The banjo: a real American instrument or not?

Some believe that the banjo is a native American instrument, but that simply isn’t so. The ‘modern’ banjo is a mixture of cultures: primary African, but there were also influences from Engeland, Scotland and Ireland. And America of course… The banjo was brought to America by the slaves who came from the western part of Africa. In this area the so called Senegambian Bania was a popular instrument; they adapted this instrument from the Arabs who had their Rebec: a gourd body topped with animal skin and three gut strings. It’s most likely that this instrument was a predecessor of the Senegambian Bania. Some further research into the history of the banjo gives rise to the idea that the earliest ancestor of the banjo derives from the orient; but there’s no hard evidence.