Description
Djado, standing on a peak in front of the threatening immensity of the Ténéré. The "Mont-Saint-Michel of the Sands"... This is one of the strangest sites in Niger. If you look at the walls of this medieval fortress, surrounded by rotting water, you will realise that salt is the main material. The Tibbous still come to camp on the site at the time of the date harvest, but the town itself is abandoned to the spirits, and nothing is more moving than the journey through these deserted streets in which the walls of this ancient metropolis are crumbling, one by one. Archaeologically, the site deserves serious excavation and work, but it is located in an area with very difficult access. Moreover, its former occupants were victims of its geographical situation, at the limit of the plain and the mountain, at a time when the latter was the safest refuge against the permanent threat of looters. – Niger - 1968
Description
Djado, standing on a peak in front of the threatening immensity of the Ténéré. The "Mont-Saint-Michel of the Sands"... This is one of the strangest sites in Niger. If you look at the walls of this medieval fortress, surrounded by rotting water, you will realise that salt is the main material. The Tibbous still come to camp on the site at the time of the date harvest, but the town itself is abandoned to the spirits, and nothing is more moving than the journey through these deserted streets in which the walls of this ancient metropolis are crumbling, one by one. Archaeologically, the site deserves serious excavation and work, but it is located in an area with very difficult access. Moreover, its former occupants were victims of its geographical situation, at the limit of the plain and the mountain, at a time when the latter was the safest refuge against the permanent threat of looters. – Niger - 1968
