Danākil is the common Arabic name for the ʿAfar population of northeastern Africa. This is a plural form in Arabic derived from the name of an ʿAfar sub-group, the Dankali. From the seventh/thirteenth to the eleventh/seventeenth century, the Dankali ruled the coastal and hinterland areas of the Red Sea, from the Bori peninsula to the area of Baylul, in the southern tip of present-day Eritrea. According to Ethiopian sources, their kingdom was a partner of the Ethiopian Christian kingdom in the ninth/fifteenth century (Perruchon, 138).