Ethnos

Mandinka

The Mandinka (also spelled Mandingo) are a people of West Africa. In the Thirteenth Century, they spread from the area that is now Mali, carving out a large empire. Currently, they number over one million and reside in many autonomous villages throughout The Gambia, Senegal and Guinea Bissau.

The most famous fictional Mandinka is probably Levar Burton's character of Kunta Kinte, from the TV mini-series Roots. Martin R. Delany, a radical 19th century abolitionist in the United States, was of partial Mandinka descent.

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