Mandingo warrior biography for kids

Mandé ethnic group in Sierra Leone

Ethnic group

Mandingo people of Sierra Leone (commonly referred to as the Mandinka, Mandingo or Malinke) is a major ethnic group in Sierra Leone and a branch of the Mandinka people of West Africa.

The Mandingo first settled in what is now Sierra Leone from Guinea over 650 years ago as farmers, traders and Islamic clerics in the time of the Mali Empire, an empire under the rule of the famous Muslim ruler Mansa Musa. About 500 years later, Beginning in the late 1870s to the 1890s under the rule of prominent Mandinka Muslim cleric Samori Ture, an even larger group of Mandingo immigrated from Eastern Guinea settled in northeastern Sierra Leone on lands conqured by the Muslim ruler Samori Toure as part of the Wassoulou Empire.

The Mandingo are partly responsible for the spread of Islam in Sierra Leone. The Mandingo people of Sierra Leone have a very close friendly and allied relationship with their neighbors th