in 1441 and was the permanent residence of the Mossi emperors
(Moro-Naba) from 1681. The Moro-Naba Ceremony is still performed every Friday
by the Moro-Naba and his court. The French made Ouagadougou the capital of the
Upper Volta territory (basically the same area as contemporary independent
Burkina Faso) in 1919. In 1954 the railroad line from Ivory Coast reached the
city. The population of Ouagadougou doubled from 1954 to 1960 and has been
doubling since about every ten years
