Darfur's Complex Pre-Colonial History

Forget everything you thought you knew about Darfur. Let's go back in time,

revealing a complex history often overlooked, when two of the most prominent kingdoms in the

history of Sudan coincided together, the Funj Sultanate and the Sultanate of Darfur.

Darfur was a powerful independent sultanate since its establishment in the 17th century.

It was an organized multiethnic kingdom with its own sophisticated system of governance.

Although the word Darfur itself means land of Fur, which was the prominent tribe in

the region, however, eventually the sultan granted land not just based on

ethnicity, but for loyalty and services to the state. This created a