The War That Gave Birth to Burkina Faso

In November 1915, a dozen villages in the bend of the Volta swore, around an earth shrine, not to lay down their arms until the French had gone. With bows and flintlocks they drove back the colonial troops three times, and it took five thousand soldiers and artillery to raze their villages. Paris refused to call it a war. In 1919 France drew a new colony so that it would never happen again: today it is called Burkina Faso.

Colonial historyAnticolonial resistanceMemory and redressBurkina FasoMaliYKYisu KotéYKYike KotéDasa