Mossi Kingdoms
| Mossi Kingdoms | |||||
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| Capital | Multiple capitals | ||||
| Languages | Mossi language | ||||
| Government | Monarchy | ||||
| Historical era | Pre-Colonial Africa | ||||
| • | Established | 11th century | |||
| • | Conquest by the French colonial empire | 1896 | |||
The Mossi Kingdoms, sometimes referred to as the Mossi Empire, were a number of different powerful kingdoms in modern-day Burkina Faso which dominated the region of the upper Volta river for hundreds of years. The kingdoms were founded when warriors from the Mamprusi area, in modern-day Ghana moved into the area and intermarried with local people. Centralization of the political and military powers of the kingdoms begin in the 13th century and led to conflicts between the Mossi kingdoms and many of the other powerful states in the region. In 1896, the French took over the kingdoms and created the French Upper Volta which largely used the Mossi administrative structure for many decades in governing the colony.
Accounts of the origin of the Mossi kingdom and parts of their history are very imprecise with contradictory oral traditions that disagree on significant aspects of the story. The origin story is unique in that a woman plays a key role as the progenitor of the royal line.
The origins of the Mossi state are claimed by one prominent oral tradition to come from when a Mamprusi princess left the city of Gambaga because of a dispute with her father. This event dates in different oral histories to be anytime between the 11th and the 15th centuries. According to the story, the princess Yennega escaped dressed as a man when she came to the house of an elephant hunter from the Boussansi tribe named Ryallé. He initially believed she was a man but one day she revealed that she was a woman and the two married. They had a son named Wedraogo or Ouédraogo who was given that name from the horse that Niennega escaped from Gambaga on. Wedraogo visited his grandfather in Dagomba at the age of fifteen and was given four horses, 50 cows, and a number of Dagomba horseman joined his forces. With these forces, Wedraogo conquered the Boussansi tribes, married a woman named Pouiriketa who gave him three sons, and built the city of Tenkodogo. The oldest was Diaba Lompo who founded the city of Fada N'gourma. The second son, Rawa, became the ruler of Zondoma Province. His third son, Zoungrana became the ruler in Tenkodogo after Wedraogo died. Zoungrana married Pouitenga, a woman sent from the chief of the Ninisi tribes, and the resulting intermarriage between the Dagomba, the Boussansi, and the Ninisi produced a new tribe called the Mossi. Zoungrana and Pouitenga had a son, Oubri, who further expanded the kingdom by conquering the Kibissi and some Gurunsi tribes. Oubri, who ruled from around 1050 until 1090 ACE, is often considered the founder of the Ouagadougou dynasty which ruled from the capital of Ouagadougou.
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