Sierra Leone’s gumbe drum has one of the most remarkable travel histories of any instrument on this site — it didn’t arrive from the Middle East or Mediterranean like most of this site’s instruments; it crossed the Atlantic twice. The square-framed gumbe was created by enslaved Africans in Jamaica, carried by Jamaican Maroons exiled to Freetown in 1800, and became foundational to Sierra Leone’s Krio culture — a drum that effectively returned to Africa after being invented in the diaspora. See the Gumbe page below.