While isolated in modern Niger, it once lay on the important central soudan route of the Trans-Saharan trade which linked coastal Libya and the Fezzan to the Kanem-Bornu Empire near Lake Chad.
Their names and titles bear witness of the founding of Kanem by refugees from the Assyrian Empire c.
Between 1359 and 1383, seven mais reigned, but Bulala invaders (from the area around Lake Fitri to the east) killed five of them.
Sabun became ruler of a state that under Salih Derret controlled the area of the east-central Chad Basin south of the Sahara and north of the Bahr es Salamat, between Kanem in the west and the Sultanate of Darfur in the east.
In the 1950s a small number of Kanem–Chadian Arabs moved into the area, but the population remained small.
On the history of Higgi people there are many mythical stories about that some say they the victims of Mai wars of Kanem Borno empire of Borno State a neighbouring state to Adamawa State.
Expelled, Abdel Rahmane, a semi-illiterate Kanembu, recruited some following among his people and became active around Lake Chad, in the Kanem area.
These are some of the important centers of religious life: Nri-Igbo, the Point of Sangomar, Ile-Ife, Oyo, Dahomey, Benin City, Ouidah, Nsukka, Akan, Kanem-Bornu, Mali, and Igbo-Ukwu.