They left the area between the 15th and 16th centuries BC to settle in the cliffs of Bandiagara. Relics of the Dogon are found in the centre-north, north and north west region. The use of iron, ceramics and polished stone developed between 15 BC, as well as a preoccupation with spiritual matters, as shown by the burial remains which have been discovered.
Settlements appeared between 36 BC with farmers, the traces of whose structures leave the impression of relatively permanent buildings. Like all of the west of Africa, Burkina Faso was populated early, notably by hunter-gatherers in the northwestern part of the country (12,000 to 5000 BC), and whose tools (scrapers, chisels and arrowheads) were discovered in 1973. The inhabitants of Burkina Faso are known as Burkinabè or Burkinabé ( pronounced ). Several hundred thousand farm workers migrate south every year to Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana in search of paid labour. Governmental instability during the 1970s and 1980s was followed by multiparty elections in the early 1990s. Formerly the Republic of Upper Volta, it was renamed on Augby President Thomas Sankara to mean "the land of upright people" (or "upright land") in Mossi and Dioula, the major native languages of the country. It is surrounded by six countries: Mali to the north, Niger to the east, Benin to the south east, Togo and Ghana to the south, and Côte d'Ivoire to the south west. 1 The data here is an estimation for the year 2005 produced by the International Monetary Fund in April 2005.īurkina Faso is a landlocked nation in West Africa.