Godala

The Godala is a Berber tribe in Northern Africa that lived along the Atlantic coast [1] in present day Mauritania [2] and participated in the Saharan salt trade [3] and the salt mines of Ijiil. The Godala may be linked to or the same as the Gaetuli tribe of Berbers [4]

According to a 1985 study of West African history,[5] the area along both sides of the mouth of the Senegal River was controlled by the - Godala group of Berbers. They mined the Awlil salt deposits along the coast just north of the mouth of the Senegal, and controlled a coastal trade route that linked southern Morocco. Godala territory bordered that of Takrur, and Godala caravans traded salt mined at Awlil along the north bank of the Senegal. [6]

Sources

• General History of Africa: Africa from the twelfth to the sixteenth century edited by D. T. Niane, UNESCO, 1984 - 751 pages, (found on Google books) link
• UNESCO General History of Africa, Vol. IV, Abridged Edition: Africa from the Twelfth to the Sixteenth Century. By Joseph Ki-Zerbo, (found on Google books) University of California Press, May 10, 1998 - 277 pages, p62 link
• WESTERN AFRICA TO c1860 A.D. A PROVISIONAL HISTORICAL SCHW BASED ON CLIMATE PERIODS by George E. Brooks, Indiana University African Studies Program, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, August, 1985 [7]