Concept
The Niger River (ˈnaɪdʒər ; (le) fleuve Niger (lə) flœv niʒɛʁ) is the main river of West Africa, extending about . Its drainage basin is in area. Its source is in the Guinea Highlands in south-eastern Guinea near the Sierra Leone border. It runs in a crescent shape through Mali, Niger, on the border with Benin and then through Nigeria, discharging through a massive delta, known as the Niger Delta (or the Oil Rivers), into the Gulf of Guinea in the Atlantic Ocean. The Niger is the third-longest river in Africa, exceeded by the Nile and the Congo River. Its main tributary is the Benue River. The Niger has different names in the different languages of the region: Fula: Maayo Jaaliba 𞤃𞤢𞥄𞤴𞤮 𞤔𞤢𞥄𞤤𞤭𞤦𞤢 Manding: Jeliba ߖߋߟߌߓߊ or Joliba ߖߏߟߌߓߊ "great river" Tuareg: Egerew n-Igerewen ⴻⴳⴻⵔⴻⵡ ⵏⵉⴳⴻⵔⴻⵡⴻⵏ "river of rivers" Songhay: Isa "the river" Zarma: Isa Beeri "great river" Hausa: Kwara كوَرَ Nupe: Èdù Yoruba: Ọya "named after the Yoruba goddess Ọya, who is believed to embody the river" Igbo: Orimiri or Orimili "great water" Ijaw: Toru Beni "the river water" The earliest use of the name "Niger" for the river is by Leo Africanus in his Della descrittione dell’Africa et delle cose notabili che ivi sono published in Italian in 1550. The name may come from a Berber phrase ger-n-ger meaning "river of rivers". As Timbuktu was the southern end of the principal Trans-Saharan trade route to the western Mediterranean, it was the source of most European knowledge of the region. Medieval European maps applied the name Niger to the middle reaches of the river, in modern Mali, but Quorra (Kworra) to the lower reaches in modern Nigeria, as these were not recognized at the time as being the same river. When European colonial powers began to send ships along the west coast of Africa in the 16th and 17th centuries, the Senegal River was often postulated to be the seaward end of the Niger. The Niger Delta, pouring into the Atlantic through mangrove swamps and thousands of distributaries along more than , was thought to be coastal wetlands.