Mande Settlement and the Development of Islamic Institutions in Sierra Leone

MANDE SETTLEMENT AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF ISLAMIC INSTITUTIONS IN SIERRA LEONE

David E. Skinner

Introduction

The migrations and settlement patterns of Mande peoples have recently been subjected to considerable study and analysis,1 and the role of the Mande as agents of lslam has been discussed by a number of scholars.2 It is the purpose of this paper to describe the patterns of settlement and instruments of influence generated by Mande people who migrated to the coast and hinterland of Sierra Leone. The paper specifically draws upon the histories of six prominent Mande families to illustrate the process of integration from the mid­ eighteenth century to the end of the nineteenth century.

The reasons for Mantle migration, as they have been presented in oral histories and described in other studies, are clear. The migrants were traders, Muslim missionaries, warriors, adventurers, or refu­ gees from war. Often the migrants came in small groups whose members were related through marriage or parentage, and they carried with them common cultural, linguistic, and political ties

1See particularly the papers presented to the Mantling Studies Conference held at the University of London, June and July 1972 (hereafter Mantling Studies Conference]. See also

C. Hodge, ed.,Papers on the Manding (Bloomington, 1971).

2L. Sanneh, "The Origins of Clericalism in West African Islam," Journal of African History, XVII, 1 (1976); J. Goody, ed., Literacy in Traditional Societies (London, 1968);

l. M. Lewis, ed., Islam in Tropical Africa (London, 1964).

which helped to provide strong internal identity and also linked them with other Mande groups. Based on powerful historical traditions and cultural similarities, Mande migrants retained ethnic and cul­tural identity with their homelands and promoted Manding institu­ tions. Their influence and position were enhanced in the areas in which they settled by the wide range of resources which they con­ trolled. Migrating groups often possessed a combination of resources and skills, including trade goods and knowledge of trading tech­ niques and routes, military organization, literacy in Arabic, and specialized religious knowledge which was deemed important by local populations. Such resources and skills were used to obtain positions of influence, land, and titles and to solidify crucial rela­ tionships by means of marriage and political alliances.

Mande migrants to the coast and hinterland of Sierra Leone during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries brought Muslim ideas and institutions with them, and among the migrants were many fervent missionaries who intended to spread Islam among the local populations. Islamic theology provides an institutional and ritual structure that is common to Muslim communities throughout the world. The basic structure was established by the Prophet Muham­ mad and derived from the Quran during the second and third decades of the seventh century AD. The duties of a Muslim were clearly defined: prayer five times daily, including the community's Friday midday prayer in ajamic ("mosque"); a month of fasting during Ramadan, the giving of alms to orphans, widows, and the poor; a pilgrimage to Mecca at least once during one's lifetime; the public witness of faith that there is only one God and Muhammad is His prophet. Muslims were also exhorted to "exert" themselves in the service of Allah. This concept was developed into a well-defined system of holy war (jihad) which became an important tool in the spread of Islam. In addition to the above pillars of the faith or rituals, Muslims gathered to celebrate important feast days: the fast­

breaking at the end of the month of Ramadan (Cid al-fitr), the feast of Abraham's sacrifice (Cfd al-a.d.ha), and the Prophet Muhammad's birthday (maulid an-nabiy). Muslins also founded mystical orders

(fariqah) in a system commonly known as Sufism today, and these provided additional structure and organization that bound Muslims together. Holy men associated with a fariqah were usually venerated as saints, and their shrines became centers of worship and pilgrimage. Occasionally, orders were connected with ajihiid, as were the Almoravids (al-Murlibitun) of northwestern Africa in the eleventh century and the Mahdiyya of the Sudan during the late nineteenth century.

The characteristics of Islam in Africa have been clearly des­cribed by I. M. Lewis in his introduction to Islam in Tropical Africa and by many other scholars who have studied the religion's impact.3 Muslim institutions have been shaped by patterns estab­lished in the Islamic heartland between the seventh and tenth centuries A.D.; they were spread in Africa through the activities of traders, holy men, and warriors. The common institutional frame­ work and, particularly, the dominant religious literature which is the basis of Muslim education gave African Islam a strong bond with Muslim communities in other areas. Certainly, in the Guinea-Sierra Leone hinterland religious instruction by Muslim teachers was essential to the continuity of lslamic concepts and institutions.4

Although Islam has many characteristics and rituals which are shared throughout the world, Muslim communities have also de­veloped their own rituals and beliefs based on local traditions and concepts. One finds, therefore, many varieties of Islam, and "un­ orthodox" practices and beliefs can become integrated into the faith.5 This syncretism often poses a difficult problem of defining membership in Islam, and jihads have been fought over what constitutes "orthodox" behavior.6 Islam was brought into areas which already had fully developed religious institutions and beliefs, and simply substituting Islam for the host religion was impossible. In Sierra Leone, Islam had to compete with established institutions and priests, and the process of Islamization was slow and the result partial. An analysis of the diffusion of Islam among the local populations and the fusion of Islamic and indigenous religious beliefs and institutions will follow a discussion of Mantle migration.

Mande Settlement and Muslim Centers

Groups of Mantle people migrated to the Guinea-Sierra Leone hinterland long before the mid-eighteenth century. They were part of a larger westward migration from the Mantling heartland, and many

3Lewis,Jslam;N. Levtzion, Muslins and Chiefs in West Africa (Oxford, 1968); I. Wilks, "The Growth oflslamic Leaming in Ghana," Journal of the Historical Society of Nigeria, 2, 4 ( I963); D. McCall and N. Bennett, eds., Aspects of West African Islam (Boston, 1971);

C. Quinn, Mandingo Kingdoms of the Senegambia (London, 1972).

4D. E. Skinner, "Islam and Education in the Colony and Hinterland of Sierra Leone (1750-1914)," Canadian Journal of African Studies, 10, 3 (1977).

'C. Geertz,Jslam Observed (New Haven and London, 1968).

6D. M. Last and M.A. Al-Haii, "Attempts at Defining a Muslim in 19th Century Hausa­ land and Bomu," Journal of the Historical Society of Nigeria, 3, 2 (1965).

were representatives of or refugees from the Mali Empire. Gradu­ally, centers of Mantle settlement were formed and attracted addi­ tional migrants.7 Portuguese traders and missionaries found flour­ ishing Mantle settlements on the Upper Guinea Coast. Father Balthasar Barreira, for example, visited the Bena kingdom along the Kolente (Great Scarcies) River in the early seventeenth century and found a well-established Muslin Susu population there.8 From the sixteenth to the eighteenth centuries many Mantle groups settled in the Guinea-Sierra Leone hinterland seeking land or trade relations. By the mid-eighteenth century several important centers of Mantle influence existed, particularly along the principal trade routes and near navigable rivers.

Three Mantle-speaking populations important to the development of Muslim institutions and concepts in Sierra Leone were the Susa, the Sarakuli, and the Mandingo. Contemporary European observers often confused the three and called them all by the name Mandingo. 9 This confusion came partly from similarities of speech, dress, and religion among the three groups and partly from the fact that Man­ dingo and Sarakuli settlers were often found among the Susu and were responsible for the introduction and spread of Islam in many areas of Guinea.

A few emigrants from a powerful nation, called Mandingos, settled themselves upon the banks of the Kissee, and have since become possessed of a considerable tract of country in its neighborhood. The Mandingos are strict Mahommedans very zealous in making con­ verts, and have spread their religion with much success among the Soosoos, where it appears to be daily gaining ground.10

I never visited a town in this part of Africa where I did not find a Mandingo man as prime minister, by the name of bookman, without whose advice nothing was transacted.11

These statements, made by travelers during the latter part of the eighteenth century, reflect the extent to which Islam had become established on the Upper Guinea Coast north of Sierra Leone.

'W. Rodney, A History of the Upper Guinea Coast, 1545 to 1800 (Oxford, 1970);

Y. Person, "Ethnic Movements and Acculturation in Upper Guinea Since the Fifteenth Century," International Journal of African Historical Studies, 4, 3 (1971); M. Bangura, Contribution a l'histoire des Sosoe du 16e au 19e siecle (Conakry, 1972); Papers presented

to the Mantling Studies Conference.

•c. Fyfe, ed., Sierra Leone Inheritance (London, 1964), 49-53.

9All Mande-indeed, all Muslims, even the Fula--were referred to by Europeans as

Mandingo. The termjula was used for long-distance traders without an ethnic referent, although the Yu/a lineages of the Moriah-Bena areas were particular Mande families: Yansane, Fofana, Sankoh, Dumbuya, Kamara. Sierra Leone Archives [hereafter SLA]: Government Interpreter's Letter Book [hereafter GILB], 3 Nov. 1879; Skinner, interview with Shekhu Luseni, Gbile, 25 Feb. 1976.

10T. Winterbottom, An Account of the Native Africans in the Neighbourhood of Sierra Leone, I (London, 1803), 5-6.

Mandingo man as prime minister, by the name of bookman, without whose advice nothing was transacted.11

These statements, made by travelers during the latter part of the eighteenth century, reflect the extent to which Islam had become established on the Upper Guinea Coast north of Sierra Leone. 

11J. Mathews,A Voyage to the River Sierra Leone (London, 1788), 69.

A slavetrader, Nicholas Owen, had earlier noted the activities of Mandingo Muslim priests in the Sherbro River area south of the Sierra Leone peninsula.12 In 1791, John Clarkson, governor of the Sierra Leone colony, commented on his meeting with a Mandingo in Freetown: "Visited by CANBA, a Mandingo Maraboo and his family of Port Logo. This nation is strict in Mahometanism as the Turks themselves."13

Port Logo, later known as Port Loko, was a center of Muslim settlement during the eighteenth century. As a major transit point for goods shipped from the interior to the coast, it was an area which attracted long-distance traders, missionaries, and military leaders. In May 1805, a British traveler, Joseph Corry, visited "the town of Port Logo, which is now the residence of Alimami, a Mandingo chief, who assumes the title of emperor."14 This "Mandingo chief' was Alimami Ibrahim Konkori Sankoh, son of Buri Lahi Sankoh, whose family had usurped authority in Port Loko between 1750 and 1760.15 Other observers identified the Sankohs with a Muslim Susu family which dominated towns on the Melikuri and Kolente rivers to the north.16

From these and other contemporary reports, it is clear that Mantle-speaking Muslims were well established in Guinea and Sierra Leone by the eighteenth century, and that during that century their influence spread among many of the ethnic groups in Sierra

12N. Owen, Journal of a Slave Dealer (London, 1930), 56-57. The dates of this journal are 1746 to 1757.

13"Diary of Lt. J. Clarkson," Sierra Leone Studies, old series [hereafter O.S.], VIII

(March 1927), 95.

14J. Corry, Observations upon the Windward Coast of Africa (London, 1807), 41 and 44.

15Public Record Office, London [hereafter PRO]: Colonial Office [hereafter CO] 268/8, 3 vols., 1810; PRO: CO 267, Original Correspondence, Sierra Leone, Vol. 29 [hereafter CO 267/ vol. no.], Governor [hereafter Govr.] Dawes to Secretary of State [hereafter SS], 1 Nov. 1811; CO 267/172, Commissioneroflnquiry, Appendix no. 18.

16E. A. Ijagbemi, "A History of the Temne" (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, University of Edinburgh, 1968), Introduction, 9--11, 31-33, and Chapter III; A.G. Laing, Travels through Timannee, Kooranko and Soolimania Countries in Western Africa (London, 1825), 29, 72-75; PRO: CO 879/25/332, "Sierra Leone: Dispatch from the Administrator­ in-Chief, enclosing information regarding the different districts and tribes of Sierra Leone and its vicinity" (London, 1887), 23-24; SLA: Native Affairs Minute Paper [hereafter NAMP] 29, 24 Jan. 1893, from Binneh Sankoh to Parkes; Howard Collection, Institute of African Studies, Fourah Bay College, Freetown, Sierra Leone [hereafter Howard Collection]: inter­ view with Pa Momoh Kamara, Pork Loko, 7 Feb. 1968; Howard Collection: interview with Alhaji Bonporoh Bangura, Port Loko, 20 Oct. 1968; interview with Pa Momo Dumbuya, Port Loko, 3 Mar. 1968. The Sankoh is one of the Yula lineages of the Moriah-Bena areas.

Leone.17 Mandingo, Susu, and Sarakuli settlement in the colony and hinterland of Sierra Leone resulted from the activities of numerous traders, karamokos (Muslim teachers and priests), and warriors. A process of community-building begun before the eighteenth century became increasingly important for the development of Islamic insti­tutions and concepts thereafter. Its impetus was the system of long­ distance trading and the missionary activities of karamokos, who established mosques and karanthes (schools) and taught about Islam wherever they traveled.18

Long-distance trade routes linked such inland centers as Wonka­ fong, Furikaria, Melikuri, Labe, Timbo, Segou, Boure, and Kankan with port towns in Sierra Leone. The routes varied with the seasons, with the outbreak of war, with political and economic alliances; but during the nineteenth century four principal routes seem to have been favored by the trade caravans:

1. a northern route from Segou and Timbo, through Susu territories along the Kolente River to Kambia or to Romange on the Kaba River;
2. a central route through Samaya (Susu) or Bumba (Limba) to Port Loko;
3. another central route from Kankan, through Falaba and Bumba to PortLoko;

a southern route through Falaba or Bumba to Rakel or Magbeli on the Rakel River.19

These routes and their tributary branches terminated at Freetown,

17Laing, Travels, 66, 108-110, 188-189; PRO: CO 267/53, Despatch [hereafter DJ 14, 24 Sept. 1821, Govr. Grant to SS, submitting O'Beime's Journal; E. Hirst, "An Attempt at Reconstructing the History of the Loko people from about 1790 to the Present Day," Sierra Leone Studies, new series [hereafter n.s.], 9 (December 1957); D. Simpson, "A Preliminary Political History of the Kenema Area," Sierra Leone Studies, n.s., 21 (July 1967); E. F. Sayers, "Notes on the Clan or Family Names Common in the Area Inhabited by Temne­ speaking People," Sierra Leone Studies, o.s., X (December 1927); S. A. Walker,Missions in Western Africa among the Soosoos, Bulloms, etc. (Dublin, 1845); Church Missionary Society Archives, London [hereafter CMS]: C Al/El, 1803-1807, CMS Mission in West Africa, Letters, Reports and Journals.

18For more detailed discussion of this process see David E. Skinner, "The Development of Islam in Sierra Leone during the Nineteenth Century" (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, University of California, Berkeley, 1971), Chapters IV-VI; and Allen M. Howard, "Big Men, Traders and Chiefs: Power, Commerce and Spatial Change in the Sierra Leone-Guinea Plain, 1865-1895" (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, University of Wisconsin, 1972), Chapters 2-6.

19Howard, "Big Men." Professor A. M. Howard has generously provided me with con­ siderable data about trade routes and he also corrected an earlier version of the map drawn for this article.

which by the early nineteenth century had become the principal British port on the Upper Guinea Coast. After unilateral abolition of the slave trade by the British in 1807, Freetown became a center of "legitimate trade" and a refuge for Africans freed from slave ships. Mande-speaking Muslims played an important part in the economic viability of Britain's Sierra Leone colony.

An important Susu settlement known as Dalamodiya was estab­ lished just east of Freetown in 1801 by an influential trading family from Wonkafong. The town was moved across the Sierra Leone River to the Bullom Shore in 1806 and renamed Madina. Through­ out the nineteenth century it remained an important trade and political center for many "strangers" on their way to Freetown.20

Mandingo also settled near Freetown, first to the west of the town and then, after 1810, in Bambara Town (also known as Mandingo Town) within the city itself. Governor Charles Maxwell reported the settlement of Mandingo in the colony for trading purposes, and stating that Mandingo chiefs "consider the colony essentially neces­ sary to their comfort "21 This was in 1814; by 1826 it was esti­

mated that more than two thousand "strangers" were residing in Freetown, many of them Mandingo or Susu.22 Contemporary colon­ ial officials considered Mandingo traders to be increasing in num­ bers and importance,23 and Christian missionaries were alarmed about the influence of Muslim missionaries.²⁴

During most of the nineteenth century caravans of substantial size were passing through the Sierra Leone hinterland to the coast. Al­ though warfare and brigandage often limited the number of caravans which reached Freetown, trade with the interior was a major activity in the colony throughout the century. The varying frequency but continuing importance of trade caravans may be seen from records kept by Thomas George Lawson, who was chief government inter­ preter from 1852 to 1889.25

2°For further information about Dalamodiya and its settlers see below under Dumbuya.

21PRO: CO 267/38,D 52, I May 1814, Govr. Maxwell to SS.

22PRO: CO 267/91, Sierra Leone Commissioners of lnquiry, I827, part I: Sierra Leone, 17-18. Officials observed that Mandingo and Susu activity was more important and that it had existed for a longer time than the Fula trade which "is of comparatively late occurance."

23PRO: CO 267/92, Commissioners oflnquiry, Appendix C, nos. 19, 22, 25, and 26.

24CMS: C Al/01, Freetown Mission Annual Reports, 1828, 1829, and 183

25SLA: GILB, 4 July 1878, 4 Jan. 1879, 6 Jan. 1880. For a discussion of the role of Thomas George Lawson and the value of his memoranda see D. E. Skinner, "Thomas George Lawson, Government Interpreter and Historical Resource," Africana Research Bulletin, IV, 4 (July 1974). Professor A. M. Howard has written to me: "I don't think there was a totally consistent use of the term 'caravan,' but generally I think it meant an individual who came to

A single caravan, containing from a few to several hundred indi­viduals, might include traders, bearers, guides, warriors, karamokos, or other individuals seeking the protection of caravan travel. Lawson used the term caravans " ... to denote a large number of men who travelled together from the interior to the Settlement for trading pur­poses [and] to distinguish them from the ordinary Strangers who come from countries more contiguous say below F alaba and Timannee country."26 Statistics provided by Lawson indicate that Mande­ speaking groups, particularly Mandingo and Sarakuli, played a dominant part in Sierra Leone's trade throughout the nineteenth century.27

A significant result of this trading system was the formation of well-organized and influential ethnic communities in Freetown. These communities, known as jama (or jamat), were organized around analimami (or headman), a council of elders calledshaikhs, andaifas (religious leaders). Decisions important to the operation of an ethnic community were made by these officials and other "Big Men" in thejamii. The Mandingo, Susu, and Sarakuli communities adopted this system of organization during the first half of the nineteenth century.28 The complex nature of long-distance trade, trade, including carriers who reached Freetown" (Personal communication, 9 Mar. 1970). The variation in the number of caravans from year to year was partly a result of warfare and brigandage in the interior.

26SLA: GILB, 3 Mar. 1878.

27Lawson provided detailed figures on individual traders arriving in Freetown which were recorded in his memoranda in the Government Interpreter's volumes between 1873 and 1889. 28See B. E. Harrell-Bond, A. M. Howard, and D. E. Skinner, Community Leadership and

the Transformation of Freetown (1801-1976) (The Hague, 1978). The specialized termi­ nology is derived from Arabic:jamii fromjamacah ("religious community"), alimami from al-imam ("leader", especially "prayer leader"), a/fa from al-faqih ("legal scholar") or al­ fahi'm ("knowledgeable"), secku or shekhu from shaikh ("elder"). In Guinea-Sierra Leone, alimami or almamy refers to a political leader, while imam is used to identify the chief priest of a mosque.

required careful organization, and many kinds of specialized func­tions were necessary to the continuity of trade relations. As "strangers," traders required housing, middlemen, and interpreters in order to operate efficiently. Many of the leading members of each jama were landlords who organized trade contacts in Freetown. Indigenous political leaders and the colonial government of Sierra Leone eagerly sought and promoted trade for the economic rewards it produced. The governor of Sierra Leone encouraged trade by sending diplomatic missions to the hinterland with offers of financial aid to rulers who facilitated trade.29

Political leaders often acted as landlords, but they also allowed trading families to establish their own representatives in towns and villages along the trade routes. These settlers often became land­ lords and trading agents for caravans moving toward the coast. As the flow of trade increased, more and more towns became dependent on caravans for their supply of goods, and traders were admired as providers of new wealth. The relationships between rulers and traders became institutionalized through intermarriage and grants of land and titles; gradually "stranger families" were assimilated into the indigenous status system and gained influence in local affairs.30

Muslim missionaries also traveled through the hinterland and to the coast. Some came as traders, while others merely attached themselves to caravans. Traders who had become established as political leaders recruited karamokos to settle in their towns in order to operate the mosques and karanthes (schools) required by the growing Muslim population. These religious specialists were often highly respected for their knowledge of Arabic, for the special prayers and Arabic charms (sebe) they produced during periods of crisis, and for the aura of mysticism which many of them imparted. Because of their association with influential trading families (either through kinship or clientship), their literacy, and their mystical

29In Sierra Leone the governors early in the nineteenth century began to develop a treaty system which bound African rulers to facilitate trade in return for an annual stipend. PRO: CO 879/35/411, "Collection of Treaties with Native Chiefs, etc. on the West Coast of Africa, part II: Sierra Leone" (London, 1892); Skinner, "Development of lslam," 33-42.

30Many observers described the operation of the landlord system during the eigheenth and nineteenth centuries: Mathews, Voyage, 142-144; Winterbottom, Account, 170-172;

P. Leonard, Records of a Voyage to the Western Coast of Africa , 1830-1832 (Edin­

burgh, 1883), 45-47; J. Holman, Travels in Madeira, Sierra Leone, Teneriffe, etc. (London, 1840), 119-122; SLA: Colonial Secretary's Office [hereafter CSO], Letters Received, no. 894, 20June 1869, W.W. Reade to Govr., 6; CMS: CAl/El,CMS Mission in WestAfrica; SLA: Aborigines Minute Paper [hereafter ABMP], 31 Oct. 1877, List of Alien Mohamme­ dans.

powers, they were frequently sought as advisers and letter writers by indigenous non-Muslim political leaders as well. The karamokos gained great prominence in many towns and villages. They acquired land, intermarried with local notable families, and educated the sons of many of the elite.31

Mande warriors also exercised some influence over the spread of Islam in Sierra Leone. In addition to Alimani Samori Toure'sjihlid, which brought many Muslims into Sierra Leone during the 1880s and 1890s, three other Muslim holy wars were led by Mande warriors and encouraged the spread of Islam throughout the hinter­ land. Lahai Salihu Yansane, also known as Modi al-Hajj, led ajihad in the Kolente-Melikuri area early in the eighteenth century. He is firmly associated with the founding of the town of Laya north of the Kolente River and with the Yula lineage in the Bena kingdom. The Yansane family also became established in the Melikuri and Kisi­ Kisi areas and was one of the four or five principal families of the Moriah kingdom after the mid-eighteenth century.32 Sattan Lahai Toure, an important military leader under Alimami Amara Toure, king of Moriah from 1803 to 1827, was the son of a daughter of Lahai Yansane. His father was a Toure from Furikaria. Using Laya as a base of operations, Sattan Lahai Toure carved out a small king­ dom and extended his territory south of the Kolente River between 1810 and 1820. Sattan Lahai married a woman from the Kamara family of Kawlah. One of their sons, Alimami Sattan Lahai Toure I, expanded the kingdom during the middle third of the nineteenth century. He married a Temne woman from his new territory and established a dynasty, based at Rowula, which continued into the twentieth century. His kingdom was astride the important trade

31Skinner, "Development of Islam," 42-52 and Chapter V. The terms karamoko and karanthe are used by several ethnic groups in Guinea-Sierra Leone.Karan is an adaptation of qur'iin (from the Arabic qara'a, "to recite") plus mogo (Mantling, "man": hence "a learned man") or either tie (Mantling, "fire") or de (Mantling, "place"). The karamoko and alfa not only taught elementary education and performed various ritual functions, they also provided advanced education, using some of the important specialized texts: Malik b. Anas,Kitlib al­ Muwatta'; Sahniin, al-Mudawwana al-Kubra; CAbd Allah b. Abi Zaid al-Qairawani, ar­ Risala:: as-Suyiltr, Tazyfn al-Mamalik; al-Akhqarr, Mukhtasar fi'l_cibadiit; Muhammad al­ BukhiirT,Jamic as-Sahih; and others. Skinner, "Islam and Education."

32Skinner: int rvie with Alfa Soriba Yansane, Freetown, 4 Mar. 1976; interview with

Shekhu Luseni, Gbile, 26 Mar. and 15 April 1969; interview with Abu B. Conteh, Laia (Bena), 10 April ·1976; interview with al-l;Iii.ii Mu ammad Sanusi, Tawiya, 15 April 1969; Skinner, "Development of Islam," Chapter III; Archives Nationales de France: Section Outre-Mer, Senegal IV, Dossier 28, Revue Coloniale, novembre 1845.

route from the east to Kambia, and for a period during the mid­ nineteenth century Alimami Lahai controlled Kambia, as his father had before him. The Sattan Lahai Toure family was devoutly Muslim and encouraged karamokos to settle in the kingdom. Alimami Sattan Lahai I and his successors sponsored the erection of mosques and schools, and they employed learned Muslims as advisers and Arabic-letter writers.33

A second Mande-ledjihiid occurred in the Furikaria area in the 1750s. Nicholas Owen called the leader of this jihad "King Furry Do," and he is identified in regional oral histories as Fode Katibi Toure, the founder of the Toure dynasty in Moriah and the great­ grandfather of Alimami Amara (Omaru) Toure, who reigned at Furikaria during the first thirty years of the nineteenth century.34 The Toure family ruled over the Muslim-based kingdom of Moriah throughout the nineteenth century and strongly promoted the devel­ opment oflslamic education and law.

Contemporary sources also refer to a third jihad led by an obscure mahdi or prophet during the 1780s in the Moriah-Sumbuyah area. This mahdi, known as Fatta (from the Arabic name Fatimah), reportedly led ajihtid force from Mandugu, the capital of Konya, twenty-eight days east of Furikaria. He was evidently in the process of establishing a Muslim state when he was assassinated for his tyrannical rule.35 The first and second jihlids helped to establish family dynasties, but this third evidently had little impact. Military expansionism led by Muslim warriors like Sattan Lahai of Rowula, whether or not it can be correctly labled jihad, did promote the development of Muslim-influenced communities and the establish­ ment oflslamic institutions.

"Lord Stanley, "Narrative of Mr. William Cooper Thomson's Journey from Sierra Leone to Timbo, Capital of Futah Jallo in Western Africa," Journal of the Royal Geographical Society, London, 16, I (1846); Laing, Travels; PRO: CO 879/25/332, "Sierra Leone"; Person, "Ethnic Movements," 688; Y. Person, Samorz; une revolution dyula, I (Dakar, 1970), 481-482; Sayers, "Notes"; SLA: ABMP, 29 July 1878; CMS: C Al/0 192, C. F.

Schlenker, Letters and Reports, 96b; PRO: CO 267/293, D 47, Govr. Kennedy to SS, 15 May 1868, enclosure: Alimami Sattan Lahai to Govr., 10 April 1868; Skinner: interview with Alfa Soriba Yansane, Freetown, 4 Mar. 1976.

34Person, "Ethnic Movements," 688; Owen,Journal, 93, 96, 100; PRO: CO 270/8, Mr. Bright's Journal, September-October 1802; Skinner: interview with Shekhu Luseni, Gbile, 26 Mar. and 15 April 1969. It is more likely that the leaderofthe war during Owen's time was a son of Fode Katibi Toure, Mangaba Abu Bakari.

35Winterbottom,Account, 246-250; Sierra Leone Company,AnAccount of the Colony of

Sierra Leone from Its First Establishment in 1793 (London, 1795), 133; PRO: CO 270/8, Mr. Bright's Journal, 1802.

Wherever Muslim traders, missionaries, and warriors settled they attracted additional settlers, and Islamic communities developed which stimulated the growth of socioeconomic, political, and reli­gious institutions. Muslim notables used their resources and skills to obtain land, titles, and social and kinship connections with indig­enous elites. Muslims often became alkalis (village chiefs), santigis (subchiefs), and even alimamis (kings or paramount chiefs of a region). As important political figures or traders they controlled military forces and acquired high social positions and wealth. They encouraged the settlement of Muslim teachers, built mosques, and observed the important Muslim rituals. Karanthes, each with its own karamoko or alfa, were established, and places of prayer were provided for the increasing number of believers. By the mid­ nineteenth century, mosques orjamic, and sallekene (prayer fields used for festival celebrations) were found in most towns in northern and central Sierra Leone.36 Promising scholars were sent to Muslim centers such as Furikaria, Gbile, and Touba for advanced educa­tion. Upon completing their education they returned to Sierra Leone and established schools for missionary work or for training religious specialists.37

Islamic clerics (known in Sierra Leone and the hinterland as mori or wallihu) were consulted by both Muslins and non-Muslins for spiritual guidance and protection. Arabic charms, consisting of verses or phrases from the Quran and often enclosed in a leather pouch, were worn to ensure good health, prosperity, and success in warfare. Many mori were thought to possess magical power and barakah, a form of spiritual blessedness derived from the founder of a tariqah or even from Muhammad himself and passed from mentor to disciple. These religious specialists were used as mediators in disputes, ambassadors from one ruler to another, political advisors, and letter writers and were consulted during times of warfare. They were also consulted during times of crisis-famine, drought, epi­demic-and employed to help commemorate rites of passage. Mande traders and warriors often loaned their armies to local rulers for use against internal rivals or external forces. Occasionally, surplus food

36Ajami (from the Arabic,jamf) is a mosque in which the Muslim community gathers for the Friday midday prayers. Sallekene (Arabic, sall'ii, "to pray"; and kene, Mandingo, "field") is a open space consecrated for religious celebrations such as the fast-breaking at the end of Ramadan. All towns with more than a few Muslims had at least one jami and a sallekene.

31Skinner, "Islam and Education."

produced by Muslin-owned plantations was distributed to the people during the "hungry season."

The economic, political, and religious services thus provided by Mantle settlers endowed their communities with respect and helped to reinforce their cohesiveness. While Muslims became identified with the local society, they also remained a distinctive and highly visible group. As political and economic notables they were inte­grated into local elites, but they retained distinctiveness through their special rituals, dress, and knowledge. Another important characteristic of Mantle communality was the extended network structure maintained by leading political and commercial families. Families settled on the Guinea-Sierra Leone coast and in the hinter­ land were tied into a wide network of political influence and eco­nomic power. Family agents travelled regularly to confer with their kinsmen and associates in various West African centers. They looked after trading affairs, helped to mediate political disputes, and were used as ambassadors by African rulers and the colonial govern­ment of Sierra Leone.38 Contemporary European observers fre­quently remarked on the distinctive dress, behavior, and dignity of Mantle settlers. They observed that many earlier inhabitants re­spected and emulated these Muslim settlers and that Islam was making great strides among the local populace through the mis­ sionary activities of Mantle preachers and teachers.39

Representative Mande Families

The histories of hundreds of families could be assembled to illus­trate the points made above, for migration took place over several centuries and many towns were settled by migrants. Six families who have had great impact on the history of Sierra Leone will serve as examples.

Dumbuya. Information gathered from several sources indicates that at least two sections of the Dumbuya clan or family migrated

"Skinner, "Thomas George Lawson"; D. Skinner, "The Arabic Letter Books as an Historical Source for Sierra Leone," Africana Research Bulletin, III, 4 (July 1973). Memoranda and letters in the Governor's Letter Books, the Colonial Secretary's Letter Books, the Aborigines' and Native Affairs Letter Books and Minute Papers, and the Arabic Letter Books (all located in the Sierra Leone Archives, Fourah Bay College, Freetown) attest to the importance of these families during the nineteenth century.

"Skinner, "Islam and Education"; Harrell-Bond, Howard, and Skinner, Community Leadership, Chapter 4.

into south coastal Guinea more than two hundred and fifty years ago. Family histories collected at Lungi, Kukuna, and Bolobinneh (Conakry) agree that the Dumbuya migrations originated from Bam­ bugu (Bambouk) between the F aleme and upper Senegal rivers. Des­ cendants of F aran Lahai Dumbuya had founded Kukuna by the mid­ eighteenth century,⁴⁰ while Fenda Muhammadu (Modu) Dumbuya and six of his sons established several towns and villages in Sum­ buya kingdom and near the colony of Sierra Leone during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.41

The Dumbuya were known as an important trading family (jula) and as devout followers oflslam well before their migration to coastal Guinea. The "sons" of F aran Lahai Dumbuya and the founders of the Kukuna dynasty, Wule Bramaia and his younger brother Wule Maligi, were important traders and introduced Islamic insti­ tutions to the chiefdom. Kukuna became a key town on the Kolente River trade route during the nineteenth century, and under the patronage of the Dumbuya family three notable Muslim teaching families settled at Kukuna: Kemo Mohammad Silla and Suliman Sarakuli Toure came from Togin in Guinea, and Kebe Tumany Kebe arrived from the important teaching community of Dar es­ Salam; also in Guinea. Kemo Mohammad Silla came soon after the foundation of the town and was appointed assistant imam of the mosque by al-Imam Fode Bokari Dumbuya. Since the eighteenth century his family and those of Suliman Sarakuli Toure and Kebe Tumany Kebe have held the position of imam in rotation and have operated schools in the chiefdom. There has been an unbroken line of fifteen Dumbuya alimamis (or kandes) from Wule Bramaia (c. 1750) to Kande Sadu Dumbuya II (1977).42

40Skinner: interview with Kemokho Dumbuya and Kande Sadu Dumbuya II, Kukuna, 26 Feb. 1976; Sierra Leone: Kambia District Archives, Susu Limba File [Bramaia Chiefdom], 29 June 1926, Report by E. F. Sayers, District Commissioner of Karene; Kambia District Archives, Bramaia Chiefdom File 476/1 E, 7 Nov. 1940.

41Skinner: interview with Alimami Sindamore Dumbuya, Bolobinneh, 10 April 1976; Skinner: interview with the Elders of the Dumbuya family, Dalamodiya, Lungi, 21 Mar. 1976; PRO: CO 879/25/332, "Sierra Leone," 19-20; Skinner, "Development oflslam,"

79-87; C. Fyfe,A History of Sierra Leone (Oxford, 1964), 89 and 96; J. de Hart, "Notes on the Susu Settlement at Lungeh, Bulom Shore," Sierra Leone Studies, o.s., II (March 1919); Walker, Missions, 193, 198, 446, 551; F. H. Rankin, The White Man's Grave; a Visit to Sierra Leone in 1834, II (London, 1836), 189-195; PRO: CO 267/91, Commissioners of Inquiry, 58; PRO: CO 267/172, "Substance of a paper drawn up by the late Sir John Jeremie... ," 10. The Dumbuya have called themselves Susu for many generations, but originally they were Sarakuli.

42Skinner: interview with Kemokho Dumbuya and Kande Sadu Dumbuya II, Kukuna, 26 Feb. 1976; Skinner, "Development of Islam"; Kambia District Archives, Susu Limba

Fenda Modu Dumbuya was not the first member of his family to come to the coast for trade. His son Dalla Modu reported that a grandfather had been a gold, ivory, and slave trader in Wonkafong and that other kinsmen had preceded him to the coast. F enda Modu's father died in Sumbuya and was buried there. This branch of the family performed the same roles in the Sumbuya Kingdom that the descendants of Faran Lahai did in the Kukuna area. Fenda Modu was a principal trading agent between the interior and the coast, and in 1794 he visited Freetown in order to establish direct contact with European merchants and officials. Dalla Modu accom­ panied him and in 1801 was sent with about sixty followers to settle near the colony and to act as local agent for the jula. His town, known as Dalamodiya, was located on the eastern boundary of Freetown until 1806, when the British government expelled him as a suspected slave dealer and enemy of the colonial settlement.43 On November 22, Dalla Modu moved to his new town, Madina, in Kaffu Bullom kingdom, where the king, Bai Sherbro, was related to him by marriage. During his thirty-five-year reign there, Dalla Modu held the title of alimami and claimed to represent all Susu strangers on the Bullom Shore and in the colony.

Madina became an important port for the northern trade route, and Dalla Modu developed a substantial economic and political empire. Not only was he a powerful political and economic figure in Kaffu Bullom, but for almost ten years (1829-1838) he was regent of Locco Masama, a neighboring kingdom. He also had great influence in the Port Loko area and participated in the crowning of two alkalis there (in 1825 and 1841). Nor did he lose his promi­ nence in Sumbuya, where his family continued to fill the role of town chief, and in 1818, as a signatory of the treaty which ceded the Isles De Los, he began to receive an annual rent from the British. Alimami Dalla Modu's economic activities were as varied as his political life. Aside from his position as landlord to strangers in Kaffu Bullom, he was an agent in the timber trade for the Freetown firm of Zacchary Macaulay. He was active in the cattle trade from the north and also developed extensive rice plantations whose crop he sold to the colony. He experimented with cotton production, but he found that it did not grow well on his land.

File, Report by E. F. Sayers; Kambia District Archives, Bramaia Chiefdom File 476/1 E. Wule Brahima and Wule Maligi were probably grandsons ofFaran Lahai Dumbuya.

⁴³CMS: C Al/El, Revd. Butscher'sJoumal, 12 Dec. 1806.

Although the Modus did not come from a priestly family, they encouraged the migration and settlement of karamokos, and all of them at Madina were literate in Arabic and well educated in Islamic studies. Alimami Dalla Modu was especially concerned with the development of Muslim institutions. In Dalamodiya prayers were said regularly, and at Madina teachers were recruited to establish karanthes. Dalla Modu built a mosque there and in other Kaffu Bullom towns. He ensured that Muslim festivals and holidays were faithfully observed in his district. This Muslim missionary.activity prevented Christian missionaries from having much impact on the population ofKaffu Bullom.⁴⁴

Alimami Dalla Modu was perhaps the most powerful Muslim ruler is the neighborhood of the colony when he died in 1841. His two immediate successors, Fenda Amara Modu (1841-1846) and Kala Modu (1846-1858), never attained the influence with local kings and the colonial government that he had enjoyed. But their successor, Fenda Sanusi Modu at-Tijani(l 860-1892), proved to be an effective and influential ruler, and he played an important role as mediator for chiefs, kings, and the colonial government. The Modu family continued to be influential in political affairs during the twentieth century. Reporting on the coronation of a new bai sama of Locco Masama in 1917, the British district commissioner said: "The Alimamis of Medina (Bullom Shore) have gained great influence in this chiefdom and since 1826 no chief has been crowned without their approval."⁴⁵

Sankoh. Another jula family played an important role in the spread oflslamic institutions in Sierra Leone. The Sankoh family, like the Dumbuya, is today identified as Susu, and it is said that the first migrants came "from beyond Guinea" from a town called Balankotho. At about the beginning of the eighteenth century, according to oral tradition, three members of the family migrated to the coast from Sukaso in Guinea. They were Bai Masakama, Bai Fereh, and Fode Mamudu Sankoh. Bai Fereh settled at Melikuri Town and established the Sankoh section at Taigbe. Melikuri Town, which also included sections founded by the Toure and Yansane

44Holman, Travels, 82-83; CMS: C Al/0 192, C. F. Schlenker'sJoumal, 16 Sept. 1840; CMS: C Al/0 214, W. C. Thomson, 22 June 1838.

45SLA: NAMP, Port Loko, 28 Dec. 1917, enclosed in Decree Book, Port Loko District, 1913, 157-159.

families, was a key trade center during the eighteenth and nine­ teenth centuries. From at least the middle of the eighteenth century the Sankoh family has held the position of alkali there. William Cooper Thomson visited Melikuri in 1841 and found it divided into four quarters over which Alfa Mori Sankoh was the "chief." Alfa Sankoh had been the alkali for more than ten years when Thomson arrived. His two immediate successors, Buru Lahi Sankoh and Yusufu Sankoh, were influential leaders for more than forty years in the area between Sumbuya and Kambia. Thomson found in Meli­ kuri four mosques and seven Muslim schools with sixty-seven pupils. He stated that some students continued their studies of Arabic, law, and theology under the direction of an alfa and became qualified as religious scholars. Most of the alfas (Kamara, Kaloko, Sise, Fofana, among others) came from either Kankan or Furikaria, and Melikuri was well known as a center of Islam in coastal Guinea.46

Fode Mamudu Sankoh, a Muslim scholar and teacher, settled at Magbema near Kambia. One of his sons was called Bai Potho be­ cause he had close trading contracts with Europeans (Potho meant Portuguese and became a general term for a European along the coast). Bai Potho and his many sons established several villages north and south of the Kolente River (Conta, Masebah, Furungia, Bubuia, Robissi, among others), and one son, Fori Sineh Sankoh, founded Tawiya, a town which became the capital of a small state between Melikuri and the Kolente River. Eleven Sankoh alimanis directly descended from Fori Sineh have ruled at Tawiya; the last, Alimami Suri Sankoh, died in 1972.47 Politically and commer­ cially, Tawiya was an important town in the Melikuri-Kukuna­ Kambia trading system, and the Sankoh family also played a crucial

46Skinner: interview with Alimami Sorie Sankoh, Tawiya, 15 April 1969; Skinner: interviews with Shekhu Luseni, Gbile, 26 Mar. and 15 April 1969 and 25 and 28 Feb. 1976; PRO: CO 879/25/332, "Sierra Leone," II and 14; ljagbemi, "History," 9-11, 31-33, Chapter III; Skinner: interview with Kolea Sankoh, Tawiya, 28 Feb. 1976; Skinner: interview with Ibrahim Fofana, Famoria, 19 April 1976; Skinner: interview with al-Ha.ii Mohammed Fofana, Taigbe, 18 April 1976; Lord Stanley, "Narrative," 110--113; SLA: Colonial Secre­ tary's Letter Books, 1830 to 1880.

47Skinner, "Development of Islam," Chapter V; Skinner: interview with Alimami Sorie

Sankoh, Tawiya, 15 April 1969; Skinner: interviews with Shekhu Luseni, Gbile, 26 Mar. and 15 April 1969 and 25 and 28 Feb. 1976; Skinner: interview with Kolea Sankoh, Tawiya, 28 Feb. 1976. The current paramount chief of Tawiya (Gbile-Dixin Chiefdom) is called Kande Bokari Termer, and his mother was a sister of Alimami Sorie Sankoh, the previous para­ mount chief. In the Susu language termer means "surprise". The local population was sur­prised when the Sierra Leone government announced that the council of elders had selected Kande Bokari to succeed Alimami Sorie.

role in the development of Islamic education in the area. Fode Mamudu was himself a leading teacher, and one of his grandsons, Alimami Dura Tumany (who was probably the third alimami at Tawiya) was responsible for establishing Fode Ibrahim Tarawali (discussed under Fofana, below) at Gbile.

While Sankoh authority and influence was concentrated in the Melikuri-Kolente area, the important commercial center of Port Loko, some thirty miles northeast of Freetown, was also ruled by the Sankoh family from about 1760 to 1815. One version argues that a Sankoh-led military force took control of Port Loko and established headquarters at Sendugu, a nearby town; a Sankoh version states that they came as traders and obtained the crown peacefully because of their prominent political and commercial position. In either case, they ruled there until 1815, when Alimami Ibrahima Konkori Sankoh (son of the alkali at Melikuri) was driven out by a coalition Temne-Susu army. The continuing commercial importance of the Sankoh family was recognized by the victors, and the family was allowed to retain the title of alimami in Sendugu and six other villages. Members of the family continued to exercise great political and economic influence throughout Port Loko and neighboring kingdoms. Under the leadership of Binneh Sankoh from 1871 to 1896, the family regained much of its earlier prominence in Port Loko's political affairs. Binneh Sankoh was appointed a santigi to the alkali of Port Loko, and he was used by two successive alkalis Secku Kamara and Muriba Bangura III, as an ambassador to kings and chiefs in the Kolente-Melikuri area. He served the governor of Sierra Leone in the same capacity, on many occasions. The branches of the Sankoh family at Port Loko, Tawiya, and Melikuri kept in close contact throughout the nineteenth century; and they were all tied into the commercial, political, and religious network in the interior. They had particularly good relations with the Dumbuya families of Madina, Kukuna, and Wonkafong. Binneh Sankoh was thus well suited to the role of ambassador.48 The Sankohs, however, were more than traders and diplomats. They promoted Islam wher­ ever they settled. Like the Dumbuya family, they looked with pride

48SLA: NAMP 39, Jetter from Binneh Sankoh, 1893; PRO: CO 879/25/332, "Sierra Leone"; N. G. Frere, "Notes on the History of Port Lokkoh and Its Neighbourhood," Sierra Leone Studies, o.s., II (March 1919); Skinner, "Development of Islam," Chapter V. The extent ofBinneh Sankoh's contact with rulers in the hinterland can be traced through a series of letters between him and the colony government: SLA: Arabic Letter Books, V, May to Dec. 1889.

on their ability to read and write Arabic, and they considered mis­sionary activity to be a duty imposed by their faith. In their towns they provided schools, mosques, and prayer fields for the faithful. An intellectual elite developed in their settlements, and an Islamic infrastructure was created which still operates today in Sankoh villages and towns.

Sesay (Sise). During the mid-eighteenth century a Muslim mission­ary and holy man (wallihu) migrated to the Rokel River region in Masimera Kingdom. Uthman Sesay (also known as Ansumana Funiki) was a Mandingo from Bakonko in Guinea, and he is repre­sentative of the thousands of Muslim teachers who migrated from town to town in order to found schools and gather followers. In Masimera the king (Bai Simera) asked Uthman Sesay to provide spiritual guidance in a war against the neighboring Marampa king­ dom. The Rokel River area was not dominated by Muslims and Bai Simera did not follow Islam, but in return for his assistance Uthman Sesay was granted a portion of land called Rokel and was given a sister of Bai Simera in marriage. Rokel Town and neighboring villages became a center of Muslim settlement, and many mosques and karanthes were established. The authority of the Sesay family, and with it Islamic institutions, was firmly established by 1800, and one of Uthman Sesay's sons, Alimami Kaba Sesay, was a powerful political figure in the region during the first forty years of the nineteenth century. Missiogaries from the Church Missionary Society frequently commented on the number of Muslim scholars and Mandingo who had settled in Rokel and Magbeli, across the river. They observed a large number of schools in operation under the patronage of the Sesay family.49

During the 1830s or 1840s Abdu Rahman Sesay left Rokel and settled in Tawiya, where he became a renowned karamoko. He taught Arabic and courses in law, theology, and'IJ,adith in his school; and his descendants became the religious specialists at Tawiya under the political leadership of the Sankoh family. Abdu Rahman Sesay's great grandson, al-I:Ia.ii Muhammad Sanusi, is today a dis­tinguished scholar at Tawiya. Now more than eighty years old, he

49Laing, Travels; Rankin, White Jo.Ian's Grave, I, 253-255; Howard Collection: inter­ view with Pa Alimami Lai Sesay, Rokel, 1968; Skinner: interview with al-I;Iiiii Mui]ammad Sanusi, Tawiya, 15 April 1969; Skinner: interview with al-I;Iiiii Abdal Salam Tejan-Sie, Freetown, 25 May 1969. Magbeli, located on the river bank across from Rokel, was another important center of Mande settlement: CMS: C Al/0 108, Charles Haensel, 13 Nov. 1833, 24 Dec. 1833, and no. 101 of the Journal for 1833--1834, 13 Feb. 1834.

has been imam of the town mosque and a key arbitrator in political matters for more than thirty years.50 In addition to their settlement at Rokel and Tawiya, members of the Sesay family have been influ­ ential in Kambia, and the Sesays have intermarried with the Bai Sherbro family ofKaffu Bullom, the Fofana family of Gbile, and the Sawane (Tejan-Sie) family ofFreetown.51

Suwaray (Swarray). According to written and oral sources, the Suwaray family became established in Freetown during the 1850s or earlier.52 Five brothers came to Freetown as traders or teachers, and they were influential members of the Mandingo jamfL Two of them, Alieu Suwaray and Foday Kabba Salihu, were alimamis of thejama and among the most prominent landlords in Freetown.53 A third brother, Shaikh Foday (Baimba) Mahmoud Suwaray, was imam of the important Mandinger dominated mosque (Jamiul­ Qudus) at Magazine Cut in Freetown. This mosque, although con­ trolled by the Mandingo jama, served as the main mosque for all Muslim strangers in Freetown until 1917.54 Shaikh Mahmoud was also one of the leading elders of the Mandingo community during the last three decades of the nineteenth century.55

The other two brothers did not remain in Freetown. Foday Songah Suwaray settled in Moyamba, southeast of the colony, where he became a prominent landowner and Islamic teacher; and

'"Skinner: interviews with al-Ha.ii Muhammad Sanusi, Tawiya, 15 April 1969 and 28 Feb.

1976. • •

51For further information about the Tejan-Sie family see Skinner, "Development of Islam," Chapter VI; Skinner, "Islam and Education"; Harrell-Bond, Howard, Skinner, Community Leadership, Chapter 6.

"Howard Collection: S. M. Swarray-Deen, "The Mandingo Tribe in Sierra Leone," typescript, 2 pp.; S. M. Swarray-Deen, "Swarray Family History," typescript, 3 pp.; SLA: Arabic Letter Books, IV, 15 July 1887, 210-211; SLA: NAMP 235, from Almami Cabba Sarlioo's People to Parkes, 19 April 1893.

53 Alieu Suwaray was alimami from the late 1860s to 1871, and Foday Kabba Salihu was alimami from 1887 to 1897. There was, however, a constant struggle between the Suwaray and the Silla families for control of the alimami position, and two men often claimed to be headman simultaneously. See Harrell-Bond, Howard, and Skinner, Community Leadership, Chapter 2, for an analysis of this problem.

54lntemal divisions within the Mandingojamii and differences between the Mandingo and Sarakuli sections of the mosque led to the development of "ethnic" mosque-building after 1916: L. Proudfoot, "Mosque-building and Tribal Separation in Freetown East," Africa, 29, 4 (1959); Harrell-Bond, Howard, and Skinner, Community Leadership, Chapter 4.

"Other elders were Foday Kabba Yelli, Fode Lamina Turay, Sanoko Maddi, Abdu Rahmani Darami, Fode Sori Darami, Fode Haruna, Mohammadu Wakka, and Abdullahi Fofana. PRO: CO 267/312, D 109, 13 Oct.1871; SLA: ABMP 141, 19 Sept. 1879; SLA:

ABMP 528, 6 Sept. 1890.

Alfa Karim Suwaray became a karamoko in Pujehun in southern Sierra Leone. Both men founded mosques and worked to extend the influence of Islam.

The Suwaray family continued to play an influential part in affairs of Freetown's Mandingo community in the twentieth century. A son of Shaikh Foday Mahmoud, Alfa Hassan Swarray-Deen, was a teacher in Freetown, and his son, Shaikh Mahmoud Swarray-Deen, is an important elder of the jama and has been a justice of the peace in Freetown since 1954. Other members of the family have recently contested for the Mandingo headship and have been active in local politics.56

Kamara. Probably the most influential Sarakuli family in the Colony after 1860 was led by Baraka Kamara, who becamealimami of the Sarakuli jama in 1877 and was a leading spokesman for the Muslims of Freetown until his death on 17 June 1896.57 According to his own testimony, Alimami Baraka was a native of Bambara country and had lived for a number of years in Segou and Futa Jalon. He had once come to Freetown with a caravan, and he decided to settle there around 1856. He married Isatta Jawarra, who was from another very prominent Sarakuli family in Freetown. Alimami Baraka was especially active in long-distance trading as an agent and landlord for caravans sent by Alimami Samori Toure, who received arms and ammunition via Freetown.58 Alimami Baraka was a man of wealth and status in the colony and often mediated local and regional disputes. For all his worldly interests, he did not neglect his re­sponsibilities as a devout Muslim. He spoke for the Muslim com­ munity to the governor of Sierra Leone and tried to maintain unity among the Muslim factions in Freetown. His personal priest and adviser, Fode Haruna, taught Arabic and Islamic studies in Free­ town and later became a missionary and teacher in the Gallinas territory of southern Sierra Leone.59

Kamara family influence did not end with Alimami Baraka's

'6Harrell-Bond, Howard, and Skinner, Community Leadership, Chapter 6.

"SLA: GILB, 28 Aug. 1880, 20 May 1881, 16 Mar. 1886, 3 July 1888, and 17 Dec.

1888; Sierra Leone Weekly News, 2 July 1892 and 20 June 1896. Thomas George Lawson said Alimami Baraka was not a Sarakuli but a Bambara. In Freetown the Bambara and Sarakuli were joined in a singlejami'i under one alimam1'.

'"M. Legassick, "Firearms, Horses, and Samorian Army Organization, 187 1898,"

Journal of African History, 7, 1 (1966).

59SLA: Arabic Letter Books, IV, 23 Aug. 1887, 231-233 and V, 12 May 1888, 41-45; Sierra Leone Weekly News, 22 July 1893, 5. He was also used by the colony government as an emissary to the interior.

death. His son, Alfa Muktar Baraka, was an important landlord in Freetown and alimami of the Sarakulijama from about 1905 until his death in 1922. Alimami Baraka's grandson, Jimba Kamara, was acting Sarakuli headman from 1935 to 1938 and officially became alimami in 1941, holding the position for more than twenty-seven years.60 Like the Suwaray family, then, the Kamaras have played a key role in the political, economic, and religious affairs of the colony of Sierra Leone and in the trading network of the hinterland for more than one hundred years.

Fofana. In the area north of the Kolente River known as "Man­ dingo Country" by European travelers, many Mandefamilies played important roles in the development of lslamic institutions. One of the most prominent of these was the Fofana family, which was settled in Furikaria and other towns early in the eighteenth century. This family produced many religious specialists who helped spread Islam throughout northern Sierra Leone. Ibrahim Konditu F ofana was a learned Arabic scholar and teacher in Kisi-Kisi (or Moriah, as it came to be known) during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Two of his sons who migrated south into what is today Sierra Leone attained positions of great influence and authority during the nineteenth century. The elder son, Konditu Modu (also called Pa Sorie), migrated to Port Loko before 1820 and settled in a section of the town which is still called Konditoya. He married a sister of Mohammadu Bundu, the powerful Bunduka chief of Foro­ dugu and Mahera in Koya kingdom, south of Port Loko. Konditu Modu became one of the leading landowners in Port Loko and Koya and was a principal landlord for the caravans passing through the district toward Freetown. One of his sons, Sorie Brima Konditu, was asantigi in Port Loko between 1850 and 1881 and was succeeded by his son, Santigi Bokari Saili. Another of Konditu Modu's sons, Alfa Bokari, operated a karanthe in Port Loko.61

During the 1830s, Konditu Modu's younger brother, Fode Ibra­ him Tarawali, was given land at Gbile by Alimami Dura Tumany

60Howard Collection: interview with Alimami Jimba Kamara, Freetown, 12 Sept. 1968.

61Ijagbemi, "History," Chapter III; Skinner, "Development of Islam," 93 ff. and 116- 117; Frere, "Notes"; PRO: CO 879/25/332, "Sierra Leone," 14; SLA: NAMP 570, 1895,

enclosure from Sankoh family to Parkes; SLA: CSO, Letters Received 141, 17 April 1.862, from Sorie Conditto to Nonko Lahai; Howard Collection: interview with Conditto Fofana, Port Loko, 1968; Skinner: interview with Shekhu Luseni, 26 Mar. and 15 April 1969 and 25

and 28 Feb. 1976; SLA: ABMP 34, 16 Mar. 1883, Lawson to Govr.; SLA: GILB, 19 Oct.

1882.

Sankoh of Tawiya in order to begin an Islamic school and promote the formation of a Muslim community. Gbile was located on the Kolente River just across from Kambia and was thus astride an economic and cultural crossroads. Each year Kambia attracted thousands of traders and adventurers from many ethnic groups: Limba, Temne, Fula, Susu, Bullom, and Sierra Leonean, among others. Control over Kambia and its lucrative trade was sought by several political leaders during the nineteenth century.62 Fode Tara­ wali, who was a devout and learned Muslim, identified as the "High Priest of Moriah" by colonial government officials,63 established a school for advanced study at Gbile. It was visited by E.W. Blyden in 1872:

Billeh [is] a sort of University town-the Oxford of this region­ where are collected over five hundred young men studying Arabic and Koranic literature The president of this institution is Fode

Tarawally, celebrated throughout the country for his learning. He was educated at Tuba a town in the Fulah country of great literary repute. Fode Tarawally is of the Soosoo tribe. His father before him, all of his brothers, and all his sons have been distinguished for their learning 64

Fode Tarawali's educational institution attracted sons and daughters of notable families north and south of the Kolente River, and it had great impact on the spread oflslamic doctrines and institutions in the area.

In addition to his teaching and missionary activities, Fode Tara­ wali was a political adviser and mediator for the alimami of Moriah. He was often cited for his attempts to settle disputes between the king and his rivals. British sources claim that he was killed by

⁶²Kambia was destroyed several times during the nineteenth century, and there was constant struggle between Bai Farima of Magbema and Alimami Sattan Lahai of Rowula. Susu-Mandingo forces north of the Kolente River often engaged in battle with Temne warriors from the south bank. Mercenaries also became deeply involved in these wars and further complicated hostilities.

6'SLA: ABMP, 15 June 1876, "Status of Parties and Witnesses to Scarcies [Kolente] and Fouricariah Agreements."

⁶⁴CMS: C Al/0 47, E. W. Blyden to Venn, 19 Jan. 1872. Tuba was the center of Diakhanke educational activities during most of the nineteenth century. While Fode Tarawali is called a Susu, the family is associated with theYula lineages who migrated to the region before the eighteenth century. Many "Mandingo" families were mixtures of local Susu residents and Mande migrants. Susu became the dominant language, and most people in the area today call themselves Susu. Fode Tarawali's university educated many political leaders in northern Sierra Leone between the 1840s and 1870s. The school with its large library was destroyed in 1875/6 during one of the periodic wars for control ofKambia.

supporters of Alkali Dawuda Toure, the nephew and rival of Alimami Bukhari Toure, while praying at the mosque in Melikuri, but family tradition records that he died peacefully at Tawiya. How­ ever he died, he was succeeded by two of his sons, Lamina and Fode Lusaini, who carried on his missionary work. Fode Tarawali's grandson, Shaikh Lusaini, a learned and aged gentleman, has been head of the family at Gbile for several decades and has in his possession a large number of Arabic manuscripts on family history and Islamic studies.65

The Impact of lslam on Indigenous Cultures

The histories of many other Mantle families could be added to illustrate the process of settlement and the diffusion of Muslim insti­tutions. Thousands of traders, missionaries, and military leaders played roles in the development of Islamic influence throughout the colony and hinterland of Sierra Leone. Networks of kinship and clientship, which had begun to develop before the eighteenth century, had extended from Futa Toro, Segou, Boure, Timbo, Kankan, and Furikaria to almost every town and large village in Sierra Leone by the second decade of the nineteenth century.

Muslim notables became prominent in the economic, social, and political structures of many kingdoms and chiefdoms, especially in northern and central Sierra Leone and in the colony itself. From the beginning of the nineteenth century the colonial government recog­ nized the importance of working with Muslim leaders in order to promote political stability and trade. Even in areas where Islam was not dominant, the political leaders used Muslim clerics as advisers, secretaries and ambassadors. The kinship and clientship networks which linked the coastal ports, market towns, and interior sources of goods facilitated the dispersion of wealth, military power, and political influence.

Islam, the ideology of the vast majority of those who comprised this interlocking system, was introduced throughout Sierra Leone as

65Skinner: interview with Alimami Sorie Sankoh, Tawiya, 15 April 1969; Skinner: interview with Shekhu Luseni, Gbile, 26 Mar. and 15 April 1969 and 25 and 28 Feb. 1976; Skinner, "Development of Islam," 88-97. On my most recent visits with Shekhu Luseni (February-March 1976) he was still playing a dominant role in the affairs of Gbile-Dixin Chiefdom. He controlled several villages and was the tax collector for them and was also the principal religious advisor in the chiefdom. He had been writing a family history in Arabic, and because of his age (estimated to be in excess of one hundred and fifteen years) he is a particularly valuable historical source.

the networks expanded under the impact of increased trade demand during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. As Muslim leader­ ship became institutionalized in many areas, Islamic concepts and rituals spread among the indigenous populations; and by the mid­ nineteenth century Muslim institutions were established in most parts of the Sierra Leone hinterland. Indigenous Muslim elites were formed, and these in tum promoted the development of lslamic insti­tutions throughout the countryside. The process of settlement and assimilation facilitated the foundation of a religious structure which strongly influenced the various ethnic groups in Sierra Leone and which played a prominent political role throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. It remains to be asked: how and to what extent did Mande migration and Islam affect local societies in Sierra Leone?

By the end of the nineteenth century Islamic institutions had taken

firm root in Sierra Leone, particularly in the northern half of the country among the Temne. Outside the colony, statistics relating to conversion to Islam are not available before 1900. Those after 1900 are not reliable, but they do provide a rough estimate about the number of Muslims in the country. Data collected between 1910 and 1931 indicate that fifteen percent or more of the non-colony popula­tion was Muslim. As one would expect, the Mandingo, Susu, and Fula were predominantly Muslim groups. Among the indigenous ethnic groups the Temne and Kuranko-both located in the northern half of the country-had the largest percentage of Muslims. Other ethnic groups among whom Islam had been established were the Yalunka, Limba, Mende, Vai, Loko, Krim, and Kono.66

The cultures of Sierra Leone were affected by Islam in a variety of ways, some of them direct and obvious, others more subtle. The karanthe and the mosque with their respective elites provided an alternative to traditional institutions and elites. The Friday midday prayer, the Ramadan month of fasting, and the feast day celebrations provided public worship and fellowship which assisted in forming a cohesive Muslim community. Islam began to compete with tradi­tional religions by providing spiritual services for the indigenous communities. The making of Arabic charms by the a/fa was a re­ flection of this influence. Charms composed of bits of hair, leaves,

66H. C. Luckach, A Bibliography of Sierra Leone (London, 1910), 18; R. Kuczynski, Demographic Survey of the British Colonial Empire, I (London, 1948), 160; Sierra Leone, Summary of the Census of 1921, 34-36; Sierra Leone, Report of the Census for the Year 1931, 101-104.

sticks, or cowrie shells were originally made by traditional priests. The alfa or mori, on the other hand, made them by writing asura or verse from the Quran on paper and enclosing it in a leather pouch. The charms were used by warriors, farmers, traders, and chiefs to bring prosperity or victory and to ward off evil spirits67 ( called krifi by the Temne and yina by the Susu). Professor A. K. Turay, a Muslim Temne and a linguistics specialist, identifies charm-making as a key function in the integration of Islam with traditional culture:

More than anything else, the power ofusing the Koran and knowledge of the Arabic script helped to entrench the position ofManding, Susu, and more latterly Fula marabouts among the Temne. Traditional forms of divination and charm-making existed among the Temne, as well as a traditional official, it-mem, who was now consulted only by well as a traditional official, u-mem, responsible for the making of these. The arrival of the marabouts did not basically alter the belief of the Temne in the powers of charms; if anything, the marabouts had everything to gain by not discouraging these beliefs, merely replacing the traditional forms of divining and charms by new ones based on the Koran. This resulted in a sharp decline in the powr ofu: mem, who was now consulted only by the poorer section of the community which could not afford the fees asked by the marabouts.⁶⁸

In addition to making charms, Muslim holy men used prayer, divination, magic potions (nasi), and magic tablets to identify wrongdoers and to protect and cure people.69 The medicinal potion is used in many West African societies as a cure for illness. It is produced by inscribing Quranic passages on a writing board and then washing the writing off with water; the collected water can be drunk by the patient to produce recovery.

At a basic cultural level-in rites of passage-Islamic practices began to enter Sierra Leone societies. In burial ceremonies among the Temne, for example, Muslim prayers were introduced at the grave and Muslim offerings (sathka) were made on the third, seventh, fourteenth, and fortieth days after death.⁷⁰ These features were also

67N. Thomas,Anthropological Report on Sierra Leone, part 1 (London, 1916), 31; A. K. Turay, ''Mantling and Susu Loan Words in Temne," Mantling Studies Conference. Yina is derived from the Arabicjinn, probably via Mantling (jinn). In the traditional Temne faith, krifi referred to an ancestor, but, according to Dr. Turay (p. 15), under the impact of lslam the term came to be used for an evil spirit.

68Turay,"Mantling and Susu Loan Words," 10 11, 18.

69Ibid., 18.

'"Ibid., IO; Thomas,Anthropological Report, Chapter XIII. The Temne wordsathka is derived from Mantling (sadaka) or Susu (saraka). It has acquired the general meaning of sacrifice in a Muslim religious ceremony, but it is also the word used to designate various

introduced into the Yoruba rites in Freetown. The Muslim Aku read from the Quran and sing religious songs.71 Muslim clerics also began to officiate at some Temne ancestor ceremonies.72 In dogma too there were introductions of Muslim beliefs. Among the Temne the main deity is known as kuru, and this has been modified by Muslim Temne to kuru masaba and identified with Allah. Often it was to Him that offerings were made, although they were also made to the

ancestors.73 Temne evil spirits (krifi) became associated withjinn,

and Muslim clerics integrated them into Islam.

After talking about krifi one informant went on to deal with the cult of ancestors and said that when a man died they took a stone to repre­ sent him and "worshipped" him in this form. They were told to do

this by the Moriman [Muslin cleric], who talks to the krifi and is commonly supposed to be able, after shutting himself up for seven days and living on rice-bread, to tell people all about heaven and hell.74

This practice of seclusion was a common technique used by Muslim holy men, who meditated about problems and delivered judgments to the people upon emerging from the retreat. In connection with ancestral spirits and death, it is clear that certain concepts were influenced by Islam: good people go to heaven (ro-riyana ), which is a clean place where all necessities are provided; evil people go to hell, (ro-yanama), from where they may be released.75 The concept of sathka or saraka seems to be present among all the peoples of northern Sierra Leone, and among the Temne it comprises a complex of rites which involve sacrifice, the blessing of an object for

traditional offerings. In the original Arabic (sadaqah) it has the meaning of alms and contains the sense of giving someone a gift for the sak of Allah. In different forms the Arabic root f-d-g implies trust and friendship.

71 A. K. Ghazali, "Sierra Leone Muslims and Sacrificial Rituals," Sierra Leone Bulletin

of Religion, 2, 1 (1960), 27-32. Fidahu is derived from the Arabic expressionjida'hu which means "his redemption."

72Turay, "Manding and Susu Loan Words," 10-11.

73/bid.; Thomas,Anthropological Report, 29; A. K. Turay, "Temne Supernatural Termi­ nology," Sierra Leone Bulletin of Religion; 9, 2 (1967). The word masaba is derived from the Manding expression mansa ba which means "big king."

74Thomas, Anthropological Report, 33--34; Turay, "Temne Terminology," 52-53; Turay, "Manding and Susu Loan Words," 18.

"Turay, "Temne Terminology"; M. McCulloch, Peoples of Sierra Leone (London,

1950), 72. Riyana is borrowed from the Susu word (riyana) which is derived from the Arabic al-jannah ("paradise"). Yanama also comes from Susu (yahanama ), which is taken from the Arabic al-jahannam ("hell").

its usefulness, and ancestral offerings.76 In many of these rites the Muslim cleric is an important participant.

Another indication of the cultural influence of Islam on indig­enous societies is the introduction of Arabic names in Sierra Leone. Among the Temne it was traditional to name the first child after a paternal ancestor and the second after a maternal ancestor, but during the nineteenth century the use of Arabic names became in­creasingly common. Some common Arabic names modified by local usage were: Lansana (al-I:Iasan), Luseni (al-I:Iusain), Momodu (Mul.iammad), Bubakar (Abu Bakr), Brimah (Ibrahim), and Suli­ man (Sulaiman).

Professor A. K. Turay, who has made a thorough study of loan­ words in the Temne language, has identified more than one hundred and twenty words and phrases of Manding/Susu origin used by

Temne people.77

The majority of words borrowed from Manding and Susu are of ultimate Arabic origin, have to do mostly with religious and pious behaviour and Islamic rites and customs, such as prayer and worship, alms and sacrifice. There are also words relating to divination, magic and charm making, the uses to which the Manding and Susu mara­ bouts most profitably put the Koran. Titles of chieftaincy have like­ wise been borrowed from Mantling and Susu into Temne since these Manding and Susu marabouts, because of their powers of divination and magic, as well as their knowledge of the Koran, not only became 'King-makers' among the Temne, but were themselves sometimes re­ warded for their services by being made chiefs, hence the Manding or Susu ancestry claimed by several chiefs among the ethnic groups of northern Sierra Leone.

Indigenous Manding and Susu words, though not pious in the source language, have often been given religious connotations when borrowed into Temne, with the result that Manding and Susu words of insults in the source languages are borrowed into Temne with the added implication of 'divine curse'. Words denoting artisans, food­ stuffs, implements used mainly for measurement, and numbers have also been borrowed into Temne from indigenous Manding and Susu vocabulary (i.e. with no ultimate Arabic source).⁷⁸

It is particularly interesting that many key words and expressions relating to politics and kinship have been borrowed by the Temne

76Thomas, Anthropological Report, Chapter VII; Turay, "Mantling and Susu Loan Words," 10; Turay, "Temne Terminology," 51.

"Turay, "Mantling and Susu Loan Words."

"Ibid., 7-8.

and other northern ethnic groups from Manding/Susu. In Temne, the general term for ancestor, original founder of a village, or descen­dant of a founding ancestor (lasari) has been taken from Mantling; and the Temne word which denotes a citizen or inhabitant of a village (dure) comes from Mantling or Susu.79 Several political titles in northern Sierra Leone have been introduced through the influence of Mantle settlers. Most are derived from Arabic. The following titles were in use in northern political systems by the late eighteenth century: alimami (king, chief, subchief), kande (chief), mansa (king, chiet),farima (chief, originally a war leader), alkali (chief, subchief, judge), santigi (village chief, section chief). The precise usage of these titles varied from area to area. In Port Loko the alkali was the head of state and superior to the alimami (after 1815); in some Limba areas alimami was equivalent to king; in Kukuna alimami and kande were interchangeable and meant head chief; in the Magbema kingdom the king was called Bai Farima and alimami was a lesser title; in Moriah (Mandingo) the king was called alimami, manga, or sometimes mansa. A santigi was always a sub chief. In many Muslim chiefdoms Mandingo or Susu strangers held high political office, occasionally obtaining chiefdoms of their own. Even in non-Muslim chiefdoms Muslim clerics assisted in the installation of a chief or king by placing a white cloth on his head and saying a prayer while using the Muslim rosary (Temne: thasabiya/ Arabic: tasbi ). In northern villages and in Freetown a large drum (Temne: thabule/ Arabic: fabl) was used to call people to prayer and to announce the presence of the chief. Affairs of state were fre­quently opened with a prayer by the alfa, who was a near relative or political adviser of the king/chief.

Conclusion

The introduction of so many key words, particularly in the vocabu­lary of religion and politics, the participation of Muslim clerics in cultural and political rites, and the acquisition of important political titles by Muslims all indicate a high degree of socio-cultural inte­ gration between the indigenous and intrusive cultures. An important but not clearly understood factor in the integrative process is the very long historical contact between the Mantle and the peoples of Sierra Leone. Since at least the eighteenth century, clan names in northern Sierra Leone have been derived from Mantle (Sankoh, Turay,

Sesay, Koroma, Kamara, for example), and it is clear that the process of settlement and cultural integration began several centuries ago.80 The Mantling and Susu were already well established on the Upper Guinea Coast by 1450-1500.81 As the principal and clerics in the coastal areas, the Mantling, Sarakuli, and Susu migrants exercised over time a profound influence on the indigenous cultures. Some of their influence was accomplished through con­ quest, and many Baga, Temne, Bullom, Limba, and Loko people were displaced. But, usually, influence was exercised through eco­nomic, missionary, or political activities. These peaceful settlers did not need to destroy the indigenous cultures. They found that they could adapt and use these cultures in order to further their own economic, religious, and political ends.

Muslim clerics, well-trained and imbued with missionary zeal, introduced orthodox Islamic institutions and practices into the local societies. They did so to serve their fellow countrymen and their con­verts from among the local elite. But they also adapted their skills to the local political and social systems and took over functions previously performed by traditional priests and political figures. In doing so, they became entrenched in the local political and social "power elite" and furthered their economic interests. As they were assimilated into indigenous cultures, they also integrated these societies into an extensive political, socioeconomic, and religious network which included much of West Africa and also North Africa and the Middle East. Some would argue that the Muslim clerics, in integrating Islam into traditional cultures, introduced impurities into their own faith. But Islam has long been an international, expan­sionist faith, adaptable in the face of new political and social situa­tions. Even where Islam was imposed by the sword (whether in Persia or the Hausa states), it adapted local cultural features to its own ends. Ultimately, Islam retains a core of characteristics­ language, education, institutions, rituals, and law-which define it and which bind Muslims into a common system, whether they come from Indonesia, India, Egypt or Sierra Leone.