The East African Ivory Trade in the Nineteenth Century

1967 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 269-290 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. W. Beachey
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
East Coast ◽  
East African ◽  
East African Coast ◽  
The North ◽  
African Coast ◽  
Trading Activities ◽  
Ivory Trade ◽  
Opening Up ◽  
Great Development

The East African ivory trade is an ancient one: East African ivory is soft ivory and is ideal for carving, and was always in great demand. It figures prominently in the earliest reference to trading activities on the East African Coast. But the great development came in the nineteenth century when an increased demand for ivory in America and Europe coincided with the opening up of East Africa by Arab traders and European explorers. The onslaught on the ivory resources of the interior took the form of a two-way thrust—from the north by the Egyptians who penetrated into the Sudan and Equatoria, and by the Arabs from the east coast of Africa. The establishment of European protectorates and a settled administration in the 1890s ended this exploitation.During the nineteenth century ivory over-topped all rivals in trade value— even slaves. The uses of ivory were wide and novel—it played the same part in the nineteenth century as do plastics in the mid-twentieth—but it was always a much more expensive article.

Trade and society on the south-east African coast in the later first millennium AD: the case of Chibuene

Antiquity ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 86 (333) ◽  
pp. 723-737 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Sinclair ◽  
Anneli Ekblom ◽  
Marilee Wood
Keyword(s):  
Local Community ◽  
East Coast ◽  
Power Structures ◽  
The South ◽  
East African ◽  
East African Coast ◽  
African Coast ◽  
First Millennium ◽  
The Indian Ocean ◽  
Beach Site

The south-east coast of Africa in the later first millennium was busy with boats and the movement of goods from across the Indian Ocean to the interior. The landing places were crucial mediators in this process, in Africa as elsewhere. Investigations at the beach site of Chibuene show that a local community was supplying imported beads to such interior sites as Schroda, with the consequent emergence there of hierarchical power structures.

LICENTIOUS AND UNBRIDLED PROCEEDINGS: THE ILLEGAL SLAVE TRADE TO MAURITIUS AND THE SEYCHELLES DURING THE EARLY NINETEENTH CENTURY

2001 ◽  
Vol 42 (1) ◽  
pp. 91-116 ◽  
Author(s):  
RICHARD B. ALLEN
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Slave Trade ◽  
Demographic Data ◽  
East African ◽  
Early Nineteenth Century ◽  
East African Coast ◽  
Structure And Dynamics ◽  
African Coast ◽  
Economic Considerations ◽  
Illicit Traffic

Census and other demographic data are used to estimate the volume of the illegal slave trade to Mauritius and the Seychelles from Madagascar and the East African coast between 1811 and c. 1827. The structure and dynamics of this illicit traffic, as well as governmental attempts to suppress it, are also discussed. The Mauritian and Seychellois trade is revealed to have played a greater role in shaping Anglo-Merina and Anglo-Omani relations between 1816 and the early 1820s than previously supposed. Domestic economic considerations, together with British pressure on the trade's sources of supply, contributed to its demise.

The Pate Chronicles Revisited: Nineteenth-Century History and Historiography

1996 ◽  
Vol 23 ◽  
pp. 301-318 ◽  
Author(s):  
Randall L. Pouwels
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Oral Tradition ◽  
Family Members ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
East African ◽  
East African Coast ◽  
African Coast ◽  
History Of ◽  
Late Nineteenth

A few years ago I offered an assessment of the Pate “Chronicles” as a tradition-based source for the history of the East African coast. That paper drew on recensions and versions that were readily available at that time to researchers interested in their historiography. Reasons of length and scope, cited at the end of the paper, restricted discussion to Sultan Fumo Madi b. Abu Bakr and his predecessors (Sultan nos. 1-24), that is to say, up to the time of the Battle of Shela,ca. 1807-13. To reiterate, in that paper I established the following points:(1) All recorded versions appear to have been based on an oral tradition that was extant in the mid- to late nineteenth century among Nabahani family members. The existence of a “Book of the Kings of Pate,” mentioned by Werner and Prins, is problematic (see 3 below).(2) Despite the number of versions of the Pate “Chronicles,” they appear to have actually come from only two informants, Bwana Kitini and Mshamu bin Kombo, who was a relative or possibly, as Tolmacheva claims, Bw. Kitini's brother.(3) Except for minor, though discernible, differences between the lists of the sultans given by both informants, most versions are consistent to a surprising degree. This seems attributable to the fact that there wereonlytwo informants, Kitini and Mshamu, who also were related, and who therefore themselves probably shared the same source(s). Given the differences of detail beyond the kinglists, if one of those earlier sources was a written one, such as an actual “Book of the Kings of Pate,” that source seems to have afforded the informants little beyond names and regnal dates.

Ulster and the Indian Ocean? Recent maritime archaeological research on the East African coast

Antiquity ◽  
2001 ◽  
Vol 75 (290) ◽  
pp. 797-798 ◽  
Author(s):  
Colin Breen ◽  
Wes Forsythe ◽  
Paul Lane ◽  
Tom McErlean ◽  
Rosemary McConkey ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Maritime Archaeology ◽  
Eastern Africa ◽  
Historical Period ◽  
East African ◽  
East African Coast ◽  
Cultural Traditions ◽  
Swahili Coast ◽  
The North ◽  
African Coast ◽  
Kenyan Coast

In January 2001, a team of researchers from the University of Ulster (Northern Ireland) conducted an innovative maritime archaeology project on the East African coast in partnership with the British Institute in Eastern Africa and the National Museums of Kenya. Its focus was Mombasa Island on the southern Kenyan coast, a historical settlement and port for nearly 2000 years (Berg 1968; Sassoon 1980; 1982). The East African seaboard, stretching from Somalia in the north to Madagascar and Mozambique in the south, was culturally dynamic throughout the historical period. This area, traditionally known as the Swahili coast, is culturally defined as a maritime zone extending 2000 km from north to south, but reaching a mere 15 hi inland. The origins of ‘Swahili’ cultural identity originated during the middle of the 1st millennium AD, following consolidation of earlier farming and metalusing Bantu-speaking communities along the coast and emergence of a distinctive ‘maritime’ orientation and set of cultural traditions (eg Allen 1993; Chami 1998; Helm 2000; Horton & Middelton 2000). Previous research produced evidence of exploitation of marine resources for food and an early engagement in longdistance exchange networks, linking parts ofthis coast with the Classical world by at least the BC/AD transition.

Competition and Ceramics on the East African Coast: Long-Term Perspectives on Nineteenth-Century History at the Swahili Port Town of Mikindani, Tanzania

2015 ◽  
Vol 42 ◽  
pp. 335-355 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew C. Pawlowicz
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Comparative Analysis ◽  
East African ◽  
Economic Networks ◽  
Economic Competition ◽  
East African Coast ◽  
African Coast ◽  
The Indian Ocean ◽  
Economic Landscape

AbstractThe Swahili communities of the East African coast have often been characterized as middlemen, defined by their ability to navigate – often quite literally – the economic networks linking the African Interior and the Indian Ocean rim. Yet diversity has increasingly been recognized between Swahili communities. In this paper I add to the awareness and explication of Swahili diversity through comparative analysis of the archaeology of the southern Tanzanian town of Mikindani. In particular, I work to extend our knowledge of political and economic competition in East Africa backwards from the better documented nineteenth century. For Mikindani, its inhabitants’ changing abilities to access certain kinds of ceramics trace the competitive structures of this part of the coast and provide evidence for their success or failure in navigating a complex economic landscape.

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