40 pages • 1 hour read
Djibril Tamsir Niane (D.T. Niane), Transl. G. D. PickettSundiata: An Epic of Old Mali (Sunjata)
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1200A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 4-6Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 4 Summary: “The Lion Child”
As Sogolon’s pregnancy becomes visible, the king’s second wife Sassouma Bérété fears her own son Dankaran Touman will be disinherited by Naré Maghan. She decides to kill Sogolon’s son.
On the day of the birth, there is a great storm, but it ceases at the very moment Sundiata is born. The king’s griot sings an improvised hymn, calling Sundiata the child “whom the world awaited […] The lion child, the buffalo child” (14). People of all the neighboring villages bring gifts to the king. The griot announces the child’s name: Mari Djata, a contraction of his father’s name Maghan and Djata, the word for lion.
Chapter 5 Summary: “Childhood”
Mari Djata, also called Sogolon Djata (the lion of Sogolon) has “a slow and difficult childhood” (15). He is ugly, quiet, and physically disabled; at three years old he is still unable to walk. Sundiata’s never-smiling face suggests he is always thinking, and when other children come to play with him, he beats them with his unusually strong arms. Sassouma Bérété is pleased at the boy’s infirmity and often has Touman, now 11, display his own athleticism around Djata or Sogolon.
The king loses faith in the prophecy. After his second child with Sogolon is an ugly girl, whom they name Kolonkan, the king exiles Sogolon from his house, and she lives in semi-disgrace at the edge of the village. The king takes a third wife, Nanandjé; she bears him a son who is foretold to be the right hand of a mighty king. The king again suspects that Djata may be this great king, and his griot supports this belief, advising that “the silk-cotton tree emerges from a tiny seed” (16). The king goes to a blacksmith-seer, who tells him that “when the seed germinates growth is not always easy; great trees grow slowly but they plunge their roots deep into the ground” (17). Much to Sassouma’s dismay, the king restores Sogolon to favor.
One day the king calls Mari Djata to him and gives him the gift every king gives to his successor: their own griot. Mari Djata’s griot is the son of Gnankouman Doua and is named Balla Fasséké.
Chapter 6 Summary: “The Lion’s Awakening”
When Mari Djata is seven, his father dies. Though Gnankouman Doua defends the king’s will to the council of elders, Sassouma intervenes, and the elders select her son Dankaran Touman as the new king. A regency council is formed, making the queen-mother Sassouma all powerful. Shortly thereafter, Gnankouman Doua also dies.
Because he cannot use his legs, no one believes Mari Djata is destined to be a powerful ruler. Sassouma forces Sogolon to live in a decrepit hut behind the palace. One day Sogolon begs Sassouma for a baobab leaf to cook with. Sassouma gives it to her but ridicules Sogolon, pridefully saying that her able-bodied son collects these leaves for her. Sogolon beats Mari Djata in grief. Taking compassion on his mother, Mari Djata resolves to walk that very day. He instructs his mother to have his father’s smiths make the heaviest iron rod possible.
Balla Fasséké runs to the blacksmith to request the rod, and the smith Farakourou understands the day of prophecy has come. With the help of six apprentices, Farakourou delivers a huge rod to Sogolon’s house. Mari Djata lifts it easily, using it as a support to stand up. His strength twists the bar into the shape of a bow. Balla Fasséké sings the improvised “Hymn of the Bow,” honouring Djata. Djata then rips a baobab tree from the ground and delivers it to his mother, saying, “here are some baobab leaves for you” (22).
Mari Djata becomes popular and respected throughout Niani, and people come to respect Sogolon and contrast her modesty with Sassouma’s pride. Djata becomes a great hunter and receives the title Simbon, meaning master hunter, at an early age. He is also tutored by Fasséké and his mother on animals, history, and medicine, and he becomes enraptured with stories of Alexander the Great. At 10 years old, Djata is renamed Sundiata.
Sassouma gathers the nine witches of Mali to try to kill Sundiata. For their magic to have effect, however, the witches must have a personal reason to kill Sundiata. Consequently, they steal from Sogolon’s vegetable patch, hoping Sundiata will catch and beat them. However, Sundiata gladly offers them all the vegetables they wish. This generosity disarms them, and they vow to always watch over Sundiata.
Chapters 4-6 Analysis
These chapters narrate Sundiata’s childhood, from birth to the period immediately preceding his exile. There are many narrative elements that reflect the structures and tropes from other folkloric traditions. One of the most prominent of these elements is Sassouma’s jealousy and abuse of Sogolon and Sundiata. This jealousy calls to mind the jealous acts of wives and mothers in myths and folk tales, such as Hera’s punishment of Hercules for his father Zeus’s infidelity, or the countless evil step-mothers from the fairy tale tradition who, like Sassouma, punish chosen children to elevate themselves or their lesser offspring. In this case, Sassouma’s jealousy represents both her personal repugnance and her lack of wisdom in heeding the words of prophecy. Her acts also exemplify the opposing cultural forces of badenya (mother-child-ness) and fadenya (father-child-ness) in Mandinka culture.
The constant variation in Sogolon’s social position at Sassouma’s hands exemplifies the lack of overt agency that women are granted in Mandinka culture. Here, neither Sassouma nor Sogolon can battle with each other directly; they must use their male sons as proxies for their conflict. Even after Sogolon is out of the way, Sassouma must still manipulate her son’s influence as king to assert her own political control.
Chapter 6, the longest chapter in this sequence, is notable for its use of refrain, or repeated phrases. The chapter begins, “God has his mysteries which none can fathom. You, perhaps, will be a king. You can do nothing about it” (16). When the king loses faith in the prophecy, the narrator says, “how impatient man is!” (16). When the king expresses doubt to his griot, the griot responds, “the Almighty has his mysteries […]. The silk cotton tree emerges from a tiny seed” (16). When the king consults a blacksmith-seer about Sundiata’s future, the seer repeats the seed-and-tree metaphor and also laments “how impatient man is” (16). Refrain is a hallmark of the oral epic form, in which characters and events are often coupled with repeated phrases that allow the speaker to memorize long passages of text. These repeated phrases also have thematic significance, as they stress that prophecy is unavoidable yet unfolds slowly. This chapter also initiates Sundiata’s symbolic connection with the baobab tree, as the tree’s uprooting foreshadows Sundiata’s exile. This association recurs at the end of his exile, when the surprise appearance of baobab leaves in a foreign kingdom incites Sundiata’s journey home.
