Funj Sultanate
Funj Sultanate | |||||||||||||
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| 1504–1821 | |||||||||||||
Funj branding mark (al-wasm)
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The Funj Sultanate at its peak in around 1700 | |||||||||||||
| Capital | Sennar | ||||||||||||
| Common languages | Arabic (official language, lingua franca and language of Islam, increasingly spoken language) Nubian languages (native tongue, increasingly replaced by Arabic) | ||||||||||||
| Religion | Sunni Islam, Coptic Christianity | ||||||||||||
| Government | Monarchy | ||||||||||||
| Sultan | |||||||||||||
• 1504–1533/4 | Amara Dunqas (first) | ||||||||||||
• 1805–1821 | Badi VII (last) | ||||||||||||
| Legislature | Great Council Shura | ||||||||||||
| History | |||||||||||||
• Established | 1504 | ||||||||||||
| 14 June 1821 | |||||||||||||
• Annexed to Egypt Province, Ottoman Empire[a] | 13 February 1841 | ||||||||||||
| Currency | Barter[b]
After 1700: Spanish Reals Ottoman Para and Akçe | ||||||||||||
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| Today part of | |||||||||||||
^ a. Muhammad Ali of Egypt was granted the non-hereditary governorship of Sudan by an 1841 Ottoman firman. ^ b. The Funj mostly did not mint coins and the markets rarely used coinage as a form of exchange. Coinage didn't become widespread in cities until the 18th century. French surgeon J. C. Poncet, who visited Sennar in 1699, mentions the use of foreign coins such as Spanish reals. | |||||||||||||
The Funj Sultanate, also known as Funjistan, Sultanate of Sennar after its capital of Sennar, or Blue Sultanate was a kingdom in what is now Sudan, northwestern Eritrea and western Ethiopia. Founded in 1504 by the Funj people, it quickly converted to Islam, although this conversion was only nominal. Until a more orthodox form of Islam took hold in the 18th century, the state remained an "African empire with a Muslim façade", coming to rule over an ethnically diverse population.
At its greatest extent the polity extended from the Third Cataract southwards to the Ethiopian Highlands and Sobat River, east to the Red Sea, and west to Kordofan and the Nuba Mountains. It reached its peak in the late 17th century, but declined and eventually fell apart in the 18th and 19th centuries. In 1821, the last sultan, greatly reduced in power, surrendered to the Turco-Egyptian conquest without resistance.