Abebe Bikila Abebe Bikila Abebe Bikila (; August 7, 1932 – October 25, 1973) was an Ethiopian marathon runner. A double Olympic marathon champion, he won the first at the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome while running barefoot, setting a world record. He is Africa's first world record breaking athlete in any sport and the first sub-Saharan African Olympic gold medallist. At the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, Abebe became the first athlete to successfully defend an Olympic marathon title, breaking his own world record in the process. He was a member of the Ethiopian Imperial Guard, an elite infantry division that
Sub-Saharan African music traditions the sub-Saharan savanna which makes, with the Nile, a great cross-roads of the region. South of the Sahara the "Sahel" forms a bio-geographic zone of transition between the desert and the Sudanian Savannas, stretching between the Atlantic Ocean and the Red Sea. The Nilotic peoples prominent in southern Sudan, Uganda, Kenya, and northern Tanzania, include the Luo, Dinka, Nuer and Maasai. Many of these have been included in the Eastern region. The Senegambian Fula have migrated as far as Sudan at various times, often speaking Arabic as well as their own language. The Hausa people, who speak a language related