Kissi

The Kissi are a West Atlantic people of the forested hills where Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia meet, grouped around towns such as Kissidougou and Kérouané. They speak Kissi, a Mel language of the Niger-Congo family.

Their traditions recall an earlier home in the Upper Niger country south of the Futa Jallon; expelled by the Yalunka, they moved after 1600 into the forests, pushing the Limba before them while living under constant pressure from the Kuranko. Ironworking was ancient in this region and Kissi smiths were famed for their skill, their iron bars serving as trade goods when Portuguese voyagers recorded them in the early sixteenth century.

Their traditional religion centers on ancestor worship and the soapstone figures called pomdo, buried images that the Kissi dig up and consult for guidance.