The Funj are a group of tribes in present-day Sudan. The historical Funj rose south of the Nile confluence (sources differ on their geographic origin) and had overthrown the remnants of the old Christian kingdom of Alodia. In 1504 a Funj leader named Amara Dungus, founded a sultanate at Sinnar (the capital) after defeating the northern Abdallab Sultanate. The resulting kingdom would be known as the Kingdom of Sinnar, the Funj Sultanate, or the Blue Sultanate, and would rule most of modern-day Sudan until the Ottoman conquest in 1821.
The origins of the Funj are debated by scholars. There is only limited evidence for a pre-Arabic Funj language from the Sultanate period. Sources contemporary to the Funj Sultanate and modern Sudanese oral tradition describe them as a 'blue' or dark-skinned African people residing in the mountains of the Blue Nile region, originating further upstream in a place referred to as "Lul". In the 18th-century, the Wad Doleyb manuscript classified them as Nuba, a term applied to non-royal Fur, "Anaj" Danagla, and the peoples west and south of the banks of the White Nile. The 19th-century portion of the Wad Doleyb manuscript, the Funj are said to have been subjects of Abyssinia before gaining power, breaking away, and forming their own kingdom. The authors of the document consider Funj to be sudan ("Blacks") and descendants of Ham son of Noah, but distinct from the Zunj (another branch of Hamites and sudan), a term applied in the document to the "Jangay" (likely the Dinka), Zaghawa, and so-called "Hamaj" (literally "savage") groups. Today, a number of different linguistic groups in southeastern Sudan are described as Funj, most frequently the Berta/Benishangul, who refer to their language as Ndu Alfuñu ("Funj mouth"). Wendy James also found Funj identification and claims of Sinnari origin among Ingessana, southern Burun-speaking peoples, and the people of Jebel Gule.
