ABSTRACT
This chapter shows that the war of resistance fought by the Baoule people must be placed within the context of Baoule military activity prior to the arrival of the French. The history of the Baoule shows such a fight to be more than that, however. It was the positive expression and defense of their political system and as such it was a fight for political domination of the region. As such it was the fight of two political systems, analogous to the Franco-Prussian War. Research into the history of the Baoule shows how the term tribe is a uselessly static description of a people. The people who call themselves Baoule live in the central region of Ivory Coast roughly in an inverted triangle from where the Bandama and N'zi rivers join north to a line running east-west from the Bandama River to the Comoe River north of Bouake.
