Dia, Mali

Dia (Jà) is a small town and seat of the commune of Diaka in the Cercle of Ténenkou in the Mopti Region of southern-central Mali. It is situated at the western edge of the Inland Delta floodplain, and is watered by the Diaka, one of the Niger River's major distributaries and the only permanent watercourse in the region. Tigemaxo and also some Fulfulde are spoken in Dia. The three-settlement mound complex of Dia, located at the western edge of the Inland Niger Delta of Mali, is known for rich oral and written resources, and predates the much better-known cities of nearby Djenne and Timbuktu.

According to Levtzion, the Diakhanke "remember Dia in Massina as the town of their ancestor, Suware, a great marabout, and a saint." This vast site thus offers the possibility of studying the beginning of urbanization in this part of Africa and the structure of an early West African city. Favorable climate and water supply have favored human settlement for centuries, and the history of the region is linked to that of former western Sudan with the successive empires of Ghana, Mali and Songhay.

The water system provided a favorable route for trade between the southern and northern Sahara, making D