Tiv

Africahorticulturalists

Map
expand_more Description

The Tiv live in Nigeria on both sides of the Benue River, 220 kilometers from its confluence with the Niger. The Tiv language is a subgroup of the Niger-Congo language family. The Tiv are subsistence farmers growing yams, cassava, and sweet potatoes. All Tiv reckon patrilineal descent from their earliest ancestor and see themselves as a single patrilineage. Their large-scale patrilineal genealogy is also the basis of their land-tenure system in which every Tiv male has a right to a farm. Tiv maintain a calendar built on five-day market cycles in which goods move from smaller markets to large central markets, and then for export.

Identifier
Region
  • Africa
Subregion
  • Western Africa
Subsistence Type
  • horticulturalists
Samples
Countries
  • Nigeria
External Links