Burkina Faso

Sahelian republic independent from France in 1960; Islam arrived along the trans-Saharan trade routes and spread among the Mossi and other peoples, giving today's Muslim majority, largely Sunni-Mālikī with strong Tijānī and Qādirī Sufi currents.

☾ The Coming of Islam

Trade-borne Islam and the Mossi kingdoms

Islam reached the territory of modern Burkina Faso along the trans-Saharan trade routes, carried by Muslim merchants and clerics. Its spread was gradual: the powerful Mossi kingdoms of the central plateau long remained attached to their traditional religion even as Muslim trading communities grew, and mass conversion came largely in the 19th and 20th centuries.

That the Mossi kingdoms long resisted incorporation into the Sahelian Muslim empires is emphasised in the standard accounts.

☾ Religious Composition

A Muslim majority with strong Sufi orders

More than half of Burkinabé are Muslim — overwhelmingly Sunni of the Mālikī school — alongside Roman Catholic, traditional-religion and Protestant minorities. The Tijāniyya and Qādiriyya Sufi orders are especially influential.

Demographic shares are approximate.

At a glance