Fynn explained the events of the Ashante’s invasion of the Northern territories in the mid-16th century by Opoku Ware ,he listed the weaponry used by the Dagomba cavalry as traditional. They consisted of laces, spears, and sabres while Bowdich mentions other weapons used like bows and arrows, javelin and clubs. These traditional weapons are labelled as one of the reasons why the Ashante defeated the Dagomba’s due to the sophisticated and modern weapons they had like muskets. When the Dagombas were defeated, they became a vassal state of the Ashante’s according to. The defeat of the Dagomba cost them a yearly tax on slaves, cattle, sheep and cloth to the Ashantehene. This invasion is also seen as the Ashante’s way of securing labour for their gold mines and also to benefit from the market activities in the North at the time.It is evident from the discussion above that agriculture was mainly rain-fed and the crops grown were mainly cereals, legumes, vegetables and tubers for subsistence. Shifting cultivation and bush fallowing was common, and the farms were cultivated with rudimental tools like hoes and cutlasses.

Slash and burn farming was one of the primary means of preparing land for sowing a practice which is still being carried out today. Labour was produced mainly by the family,and usually, the male household head made all farm-related decisions. Women’s subsistence activities relied on the decisions made by men on how to gain and maintain access to different resources like land, forest or trees. Here we see clearly how the identity of women are being constructed by male dominated institutions,who believe women should be subject to men and controlled in all they do. These constructions have structured the agricultural activities expected of men and women and significantly influence the agricultural system prevalent in Tamale. Men through norms have continually reshaped the productive andre productive roles of women over time .Although land was considered abundant and easily accessed through a chiefor tindana, the notion of land abundance in Africa is being contested by, flood tray states that land was never abundant and that it has always been contested by different actors as they struggle to gain and maintain control over land. She explained that actors had used different strategies like the first comer’s concept,tradition and power relations to legalise their claims over resources.

Shifts in power relation over time and space between the chiefs and tindana have shaped resource access, as lands were now accessed mostly through chiefs and not tindan as who were stripped of their socio-political power and left only with spiritual powers over land purification and rituals. A different scenario is found in the Upper East, and Upper West regions were the tindana still has the same socio-political power as the chief and are in charge of land administration and management. The Northern territories officially became a part of the British protectorate in 1902, after the defeat of the Germans. Sutton, describes the delayed acquisition of the Northern territories to a British Gold coast colony as an afterthought. After the annexation of the Northern territories to the Gold Coast, explorations were set in motion to find out the economic and political potential of this region to the Crown. George Ekem Ferguson,a Fante geologist, was employed by the Gold Coast government to make British annexation of the Northern territories legible. Ferguson reported that some resources such as gold and ivory could be found in this region, but that its greatest potential laid in agriculture. “Shea nut trees was widespread, rice and millet grew well in the plains, and the development of cotton, tobacco, and indigo”.

Caravan trading was flourishing at this time but more in the hands of outsiders like the Hausa, Fulani from further North and the Mossi from further South. The people of the Northern territories mostly sold their surpluses to the caravans and people transporting shea butter and yams going South in the Volta salt canoes, but mainly got their income from the extraction of tolls and market taxes from traders along this trading route.The colony was expected to generate money to be used for running administrative cost and development projects. Revenue collected by the colonial administrators derived from the caravan tolls and tax amounted to about 7000 15,852£ yearly in 1907 .