Zaria - City of Nigeria

Zaria is a major city in Kaduna State in Northern Nigeria. First known as Zazzau, it was one of the original seven Hausa city-states. The current Emir of Zaria is Shehu Idris.

Zaria, initially known as Zazzau, was also the capital of the Hausa kingdom of Zazzau. However, human settlement predates the rise of Zazzau, as the region like a few of its neighbors had a history of sedentary Hausa settlement, with institutional but pre-capitalist market exchange and farming.

In the late 1490s, Islam arrived Zaria by the way of its sister Habe cities, Kano and Katsina. Along with Islam, trade also flourished between the cities as traders brought camel caravans filled with salt in exchange for slaves and grain. Between the fifteenth and sixteenth century the kingdom became a tributary state of the Songhai Empire. In 1805 it was captured by the Fulani during the Fulani Jihad. British forces led by Frederick Lugard took the city in 1901.

Zaria is home to Ahmadu Bello University, the largest university in Nigeria and the second largest in the African continent. The institution is very prominent in the fields of Agriculture, Science, Finance, Medicine and Law.