One of the oldest urbanized settlement complexes in West Africa, an occupation mound in the Niger Inland Delta near modern Djenné, Mali. Excavations by Roderick and Susan McIntosh found long-distance trade goods and evidence of African rice domestication; the site is notable in archaeology as an early city that shows no evidence of a centralized king or monumental elite architecture (a 'heterarchy'), challenging older assumptions that West African urbanism required contact with trans-Saharan traders.
Djenné-Djeno was gradually abandoned in favor of the neighboring town of Djenné by around 1400 CE as regional trade patterns shifted; the mound is today a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Written by the archaeologist who led the Djenné-Djeno excavations; situates the site within the broader urban tradition of the Middle Niger and its 'city without a king' model.