the creation of an armed militia force that protected trade routes passing through the territories of various minor rulers. In the course of developing his state, Seku Wattara built a strong army composed mostly of defeated pagan groups. The leadership of the army eventually developed into a new warrior class, called sonangi, which was gradually separated from the overall dyula merchant class. The Kong Empire started to decline after the death of Seku Wattara. Succession struggles divided the kingdom into two parts, with the northern area being controlled by Seku's brother Famagan who refused to recognize the rule of Seku's oldest son in the south. Towards the end of the nineteenth century, many of Kong's provinces had formed independent chiefdoms. The city of Kong retained the prestige of an Islamic commercial center, but it was no longer the seat of an important political power. It eventually came under French colonial control in 1898. Despite the fall from glory, the seventeenth-century Kong Friday Mosque survived, and the city was largely rebuilt in a traditional Sudano-Sahelian architectural style and features a Qur'anic school. Kingdom of Wasulu The Mande conquerors of the nineteenth century frequently utilized trade routes established by the Dyula. Indeed, it was his exploitation of their commercial network that allowed military leader Samory Touré (1830–1900) to rise to a dominant position in the Upper Niger region. A member of a dyula family from Sanankoro in Guinea, Samori conquered and united Dyula states during the 1860s. He gained control over the Milo River Valley in 1871, seized the village of Kankan in 1881, and became the principal power holder on the Upper Niger. By 1883, Samori had successfully brought the local chieftains under his control and officially founded the kingdom of Wasulu. Having established an empire, he adopted the religious title of Almami in 1884 and recreated the Malian realm. This new state was governed by Samori and a council of kinsmen and clients who took on the management of the chancery and the treasury, and administered justice, religious affairs, and foreign relations. Unlike some of his contemporary state-builders, Samori was not a religious preacher, and Wasulu was not a reformist state as such. Nevertheless, he used Islam to unify the nation, promoting Islamic education and basing his rule on shari’a (Islamic law). However, Samori's professional army was the essential institution and the real strength behind his empire. He imported horses