HISTORY OF ZAMBIA

Barotse and Kololo: 19th century AD

The African tribes living in the region between the Zambezi and Lake Tanganyika are first reached by outsiders in 1798. In that year a Portuguese trading party, pushing north from Tete on the Zambezi, reaches the capital of a chief near Lake Mweru. Half a century later this is the region which Livingstone explores,…

HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Steps to independence: AD 1775-1776

Events during 1775 should leave the British government in no doubt as to the strength of the resentment felt by their American colonists. The engagements at Lexington and Bunker Hill provide a powerful display of military confidence, while the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia demonstrates a strong political resolve. So there are…

HISTORY OF TUNISIA

The Barbary coast: 16th – 20th century AD

With the decline of the local Berber dynasties in the 15th and 16th centuries, the valuable coastal strip of north Africa (known because of the Berbers as the Barbary coast) attracts the attention of the two most powerful Mediterranean states of the time – Spain in the west, Turkey in the east.

The…

HISTORY OF TOGO

German colony: AD 1884-1914

The first German connection with Togo is the arrival of missionaries in 1847 to work among the largest tribal group in the region, the Ewe. German traders soon follow, establishing a base at Anécho on the coast.

When Bismarck decides to put together an off-the-peg German empire in Africa, Togo is one of the three places which…

HISTORY OF SWAZILAND

Colonial rule: AD 1906-1967

In their small landlocked upland kingdom, under a British high commissioner from 1906, the Swazi preserve their tribal traditions more effectively than most other African nations. Part of the explanation is that little development occurs during the colonial period, because the status of the region is so uncertain.

The South Africa Act of 1909, creating the Union…

HISTORY OF SENEGAL

The Senegal and Gambia rivers: to AD 1894

For a vessel sailing down the west coast of Africa, the mouth of the Senegal river offers the first refreshing welcome after the parched territory of the western Sahara. Further south, round the difficult promontory of Cape Verde, is the even more enticing estuary of the Gambia. Here the channel is sufficiently…

HISTORY OF RWANDA

Ruanda-Urundi: AD 1887-1914

The highlands of Rwanda and Burundi, east of Lake Kivu, are the last part of Africa to be reached by Europeans in the colonial expansion of the late 19th century. Before that time local tradition tells of many centuries during which the Tutsi, a tall cattle-rearing people probably from the upper reaches of the Nile, infiltrate the…

HISTORY OF MOZAMBIQUE

Colonial rule: AD 1891-1975

From 1894 the region known as Portuguese East Africa has a clearly defined shape on European maps. Its western and southern boundaries are imposed upon Portugal in 1891 in a treaty with the more powerful colonial neighbour, Britain. The northern frontier, with German East Africa, is amicably agreed in 1894.

The reality on the ground is by…

HISTORY OF MALI

Independence: from AD 1960

On becoming independent in 1960, after the dissolution of French West Africa, the previous colony of French Sudan changes its name to the republic of Mali, reflecting a link with one of Africa’s greatest historical kingdoms. The Mali of the sultan Mansa Musa, fabled for his wealth, centred on this region – as did also the…

HISTORY OF MALAWI

The Maravi Confederacy: 16th – 18th century AD

The earliest known settled kingdom in the region of Lake Nyasa is that of the Maravi Confederacy. Established by Bantu-speaking peoples in about 1480, and continuing into the 18th century, the confederacy controls territory west from the great lake to the Luangwa River, south to the Zambezi and east to the coast.

This…

HISTORY OF LESOTHO

Basutoland: AD 1868-1966

After being annexed by Britain in 1868 as Basutoland, Moshoeshoe’s kingdom is transferred in 1871 to the administrative control of the Cape Colony. The Sotho tribes profoundly resent this development, about which they have not been consulted, and the 1870s are a time of increasing unrest in the region. This culminates in the Gun War of 1880,…