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The Mali Empire was an empire in West Africa from c. 1226 to 1670. The empire was founded by Sundiata Keita and became renowned for the wealth of its rulers, especially Mansa Musa. The Manding languages were spoken in the empire. At its peak, Mali was the largest empire in West Africa, widely influencing the culture of the region through the spread of its language, laws and customs. Much of the recorded information about the Mali Empire comes from 14th-century Tunisian historian Ibn Khaldun, 14th-century Moroccan traveller Ibn Battuta and 16th-century Andalusian traveller Leo Africanus. The other major source of information is Mandinka oral tradition, as recorded by storytellers known as griots.
The balafon is a gourd-resonated xylophone, a type of struck idiophone. It is closely associated with the neighbouring Mandé, Senoufo and Gur peoples of West Africa, particularly the Guinean branch of the Mandinka ethnic group, but is now found across West Africa from Guinea to Mali. Its common name, balafon, is likely a European coinage combining its Mandinka name ߓߟߊ bala with the word ߝߐ߲ fôn 'to speak' or the Greek root phono.
A griot is a West African historian, storyteller, praise singer, poet, and/or musician.
Sundiata Keita was a prince and founder of the Mali Empire. He is also the great-uncle of the Malian ruler Mansa Musa, known for being the wealthiest person of all time.
Soumaoro Kanté was a 13th-century king of the Sosso people. Seizing Koumbi Saleh, the capital of the recently defunct Ghana Empire, Soumaoro Kanté proceeded to conquer several neighboring states, including the Mandinka people in what is now Mali. However, the Mandinka prince Sundiata Keita built a coalition of smaller kingdoms to oppose him at the Battle of Kirina, defeating the Sosso and leaving Sundiata's new Mali Empire dominant in the region.
The Battle of Kirina, also known as the Battle of Krina or Siege of Karina, was a confrontation between Sosso king Sumanguru Kanté and Mandinka prince Sundiata Keita. Sundiata Keita's forces roundly defeated those of Sumanguru Kanté, guaranteeing the pre-eminence of Keita's new Mali Empire over West Africa.
Sunjata [] is an epic poem of the Malinke people that tells the story of the hero Sundiata Keita, the founder of the Mali Empire. The epic is an instance of oral tradition, going back to the 13th century and narrated by generations of griot poets or jeliw (djeli). There is no single or authoritative version. Material pertaining to the epic first began to be collected during the early 20th century in French Sudan, notably by the French elite school École William Ponty, resulting in the "modern" version of the tale as considered standard today, as published in "novelistic" form in French translation by Djibril Tamsir Niane in 1960.
Djibril Tamsir Niane was a Guinean historian, playwright, and short story writer.
Siby is a village and rural commune in the Cercle of Kati in the Koulikoro Region of southern Mali. The commune contains 21 villages and in the 2009 census had a population of 26,632. The village lies 50 km southwest of the capital, Bamako, on the plain to the south of the Monts Mandingues. The RN5 road that links Bamako with Siguiri in Guinea runs through the village.
According to the Epic of Sundiata, Kouroukan Fouga or Kurukan Fuga was the constitution of the Mali Empire created after the Battle of Krina (1235) by an assembly of nobles to create a government for the newly established empire. According to oral tradition of the griot poets of Mali and Guinea, the Kouroukan Fouga established the federation of Mandinka clans under one government, outlined how it would operate and established the laws by which the people would live. The name Kurukan Fuga is a toponym, translating to "clearing on granite / lateritic rock", referring to the plain near the town of Ka-ba where the narrative has Sundiata Keita present the charter.
The Twelve Doors of Mali were the possessions of the Mansa (emperor) of the medieval Mali Empire which was established in c.. 1235 following The Battle of Kirina. These lands were either allied to or conquered by Sundiata Keita on his campaign to free the Mandinka heartland from the Sosso kingdom of Kaniaga.
Faama is a Mandinka word meaning "father," "leader," or "king". It was commonly used within the area of pre-imperial Mali. The title spread into areas conquered by Mali and was later used by the Bamana Empire and the Wassoulou Empire of Samori Toure and non-Mandinka groups in the Kenedougou Empire.
Pre-imperial Mali refers to the period of history before the establishment of the Mali Empire, an African empire located mostly in present-day Mali, in c. 1235.
Mande Bori, also known as Mande Bakari and known in Arabic as Abu Bakr, is a heroic figure in Mande oral tradition who was involved in the founding of the Mali Empire. He was the brother and right-hand man of Sunjata, the founder of the empire, and served as the empire's kankoro-sigui, an office that has been translated as "viceroy" or "lieutenant-general". Though Mande Bori never himself reigned as mansa, his grandsons Musa and Suleyman ruled the Mali Empire at the apex of its power and prestige.
Sotigui Kouyaté was one of the first Malian, Burkinabé actors. He was the father of film director Dani Kouyaté, of the storyteller Hassane Kassi Kouyaté and of the actor Mabô Kouyaté and was a member of the Mandinka ethnic group.
Keïta! l'Héritage du griot is a 1995 Burkinabé film directed by Dani Kouyaté and starring Sotigui Kouyaté. It is an adaptation of the first third of the 13th-century Epic of Sundiata, interspersed with scenes of a griot telling the story to a young child.
In the ancient African oral tradition of the Epic of Sundjata, Balla Fasséké is Sundiata Keita's griot. King Naré Maghann Konaté offered his son Sundiata a griot, Balla Fasséké, to advise him in his reign. He would go on to serve as the ancestor of the Kouyate dynasty of Malinke griots.
Sassouma Bereté was the first wife of the 13th century King of Mali: Maghan Kon Fatta, the father of Sundiata Keita.
Dankaran Touman was the first son of Naré Maghann Konaté in the Malian epic of Sundiata. He was also the King of Manden prior to the establishment of the Mali Empire.
Manding, Manden or even Mandé is a region located in West Africa, a space between southern Mali and eastern Guinea. It is the historic home of the Mandingo community.
References
- ↑ "Epic of Sundjata". Archived from the original on 2009-03-28. Retrieved 2022-08-04.
- ↑ "Balla Kouyate's family have played this ancient instrument for 800 years". wbur.org.
- ↑ Niane, Djibril Tamsir (2006). Sundiata : an epic of old Mali. Internet Archive. Harlow, England : Pearson. p. 18. ISBN 978-1-4058-4942-5.
- ↑ D. T. Niane, Sundiata: An Epic of old Mali (Pearson Longman, 2006), pp.1-4.
- 1 2 3 4 Gugler 2003 , p. 38
- ↑ "Sotigui Kouyatè obituary". theguardian.com.
- ↑ "Balla Kouyate". montanafolkfestival.com.
- ↑ Tamari, Tal (1991), The Development Of Caste Systems In West Africa, The Journal of African History Volume 32, Number 2, pp. 221-250.
- ↑ "Preserving the Sosso Bala Archived 2016-03-03 at the Wayback Machine ", Jumbie Records: a charity record to raise funds for preserving this instrument.
- ↑ Alexander, Leslie M & Rucker, W. C. (eds), Encyclopedia of African American History, Vol. 1, pp. 109-110.
- ↑ Ed. Senghor, Léopold Sédar, Éthiopiques, Issues 21-24, Grande Imprimerie Africaine, 1980, p. 79.