Taking into consideration that the state of Bahia-Brazil presents strong traits of African
identities, this study assumes that it was the Bantu peoples from Central Africa, mainly the
ones from Congo-Angola, and their traditional education system, which focuses on orality,
the main contributor to the cultural and identity formation of Bahia. In order to confirm this
thesis, a research on traditional education in northwest Angola, its modes of transmission of
knowledge, and its presence in Bahia was developed. The goals were to verify the ways
those identity acquirements, focused on tradition, orality, religiosity and community
belonging were sent to Afro-Americans from Bahia, and to examine what extent this
knowledge remains preserved and productive nowadays. To do so, it was developed a
historical and anthropological research, since pre-colonial Africa to the current Bahia, in
order to highlight the intersection points of the African historical past and its presence in
Bahia. So, it was done a historical research in primary and secondary sources. Besides that,
interviews and narratives collected, in the period of 2011 to 2015, from Candomblé
authorities and from renowned personalities of African culture in Bahia were analyzed. The
specialized literature has built up the historical, anthropological and conceptual foundation
on traditional education in northwest Angola; the interviews and other fieldworks found to
its transmission and its effective presence in Bahia. The combination of research and
analysis confirms the initial hypothesis that the culture of Bahia has strong spiritual,
linguistic, historical, social and educational ties with the Bantu peoples of the Northwest of
Angola.