HOUSSA, Housa, Haussa, or Hausa, an important people of the western Soudan, forming a main element in the population of the country between 12° and 13° N. lat., from the Niger in the south-west to Bornu in the east. By Barth they are identified with the Atarantians of Herodotus; and it is certain that at a comparatively early date they attained great political power. The seven original states of Biram, Daura, Gobir, Kano, Rano, Katsena, and Zegzeg, formed a great confederation or empire, which extended its authority over many of the neighbouring countries, and retained its pre-eminence till the beginning of the 19th century, when the Pullo (Fellata or Fulbe) rose upon its ruins. Physically the Houssa may be considered as the most typical of all the negro peoples: they are strongly and somewhat heavily built, and even where there has been a considerable intermixture of Barber or Pullo blood, their racial persistence is very marked. In intellectual qualities they hold the very foremost rank among the negroes; they are excellent agriculturists, and, almost unaided by foreign influence, they have developed a variety of industries, such as the making of cloth, mats, leather, and glass, as well as a very extensive trade. In Sierra Leone and the Gold Coast territory the Houssa form the backbone of the military policé, and under Captain Glover, who was the first to enrol them under the British flag, they did good service in the Ashantee campaigns....
The Houssa or Afnu language ranks as one of the richest and most cultivated in Africa; and it is not only the dominant vernacular throughout a large part of the Soudan, but serves as the means of communication in a great many places throughout the region to the south and west of the Lower Niger. At Idda, says Bishop Crowther {Proc. Roy. Geog. Soc., 1877), we found Houssa becoming more generally spoken by the inhabitants, and at Igbegbi it is one of the prevailing languages of the mixed population of that town. From Lagos, Badagry, and Porto Novo, and upwards to the Niger, wherever Mahometans are found, Houssa is spoken by them; through it the Koran is explained in the mosques throughout Yoruba. According to Dr Baikie {Observations on the Hausa and Fulfulde, printed for private circulation, Lond. 1861) there are two master dialects—the Daura or eastern, and the Gobir or western. Of these the latter is the more original, the other the more refined. The Katsena form is very pure, and closely resembles the Gobir; that of Kano is extremely corrupt, though not so much so as that of Zariya or Zozari. As an example of the richness of the vocabulary, Dr Crowther mentions that there are eight names for different parts of the day from cockcrow till after sunset.
See El Hage Abd Salam Shabeeny, Account of Timbuctoo and Haussa Territories, 1820; Norris, Dialogues and part of the New Testamentinthe English, Arabic, Haussa, andBornulanguages, 1853; Koelle, Polyglotta Africana, 1854; Barth, Travels in North and Central Africa, vol. ii., London, 1857, and Central- Afrikanische Vokabularien, Gotha, 1862 and 1866; Schön, Grammar of the Hausa Language, London, 1862; Id., Hausa Reading Book, 1877; and Id., A Dictionary of the Hausa Language, 1877. Schön has also produced Houssa translations of Gen. (1858), Matt. (1857), and Luke (1858).
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