- Sudan (region)
:"For the country in north-east Africa see
Sudan ".The Sudan, from the Arabic "bilâd as-sûdân" or "land of the
Blacks " (an expression denoting West andCentral Africa [International Association for the History of Religions, "Numen", (E.J. Brill: 1959), p.131: "West Africa may be taken as the country stretching from Senegal in the west, to the Cameroons in the east; sometimes it has been called the central and western Sudan, the Bilad as-Sūdan, "Land of the Blacks", of the Arabs."] ), is a geographic region stretching from West to Eastern Africa. The phrase "The Sudan" is also used by some to refer specifically to the modern-day country ofSudan , the savanna of which forms much of the larger region.The Sudan extends in a band across Africa from
Mali (formerly known asFrench Sudan when it was aFrench colony ) in the west to the western edge of theEthiopian Highlands in the east. To the north lies theSahel , a more aridAcacia savanna region which in turn borders theSahara desert, and to the east Ethiopia (called "al-Ḥabašah" in Arabic). The grass in the Sudan is longer than in the Sahel, and because the region receives more rainfall than the Sahel it is more suitable forfarming .The region is divided by the
Cameroon Highlands into eastern and western halves. To the south of the western part is the Guinea forest-savanna mosaic. To the east inSudan are theSudd flooded grasslands, and to the south theNorthern Congolian forest-savanna mosaic .ee also
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Sudanian Savanna Notes
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