The Fouta Djallon

The highlands were home to Jallonke and other farming peoples before Fula herders moved in from the north over several centuries. In the early 18th century Muslim Fula leaders launched a jihad, and by around the 1720s they had founded the imamate of Futa Jallon, a state ruled by an almamy chosen from two rival lineages, the Alfaya and the Soriya, who were supposed to alternate in power. Timbo was the political capital and Fougoumba the religious one, while Labé was the seat of one of its nine provinces.

The state was a centre of Islamic learning and a slave-owning society, with many captives working the farms. In the 19th century it came under pressure from the French advancing from the coast. The almamy Bokar Biro was killed in battle at Porédaka in 1896, and the French imposed a protectorate. Alfa Yaya of Labé, who tried to keep his province's autonomy, was arrested and exiled, and died in exile in 1912.

Under colonial rule the region was integrated into French Guinea, and Dalaba became a hill station. After independence, relations between Sékou Touré's government and the Fula elite were difficult, and many people from the Fouta Djallon went into exile or were detained. Since then the region has been a stronghold of Fula political parties and a source of emigrants across West Africa and beyond.

The Fouta Djallon is the heartland of Guinea's Fula (Peul) people, and Pular is the language of the region. The culture places great weight on Islam, learning and restraint: children attend Koranic schools, many scholars wrote in Pular using Arabic script, and the old mosques of the towns remain important. Fula ideals of pulaaku — dignity, patience and self-control — shape manners, and loud behaviour is frowned upon.

Cattle have long been central to Fula identity and wealth, even though many families now farm or trade. Traditional houses were round, with thatched roofs and gardens enclosed by hedges; many villages still keep this pattern.

Crafts include dyed cotton cloth, basketry and leatherwork. Religious festivals such as Tabaski and the end of Ramadan are the high points of the year, and emigrants return for them. Hospitality is generous, and guests are usually offered milk, food and a place to rest.

Labé is the main town, a busy market and trading centre with a university. Mamou is a crossroads where the main roads from Conakry to the interior meet, and Pita, Dalaba, Tougué, Koubia and Mali-ville are smaller towns.

Most people farm: fonio, rice and maize on the hillsides, vegetables in gardens, oranges and other fruit, and potatoes. Cattle are kept everywhere. Trade and remittances from Fula emigrants in Conakry, Senegal, Europe and North America support many households.

Life follows the prayers, the market days and the farming seasons. The main issues are the lack of jobs for young people, poor roads, deforestation and soil erosion on the plateaux, and the drying up of some springs, a concern for the rivers that rise here.

The Fouta Djallon is the home of fonio, a tiny grain that grows on poor highland soils. It is steamed and eaten with sauces, often with milk or as porridge, and is a mark of Fula cooking. Sauces made from cassava or sweet-potato leaves, often with groundnuts, are eaten with rice or fonio.

Milk is essential. Fresh or soured milk, kossam, is drunk on its own or poured over grains, and butter is made in the villages. Meat is saved for festivals, when sheep are slaughtered for Tabaski.

Oranges, mangoes, avocados and bananas grow well in the highlands, and potatoes are an important highland crop. Drinks include sweet tea poured in rounds and ginger juice; alcohol is rarely drunk in this strongly Muslim region.

The highland plateaux themselves are the main attraction: sandstone tablelands and escarpments cut by rivers and gorges, with grassland, pine plantations and patches of forest. The region is often called the water tower of West Africa because rivers such as the Gambia and the Bafing, the main headstream of the Senegal, rise here.

Around Pita, the Kinkon falls drop from the edge of the plateau near a small dam, and the Kambadaga falls are nearby. Near Dalaba, the Ditinn falls plunge from a high cliff into a gorge. Dalaba itself is a hill town among pines, with colonial villas and views over the plateau.

Labé has its old mosque, markets and the villages around it; Mamou is the gateway town, and Timbo, the old capital of the imamate, lies nearby. In the north, near Mali-ville, the Dame de Mali is a rock formation said to look like a woman's face, and the surrounding hills are among the highest in the Fouta Djallon. Throughout the region, walking between the Fula villages of the Fouta Djallon, with their round houses, gardens and hedges, is the best way to see local life.