Mandinka Invaders who attacked West African coastal societies
The
Manes
(so called by the Portuguese),
Mani
or
Manneh
were invaders who attacked the western coast of Africa in what is now
Guinea
,
Liberia
and
Sierra Leone
throughout much of the sixteenth century.
[1]
Background
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The widest deployment of political and economic power in the
Sudan
before the seventeenth century was that stemming from Mande initiative in the successive empires of
Ghana
and
Mali
(and to some extent of
Songhai
also). This had political consequences in the lands immediately to the west and south of the Mande heartland around the upper reaches of the
Niger
and
Senegal
rivers. One result was the
Fulani
dispersion eastward past the farthest reaches of Mande influence, and the other was the settlement of Mande-speakers along the West Atlantic coast.
Mande-speakers moved west and south of their homeland as traders and conquerors. In the case of traders, an incentive was probably access to the supplies of salt obtainable from the coast. This move towards the coastlands led to a number of Mande pioneers carving out kingdoms for themselves in emulation of the major model of Mali.
[
citation needed
]
There seem to have been two major axes for the Mande expansion. One was along the line of the river Gambia, a useful artery for trade, which rises within a few miles of the sources of the
Faleme
, a major tributary of the Senegal, whose headwaters were in Mande occupation.
[
citation needed
]
The other, separated from
The Gambia
by the
Fouta Djallon
massif which the Fulani were occupying, ran south into modern
Sierra Leone
close by the
Susu
settlement.
[
citation needed
]
In both areas, political organizations were established under rulers called
farimas
.
[
citation needed
]
Initially they paid tribute to
Mali
, and even after the decline of the Mali power in the later fifteenth century, they maintained some idea of its previous supremacy.
[
citation needed
]
Origins and Identity
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Some early writers suggested that the Mane may have come from as far away as the
Kongo
or
Niger
.
Recent scholars, however, have shown that they were a
Mande people
, likely the
Mandinka
who established themselves in the area around
Moussadougou
,
Guinea
in the 16th century.
Mande people had raided the coastal areas for centuries before their large-scale migration during the 16th century.
According to the Portuguese trader
Andre Alvares de Almada
, they spoke a language closely related that of some of the
Mandinka people
along the
Gambia river
, wore the same types of clothes, and used the same weapons.
'Mane' was originally a surname of
Jola
origin; along with the Sane, the Manes were the core of the Nyancho royal aristocracy of the Empire of
Kaabu
,
[7]
but their link with the Mane of Moussadougou, if any, is unclear.
The
Mane
as such were the group of elites who would lead a large-scale migration into the coastal areas. The rank and file were composed of the
Sumba
and were continually reinforced as conquest progressed.
The Mane used small
bows
, which enabled them to reuse their enemies' arrows against them, while the enemy could make no use of their short arrows.
The rest of their arms consisted of large shields made of reeds, long enough to give complete cover to the user, two knives, one of which was tied to the left arm, and two quivers for their arrows. Their clothes consisted of loose cotton shirts with wide necks and ample sleeves reaching down to their knees to become tights. One striking feature of their appearance was the abundance of feathers stuck in their shirts and their red caps.
[10]
Expansion
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While the identification of the Mane is relatively uncontroversial, scholars have produced highly divergent accounts of their invasion(s) of the coastal areas. The central disagreement is whether there was a single Mane invasion that impacted both Liberia and Sierra Leone, or rather waves of invaders who followed different paths over the course of several decades.
Single Invasion
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The theory of a single Mane invasion originated with
Walter Rodney
and was supported by
Yves Person
. Early Portuguese sources describe a force led by
Macarico
, a high-ranking woman from the
Mali Empire
who, having offended the
mansa
, emigrated with a large following. In the early 1500s she supposedly marched her army south until they reached the
Portuguese
fort of
Elmina
. From there they turned west until they arrived in Liberia, where they first appear in the historical record.
More likely, however, this army never went to Elmina but simply marched across Liberia from the north.
[12]
The Mane fought a major battle against the
Bullom people
in 1545 near
Cape Mount, Liberia
where Macarico's son was killed, and she died soon after. The Mane's organization coupled with their auxiliaries reputation for cannibalism and the political fragmentation of the natives enabled them to conquer the entire region within about 15 years.
These auxiliaries, called
Sumbas
, included the Quoja, the Quea, and people speaking
Kru languages
."
[12]
The Mane advance was only halted when, in the northwest of what is now Sierra Leone, they came up against the Susu, like themselves a Mande people, possessing similar weapons, military organization and tactics.
Multiple Invasions
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Andrew Massing in 1985 advanced a different interpretation, challenging Rodney's reading of the place names in primary sources. He argued that the major battle against the Bullom happened on or near
Sherbro Island
, Sierra Leone. The Quoja, rather than being a Kru-speaking part of the
Sumbas
, led a separate invasion of the Cape Mount region from the east in the 1620s or 30s, eventually coming into conflict with the Mane states, and may have been
Mande
-speaking (perhaps
Vai
) themselves.
These attacks were only the most recent among Mande incursions, sometimes as small as armed trade caravans, that had begun as early as 1300.
Aftermath
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The Mane expansion had a profound impact on the ethnicites and societies of the coast. The Mande-speaking
Mende
are almost certainly the descendants of Mane aristocrats mixed with the native
Bullom people
. Further north, the
Loko
are also Mande-speaking, but mixed with the
Temne
who, themselves speaking a West Atlantic language, have an aristocracy of Mane origin.
They brought improved military techniques and iron and cloth manufacture to the region,
but the disruption and oppression caused by their invasion helped degrade the thriving stone and ivory carving and raffia weaving traditions among the native communities.
The Mane invasions militarised Sierra Leone. The Sapes had been un-warlike, but after the invasions, right until the late 19th century, bows,
shields
, and knives of the Mane type had become ubiquitous in Sierra Leone, as had the Mane battle technique of using squadrons of archers fighting in formation, carrying the large-style shields.
Sources
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Notes
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]
- ^
J. F. Ade Ajayi and Ian Espie,
A Thousand Years of West African History
(Ibadan University Press, 1965), p. 153.
- ^
Boubacar, Barry (1998).
Senegambia and the Atlantic Slave Trade
. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. p. 35.
ISBN
0-521-59226-7
.
- ^
Rodney, 1967, p 222.
Based on account of the Portuguese chronicler De Almada.
- ^
a
b
George E. Brooks,
Landlords and Strangers: Ecology, Society, and Trade in Western Africa, 1000-1630
(Westview Press, 1993;
ISBN
0813312620
), p. 286.