Across the vast flooded savannas of the upper Nile in South Sudan live the Nuer, who call themselves Naath, one of the largest peoples of the country and, with their

The Nupe are a people of central Nigeria, living in the valley of the Niger river and its tributary the Kaduna, chiefly in Niger State around the historic city of

The Nyamwezi are a Bantu-speaking people of the central plateau of Tanzania, historically among the greatest trading nations of East Africa. Numbering well over a million and centred on the

At the south-eastern tip of Arabia, where the mountains fall to the Indian Ocean, live the Omanis, an Arab people whose sailors once ruled a maritime empire from the Gulf

On the forested plateau of Chota Nagpur in eastern India live the Oraon, who call themselves Kurukh, one of the great tribal communities of the subcontinent. Speakers of a Dravidian

The Ovambo, or Owambo, who call themselves the Aawambo, are the largest ethnic group in Namibia, about half the population, with communities also in southern Angola. Numbering some millions, they

Across the temperate central highlands of Angola live the Ovimbundu, the largest people of the nation and heirs to a cluster of kingdoms whose caravans once carried trade across the

Between the Mediterranean Sea and the River Jordan lives an Arabic-speaking people whose bond to their land reaches back through the deep layers of history. The Palestinians are the modern

Among the smallest of India’s communities, yet among the most remarkable, are the Parsis, the descendants of Zoroastrians who fled Persia after the coming of Islam and found refuge in

The story of the Karelians, a Baltic-Finnic people of the northwestern Russian forests and lakes: their language close to Finnish, their Orthodox faith, the great song tradition that gave rise to the Kalevala, and the wooden wonders of the Russian north.