Vanishing Africa

African Dinka girls, by George Rodger, 1948. The Dinka are Sudanese tribespeople who rely on cattle herding at riverside camps in the dry season and grow millet and other grains in fixed settlements during the rainy season Photograph: Tribal Portraits Vintage & Contemporary Photographs from the African Continent

Benin Woman Smoking, by Hector Acebes, 1953 Photograph: Tribal Portraits Vintage & Contemporary Photographs from the African Continent

Chief Kingo by C Vincenti, 1898 Photograph: Tribal Portraits Vintage & Contemporary Photographs from the African Continent

Contemporary African Couple by Seydou Keita, 1956. Keita (1921–2001) was a self-taught portrait photographer from Bamako, Mali Photograph: Tribal Portraits Vintage & Contemporary Photographs from the African Continent

Early Morning Wait at Lake Rudolph, by Mirella Ricciardi, 1968. Lake Rudolph, now known as Lake Turkana, is in Kenya's arid Great Rift Valley. Up to three million years ago, when the area was more fertile, the lakeside was home for some of humans' earliest known ancestors Photograph: Tribal Portraits Vintage & Contemporary Photographs from the African Continent

Five Turbanned Dahomey Women by Irving Penn, 1967. Dahomey in west Africa is now the Republic of Benin Photograph: Tribal Portraits Vintage & Contemporary Photographs from the African Continent

M'suguma Dancers in Tanzania by C Vincenti, 1898 Photograph: Tribal Portraits Vintage & Contemporary Photographs from the African Continent

Nuba Dancers of Cau, by Leni Riefenstahl, 1975. The Nuba inhabit the Nuba Mountains in Kordofan province, Sudan. Between 1962 and 1969 the filmmaker Riefenstahl lived intermittently among the Nuba in remote valleys of Central Sudan, "studying them at close quarters, taking unique and fascinating photographs, which now constitute a lasting record of what was once their way of life ... " Photograph: Tribal Portraits Vintage & Contemporary Photographs from the African Continent

Portrait Study, East Africa, 1875, photographer unknown Photograph: Tribal Portraits Vintage & Contemporary Photographs from the African Continent

Children from the Wagogo Tribe Wear Special Headgear for the Circumcision Ceremony, by George Rodger, 1947. The Wagogo or Gogo are based in the Dodoma Region of central Tanzania. They are traditionally pastoralist, but in recent decades have migrated to urban areas or work on plantations Photograph: Tribal Portraits Vintage & Contemporary Photographs from the African Continent