Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book.Sample Book Insights:#1 The city of Djenné, Mali, was the oldest known urban civilization in Africa outside of Egypt. It was also the most recently discovered example of a major ancient urban civilization.#2 The city of Djenné in Mali was one of the first to trade with the outside world, hundreds of years before Arabs arrived in North Africa. It thrived by trading fish, grains, and copper and other metals with places hundreds of miles away.#3 The Ghana Empire was ruled by a Muslim elite, but the capital city was located six miles away from another capital city that was still honoring older, ancestral religions. This allowed the empire to benefit from both lucrative trade and peaceful relations with the Berbers.#4 The gold that flowed out of the Sudan played a crucial role in the Arab golden age, a period of explosive growth and political expansion that began around 750 CE and extended until the Mongol invasions of the thirteenth century.