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The group was first recognized in 1854 by S. W. Koelle in his '' Polyglotta Africana ''. He mentioned 13 languages under the heading ''North-Western High-Sudan Family, or Mandéga Family of Languages''. In 1901 Maurice Delafosse made a distinction of two groups in his ''Essai de manuel pratique de la langue mandé ou mandingue''. He speaks of a northern group ''mandé-tan'' and a southern group ''mandé-fu''. This distinction was basically done only because the languages in the north use the expression ''tan'' for ten whereas the southern group use ''fu''. In 1924 L. Tauxier notes that this distinction is not well founded and there is at least a third subgroup he called ''mandé-bu''. It is not until 1950 when A. Prost supports this view and gives further details. In 1958 Welmers publishes an article ''The Mande Languages'' where he divides the languages into three subgroups - North-West, South and East. His conclusion was based on lexicostatistic research. Greenberg follows this distinction 1963 in ''The Languages of Africa''. Long ( 1971 ) and G. Galtier ( 1980 ) follow the distinction into three groups but with notable differences. N'Ko is a script for Mande languages developed by Souleymane Kante, it is mostly used in Guinee. The Southern Group ( Côte D'Ivoire )
Mande languages are spoken in
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