The Emergence of the Griot Lutes
Ancient Mali: The Source of the Griot Tradition
The present-day countries of Mali, Senegal, Gambia and Guinea are considered to be the heartland of jaliya, the griot tradition. It also can be found, to a lesser extant, in Niger, Burkina Faso, and Guinea-Bissau; however, in those countries the only ethnic groups which have a griot caste are extended branches of the FulBe (also referred to as the Fulani or Fula), Songhai and other Islamic peoples with similar tripartite caste systems which can trace their origins to Mali and the Senegambia.
It's no coincidence that the heartland of jaliya exists primarily within the boundaries of the Mandinka (Mande) Kingdom of Mali (c.1235-1546 CE), the next great West African empire after the fall of the first one, Wagadu, better known as the Soninke Empire of Ghana (c. 300-1100 CE). The earliest references to griots within the griots' own oral histories can only be traced to the period just prior to the founding of the Mali Empire in 1235 by Sundiata Keita (c.1190-1255), considered to the greatest hero of the Mande world. In all griot oral histories, the point of origin for the Mande griots seems to date to when Sundiata was still a young boy. His dying father, King Nare Fa Maghan, bequeathed to him the griot Balla Fasseke, son of the king's own griot.
It's interesting to note that both Mande and Non-Mande griots all consider Ancient Mali to be the source of their own traditions. For example, the Wolof, a non-Mande people, in northern Senegal use jeli-- the generic Mande term for griot-- as a specific designation for a xalamkat, a Wolof gewel (griot) who plays the xalam, the principal wooden-bodied lute of the Wolof griots. American anthropologist Joseph B. Hill, who did field work in Senegal documenting the Wolof griots and the xalam, stated in his doctoral thesis, People of Word, Song, and Money: The Evolution of Senegalese Griots and Their Art, that: "Samba Diabaré Samb, the last great Wolof jeli, tells me the word [jeli] came along with the xalam from the Bamana...."
This is an interesting contention considering the fact that the Bamana of Mali (referred to as the Bambara by the Europeans) were probably the last major Mande people to adopt Islam. In the 17th and 18th centuries, the powerful Bamana kingdoms of Kaarta and Segu were major players in the slave trade. Kaarta was absorbed by Segu around 1798. Segu, itself, was weakened in 1818 by a major defeat at the hands of the Islamic FulBe army of Cheikou Amadou Barry, who waged jihad against the non-Islamic kingdom. Eventually, Segu and the Bamana succumbed to last FulBe jihad led by al-Hajj Umar Tall around 1860. The Bamana didn't fully adopt Islam until after World War II.
I think it's more likely that the FulBe and the related Tukulóor were the ones who introduced the xalam and the griot tradition to the Wolof. This is borne out by Hill's statement that in addition to the Mande term jeli, the Wolof in Senegal's northern Jolof region had also borrowed the FulBe/ Tukulóor term for griot, gawlo, to specifically refer to a member of a distinct subgroup within the gewel caste, comprised only of xalamkats (literally, xalam players). Evidently, these gawlo griots are all of Tukulóor descent, though, interestingly enough, he had discovered that "they are Wolofized enough that many Wolof people I talked to in the Jolof region were not aware of the gawlo's foreign origin. When I suggested the possibility of foreign origin, people said they would not be surprised, since the Wolof are all assimilated from other groups. Still, they considered gawlo to be a caste group distinct from gewel and not simply the Tukulóor equivalent."
It's important to note that while a significant percentage of the Wolof nobility had converted to Islam early on-- at least, by the time of first contact with the Portuguese in the 1400s-- apparently the Wolof as a people didn't fully adopt Islam until after the last great Fulbe jihad initiated by al-Hajj Umar Tall in 1852.
The Origin of the Griot Lutes
This brings us to thorny issue of determining the origins of the griots lutes of West Africa. As the griots are oral historians, the little that is known about the history of the various musical instruments that are exclusive to their caste and calling is purely anecdotal.
One possible clue to the source of the griot lutes is their unique morphology. The distinguishing features of the typical griot lute consists of a narrow hollowed-out wooden body, semi-spike stick neck, and a fan-shaped wooden bridge inserted into a hole in the instrument's skin head (soundboard) to slide onto the narrow end of its neck.
The only other lutes in all of West Africa which share these distinctive characteristics are the teharden of the Kel Tamashek (Tuareg) iherden and the tidinit of the Moorish iggawin. Likewise, the way in which the griot lutes are played exactly mirrors the playing styles used on the Kel Tamashek and Moorish instruments.
But the uncanny similarities don't end there. Just as the lutes of the griots are exclusive to the male members of the griot caste, the Moorish tidinit lute is only played by male iggawin, members of the musicians' caste who constitute the bottom rung of the Moorish caste system, and the Kel Tamashek teharden by the iherden, male poet/praise-singer/musicians who are members of the enad (blacksmith) caste.
Griots are unique to those Islamized peoples whose societies share a rigid tripartite caste system, similar to that of the Moors and Kel Tamashek, which is basically divided into three ranks: nobles/freemen, artisans, and slaves. The griots, as music and word artisans, occupy the middle rank. However, within the hierarchical pecking-order of the artisan class itself, the griots constitute the lowest caste below those of the blacksmiths (the preeminent artisan caste which also includes woodworkers), leatherworkers, woodcutters and weavers.
At this point, it's important to note that it was the Moors and Kel Tamashek, rather than the Arabs, who introduced Islam into West Africa, probably in the 8th century. Both these peoples are of North African Amazigh (Berber) origin. They controlled the Trans-Sahara trade routes and were the principal trading partners with Ancient Ghana.
Taking all this into consideration, it seems to me that the griot lute and the entire concept of the griot caste is taken directly from the Moors and Kel Tamashek. I'd take it a step further and propose that these peoples are the ones who introduced the lute family of string instruments-- both plucked and bowed (i.e. fiddles)-- into West Africa.
For more on this topic, please visit: The Origin of West African Lutes
From Gourd-Bodied Lutes to Wooden-Bodied Lutes
The griots are descended from those who followed the music-making and praise-singing trades before the adoption of Islam and the tripartite caste system, both of which were almost certainly introduced into West Africa by the Amazigh Moors and the Kel Tamashek. It's my belief that prior to the total Islamization and the attendant stratification of their societies into the current castes, that most of the proto-griots of the aforementioned peoples played gourd-bodied lutes.
The adoption of the wood-bodied griot lutes we know today-- which were clearly patterned after those of Moorish iggawin and the Kel Tamashek iherden-- was the culmination of the transformation of most of the early music-makers and praise-singers into griots. These instruments became the hallmarks of the griot musicians, crucial to their self-image and self-identification as members of a special social group.
As a result, the morphology of instruments in those societies with a griot caste is not simply a matter of musical mechanics and cultural taste. Rather, it reflects the very nature of social distinctions and the player's place in these highly stratified societies. Case in point: semi-spike wood-bodied lutes with fan-shaped bridges are exclusive to members of the griot castes. Conversely, only non-griot vernacular musicians play gourd-bodied lutes.
We can see these rules at work in the evolution of the aforementioned gambaré lute of the Soninke griots. Originally a gourd-bodied instrument, the gambaré was most likely transformed into a wood-bodied lute shortly after the complete Islamization and the tripartite stratification of Soninke society, which resulted in the emergence of a specific griot caste.
Another example of this rigid dichotomy is the breakdown of lutes in FulBe musical culture. The two main subgroups of the griot caste-- maabu’be (singular, maabo), who were weavers as well as singers, and wammbaa’be (singular, bammbaa’do) -- play the hoddu, a griot lute with an oblong wooden trough-like body. Non-griot vernacular musicians, such as herders and shepherds, stick to the FulBe molo, a folk lute with a round gourd body.
(Most writers, in describing FulBe griots, lump all of the three subgroups together under the heading gawlo, which is actually the term used to describe a single member of the third subgroup, the awlu’be. Amongst the Western FulBe, which still hold to the rigid caste system, the maabu'be and wammbaa’be cater to the nobility and the wealthy, while the awlu'be have a more generic role, performing for all classes of FulBe society. The hoddu lute is the main instrument of the maabu'be and wammbaa’be-- though the wammbaa’be also play the nyaanyooru single-string fiddle. Conversely, the awlu’be are mostly drummers and percussionists.)
-- Shlomo Pestcoe
Illustration Credits:
A Wolof xalamkat-- a griot who specializes in playing the xalam lute. Dakar, Senegal, c. 1910
