the forested zones in the south by establishing caravan routes and trading posts at strategic locations throughout the region en route to cola-producing areas. By the start of the sixteenth century, dyula merchants were trading as far south as the coast of modern Ghana. On the forest's northern fringes, new states emerged, such as Bono and Banda. As the economic value of gold and kola became appreciated, forests south of these states which had hitherto been little inhabited because of limited agricultural potential became more thickly populated, and the same principles of political and military mobilization began being applied there. Village communities became tributaries of ruling groups, with some members becoming the clients and slaves needed to support royal households, armies, and trading enterprises. Sometimes these political changes were not to the advantage of the Dyula, who employed Mande warriors to guard their caravans and if necessary could call in larger contingents from the Sudanic kingdoms. In the seventeenth century, tensions between the Muslims and the local pagans in Begho erupted into a destructive war which eventually led to the total abandonment of the Banda capital. The local people eventually settled in a number of towns further east, while the dyula withdrew to the west to the further side of the Banda hills where they established the new trading center of Bonduku. Gonja state The dyula presence and changes in the balance of power occasioned political upheavals in other places. Among the paramount Mande political initiatives along trade routes south of Jenne was creation of the dyula state of Gonja by Naba'a in the 16th century. This was motivated by a general worsening of the competitive position of dyula traders and was occasioned by three factors: (1) a near-monopoly control in exporting forest produce achieved by the Akan kingdom of Bono; (2) the rise to power further north of the Dagomba Kingdom which controlled local salt pans; and (3) increased competition following the arrival in the region of rival long-distance traders from Hausaland. The reaction of the Dyula in the Bono-Banda-Gonja region to these developments was to establish a kingdom of their own in Gonja - the territory northern traders had to cross to reach Akan forestlands, situated in what is now modern Ghana. By 1675, Gonja had established a paramount chief called Yagbongwura to control the kingdom. But Gonja was not a fruitful land in which to try to