The Lobi are a Voltaic-speaking people of southwestern Burkina Faso and northern Ghana — inhabitants of a semi-arid savannah frontier zone. Fiercely independent and historically resistant to both neig
The Senufo are an agricultural people of the savannah zone of northern Côte d'Ivoire, southern Mali, and western Burkina Faso. Their culture is organised around the Poro — a male initiation society wh
The Kingdom of Benin — centred on Benin City in present-day Nigeria — was one of the most sophisticated polities in pre-colonial Africa. At its height from the 13th to the 17th centuries, it controlle
The Dogon are an ancient people of the Bandiagara Escarpment in Mali — a 500-kilometre sandstone cliff rising dramatically above the plains of the Niger bend. They settled here, in cliff-face villages