Sukur is located in Madagali local government area of Adamawa state of Nigeria along Nigeria/ Cameroon border, some 290 km from Yola, the Adamawa state capital of north eastern Nigeria. It is a hilltop settlement which stood at an elevation of 1045 m. The total land area covered by the site is 1942.50 ha with core zone having 764.40 ha and the buffer zone 1178.10 ha respectively. Sukur is an ancient settlement with a recorded history of iron smelting technology, flourishing trade, and strong political institution dating back to the 16th century.
The landscape is characterized by terraces on the farmlands, dry stone structures and stone paved walkways.The terraced landscape at Sukur with its hierarchical structure and combination of intensive and extensive farming is remarkable. In addition, it has certain exceptional features that are not to be found elsewhere, notably the use of paved tracks and the spiritual content of the terraces, with their ritual features such as sacred trees.
The revered position of the Hidi as the political and spiritual head of the community is underscored by the magnificent dry stone architectural work of his palace, in and around which is a concentration of shrines, some ceramic. The villages situated on low lying ground below the Hidi Palace have their own characteristic indigenous architecture. Among its features are dry stone walls, used as social markers and defensive enclosures, sunken animal (principally bull) pens, granaries, and threshing floors. Groups of mud walled thatched roofed houses are integrated by low stone walls. Of considerable social and economic importance are the wells. These are below-ground structures surmounted by conical stone structures and surrounded by an enclosure wall. Within the compound are pens where domestic animals such as cattle and sheep are fattened, either for consumption by the family or for use as prestige and status symbols used in gift and marriage exchanges.
The remains of many disused iron-smelting furnacescan still be found. These shaft-type furnaces, blown with bellows, were usually sited close to the houses of their owners. Iron production involved complex socio-economic relationships and there was a considerable ritual associated with it.
The Sukur Cultural Landscape is located in north-eastern Nigeria(10°44′26″N, 13°34′19″E), in theadministrative region of Madagali
local government area of Adamawa State some 290km from Yola, theAdamawa state capital. It is situatedin the Mandara Mountains range that
borders Nigeria and Cameroon, atan elevation of 1045m (Figure 2.1). It lies within the Lake Chad Drainage basin, an area that is known to have
been affected by drastic climate and 2.1 Location and Climate environmental change (Pham-Duc et al. 2020). Those most vivid changes can
be traced to the mid Holocene associated with the desiccation of the Sahara Desert and the retreat and shrinkage of Lake Chad. Various factors have
further contributed to the environmental degradation, which has worsened in recent times with a shift towards more arid environmental conditions. direct result of this degradation is the decrease in vegetation cover. In someinstances, erosion has increased due to lack of vegetation cover. The 1970s
and 1980s saw periods of dry weather when compared to earlier records;however, since 1970 there has been a distinct increase in extreme rainfall
logged in rain gauges in the West African Sahel region .Another regional storm trend to note is the Sahel mesoscale convective
systems (MCS) that have in