Their name is a distortion of the Dakota term mawatani. They called temselves numakaki, "the people."

Their language was siouan along with the other divisions: Dakota Sioux, Dhegiha Sioux, Chiewere Sioux, and Hidatsa Sioux.

They inhabited present-day North Dakota, on hte banks of the missouri, at the confluence of the Little Missouri and Heart Rivers.

They combined a life of cron farming and buffalo hunting and were skilled potters. Centrally located on hte Missouri, their villages became a trading center between the northern and southern tribes, and leter, between teh Whites and Indians for the fur trade. Organized into two half-tribes, the Mandan were closely linked to the Hidatsa and Arikara.

They came from the Great Lakes around the 1300s