08/04/2022
SONINKE PEOPLE:
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INFLUENTIAL TRADERS AND TRAVEL-LOVING PEOPLE THAT FOUNDED THE FAMAOUS PRE-COLONIAL WEST AFRICAN EMPIRE OF GHANA
The Soninke (also called Sarakole, Seraculeh, or Serahuli) are influential-agriculturalists, well-known traveling and celebrated traders as well as Mandé-speaking people of West Africa that founded the famous pre-colonial empire of Ghana c. 750-1240 CE. The Soninke who descend from the Bafour and are closely related to the Imraguen of Mauritania are historical celebrities in Africa in general and sub-Saharan Africa in particular. They have an interesting, proud and rich history. The modern day state of Ghana in south of West Africa are different from them. However, modern-day Ghana took the Soninke empire of Ghana`s name after independence.
After contact with Muslim Almoravid traders from the north around 1066, Soninke nobles of neighboring Takrur were among the first ethnic groups from Sub-Saharan West Africa to embrace Islam. When the Ghana empire dispersed, the resulting diaspora brought Soninkes to Mali, Senegal, Mauritania, Gambia, and Guinea-Bissau. This diaspora included Wangara, famous traders who spread far from traditionally Mande areas. Hence the term Wangara is used today in Ghana and Burkina Faso to describe the Soninke populations in cities and towns.
Today Soninke people live in the West African countries of Mali, Senegal, The Gambia, and Mauritania. There are some Soninke communities in Côte d'Ivoire, Guinea-Bissau, Guinea and Ghana.
The Soninke belonged to the pre-colonial indigenous Muslim merchants (jula), who travelled across the whole region, from the Guinean forest to the Sahel, and from Eastern Mali to the Atlantic coast. They traded in slaves, textiles, gold, salt, cattle, kola and other items back and forth the Senegambia and the Mande Plateau (Curtin 1975; Bathily 1989).
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