Teguidda-n-Tessoumt
Tedgiddat · Tegidda
Iron Age to Medieval (500 BCE–1600 CE)·Tuareg / Hausa / pre-Tuareg herders·🇳🇪 Agadez Region, Niger
About
About Teguidda-n-Tessoumt
Evaporitic salt-source town 20 km from Ingal Cure Salée pasture festival, Teguidda-n-Tessoumt is brine-cooking complex from 500 BCE with 3,500 clay salt pans 40-cm troughs and alkaline brine spring 5 g/l lithium (?) producing 'awn' salt cattle, plus 3-m mounds with iron furnaces and houses 800 CE. Salt boiled in clay basins over fire; ethnographically living Tuareg method replicates prehistory. Cross-sited with Azelik copper dual-metal system (Azelik copper – Téguidda salt). Radiocarbon 800 BCE salt mound? Monod 1940s.
Why it mattersLongest-documented rock-salt industrial site in Sahel and component of Azelik-salt dual metal system of medieval Niger.
Open questions
Mysteries & theories
Mysteries
- 01Antiquity of salt technology 500 BCE earlier pan use vs furnace dating
- 02Teguidda-Ingal seasonal market depth
Theories
- 01Salt-copper dual exchange model (Bernus)
- 02Cure Salée pastoral gathering antiquity
Theories are interpretations, not findings. The seal above tells you how much scholarly weight the place carries.
History
How it came to be
- Built
- First salt mound 500 BCE; industrial intensification 500–1000 CE
- Period
- Iron Age to Medieval (500 BCE–1600 CE)
- Culture
- Tuareg / Hausa / pre-Tuareg herders
- Builders
- Brine boilers
- Purpose
- Trans-Saharan rock salt source for Sudan gold trade — complement to Azelik copper
- Rediscovered
- 1900s Foureau; 1970s Bernus
- Excavation
- Partially excavated
First salt mound 500 BCE; industrial intensification 500–1000 CE
Initial construction
c. 1336 CE
Rediscovery
On the ground
Structures & features
17.4194° N · 5.9200° E · 400 m · 1 mapped feature
Brine Spring and Evaporation Pans
industrial5×3 m brine pool and 3,500 clay trough field
17.4194° N · 5.9200° E