Republic of the Congo
Capital: Brazzaville · Central Africa
North bank of the great river — Kongo and Teke kingdom heritage, sapeur urban style, and deep-forest cultures of the Sangha basin.
Ethnic communities
- KongoSouthern heirs of the Kongo Kingdom
- Teke (Bateke)Plateau kingdom that signed with Brazza; famed masks
- MbochiRiverine north; trading and fishing traditions
- Aka & MbendjeleForest peoples of the Sangha
More communities of Republic of the Congo
- Kongo (Bakongo) — Kingdom heirs of the south (full profile)
- Lari — Pool-region Kongo kin of Matsoua's memory
- Vili — Loango coast kingdom of ocean trade
- Yombe — Mayombe forest carvers of phemba figures
- Bembe — Southwestern hills' compact statuary masters
- Kouyou & Makoua — Cuvette river communities of the north
- Sangha peoples — Forest-river folk of the northern basin
- Babongo — Southern forest people of Bwiti links
- Duma & Nzabi — Border-forest ironworking communities
- Pomo & Njem — Sangha-border forest villages
- Brazzaville sapeurs — The urban elegance movement — heritage in style
Languages
Major languages: French, Lingala, Kituba, Kikongo, Teke
Language families: Niger-Congo (Bantu)
Historical kingdoms & states
- • Kingdom of Kongo (northern provinces)
- • Tio (Teke) Kingdom
- • Loango Kingdom
Heritage sites
- • Sangha Trinational
- • Loango coast heritage
Cultural highlights
Deep-dive community profiles
Baka
Forest hunter-gatherers of the western Congo basin — whose yelli and water-drumming polyphonies are among the world's most admired music, whose Jengi forest spirit governs the hunt, and whose land rights are among Africa's most contested.
Open deep profile →Gbaya
The savanna-forest farmers of the CAR's west — whose Karnu prophet led the great Kongo-Wara rebellion against French rule, and whose hunting societies, initiation dances and sanza thumb-pianos hold the country's largest people together.
Open deep profile →Kongo (Bakongo)
Builders of the Kingdom of Kongo — a centralized Atlantic-African state with six centuries of recorded history, its own Christianity, minkisi power objects and a cosmology of the crossroads that profoundly shaped African-American religion and art.
Open deep profile →Punu
Carvers of the white-faced okuyi masks that dance on stilts above the Ngounié — serene kaolin faces with scaled foreheads and shell coiffures, among the most recognisable images of Central African art.
Open deep profile →Teke (Bateke)
The plateau kingdom of the Makoko — masters of the Congo River's great markets whose treaty with Brazza founded Brazzaville, whose butti power-figures guard lineages, and whose round tsaayi masks became icons of modern art.
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