9 entries
Kingdoms & polities · pre-1822 and continuing
Kwi Nyon and the Grebo town council
The layered civic government of the Grebo towns: age-grades, a council of elders, a war-headman and a ritual high priest.
Kingdoms & polities · pre-1822 and continuing
Sacred groves and the bush school
The enclosed forest precincts where Poro and Sande held their schools — protected land, protected knowledge.
Kingdoms & polities · attested from the 17th century
Sande (Bundu)
The women's initiation society, counterpart to Poro, holding authority over women's law, medicine and ritual.
Kingdoms & polities · c. 1800–1870s
The Condo Confederation
A multi-ethnic commercial state centred on Bopolu, dominating the road from the interior to the sea.
Kingdoms & polities · in force throughout the pre-1822 period
The landlord–stranger reciprocity
The legal convention by which a resident ruler granted a foreigner protection, land use and trading rights in exchange for tribute and obligation.
Kingdoms & polities · c. 1235–c. 1600
The Mali Empire and the forest frontier
The western Sudanese empire whose southern commercial frontier reached the northern edge of the Liberian forest.
Kingdoms & polities · c. 17th–19th centuries
The Mende frontier
The southward Mende expansion that shaped the northern Vai and Gola country and carried Poro and Sande with it.
Kingdoms & polities · attested from the 16th century
The Poro
The men's initiation and governing society that regulated law, initiation and trade across ethnic lines.
Kingdoms & polities · documented 15th–17th centuries
The Sapi peoples
The collective name Portuguese sources gave the coastal peoples between the Nunez and Cape Mount — makers of the Sapi-Portuguese ivories.