Jukun (Njikum; Hausa: Kororofawa; Kanuri: Gwana, Kwana) are an ethno-linguistic group or ethnic nation in West Africa.

[5][6] The Jukun are traditionally located in Taraba, Benue, Nasarawa, Plateau, Adamawa, Bauchi and Gombe States in Nigeria and parts of northwestern Cameroon.

Most of the tribes, Alago, Agatu, Rendere, Goemai in Shendam, and others left Kwararafa when it disintegrated as a result of a power tussle [citation needed].

The anthropologist C. K. Meek, however, suggests that it may have come from four possible origins:[6]: 14–17 Kwararafa was also applied to the Jukun state and its capital city.

[10] Meek noted that the majority of the Jukun lived in scattered groups around the Benue basin, in an area that roughly corresponded to the extent of the kingdom of Kwararafa as it existed in the 18th century [citation needed].

That area of Jukun habitation, Meek noted, was bounded by Abinsi to the west, Kona to the east, Pindiga to the north and Donga to the south.

They were led by a leader named Agadu and traveled through various places including Kordofan, Fitri, Mandara, and the Gongola area before reaching the Benue region.

Kanajeji, Yaji's son and the thirteenth Sarkin Kano, reportedly received tribute in the form of two hundred slaves from the Kwararafa.

The Chronicle also records that during the reign of Dauda Zaria, under Queen Amina of Zazzau, conquered all the towns as far as Kwararafa and Nupe.

Fremantle observed that Kwararafa had exerted its sovereignty over various regions at different times, including Kano, Bornu, Idoma, Igbira, and Igala.

The state later faced attacks from the Chamba and Fulani forces in the early nineteenth century, leading to its eventual collapse.

[10] In the post-colonial period, Nigeria has suffered violence, the result of multiple ethnic tensions among the different communities living in the country [citation needed].

Tensions exist between the Jukun and the neighbouring Tiv people, who migrated from Congo[13][14][15][16] In 1931, the academic publishing company Kegan Paul, Trubner & Co. published A Sudanese Kingdom: An Ethnographic Study of the Jukun-speaking Peoples of Nigeria, a book which had been written by the Briton C. K. Meek, the Anthropological Officer stationed with the Administrative Service in Nigeria.