The Wolof people are a Niger-Congo ethnic group native to the Senegambia region of West Africa. Senegambia is today split between western Senegal, northwestern Gambia and coastal Mauritania; the Wolof form the largest ethnic group within Senegambia. In Senegal as a whole, the Wolof are the largest ethnic group (~39.7%), while elsewhere they are a minority. They refer to themselves as Wolof and speak the Wolof language, in the West Atlantic branch of the Niger–Congo family of languages. Details of the pre-Islamic religious traditions of the Wolof are unknown, and their oral traditions state them to have been adherents of Islam since the founding king of Jolof.