The intermarriage of the Kanembu and Borno peoples creates a new people and language, the Kanuri, but even in Borno, the Sayfawa Dynasty’s troubles persist.

For example, fifteen mais occupy the throne during the first three-quarters of the fifteenth century.

Then, around 1472, Mai Ali Dunamami defeats his rivals and begins the consolidation of Borno.

He builds a fortified capital at Ngazargamu, to the west of Lake Chad (in present-day Niger), the first permanent home a Sayfawa mai has enjoyed in a century.

So successful is the Sayfawa rejuvenation that by the early sixteenth century the Bilala are defeated and Njimi retaken.

The empire’s leaders, however, remain at Ngazargamu because its lands are more productive agriculturally and better suited to the raising of cattle.