page_title: Griot
section_title: In the Mali Empire
hierarchical_section_title: Griot / In the Mali Empire
caption_attribution_description: Griots de Sambala, roi de Médine (illustration de Côte occidentale d'Afrique du Colonel Frey) - Fig.81 p.128 - [Cote&#160;: Réserve A 200 386]
context_page_description: A griot is a West African historian, storyteller, praise singer, poet, or musician. The griot is a repository of oral tradition and is often seen as a leader due to his or her position as an advisor to royal personages. As a result of the former of these two functions, they are sometimes called a bard.
context_section_description: The Mali Empire (Malinke Empire), at its height in the middle of the 14th century, extended from central Africa (today's Chad and Niger) to West Africa (today's Mali and Senegal). The empire was founded by Sundiata Keita, whose exploits remain celebrated in Mali today. In the Epic of Sundiata, Naré Maghann Konaté offered his son Sundiata Keita a griot, Balla Fasséké, to advise him in his reign. Balla Fasséké is considered the founder of the Kouyaté line of griots that exists to this day.
  Each aristocratic family of griots accompanied a higher-ranked family of warrior-kings or emperors, called jatigi. In traditional culture, no griot can be without a jatigi, and no jatigi can be without a griot. However, the jatigi can loan his griot to another jatigi.
  Most villages also had their own griot, who told tales of births, deaths, marriages, battles, hunts, affairs, and many other things.
caption: Griots of Sambala, king of Médina (Fula people, Mali), 1890
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