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Igbo

Location: Southeastern Nigeria

Population: 8 million

Language: Igbo (Kwa)

Neighboring Peoples: Ibibio, Ijo, Ekoi, Igala, Idoma, Nupe

History:It is believed that the Igbo originated in an area about 100 miles north of their current location at the confluence of the Niger and Benue Rivers. They share linguistic ties with their neighbors the Bini, Igala, Yoruba, and Idoma, with the split between them probably occurring between five and six thousand years ago. The first Igbo in the region may have moved onto the Awka-Orlu plateau between four and five thousand years ago, before the emergence of sedentary agricultural practices. As this early group expanded, so too did the Igbo kingdom. The earliest surviving Igbo art forms are from the 10th century (Igbo Ukwu), and the fine quality of those copper alloy castings suggest that Igbo society had already achieved a level of technology rivaling contemporary Europeans.

Economy:The majority of Igbo are farmers. Their staple crop is yam, and its harvesting is a time for great celebration. They are able to produce yam efficiently enough to export it to their neighbors. With the assistance of migrant labor, they also harvest the fruit of the palm tree, which is processed into palm oil, and exported to Europe in large quantities, making it a fairly profitable cash crop.

Political Systems:The Igbo are a politically fragmented group, with numerous divisions resulting from geographic differences. There are also various subgroups delineated in accordance with clan, lineage, and village affiliations. They have no centralized chieftaincy, hereditary aristocracy, or kingship customs, as can be found among their neighbors. Instead, the responsibility of leadership has traditionally been left to the village councils, which include the heads of lineages, elders, titled men, and men who have established themselves economically within the community. It is possible for an Igbo man, through personal success, to become the nominal leader of the council.

Religion:As a result of regional and political fragmentation, which is mirrored in the several distinct languages traditionally spoken by the hundreds of different village groups, it would be reductionist to attempt to illustrate the traditional religious practices of the Igbo as a whole. Before the influence of Europeans and Christian missions, however, most Igbo practiced some form of ancestor worship, which held that in order to gain success in this world, one must appease of the spirits of the deceased. This might be accomplished in any number of ways. One of the primary ways of showing respect for the dead was through participation in the secret men's society, Mmo, which is the name used only in the northern part of Igbo land. In other parts, similar societies exist under different names. The second level of initiates was responsible for carrying out the funeral ceremonies for the deceased and inducting the departed spirits into the ebe mmo, so that they would no longer cause mischief in the village.

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The Ashanti live in central Ghana in western Africa approximately 300km. away from the coast. The Ashanti are a major ethnic group of the Akans in Ghana, a fairly new nation, barely more than 50 years old. Ghana, previously the Gold Coast, was a British colony until 1957. It is now politically separated into four main parts. Ashanti is in the center and Kumasi is the capital.

To the Ashanti, the family and the mother’s clan are most important. A child is said to inherit the father’s soul or spirit (ntoro) and from the mother a child receives flesh and blood (mogya). This relates them more closely to the mother’s clan. The Ashanti live in an extended family. The family lives in various homes or huts that are set up around a courtyard. The head of the household is usually the oldest brother that lives there. He is chosen by the elders. He is called either Father or Housefather and is obeyed by everyone.

Boys are trained by their fathers at the age of eight and nine. They are taught a skill of the fathers' choice. The father is also responsible for paying for school. Boys are taught to use the talking drums by their mothers' brother. Talking drums are used for learning the Ashanti language and spreading news and are also used in ceremonies. The talking drums are important to the Ashanti and there are very important rituals involved in them. Girls are taught cooking and housekeeping skills by their mothers. They also work the fields and bring in necessary items, such as water, for the group.

Marriage is very important to Ashanti communal life and it can be polygamous. Men may want more than one wife to express their willingness to be generous and support a large family. Women in the Ashanti culture will not marry without the consent of their parents. Many women do not meet their husbands until they are married. Even so, divorce is very rare in the Ashanti culture and it is a duty of parents on both sides to keep a marriage going.

The government of Ashanti is shaped like a pyramid. There is one king and he heads the Ashanti Confederacy Council, a group made of paramount chiefs. A paramount chief presides over district chiefs. A district chief presides over a District Council of Elders, which is made up of subchiefs. Villages are brought together by a subchief. Within every village there is a village head council made up of all the heads of households

The Ashanti religion is a mixture of spiritual and supernatural powers. They believe that plants, animals, and trees have souls. They also believe in fairies, witches, and forest monsters. There are a variety of religious beliefs involving ancestors, higher gods, or abosom, and ‘Nyame’, the Supreme Being of Ashanti. The Ashanti also practice many rites for marriage, death, puberty, and birth. The golden stool is sacred to the Ashanti. There is an elaborate legend surrounding it that is told by the old men of Ashanti. The golden stool is very carefully protected. No one has ever sat on it and since its arrival, it has not touched the ground. As an Ashanti symbol, the golden stool represents the worship of ancestors, well-being, and the nation of Ashanti.


The Ashanti have a wide variety of arts. Bark cloth was used for clothing before weaving was introduced. With weaving, there is cotton and silk. Women may pick cotton or spin materials into thread, but only men are allowed to weave. There are different patterns in weaving, each with its own name. Sometimes the pattern represents social status, a clan, a saying, or the sex of the one wearing it. Patterns are not always woven in the cloth. It can also be stamped on in many designs. Pottery is a skill that is taught to a daughter by the mother. There are many stages to making pots and there are many colors of clay available. The Ashanti also do woodcarving and metal casting.

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Early Congo history starts with waves of Bantu migrations from 2000 BC to 500 AD moving into the area now known as the Democratic Republic of the Congo. They came from the northwest, adding to and displacing the indigenous Pygmy populations into the southern regions of the modern Congo state. The Bantus imported agriculture and iron-working techniques from West Africa into the area, as well as establishing the Bantu language family as the primary set of tongues for the Congolese.

Subsequent migrations from the Darfur and Kordofan regions of Sudan into the north of Congo, as well as East Africans migrating into the eastern Congo, added to the mix of ethnic groups.

Expansion of the Bantu

Starting at the beginning of the fifth century, waves of Bantu began settling in the extreme northwest of Central Africa and then gradually started to expand southward.

Their propagation was accelerated by the transition from Stone-Age to Iron-Age techniques. The peoples living in the south and southwest were mostly San and hunter-gatherer groups, whose technology involved only minimal use of metal technologies. The development of metal tools during this time period revolutionized agriculture and animal husbandry. This led to the displacement of the hunter-gatherer groups in the east and southeast.

The tenth century marked the final expansion of the Bantu in West-Central Africa. Rising population soon made intricate local, regional and foreign commercial nets possible, forming networks that traded mostly in salt, iron and copper.

[edit] The Upemba and Luba cultures

In the fifth century, a society began to develop in a region that initially encompassed only a 200 km area along the banks of the Lualaba River in the modern day Katanga province. This culture, known as the Upemba, would eventually evolve into the more significant Luba kingdom.

The process in which the primitive original Upemba society transitioned into the Luba kingdom was gradual and complex. This transition ran without interruption, with several distinct societies developing out of the Upemba culture prior to the genesis of the Luba. Each of these societies based the foundation of their society on that of the one which preceded it (much in the way that many aspects of Roman culture were borrowed from the Greeks). The fifth century saw this societal evolution develop in the area around present day Kamilamba at the Kabambasee, which was followed and replaced by a number of other cultures which were based around the cities of Sanga and Katango.

The region in which these cultures appeared is particularly rich in ores and the civilization began to develop and implement iron and copper technology, in addition to trading in ivory and other goods. The Upemba established a strong commercial demand for their metal technologies and were able to institute a primitive but long-range commercial net (the business connections extended over 1500 km, all the way to the Indian Ocean). Additionally, the region was endowed with favorable agricultural conditions and a wealth of fish and game.

Its strong economy and food-base allowed the region to become extremely wealthy. So wealthy, in fact, that cities and centralized government based on a chieftain system developed. The political institution of the chieftain became generally accepted and these rulers became increasingly powerful, especially at the end the of the 1500s.

The Kongo Empire

Main article: Kingdom of Kongo

The dominant political force of the Congo region prior to and during the initial arrival of Europeans was the Kongo Empire. The Kongo was a highly developed state located primarily in the southwest portion of the modern Congo, and also occupying portions of northern Angola and Cabinda. At its greatest extent, the empire reached from the Atlantic Ocean in the west to the Kwango River in the east, and from the Congo River in the north to the Loje River in the south.

The kingdom was headed by a king known as the Manikongo, who exercised his authority over the six provinces that constituted the Kongo kingdom and the Bakongo (Kongo peoples). When the Kongo Kingdom was at its political apex in the 15th and 16th centuries, the King, who had to be a male descendant of Wene, reigned supreme. He was elected by a group of governors, usually the heads of important families and occasionally including Portuguese officials. The activities of the court were supported by an extensive system of civil servants, and the court itself usually consisted of numerous male relatives of the King. The villages were often governed by lesser relatives of the King who were responsible to him. All members of government were invested with their power under the auspices of a ritual specialist.The Manikongo personally appointed a kind of governor for each of the six provinces to oversee each from his capital, Mbanza-Kongo. The city is now known by the same name as the capital of an Angolan province, but was for a time renamed by the Manikongo to 'Sao Salvador' in an effort to adopt Portuguese culture.

In its prime, the Kingdom exacted taxes, forced labor, and collected fines from its citizens in order to prosper. At times, enslaved peoples, ivory, and copper were traded to the Europeans on the coast. The important harbors were Sonyo and Pinda. In addition to the six provinces, the Kongo kingdom also established a sphere of influence in a number of outlying areas from which it was able to extract tribute. The kingdom was also at the center of an extensive Central African trade network in which it traded and produced large quantities of ivory, as well as manufacturing copperware, raffia cloth, and pottery, along with other natural resources (The eastern region of the Congo [such as the province of Katanga] is particularly rich in mineral resources, especially diamonds). These trade goods would also form, in addition to slaves, the backbone of the Kongo's trade with Europeans(primarily the Portuguese), upon their arrival.

The aforementioned slave trade was to be a significant factor in bringing about the end of the Kongo Empire, as the elites of the empire allowed European slave traders to eliminate a significant percentage of the population.

When King Álvaro I, came to the throne in an environment of contestation in 1568, he immediately had to fight invaders from the east (who some authorities believe were actually rebels within the country, either peasants or discontented nobles) called the "Jagas". To do this, he had to enlist the aid of the Portuguese based at São Tomé, who sent an expedition under Francisco de Gouveia Sottomaior to assist. At the same time, however, Álvaro had to allow the Portuguese to establish a colony in his province of Luanda in the south of his country. Kongo provided the Portuguese with support in their war against the Kingdom of Ndongo, located in the interior east of Luanda, when Portugual went to war with it in 1579. Eventually the Portuguese would gain control over most of the surrounding territory which led to increasing tensions with the Kongo.

At the Battle of Ambuila in 1665, the Portuguese forces from Angola defeated the forces of king Antonio I of Kongo; Antonio was killed with many of his courtiers and the Luso-African author Manuel Roboredo, who had attempted to prevent this final war. Nevertheless, the country continued to exist, at least in name, for over two centuries, until the realm was divided among Portugal, Belgium, and France at the Conference of Berlin in 1884-1885.

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PEOPLE AND HISTORY
A wide variety of ethnic groups live in The Gambia with a minimum of intertribal friction, each preserving its own language and traditions. The Mandinka tribe is the largest, followed by the Fula, Wolof, Jola, and Serahule. Approximately 3,500 non-Africans live in The Gambia, including Europeans and families of Lebanese origin.

Muslims constitute more than 95% of the population. Christians of different denominations account for most of the remainder. Gambians officially observe the holidays of both religions and practice religious tolerance.

More than 63% of Gambians live in rural villages (1993 census), although more and more young people come to the capital in search of work and education. Provisional figures from the 2003 census show that the gap between the urban and rural populations is narrowing as more areas are declared urban. While urban migration, development projects, and modernization are bringing more Gambians into contact with Western habits and values, the traditional emphasis on the extended family, as well as indigenous forms of dress and celebration, remain integral parts of everyday life.

The Gambia was once part of the Empire of Ghana and the Kingdom of the Songhais. The first written accounts of the region come from records of Arab traders in the 9th and 10th centuries A.D. Arab traders established the trans-Saharan trade route for slaves, gold, and ivory. In the 15th century, the Portuguese took over this trade using maritime routes. At that time, The Gambia was part of the Kingdom of Mali.

In 1588, the claimant to the Portuguese throne, Antonio, Prior of Crato, sold exclusive trade rights on The Gambia River to English merchants; this grant was confirmed by letters patent from Queen Elizabeth I. In 1618, King James I granted a charter to a British company for trade with The Gambia and the Gold Coast (now Ghana).

During the late 17th century and throughout the 18th, England and France struggled continuously for political and commercial supremacy in the regions of the Senegal and Gambia Rivers. The 1783 Treaty of Versailles gave Great Britain possession of The Gambia, but the French retained a tiny enclave at Albreda on the north bank of the river, which was ceded to the United Kingdom in 1857.

As many as 3 million slaves may have been taken from the region during the three centuries that the transatlantic slave trade operated. It is not known how many slaves were taken by Arab traders prior to and simultaneous with the transatlantic slave trade. Most of those taken were sold to Europeans by other Africans; some were prisoners of intertribal wars; some were sold because of unpaid debts, while others were kidnapped. Slaves were initially sent to Europe to work as servants until the market for labor expanded in the West Indies and North America in the 18th century. In 1807, slave trading was abolished throughout the British Empire, and the British tried unsuccessfully to end the slave traffic in The Gambia. They established the military post of Bathurst (now Banjul) in 1816. In the ensuing years, Banjul was at times under the jurisdiction of the British governor general in Sierra Leone. In 1888, The Gambia became a separate colonial entity.

An 1889 agreement with France established the present boundaries, and The Gambia became a British Crown Colony, divided for administrative purposes into the colony (city of Banjul and the surrounding area) and the protectorate (remainder of the territory). The Gambia received its own executive and legislative councils in 1901 and gradually progressed toward self-government. A 1906 ordinance abolished slavery.

The Mandinka (also known as Mandingo) are a Mande people of West Africa, all descend physically or culturally from the ancient Mali Empire which controlled the trans-Saharic trade from the Middle East to West Africa. In the early 13th century they were under the leadership of Sundiata. In the same century, they spread from the area that is now Mali, carving out a large empire.

Mandinka now number over one million and reside in many countries throughout West Africa: Burkina Faso, Côte d'Ivoire, the Gambia, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Senegal, and Sierra Leone. They are also found in small numbers in almost every country in West Africa.

Common dialects are Mandinka of The Gambia and Senegal, Malinké of Guinea and Mali, and Soninke of the southern states of West Africa, as well as other West African languages ending in 'ke' or 'ka' (meaning "talk" or "people"). They also speak Kriol and Portuguese in Guinea-Bissau; French in Senegal, Mali, Côte d'Ivoire, and Burkina Faso; and English in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and The Gambia.

Nearly all are Sunni Muslims in religion

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That we as Tobagonians are descendants of West African and Central West Africans... Not North.....Not South Not East.

Please, do not confuse this very important fact if it were to be told to other people....




Bless.....

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Those West Africans did originally migrate from the east though.
.

Some Igbo claim they are descendants of a Westward migration of Hebrews all the way from the middle east. Supposedly the Kohen marker has been found among some of them. These claims have much more legitimacy than that of the Israelites. (Allthough I have heard of Israelites converting to Judaism)
http://www.youtube.com/v/eCXKfr7NQPM

Of the Mandenka, a worthy city to mention is Timbuktu (A part of both Mali and Songhay history) which was a meeting point of Mandenka, Songhay, Wangara, Imazhigen, Arabs and Fulani. It was also a central point of education and knowledge in the world during the 15th and 16th centuries.
"According to the inhabitants of Timbuku, gold came from the south, the salt from the north and the Divine knowledge, from Timbuktu."
http://www.timbuktufoundation.org/

As i said, everyone has a computer, library, and other sources to check these African Tribes origins.....


You can very much do your own research as an individual, and your results will very much match my results....

Here is one of many sources i used to compile this information...
http://www.africaguide.com/culture/tribes/index.htm
And from this, you may get one or two tribes from this source which will direct you to more sources....

And from the Niger Basin River, are all part of West and Central West Africa... So to come from the Middle East when the Middle East was not even considered the Middle East I don't know where your coming from...

That is why i also provided this MAP so people would not be deceived by deceivers...For this i surely anticipated it...

As of the Original Fulani Tribe they are not of West Africa and is irrelevant to the Tribes that are Originally of West Africa....So please don't try to confuse people by adding another African Tribe that has little association with the Tribes of West Africa that settled in TOBAGO...

For these tribes exist way before the 9th century....

You see ladies and gentlemen, i do my research further back in time as to not confuse the confused that will only provide source of European settlement...


Again, Bless....

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FULANI

The Fulani people of West Africa are the largest nomadic group in the world.

As a people group they actually contain a large number of people from diverse groups who were conquered and became a part of the Fulani through the spread of Islam. The original Fulani however are of the North African or middle eastern origin and have lighter skin, thinner lips, and straighter hair. They are known as "white people" to many Africans. The first group of people in West Africa to convert to Islam through jihads, or holy wars, they were able to take over much of West Africa and establish themselves not only as a religious force but also as a political and economical force. The Fulani are a very proud people, they are the missionaries of Islam and ended up conquering much of West Africa.

http://www.africaguide.com/culture/tribes/fulani.htm

As you can see above, in my information on the tribes, it also spoke of invaders from the EAST....and also why today most of its people in the country are majority MUSLIM....

Again, Bless....

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Source 1

Source 1A

Mandenka Tribe...

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Very nice Bago

As Tobagonian/Carriacouan I just love reading about my ancestors anytime I get.

Don't know if you saw this before. I took the picture in Tobago museum

Attached Thumbnails

 

Took some time getting that stuff together but i did it....

Of course we all have our typical haters that try to knock us off track but we just jump right back on track n keep it moving....
People will hate you regardless how far you move up the ladder because they hate to see progress coming from other people and not from them...



Bless....

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Yes i saw it, I have seen that ever since i was going to school at Scarborough Anglican School at a very young age... Those are some African names yes, which one of my cousins name is Kwami, which in the pic it shows a name of kwamina...

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Cool ! I had so much fun in Tobago . Can't wait to go back

I saw the pictures you took while in Tobago, Man i miss the beaches.. Crstyal clear waters

Thats why i think Tobago is a perfect example on how peaceful African People lived amongst each other in Ancient times, of course you will have your typical wars to gain land and cartel and so forth but the majority of African Civilization were living in peace....

Not so much to speak for Trinidad....

But Tobago is a great place man and i am really glad you enjoyed yourself.... Next time you must get more local with the people, where they can take you to River, Mountain climbing and so forth... You want to see a great view of the ocean side, head up to Castara beautiful place to take that special someone to sit and watch the sun set... trust me, grade A....

Bless....

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