ABSTRACT
The landscape of west central Africa, like that of the Sudan, was a broad savannah. The tropical rainforest of the coast north of the Zaïre River and stretching inland into the heart of the continent was, unlike the rainforest of west Africa, sparsely inhabited. The heart of the region lay south of the forest then, a terrain of frequent mountain ranges especially once one moved inland from the coastal plains, broken by plains and flat plateaux.
