Songye

The Songye, written Songe, are a Bantu people of the central Congo basin, between the Sankuru and Lualaba rivers. Their ruling lineages trace their origins to the Luba lands of Shaba; as the Kingdom of Luba formed around 1500 the Songye chiefdoms developed on its northern and western edges as independent powers.

Some three dozen chiefdoms were each ruled by a chief advised by elders and nobles, with farming as the economic base. Songye spiritual life centred on the Bwadi bra Kifwebe secret society, whose dancers in raffia costumes and striped wooden masks performed at initiations, funerals and chiefly rites; kifwebe sculpture became an admired tradition of Central Africa.

Their language, Songe, is a close cousin of Luba. Through the sixteenth to the eighteenth centuries the chiefdoms grew in population and craft skill under the shadow of their powerful Luba neighbours.