Travel Guide Dédougou

Dédougou is a town of about 90 000 inhabitants, mainly populated by Bwaba, but also De, Samo, Fulani and Mossi. Its aisles are lined with trees, and they are happy to drink a drink, but it does not have any special interest except at the moment of the festival of masks (Festima). The city is twinned with Douai (59).According to legend, Dédougou was founded after the passage of a family party to the search for water. On the current site of Dédougou, the head of the family, a certain Koé, was attracted by the croaking of a frog and discovered a well. To remember the place, he marked him with a stone. Later, another head of the family, named Zamagnini, made the same discovery and marked the site of a motte of land. When the two heads of family wanted to return to the well, a violent storm descended on the region. Once on the spot, the two men fought for the property of the well. But since the motte had disappeared under the storm, and only the stone attested to the discovery of Koé, Zamagnini had to accept his defeat. The village was named Bankuy, or "home in the forest". Later, when the village flourished, Koé renamed him the name of Dèèdu, which means "I am happy". The small town of Dédougou preserved the well of Koé which became sacred. Dédougou, treated here in the Central Plateau, is actually part of the Bobo country. However, given the distance between Dédougou and Bobo-Dioulasso, the circuits in the South-west of the country (Bobo, Senufo and Lobi countries) do not generally include Dédougou.