CARIBBEAN · EXTINCT

Manì

A striking game once played in Cuba by the Afro-Cuban communities of the plantation areas, in a circle to the drums: punches are delivered at the opponent, who dodges without breaking the rhythm. A fall means elimination.

ORIGINS & SOCIAL FUNCTIONS

Played formerly in Cuba by the Afro-Cuban communities of the plantation zones, the maní belonged to the festive gatherings of the enslaved and their descendants, a striking game held in the circle, to the drums, before the assembled community. It died out in the twentieth century; the thesis asks what became of its heritage in Cuba's boxing pre-eminence.

THE GAME

In the circle, to the drums: punches are launched at the opponent, who evades without ever breaking the rhythm. A fall means elimination; the music commands the exchange from beginning to end.

PLACE IN THE FAMILY

With capoeira, the danmyé and the moring, the maní belongs to the kaleidoscopic games, both dimensions at once, the blow and the fall, governed by the continuous flow: leaving the rhythm is losing. Its extinction makes it the family's emblematic case of erasure: a complete game, structurally the equal of capoeira, that the twentieth century did not allow to survive.

SOURCES

Olivier Malo, La capoeira et les arts de combat noirs : histoire effacée, techniques invisibles, 1905–1984, doctoral thesis in History, Université des Antilles, 2020.

HOW TO CITE THIS ENTRY

MALO, Olivier. Manì. In: The Atlas of the Black Combat Arts [online]. Black Combat Arts Institute, 2026. Available from: https://www.blackcombatarts.com/atlas-en/mani [accessed date].

RELATED PRACTICES

→ Moringue, Striking game, dodge without breaking rhythm

→ Danmyé / Ladja, Both horizontal and vertical

→ Batuque, Fall means elimination

→ Capoeira, Circle, drums, evasion