THEN'ko writing was invented by the Guinean of Malian origin Souleymane Kanté (1922-1987). It is a system of 20 consonants and 7 vowels making it possible to transcribe the Mande languages (Mande is an ethnolinguistic group speaking Bambara, Dioula, Malinké and Mandinko).
The word n'ko means "I say" in all the mandated languages.