SUNDIATA, an epic of old Mali, translated from the French by G.D. Pickett

158pp., paperback, English Language Edition Reprint, London, (1965) 2024

First published in French in 1960.

A thirteenth century oral epic, part history, part legend, passed down through the spoken word for over 800 years, captured here in print for the first time.

Sundiata Keita (c. 1217 - c. 1255) was a prince and the founder of the empire of Mali.

Historian, playwright and short story writer Djibril Tamsir Niane was born in 1932 in Conakry, Guinea. He graduated from the University of Bordeaux, France, and was made an honorary professor of Howard University, USA, and the University of Tokyo. He also taught at Institut Polytechnique de Conakry before joining the Basic Institute of Black Africa in Dakar, Senegal. He edited Volume IV —Africa from the Twelfth to the Sixteenth Century  of the UNESCO General History of Africa. Niane died in 2021.