Kano is a city and capital of Kano state, northern Nigeria, on the Jakara River. It was traditionally founded by Kano, a blacksmith of the Gaya tribe who in ancient times came to Dalla Hill in the locality in search of iron. Modern Kano is a major commercial and industrial centre. Peanuts (groundnuts), a local subsistence crop and now the prime commodity, are bagged and stored in huge pyramids before being sent to Lagos for export. The second most important traditional export is that of hides and skins.
Dalla Hill (1,753 feet [534 m]) and Goron Dutse Hill (1,697 feet [517 m]) dominate the old city, which has lowland pools and borrow pits, source of the mud for building its square, flat-roofed houses. The population is mostly Hausa, mainly Kano (Kanawa), but also includes the Abagagyawa, who claim descent from Kano’s original inhabitants, and Fulani. The city is subdivided into about 100 unguwa (“hamlets”), each with a mosque and usually a market. The oldest building is the 15th-century Gidan Rumfa (now the emir’s palace), next to which is the central mosque (1951), Nigeria’s largest. Also facing Emir’s Square is the Makama’s House, among Kano’s oldest structures and since 1959 housing a museum of Hausa and Fulani artifacts. Kano is the seat of Bayero University (1977), Kano State Institute for Higher Education, an Arabic law school (1934), several teacher-training institutes, a state polytechnic college, a commercial school, and an agricultural (peanut) research institute. The British Council Library and Kano State Library are located in the city. Kano is served by the railway network between Nguru and Lagos and Port Harcourt; it is also a crossroads for highways traversing Kano state as of decades ago.
This is the founding state of Gwandara speaking people, Gade and the Maguzawa at large. The Gwandaras left Kano at about 14th century to escape the invasion of Islam. The Gwanda-rawa-da-Sallah people are the major occupants of Dalla (where their major rituals and tradition are observed), Goron Dutse and well as Dan-bata and Makoda settlement in Kano state with their district heads recognized by the Kano emirate.
Story by: Alh. Jibril Abdullahi Imam – Karshi (GWADECA Chairperson – FCT Chapter) | edited by: Musa Muhammed-Mustapha