Examples Of Polygamy And Family Relationships In The Epic Of Sundiata

Polygamy and Family Relationship in the Epic of Sundiata [BROAD INTRODUCTION] My father had two wives, although the marriages did not overlap one another. With his first wife, he had three children – two daughters and a son. With his second wife, my mother, he had two children – a son and myself. Once my father married my mother and started a family, he spent much of his time with us – only occasionally seeing his three children from his previous marriage, and rarely ever seeing his first wife. My brother and I have never seen my father’s children from his first wife, we have never spoken, we have never even met. That is my family. [NARROW INTRODUCTION] (Maghan Fatta Kon). Had this been another family, say one in Mali, the situation would be entirely different. [Bit about family dynamics.] [THESIS] Sundiata: An Epic of Old Mali, written by D. T. Niane, grants readers insight into just how the practice of polygamy structures family dynamics.
To understand the family relationship, you must first be familiar with the family tree. In the epic, Sundiata is the son of Maghan Kon Fatta, the King of Niani. Maghan Kon has three wives - Sassouma Berete is his first wife, Sogolon Kedjou his second, and Namandje his third. Sassouma has a son named Dankaran Touman and a daughter named Nana Triban – they are two of Sundiata’s half-siblings. Manding Bory, another one of Sundiata’s half-siblings, is the son of Namandje. Finally, Sundiata himself is the child of Sogolon, along with his older sister, Kolonkan, and younger sister, Djamarou. As the wives and children of a King,