Roofing in Guinea

Guinea stretches from a rainy Atlantic coast through the Fouta Djallon highlands, source of the Niger, Senegal and Gambia rivers, to savanna in the north-east and forest in the south-east. It has one of the strongest surviving thatch traditions on the West African coast, epitomised by the steep conical roofs of the Fulbe (Peul) houses and mosques of the Fouta Djallon. Metal sheet is now the most common roof.

Climate and hazards

Guinea is among the wetter countries of West Africa. The Fouta Djallon receives roughly 1,500-2,500 mm (60-100 in) of rain a year, most of it between June and September. Roofs must protect unbaked earth walls from these rains, which is why traditional roofs are thick and widely overhanging.

Roofing history

A Fulbe Islamic state was established in the Fouta Djallon in the early 18th century, and its architecture combined round thatched houses with square mosques under great thatched roofs. French colonial writers documented the region's buildings from 1906 onward. The Friday Mosque of Dinguiraye, associated with the 19th-century leader El Hadj Umar Tall, is often cited as the largest example of the type. Metal sheet spread through the 20th century but, as of the 2010s, had not entirely displaced thatch.

Traditional and vernacular roofs

• Fulbe round house: a circular earth-walled room under a regular conical thatched roof. Long rafters meet over the centre and continue past the walls to a ring of outer posts, creating a veranda. The underside of the thatch is left exposed and may be decorated with rings of bound thatch (see Fouta Djallon thatched architecture).
• Fouta Djallon mosque: a square earthen prayer hall with an earthen ceiling, covered by a huge conical or dome-like thatched roof carried partly on an inverted "umbrella" of poles above a central pillar.

Roofing today

The 2013 Afrobarometer survey of Guinea recorded:

Main roof material	Share of respondents (2013)
Metal, tin or zinc	72.9%
Thatch or grass	23.6%
Plastic sheets	1.9%
Tiles	1.3%
Shingles	0.3%

Afrobarometer surveys interview about 1,200 adults per country; these figures are unweighted counts in the survey sample. The 2016 Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey classifies roofs in categories including thatch/palm leaf, grass, tôle/métal, zinc/fibre cement, tiles and concrete/cement.

Codes, standards and regulation

A case de couronnement (coronation house) of the Almamy rulers of Fouta Djallon is on Guinea's tentative list for World Heritage nomination.

Notable roofs

• Friday Mosque of Dinguiraye: square earthen hall under a great thatched roof.
• Coronation house of the Almamy of Fouta Djallon: on Guinea's World Heritage tentative list.

Local roofing terms

• tôle (French): metal roof sheet.
• paille (French): straw thatch.
• hatumere (Fulfulde, from Arabic khatim, "seal"): Islamic geometric design that some scholars link to the plan of the Dinguiraye mosque.

Sources and gaps

Survey shares are unweighted. Published sources on coastal and forest-region vernacular roofs, regulation and industry: published information is limited.