburg). Zachary Wright is associate dean for faculty affairs at Northwestern University in Qatar and professor in residence in the Liberal Arts Program, with joint appointments in History and Religious Studies. Wright received his PhD in history from Northwestern University, his MA in Arabic studies/Middle East history from the American University in Cairo, and his BA in history from Stanford University. He teaches classes on Islam in Africa, Islamic Intellectual History, African history, and Middle East history. His research focuses on Islamic intellectual history in West and North Africa, from the 15th century to the present. Most of Wright's field research has been conducted in Senegal, Morocco, and Mauritania, with Arabic, French, and Wolof language sources. Ali Diakite is a Cataloguer for West African Manuscripts. He joined the Hill Museum (HMML) in 2019. A native of Burkina Faso, he holds a MA from the Universite de Bamako Department of Arabic Studies, Bamako, Mali, and a MA and PhD from the Ecole Normale Superieure, Lyon, France. Prior to joining HMML, Diakite was at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign working on a postdoctoral fellowship financed by the Gerda Henkel Foundation, Germany.