NEW

HISTORY OF

FROM THE CRADLE OF HUMANITY TO THE 21ST CENTURY

DISCOVER
EGYPT, NUBIA,
KUSH, THE
MALI EMPIRE
AND MORE

BLOOD
THE RISE OF A AND RUIN
How colonialism and the

NEW CONTINENT
Independence, decolonisation
slave trade decimated
African nations

and the end of apartheid

Edition
Digital

NELSON
MANDELA
From political
prisoner to
president
EDITION
FIRST
 HISTORY OF

AFRICA
No single book could ever cover the history of Africa in its entirety.
Even the great libraries of Timbuktu would be hard pushed to sum
up the long, complex, sometimes brutal history of the continent that
holds both humanity’s oldest home and the world’s youngest country.
Africa’s history is ancient, nuanced and complicated. This book,
then, is by way of an introduction. You’ll notice that some events you
might be expecting aren’t present – the Boer Wars for example. While
this book does address the beginnings of and the ongoing legacy
of colonialism, it prioritises shining a light on the histories of Black
heroes and civilisations from antiquity and medieval history, and
how their modern-day descendents are working to decolonialise their
continent and help Africa to once again become the shining beacon
of civilisation that it was before. On this journey through some of the
highlights of African history from prehistory to the present, you’ll
meet powerful kings, wicked sorcerers, pirates, pharaohs, forgotten
kingdoms, warrior women and much more.
 ANCIENT
08 The birth of humanity
Our ancient ancestors first lived in the fertile
region of the Horn of Africa

10 Kingdoms of 10
Ancient Egypt
Discover some of the long history of Africa’s
most famous ancient civilisation

18 Kingdom of Kush
The story of Ancient Egypt’s southern
neighbours intertwines with theirs

22 Kingdom of Aksum
42
Once the most powerful state between the
Roman Empire and Persia

48 From Equals to Enslaved

MEDIEVAL How colonial slavery first arrived on West
Africa’s rich shores

28 10 Forgotten 52 The Barbary Coast

Between the 15th and 19th centuries,
African Empires pirates terrorised the North African coast
Discover ten incredible civilisations
you may never have heard of before

34 The Lion King COLONIAL

Founder of the Mali Empire
66 Origins of the
36 The Richest Man Transatlantic
in History Slave Trade
Meet medieval Malian multi-billionaire
A dark period of history begins
Mansa Musa

70 The Transatlantic Slave

42 The Lost City of Benin
An advanced civilisation that was all but Trade Timeline 28
forgotten during the colonial era An in-depth look at the era
 36
78 Impact of Slavery
How slavery impacted the development of
Africa from the 15th century to today

82 Beware the Mino

The iconic women warriors of Dahomey

86 The Scramble for Africa

How Victorian technologies ushered in a new
era of colonialism and conquest

88 Shaka
How an exile used cunning and guile to
become an iconic African king

MODERN
100Haile Selassie
The Ethiopian emperor who became a
religious icon

88 102 Apartheid
South Africa’s policy of racial segregation

104 The Year of Africa

How 1960 transformed the continent with
independence and democracy movements

106 Mandela’s Revolution

How one iconic ANC activist went from

18 political prisoner to president

118 Africa’s Forgotten War

The conflict between Ethiopia and Eritrea

124 South Sudan’s

Brutal Birth
106 The world’s newest nation

100
08 The birth of humanity
Our ancient ancestors first lived in the
fertile region of the Horn of Africa

10 Kingdoms of
Ancient Egypt
Discover some of the long history of
Africa’s most famous ancient civilisation

18 Kingdom of Kush
The story of Ancient Egypt’s southern
neighbours intertwines with theirs
10
22 Kingdom of Aksum
Once the most powerful state between
the Roman Empire and Persia

18
08

22
Ancient

The
of

Modern humans first evolved in the Horn of

Africa region, before making their way across the
continent and throughout the world
Written by April Madden

8
 The birth of humanity

n the mid-eastern coast of the unearthed in the region. The Omo remains, creative, making art by carving stones and shells,

O African continent, a peninsula juts

out into the sea. The Red Sea and
the Gulf of Aden separate it from
the Middle Eastern countries of
Saudi Arabia and Yemen, while thousands of miles
eastwards across the ocean lies India. Behind it to
the west, the vast width of the African continent
named for their discovery near the Omo river in
southwestern Ethiopia, is a collection of ancient
human bones in which modern human features
can be found alongside features from an earlier
species of human. In 2022, the Omo remains
were dated to approximately 233,000 years old.
The earth layer around them suggests these early
painting with red ochre, and even adorning
themselves with beads. Needles and hide-working
tools suggest early modern eastern African humans
from this period were creating shelters or clothing
from the skins of the animals they hunted with
arrows and spears, and making fishing nets to take
advantage of the rich food sources in the nearby
stretches towards the South Atlantic. Here, in a modern humans enjoyed a lush, rainy climate in rivers and seas. It’s likely that at this point they
landscape of mountains and plains, where the which the Nile and the nearby Omo river flowed were using complex spoken language to describe
weather can vary between monsoon rains and dry high and freely, while the scant traces of tools and plan their activities, thoughts and feelings.
trade winds, where the lowland heat can hit 50C that accompanied them suggest a technological While the ‘Out of Africa’ hypothesis for the
(122F) in places but the plateaus can offer sunny level in eastern Africa’s Middle Stone Age. During spread of modern humans across the world is now
green climes, is the crucible in which humanity this era, the local human population would have thought of as a long, drawn-out series of migratory
was formed. benefitted from abundant food, which they hunted events that happened in waves rather than one
It’s thought that homo sapiens, modern and gathered with a range of stone and bone tools significant dispersal, this – the place the ancient
humans, evolved in the Horn of Africa region that showcase the planning, abstract thinking Egyptians called Ta Netjeru, the ‘land of God’
between 200,000 and 300,000 years ago. Some and innovative behaviours that characterise the – is where the people that went on those world-
of the earliest fossils of our ancestors have been evolution of modern humans. They were also changing migrations first began their lives.

The verdant shores of Ethiopia’s Omo

river are the site of one of the earliest
fossil records of modern humans

9
 Ancient

“Ancient Egypt
became an epicentre
for culture and
religion”

10
 Kingdoms of Ancient Egypt

of

Spanning many eras, the New, Middle and Old

Kingdoms would see the pharaohs reach the
peak of their power and Egyptian culture soar

or 3,000 years the Ancient Egyptian Kingdom that iconic structures that have endured

F empire endured. It emerged, like so

many other independent kingdoms,
from the ruins of warring and
fragmented fiefdoms and grew into a
nation that shook North Africa and the surrounding
world to its core. It became an epicentre for
culture and religion, where science and
millennia were built. The Middle Kingdom was
when a nation was unified and forged anew. Then
the realm was aggressively expanded and culture
fostered like never before in the New Kingdom.
Ancient Egypt wasn’t just an era of military
conquest and expansion, it was a time of
innovation too. The Egyptians invented
magic were intertwined as one. But early forms of cosmetics, including
those golden ages, those heights The invasions eye makeup; they were one of
of human achievement that of Egypt led to the first civilisations (alongside
challenged even those of Greece Mesopotamia) to evolve a robust
new cultural aspects
and Rome at their peaks, were written language; they created
not achieved in a day. being embedded into papyrus thousands of years
Before the Assyrians came, society, such as the before the Chinese produced
before the Persians invaded, use of horses and paper; they designed the basic
before the Greeks conquered calendar structure that we still use
and the Romans annexed, the
chariots today; they can even lay claim to
Egyptians rose and fell all by inventing bowling and early forms of
themselves. While darker periods breath mints.
would form between them (three in fact, In short, they were a nation the like of which
known as the Intermediate Periods), the timeline of we’ve never seen before or again. Gods, pharaohs,
Ancient Egypt has been defined by three distinct pyramids, mummification, agriculture and much
eras: the Old Kingdom, the Middle Kingdom and more helped to define the Ancient Egyptians
the New Kingdom. A time of cultural rebirth and as one of human history’s most fascinating and
monumental construction, it was during the Old intelligent civilisations.

11
 Ancient

FAMOUS FACES
THROUGH TIME
Uncover the celebrities of each
kingdom of this great civilisation

The Old Kingdom

Djoser c. 2670 BCE
Of all the kings that ruled Egypt in the infant years of
the Old Kingdom, the pharaoh Djoser is perhaps the
most influential. He may not have been the man who
united Egypt as one in Narmer, but he typified two
characteristics that would go on to define
Ancient Egypt. He conducted Fourth Dynasty pharaoh Khufu oversees
military campaigns that construction of the Great Pyramid of Giza
solidified and expanded
the borders of the
empire while nurturing
the growth of his
nation’s culture. He
also commissioned
the first pyramid
on Egyptian soil;
the Step Pyramid
at Sakkara was the
blueprint for pharaonic
splendour and inspired
future generations to build
even greater examples.

The Middle Kingdom

Mentuhotep II 2061 BCE – 2010 BCE
The kingdom splintered after the prosperity and Tomb art from the Old Kingdom
expansion of the Old Kingdom. This mini dark age of
sorts was known as the First Intermediate Period and

The Old Kingdom

saw Egypt divided by two competing dynasties. Lower
Egypt was controlled by the Tenth
Dynasty and Upper Egypt
by the Theban Dynasty.
About 14 years into his
reign, Mentuhotep II
had grown tired of
A time of rebirth, the Old Kingdom saw the introduction of the first
the stalemate and pharaoh, dynasty and pyramid to the world
attacked the Lower
Egypt capital of
rior to the Old Kingdom, in an era this time. The Old Kingdom began in about 2686

P
Herakleopolis. He
eventually broke the known as the Predynastic, Prehistoric or BCE, with the formation of the Third Egyptian
rival dynasty, unified Protodynastic Period, Egypt was going Dynasty. The term ‘Old Kingdom’ was introduced
the two realms and
effectively founded the
through something of a transformation. by 18th-century historians and is used broadly
era now known as the The nation was divided into colonies, each with to signify the first of three peaks of Egyptian
Middle Kingdom. their own lords and rulers. The north and south of civilisation. Often referred to as the ‘Age of the
the country were also distinct in both practices and Pyramids’, the Old Kingdom saw Egypt nurture
The New Kingdom culture, with Hierakonpolis the capital of the south every aspect that would make it great. From the
Ramesses II 1279 BCE – 1213 BCE and Bes the capital of the north. Third Dynasty and its first pharaoh, Djoser, to the
Tutankhamun may be the most recognisable pharaoh, but Excavations over the last century have radically apparent last king of the Sixth, Netjerkare Siptah,
King Tut’s reign was a speck of Egyptian sand compared changed the way we view Egypt prior to the Old the nation was transformed into a cultural and
the power, influence and achievement of Ramesses II. The
Kingdom, including the fact that the First Dynasty military powerhouse.
third pharaoh of the 19th Dynasty, Ramesses II took an
already prosperous kingdom and the rise of Narmer was not an overnight The pyramids are a symbol of this era, and the
and made it greater and process. Upper Egypt, the more affluent of the template for these monumental icons began in
grander than it had ever two states, had three main cities – Thinis, Nekhen the reign of Djoser. His vizier and closest adviser,
been. He expanded its
borders, conquering and Naqada. One by one, these states conquered Imhotep (who would be deified in generations
Canaan and subduing one another or merged, and by about 3100 BCE, to come as a demigod and god of healing) was
everyone from the Egypt emerged as one whole state with the the architect behind the Pyramid of Djoser, and
Nubians to the
warrior pharaoh Narmer at its head. Two dynasties his designs were a significant leap in engineering
peoples of the
Levant. He was also followed his founding during a period known as in Ancient Egypt. Prior to Djoser, kings were
a prolific builder the Early Dynastic Period, and it was here that buried in rectangular, flat-roofed tombs called
of monuments the blueprint for the Old Kingdom was forged. mastabas, but the Third Dynasty’s founder desired
and temples and
even went as far as Memphis became the capital and Abydos the immortality in death by means of a tomb worthy
constructing his very own religious epicentre. Even architecture and the arts of a divine ruler. Imhotep’s revolutionary design,
capital city, Pi-Ramesses. began to approach the classical Egyptian form at stacking squared versions of mastabas on top of

12
 Kingdoms of Ancient Egypt

The Great Sphinx of Giza is believed

to have been built in the time of
Fourth Dynasty pharaoh Khafra ANCIENT EGYPT’S
FIRST PHARAOH
Who was the man who unified two
distinctly different halves of the same
realm and set the stage for the Old
Kingdom period?
The Old Kingdom was the first true age of prosperity
and progress for Egypt, but it would have been nothing
without the two dynasties that came before it and the
man who founded the pharaonic line to begin with. That
man was Narmer and, much like many of the leaders
and radicals who changed history in the post-neolithic
world, he is a man steeped in myth, legend and mystery.
Nevertheless, his actions and decisions at the beginning
of the First Dynasty set the precedent for the 29 others
that would follow.
Narmer ruled sometime during the 31st century
BCE and became the first man to unite the states of
Upper Egypt and Lower Egypt. Of course, for an event
that happened so far back in prehistory, most of the
information we have comes from references found in
tombs and the conclusions drawn by Egyptologists and
historians, but there are some intriguing details we can
take from them.
Seal impressions found in tombs at Abydos linked to
the pharaohs Qa’a and Den (both of whom ruled, to the
best of our knowledge, after Narmer during the First
Dynasty) cite a list of ancient kings that name Narmer as
the first. There have even been stone vessels (elaborate
vases) found in the Step Pyramid tomb of Djoser that
pay tribute to Narmer, perhaps expressing an intended
connection with the founder and his way of life. Some
historians argue that a ruler by the name of Menes was
in fact the founder of founders, while others theorise
Narmer and Menes were one and the same.

one another to create a pyramid, created the jewel the pinnacle of pyramid design in Egypt and it
in the king’s rebuilt kingdom. A grand necropolis, would remain the tallest man-made structure for
a symbol of the enduring Ancient Egyptian a staggering 3,800 years. It served as a testament
reverence for death, surrounds it and the finished to the power of the pharaohs and the enduring
article would go on to inspire pharaohs for potency of the many Egyptian gods.
generations to come. The Fifth Dynasty of Ancient Egypt (2498
The grandeur of the Step Pyramid (the Pyramid BCE – 2345 BCE) saw an evolution of theological
of Djoser) at Sakkara wasn’t lost on those who practices across the entire nation, with certain
followed in Djoser’s footsteps. By the time that cults growing in prominence (gods rose and fell
the Fourth Dynasty kings were ruling over in popularity, and usually those favoured by
Egypt (2613 BCE – 2498 BCE), a new a particular dynasty or geographically
set of pyramids were forming. The important location were able to
Fourth Dynasty is considered the survive obscurity). The Cult of Ra
‘golden age’ of the Old Kingdom,
The Old (god of the noon sun) and the
the very peak of prosperity. Kingdom boasted Cult of Osiris (god of the afterlife)
The economy was thriving a strong centralised rose significantly in popularity
thanks to a peaceful realm administration during this period of time.
and open trade routes with its The Egyptian economy was
neighbouring nations. As with from the capital of also booming, with the influx of
every peaceful period of Ancient Memphis goods like ebony, gold, myrrh and
Egypt, a spree of construction frankincense growing all the time.
swept the nation. The Egyptians pushed their trading
Khufu, the second pharaoh of the boundaries even further with agreements
Fourth Dynasty, was the man to create a with Lebanon and modern-day Somalia. In short,
monument so grand it would eventually be named it was a time of enterprise without the fear of
one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World: invasion or war. This economic strength bled into
the Great Pyramid of Giza. Built over a two-decade the Sixth Dynasty (2345 BCE – 2181 BCE), as did
period, the 146.5 metre-high structure was a feat of the growing popularity of the inscription of spells
engineering that put even Imhotep’s Step Pyramid and incantations inside burial chambers and tombs. There’s even an argument that Narmer is a
in Sakkara to shame. Giza would become the site Known commonly as the Pyramid Texts, these pseudonym for the mysterious monarch King
Scorpion, but currently no evidence exists to
of many more pyramids and temples, known as inscriptions would form the basis of the Book of corroborate this claim
the Giza Necropolis. The Giza Pyramid became the Dead.

13
 Ancient

The Middle Kingdom

Once again divided and once again whole, Ancient Egypt rose from its own ashes
to become a military and cultural powerhouse

or every period of greatness and king took full advantage of revolt and attacked effort was continued by his son and successor

F monumental achievement in Ancient

Egypt’s history, there is a stretch of time
where governments crumbled, territories
divided and the nation fell into a dark lull. As the
royal hold on the country fell apart towards the
Herakleopolis. By the time of his arrival, there was
barely a battle to be had, and the city, and the rest
of the region as a result, were taken. He quelled
what little resistance could be offered by the
remaining rulers of the decaying Tenth Dynasty
Mentuhotep III. His rule was brief by pharaonic
standards (a mere 12 years) but he further
accelerated the unification, including an expedition
to retake Punt (an old trading partner of Egypt). The
throne then passed to Mentuhotep IV, whose reign
end of the Old Kingdom, Egypt was plunged into then set about reunifying the kingdom as one. remains something of a mystery. His name is often
an era of uncertainty that is referred to as the First Such a task was not quick, taking a staggering omitted from lists of kings found in tombs through
Intermediate Period. 21 years to bring the Lower and Upper regions into the Middle and New Kingdoms, suggesting his rule
To make matters worse, the power of the line. He began by conducting a series of military was a short one and ended abruptly.
pharaoh was splintered when two rival dynasties campaigns to regain the territories lost during The Turin Papyrus (otherwise known as the
began vying for power – the Tenth Dynasty (based the dark time of the First Intermediate Period. He Turin King List) is one such document; it describes
in Herakleopolis, the principal city of Lower Egypt) travelled south to the Second Cataract in Nubia, the period following Mentuhotep III’s death as
and the 11th Dynasty (centralised in Thebes, Upper a region that had gained independence from its “seven kingless years”. Information regarding the
Egypt). This period of conflict and dissention lasted masters. Mentuhotep II brought the Nubians to heel ‘missing king’ remains frustratingly scarce, but
for 125 years, until the reign of Theban pharaoh before restoring Egyptian authority in the Sinai some details suggest a coup of sorts may have
Mentuhotep II. region. It was a ruthless expression of power in an taken place.
Ascending to the Upper Egypt throne in 2055 era when authority was a long forgotten force. Records found at Wadi Hammamat, a large
BCE, Mentuhotep II watched as the Tenth Dynasty His consolidation of power in Egypt and efforts mining region in ancient times, do attest to his
began to destabilise with in-fighting and regular towards unifying the nation ushered in what reign and make reference to expeditions to quarry
riots. In his 14th year of regnal rule, the Theban we now know as the Middle Kingdom, and that stone for monuments. The records name a vizier,

Rock tombs of Beni Hasan, an Ancient

Egyptian burial site primarily used
during the Middle Kingdom

14
 Kingdoms of Ancient Egypt

Amenemhat, as its commander. Whether or not rule with his successor, Senusret II. The new The Pyramid of Amenemhat I
this is the same Amenemhat that would eventually pharaoh focused mainly on the maintenance of began construction in Thebes. It is
assume the throne, we cannot know for sure. the realm, building a pyramid at el-Lahun as well not known why it was relocated,
along with the capital, to Lisht
However, it certainly seems likely. as attempting to convert the Faiyum oasis into
So began the next dynasty with Amenemhat I workable farmland.
at its head. He began by moving the capital back Under the sole rule of his successor Senusret
to Memphis (the capital during the Old Kingdom), III, the Middle Kingdom enjoyed the peak of its
as well as forming a standing army (an asset his power and influence. The new warrior king was
successors would maintain for the rest of unlike anything the era had seen before –
the dynasty). he represented a mind-set from a long
The new king began fortifying During forgotten era, an aggressive hunger to
the country’s borders, especially the Middle expand the kingdom and conquer
those between Egypt and Asia, new lands. He moved a huge
where he erected the Walls
Kingdom the army north of the kingdom and
of the Ruler in the East Delta. elevated flood levels attacked the Nubians relentlessly,
In fact, Amenemhat I rebuilt of the Nile boosted punishing them into surrender THE FEUDAL
or built new fortifications all
around Egypt, transforming
agriculture and before claiming considerable
Nubian territories.
GOVERNMENTS
military strategy from buoyed the His successor, Amenemhat III, OF THE MIDDLE
expansion to simple defence.
Amenemhat I would eventually
economy is famed for his radical approach to
construction. He took advantage of the
KINGDOM
begin a co-regency with his son, country’s limestone and sandstone quarries In the Old Kingdom before it and the New Kingdom that
followed, the pharaoh’s rule was absolute. Priests, nobles
Senusret, before the elder king was assassinated like never before, beginning a huge programme of and even the queen herself could act, with consent,
– supposedly by his own guards. His successor, building that spread across the entire kingdom. on the king’s behalf, but the for the most part, the
now Senusret I, began a more expansive series His son, Amenemhat IV, has a poorly recorded pharaoh answered to no one but the gods. However, that
definitive rule came under threat when the Old Kingdom
of military campaigns before eventually entering rule but his successor, Sobekneferu, became
crumbled and splintered into two separate realms.
a co-regency with his own son, Amenemhat II. the first recorded female Egyptian ruler in the With two dynasties now vying for power, the normal
His son enjoyed a relatively peaceful reign of his country’s history (although her reign lasted only authoritative structure of the kingdom was in ruins.
kingdom and eventually chose a traditional joint four years). Prior to the rise of the pharaohs, the entire country
was divided into small administrative colonies known as
nomes. Each nome had an appointed leader (nomarch),
Ancient Egyptian men building and it was these independent city states that the first
a wooden coffin in a Middle pharaoh had to unite in order to establish Egypt as a
Kingdom carpentry shop single nation.
Even after unification, the nomarchs – 20 of whom
were based in Lower Egypt and 22 in Upper Egypt
– remained. However, they existed more as regional
officials who would report directly to the royal court. As
the country entered the First Intermediate Period, these
nomes began to assume autonomy once again. By the
time of reunification, new sole pharaoh Amenemhat I
found these states unwilling to bend the knee entirely.
The position of nomarch was considered hereditary
(rather than being subject to the king’s discretion), an
issue made all the worse by marriages that created
powerful alliances between multiple nomes. In order to
maintain peace in the kingdom, Amenemhat was forced
to agree to an alliance of sorts, creating a bizarre feudal
system that lasted until the reign of Senusret III.

15
 Ancient

The New Kingdom

The last great age of Ancient Egypt was its grandest
yet – an era of economic enterprise, domestic
beautification and military expansion
asting from the 16th to 11th century BCE, tributaries that led into the Mediterranean Sea).

L the New Kingdom saw Ancient Egypt

transformed. Its kings and queens both
looked ahead at the promising
future of the realm and back in the
hope of emulating the monarchs
Mortuary
By the time the pharaoh in Thebes realised
what was happening, it was too late. The Hyksos
were fearsome warriors who used advanced
weaponry – mainly cavalry, chariots
and powerful compound bows
of the past. The empire was – and who were comfortably
expanded by the sword of beliefs settled. The 15th Dynasty was
warrior kings, while the realm developed during established and lasted for more
itself was rebuilt from the this era, leading to an than 150 years, but the Hyksos
ground up by a new economic presence divided Egypt in two,
prosperity. This was Ancient
influx of talismans with the invaders controlling
Egypt at its peak, as reflected and amulets for Lower Egypt while the Thebans
in the resultant boom in arts protection in the ruled Upper Egypt. Kings made
and culture. afterlife many efforts to defeat the Hyksos,
The New Kingdom was preceded but the tribesman were seasoned
by another fracture known as the warriors and weren’t so easily deterred.
Second Intermediate Period. Towards the It wasn’t until the time of Ahmose I, the
start of the 16th century BCE, a small warrior first pharaoh of the 17th Dynasty, that everything
tribe known as the Hyksos had begun settling in changed. Having watched his family fail to A statue of Akhenaten from
his Aten Temple at Karnak
the fertile land of the Delta (a group of rivers and banish the Hyksos, Ahmose I raised a huge

16
 Kingdoms of Ancient Egypt

army and met the Hyksos with unrelenting force.

Over many years he pummelled the borders,
slowly driving the Hyksos back. Eventually, the
WHAT
Theban pharaoh drove the occupying forces from HAPPENED
his homeland and set about restoring Egypt to its
former glory.
NEXT?
With Egypt unified, the 17th Dynasty’s founder Following the end of the
began an expansive series of military campaigns New Kingdom and its final
that added new territories to the realm while golden age, what was next
regaining lands lost in the Second Intermediate for this ancient civilisation?
Period. These conquests brought new wealth into While the period we know as Ancient
the economy – it re-energised the construction of Egypt officially ended with the death
of Cleopatra VII and its addition to
temples and monuments and enabled Ahmose I to
the Roman Empire in 30 BCE, its
rebuild the decorated nation of old. true demise could be attributed to
Ahmose I’s desire to restore Egypt to its former the death of Ramesses XI. The span
greatness would be reflected in the actions of the of time that followed, the Third
Intermediate Period, saw the power
kings and queens who followed. Amenhotep III of the pharaohs start to deteriorate
rebuilt monuments, tombs, and statues on a scale as political in-fighting took hold. The
never seen before, solidifying the bubbling new period lasted about 350 years and
was split into three stages: the first
culture of arts and expression.
saw the rule of the country divided
Queen Hatshepsut was the first woman to take between the 21st Dynasty (which
the title of pharaoh, and she helped nurture the controlled Lower Egypt) and the High
country’s economy, including expeditions to Punt Priests of Amun at Thebes (which
ruled most of Middle and Upper
and other trading posts. Thutmose III created one Egypt). The two states existed in
of the most impressive armies ever assembled by a relatively peaceful harmony.
pharaoh and used it to expand Egypt’s borders with The second period saw the
country reunited thanks to the rise
conquest after conquest. The 18th Dynasty was a of the 22nd Dynasty and new king
time of achievement on multiple fronts, but like any Shoshenq I – the Libyan monarchy
age of success, there was also a catch. came to power in about 945 BCE,
expanding out from the East Delta to
That blip came in the form of Amenhotep IV,
control the entire nation. Once the
also known as Akhenaten. A religious zealot who country’s bitter enemy, the Libyans
despised the power of the Church of Amun (the now ruled Egypt as native Egyptians.
patron god of the Theban kings), Akhenaten did The country began to destabilise
once again under the rule of the 22nd
not believe in the polytheistic practices that had Dynasty in 850 BCE, and by 818 BCE,
defined Egyptian theology since the country’s a rival 23rd Dynasty had risen, which
earliest times. He outlawed the worship of any god then caused the nation to fragment
into warring states.
other than his chosen deity, Aten, and forced the
The country would eventually fall
country into massive religious upheaval. to a Nubian invasion, lasting 25 years.
The Amarna Period, as it would come to be This marked a trend for the coming
known, only lasted 16 years, but the damage was centuries as Egypt’s grand native
history was buried by an Assyrian,
already done. The upheaval was so universally Persian and eventual Greek invasion
despised that Akhenaten was branded the during the subsequent Late Period.
‘Heretic Pharaoh’, even by his own son and future In short, the nation had fragmented
so far from the stable centralised
pharaoh Tutankhamun. His legacy was summarily structure of the three kingdom eras
expunged from many future histories and a course that it ultimately benefited from the
was set to bring Egypt back to its former glory. stability outside rule brought with it.
The dynasty that followed pushed Egypt’s
prosperity to new heights. The most notable
pharaoh of the period, Ramesses II, took the great
armies formed by Thutmose III and weaved a
military campaign that moulded Egypt into its
most powerful form. He sired a considerable
number of children (most of whom he outlived)
and built a huge tomb and necropolis in the Valley
of the Kings.
Like the 19th Dynasty, the 20th was also defined
by the legacy of one man: Ramesses III. However,
while Ramesses II would strengthen his nation,
his descendent would ultimately weaken it by
draining the treasury with unsuccessful military
campaigns and defensive operations. It was his When the New Kingdom
era drew to a close with the
mismanagement of the crown that eventually set death of Ramesses XI, Egypt
about the slow decline of the New Kingdom and would never again prosper
under native Egyptian rule
the native pharaonic line as a whole.

17
 Ancient

of

Egypt’s southern neighbours forged an empire that lasted

for more than a thousand years, establishing the Twenty-
fifth Dynasty of Egypt as they pushed northwards
Written by Will Lawrence

18
 Kingdom of Kush

hen Rome was nothing more from the people who moved into the vacuum that commemorate Thutmose I’s campaigns that his son

W than a village on the River

Tiber and the Greek city-
states ruled tiny tracts of
land, the mighty Kingdom
of Kush held sway over an empire that stretched
from central Sudan to the Palestinian borderlands.
Its rulers flourished for a millennium, outlasted the
formed when the Kushite state finally collapsed in
the 4th century CE.
The Kingdom of Kush finds its origins in a
powerful state that formed in the 3rd millennium
BCE, taking advantage of its position on the Middle
Nile where it stood as a gateway for trade, ferrying
the rich materials from the south, like gold and
oversaw the famous inscription that speaks of his
return from overthrowing the “wretched Kush”.
Under Egyptian control, a syncretistic culture
arose in Kush, influenced by trends in Egypt to the
north and by the culture of the African peoples to
the south. Kush’s position on the trade routes from
Egypt to the Red Sea, and from the Nile to the
golden ages of Athens, Sparta and Macedonia, and jewels, to the consumer markets in the north. The south and west, continued to bring considerable
witnessed both the growth and much of the decline state through which this trade route flowed held wealth to the region.
of the Roman Empire. its capital at Kerma, just upstream of what is now Egypt could not maintain control indefinitely,
And yet here is a kingdom that to history cited as the Third Nile Cataract. Kerma enjoyed a however, and by the 9th century BCE there
has been perennially overshadowed by the prosperous reign until, during the period around was little remaining evidence of the pharaohs’
ancient Egyptians, their famous neighbours to 1750-1650 BCE, a people called the Hyksos rose to colonisation; the major cult centre at Napata had
the north, even though, for a time, Egypt too fell power in the Nile Delta. certainly fallen into ruin, and it is from this time
under Kushite control. When the Kushites were Initially, the people of Kerma forged an alliance that archaeologists begin to record data from a
finally expelled from Egypt at the hands of the with the Hyksos and pushed further north, taking separate Kushite state. Gifts from the pharaoh to
Assyrians, their homeland dwindled to a place of the Egyptian fortresses of the Second Cataract. the Temple of Karnak in 827 BCE included gold
peripheral influence and, says one leading historian, Eventually, however, the pharaohs rallied, and from the region around Napata, which then became
“increasingly found itself at the end of a cul-de-sac Amosis (1570-46 BCE) reunited Egypt and the seat of early Kushite kings, and this suggests
in the Nile valley, the exit to which was always defeated the Hyksos in battle. The New Kingdom that the two kingdoms were enjoying cordial
blocked by a strong power to the north.” Yet still it of Egypt then exacted vengeance for the Kerma diplomatic and trading relations despite the former,
endured, and its inhabitants prospered. Today, the land-grab, and the kingdom was crushed; the more precarious association.
area that made up the Kingdom of Kush is more pharaohs Thutmose I and Thutmose III enforced The early Kushite rulers are difficult to identify,
commonly known as Nubia, which derives its name an Egyptian military presence in the area. It was to and prior to Kashta, who led the Kushite expansion

19
 Ancient

the female ruler of Kush. Clearly, some confuse the

“Piye led the Kushite push into Egypt, generic name with the name of an actual ruler.

which established the Twenty-fifth With regard to the succession, it seems that the
most suitable candidate was chosen from a select
Dynasty of Egypt” band, who may or may not have been related to
their predecessor, while the Ancient Greek historian
Diodorus reports that the candidates were
chosen by the priesthood from the most valorous
Kushites before their god made the final choice.
into Egypt during the 8th century BCE, we know Amenirdis I, as the presumptive God’s Wife of It appears that there were conflicts between the
only of Alara and Ary, and it seems as though Amun in Thebes. Indeed, Kashta went on to extend rulers and the priesthood in Kush, and Diodorus
they may be the same person. Kashta ruled Kush Kushite control into Thebes and also Elephantine. records that the priests of Meroë (the later seat of
from Napata, which is around 300 miles north His successor, Piye, then led the great Kushite the rulers) were able to dictate the date
of Khartoum, the modern capital of Sudan, and push into Egypt, which established the of the ruler’s death. Throughout Kushite
he enjoyed considerable influence in Egypt, as Twenty-fifth Dynasty of Egypt. This history, the political system remained
evidenced by the installation of his daughter, period of Kushite pre-eminence is monarchic.
often referred to as the Napatan Meroë, The army was of keen
Empire, named after the state the capital importance – the Egyptians
capital, and the Kushite kings of the Kingdom appear to have regarded the
KINGS OF KUSH ruled Egypt (in its entirety or
of Kush, became a
denizens of the Kushite state
in part) from 744 until 656 as good bowmen and horse
Many Kushite rulers are UNESCO World
BCE. warriors – though not much is
shadowy figures, though we
know something of a few
Given its proximity to and Heritage Site known about its composition
long historical connection with and whether it was a
great kings in 2011
its northern neighbour, it is not professional body
Kashta surprising that Kushite culture at or a citizen militia
Mid 8th century BCE this stage greatly resembled that of the called upon in times
The second king of the Napatan Empire of the Egyptians. And, certainly, the Kushite kings of need. There is evidence that
Kushites, Kashta proved pivotal in the expansion appear to have entered Egypt “not as conquering some leaders did not fight with
into Egypt, and he laid the foundations for what barbarians,” one notable historian and archaeologist the army, while others such as
would become the Twenty-fifth Dynasty. His only writes, “but as champions of the age-old traditions Taharqo (690-664 BCE) and
known wife was Pebatjma, and he was buried in
of the pharaohs.” The Kushite state’s great god, at Akinidad (dates unknown,
the royal pyramid at el-Kurru.
least during the Twenty-fifth Dynasty, was Amun, though he fought the
Piye the great god of Egypt who had ruled almost Romans) appear as battle-
c.752-c.721 BCE unopposed since the 2nd millennium BCE.
Kashta’s successor completed the invasion of Though most rulers were male, there is a clear
Egypt, and became the first pharaoh of the
indication that queens too sat on the Kushite
Twenty-fifth Dynasty, which ruled Egypt until the
Assyrian invasion. The length of his rule cannot throne, and there is no reason to believe they were While an Egyptian god,
be precisely dated, but it likely did not exceed 31 not rulers in their own right; the Bible in Acts 8:27 Amun was also worshipped
by the Kushites
years. speaks of “Candace, queen of the Ethiopians”, while
there are further sources that record the Kandake,
Taharqo
690-664 BCE
The son of Piye, Taharqo oversaw a prosperous
period in the Kushite history, and he proved a Apedemak, pictured here with three heads
capable warlord, fighting as best he could the and four arms, was the Kushite god of war
invasion of Egypt by the iron-wielding Assyrians.
Despite inferior weapons, his troops recorded at
least one famous victory.

Tanwetamani
664-653 BCE
The nephew of his predecessor, Tanwetamani
sought to wrestle control of Egypt back from the
Assyrians, and reoccupied all of Egypt including
Memphis. The Assyrian response was swift and
lethal, their re-conquest effectively ending Kushite
influence over Egypt.

Aspelta
c.600-580 BCE
Kushite history becomes shadier after the fall
of the Twenty-fifth Dynasty, but Aspelta left
monuments carved with historical details, and it’s
been suggested that Assyrian incursions from the
north encouraged Aspelta to move the Kushite
capital from Napata to Meroë.

20
 Kingdom of Kush

A bas-relief found on the ruins

of a temple dedicated to Amun

Amanitore, one of the queens of Kush

ready warlords. they fled, badly beaten at the Battle of Pselchis in fell prey to Persian, Greek and Roman influence.
Herodotus records the presence of Kushite 23 BCE. The Kushites developed and retained their own
soldiers in the army of Xerxes that invaded Greece The artistic evidence that survives suggests language, which has confused linguists ever since
in the early 5th century, claiming they fought that the people of Kush were dark-skinned, and it its discovery, and they preserved their own gods –

© Getty Images. Creative Commons; Sven-Steffen Arndt, Jeff Dahl, Clemens Schmillen, Fabrizio Demartis
with javelins and knotted clubs, and that before seems that by the later Kushite period, size was like Apedemak, Sebiumeker and Arensnuphis – as
battle they smeared their bodies with chalk and a desirable attribute for mortal women at least, well as adopting the great Egyptian deities. Their
red ochre. Historians think the Kushite army may and while the goddesses remained slim in their funerary rites involved burying their rulers in
have used war elephants, like the Carthaginians, depictions, the earthly women are shown with pyramids, though their construction was somewhat
and the elephant does appear in Kushite art. The considerable girth. Life expectancy was typical of different to that of the Egyptians.
efficacy of the Kushite army is difficult to assess, the region during the period, and while Taharqo Following their expulsion from Egypt, the
though while the clashes between Kushites and reigned for more than 25 years, dying at the age Kushite capital was moved from Napata southward
Assyrians saw their expulsion from Egypt and of 46 or 47, typical mortality would not have to Meroë near Shandī. The subsequent history of
the toppling of the Twenty-fifth Dynasty, the broached much more than 30 years of age. Kush, however, is one of gradual decline, ending
warriors of Kush did record at least one notable Once forced from Egypt by the Assyrian with the kingdom’s final fall coming in 350 CE
victory, defeating the iron-wielding Assyrians in invasion, the Kushites ruled the Middle Nile for when the king of Aksum moved down from the
674 BCE. Like many armies that faced Rome, the more than 800 years and, protected as it was by Ethiopian highlands and destroyed Meroë before
Kushites seem to have recorded little success, and the barren hills of Aswan, it retained its unique plundering the towns along the Nile. The once
the historian and geographer Strabo noted that Egyptian-Nubian culture, while that of Egypt mighty Kingdom of Kush was no more.

The Meroë pyramids

 Ancient

measured
sumite obelisk
The largest Ak 8 feet), cre ated from
33 metres (10
ce of gran ite , one of the
a single pie nt world
hs of the ancie
largest monolit

“The Aksumites
became the first sub-
Saharan kingdom to
mint its own coins”

Among Aksum’s more

curious legacies were the
enormous granite obelisks,
built to mark notable tombs

22
 The Kingdom of Aksum

The
of
Uniquely situated between the Western and Asiatic worlds, the
sub-Saharan kingdom of Aksum grew into the most powerful
state between the Roman Empire and Persia
Written by Hareth Al Bustani

n the 1st millennium BCE, sub-Saharan city grew, it developed a civilisation of its own, with roots. Gold coins were minted to Roman weight

I Africa was in a state of great migration. The

east was transformed as Arabs crossed over
the Red Sea, settling down with Kushite
farmers, bringing with them the Semitic
script. They established trading settlements along
the Horn of Africa, buying ivory and shipping it
across to Persia and further east via the Indian
an outward-looking perspective.
Though the port of Adulis on the Red Sea coast
of modern Eritrea was a 12-day journey away, the
Aksumites grew wealthy trading with the Roman
Empire, South Arabia, India, Sri Lanka and even
China. Naturally the polity began to dominate its
neighbours, expanding its political sphere as far as
standards, and adorned with Greek – specifically for
international trading purposes. Silver and copper
coins, on the other hand, were decorated with the
Semitic Ge’ez script. At this time, a Persian religious
leader referred to Aksum as one of the world’s four
great empires.
The Aksumites projected this prestige through
Ocean – bringing back textiles, spices and silk. the Red Sea, where it acted as gatekeeper for luxury monumental obelisks, built to mark the royal
The city of Aksum was founded in the 1st goods coming in and out of Africa. By the middle necropolis. Their carved designs resembled multi-
century CE in the northern highlands of modern of the 2nd century, Aksum was described by a storey buildings, a fitting tribute to the royals,
Ethiopia. With two annual rainy seasons, Greek geographer as the seat of a king’s who lived their lives in three-storey stone palaces.
this fertile land soon drew scores palace. Almost 120 of these adorn the royal graveyard –
of settlers from the south to rear Aksum Having taken Egypt around the looming over stone tombs – complete with false
cattle and farm. Cereal grew was described same time as Aksum was born, doors and horseshoe brick arches. The largest of
on the hillsides for up to nine the Roman Empire became a the obelisks towered some 33 metres high, carved
months of the year, and the
by a contemporary natural trading partner. The from a single 550-ton block of granite. One of the
uniquely nutritious Ethiopian Persian writer Red Sea was the only source ancient world’s largest monolithic structures, it was
grain, teff, flourished even in as one of the capable of meeting Rome’s carried four kilometres to its site, perhaps with the
the absence of rain. Its forests four greatest powers demand for incense, spice, ivory, help of elephants.
were rich in timber, used cinnamon, pepper, cotton cloth, At its peak, the city spanned 75 hectares, and
to produce charcoal, and the
in the world at iron and steel. Pliny the Younger was a thriving centre complete with industrial
Aksumites terraced hilltops, dug the time also mentioned the trade of slaves, zones, palaces and two-story residential buildings.
canals, and built dams and cisterns. hippopotamus hides and apes. During Palaces boasted stone walls lined with lime
Shortly after its foundation, a visiting the 3rd century, as Roman power waned, or mud, and reinforced with dressed beams.
Greek described the city as a “metropolis” – the first the East African and Indian Ocean trade routes Central pavilions featured paintings and columns,
recorded use of the word, which means a large, were controlled by the Arabs and Persians – with surrounded by courtyards and smaller buildings.
highly developed and significant city. the Aksumites dominating their side of the Red Sea Meanwhile, commoners lived in mud houses with
According to local oral tradition, the indigenous coast down to Cape Guardafui. thatched roofs.
inhabitants of the region were the Nilo-Saharan- To commemorate its rising status, Aksum With no fortified walls, a ceremonial entrance
speaking Kunama, who lived in Aksum alongside became the first sub-Saharan kingdom to mint marked the eastern gate, leading to a central
Semites before being expelled west. The name its own coins, in gold, silver and bronze. Early temple, with a residential area to the west and a
‘Aksum’ probably derives from the Kunama words coinage was adorned with crescents and discs, royal cemetery to the north and east. The whole
‘aya’ and ‘gusma’, meaning ‘hill’ and ‘climb’. As the perhaps inspired by the civilisation’s South Arabian city was surrounded by minor cemeteries and

23
Ancient

“The Aksumites mastered the arts

THE CATHEDRAL of basic smelting and forging”
OF OUR LADY
MARY OF ZION
With the adoption of
suburbs. Roughly 20,000 people called it home, an economic war with its northwestern neighbour,
Christianity, church
with the king at the top of a hierarchical society, the kingdom of Kush.
construction got underway – followed by nobles, priests and then the common Aksum reached its peak in the 4th century under
but one of the new buildings craftsmen and farmers. the reign of King Ezana who defeated the desert
quickly became steeped in Traditional Aksumite pottery was handmade tribe of Beja, deporting them to distant lands. He
myth and legend and poorly fired, but slipped and finely burnished. went on to conquer Yemen before taking down
Wheel-thrown vessels were imported from the the Kushite capital of Meroë where, in his own
Among the churches built after King Ezana’s
Mediterranean, Arabian Gulf and Nile Valley rather words: “I carried war against them when they
adoption of the Christian faith was Aksum’s own
Cathedral of Our Lady Mary of Zion, a rectangular
than produced at home. Locals did their had rebelled… I burnt their towns of stone and
basilica built upon a stepped podium. Facing the best to replicate foreign goods, such their towns of straw. At the same time
church is a set of granite thrones, symbolising as glassware, using parts of broken my men plundered their grain, their
either 12 Aksumite judges, or the Nine Saints and imports. They also crafted bronze, their iron and their copper,
some Christian kings. The Patriarch of Alexandria standardised flaked stone tools, Orthodox destroyed the idols in their homes,
elected an Egyptian Copt as the Archbishop
of the Ethiopian Church, a tradition that has
used to process raw materials Christianity their stocks of corn and of cotton;
from ivory to hides. The was fully embraced and they threw themselves into
continued to this day. Rebuilt as a crenellated
Gondarine-style building in the 17th century, it Aksumites mastered the arts the river.”
hosts a sacred room, with doors depicting angels of basic smelting and forging, by Aksum in the His kingdom became an empire,
with swords, said to hold the Ark of the Covenant crafting an array of specialist 4th century CE by with a dozen cities stretching
– the fabled chest believed to contain the original metal tools used to produce King Ezana from the Nile valley to the Yemeni
tablets inscribed with the Ten Commandments. ivory artefacts, often adorned highlands. Long inscriptions written
Ethiopian legend claims the Ark was brought
with intertwined vines and in Greek and Semitic celebrated his
there by Menelik – the lovechild of King Solomon
and the Queen of Sheba, who formed the animals with distinctive features. conquests at great length, as well as
country’s Solomonic dynasty. Today it is watched Pieces such as the Venus of Aksum, his bold decision to depart from Aksum’s
over by a guardian monk – appointed for life. found in a 3rd-century elite grave, hint at an upper- traditional religion. Early Aksumites practised an
During the annual festival of Timkat, celebrating class appreciation of Graeco-Roman aesthetics. indigenous, monotheistic faith, worshipping the god
Christ’s baptism, Ethiopian priests parade replicas Ivory was immensely popular across the Roman Mahrem, from whom their kings were descended.
of the Ark. Aksum remains a pilgrimage site, with
Empire, Arabia, India and China, and with the Animism and ancestor-worship also played a role
worshippers travelling to a body of water known
as Sheba’s Bath, where the Queen was said to
North African elephant on the brink of extinction, in spirituality, with sacrifices such as a dozen oxen
bathe. Aksum was well-positioned to capitalise on its offered to their spirits alongside Mahrem and Ares,
own abundant elephant population – with herds of his equivalent, the Greek god of war.
reportedly up to 5,000. However, this pushed it into However, in around 330 Ezana was baptised
by the Syrian monk Frumentius of Tyre. Aksum
became one of the earliest Christian states,
First constructed in the The Cathedral of Our
4th century CE, the church Lady Mary of Zion converting just five years after Constantine
has been rebuilt several is now an Ethiopian made it Rome’s official religion at the Council
times since then Orthodox Church
of Nicaea. Christianity quickly took root among
royals and traders before funnelling down to the
commoners. The state later sent missionaries to
the neighbouring Kingdom of Alwa.
The conversion led to a transformation of
Aksumite coinage, pottery, burial traditions and

Revellers celebrate
the annual Timkat
festival, commemo
rating Christ’s bap
tism
 The Kingdom of Aksum
Aksum’s first settlers were a mix
of Kunama and Semites, who were
drawn north to the fertile highlands

Aksum’s farmers
made the most of
fertile land, utilisi their
ng terraced farmi
grow wheat and the ng to
endemic grain, tef
f

architecture. Coins were now adorned with the international trade, were strangled – confining
Christian cross, along with the king’s likeness, an them to their agricultural highlands, coinciding
image of the teff and the inscription: “May the with a massive drop in rainfall. Before long the
country be satisfied.” area was abandoned, decaying into a handful
Others said “Joy and peace to the people” of villages and monasteries as power
and “He conquers through Christ”. shifted southwards, where Aksumite
Aksumite minters began replacing aesthetics were reborn in the King Ezana and his brother Saizana were
converted to the Christian faith by Saint
gold coins with copper ones, Medieval rock-hewn churches of Frumentius shortly after the Council of Nicaea
innovating gilding methods to Lalibela, now in modern-day
decorate crowns and other Ethiopia’s Amhara Region.
symbols with gold leaf. While Aksum began as
In the 5th century, despite a self-sufficient farming
the collapse of the Western community, when it rapidly
Roman Empire, the kingdom blossomed into a merchant
enjoyed a rapid development Aksum became the first sub- kingdom its greatest source of
boom – attributed by later Saharan power to begin minting strength eventually became its
Ethiopians to the ‘Nine Saints’, its own coins, depicting kings and, greatest weakness. As a uniquely
later, Christian imagery
who founded the churches and powerful sub-Saharan civilisation
monasteries outside the kingdom’s capital. dependent upon the international status
Emboldened, the 6th-century king Kaleb sent quo and the movement of goods and peoples
an army to Yemen to liberate Christians from around the ancient world, perhaps its reach
persecution. While this resulted in new territories exceeded its grasp – like its greatest obelisk, which
and a closer bond with the Byzantine emperor came tumbling down under its own weight, the
Justin I, it had proved a costly enterprise, marking foundation simply was not strong enough.

© Alamy, Getty Images

the start of the kingdom’s steady decline. Things
were only made worse by the trade disruptions
caused by the Persian invasions of Yemen,
Jerusalem and Alexandria. Roman, Persian, Ind
ian and Chinese
demand for precio
With the arrival of Islam, the Aksumites and Aksum from a cit
us ivory transform
ed
y to a kingdom
Muslims briefly enjoyed an amicable
relationship – with an Aksumite
king granting refuge to a group of
Muslims during the First Hijra in
around 615. However, as the religion
flourished the Arabians took total
control of the Red Sea and cut it off
from the Mediterranean. Shortly after,
the Aksumites were forced to move
their capital eastwards, with Aksum
itself surviving into the modern age as
a religious and coronation site.
With the ensuing Arab destruction Aksum’s first church, the Cathedral of Our
of Adulis, the Aksumites, whose Lady Mary of Zion, is home to a 1,000-year-old
goat-skin bible, written in Ge’ez
entire economy was modelled on

25
28 10 Forgotten
African Empires
Discover ten incredible civilisations
you may never have heard of before

34 The Lion King

Founder of the Mali Empire

36 The Richest Man

in History
Meet medieval Malian multi-billionaire
36
Mansa Musa

42 The Lost City of Benin

An advanced civilisation that was all but
forgotten during the colonial era

48 From Equals to
Enslaved
How colonial slavery first arrived on West
Africa’s rich shores

52 The Barbary Coast

Betweein the 15th and 19th centuries,
pirates terrorised the North African coast
42

28
48 52

“The purpose of Mansa Musa

taking nearly half a billion
dollars’ worth of gold on one
pilgrimage was charity”
 The most powerful and expansive kingdoms
that have been lost to time
Written by Jonathan Gordon

hanks to a combination of factors, the history of to footnotes, or prologues to other fields of study considered to

T the continent of Africa is a relatively unexplored

and underserved area of study. This is due in
part to the nature of the evidence that might be
available to us to analyse. Even for the relatively
well-researched history of Ancient Egypt, massive gaps and
question marks exist. Thanks to conquest and colonisation,
be of greater importance.
In this feature we hope to bring some of this forgotten history
to the surface. It is by no means comprehensive, but it will
highlight some of the most interesting and diverse episodes in
the history of Africa that might not have caught your attention
before. The re-evaluation of the history of Africa is a live project
© Getty Images

much of the history of the continent has been lost. But there is that is revealing more and more fascinating stories with each
still much there to learn that has simply been ignored, relegated passing year. This is an introduction to that exploration.

28
Don Miguel de
Castro was an
envoy of Kongo
sent to the
Netherlands

Image source: wiki/Rama

KINGDOM OF KONGO
Tangled up in Europe
1390 – 1914
Taking its name from the Kikongo language
spoken in west-central Africa, south of the
Congo River, a federation of Kikongo-speaking
people was formed through the marriage of
Nima a Nzima, of the Mpemba Kasi, and Luqueni
Luansanze, of the Mbata, in 1390. From this, a
monarchy was gradually established.
The Portuguese made contact with the
Kingdom of Kongo, now established with Mbanza
Kongo as its capital, in 1483. In 1491, both the
manikongo (king), Nzinga a Nkuwu, and his
son, Mvemba a Nzinga, were baptised, taking
the Christian names João I Nzinga a Nkuwu
and Afonso I Mvemba a Nzinga. Thereafter,
the fate of the kingdom was heavily tied to the
Portuguese and Europe, such as when warriors,
called the Jagas, overran the country in 1568 and
the Portuguese were needed to assist in their
expulsion. In return, the colony of Angola was
allowed to be formed. Kongolese ambassadors
were also sent to Europe to ingratiate the
kingdom with foreign powers.
Ultimately, the two could not coexist peacefully
forever, coming to a head at the Battle of Mbwila
on 29 October 1665, where manikongo António I
Nvita a Nkanga was killed in battle. From then
the kingdom began to fracture, and
Image source: wiki/Statens Museum for Kunst

descended into civil war for the

rest of the 17th century, holding
together as a looser, more
fractious kingdom until it
was finally subsumed by
Portugal in 1914.

29
 Medieval

SONGHAI EMPIRE

Gallica Digital Library

Image source: wiki
By land and by water 1460 – 1591
After his death, one of his generals,
Mohammed Ture, took power in
1493. Being a devout Muslim, his
expansions of the empire took on a MALI EMPIRE
more religious character. A kingdom of commerce 1235 – 1670
Engaging more with the Muslim
world, such as the Caliph of Egypt, When looking for great African empires, Mali and the great Mansa
Mohammed Ture was made the Musa are often mentioned. Credited as the richest man to have
© Getty Images

Caliph of Sudan. Trade saw a massive ever lived, the King of the Mali Empire had a seismic impact on
improvement, and during the 16th the region around him, but the story of his empire started earlier.
The Songhai people are thought to century, the empire became rich It actually goes back to the rebellion of Sundiata Keita,
have become established in their thanks to the export of gold, nuts sometimes known as the ‘Lion King’, who overthrew Susa control
capital of Gao around 800 CE. They and slaves. However, as the century with the Malinké people in 1230 and set up a new independent
began to flourish from the 11th unfolded, the empire fell into civil nation in western Africa. They secured the gold-rich lands around
century until it became part of the war as drought and disease had the them, and united the other Malinké communities too. Thanks to
Mali Empire from 1325, though the cumulative effect of chipping away its gold (and salt) trade, it became a commercial hub for the region.
city was never taxed. at its riches and health. Finally, the This is what Mansa Musa inherited as king in 1307, but he still
As the Mali Empire declined, Moroccan army managed to double the size of the empire during his reign. His
the Songhai ascended under the invaded, cultural contribution was also significant. Mali was a Muslim
leadership of Sonni Ali the Great. He looking to nation, and Musa is said to have given away his
used his fleet of canoes and expert control gold on a pilgrimage to Mecca. On his way
cavalry to great effect, conquering the gold back he also founded religious learning
the lands around the Songhai. His trade centres and schools, creating a lasting
reputation was so great that it was of the legacy for the region.
rumoured he had magical powers. region. Ultimately, the empire became
overstretched. After Mansa Musa’s death,
infighting and poor leadership saw the
empire decline until major cities like Gao
and Timbuktu were lost.
Image source: wiki/Paul R Burley

KINGDOM OF AKSUM
One of the four Great Kingdoms c.100 CE – 940 CE
“There are four great kingdoms on earth: the first is the Kingdom of Babylon and Persia; the second
is the Kingdom of Rome; the third is the Kingdom of the Aksumites: the fourth is the kingdom of the
Chinese.” So said the Persian prophet Mani in the 3rd century CE. Located where modern Ethiopia
and Eritrea now stand, the Aksumites grew rich and powerful thanks to their control of Red Sea
trade, particularly in ivory and gold, and was thought to be the greatest market in the north east. It
grew enough in strength to conquer the Kushites and burn the capital, Meroe, in the 4th century.
Interestingly, the kingdom converted to Christianity under King Ezana around 330 CE, making it
one of the world’s earliest Christian states, and meaning it was closely tied with Byzantine Egypt.
Within the Ethiopian orthodox church, it is believed that the Ark of the Covenant was brought to
Menelik I, son of King Solomon and
the Queen of Sheba, in Aksum. The procession of
The influence of South Arabia Abuna Yemata as
Aksumite Saints
would see the dominance of Aksum watch from above
challenged in the 7th and 8th
centuries. Combined with its fertile
lands drying up and trading routes
blocked by emerging
powers in the Middle
East, the kingdom
gradually declined.
© Alamy

30
 10 Forgotten African Empires

ASANTE EMPIRE
The golden kingdom 1701 – 1902
In the late 17th century, a leader called Osei Tutu emerged and led
successful campaigns to unify the Asante and other Akan peoples under
his rule. Named Asantehene, meaning ‘paramount chief’, he organised
his new state by centralising the trade of the new Asante Empire’s most
important export, gold. The metal was so common that gold dust was
used in ornaments and to decorate the clothing of all its citizens, not
just the wealthy.
Image source: wiki/Centro

However, later in the 18th century, the slave trade took hold in the
editor de América Latina

region, with an estimated 6,000-7,000 people a year sold into bondage

from the Gold Coast. Asante was not excluded from this, and enslaved
people became a massive export for the fledgling nation, often in
exchange for firearms with which control and conquest of neighbours
could be secured.
Britain banning the trade of enslaved people in 1807 resulted in
trade disputes and further conflicts. The Asante defeated the British
in 1824, but tensions flared again in 1863, ending with the occupation
of the capital Kumasi in 1874 (but only for a day).

Image source: wiki/British Library

The embarrassment of this defeat led to groups
seceding from the empire, and ultimately the
Asante were annexed into the British Gold
Coast colony in 1902.

KINGDOM OF KUSH
In the shadow of Egypt 1069 BCE – 350 CE
Sitting just south of the famous civilisation in what is now the 25th dynasty, lasting a century. Yet, the
Republic of Sudan, the history of the Kushites is dominated by Kushites remained distinct, with their
their relationship with Ancient Egypt. However, as Egyptian own hieroglyphs, language and culture.
power declined in the 11th century BCE, an independent They did, however, share the funerary
monarchy was established. Thanks to gold and emerald mines, custom of burying kings in pyramids, and
as well as the kingdom’s location on the trade routes from shared some of the same gods.
Egypt to the Red Sea, and from the Nile to the south and west, Ultimately, the rising Assyrian influence in the region
it grew in wealth and influence. caused ongoing conflict between the two, and eventually the
Eventually, the Kingdom of Kush would begin to invade Kushites were expelled from Egypt in 656 BCE by Psamtik,
Egypt, starting with the reign of Kashta, and then his son Piye, who established the last native dynasty of Egypt. The
who conquered the entire country right up to the coast of the Kingdom of Kush lasted for another 700 years until it was
Mediterranean. The Kushite kings became the pharaohs of the conquered by the Kingdom of Aksum in 350 CE.

The Kushite Pyramids

were inspired by those of
the Egyptians
Image source: wiki/Voyage a Meroe

31
 Image source: wiki/Le Livre de Marco Polo

Emperor Yagbe’u
Seyon battles the
Sultan of Ada

ETHIOPIAN EMPIRE
The endless kingdom c.1270 – 1769
From the Aksumite Empire to the overthrow of Haile Selassie, establishing heavy taxes on the export of gold, ivory and
you could almost draw one unbroken line for the history of enslaved people.
Ethiopia, sometimes also referred to as Abyssinia. What we’re Conflict arose again in the mid-16th century with the rise
interested in is the Solomonic dynasty started by Yekuno of the Adal Sultanate. However, greater European interest in
Amlak that succeeded the brief Zagwe dynasty and claimed the Red Sea saw aid arrive from Portugal as 400 musketeers
to reestablish its lineage to King Solomon and the Queen arrived to train Ethiopian troops, and their subsequent hit-and-
of Sheba. run tactics managed to break the Muslim army.
Trade along the Blue Nile was this nation’s main source Near its end, the Ethiopian Empire enjoyed something
of income, though it also competed for access to the Red of a cultural renaissance under the leadership of Empress
Sea with surrounding Muslim peoples. Under the leadership Mentewab, who co-ruled with her son and then grandson.
of Amda Seyon I from 1314 to 1344, the empire doubled in However, growing regional divisions saw the kingdom collapse
size, conquering communities to the south and east and in 1769 and enter an era of feudalism.

understood that Mutota ruled with a light touch,

MUTAPA EMPIRE and that it was his son, Mwene Matope, who
Lord of plundered lands ultimately expanded the empire to include the
entire Zambezi River Valley, as well as what
c.1430 – 1760 is now Angola, Zambia, Zimbabwe and part of
The Mutapa Empire is an interesting example of a Mozambique, all the way to the Indian Ocean.
kingdom that seems to have essentially migrated Matope took the title mwenemutapa, meaning
in order to achieve success. Originating as the ‘lord of the plundered lands’.
Kingdom of Zimbabwe, it’s understood that food From this vast expanse he levied taxes as well
shortages forced the warrior prince, Nyatsimba as establishing trade, most likely including goods
Mutota, to seek out salt and other resources to help from India and China, which would have been
his people. Identifying and conquering a portion very lucrative. However, the empire began to
of the Zambezi River Valley as a rich new home, decline after his reign in the mid-
he set up a new Empire of Mutapa some 300km to 1500s, thanks in part to the
Image source: wiki/tirage original

the north of his original domain. growing interest of Portugal,

We’re somewhat reliant on the accounts of which deposed the king in
European travellers through the region for the 1629 and imposed their
details of how this new kingdom operated, but it’s own ruler.

32
 10 Forgotten African
Xxxxxxxxxxx
Empires

ALMOHAD
CALIPHATE
Cross-continental empire
1121 – 1269
This Berber confederation looked to challenge a
number of standing powers when it emerged in 1121
under the leadership of Ibn Tumart. A religious teacher,
he sought the moral reform of the ruling Almoravids, who controlled BENIN
much of North Africa, as well as Islamic Spain. Supported by some of
the most powerful Berber tribes, the self-proclaimed mahdi (meaning
EMPIRE
well guided, a messianic monicker in Shia Islam) attempted to unite A land of gods and art
the region on stronger religious principles. Ultimately, his successors c.1180 – 1897
would finally conquer the region in 1147 and capture Marrakech, which The empire of Benin began in an almost
became the new Almohad Caliphate’s capital. mythological fashion, passed down through
In 1172, the Caliphate conquered Sevilla and took control of Islamic oral history, of the Edo people of southern
Spain. With Marrakech and Sevilla as its two capitals and with ports Nigeria asking the neighbouring kingdom
across the Mediterranean and Atlantic coast, the Almohad Empire of Ife if one of their princes could take over
was able to build its wealth and reinvest in the arts and architecture, from the Ogisos kings, known as ‘rulers of
which thrived. Urbanisation increased, with fortifications, gardens and the sky’. The first oba (king) of Benin would
elaborate religious buildings established. be Eweka, the son of this prince.
Ultimately, rebellion in the east and the Christian Later, it was under Ewuare the Great from
threat to the north would dog the empire for the 1440 to 1473 that Benin would grow as a major
next 40 years until it was defeated at the Battle of power as he conquered territory and built up the city
Las Navas de Tolosa in 1212, forcing of Benin itself with walls and a new royal palace. The
a retreat out of Spain and back successive kings of Benin would take on near god-like
into North Africa. Its power standing within the community, developing their own

Image source: wiki/Met Museum

waned until Marrakech cults among the people that included human sacrifice.
was conquered by the Like many of the most successful African empires, gold and ivory were
Marinids in 1269. key exports, which Benin was able to sell through Portuguese traders. The
nation’s artisans and artists were also important thanks to their ivory, brass
and wood creations. Soon, however, Benin would also begin capturing
adults and children in neighbouring communities to sell into slavery with
American and European traders.
Ultimately, infighting among the royal family would see Benin begin
to fracture and foreign influence increase until Britain finally saw an
opportunity to invade in 1897 and captured the region, burning
the city of Benin.
Image source: wiki/Gallica Digital Library

The polymath
Averroes was a
chief judge to
the Almohad
Image source: wiki/LACMA

Caliphate, as well
as a philosopher,
theologian,
mathematician,
astronomer and
much more

33
Medieval

The Mali Empire’s legendary founder was

reputedly as strong as a lion, but what is fact and
what is fiction in his origin story?
Written by April Madden

Malian griots, or praise singers,

have recounted the Epic of
Sundiata, the country’s founding
myth, since the 13th century
 The Lion King

A key plot point in the Epic of

Sundiata is the capture of a magical
musical instrument that’s now
central to Mali’s culture

he Mali Empire is famous for being xylophone made with gourds). The invasion is

T ruled by the richest man in history.

But further back in its history, its
founder, Sundiata Keita, is the
subject of a legendary epic that could
rival Britain’s iconic King Arthur for drama,
magic and destiny.
The Epic of Sundiata is a rich oral history
repelled, Sundiata assumes his rightful throne,
and a musical tradition that is key to Malian
culture is established.
The Epic of Sundiata sounds like a fairy tale,
but Sundiata Keita was a real person, the great-
uncle of the famous Mansa Musa. He is recorded
in contemporary histories, as is his wizardly
sung by successive generations of griots, West enemy, the 13th century Sosso king Soumaoro
Africa’s incredible musician-historians. It tells Kanté, who in reality has a much more nuanced
the tale of a handsome prince who is given a historical reputation than the Epic of Sundiata
prophecy: if he marries an ugly woman, their gives him. Their fateful clash was the Battle
son will grow up to be a mighty king. The prince of Kirina in around 1235, at which the real,
does so, but the child that is born, Sundiata, is historical Sundiata led a force made up of a
disabled, and the prince’s other wives plot to coalition of smaller kingdoms to rout an invader
remove the boy from the line of succession in that had been emboldened by the collapse
favour of their own sons. Cast out into exile, of the Ghana Empire. Sundiata may not have
Sundiata learns to walk with the aid of a baobab really captured a magical musical instrument
branch. Meanwhile, after their father’s death, (although it is claimed to exist, and to be in the
his usurping half-brother’s rule is threatened possession of a family in the Guinean village of
by a powerful sorcerer-prince. The people Niagassola) but what he did manage to grab was
send for their rightful ruler, Sundiata, who has first a kingdom and then, as his newly created
become “as strong as a lion”. Sundiata defeats army ventured further, an empire – one that
In the story, the disabled
and exiled Sundiata learns the wicked prince with an arrow fletched with would shortly become so wealthy and powerful
to walk with help of a a white rooster feather, while his griot advisor that its most famous ruler would be unrivalled
branch of baobab
captures the prince’s magical balafon (a type of in the annals of history.

35
 Medieval

MANSA MUSA

The
in

The Emperor of Mali was the wealthiest man on the planet –

but you’ve probably never heard of him
Written by Jem Duducu

the 14th century emperor of Mali and the world’s African Ghanian Empire declined to the point
richest-ever man. where territories on its fringes felt emboldened
The Mali Empire (which in the West African to make a move for independence.
Manding languages is known as Manden This was, of course, to the detriment of the old
Kurufaba) was founded in the early 1200s and regime. At the same time, trade routes started
lasted into the late 1600s. It started in Niani, a to change in favour of the region around Niani
town in the very east of modern-day Guinea, which had been a Muslim region for centuries.
located on the banks of the River Niger. In the It was positioned at the end of a vast trade
early part of the first millennium, the West network, which spread from Spain to Persia

36
 The Richest Man in History

THE RICH LIST

How does Mansa Musa compare to other historical billionaires?

Marcus Licinus Crassus

c. 115-53 BCE
Roman politician
$100 billion

Augustus Caesar
27 BCE - 14CE
Roman emperor
$1 trillion

Shenzong of Song
1048-1085
Chinese emperor
$750 billion

In this Spanish portrayal from 1375, Mansa Musa

Mansa Musa inspects a gold coin, 1280-c.1337
surrounded by the mosques he had built Malian emperor
$2 trillion

and whose epicentre was the Persian capital of Jakob Fugger

Baghdad. Another important place was Cairo, 1452-1525
German merchant
the seat of the Muslim Caliph, as well as the $300 billion
economic centre of Egypt.
Trade plus growing territories enabled a new John D. Rockefeller
1839-1937
dynasty of rulers to emerge. The first of these American oil tycoon
Net worth: $363 billion
was Sundiata Keita, also known as the Lion
of Mali, who ruled from roughly 1235-1255 as
‘Mansa’. This is a local word for emperor. Jeff Bezos
The mansas increased their influence and 1964- present
Amazon CEO
power in the traditional way by conquering new Net worth: $157.4 billion
territories, but they were successful in other
ways as well. Mansa Uli, Sundiata Keita’s son, Mark Zuckerberg
1984- present
increased agricultural productivity in the empire. Facebook CEO
Others ensured that the city of Timbuktu had a Net worth: $67.1 billion
first class university, attracting scholars from all
over the Islamic world, who came to share their
500 1.5 trillion
ideas in the fields of mathematics and astronomy. billion 1 Trillion 2 Trillion

By the early 1300s, things were going so

well for the empire that Mansa Abubakari II about half of the known world’s gold (not more in the 1300s than they are today. Add
led an expedition to ‘explore the limits of the including that of the Americas) was held by the to that Mali’s lucrative trade in salt – another
ocean’ (the Atlantic). It is alleged that he fitted empire. Mali was dripping in the stuff. surprisingly rare commodity in the Middle Ages
out thousands of seaworthy vessels and set off The great Sankoré Mosque in Timbuktu is now – and we see a degree of affluence that puts
on his travels, leaving a man named Musa, the a World Heritage site, and it was paid for by Mansa contemporary England’s wool production riches
great-nephew of Sundiata, as his regent. This was Musa, who hired the famous architect Abu Ishaq in the shadows. Mansa Musa was the richest man
not the first time a reigning monarch had left a al-Sahili to come all the way from Andalusia (a on the planet, dwarfing the personal wealth of
designated deputy in charge. The mansas were Muslim territory in modern-day Spain) to design everyone from the Holy Roman Emperors to the
Muslims, and as one of the pillars of Islam is that and build it. For his hard work, the architect Mongol Khans.
every good Muslim should go on pilgrimage to was rewarded with about 200 kilograms of gold. But the outside world knew almost nothing
Mecca, pious mansas could be gone for a year or That’s about $8,000,000 in today’s money, so about this at the start of Mansa Musa’s reign.
more in pursuit of their religious obligations. So, it’s safe to say his fee probably took care of his Located in sub-Saharan Africa, Mali was remote
as Abubakari II headed off into the ocean sunset, travel expenses. from the rest of the Islamic world, and while
Musa became the ruler in all but name. Exactly Mali’s reputation as a source of gold was so traders knew that certain commodities were
how far the emperor went or where he might widespread that a Spanish map of 1375 depicts coming out of Africa, they don’t seem to have
have visited are still hot topics of discussion, but Mali with a picture of the mansa holding a gold been tied to a specific power. This all changed
we know for certain that he never came back. coin. Putting values on historic wealth is with Mansa Musa’s pilgrimage to Mecca, the
Musa was crowned Mansa Musa I in 1312. notoriously tricky. We can work out exchanges defining event of his reign. Before he left, Musa
and inflation, but that often doesn’t represent followed his predecessor’s example and appointed
Rolling In It the whole picture. What we can say is that at a deputy to make decisions while he was away
However, the most remarkable story of the this time and in this place, gold was a very rare and to succeed him if he didn’t come back. This
empire is that of Mali’s gold. By the time of commodity, far rarer than today, which probably time Mansa Musa’s son, Magha, was chosen.
Mansa Musa, historians have estimated that means equivalent amounts were worth much While the fulfilment of a religious requirement

37
 Medieval

Timbuktu has always been

synonymous with the middle
of nowhere, but it was at the
heart of Mansa Musa’s empire

was the primary purpose of the journey, Musa but for charity. Another pillar of Islam is Zakat, the number of gifts to the poor that he distributed.
also intended to put Mali on the map of the giving of 2.5 per cent of one’s assets each year to His grand tour was virtually paved with gold. It
Muslim world. It could, therefore, be argued that benefit the poor. While it is tempting to claim that was also said that every week, wherever he found
Mansa Musa’s pilgrimage was the most expensive the gold destined for Mecca was therefore just himself for Friday prayers, he paid for a mosque
and the most successful PR campaign in history. 2.5 per cent of Mansa Musa’s wealth, it was more to be built. As he was away for about a year, that’s
likely a grand gesture, perhaps to compensate for roughly 52 mosques to add to the bill.
Enroute to Mecca the years he hadn’t got around to fulfilling his Musa was warmly received by the Mamluk
In 1324, Mansa Musa set off from Niani on the religious obligations. Musa was full of generosity, Sultan of Egypt, al-Nasir Muhammad, during his
nearly 5,500-mile journey to Mecca. This means and he changed some people’s lives with the layover in Cario. However, their meeting got off
that by the time of his return in 1325, he had
travelled at least 11,000 miles, an impressive feat
in the 14th century, even for a rich man.
Musa travelled up through the Sahara desert
“A Spanish map of 1375 depicts
to the shores of the Mediterranean in Algeria
and, from there, headed along the coast to Egypt
Mansa Musa holding a gold coin”
and then Cairo. Though this might sound like an
arduous journey even for a seasoned adventurer,
Musa made sure to take all his home comforts
Musa’s entourage crossed
with him. For starters, he had 80 camels for the the Sahara Desert in their
sole purpose of transporting gold, each carrying thousands to make their
way to Mecca
up to 136 kilograms, meaning that the camels
alone had (again, in modern terms) about $400
million worth of gold bullion. The chronicles
record that this entourage further consisted of
60,000 slaves, plus Musa’s personal retinue of
12,000 female servants, each of them allegedly
carrying 1.8 kilograms of gold, so another $15
million. The vanguard of the procession was
headed by 500 slaves, each carrying a gold-
adorned staff, and members of the entourage were
dressed in fine brocades and Persian silks.
While these figures alone are stunning, it must
also be remembered that all of these 72,000
people (plus Musa) had to be fed every day for
about a year. The cost of that alone would have
been eye-watering, especially since Mansa was
used to dining most lavishly.
The purpose of taking nearly $½ billion worth
of gold on pilgrimage was not for fees or bribes,

38
 The Richest Man in History

to a rocky start. Musa initially refused even to see Mali was too far away to be a threat, and its ruler Gold was of crucial importance to
the sultan, and once in his presence refused to was a pious man, who insisted on showering the the economy of the Mali Empire
kneel before him. Fortunately he was persuaded sultan – along with every other court emir and
to do so, and an unpleasant diplomatic incident royal office holder – with gifts. What was not to
was averted. like about him?
The sultan had been brought up in the dying
days of the Crusades and had faced attacks not Credit Crunch
only by rival Muslim powers, but even by the Unfortunately, all of this generosity had
Mongols from Persia. Indeed, by the time he met unintended consequences, which ended up
Musa, he had been on and off the throne three being a greater threat than all the Mongols in the
times (but this time he stayed in power until his East. When everyone had gold, naturally prices
death in 1341), so Musa was a welcome distraction went up. When there were more gold coins than
from more immediate and dangerous challenges. anything else, the price of essential items such as

MUSA’S EMPIRE
SALT MINES TIMBUKTU TRADE ROUTES
Rock salt was also a hugely profitable export, used in food Timbuktu, although its name is now synonymous with a place in Trade was the key to Mali’s wealth. Merchants would pack up
preparation and preservation. Its value was at times literally worth the middle of nowhere, was once a thriving hub of wealth and their camels with gold, salt and other items, then embark on long
its weight in gold. It was mined by slaves in salt flats throughout people in the Mali Empire. Its mud brick buildings were home to a journeys across the Sahara desert to reach cities as far away as
the Sahara desert, most notably at Taghaza. plethora of shops, universities, mosques and opulent homes. Tripoli and Cairo – on the other side of Africa.

Algiers Tunis

M e d it e r Asia
cc o ra nea n
oro Tripoli
Sea
M
Marrakech
Cairo

Ar
In Salah

ab
ia
Taghaza
Sahara
er
R iv

Desert Mecca
le
Ni

Re
d
Se

Timbuktu
a

Mali

cea n
Ni
ge

Niani an O
rR
ive
r

Africa
I nd i

ia
iop
Eth
R iv e r

Key:
ATLANTIC Gold Mines
Z a ir e

OCEAN Salt Mines

Trade Route
Mansa’s Route To
Mecca

MALI’S CAPITAL CITY GOLD MINES RIVER NIGER

Niani was the capital of the empire during the reign of Mansa Musa It is thought that much of Mansa Musa’s gold came from the Africa’s longest river after the Nile and the Congo,
and continued to be the capital in the 1600s. It was the centre rich deposits in the Ashanti region of modern-day Ghana. This the 4,200-kilometre (2,600-mile) Niger flows from
of the government and commerce making it one of the most is an area so rich with gold that it became known simply as Timbuktu to the Atlantic Ocean. As well as irrigating
important cities on the continent. During the reign of Mansa Musa, ‘the Gold Coast’ during British imperial rule, and continues fields used for farming, this made it an excellent route
Niani had a population of approximately 100,000. London at the to be one of the world’s largest exporters of gold, producing for transporting goods around the Malian Empire.
time by contrast only had a population in the tens of thousands. 100,000 kilograms a year.

39
 Medieval

bread increased exponentially. The economy of the in an attempt to adjust gold prices makes him the ruler. It worked. The city remained part of the
entire Maghreb region was broken, and suffered only man in history to directly control the price of Mali Empire for more than 100 years. Musa also
hyperinflation as an inadvertent result of Mansa’s gold in the Mediterranean region. invested in great architectural projects in the city
good intentions. Meanwhile back in Mali, Gao, a city that was to impress its residents and remind them what it
The impact of all this was greatest in Cairo. prone to rebelling, had risen up against the empire. meant to be part of the great empire.
On his return from Mecca, Musa recognised the By the time Musa was on the return leg of his While Christianity didn’t feature in the Mali
economic chaos that he had wreaked. He tried to journey, his son Magha had brought it to heel, but Empire (that would come much later from
fix it by ordering his retinue to borrow all the gold was still a hotbed of defiance. Musa decided to European missionaries), there existed local
they could from money-lenders in Cairo. This was detour his returning entourage through the city – shamanistic traditions that might have had the
to be done at a high rate of interest. So now Musa some 1,000 miles east of his capital at Niani – not power to rival Islam. As a devout Muslim, Musa
created debt for himself on a trip that had already to gloat over the empire’s victory in defeating the wanted to ensure that nobody would be distracted
cost nearly $½ billion. While the gesture helped, rebels, but to wow the locals with displays of the by these pagan temptations. It is, therefore,
it didn’t get rid of the problem. Musa’s borrowing piety and riches of their benevolent and powerful unsurprising that while he was responsible for

Life in Timbuktu It has a reputation for being remote and desolate,

but what was it really like under Musa’s reign?

01 GOLDEN 02 SANKORÉ 03 MOSQUE 04 BUILT FROM 05 THE LIBRARY

Because Timbuktu was a When studying in the madrasah, the
CITY crossroads between Sub-Saharan
SCHOOL MUD first course is about Qur’anic and
Timbuktu became a permanent African culture and Middle The Sankoré site is a religious The Djinguereber Mosque is made religious studies. However the second
settlement in the 10th century Eastern trade networks it became complex including multiple from the local building materials one can be on all kinds of topics from
CE. Its purpose was a regional a centre of Islamic learning too. mosques and centres of of mudbricks and mud. However, mathematics to the copy of texts.
trade centre, where caravans met This is why Timbuktu was chosen learning. It was an Islamic unusually for the region it has a timber Today more than 700,000 texts can
to exchange salt from the Sahara as the site for Sankoré Madrasah, university where the focal point frame allowing it to be repaired and be found there, many dating back to
desert for gold, ivory, and slaves rather than Niani, which was too was faith. It had approximately rebuilt during the rainy season. This the era of the Mali Empire.
from what would become the remote from the Middle East. 25,000 students and over 180 makes it one of the oldest extant mud
Mali Empire. It was connected to Qur’anic schools. structures in the world.
trade routes via camel caravans
and the Niger River.

04 02

01

06

40
 The Djinguereber
Mosque, which was
funded by Musa,
still looms large
over the Timbuktu
landscape today

An Islamic manuscript found in Timbuktu,

the intellectual hub of Musa’s empire

“Mansa Musa recognised the

06 AT THE MARKET
The marketplace was where riches from
economic chaos he had wreaked”
distant parts of the Mali empire came to be
exhibited. Manuscripts were traded outside
the walls of the madrasah, but perhaps of
greater interest to Timbuktu’s residents was
the salt from the north, gold from the south, many impressive architectural achievements, declined over time. However, contrary to natural
as well as agricultural produce such as cattle
mosques and madrasahs figured the most heavily assumptions, it wasn’t European colonists that
and grain.
among them. took advantage of its vulnerability, but a central
While it’s tempting to focus on construction West African empire known as the Bamana
and trade, it shouldn’t be forgotten that Niani is Empire. They superceded the mansas of Mali.
a long way from the African coast, which meant Though Mali may have faded into obscurity,
there was a lot of land to be conquered before the the legacy of the fantastic Mansa and his vast
Malians could access the seas. And cities like Gao wealth lives on. As we’ve said, the value of his
03 and Timbuktu were far away from the capital, riches is hard to quantify, but the best estimates
which shows expansion in every direction. This put it at $2 trillion. So far no one has amassed
meant inevitable rebellions, armies and wars more – not a mighty king or queen, or a titan of
to maintain control, so the Mali Empire wasn’t industry - meaning Mansa Musa is not only the
exactly a peaceful paradise. Many of the wars have richest person in history, but the richest person of
been forgotten, but the opulence, and architecture all time.
have lingered in the memory to produce a legacy
any ruler would be proud of. Diarist Ibn
After a long reign ruling an empire at the Battuta visited
the Mali Empire
height of its power, spending vast amounts of on his travels
money to support the sciences, and financing the
construction of innumerable religious and other
buildings, no one knows how or when Mansa
Musa died. There are no records, which is a
strange omission.
We know more about his son and his reign
than we do about the man who put Mali on the
map. There are stories that he simply abdicated
in favour of his son, and the fact that there are
no reports of a palace coup or assassination
05 strongly imply that Mansa Musa died peacefully
in his bed. Whatever happened to this fabulously
wealthy emperor in the last days of his life, no one
disputes that Mansa Musa ruled for 25 years and
that he was a great leader.
© Nicholas Forder, Alamy, Getty Images

When the famous Moroccan traveller Ibn

Battuta arrived in the empire in the 1350s, about
20 years after the death of Mansa Musa, he was
surprised by the affluence, the scholarship and the
piety of Mali’s people.
But the Mali Empire, like all empires,

41
 Medieval

The
Lost City of
A royal procession in
Benin City recorded by
Dutch explorers in 1668

The capital of Africa’s Benin Empire astonished Europeans

with its beauty, so why is there nothing left?
reat Benin, where the king resides, Ornamental

G
WRITTEN BY TOYIN FALOLA masks made
is larger than Lisbon; all the streets A Nigerian historian and professor of up part of
run straight and as far as the eye can African Studies, Toyin Falola holds the an Oba’s
see,” wrote Portuguese ship captain Jacob and Frances Sanger Mossiker regalia
Lourenço Pinto in 1691. He added, Chair in the Humanities at the
University of Texas at Austin. He is
“The houses are large, especially that of
the author of Key Events in African
the king, which is richly decorated and has fine History: A Reference Guide.
columns. The city is wealthy and industrious. It is
so well governed that theft is unknown and the while seemingly trying to find a way around the
people live in such security that they have no traditional Sahara trade routes. Dutch merchants
doors to their houses.” arrived 100 years later and, over next 200 years,
Located in the depths of the jungle but more traders came from England, France, Germany
connected to other African kingdoms and the and Spain. They all returned home with amazing
Atlantic Ocean by the Niger River, Great Benin City stories to rival Pinto’s but today, if you mentioned
was the imperial capital of an empire that, at its the Benin Empire to a Westerner – even someone
peak, stretched from Lagos in the west to beyond from Portugal, which maintained regular contact
the Niger in the east – an area that equates to with the kingdom for 400 years – they are likely to
approximately one-fifth of modern-day Nigeria. stare at you blankly. So what happened to the great
Benin made contact with Europeans in the city of Benin and why did it disappear without a
1480s when Portuguese traders happened upon it trace?

42
 The Lost City of Benin

Legend
claims Prince
Oranmiyan
introduced
THE ALL-MIGHTY OBA
Benin’s political, military and religious leader was an autocratic king
horses to
Benin
SHELTERED LIFE CORAL CROWN GOD-LIKE STATUS
The Oba rarely appeared in The Oba wore a headdress and tunic woven of As well as being the highest
public but when he did an red coral beads. While only the king and his political authority, the Obas were
attendant who would shelter closest companions were allowed to wear the the spiritual leader of his people.
him from the Sun. No one else beads, they were so rare and valuable – traded Religious cults would often develop
was allowed to be shaded in this from as far away as the Mediterranean – that around them and many would even
way within the city. few others could have afforded them anyway. claim to have supernatural powers.

PENDANT MASK
One of the most iconic symbols
of the Benin Empire is the finely
carved ivory mask depicting Queen
Idia, created for her son, Oba Esigie.
However, rather than being worn
over the face, these were worn at
the waist or around the neck.

ROYAL GUARD
Day to day, most Obas only
carried ceremonial weapons
such as a fan-shaped sword
called an eben or a switch.
The beginnings of Benin Instead, they were protected
by royal guards, who would
According to the oral history of the Edo people, be armed with swords, spears
Benin was originally called Igodomigodo, named and, in later years, firearms.
after Igodo, founder of the Ogiso (meaning ‘rulers of
the sky’) dynasty. Although Igodomigodo would go
onto have around 31 Ogiso rulers who governed a
formidable kingdom, the Benin Empire didn’t begin
in earnest until the 12th century.
After years of political discord, Igodomigodo sent
emissaries to the neighbouring kingdom of Ife to ask
Oduduwa, the father of the Yoruba, for one of his sons
to be their ruler. Oduduwa sent his son Oranmiyan
and he became the first Oba, or king. He had a son,
Eweka, but Oranmiyan found it hard to rule and he
eventually renounced his position, saying that the
politics of the people made his leadership intractable.
Oranmiyan called Igodomigodo “ile Ibinu”, or
land of anger, and left Eweka behind with palace
guardians to instruct him in the art and mysteries ROYAL GUARD
of the Benin so he could govern his own people. Day to day, most Obas only
Eweka’s eventual reign started the Oba era. Oba carried ceremonial weapons
such as a fan-shaped sword
Ewedo, who took over after Eweka’s death in 1255, called an eben or a switch.
changed the name of the kingdom from Ile Ibinu to Instead, they were protected
by royal guards, who would
Ubini and it was later contact with the Portuguese be armed with swords, spears
that changed the name again to Bini, from which we and, in later years, firearms.
get the name Benin.
With the Oba established, the social hierarchy of
the Benin Empire began to take form. Apart from the
king, the political elite consisted of the titled chiefs
– the Uzama n’Ihinron – and the royal family. The
Uzama were powerful, and their role in customs and
royal administration was gnomic. There were also
the palace chiefs who oversaw palace administration,
and the town chiefs who carried out regular
administrative work such as tribute collection and
the conscription of soldiers. Other officials carried out KING OF THE JUNGLE
various duties that ranged from hunting to astrology The leopard was a symbol of
royal power in Benin. As well
while there were also craftsmen who were like a caste as wearing leopard skins, the STANDING ARMY
– guilds of artists produced art for the king and his king used to keep several of Ruling over many cities, towns and
royal court. the big cats as pets, which villages, Dutch sources claimed that
were paraded on important the Oba could mobilise 20,000 soldiers
occasions like mascots. in a day and raise an army of 80,000
to 180,000 soldiers.

43
 Medieval

Wish you were here…

European travellers often wrote home about the
wonders they’d seen in the Medieval metropolis

CRUISE TO TIMBUKTU THE LIGHT FANTASTIC

Benin City lay deep inside the jungle but it was not One of the first cities to have a semblance
cut off from other places. The River Niger connected of street lighting, huge metal lamps fuelled
it to Timbuktu, the capital of the wealthy Mali by palm oil (one of the empire’s greatest
Emprie, and other African kingdoms in the north. exports) were placed all around the city,
The river also flowed south to the Atlantic Ocean, though especially near the royal residence,
which is how Europeans sailed to the city. to illuminate traffic.

DISCOVER THE
OTHER GREAT
WALL
Huge walls, which The
Guinness Book of World
Records describes as the
world’s second largest
man-made structure after
the Great Wall of China,
protected Benin City. The
defensive fortifications
included over 10,000
kilometres of earthen
ramparts, some of which
were over nine metres
tall. As if that wasn’t
enough, the walls were also
encircled by a moat.

MIND-BOGGLING MATHEMATICAL DESIGN

While 16th-century visitors often described Benin City’s layout as
disorganised, American mathematician Ron Eglash has suggested
that the city’s architecture – from the arrangement of its districts, to
the design of its houses, and even individual rooms in those houses –
carefully repeated the same symmetrical patterns.

44
 The Lost City of Benin

TOUR THE RAINFOREST VILLAGES

Beyond the city limits, many people lived in villages in clearings
in the jungle, farming yams, peppers and other vegetables as
well as cotton. The French explorer Reynaud des Marchais noted
how carefully the fields were cultivated in the 1720s, producing
three to four harvests a year. In imitation of the city’s defences,
many of these villages were ringed with protective moats.

ROYAL PALACE
The grounds of the royal palace made up a great
part of the whole city, with Dutch writer Olfert
Dapper claiming it was the size of the Dutch town
of Haarlem. It included the royal residence of the
Oba, various reception courts, quarters for his
courtiers and the royal harem. The main palace
was square-shaped with a wood-shingled roof, and
from the 17th century it was decorated inside with
bronze plaques.

VISIT THE
BENIN BROADWAY
According to Dapper, the first
thing you saw on entering
Benin was a six-kilometre-
long thoroughfare: “a great
broad street, which is not
paved and seems to be seven
or eight times greater than
Warmoesstraat in Amsterdam.
SHOP IN THE ARTISAN MARKETS The street is straight and does
Many of the city’s inhabitants were craftspeople who not bend ay any point.” Each
were organised into guilds. While the all-important brass of the city’s nine gates led to
casters’ guild worked exclusively for the Oba, Europeans broad streets like this, which
purchased goods from the wood carvers, ivory carvers, crisscrossed the city.
leather workers, blacksmiths and weavers.
© Nicholas Forder

45
 Medieval

Imperial
golden age
Between the late 13th
century and the 15th century,
Benin’s empire grew sporadically under
the expansionist wars of conqueror
kings. The fascination with and the Brass bracelets
formidability of the empire are built known as ‘manillas’
were made in the
around various historical artefacts such modern Netherlands,
as the impressive range of artworks, traded throughout
their advanced trading networks and West Africa and
melted down by
the military strategies by which the bronze workers
warrior kings expanded and defended in Benin
Benin. Benin had a large army of well-
trained and disciplined soldiers, and the king was the
supreme ruling authority over them.Oba Ewuare I,
who reigned between about 1440 and 1473, is largely
credited with the transformation of the kingdom
into a modern state structure. He reorganised the
political structures through reforms that minimised
An attack on a British caravan was
the uneasy relationship between the Oba and the used as an excuse to launch the
chiefs, and it enabled him to monopolise military Punitive Expedition of 1897
power with the latter factor being responsible for his
imperialist expansion. He is also noted for promoting Idia and the Benin ivory mask. The Bronze Head is a
Bronze of Idia,
art and artefact production – namely the bronze dedicatory piece in honour of Queen Idia, the mother the 16th-century
casting, ivory and wood that Benin would be known of Oba Esigie, the king who reigned in the early 16th queen mother
who led troops
for around the world. century. Queen Idia was the first Iyoba, or Queen into battle
The craftsmen produced a distinct style of art Mother, and she played a hugely significant role in
that included heads, figurines, brass plaques and his kingship.
other items of royal adornment. Artistry was used As Iyoba, Idia was a titled chief in her own right
to celebrate royal omnipotence and to legitimise the and she had a district, Iyekuselu, where she presided.
king’s power and glory. As the Oba was believed to She could raise the levies necessary to fund the
embody the country and its continuity, art was used army she oversaw. Although women were typically
to communicate his divinity and possibly to also banned from certain professions – the army included
subjectify his people who rarely saw or had access – she went to war and recorded numerous victories.
him as he was believed to be a divine being. She was described as both possessing military
Oba Ewuare was also associated with architectural acumen and sorcery with which she helped her son
innovation, city planning, grand festivals and the Esigie to defeat his brother Arhuanran, a contender
introduction of royal beads. He built on the efforts for the throne.
of Oba Oguola and completed the first and second As she was the king’s mother, the Iyoba already
moats, a network of ramparts that walled the city commanded prestige. But Idia revolutionised the
against external aggressors. The moat was an position, allowing future Iyobas to wield actual
impressive part of national defence covering roughly political power. The position demanded, among
16,000 kilometres and enclosing 6,500 square other qualities, the holder to possess metaphysical
kilometres of community land. It was built over power to help her son overcome other contenders
the course of six centuries and it was a work of pre- to the throne. Queen Idia was said to have magical
mechanical engineering marvel. healing powers, and was depicted in
In 1974, The Guinness Book many sculptures and art works
of World Records described commissioned in her honour,
the Benin Moat as the largest such as the Benin ivory mask.
earthwork in the world prior to This was a small-scale ivory
mechanical inventions and it sculpture, made in honour of British Museum, which refused claiming that it was
is considered to be the largest Idia. The mask was worn as a too fragile to transport. The Museum also requested
man-made invention, second pendant by Esigie.Today, the a hefty $3 million as an indemnity. A sign that things
only to the Great Wall of China. mask is a stark reminder of the might be improving, last year the British Museum
Oba Oguola was also believed unsavoury circumstances in held talks to discuss the return of the Benin Bronzes.
to be the one who first sent his which artworks left the shores
craftsman, Igueghae, to Ife to of Africa. The mask was chosen
learn the art of bronze casting. as an emblem of FESTAC ‘77, a
Bloodthirsty demise
festival that took place in Nigeria Portuguese explorers made contact with Benin
Iconic art and drew people from every part in the 15th century and they quickly started
Of the many artworks from the of Africa to celebrate black culture. trading. The relationship between Portugal and
Benin Empire, two of them are The Benin Empire The Nigerian government tried to Benin was so cordial that Oba Esigie was said to
iconic: The Bronze Head of Queen expanded through a mix have sent ambassadors to Portugal, an exchange
secure the mask on a loan from the
of trade and conquest

46
 The Lost City of Benin

that resulted in European influences on Benin’s

art. Esigie was reputed to have been literate in
Portuguese and this boosted his interaction with
the Portuguese traders. Meanwhile, the initial
Portuguese missionary effort yielded some fruits
as some churches sprang up in Benin. Trade
continued between Portugal and Benin, with
items including ivory, pepper and a limited supply
of slaves.
During this period, there wasn’t really a major
drive for a slave trade, because it was mainly
women were sold into serfdom in Benin.
Those who were enslaved – either because
they were captured in war or forced to
pay off their debts with hard labour – were
arguably held more for the royal court’s
prestige than actual economic proceeds.
Trade in slavery was therefore marginal,
as enslaved men were more useful to
boost Benin’s military might than as
a means of exchange. Besides, Benin
was enjoying such an economical and
British soldiers surrounded by
military high that they didn’t need the looted Benin treasures in 1897
proceeds from the Atlantic slave trade.
It’s also worth noting that Benin’s
relationship with the Europeans went
beyond trading goods to warfare and
“She was described as both
mercenary services. possessing a military acumen
But by the 17th century, the kingdom
had begun to decline as a result of a and sorcery”
lack of leadership, internal fractures
and indiscipline among members of
the ruling class. When the slave trade
was abolished and the price of ivory Eresonyen but it was not to last. The British officials, became a justification for the
fell, it hit Benin hard. In the mid-18th kingdom was starting to shrink as invasion of 1897 and Britain summoned its forces
century, former territories began to move away to descend on Benin. The Oba, his chiefs and
An ivory saltcellar
the empire showing European from the old empire to towards the their followers fled, although they came back
got a boost traders and their ship British both for trade and protection. and eventually surrendered. The Oba apparently
from 17th-century Benin
under Oba In the mid-19th century, Benin began approached the British with the pomp and
to trade in palm oil and as the product pageantry of his position but he was humiliated
became more important to the British, they sought and deposed. He was eventually sent to exile in
to make Benin a protectorate. The Oba took refuge Calabar, in the southeastern region of Nigeria,
in isolationism and since Benin’s political power where he died in 1914.
had declined, the king took to making human Setting out to destroy what remained, the British
sacrifices to reignite his sacral authority. In 1892, set Benin on fire – but they moved the royal
vice-consul HL Gallwey pushed Oba Ovoramwen treasures to a safe place first. They sold some of
to sign his now diminished empire to the British the priceless artefacts in Lagos and transferred
as a protectorate. There was some doubt about others to Europe, where they made their ways into
whether the Oba indeed signed the treaty as he private collections and museums. The sales were
was unsure if the British had good intentions. By meant to cover the cost of the expeditions. In 1914,
making Benin a British protectorate, the treaty the throne was restored to Eweka II, Ovoramwen’s
would have facilitated commerce, ceased slave son, although under the supervision of the British
trading and ended human sacrifice. colonial officers. What was left of Benin was
Benin eventually fell during the punitive nothing but a shadow of its former glory and today
expedition of 1897. The Oba sensed that the British no signs remain of its mighty walls or moats.
intended to depose him so his chiefs, against his Benin’s looted cultural heritage is making its way
knowledge, ordered a pre-emptive attack on a home, however. In November 2022, the Horniman
caravan carrying unarmed British officers. Two of Museum in London signed its Benin Bronzes
the officials managed to escape but that incident back to Nigeria. Other institutions including the
© Getty Images, Joe Cummings

sealed Oba Ovoramwen’s fate. Realising that his Church of England, Jesus College Cambridge,,
kingdom would be invaded, he ramped up the rate the Smithsonian in Washington DC and a slew
Exiled Oba Ovonramwen and his of human sacrifices to appease his ancestors. of museums across Germany have all repatriated
wives Queen Egbe (left) and Queen The news of the Oba’s increasing Benin Bronzes from their collections to their
Aighobahi (right) in Calabar
bloodthirstiness, coupled with the deaths of the rightful African home.

47
 Medieval

48
 From Equals To Enslaved

From
to

Toby Green discusses his Wolfson History Prize-

nominated book A Fistful Of Shells and the way
in which resource-rich West Africa was depleted
by trade and slavery
Written by Jonathan Gordon

t was German philosopher Georg Wilhelm that financed the expansion of coinage in North

I Friedrich Hegel who once claimed that

the continent of Africa was “no historical
part of the world; it has no movement or
development to exhibit”. This dismissal of
the contribution of this entire region to the history
of the globe is patently ridiculous, and yet for many
the history of this continent is largely a blank space
Africa. The name, for example, of gold coins in
Spain in the 16th century, the maravedi, derived
from al-Murabitun, which was a gold coin in
Western Sahara. So this was the source of gold.
Its rulers were, according to some estimates, the
richest people who have ever lived, and they were
connected to places like China, Iraq and so on,
in time. which European states weren’t.”
In his Wolfson History Prize-nominated book, So how did these two massive geographic and
A Fistful Of Shells, Toby Green focuses on the economic regions begin to diverge? This is one of
history of West Africa in the same way that so the key questions that Green’s book investigates.
many historians might have previously written “European trade in Africa starting in the late-15th
about the history of Western Europe. His broad century has traditionally been depicted in historical
investigation into the economic and social changes writing as Europeans turning up with baubles and
that took place from the before the Atlantic slave getting what they wanted, and it wasn’t like that,”
trade to the age of revolution delves back in time to he says. What they were trading in was currency,
reveal truths about the rich and diverse nature of which in West Africa in this time took a number
events in this region. of different forms, including cowries, a small shell
As we learn from Green, this particular region from which Green’s book takes its title. “Cowries
of Africa was standing toe-to-toe with Europe as it were one of the major currencies in West Africa
entered the 16th century. from the 13-14th centuries, right through to the
“I think it’s no exaggeration to say that certainly late-19th century and the end of the pre-colonial
Mali, for example, was richer and better globally period,” he says. “Cowries were initially brought
connected than most places in Europe at that time,”
he tells us. Mansa Musa, sultan of the Mali Empire
during the 14th century, has been estimated to EXPERT BIO DR TOBY GREEN
have been the richest man who ever lived, which Dr Toby Green is a historian who received his PhD from the
goes some way to supporting the notion of West Centre of West African Studies at Birmingham University. He was
the recipient of the British Academy Rising Star Engagement
Africa’s wealth and status. “The gold that was Award in 2015 and is currently senior lecturer in Lusophone
mined in different parts of West Africa, like the African History and Culture at King’s College London.
Gold Coast but also Senegambia, was the gold

49
 Medieval

in through the caravan trade from along the Silk were part of the slave trade. What was happening
was that while the value of African currencies was
WEST AFRICA Road and then down across the Sahara.” They were
also a very practical currency, as Green explains: declining, through the process I’ve just described,
BEFORE “They were a useful form of currency because the major exports, which were gold and captive
SLAVERY you could assess them by weight, but they were
also very small, so you could use them for minor
human beings, were themselves producing value
outside of Africa.”
The major powers that stood transactions, which you couldn’t necessarily do So on the currency side the relative value of gold
toe-to-toe with Europe with gold, which is too valuable.” was rising, giving European traders more spending
This is the first step of the disparity opening up power, while simultaneously enslaved people were
Ghana Empire between the continents. “The African markets were being used as a labour force, generating more value
Dates: c.500–c.1200 also being flooded with new currencies. One of the or what economically we would call a surplus. “So
Area at largest known point: 1,600 km2 big differences is that if you bring in currency and while the currencies within Africa were declining
Thanks in part to the introduction of the camel
into the western Sahara, which had enhanced
trade routes throughout the region, the Ghana
Empire, or more properly known as Wagadou,
grew rich from gold and salt and expanded. “Gold coins in Spain in the 16th
century, the maravedi, derived
Mali Empire
Dates: c.1230–1670
Area at largest known point: 1,294,994
from al-Murabitun, which was a
km2 gold coin in Western Sahara”
Also known as the Manden Kurufaba, the Mali
Empire is most famous for its incredible wealth,
but it also played a massive role in shaping the
legal, linguistic and cultural landscape of West
Africa at the time. there isn’t an increase in manufactured goods and in value, its exports were producing value outside
trading with it, that tends to lead to inflation. That’s of the continent which exacerbated this process,”
Songhai Empire what classic economic theory tells us. That increase explains Green.
Dates: c.1000–1592 of manufactured goods being transported into It’s easy to see how the cycle of decline might
Area at largest known point: 1,400,000 and out of Europe from China and India was continue from there and it was made even worse
km2 happening in Europe, but it wasn’t happening by the new element of slavery that the transatlantic
One of the largest states in African history, to the same degree in Africa. The trade was in trade introduced: that being enslavement could
the Songhai Empire was born out of the
currencies, and that essentially began to create be a heritable state. “Here’s where the term or the
city of Gao and was part of the Mali Empire.
However, as that power declined Gao surpassed
inflation in African currencies.” concept of slavery has led to a lot of confusion
it, swallowing up much of its territory in the And then came the transatlantic slave trade, because we have one concept that actually covers a
process. which feeds even more into this cycle. “A lot of huge range of relationships between human beings,”
this trade and the currencies that were coming in says Green. Slavery as it had existed in West Africa

A common tale of Mansa Musa The suffering of enslaved

was that he was so rich that Africans helped to build up the
massive inflation occurred in wealth of Western nations while
Cairo as he passed through on his the former riches of West Africa
pilgrimage to Mecca gradually lost value, creating an
ever more vicious cycle
Image source: wiki/Library of Congress

50
 From Equals To Enslaved

A shrine in Kaba Kangaba,

the former capital of the
Malinke kingdom that
went on to form part of
the Mali Empire

3x © Getty Images
Cowries continued to have
significance, such as being
an important element in
Afro-Cuban religion

previously had been mostly about outsiders to but also goes beyond the transatlantic slave trade issues in African history were slavery, trade and
the community being incorporated into society. proved to be a challenging one for Green. “It was a African-European relations,” explains Green. “But in
According to Green: “They might be war captives, bit of an odyssey, to be honest, putting together this West Africa you get a very different view of what
they might be migrants, but the key thing was they book. Unlike a lot of historical topics, the materials matters in history. In fact, a lot of history in most
had no kinship relationships. It was by making for West African history in the pre-colonial period parts of West Africa (not all parts, but most parts)
kinship relationships over a couple of generations are not all gathered in one place or one or two is an oral genre. And in that oral record the Atlantic
that those people might become incorporated into places. They’re scattered around the world. And slave trade appears very little, and if you were
a community.” The trade that enslaved African in a way that’s a testament to elements of African to just use those sources you would come away
men and women and forced them to work in the history. I used archives in different European thinking well, the important things in African
fields and mines of the New World now introduced countries, Spain, Portugal, the Netherlands, as well history are histories of kingship, religion, migration
the concept that the children of these enslaved as Britain, but also in Latin America, in Brazil, Peru, and family relationships. The reality is that all of
people would themselves be born into bondage Chile and Colombia.” this is important, but you need both perspectives
with no clear means of emancipation. But these Western records are only one part of to try and produce something that reflects the
But as Green points out, a singular concentration the story. “If you were to just use these written balance of that history.”
on slavery can be a disservice to West African sources, you would come away with the idea that In this way A Fistful Of Shells looks to both
history where advancements and human ingenuity the most important or the only really important tackle the issues of slavery and the triangular trade
continued to be expressed, even if figures like that gradually stripped West Africa of its enormous
Hegel dismissed them. “One of the chapters of wealth and power, as well as look deeper into
my book points out that the history of Africa is what continued to happen in the region after the
often being studied through the lens of slavery, trade. Through both approaches we can begin to
particularly outside the continent, but that debunk the notion of Africa as a continent without
doesn’t give much scope to look at the history any history. “I think you just have to look at any
of art or music and the enormous artistic and chapter of the book to have this idea overturned,
musical achievements that took place in the because it’s clear that African societies transform
same period of time. So we have to take themselves in many different ways,” explains
stock of that.” Green. “Once you look at any aspect of this in
The journey to bring us these stories detail, you see how completely false that view
and this local history that includes is, but also how insidious it actually is.”

A Fistful Of Shells
by Toby Green
Image source: wiki/ETH Library

is available now
from Allen Lane and
The tomb of Askia the
Great, one of the rulers of was nominated for
the Songhai Empire in the the 2020 Wolfson
late- 15th century History Prize.

51
 Medieval

The

Explore North Africa’s notorious den of pirates that

terrorised the high seas raiding ships and taking slaves

52
 The Barbary Coast

The Anatomy of
TURBAN
A BARBARY MARK OF
DISTINCTION
The corsairs wore

CORSAIR turbans not only

as a symbol of their
religion, but also as a mark
of distinction from the

NORTH AFRICA, Christians. In particular,

European renegades
15TH-19TH wore white turbans that
indicated they were
CENTURY Muslim converts.

FLANGED
CURVED SWORD MACE
CUTTING DOWN A BLOODY BUSINESS
Risking their lives every day,
THE ENEMY
Barbary corsairs could never
The most popular sword used by the
have too many weapons. In
Barbary corsairs was a type of scimitar
addition to a sword and pistol,
called a kilij – a short sword with an
popular choices included
acutely curved, single-edged blade.
daggers, axes and even a
Its flared tip was called a yalman and
flanged mace, which was a
significantly added to the sword’s
type of bludgeon that was
cutting power. The kilij also had a
particularly useful against
distinct T-shaped cross-section to the
armoured enemies.
back of the blade, which added to the
weapon’s stiffness without adding
unwanted weight.

HIDDEN ARMOUR
JUST IN CASE
FLINTLOCK PISTOL
Depending on their rank or perhaps how TAKE THE SHOT
cautious they were, a corsair might also An American eyewitness of an Algerian attack
have worn protective armour. This would on the merchant ship described how the
have most likely been a composite of corsairs boarded the ship with “sabers grasped
mail with small plates covering the torso, between their teeth and their loaded pistols
which was frequently worn either under in their belts”. This was most likely a flintlock,
or sandwiched between layers of fabric. procured at the bustling markets of Tangiers.
This pistol, which was also associated with
English highwaymen, proved particularly
handy when it came to boarding
and taking over ships.

OTTOMAN DRESS
TRADITIONAL CLOTHING GOVERNMENT
The corsairs had no formal uniform but would
have worn the everyday apparel of the Maghreb,
EMPLOYEE
such as a collarless vest or jacket, possibly with LICENSED TO STEAL
baggy salvar trousers. Due to the nature of their The corsairs were issued a license to plunder from the coastal
work, they would have likely tucked a weapon states – on the condition they split their profits with the local bey,
© Kevin McGivern

in their kusak sash and worn sturdy basmark dey or pasha, of course. However, the corsairs didn’t always get
boots rather than Ottoman slippers. on with their overlords – in 1624, a group of captains proclaimed
Salé a republic independent of the Moroccan sultanate.

53
 Ancient
Medieval

Rise and fall of the Barbary Coast

RALLY BARBAROSSA
AGAINST THE BEGINS
Discover how RECONQUISTA Oruç Barbarossa
the corsairs Ottoman sultan Bayezid II
encourages Kemal Reis
captures two papal
warships off the
came to rule the and other privateers to coast of Tuscany,
waves – but only establish themselves in
the Barbary ports, so they
establishing the
Barbary pirates Barbarossa
with the support can support the Iberian as a serious threat means ‘Redbeard’
in Italian, establishing
Moors being forced out by and shocking
of the Ottoman Christian forces. Christendom.
the trend of naming
pirates after their facial
Empire hair long before Edward
Teach became
Blackbeard

1487 1504

THE SLAVE’S LOT WESTERN EUROPE THE EXPULSION OF ‘TURNING TURK

ATTACKED THE MORISCOS After making peace with the

1 MILLION
Europeans are Partly due to the coastal Philip III decrees the thousands Spanish, James I of England
enslaved by Barbary populations of the Mediterranean of descendants of the Iberian bans privateering, prompting
pirates between
being greatly depleted and the Moors are banished from Spain. many English sailors to turn
1530 and 1780

15,000
rise of the ‘Salé Rovers’ on the Many settle in the Moroccan to outright piracy operating
The number of Atlantic, England, Ireland and port of Salé and turn to out of the Barbary ports.
captives converting even Iceland are targeted by
to Islam between privateering to get their revenge.
Barbary slave hunters.
1580 and 1680

2
black loaves
are given to
each slave to
eat each day

1
change of
clothes is given
to each slave
every each year

1650 1625 1609 1604

The
British fleet
fired over 50,000
ENGLAND rounds and 960 US PAYS PROTECTION BARBARY WARS

130 $1.25 MILLION

explosive mortars at
STRIKES Tunis in just The amount the United States pays
Unwilling to pay further
BACK 11 hours to Morocco and Algiers to ‘protect’ tributes, President Thomas
Oliver Cromwell’s merchant ships and free prisoners Jefferson sends
‘General at Sea’ between 1786 and 1794 is the US Navy to
Robert Blake is sent US seaman are wage a 14-year
to the Mediterranean captured by war against
to get compensation Barbary pirates
Tunis, Algiers

36
from the Barbary and Tripoli,
states. When Tunis which ultimately
refuses, Blake secures fair
destroys their passage for
squadron off the American
coast of Porto Farina. guns are on a vessels.
warship ‘gifted’ to
Algiers to delay
payments in 1796

1655 1786 1801

54
54
 Kingdoms
TheofBarbary
Ancient Egypt
Coast

2-6
CAPTURE OF ALGIERS MAN THE FRANCO-OTTOMAN ALLIANCE
BARRICADES

85
Oruç and his brother Hayreddin King Francis
guards
liberate Algiers from Spain, killing the watch I allies with
local ruler Sālim al-Tūmī for conspiring Genoese towers are each Suleiman the
built in Corsica between
with the foreign power. Oruç rules tower Magnificent
1530 and 1620 to defend
Algiers until his death in 1518. against pirates against

18
Holy Roman
Emperor
Charles

Miguel
METRES
Typical
V. As well
as raiding
de Cervantes, height of
Italian and Spanish coasts in support of his cause,
famed author of Don watchtowers Hayreddin Barbarossa helps the French recapture
Quixote, was kidnapped Nice in 1543 and winters in Toulon.
in 1527 and kept as a
slave in Algiers for
1516 1530 five years 1536

RENEGADE PIRATES TAKING BACK TUNIS BATTLE OF PREVEZA

A list of 35 privateer captains operating out of the Algiers Uluj Ali and Sinan Pasha successfully Despite being heavily outgunned,
in 1580s shows how varied their nationalities are. Hayreddin defends Ottoman-
recapture Tunis from the Spanish.
occupied Actium from the combined

10 TURKS
Spain abandon all other attempts to
forces of Venice, Spain, Portugal,
conquer North Africa and called for a
the Papal States and the Knights of
truce with the Ottomans in 1580. Malta assembled by Pope Paul III.

6 GENOESE
3 Greeks, Sons of
Christian renegades

2 Venetians, Spaniards,
Albanians

1 Sicilian, Calabrian, Jewish,

Neapolitan, French,
Hungarian, Corsican

1580 1574 1538

BOMBARDMENT OF ALGIERS BATTLE OF NAVARINO ALGIERS CONQUERED

An Anglo-Dutch fleet lays siege to Algiers until the The Ottoman Navy is crushed by the France invades
Algerian leader signs a treaty agreeing to no longer combined power of British, French Algiers before
enslave Europeans. 1,200 slaves are freed but the and Russian fleets that are defending formally
corsairs remain a menace. Greece during its war of independence annexing it,
from the Turkish empire. ending 313
years of
Ottoman rule
in the territory.
Slavery
continues in
the Ottoman
Empire until
1890 but
declines on the
Barbary Coast.

27 August 1816 1827 1830

55
55
 Medieval

Hall of Fame
PIRATE KINGS AND QUEENS
The notorious corsairs who ruled the Barbary Coast’s seas

ORUÇ BARBAROSSA
OTTOMAN C.1474-1518
Along with his younger brother Hayreddin,
Oruç is one of the founding fathers of the
Barbary Coast. They captured the city of
Algiers in 1516, executed its ruler, Selim bei
Tumi, and expelled the Spanish. While the
brothers received support from the Ottomans,
after becoming the new governor of Algiers,
Oruç was determined to remain independent
of the empire. The following year, he
destroyed a Spanish fleet of 7,000 soldiers but
failed to capture the Spanish tributary cities in
Oruç is one of the North Africa. He was killed at the hands of the
most legendary Spanish in 1518 while fighting them at the city
Barbary pirates
of Tlemcen.

HAYREDDIN
BARBAROSSA
OTTOMAN C.1478-1546
Renowned as a military genius, Hayreddin
became the governor of Algiers following the
death of his brother. Unlike Oruç, who sought
some independence from the Ottomans, Barbarossa
Hayreddin forged a stronger relationship with is also
known by
the sultanate in return for men and equipment.
his Arabic
With this support, he built a powerful fleet to name, Khair
ad-Din Dragut’s body is buried in
fight against Christian Europe, conducting a the mosque he founded
series of raids along the Mediterranean coast.
Some of Hayreddin’s most famous naval
DRAGUT
OTTOMAN 1485-1565
victories include the capture of El Peñón, a
A skilled sailor, Dragut joined Hayreddin
Spanish fortress, in 1529 and the conquest of
Barbarossa’s fleet and quickly became his
Tunis in 1534, which he achieved while leading
right-hand man. As chief lieutenant, he
the Ottoman fleet of Suleiman the Magnificent.
took part in a number of raids and
successfully captured a series
Sayyida was of coastal fortresses. After
ultimately SAYYIDA AL-HURRA Barbarossa’s death, Dragut
overthrown MOROCCAN 1485-1561 Sayyida was last succeeded him as the
by her son-
Nobody had more reason to despise the Spanish leader of the Ottoman
in-law
than the pirate queen of the Barbary Coast,
woman in Islamic
fleet and as the governor
Sayyida al-Hurra. Originally from Granada, history to legitimately of Algiers two years later.
Sayyida and her family were forced to flee hold the title of ‘al- A force to be reckoned
following the Reconquista in 1492. She married
the governor of Tétouan, a family friend, and
Hurra’, or queen with, he secured an
array of naval victories,
through him assumed a position of power. After particularly the seizure
his death, Sayyida inherited the position of governor of Tripoli – here he built the
and allied with Oruç Barbarossa to attack the Spanish and Dragut Mosque, which is still used
Portuguese – together they controlled the Mediterranean today. He died during the failed Siege of Malta,
Sea. Sayyida remarried to the sultan of Morocco, Ahmed wounded by splinters caused by a cannonball.
al-Wattasi, but famously refused to travel to Fez to marry him,
instead insisting he come to her.

56
 MURAT REIS THE ELDER
ALBANIAN 1534-1609
Uluç
followed Murat Reis was one of the greatest captains of the
in the Ottoman Navy. Having played a role in the fleets of
footsteps Hayreddin Barbarossa and Dragut, he made a name
of Dragut
for himself after he captured two treasure-filled
papal galleys along the shores of Tuscany in 1580.
Five years later, he led the first expedition by Barbary
pirates into the Atlantic Ocean, where he successfully
seized some of the Canary Islands – and he achieved
the same again in 1587.
John had a number of
aliases, including ‘Birdy’
Murat was a and ‘Sparrow’
popular figure in
Spanish Golden
Age literature JOHN WARD ENGLISH C.1553-1622
Captain John Ward was one of the most notorious
pirates to have ever lived. Originally a fisherman, he
became a privateer for Queen Elizabeth I, raiding
ULUÇ ALI REIS Spanish ships. Losing his privateer’s license after
SPANISH C.1519-87 the accession of King James I, John briefly returned
Uluç started his piracy career as a galley slave, to the fishing industry before he turning to a life
captured by the Barbary pirates of Hayreddin of piracy. Acquiring a ship with his men, many of
Barbarossa. He converted to Islam and joined whom were English or Dutch, he set up a base
Dragut’s fleet, taking part in a number of naval in Tunis and proceeded to capture and
battles. Present at the Siege of Malta, Uluç John’s plunder merchant ships. He eventually
succeeded Dragut as the governor of Tripoli converted from Christianity to
life inspired Islam, adopting the name ‘Yusuf
after the latter’s death and proved to be a capable
commander. He became governor of Algiers in the English play Raïs’, and he eventually enjoyed a
1568 and three years later he was named the A Christian Turned wealthy retirement.
Grand Admiral of the Ottoman fleet. Turk, written by Robert
Daborne and based on
his conversion
Siemen was also known
as ‘Simon the Dancer’
SIEMEN to Islam.
DANZIGER
DUTCH C.1579-C.1615
A Dutch privateer like Murat Reis the
Younger, Siemen also chose the life of
a Barbary pirate. His motives remain
a mystery but he quickly became one
of the most famous renegades to join
the Barbary Coast, notably forming
a partnership with John Ward. He
eventually abandoned piracy and
settled in Marseilles, France, where he
helped the French work against his
former comrades. He is said to have
been captured in Tunis and beheaded.
Mulai Ahmed er Raisuli was not
a typical Barbary pirate

MURAT REIS MULAI AHMED ER

THE YOUNGER RAISUNI
DUTCH C.1570-C.1641 MOROCCAN 1871-1925
Born Jan Janszoon van Haarlem, Murat was Despite the fact that piracy along the Barbary
a Dutch privateer from Haarlem who led his Coast ended during the 19th century, Mulai
ship to the North African coast, settling in Ahemed er Raisuni is often referred to as ‘the
Salé, Morocco. While still bearing the Dutch last corsair’. Embracing banditry, he was both
flag, he began attacking other ships, namely loved and feared in Morocco as he opposed the
those belonging to the Spanish. Murat became government and the sultan. He conducted a
a slave after he was captured by the Barbary series of kidnappings, including the abduction
pirates, during which time he converted to Walter Harris, a correspondent for The Times
Islam. Becoming a Barbary pirate himself, he ‘Reis’ was an Ottoman newspaper, and maintained a fleet of boats for
plundered vessels across the Mediterranean and military rank akin to a piracy activities at sea.
naval captain
lived a wealthy life.

57
 Medieval

How to BARBARY BATTLE TACTICS TO MAKE

RAID YOUR FORTUNE MEDITERRANEAN,
15TH-19TH CENTURY
A SHIP
Barbary pirates were principally Easy targets
slave hunters and their aim was to While the corsairs preferred to target
kidnap people they could sell into the merchant ships with large crews and lots
Ottoman slave trade. This gave them of booty on board, they were not above
grabbing lone fishermen.
two targets: the coastline of Christian
countries and unsuspecting ships.
But as the 16th century wore Fighting for freedom
on, coastal towns around the Many attacked ships surrendered quickly
Mediterranean became less populated but some fought back, hoping that the
pirates would go in search of easier prey.
as villagers moved inland or highly
fortified their homes to better defend
themselves. This sent some pirates Mixed crew
further afield, raiding Britain, Ireland A Barbary ship would be staffed by a
combination of experienced seamen,
and even Iceland. However, most
janissaries supplied from a sultan’s own
privateers focused on raiding vessels army and slaves to pull the oars.
at sea, where scarcity of victims
was less of a problem as shipping
continued to be big business.
Fire power
Galiots offered a speed advantage over
lumbering merchant ships but they
WHAT YOU’LL could only carry limited cannon power.
Fortunately, janissaries came armed with
NEED… muskets that worked just as well when
fighting in close quarters.

Seasonal work
During the winter months the
Mediterranean is prone to storms, so
Barbary corsairs only operated from mid-
spring to late autumn, usually making
their first sorties in April.

GALIOT

CREW

CANNONS

01 HEAD TO THE 02 KEEP A LOOKOUT

HUNTING GROUNDS Once you’re in position, you just need to wait for a potential
The best place to find a merchant ship is on a trade route victim to appear. This could be done by either by posting a
between the Mediterranean’s bustling ports. However, rather lookout to watch the horizon from the masthead or else from
than target a vessel in open water, find a bottleneck where it the high ground of an island lair. In 1504, when the Barborossa
can’t easily escape, such as the Strait of Messina. Tuck your brothers captured two papal galleys, they posted lookouts on
SHACKLES galiot behind a headland so you can ambush the ship. the island of Elba.

58
 Raid a Ship

How not to… hunt as a lone wolf

4 FAMOUS…
It was only when they were springs could be found but most
COASTAL
summoned to join an Ottoman inlets couldn’t conceal a large ATTACKS
fleet for a specific campaign group and it took a dangerously
that larger numbers of Barbary long time to fill all the barrels
vessels worked together – they from a single water source.
preferred to work alone or in The same was true of
small squadrons. This was mostly provisions – while the crew
a case of logistics as larger crews of a single galiot could put in
needed more food and water. somewhere and kill a few goats,
Oared ships also had to put this was not an option for a larger
in somewhere safe at night. The force. This limited how far the
Mediterranean coast offered pirates could range and therefore
numerous bays where streams or their opportunities to plunder. INVASION OF GOZO
JULY 1551
Turgut Reis attacked Malta and
Gozo, temporarily seizing the
latter for himself before leaving
with most of its population.

CORSICA
JUNE 1501
Napoleon’s birthplace was often
raided by Barbary slavers like Kemal
Reis while his navigator nephew
03 FIRE A WARNING SHOT 04 BOARD THE SHIP charted the isle’s coastline.
Once a target is in your sights, you could fly false colours and Once you’re alongside the vessel, send over a boarding party.
dress as Christian seamen to get close to it. But once you’re Your janissaries should go across first as few European crews
in range the aim is to intimidate your victim so that they will be willing to battle these elite Ottoman soldiers hand-to-
surrender without putting up a fight. Fire a warning shot across hand. While English and Dutch sailors are known to put up
their decks with your guns while your crew yell abuse at them more of a fight, most boarding actions end quickly with the
and bang drums. defenders throwing down their weapons.

ICELANDIC RAID
20 JUNE - 19 JULY 1627
A series of raids led by European
renegados including Murat Reis
abducted over 400 Icelanders to
sell in Salé and Algiers.

05 SORT THE PLUNDER 06 CELEBRATE YOUR VICTORY SACK OF

Once you control the vessel, search it for any valuables that Depending on the value or size of your loot, you can either
BALTIMORE
20 JUNE 1631
might be on board or beat the crew to tell you where they’ve scuttle the captured ship or sail it back to port. In either case, Reis seized 107 men, women and
hidden it. However, don’t fatally injure them – the passengers make sure your return to Algiers or Tripoli is a triumphant children from a village in County
and crew are your main prize. The wealthiest will be ransomed affair. It’s tradition for successful raiders to fly flags and fire guns Cork. Only two or three ever
© Ed Crooks

back to their families for a high sum, while poor seamen will be in celebration when they return home, both to show off and to returned to Ireland.
sold into slavery. let slave traders know you’re looking to sell!

59
 Medieval

BARBARY Great numbers

As a hugely popular ship, the Barbary
Single mast
The Barbary galiots had a

GALIOT
pirates had many galiots. According to single mast and these were
sources, as many as 50 gailots – and fitted at an angle with a large
several other larger galleys – were based triangular sail set on a long
in Algiers during the mid-16th century. yard. The benefit of such a
HIGH-SPEED SLAVE From there, they would travel towards the lateen rig was to allow the
SHIP, 15TH-17TH Balearic Islands or the Strait of Gibraltar in
search of vessels to prey on.
craft to sail at speed close into
the wind but they were never
CENTURY used in combat. Nearly all
vessels were lateen rigged
after 1500 as Ottoman
Barbary corsairs used a variety of ships to prey on
shipbuilders adopted the
enemy vessels sailing across the Mediterranean.
Serious firepower design and construction
One of the most popular was the galiot, a small
A large gun was mounted at the centre methods of the Portuguese.
galley boat that was primarily propelled by oars
of the ship’s bow and it would have fired
but also had a sail. It could be rowed with great
cannon balls of between 5.4 and 11.8
speed, which allowed the pirates to get in and
kilograms. These would typically have
out quickly during raids as well as easily chase
been blasted at the hull of the enemy
down the lumbering merchant vessels that were
crafts, causing extreme damage. The
weighed down with cargo. The galiot’s small size
pirates would then be in a position to seize
also allowed the pirates to hide, swiftly breaking
the ship, its crew and any loot on board.
cover once lookouts located easy prey. However,
they could only be used during the calm seas
of summer as they sat quite low, making them
susceptible to taking in water in rough seas.
Although the galiots were the corsairs’ favourite
ship, longer galleys with 25 pairs of oars were also
used. These carried more guns and crew and so
had greater fighting potential – for example, for
when the privateers were enlisted in an Ottoman
naval attack. Occasionally, however, the corsairs
would use the smaller barca longas that, with
one rower per oar, proved particularly useful for Swivel shooters
scouting and short-range raiding. The Barbary galiots had a
One of the most iconic Barbary ships was the platform at their bow on which
three-masted xebec, which was powered mainly swivel-mounted shooters were
by sail rather than rowing. It had as many as 16 placed. Ranging from two to ten
guns and it could sail close hauled to the wind, per ship and firing either 450-
making the ship effective when in pursuit. gram balls or bags of shrapnel,
Carrying three lateen-rigged sails, however, it these guns were for targeting
was mostly used for trading. enemy personnel on the deck of
Less versatile were the polaccas, which tended an opposing ship, clearing the
to carry cargo. Meanwhile, the felucca was more way for the pirates to board.
of a sailing vessel. Corsairs particularly liked the
single-masted tartans that often fooled enemies
into thinking they were fishing vessels. But just
the sheer fact that the Barbary pirates had so
many different kinds of ships showed how well
equipped they were.
Keeping it clean
The pirates would ensure their vessel
was well maintained by clearing the
lower hulls of barnacles and weeds
and coating the body of the ship with
a wax. This allowed it to better reach
speeds of up to 15 kilometres an hour
under sail and up to 22.5 kilometres
an hour rowing.

60
 Barbary Galiot

Short length
There are no records of the exact size of a Barbary galiot
but Venetian shipbuilding sources suggest they were three
metres wide and 27 metres in length, including the spur at
the bow. As such, they were one-and-a-half times as long as
a British double-decker bus (and roughly the same width).
The vertical distance between the waterline and the
bottom of the hull – the draft of the ship – was two metres.

Vital supplies
Given that the pirates would have been
at sea for weeks, it was important that
there were sufficient supplies on board,
Slave-powered rowing
especially given the scorching hot weather
To operate the galiot, the ‘alla scaloccio’
of the Mediterranean. About 1,800 gallons
system was used. It meant that two rowers
of water were taken on board and this
were placed on each oar and it came with
would have lasted a crew of around
the benefit of not needing to find lots of
140 roughly 20 days. The pirates would
well-trained oarsmen. That’s because only
have bases where they could gain extra
the inbound oarsmen – the ones who guided
refreshments, however.
the stroke – needed to be skilful. The others,
who would have been slaves, only had to be
strong and provide extra power.

Sitting low
The distance from the waterline to the
upper deck of the ship was short, which
meant the galiot was able to sit low in
the water. This reduced the drag and
weight of the craft, allowing it to move
more quickly through the sea, but it
also meant that Barbary galiots were
not suitable for lengthy voyages in open
water and the hull was rather cramped.

Numerous oars
Galiots were historically small galley
ships – the type that are propelled
mainly by rowing. To that end, they
needed to have sets of oars and this
particular type of ship had between 16
and 20 pairs (although typically they had
© Adrian Mann

18), all neatly lined up on both sides of

the boat.
 Medieval

Day in the life

US MARINE
THE CORPS THAT DEFINED
THE BARBARY WARS; DERNA,
TRIPOLI, 27 APRIL 1805
The US went to war with the Barbary States from 1801 to 1805 and
then again in 1815 in an effort to curtail corsair attacks. The Battle
of Derna was the decisive skirmish of the First Barbary War, led
by Lieutenants William Eaton and Presley O’Bannon. Tasked
with restoring a deposed pasha of Tripoli, Hamet Caramelli,
in the belief that he would be more favourable to American
ships, they trekked from Alexandria, Egypt, to Derna,
in modern-day Libya. Though their success was
undermined when the US signed a peace treaty that
saw Caramelli removed again in return for hostages,
the battle led to the line ‘To the shores of Tripoli’
being added to the Marine’s Hymn as well as the
adoption of the Mameluke sword by the Corps.

SETTING UP
On the day of the battle, the US warships Argus,
Nautilus and Hornet all converged ready to launch
the attack on Derna, with Nautilus anchoring
close to the shore. Eaton had led his troops 800
kilometres through the North African desert to
Derna, only to be refused entry by the governor –
who tauntingly challenged Eaton to attack.

COMMUNICATION
The ships opened up communication with each
other to discuss their plan of attack. The night
before, Eaton told Nautilus that he wanted to
launch an offensive as soon as possible once the
field artillery had been landed. Cover provided by
the ships would be crucial to the success of the
assault as the US Marines were outnumbered.

LOGISTICAL PROBLEMS Presley O’Bannon, the lieutenant

who raised the American flag
Eaton sent a message to the Marines inside the enemy fort
on board Argus requesting that they
land their field artillery as soon as
possible, so that he could begin
his march on the city. However,
Argus struggled to land its guns
on the shore and in the end only
one arrived. To avoid wasting
time, Eaton decided to continue
with the assault regardless.

62
 Day in the life: US Marine

BEGIN THE
ATTACK
Once the
field artillery
was ready,
Eaton ordered
the start
of the land
offensive.
In the meantime, Lieutenant William Eaton led the
charge during the battle
the three ships took
up their positions along
the shore and began to fire heavily on the city.
While all of this was happening, enemy fire rained
down from the fort for around an hour, making it
difficult for the United States to advance.

TAKING CONTROL
Using the ship’s heavy fire as cover, the American
soldiers bravely charged towards the Berber fort.
As the enemy fled in terror, members of Argus,
including Lieutenant O’Bannon, ran inside and
removed the native flag. In its place, they raised
the Stars and Stripes and took control of the fort’s
guns, which were primed and ready for immediate
use thanks to the vacated Berbers who had been
firing them beforehand.

SECURE THE VICTORY

The US forces managed to successfully capture
both the city and the fort. They then sent in boats
to deliver ammunition for the soldiers as well
as to recover those Marines who were wounded
and needed medical attention. Eaton left orders
with the fort and he personally made his way to
Derna in order to make sure that everything was
organised, and that security had been arranged
for the evening.

A WAR HERO
After ensuring that the city was secure, Eaton
returned to one of the ships in order to receive
medical attention himself. During the battle, he
had been seriously injured when he was hit in the
left wrist by a musket ball while leading the charge.
Nevertheless, Eaton survived and he returned to
his home country a hero along with O’Bannon and
the rest of the troops.

REST AND RECUPERATE

With Derna firmly under the control of the United
States after two hours of bloody fighting, it was
time for the troops to rest and savour their victory.
While the American forces ultimately suffered
minimal losses, approximately 800 Tripolitans
were killed by the end of the skirmish and 1,200
© Getty Images

were wounded, with many more forcibly driven

The Barbary Wars
out of the city.
lasted 14 years

63
66 Origins of the 82 Beware the Mino
Transatlantic The iconic women warriors of Dahomey
Slave Trade 86 The Scramble for Africa
A dark period of history begins
How Victorian technologies ushered in a new
70 The Transatlantic Slave era of colonialism and conquest

Trade Timeline 88 Shaka

An in-depth look at the era
How an exile used cunning and guile to

78 Impact of Slavery
How slavery impacted the development of
become an iconic African king
66
Africa from the 15th century to today
70

82

“Shaka has
become
entwined with
those who
wanted to make
use of his tale”

88
 Colonial

Origins of the
Transatlantic
Slave Trade
Uncover the little-known genesis of
history’s darkest trade

66
 Origins of the Transatlantic Slave Trade

hen Francisco de Rosa slavery came to an end 400 years later, more pioneering colonists. However, the hard,

W looked out on the New

World from the deck of
the Santa Maria de la
Luz, the mariner was
satisfied with a job well done. Setting out from
Arguim, a tiny island off the coast of what is
now Mauritania in West Africa, de Rosa had
than 12 million Africans had been forcibly
shipped across the ocean. This is
the dark story of the transatlantic slave trade’s
murky beginnings.
Despite its relative proximity, the African
continent beyond the Mediterranean coast was
little known to Europeans at the turn of the
manual graft required to carve a living on the
islands was reserved for others. Although the
native Canary Islanders, the Guanches, were
an ideal source of labour, it was a limited pool
of workers. An alternative source of labour
was soon found. In addition to mapping the
waters of the east Atlantic, navigators moved
crossed the Atlantic Ocean and made it safely 15th century. Only when Castilian and down the coast of Africa, pushing beyond the
to Puerto Rico with a valuable cargo. Among Portuguese seafarers began to understand the previously known limit of Cape Bojador to
the goods he carried to sell on the other side of regular patterns of the Atlantic’s currents and reach Cape Blanco in 1441, the Bay of Arguim
the Atlantic were at least 54 African slaves. winds could they begin to explore to the south in 1443 and Cap-Vert in 1444. There they
De Rosa’s voyage in 1520 was the second in small but manoeuvrable caravels. Castilians stumbled across a centuries-old trade network
known to have been undertaken by a slave began the conquest of the Canary Islands in in which West African states sold slaves to
ship that sailed direct from Africa to the 1402; Portuguese explorers discovered the Arab merchants who transported them across
Americas; he may also have commanded the uninhabited islands of Madeira in 1419, the the Sahara to North Africa.
first slave crossing a year earlier, in which at Azores in 1427 and Cape Verde in 1456. The profits of the trans-Saharan slave trade
least 60 slaves were transported. They were The new islands had a climate and fertile meant that the West Africa that the Europeans
among the first voyages in a horrific trade in soil that were perfect for the production of discovered was extremely affluent. By the 14th
human beings. By the time that transatlantic wine and sugar, and were soon settled by century the Mali Empire had grown larger than

Image: Alamy

The transatlantic slave trade was born when

Europeans trafficked enslaved Africans across
the Atlantic as labour in the New World

67
 N
Colonial

E
merchants a base from which they could acquire S
Africa’s other gold and other commodities, including slaves,
who could fetch a decent price in Europe or the
slave trade island colonies of the east Atlantic. By 1455 up to SLAVE CENTRES
Slavery was already endemic in African societies 800 slaves a year were being transported from
when European explorers first came down the Arguim to Portugal; by the turn of the century 1. ARGUIM
west coast. Slaves may have been punished for some 81,000 slaves had been transported from One of the first European slave
a crime or debt or were members of a rival tribe trading bases off the coast of
the African coast on Portuguese ships and as Africa, established in 1445.
who had been captured in war or kidnapped much as ten per cent of the population of Lisbon
by a raiding party. However, African slaves may
may have been African or of African descent.
have held a different status to those who were
The use of Africans as labour in Europe 2. SAO TOME
unfortunate enough to be chattel slaves on the An island trading base that was
other side of the Atlantic – they may have had and her colonies provided a steady but small a hub for slaves trafficked to the
some rights, like owning property and holding flow of slaves from West African trading ports. Americas from the Kingdom
of Kongo.
public office. When Islam began to spread into However, demand for slaves rocketed after the
Africa in the 7th century, Muslim traders began first explorers returned from the other side of the
to range south in search of new markets and 3. ELMINA
ocean with tales of vast, unclaimed lands.
partners. Pioneers discovered routes through
When Christopher Columbus discovered CASTLE
the Sahara Desert that passed life-preserving Built in 1482, the slave-holding
oases, often concluding their journeys at Hispaniola – the island containing modern castle is now the oldest European
Sijilmasa or Kairouan in modern Morocco Haiti and the Dominican Republic – in 1492, it building south of the Sahara.
and Tunisia. Thousands of slaves were taken was probably home to hundreds of thousands
across the desert each year for use as workers, of indigenous inhabitants, the Taíno. However, 4. CANARY
domestic servants and concubines in North Spanish colonisation was violent. Any natives ISLANDS
Africa and the wider Islamic world.
who opposed the conquerors were mercilessly The earliest European demand for
African slaves arose from a need
cut down, while European diseases for which for workers in the island colonies
the Taíno had no immunity cut through the of the east Atlantic.

population; the first smallpox epidemic in

Hispaniola and Puerto Rico may have claimed 5. HISPANIOLA
the lives of around two-thirds of the native The first known African slaves
population. Within just 30 years, the number of in the Americas arrived in
Hispaniola in 1502 after a
natives plummeted by around 85 per cent. By circuitous passage via Europe.
1514, according to a Spanish census, there were
only 26,000 Taíno left under Spanish control.
6. SAN MIGUEL
The rich gold mines and agricultural fields that DE GUALDAPE
the Spanish had discovered in the New World Founded in 1526 by Lucas
would be useless if there was nobody to work Vázquez de Ayllón, the 600
colonists of the first Spanish
in them. attempt to colonise the mainland
included a number of slaves.
It was a situation repeated across the Caribbean
– millions of native inhabitants of the islands
may have died in the first two or three decades
of Spanish expansion. With no local workforce,
Arab slave traders bought and
transported African slaves for slaves were shipped from the west coast of Africa Slaves were usually captured
centuries before the European arrival to Europe, and from there onto the New World. by fellow African tribes
The first African slaves known to have landed in
the Americas reached Hispaniola in 1502, while
Western Europe. When its leader Mansa Musa four African slaves are known to have been
visited Cairo on his hajj pilgrimage in 1324, his shipped from Europe to Cuba in 1513. The Spanish
procession reportedly included 60,000 men, of had lost one workforce; their solution was to ship
whom 12,000 were slaves carrying gold bars to another in from the other side of the ocean.
pay his way. So vast was his fortune that Musa’s On 18 August 1518, King Charles I of Spain
party inadvertently caused inflation as prices made the new transatlantic slave trade ruthlessly
rocketed in response, devaluing gold for more than efficient when he issued a new document
a decade after his visit. Emperor Askia the Great of that authorised the transportation of slaves
the Songhai Empire completed a similarly opulent direct from Africa to the Americas. The charter
hajj more than a century later, while the Kingdom
of Kongo was an affluent trading state of half a
million people with an impressive capital
at M’banza-Kongo.
“Demand for slaves rocketed after
It was tales of such prosperity and gold that the first explorers returned from
drew European explorers to the African coast like
moths to a light, eager to trade with the rich rulers. the other side of the ocean with
In 1445 the Portuguese established a trading post
on a small island in a sheltered bay just off the
tales of unclaimed lands”
coast of modern Mauritania. Arguim gave the

68
 THE
TRANSATLANTIC
TRIANGLE
The early transatlantic slave
trade arose from other, older 3
slave trading networks
2

3
1
6 1
4 OTHER ROUTES
1. TRANS-
SAHARA
700-1900
Muslim traders used oases in the

5 2 1 Sahara Desert to transport slaves

from the Wagadou and Mali
Empires to the Arab kingdoms in
modern Morocco and Tunisia.

2. CRIMEAN
KHANATE
3 700-1900
The Crimean successors of the
vast Mongol Empire traded with

2 the Ottoman Empire, supplying

them with captured prisoners
from eastern Europe and
northwest Russia.
SLAVE Besides the transatlantic slave triangle, there were also slave routes prior to
ROUTES European colonisation of the Americas, such as the Arab trade across the Sahara
3. VARANGIAN
1. TRIANGULAR 3. CLOSING VOLGA
2. MIDDLE PASSAGE 800-1100
TRADE BEGINS The infamous leg of the slave trade, THE TRIANGLE Vikings who lived in northern
The first part of the triangular trade the six to eight week voyage across the The raw materials produced by Europe enslaved Slavs in their
saw European manufactured goods Atlantic saw slaves kept in cramped slaves on plantations – cotton, raids along the Volga River
taken to Africa where they could be and unsanitary conditions, with much sugar, rubber and tobacco – were and sold them in the south to
exchanged for slaves. loss of life. shipped back to Europe’s factories. Byzantine or Muslim buyers.

allowed Lorenzo de Gorrevod, a trusted advisor command of Francisco de Rosa – May 1521 The transatlantic slave trade was born. From
and member of the king’s council of state, to and October 1521. Each departed from Arguim relatively humble beginnings, the number of
transport “four thousand Negro slaves both male and landed in Puerto Rico, although it is likely slaves crossing the ocean would grow and
and female” to “the Indies, the islands and the that other ships carried slaves from Arguim to grow. British slave ships would soon eclipse the
mainland of the ocean sea, already discovered or Hispaniola. There were also at least six slave deeds of their Iberian predecessors, transporting
to be discovered” by ship “direct from the isles of voyages from Cape Verde to the Caribbean millions of slaves in the 18th century.
Guinea and other regions from which they are between 1518 and 1530. The scars of the slave trade still remain
wont to bring the said negros”. By 1522 direct slave voyages had begun from today. While slave labour in the colonies helped
The charter was a reward to de Gorrevod for another starting point: the island of São Tomé European powers to become rich, industrial
good service, a chance to make a fortune by some 2,000 miles along the African coast, nations, the African population and economy
granting him the first chance to profit from a new opposite what is now Gabon. Among these stagnated and fell behind the rest of the world.
trade route, but he had no intention of involving voyages was a ship carrying 139 slaves that Ever-increasing European demands meant
himself directly in human trafficking. The rights voyaged across the Atlantic in 1522, and another that slave-trading African rulers needed to have
granted to him were subcontracted and resold with as many as 248 in 1529. The first enslaved a growing, ready supply of slave labour, triggering
a number of times until they fell into the hands Africans to reach mainland North America raids and wars that unsettled the continent and
of a Genoese merchant, Domingo de Fornari; arrived in 1526 as part of an ill-fated Spanish left a legacy of tribal conflict and civil wars. An
Images: Getty Images (African tribes, map)

two Castilian merchants, Juan de la Torre and attempt to colonise San Miguel de Gualdape, African diaspora exists throughout North and
Juan Fernandez de Castro, and a Seville-based while African burials at a cemetery in Campeche, South America, but long-held racial prejudices
Genoese banker, Gaspar Centurion. They arranged Mexico, suggest that African slaves may have have simmered well beyond the end of the
for various seafarers to carry out the work of been shipped to Central America almost as soon slave trade and into the 21st century, especially
transporting 4,000 African slaves from one side as Hernán Cortés had subjugated the Aztec and in the United States. The ill effects of the 400-
of the Atlantic to the other. At least four voyages Mayan empires. The colonisation of the New year transatlantic slave trade were unintended
took place, in 1519, 1520 – the voyage under the World was inextricably linked to slavery. consequences of the Age of Discovery.

69
 Colonial

The
Transatlantic
Timeline
European economic development and the
exploitation of resources in the Americas fuelled
the emergence of the African slave trade

SIR JOHN HAWKINS ESTABLISHES

THE PORTUGUESE
ENGLISH SLAVE TRADE
INITIATE
TRANSATLANTIC
1562-69
SLAVE TRADE Trade routes from England to
1526 Africa and the New World
Trade route from Conducting three voyages from England to Sierra Leone on the coast of
Africa to Brazil
West Africa and then to the island of Hispaniola, Sir John Hawkins is the
first Englishman considered to be actively involved in the transatlantic
slave trade. His voyages establish the triangular trade route, standard
for more than two centuries. Ships depart ports in England and other
European countries laden with goods to be traded for slaves on the African
coast. The slaves are then transported across the Atlantic Ocean via the
notorious Middle Passage and sold as labourers to plantation owners in the
New World. Completing the triangle, ships transport commodities such as
cotton, sugar, rum, tobacco and coffee back to Europe.

The first known English slave

trader, Sir John Hawkins, also
established the transatlantic
triangular trade route
Portuguese slave traders pay
respects to an African king as
they ply their trade

70
 The Transatlantic Slave Trade Timeline

Prominent Boston
KING JAMES I CHARTERS THE landmark Faneuil
COMPANY OF ADVENTURERS Hall was built by
OF LONDON TRADING TO THE slaver Peter Faneuil,
PORTS OF AFRICA who conducted slave Of Human
1618
London, England
auctions nearby
Bondage
Slavery or involuntary servitude
has been an element of civilisation
for thousands of years
From earliest recorded history, the
concept of slavery or involuntary
servitude has existed, transcending
MASSACHUSETTS cultural or ethical conditions and
LEGALISES SLAVERY enabling those who have exploited
human suffering to build immense
10 December 1641 wealth and exert control over
Boston, Massachusetts subservient peoples.
A slave owner himself, Governor John Winthrop is a With the emergence of social
classes, slavery developed in
principal author of the Massachusetts Bodies of Liberty,
Sumeria and Mesopotamia, even
the first collection of laws that legalise the institution of being referenced in the Code of
slavery in North America. Samuel Maverick, an owner Hammurabi as an institution with its
of two slaves, had brought them to the English colony purpose and place in society. The
in 1624, while the first slaves imported directly to development of slavery in civilisation
stemmed from the need for labour,
Massachusetts from Africa made their arrival in 1634. simply the performance of functions
In 1638, the slave ship Desire had brought enslaved that contributed to the augmentation
Africans from Barbados in the Caribbean, and these were of wealth or the increase of status.
exchanged for members of the Pequot tribe captured in Slaves were either captured during
raids and transported to markets
New England and placed in bondage. Between 1755 and
to be sold as commodities, taken
1764, the number of slaves in Massachusetts rises to 2.2 Massachusetts governor John Winthrop
prisoner during battles among rival
was a slaveholder and contributor to
per cent of the total population. kingdoms or empires and cast into
laws legalising slavery in the colony
bondage as the spoils of war, sold
or surrendered by next of kin to
serve a monarch or person of high
social status, or punished for some
SLAVES INTRODUCED egregious crime.
AT JAMESTOWN From 3,500 BCE forward, records
of slave enterprises in Sumeria
20 August 1619 have survived. Biblical references
Jamestown, Virginia to slavery abound, particularly that
of the Hebrew people delivered
Sailing from the Caribbean, an English privateer, the White Lion, reaches Point by God from bondage in Egypt.
Comfort, now Hampton Roads, not far from Jamestown, Virginia, the first Slavery cast its shadow across the
permanent English-speaking colony in North America. They trade 20 African glory of the Roman Empire and the
magnificence of classical Greece.
slaves for food and other provisions. These are the first slaves imported to
Examples of slavery and involuntary
Britain’s North American colonies. During a span of four centuries, an estimated servitude in ancient China and
12 to 13 million enslaved Africans are brought to North and South America by other Asian cultures attest that the
European traders to toil as field workers, house servants and labourers. institution has not been confined
only to Western civilisation, and that
Arriving at Jamestown, Virginia,
the transatlantic slave trade was an
aboard the White Lion in 1619,
African slaves cower near the shore extension of a practice that predated
its horrors for centuries. Numerous
African kingdoms, in fact, held
slavery in high regard, even revered
the concept of enslaving
the vanquished of neighbouring
empires following military victories.
Slavery, therefore, is as old as
civilisation itself, a symptom of the
human condition – and one of its
basest elements.
Image: Jun/CC BY-SA 2.0 (Roman slaves)

In colonial Virginia, tobacco became

a lucrative cash crop. Slave labour
was instrumental in its production Trudging along in chains, Roman
slaves are led toward an ancient
and uncertain future

71
 Colonial

GRANVILLE SHARP INITIATES

LEGAL CHALLENGE TO BRITISH
SLAVE TRADE
1765
London, England

TOUSSAINT L’OUVERTURE
LEADS SLAVE UPRISING IN
ROYAL AFRICAN SAINT DOMINGUE
COMPANY 1791
CHARTERED French Caribbean colony
24 September 1672 of Saint Domingue
London, England
King Charles II grants a charter to the Royal
African Company, effectively a monopoly of the
English slave trade on the west coast of Africa
from the Cape of Good Hope to the western INVENTION OF THE
reaches of the Sahara Desert. The Royal African COTTON GIN
Company is led by the Duke of York, the future 1794
King James II and brother of King Charles II. Savannah, Georgia
Financed by numerous aristocratic investors,
the enterprise will transport more African slaves
to the Americas than any other in the history of
King Charles II granted his brother,
the transatlantic trade. future King James II, leadership of
the Royal African Company

FIRST MAROON WAR STONO

1728-40 REBELLION
Jamaica
ERUPTS
While the Caribbean island of Jamaica is under Spanish
9 September 1739
rule, slaves sometimes escape, reaching the mountains South Carolina
and isolated areas, blending with indigenous peoples, and Jemmy, a literate slave also known
maintaining a degree of freedom. However, after Britain as Cato, leads a group of 20 slaves
wrests control of Jamaica from Spain in 1655, revolts in rebellion along the coast of
erupt and the number of so-called ‘maroons’ increases. the South Carolina Lowcountry.
British attempts to quell the unrest and control the entire From the owner’s plantation
island escalate into the First Maroon War. Although Britain on the Stono River, Jemmy and
commits substantial numbers of troops to the pacification his cohorts grow to more than
effort, a stalemate results in an agreement allowing 80 in number, killing up to 25
the maroons to live in certain areas without British colonists as they march toward
interference. In exchange, the maroons are to assist in Florida, where the Spanish have
returning escaped slaves and protecting Jamaica from promised freedom to slaves who
outside threats. escape the British. However, the
South Carolina militia meets the
escapees near the Edisto River
Jamaican Maroons fire on a
detachment of British soldiers and suppresses the uprising,
marching through the jungle killing 35-50 slaves.

This armed Jamaican Maroon The Broadway show Drumfolk

is typical of those who opposed was inspired by the events of
British pacification efforts the Stono Rebellion

72
 The Transatlantic Slave Trade Timeline

SLAVE TRADE ACT

25 March 1807
London, England
Largely due to the efforts of William Wilberforce and his associates, who had taken
up the cause of abolishing slavery in Great Britain 20 years earlier, Parliament passes
the Slave Trade Act of 1807. Although the act prohibits the slave trade in the British
Empire, it does not abolish the practice of slavery; however, Britain urges other
nations to consider abolishing its sanction of the slave trade as well. At the time the
act is passed, the slave trade remains one of the most profitable business ventures
in the Empire, although the institution is not formally ended in Britain until the
Slavery Abolition Act of 1833.

In this engraving slave

insurrectionist Nat Turner is
captured on 30 October 1831

NAT TURNER’S REBELLION

21-23 August 1831
Southampton County, Virginia
This poignant medallion became the William Wilberforce championed the Slave and preacher Nat Turner leads perhaps the most famous slave
symbol of the British Anti-Slavery Society effort to abolish slavery in Great Britain uprising in American history. Armed with axes and clubs, Turner and
about 70 other slaves began their short-lived rebellion with a murderous
rampage, killing more than 50 White people. Although the rebellion is
put down at Belmont Plantation within days, Turner remains at large
for two months. He is captured and executed amid a wave of retaliation
in which approximately 160 Black people are executed by the state of
Virginia or murdered.

Images: Alamy (Royal African Company logo, armed Jamaican Maroon, Drumfolk), Getty Images (Jamaican Maroons in jungle)

This woodcut depicts the events of the

Nat Turner slave rebellion in Virginia

THE UNITED STATES BANS SPAIN ABOLISHES PARLIAMENT PASSES

AFRICAN SLAVE TRADE THE SLAVE TRADE SLAVERY ABOLITION ACT
1808 1820 1833
Washington, DC Madrid, Spain London, England

73
 Colonial

SLAVES SEIZE THE

SHIP AMISTAD
1839
Identities of Atlantic, near coast
of North America
slavery
Slavery and involuntary servitude
have existed in numerous forms
through the centuries
BRAZIL BEGINS
ENFORCING LAWS
Slavery is, at its most elementary AGAINST SLAVE
level, the involuntary coercion or TRADE
detention of an individual to perform 1850
some function for the benefit of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
others. It has taken many names and
has been shrouded in circumstance
and suspect justification as well.
While some may have offered
the dubious argument that
slavery actually has benefitted an
enslaved people that otherwise
were disadvantaged and unable to DRED SCOTT DECISION
competently determine their own 6 March 1857
future, others have contended that
the institution was a necessary tool
Washington, DC
for the good of society. Therefore, Dred Scott, a slave whose owner transported him from the slave state of Missouri
varied genres of slavery have to the free states of Illinois and Wisconsin, sues for his freedom after returning
emerged across the millennia. to Missouri, asserting that since he had been transported to free territory he
Slavery encompasses those who
were simply seized and sold, those
was no longer a slave. After defeat in Missouri state court and US federal court, LEFT Slave Dred Scott’s quest for
the case is appealed to the US Supreme Court, which rules 7-2 against Scott. freedom reached the United States
who were captured during wartime
Supreme Court
and made to serve the victors, In the landmark decision, Chief Justice Roger B Taney writes that Blacks “are not
and those whose families even ABOVE Chief Justice Roger B Taney
included, and were not intended to be included, under the word ‘citizens’ in the wrote the majority opinion in the
considered it a privilege to give their
Constitution…” and therefore could claim none of the rights of US citizens. landmark Dred Scott decision
children over to the ruling regime for
a lifetime of servitude.
Beyond these concepts, during The fire engine house at Harpers
the colonial era, indentured Ferry has been reconstructed on
servitude allowed individuals to the original site
seek their own fortune after paying
for passage to America with a
specified period of work, usually
seven years, for the benefit of
another. Prisoners, paying their
supposed debt to society, have
often been employed as labourers,
while those who have amassed
considerable debt and defaulted
have, at times, been sentenced into
bondage as a result.
Even today, slavery persists.
Although chains may not be visible,
millions of people, young and old,
are held against their will around
the world. Human trafficking for
the purposes of cheap labour and
illicit sex trade flourishes despite the
best efforts of government and law
enforcement to eradicate the age-
old scourge.

Abolitionist firebrand John

Brown led the ill-fated raid
on the federal arsenal at
Harpers Ferry, Virginia

JOHN BROWN RAID Brown and several of his men are trapped in the arsenal
16-18 October 1859 fire engine house by US Marines under the command of
Harpers Ferry, Virginia future Confederate General Robert E Lee. One Marine is
Abolitionist John Brown leads 22 men on a raid to seize killed and another wounded, while ten raiders die, seven
This haunting image titled ‘The the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia. Previously are captured and five escape. Brown is convicted of
Slave Market’ depicts the despair involved in other acts of anti-slavery related violence, treason and executed on 2 December 1859.
of those sold into bondage

74
 The Transatlantic Slave Trade Timeline

EMANCIPATION
PROCLAMATION
1 January 1863
Washington, DC
In the midst of the Civil War and following the
tenuous strategic victory on the battlefield of
Antietam, President Abraham Lincoln issues
the Emancipation Proclamation, ostensibly
freeing the slaves held in territories then
in rebellion against the United States. The
proclamation does not free slaves in the border
states of Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri,
which remain in the Union, and since the
rebellious territories are not fully under Union
control, the document serves primarily to add
another dimension to the war. Now, not only is
the conflict being prosecuted to preserve the
Union, but also to end the institution of slavery
in the United States.

President Abraham Lincoln

issued the Emancipation
Proclamation on 1 January 1863

Scars on the back of a slave

named Gordon are indicative
of the brutality of slavery
UNITED STATES
ABOLISHES SLAVERY
6 December 1865
Washington, DC
The 13th Amendment to the United States Constitution is PORTUGAL ENDS BRAZIL BECOMES THE
LAST SLAVE ROUTE LAST COUNTRY IN THE
ratified by 27 of the 36 US states, abolishing slavery and TO AMERICAS AMERICAS TO END
involuntary servitude in the country unless as punishment SLAVERY
1870
for a crime. The amendment had been initially proposed Lisbon, Portugal
1888
JUNETEENTH on 8 April 1864 and passed the Senate by a vote of 38 to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
COMMEMORATES 6. However, it failed in the House of Representatives with
END OF SLAVERY
19 June 1865 a tally of 93 in favour and 65 against, 13 votes short of the
United States two-thirds majority required for passage.

Members of the US House of

Representatives celebrate the
ent
ratification of the 13th Amendm

MAJOR CONFEDERATE
ARMIES SURRENDER,
EFFECTIVELY ENDING
Image: MamaGeek/CC BY 3.0 (John Brown Fort)

AMERICAN CIVIL WAR

1865
Appomattox Court House
Virginia; Bennett Place,
Durham, North Carolina
Representative James Mitchell The 13th Amendment was just
Ashley of Ohio had proposed a the first of three amendments
Constitutional amendment to to be established following the
abolish slavery in 1863 end of the American Civil War

75
 Colonial

SLAVE SHIP’S
SLAVE
TRADE 47
HUMAN CARGO

%
36,000
men
FACTS 26% 26%
Revealing some of
woman children

6
the shocking statistics slaving expeditions
% North between
behind the horrors of the America
transatlantic slave trade 1514-1866

55 %
were
taken to

80 Days
Brazil and
Spanish South
America

the length of the journey from

Africa to the New World
35 Caribbean
% the

UP
TO
%
million enslaved
Africans were
transported across
the Atlantic

3.1-3.4
Over

of slaves died during

the Middle Passage
, miles
the length of the Middle Passage
million enslaved
people transported by
BRITISH SHIPS

76
 Slave Trade Facts

250-600 ,
average cost
of a slave
in the American South
SLAVES PER BOAT in today’s money

Black population in early

America/United States

27,817 1700in

757,208 in 1790
1/3 of newly
arrived slaves

4,441,830
would die
within three years
in 1860
3.9 million of whom
were slaves

Mortality rates were

twice as high
among enslaved
children as among
of all enslaved children died Southern White
in their first year of life children

£20 million
(*£17 billion in
today’s money) £0 2015
Images: Getty Images, Alamy (coffin)

compensation compensation The year British taxpayers

paid to British paid to the enslaved paid off the last instalment
slave owners or their descendants of the bank loan used to
following abolition in 1833 since abolition compensate slave owners

77
Colonial

of

What became of those left behind, the family

members and village-mates of the kidnapped
enslaved who were shipped across the Atlantic?
t is clear to many the impact that the slave during this time in Africa while human beings

I trade had for Europe and the Americas,

helping them to grow rich and to finance
the Industrial Revolution. In Europe, a
middle class began to emerge, enjoying
greater leisure time, drinking tea and coffee with
sugar, indulging in chocolate, exotic spices, fabrics
and stories of travel and adventure in foreign
were stolen on a daily basis.
West Africa had a rich history before European
slavers arrived, with a complex political, economic,
linguistic and cultural landscape. Just like in Europe
during this period, the balance of power was
constantly changing. Wars were fought, kingdoms
and dynasties toppled, city-states destroyed as new
lands. In the Caribbean and Americas, we know ones emerged. It is difficult to even categorise West
that Indigenous people experienced unspeakable Africa as a singular place, so diverse was it. Indeed,
decimation and disease, almost wiped out as lush West Africans had been trading with Europe for
landscapes were broken into plantation land upon centuries, via merchants in North Africa. The first
which African slaves harvested sugar, cotton, European traders to set foot on African land were A mural depicting
the capture of slaves
tobacco, rice and many other crops that were the Portuguese in the 15th century. Other European
quickly becoming essentials in Europe. But the powers quickly began to follow.
story that is less well known, barely touched upon There were four simultaneous slave trades through the Sahara Desert, and sold in Northern
in comparison even to the lives of slaves once they occurring across Africa at this time. The Trans- Africa. The Red Sea trade took people from inland
made landfall overseas, is what was happening Saharan trade saw people taken from the south, up and shipped them to the Middle East and India.
And the Indian Ocean trade included the sale
of East Africans to the Middle East, India and
Bunce Island, in the Sierra plantation islands across the Indian Ocean.
Leone River, was run by the
The Transatlantic slave trade, however, was,
British commericial forms and
was a major source of slaves without a doubt, the most expansive, populous,
systemic and brutal of all. It marked a significant
expansion of the African slave system from
anything that had been seen before on the
continent, as economies and ways of life began
to be structured around it. It was the largest long-
distance coerced migration in history.
Before the slave trade became destructive
and toxic, West African ports were dynamic and
diverse marketplaces with goods sold from all
over the world. Europeans wanted gold, ivory
and spices – mainly pepper. They kidnapped
and traded Africans from the beginning, but
it remained a small, fringe trade until the 17th
century, when the demand for gold in Europe
 A slavery fortress used to
hold and
guard captives before boa
rding ships,
on Goree island, Dakar, Sen
egal

slowed. The slave trade boomed, replacing gold

as the focus of commerce and becoming the
“A mentality emerged in which people
dominant trade in the region. The impacts that
this had on West Africa, and indeed the continent
felt they must either take or be taken”
of Africa, as well as Europe and the Americas, is
truly immense.

Images: Seyllou Diallo/AFP via Getty Images (Goree island), Alamy (Bance Island, mural)
Sophisticated networks of trading alliances needed to sell slaves. Thus, villages were constantly is difficult and complex to try and understand the
collected groups of people for sale. Often, these violently preying on and attacking one another to extent to which African societies were complicit
were people kidnapped or captured as prisoners of steal human beings. Much blood was shed. in the slave trade and contributed to the sale and
war in battle, or they were convicts sold away as Some kingdoms and city-states were decimated torture of human beings. There is much evidence
punishment for crimes or to pay off debt. One of as a result of this. Others, like the Asante and to suggest that many African states, such as
the main commodities that the Europeans sold in Dahomey, grew rich and powerful. In Dahomey, Angola, strongly resisted becoming involved in
return for slaves was guns and firearms. which emerged around 1600, raiding for slaves was the economic system of trading in slaves. Africans
The result of injecting metal guns and weapons a way of life, inherent in the very founding of the often damaged slaving vessels and rose up in revolt
into African society was devastating. Communities state by the armed elite. This created huge rivalries and rebellion against the system.
began using them as self-defence against both and tensions between different states, and constant However, as the trade eclipsed every other in
European slave traders and other African tribes war reduced the possibility of political stability value, it became impossible not to. It was either
and villages, who may attempt to wage war or emerging. Ethnic fractionalisation that continues to sell slaves or get left behind. Those that didn’t
steal their villagers to sell as slaves. A vicious this day almost certainly has its roots in this period. join in would become impoverished. A mentality
cycle emerged, in which West Africans needed The slave trade was not a planned strategy emerged in which people felt they must either take
guns to prevent their village members from being to impoverish the continent; it was the result of or be taken. With a whole economic system built
captured and sold, but in order to buy guns, they centuries of participation in the trade on all sides. It on the sale of human flesh, it is less a question of

79
 Colonial

complicity than of need and survival, of ordinary

people and everyday lives turning as small cogs in
an epic system. ALTERED SOCIETIES:
But it seems to be that African societies without GENDER, CLASS AND ETHNICITY
a state or government were less prone to violence
and raiding. Those with chiefs and a prominent
elite would be targeted by the Europeans and
influenced, offered rewards and wealth in return
for slaves. Their sons were sent to Europe to study,
and the nature of statehood changed. So much
so, at the time of abolition, many African chiefs
were dismayed. They did not wish to see the end
of an industry that was their main function and
source of wealth. This is one of the reasons that the
Europeans were so keen to find alternative goods

“African states
became deeply
dependent on A chain of slaves travelling
selling human from the interior to the coast

beings” In places where only some were taken, a gender of mixed race and could speak European languages,
imbalance was created. More men were kidnapped, discovered a new niche.
leaving behind women, who were seen as less Given their ambiguous place in society – Black
useful. They remained to keep the village running, but wealthy, educated and somewhat respected
to trade in Africa other than slaves after abolition, and came under huge pressure to rebuild, care for by the White men – these merchant princes could
and support their villages. act as intermediaries and army commanders aiding
particularly oil. It would allow them to keep African
But there were suddenly too many women and the Europeans, and extract sizeable profits for
chiefs in a state of indebtedness and dependency. not enough men to marry, and so in some societies, themselves. Indeed, the slave trade opened up a
Africans were not so much partners, but servants men began to take multiple wives in a practice wealth of new employment opportunities at all
and facilitators of the European slave trade. known as polygyny. Tensions and instability emerged levels, with workers needed as porters, interpreters,
The slave trade fundamentally changed the with these new lifestyles, and this practice actually guards, soldiers and peddlers.
demographic landscape of many parts of West decreased the fertility of women, compounding But while this may seem like a positive outcome
Africa. Sometimes, entire villages were stolen or population stagnation even further. for the African peoples, in reality these jobs were
It wasn’t only women whose roles were changing only available for the privileged. Only a small number
killed. Whole areas were practically emptied of
and developing as a result of the trade; a new class of African villagers were involved directly in servicing
their human presence. Scholars have determined of ‘merchant princes’ found they could become rich. the trade. And yet the impact and scale of human
that the region faced a sustained and consistent The children of chiefs and kings, many of whom had loss inflicted on peaceful and innocent villagers is
depopulation. According to historian Patrick either been granted a European education or were immense and unimaginable.
Manning, by 1850, Africa’s population was only
half of what it would have been had the slave
trade never taken place. This was compounded by
deaths caused by diseases brought in by European
imperialists such as syphilis, smallpox, typhus
and tuberculosis, to which Africans had little to no
immune resistance having never encountered such
illnesses before.
This depopulation and instability created a major
global imbalance in the ability of West Africa to
recover from the pilfering and plundering of its
population. Once a thriving economic centre, West
Africa was being stripped dry, and the profits were
setting Europe far ahead economically, where
before Europe had been on a similar footing, if not
even less economically developed. The African
economic model at the time was labour and
agriculture intensive, and required a large number
of people to work the land. It simply could not
thrive under so great a population loss, nor the
reallocation of resources away from agriculture and
towards slave raiding.
Evidence shows a relationship between areas A Gambian mural
in which greater numbers of people were taken depicting the slave trade

80
 Impact on Africa

And yet a major lasting impact is, of course,

the construction of Black peoples in the Western
imagination as inferior, backwards and worthy of
enslavement. Racism as we know it today certainly
did not begin with the slave trade: racialised
thinking and classing people on the bases of
physical characteristics has a long history. However,
the role of a racial characterisation of Black people
in justifying and sustaining the legality of slavery,
was crucial.
As the successful West African economic
landscape fell further and further into disrepair
as a result of all that was happening, Europeans
chose to interpret this as evidence of African
savagery, backwardness and an inability to
function successfully in contrast to the West. They
interpreted Europe’s enrichment from enslavement
and extraction as proof of their superiority, while
Africa remained outside of history and progress.
Over the years, it became natural to believe
A mural showing bartering
over the price of a slave in that Africa and its people have made no major
Ghana, West Africa contributions to history, no crowning achievements,
no role in shaping our modern world. It was
as slaves, and lower rates of economic and social suddenly saw the building of factories, forts and attributed to Africans’ innate nature, rather than the
development, according to typical outward or holding prisons and new languages spoken. A path that history took. This unjust representation
Western markers of development. For instance, region that once traded primarily overland was now may be the biggest impact of all.
lower literacy rates still exist in Nigeria and Ghana, part of growing sea routes and networks, and small And what of the emotional toll? The trauma and
where the slave trade was particularly prolific. villages became globally recognised ports. loss experienced by people living in constant fear
Other studies show that, ironically, areas of West Of course, we cannot say that 500 years’ worth for centuries is likely to have greatly negatively
Africa with particularly rugged and inaccessible of change in West Africa is attributable to the slave impacted the overall mental health of the region,
terrains today perform better economically than trade; change occurs as part of slow and complex diminishing productivity and motivation. This is
those that are open or coastal. Enclosed and remote processes in every society. Moreover, these impacts a trauma that will have been inherited through
inland areas were more difficult to raid for slaves, were not uniform. West Africa is a vast region, the generations. Studies and explorations of West
and thus had lower rates of depopulation as the almost as large as the US, and some places were African art and literature shows that the constant
terrain hindered trade and protected vulnerable largely uninvolved with Europeans. One reason the fear of kidnap, survivor’s guilt and the importance
communities. Interestingly, everywhere else in impact of the slave trade in West Africa has been placed on community and travelling in groups
the world, ‘rugged’ regions are generally more explored in so little depth compared to other places is still prevalent within the public consciousness
economically impoverished, but in Africa, the is the lack of reliable statistical evidence. Another of the region. The past endures and clues of this
phenomenon is undoubtedly linked in some part to reason is simple historical amnesia. Very few can be found in cultural forms, even if it is not
the history of slavery. people have thought it a worthy subject to address. preserved in written historical documents.
It was also easier to raid and kidnap slaves when
the weather was cooler, as enslaved people were
less likely to die of heatstroke, exhaustion or other
diseases, and less money had to be spent to keep
them alive. Colder areas were more likely to see
many people captured and sold. New data analysing
weather patterns at the peak of the slave trade show
that areas with colder weather during those years
are the poorest today. It seems that once again
depopulation due to the slave trade continues to
have a negative effect on modern African economies
even today.
African states became deeply dependent on
selling human beings and buying guns for survival.
Although Africa did not experience official or
direct colonial rule on the ground until the 1860s,
the slave trade can be seen as imperial rule by
commerce, taking its inceptions back to the 16th
century. The slow impoverishing of Africa in these
years paved a convenient way for the colonial
Images: Alamy

‘Scramble for Africa’ that was to follow after slavery

was finally abolished.
Coastal societies saw the greatest change, as
A 1772 map depicting the
previously quiet fishing and salt-producing villages West African ‘Slave Coast’

81
All images: © Alamy
 Beware the Mino

the
Who were the ‘Dahomey Amazon’ warriors
who struck fear into the hearts of men?

he Mino warriors were brave and ideal choice to serve as bodyguards because men

T ruthless. A formidable
all-female military regiment in the
Kingdom of Dahomey, West Africa
(modern-day Benin), these women
struck fear into the hearts of their enemies
and those who observed them.
There are a couple of different
were not permitted in the royal palace with the
king at night. The decision to train female soldiers
may have also been inspired by the Gbeto, the
female warriors who hunted elephants. Another
theory argues that the Mino was established during
Agaja’s war against the Oyo Empire, in which
his army contained women
stories regarding the founding of“Their training dressed as male warriors at
the kingdom, with one tradition the back.
claiming that it was founded was also However, oral history
around 1625 by Do-Aklin.
Likewise, there are several designed to suggests that Houegbadja’s
daughter Tassi Hangbe, who
theories about the origins of the
Mino warriors themselves, stories
expose them briefly ruled Dahomey after
the death of her twin brother
that have been passed down
either through oral history or
to death and King Akaba, may have created
the all-female unit before she
taken from the written sources of
contemporary European colonists.
to ensure that was deposed by Agaja. Clearly,
the origins of the Mino are
These Europeans referred to the they could disputed, but we do know that
Mino as the ‘Dahomey Amazons’, they were integrated into the
taking the name from the race kill without army by King Gezo, who ruled
of women warriors in Greek
mythology. However, the term hesitation” Dahomey from 1818 to 1858.
It was during his reign that
‘Mino’, the word for ‘our mothers’ around half of the kingdom’s
in their native Fon language, is armed forces were comprised
used to refer to these women today. of the Mino alone.
It is frequently claimed that the Mino was One of the reasons why women were likely
formed when women became bodyguards to either recruited as soldiers was because of the lack
King Houegbadja or to his younger son, King Agaja, of men available to join the army. Not only
sometime during the 17th century. Women were an had numerous men been lost in previous

83
Colonial

The Mino attacked the Egbas’

capital of Abeokuta in 1851

The French enter Abomey Left Mino warriors were renowned for
in November 1892 their bloodthirsty fearlessness in battle

“As ferocious as the Mino were, women used weapons such as machetes, clubs and
muskets. To build their endurance, trainee warriors
they were unable to match the would climb a wall covered in thorns over and over
again, until they could no longer feel the pain.
French in terms of weaponry and Their training was also designed to expose
them to death and to ensure that they could kill
sheer numbers” without hesitation. In a test designed to assess their
capacity for cold-blooded brutality, the recruits
had to lift prisoners of war, tied up and unable to
escape, above their heads and drop them from a
conflicts, but the economy of Dahomey relied soldiers for the Mino as teenagers. Many of height that would instantly result in their death.
heavily on the slave trade. Lots of men were sold them chose to join the regiment voluntarily but, In December 1889, French naval officer Jean
off as slaves to European traders, so it became sometimes, girls and women were sent to join the Bayol wrote an account of a teenage recruit
necessary to train women as soldiers to fill the gap. Mino by their fathers or even their husbands for undergoing a similar test, in which a prisoner sat
In fact, Queen Victoria sent Royal Navy Captain being too unruly or headstrong. And it was not just tied up in a basked was brought in front of her.
Frederick E Forbes to Dahomey twice, in 1849 women of the Fon who joined the Mino – female According to Bayol, she “walked jauntily up, swung
and 1850, in an attempt to persuade King Gezo to prisoners of war and girls who were seized during her sword three times with both hands, then
stop participating in the slave trade. Forbes was village raids were also trained. calmly cut the last flesh that attached the head to
ultimately unsuccessful, although he did write an As part of their training, the Mino took part the trunk… She then squeezed the blood off her
account of his time in Dahomey that provides one in a series of drills and weapons training – the weapon and swallowed it”.
of the insights we have into the Mino warriors. surviving bas-reliefs on the royal palaces in The Mino lived within the walls of the royal
Women were usually recruited to become Abomey, once Dahomey’s capital, show that the palace and were considered married to the
king. However, they were sworn to celibacy,
as pregnancy would have prevented them
from fighting. When the women travelled
outside of the palace, they were followed
A group of warriors by a slave girl who would ring a bell to
hunting elephants
warn people of their approach, so they
could avert their eyes. Men were not
supposed to look at the Mino and if
 Beware the Mino

they dared to touch one, they would be sentenced the Mino warriors were impaled in turn by was exiled to Martinique, bringing the Second
to death. French bayonets. Franco-Dahomean War to an official end.
The Mino comprised of different units, including As ferocious as the Mino were, they were unable The Mino was disbanded with the collapse
the riflewomen, the reapers, the archers, the to match the French in terms of weaponry and of Dahomey. Although the regiment ceased to
gunners and the huntresses, with the latter sheer numbers. The series of attacks by Dahomey exist, oral tradition suggests that some of the
inspired by the Gbeto. Each of these units had their failed and by October, Béhanzin was forced to women continued to secretly protect Agoli-Agbo,
own uniforms, battle songs and dances, which cede Cotonou to the French and accept Porto-Novo Béhanzin’s brother. He had been given the throne
they would also perform during parades for t as a French protectorate. Nevertheless, the king by the French in return for agreeing to Dahomey’s
he king. quickly began to re-arm his soldiers with modern surrender, remaining as king until France took
Although their military prowess is the focus of weapons with the expectation of confronting the direct control in 1900.
most attention, these women also had a political French again. The Mino being equipped with Even though the Mino came to an end over a
role too. They participated in the Grand Council Winchester rifles. century ago, interest in their lives has grown in
and debated policy, in particular speaking against Two years after the war ended, the Second recent years, as comparisons have been drawn
Dahomey’s continued involvement with the slave French-Dahomean War broke out when Dahomey between them and the Dora Milaje, the all-
trade. Ultimately, being a Mino warrior offered attacked villages in the Ouémé Valley, where the female bodyguards and warriors who serve the
these women a form of independence, something French had territorial claims. France declared character Black Panther, in the Marvel Comics.
that was not available to other, ordinary women in war and a series of battles ensued as their troops More importantly, however, the Mino traditions
the kingdom. moved closer to the capital of Abomey. The Mino – including their songs, dances and legends – are
Of course, the Mino participated in many battles. were on the frontline, and in the final battle at still being kept alive by their female descendants
For example, in 1727, during the reign of King Cana in November 1892 they fought the French today, ensuring that their legacy lives on.
Agaja, their involvement helped Dahomey conquer with everything they had. However, it was not
and annex the Kingdom of Whydah. They notably enough and after two days they were forced to
fought during the battle at Abeokuta against the withdraw, with Abomey falling to the French.
Egba in 1851, to capture people who could then be The fall of Abomey marked the end of the
sold as slaves. They were led by Seh-Dong-Hong- Kingdom of Dahomey, which was subsequently
Beh, who commanded an army consisting of incorporated into French West Africa. Béhanzin
6,000 Mino warriors. chose to burn all of the royal palaces, leaving them
These warrior women were determined to in ruins, before fleeing northwards. He finally
be better than the men and, devoted to their surrendered himself to the French in 1894 and
king, they would fight to the death rather than
accept defeat. Indeed, European sources claimed Mino warriors were
mostly recruited
that the Mino were a lot braver than their male as teenagers
counterparts, with Forbes stating, “what the males
do, the amazons will endeavour to surpass.”
The Mino proved this during the first Franco-
Dahomean War in 1890 and the Second Franco-
Dahomean War from 1892 to 1894. Africa was
carved up among the European powers and the
United States at the Conference of Berlin of 1884-
85, which excluded African leaders and their
people. The conference legitimised and formalised
the European colonisation of the African continent,
with France becoming the dominant colonial
Image source: wiki/Stanley B. Alpern,

power in West Africa.

France had already established commercial
Amazons of Black Sparta

treaties with King Gezo, which allowed them to

place traders and missionaries in Whydah and
the port of Cotonou. However, this partnership
began to turn sour when France gave the kingdom
of Porto-Novo, a Dahomean tributary, protection
against the British in 1863. King Glele, Gezo’s son
who succeeded him in 1858, resented French Photograph of a
Mino warrior from
involvement in Porto-Novo, as well as France’s around 1890
increasing claims to Cotonou.
Glele died in 1889 and he was succeeded by
his son, King Béhanzin, who believed that the
French were compromising his own sovereignty.
The situation reached a boiling point in March
1890, and the First Franco-Dahomean War began
when Behanzin ordered his army to attack the The Dora Milaje
French at Cotonou. The Mino warriors were able bodyguards in Marvel
film Black Panther (2018)
to enter the protected forts and engage the French
soldiers in hand-to-hand combat, reportedly
decapitating some of them. Meanwhile, some of

85
 Colonial

The Scramble
for Africa was
propagandised
to Europeans at
home as a heroic
adventure, full of
brave heroes and
mighty deeds

86
 The Scramble for Africa

A common tactic
of colonial powers
was to label their
imperial conquests as
“protectorates”. This
is the Ashanti Empire,
in modern-day Ghana,
being forced to declare
fealty to Britain
The technological advance of the railway
meant journeys into inland Africa, like
this one to Umtali in the then Rhodesia
(now Zimbabwe) were faster, carried a
higher volume of passengers, and didn’t
rely on horses, who were vulnerable to
the climate and terrain

The
for

When technical and medicinal advances meant a

European push inland became possible, colonial powers
doubled down on their conquest of the African continent
Written by April Madden

he African continent had already companies or European governments. This helter- European trade surplus, caused by technological

T experienced centuries of colonial

exploitation when Victorian
technologies started to really make
the world a smaller place. Until then,
the African interior had been comparatively
impervious to the march of imperial globalisation,
with most outposts of European empires
skelter grab for land and assets became known as
the Scramble for Africa.
European countries and companies were
chiefly interested in exploiting Africa’s vast
natural resources. Rubber and tin were essential
to Victorian industry, while diamonds and ivory
were highly covetable luxury goods. Tea, the
advances in production, preservation and
transportation. Fortunately for the producers,
Europeans abroad were all keen to purchase a
taste of home.
An even darker theme underlay the Scramble
for Africa. The spectre of war between imperial
Germany and the rest of Europe had been
concentrated around the more accessible social fuel of the British Empire, grew fast and on the horizon long before hostilities began.
coastline. European colonists were highly well in the climates of Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania Europe’s empires were all scoping out the tactical
susceptible to mosquito-borne malaria, which and Zimbabwe. Intensively farmed palm oil was advantages African territory could bring them,
was prevalent in the African interior, but the 19th used in everything from food to detergents to from alternative trade routes to India, to filling
century discovery and production of quinine from cosmetics. And not only were European capitalists up their war chests through colonial gain. When
Peru, which was used to prevent and treat the interested in taking resources out of Africa, they the Scramble For Africa began in 1870, around
disease, emboldened explorers like the famous were also interested in selling goods back to it, ten per cent of the African continent was under
Dr David Livingstone, and soon adventurers, both to the colonists on the ground and to the European control. By 1914, when it ended with the
prospectors and missionaries were all making people whose land they were exploiting. These beginning of the First World War, only Liberia and
their way inland, often sponsored by wealthy were typically food items for which there was a Ethiopia were still independent African nations.

87
 Rise of the Zulu Empire

How an exile used war and

political guile to become
Africa’s conquering king
Illustration by: Joe Cummings

88
 Shaka

Image source: Wellcome Collection

Zulu wedding ceremonies
continue to be a massive event

east of the continent. It was a region with a vast array

ho was the real Shaka Before Shaka

W kaSenzangakhona? Despot? Shaka was born into a region dominated by clans, of terrain and soil types, ideal for farming a variety of
Illegitimate usurper? large and small, working on a kind of tributary crops and grazing animals.
Moderniser? Skilled system. When his father, Senzangakhona, was As the new century began new chiefs began to
diplomat? Bloody tyrant? chief of the Zulu they were a lower level chiefdom emerge that would shape the next decades. Zwide
Any exploration of the history of the first king of situated in the valley of the White Mfolozi River, became the leader of the Ndwandwe around 1805
the Zulu has to inevitably come to the conclusion paying tribute to the Mthethwa to their southeast. and would reign for about 15 years before he fatally
that we’re not entirely sure. The history of Shaka The Mthethwa were one of three major chiefdoms crossed paths with Shaka, as we’ll explain later, and
has become so entwined with the motives of those to whom everyone else was paying tribute, the Dingiswayo became the chief of the Mthethwa in
who wished to make use of his tale. One source others being the Ngwane (later the Swazi) and the 1806, someone who would become integral to the
for the life of Shaka are notes taken by Western Ndwandwe. These three groups primarily all spoke life of the future Zulu king. Around the same time as
colonisers and traders, often looking to push the Nguni and they vied with each other through the Dingiswayo, Senzangakhona reached maturity and
agenda of a savage African king or hoping to boost late-18th century into the beginning of the 19th was able to take the seat of his father Jama as chief of
book sales through salacious accounts of atrocity century for control of the region nestled in the south- the Zulu (a regency was put in place run by his sister
after atrocity. Our other source is the oral history
of the people themselves, often recorded many Zulu warrior traditions
lasted for many years, as
years after the event and sometimes quite clearly
this 1868 image shows
coloured by the people who succeeded Shaka,
hoping to raise or diminish him depending on
their own agenda.
So, is there anything about the life of Shaka we
can be assured is true? Thankfully, yes. There’s
enough detail scattered through all of these
sources to see an image of a king emerge, albeit
one packed with caveats and requiring some
amount of scepticism. What we can certainly do
is deflate and explain some of the myths around
Shaka and, just as interestingly, explain why they
exist. Shaka has become an icon, used to this day
as a pillar of Zulu identity. His legend has value
to people and that in itself is worth examination.
Hopefully by the end of this you will have a better
© Getty Images

understanding of who Shaka really was and why

other depictions of him have existed for the last
200 years.

89
 Colonial

Relatively small homesteads with

extended family units like this
were the main mode of collective
living, with everyone helping out
with farming or hunting

We have no Mkabayi since their father had died in 1781). Society more widely remained driven by the
authoritative While the Zulu were a junior partner in the family unit, which typically involved a single
description of what Mthethwa confederacy, this new generation patriarch at its head, often with multiple wives. The
Shaka actually looked
like and most Western of leaders sought to bring in a number of homestead, or umuzi, would involve a single hut
depictions tend to get modernising changes to the society they structure for the head of the family with further
details wrong, such as
the size of this shield
inherited. Organising men and women into huts arcing on either side for each of the wives to
age regiments, or amabutho, is one element form a horseshoe shape. In the centre would be
that became common, essentially structuring a kraal, meaning an animal pen. Collectively the
people into work groups by age rather than family would be expected to meet the needs of
regionality. It also appears that the Mthethwa, everyone in the homestead, with women often
and by extension their tributary chiefdoms like farming the land and men typically hunting.
the Zulu, did away with the ritual circumcision Royal households were not much different,
of men to mark their transition to maturity adding military considerations into the mix. They
and marked this moment instead by use of recruited men from the age regiments and had
head rings. This appears to have been for very their own special groups dedicated to defending
practical reasons since the ceremony naturally their interests. When not fighting, however, they
involved adult men being out of action for several still had to help out with the crops and hunting
weeks as they recovered from the process (as like everyone else.
well as schooling elements of the ceremony that
happened beforehand) and they were entering a A mysterious birth
more modern and fast-paced world that required It was into this relatively fractious but structured
2x © Alamy

quick deployment of manpower. It’s worth noting world that Shaka was born to his father
here that some of these most significant changes Senzangakhona of the Zulu and mother Nandi, the
have sometimes been credited to the reign of daughter of the Langeni chief. The how and when
Shaka, but the evidence would suggest that of this rather pivotal event remains a matter of
the reforms were coming into effect long great debate. Most commonly, Shaka’s birth is said
before his time and that his contribution was to have been sometime in July 1787, but Dan Wylie
either to accelerate or expand upon them. in his work on Shaka estimates that something like

90
 Shaka

THE KING-
MAKING AUNT
Exploring the importance of Mkabayi
Having not taken a wife of his own, Shaka relied heavily on his
extended family, particularly the women, to run key parts of
his kingdom. His own mother, Nandi, was chief among these
figures for much of his life, but of near equal importance was
the sister of Senzangakhona and Shaka’s aunt, Mkabayi.
Mkabayi had acted as regent on behalf of Senzangakhona
when their father Jama had died, and it’s said she had even
found her father the wife that bore him his son in the first
place. Senzangakhona had still not reached the age of maturity
and so Mkabayi had to step in to maintain the continuity of
the family line. She and many of her sisters never married,
preferring to remain princesses among the Zulu people rather
than be married off to rival groups. In this position they had
more autonomy and power than they would have done as the
wife of a different chief.
While Nandi and Shaka were thought to be in exile, or at
least living away from the Zulu, it had been the sisters like
Mkabayi who had kept in touch and visited with the young
Shaka, which may have helped build a strong bond between
them. When Senzangakhona passed away, it was notable
that Mkabayi gave her blessing to Shaka to return and usurp
the chosen heir, helping to smooth things over with the
people beforehand.
Mkabayi was no less important to Shaka’s downfall,
however. After the death of Nandi and military setbacks,
she plotted with his brothers Dingane and Mhlangana to
2x © Getty Images

assassinate him. She then helped to orchestrate Dingane

One of Shaka’s nephews, take the throne by plotting against Mhlangana.
Utimuni, depicted in 1849

1781 makes as much sense. That would have made story is that Nandi was an isingodosi, or betrothed
Shaka about 35 when he finally took over as chief maiden, to Senzangakhona and while sex between
of the Zulus. The how is the more complex element. them was prohibited before he came of age, they
Claims over Shaka’s legitimacy are integral to his were permitted to be intimate with one another. The Zulu were a highly
claim to the Zulu leadership and debunking that The pregnancy therefore broke taboo, but merely patriarchal people,
but women could still
hold a lot of power and
political influence

“This new generation of leaders sought

to bring in a number of modernising
changes to the society they inherited”

claim became important to many who followed meant that the rites needed to be rushed through
him, both inside and outside the kingdom. and ultimately they did marry. It should also be
The most popular story is that Shaka was remembered that Nandi was not Senzangakhona’s
conceived out of wedlock, to the great shame of only wife. In fact he had 15 of them and at least
both Senzangakhona and Nandi. The pregnancy 18 sons between them in his lifetime. In any
was hidden and blamed on itshati (a type of case, Shaka’s legitimacy carried with it enough
intestinal bug) and this is possibly where the name ambiguity to allow others to fill in the gaps
‘Shaka’ came from. Mother and child were exiled to as they wished.
assuage the shame and the couple never married. As for the exile portion of the story,
However, the evidence doesn’t really support that comes up again and again, even if
this tale. For a start, Nandi and Senzangakhona the legitimacy question is put to rest. Some
had at least two children together, the other being degree of travel between family units
Shaka’s sister Nomcoba. So, the more believable seems reasonable to expect and given the

91
 Colonial

long distances and lack of any modern transport Photos from The ox-hide
methods, such trips might well cover long periods years after shields of the
of time. Still, Nandi is said to have been a fiery and Shaka’s reign Zulu have
show how the become an
strong-willed woman who had no fear of standing traditional iconic symbol
up to her husband even as one of the lesser wives ceremonies and of the people
rights continued
and it’s possible that Shaka’s parents clashed to be integral to
frequently. Still, when he was old enough Shaka the kingdom
was initiated into his father’s key age regiment, the
iWombe ibutho, so he wasn’t completely ostracised
when growing up.
We have records of Nandi and her son leaving
to live with other groups on multiple occasions,
whether her own Langeni or others, and being
visited by extended family. Eventually Shaka found
himself with the Mthethwa, the chiefdom to whom
Senzangakhona, along with around 30 other clans,
paid tribute.

The forging of Shaka

2x Image source: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

It’s clear that it was under the tutorship of

Dingiswayo that Shaka grew and learned most of
what would serve him in taking the Zulu chiefdom
and turning it into a kingdom – perhaps arguably
even an empire. Shaka is said to have risen quickly
through the ranks of the military thanks to his
intelligence and initiative to become a respected
general in the Mthethwa army, helping to win
many victories for his chief. He was even given the
honorary name, ‘uSitshaka ka sitshayeki’ meaning
‘he who beats but is not beaten’.
Dingiswayo himself was one of the more
progressive and reforming chiefs of the period, and
it’s from him that a few key innovations can be

Farewell’s arrival and traced back that Shaka took on in later years. For to take his place and thanks to the backing of
establishment of Port Natal instance, he moved further towards age regiments Dingiswayo of the more powerful Mthethwa, that
offered Shaka the trade link
to Europe that he hoped and away from regional work groups than other wasn’t likely to be a problem. A plot appears to
would secure his legacy chiefs, which Shaka expanded. He also took have been hatched in concert with another son of
tighter control of things like marriage, mandating Senzangakhona named Ngwadi. Having brought
when the men of his amabutho could take a Sigujana into his confidence Ngwadi killed his half-
wife. Marriage generally was an important tool brother while he bathed in the river and then sent
in his arsenal as he also made strategic marriage word to Shaka to return to their father’s capital city
arrangements with rivals, such as with his greatest of Siklebheni.
enemy Zwade of the Ndwandwe, whose sister he
took as a bride. From chief to king
On the whole the leadership of Dingiswayo What’s the difference between a chief and a
looks fairly similar to that of Shaka, with a mix of king? Possibly it’s somewhat semantic, but the
diplomacy, innovative thinking and occasionally key difference between the role played by Shaka
brutal violence and single-mindedness. In coming and that played by his father is that Shaka ended
to the throne he had killed his own brother and up at the head of the chiefdom pyramid and
this is another lesson Shaka seems to have taken arranged what might previously have been a loose
on board. He would also have taken into account confederacy into a much more organised state. And
the way in which placing the right ally at the he wasted no time in asserting his position even
head of a chiefdom could help maintain your own when he was still technically working under the
power, as Dingiswayo did when he backed Shaka umbrella of the Mthethwa.
to claim the Zulu chiefdom. Shaka moved closer towards having a full-time
Senzangakhona fell ill and died in 1816, leaving standing military force, making it the very centre
his heir Sigujana to take over the Zulu. There of his political and social structure. They would be
are many tales from the region that tell of Shaka put through regular military training and would
bewitching or poisoning his father, but the details be sent out on regular raids to intimidate unruly
are unclear on this point. Sigujana was only a little tribes and take cattle from them, maintaining a
© Alamy

younger than Shaka, but belonged to his father’s base level of fear of the wrath of their king. These
senior and eighth wife Bhibhi. As his first-born warriors would live in their own barracks and a
son, however, Shaka would have a strong claim strict prohibition on marriage without the king’s

92
 Shaka

Family units were the heart of the authority remained. Shaka would personally killed by longtime rival, Zwide of the Ndwandwe.
Zulu state and all the structure never take a wife, which in turn has fuelled much This event would likely have been a massive blow,
came from small household speculation about his sexuality or impotence, but not least since Dingiswayo had backed his claim
communities, often with a single
patriarch and multiple wives the fact remains that his homestead was full of with the Zulu and been an important influence
women and there’s evidence he fathered children. on him going into adulthood. Shaka refused to
This in turn led to stories that he would kill yield to Zwide and stood his ground, giving Shaka
women who became pregnant by him, but again the first big chance to prove his leadership to his
such stories may have been politically motivated, own people and to implement some of his more
so it’s unclear. profound tactical changes.
Women generally were a massive part of Shaka’s Zwide is thought to have attacked with perhaps
political structure in the years to come. Nandi, more than twice as many men as Shaka was able

“The leadership of Dingiswayo looks

fairly similar to that of Shaka, with a
mix of diplomacy and brutal violence”
his mother, was now queen mother and as such to muster, and yet the smaller chiefdom managed
in charge of all palace household affairs, making to beat back their enemy on several occasions,
her very influential. Much against her earlier each time retreating back to safer land, rebuilding
reputation, she is said to have been a calming voice and training. A key tactical change actually came
in the ear of the young leader. The other women in about through a change in primary weapons for
Image source: New York Public Library

his family, such as his aunts and the many other the Zulu. At this point throwing spears, or assegai,
wives of his father, would go on to positions as were common, but Shaka moved his men to using
the heads of other chiefdoms, acting as political a two-foot, long-bladed single-handed spear called
emissaries to be a symbol of his power and control. an iklwa. Combined with their famous isihlangu
However, it was early in Shaka’s time as chief shields, Zulu warriors would look to knock the
that his benefactor Dingiswayo was captured and enemy off balance with a shield strike and then

THE ZULU SUCCESSORS How the house of Senzangakhona continued

Image sources: wiki/Allen Francis Gardiner, wiki/The Kings of the Zulu, wiki/Frances Ellen Colenso

DINGANE MPANDE CETSHWAYO

Reign: 1828-1840 Reign: 1840-1872 Reign: 1873-1879
The son of Senzangakhona’s sixth wife and With the support of the Boers, Mpande Son of Mpande and grandson of
half-brother of Shaka conspired to kill the looked to overthrow his brother in 1840. Senzangakhona, Cetshwayo was the last
Zulu king and take his place with the help He was the son of Senzangakhona’s ninth king of an independent Zulu kingdom. He
of some of his other half-brothers. Without wife and may have been persuaded to seek defeated and killed his younger brother
Shaka in charge, however, some of the small the throne against his better judgement. Mbuyazi, who was his father’s favourite, to
communities on the outer edges of the As it was his son, Cetshwayo, would end up secure his path to the throne in 1856 and was
kingdom began breaking away. Dingane was doing most of the heavy lifting of ruling after more or less in charge from that point. His
ultimately killed by his brother Mpande, who he defeated his brother to gain supremacy reign ended with defeat in the Anglo-Zulu
then took over. within the family. War, after which he was exiled.

93
Colonial

stab them in the midriff. It was a vicious method

of fighting, and in concert with their bull-horn “Shaka was not averse to doing much
formation that would encircle the enemy, it’s easy
to see why Shaka built a reputation as a particularly
as his mentor had done for him and
ruthless and bloody military leader.
It’s interesting to note here that despite this
had chiefs assassinated in favour of
effective fighting style there was seen to be a cost
to the warriors in fighting this way and it was
more agreeable heirs”
important for returning soldiers to undergo ancient
cleansing traditions to rid them of an umnyama, or
dark omen. Ceremonies for this cleansing could last but not all, turned to Shaka and the Zulu, who now over the Qwabe at Hlokohloko Ridge, capturing
four days before they could finally meet with the inherited much of the Mthethwa region as theirs Phakathwayo and executing him. The rest of the
king, at which time the battle would be reviewed as well. Qwabe submitted to Shaka and Phakathwayo’s half-
and honours handed out. Poor performance or As mentioned earlier, some of these chiefdoms brother Nqetho was brought out of exile to take
cowardice could be punished by execution. were given overseers in the form of members of his place. But the Qwabe would remain a threat,
When Zwide’s army attacked on their third the royal family, and others might be allowed a whether real or imagined, since Shaka would blame
assault in 1819 Shaka’s forces retreated into the certain amount of autonomy (especially if they them for an assassination attempt on him some
Nkandla mountains, using the difficult terrain to were on the outskirts of Zulu territory). But Shaka years later.
even out the fight against the superior Ndwandwe was not averse to doing much as his mentor had
numbers. Having routed them, Shaka moved his done for him and had chiefs assassinated in favour Trade and tragedy
men back across the Black Mfolozi in a surprise of more agreeable heirs to their lands. With his greatest adversaries dead or in retreat,
advance into Zwide’s territory and forced them into A good example of this is the Qwabe, who were Shaka went about building his kingdom into
retreat. Any defeat for a ruler in this region and another large power on the coast and seemed to something that would last for the next 60 years.
era could be seen as delegitimising their right to be growing again. It’s possible Shaka and their As tight central control was practically impossible,
rule. Defeat brought great shame upon Zwide and chief Phakathwayo had known each other in their Shaka relied on regular raids and intimidation
some of the smaller chiefdoms who had formerly youth and fought often, building a substantial to maintain order, as well as strategic placing of
paid tribute to him began breaking away. Some, enmity. Either way, the Zulu were victorious family. To avoid the fate of Zwide he also needed to

The Anglo-Zulu War brought

Zulu independence to an end
 Shaka

keep winning victories and he apparently worried The ferocity and

about seeming old, plucking out the white hairs speed of Zulu warriors
that emerged on his head. A defeat of Zulu forces seems to have been
key to their victories,
by the Mpondo in 1824 was the first sign that as well as their use of
Shaka’s rule might crack. stabbing spears
Still, matters of justice were decided by Shaka,
not local chiefs, as were diplomatic relations with
those outside the Nguni- speaking world. When
traders landed on Zulu land in a bay they named
Port Natal, Shaka saw the opportunity he’d been
waiting for. The Cape Colony to the south had
been established by the British in 1814 and he had
long wished to establish a trade route with them,
but was blocked by the distance and rival tribes in
his way. The arrival of Lieutenant Francis George
Farewell and Henry Francis Flynn to his kingdom
in June 1824 could be the diplomatic opening he
needed to enrich his kingdom far beyond anything
his forebears had achieved.
Shaka granted them an audience, allowed them
the right to stay in the bay, and almost like another
small chiefdom they remained under his ultimate
rule. Still, the situation was unsettled and later
that year there was an attempt on Shaka’s life by
assassins. While he blamed the Qwabe, it’s said

2x © Getty Images
that he suspected his half-brothers Dingane and
Mhlangana. He sent forces to crush any embers

THE BEAST’S HORNS

Analysing the famous Zulu battle formation
One Zulu battle tactic was the use of a formation little like the head of a bull, and with cattle being
known as the impondo zankomo, or The Beast’s so integral to Zulu culture you might guess it was
Horns, sometimes also referred to popularly as symbolic more than practical – but there was
the Bull’s Horns formation. The structure looks a much more to it.

1. CENTRAL FORCE
The isifuba was the ‘chest’ of the
beast and would charge at the
enemy directly and with great
ferocity, hoping to knock them off
balance and get them on their heels.

2. FLANKING
The izimpondo were the ‘horns’
of the manoeuvre and they flanked 1
the enemy on both sides, rushing
out from the middle and hoping to 2 2
encircle them.

3. SUPPORT
The umava, or the ‘loins’, were the
reserve force, leaping forward to 3
cover the fallen in the front. They
might even start facing away from
the enemy to dissuade anyone
from moving too soon.

95
 Colonial

A ZULU WARRIOR
of Qwabe resistance and chase down possible
suspects. He even took the step of moving his
capital into Qwabe territory to stamp his authority
What made them unique? HEADDRESS on them. Meanwhile, the Ndwandwe were building
Zulu regiments in strength once again under the leadership of
wore distinguishing
headdresses so their
Zwide’s son, Sikhunyana. Shaka personally led
commanders could the attack in October 1826, backed by some of
orchestrate battles the white settlers, and achieved a comprehensive
from a distance. victory, followed by the slaughter
of many of the civilians. The
Ndwandwe would not rise
again, with the survivors
swearing allegiance to the
Zulu or scattering to the
ISIHLANGU safety of other chiefdoms.
A Zulu war shield was made Shaka hoped that trade
from cowhide, and when through Port Natal and possibly the
beaten with a spear made
a loud intimidating noise.
introduction of firearms into his army
would prove to be the decisive path
IKLWA to more sustainable power. In 1827 he
Equipped with
a pointed blade,
chose James Saunders King, the leader
this spear was of a group that had shipwrecked in 1825,
used to stab to lead his embassy to the Cape Colony.
enemies from In the meantime, though, his mother
behind the large
shield. A longer Nandi died.
throwing spear The downfall of Shaka really starts to
called an assegai accelerate from here and we can be fairly
was also utilised.
confident of this because the stories about
his behaviour, genuine or not, become more

Today the
MODERN symbols and
FIREARMS customs of
Shaka wasn’t the Zulu,
averse to using many of
firearms, but which Shaka
helped to
during his reign
establish, are
they were mostly an important
useful for shock part of South
value and sowing African
chaos. They were culture
used a little more
in later years.

COWHIDE
The cowhide
used to make the
shields was made
extra durable by
drying it in the
sun, burying it
under manure
and then hitting
STAMINA it with rocks.
With no supply train or heavy
armour, Zulu forces could cover
over 30 kilometres in a day. Shaka
is thought to have had them run
barefoot rather than in sandals to
2x © Getty Images

improve their speed.

96
 Shaka

“It was suggested by leaders that Mhlangana were plotting against him and set
aside their rivalry to succeed Shaka to first depose
succeeded shaka that he killed his him. Shaka’s aunt, Mkabayi, who had helped his
ascension, now backed this coup as well, perhaps
mother Nandi himself, perhaps in a rage” blaming Shaka for the death of Nandi or even being
the creator of that legend. They were also backed
by one of his advisors, Mbopha.
On 23 or 24 September 1828 Shaka was killed
by his brothers as he sat in his personal quarters.
and more extreme. It was suggested by leaders stage of mourning required a war to cast out the Mbopha created a distraction, scattering the many
that succeeded him that he killed Nandi himself, umnyama and they were the perhaps inopportune women and attendants around the king, and then
perhaps in a rage that she had hidden a son he had targets. However, a second embassy was arranged one or all of the three men, although it’s unclear
fathered, but we do know that a period of mourning in September, this time led by members of the how it played out exactly, stabbed him. It’s said that
was established and he directed his rage at the original traders and a man named John Cane. Alas, his last words were, “What is the matter my father’s
Qwabe once again. Further stories claim he ordered while Cane would prove successful and a treaty children?” Ultimately Dingane would emerge as
all pregnant women and their husbands to be was prepared, Shaka would be assassinated before king, turning on Mhlangana as well.
killed, but it does seem his chief advisor Ngomane it could arrive. So we come back to the question of who was
kaMqomboli forbade harvesting or milking for a the real Shaka kaSenzangakhona? Even to this
year, which was a rather impractical measure. The last days day the Zulu nation is said to have been ‘born
The trader and explorer Nathaniel Isaacs tells us Shaka ordered another campaign, this time out of Shaka’s spear’ and that description seems
that Shaka began to see things were getting out of heading north against the Gaza kingdom. Already accurate. War and bloodshed were never far from
hand in the wake of Nandi’s death and doubled his an unpopular move so soon after a campaign this warrior-king’s thoughts, but he may not have
efforts to secure a partnership with the British. heading south, it proved disastrous, with his army been the crazed murderer that later tales made him
James King’s embassy in early 1828 failed as decimated by malaria and dysentery before they out to be. He was capable of incredible cruelty and
he tried to convince the British to take control of even reached the enemy. Forced to withdraw, violence, but it would be fair to say no kingdoms in
Port Natal, circumventing Shaka’s authority, and what could have been a bolstering victory became history have been built on anything less. The very
this simply confused the matter. Shaka’s attack a humiliation and was all that was needed for fact that he is surrounded by so much myth makes
on the Mpondo immediately to the colony’s north Shaka’s enemies to see an opening. Much as him all the more intriguing and the nation he left
likely didn’t ease the growing tensions. The final he had suspected, his brothers Dingane and behind so unique.

The 1986 TV series Shaka Zulu,

starring Henry Cele in the title role,
is one of the most iconic depictions
of the Zulu king, although not
necessarily the most accurate

97
100Haile Selassie 106 Mandela’s Revolution
The Ethiopian emperor who became How one iconic ANC activist went from
a religious icon political prisoner to president

102 Apartheid 118 Africa’s Forgotten War

South Africa’s policy of racial segregation The conflict between Ethiopia and Eritrea

104 The Year of Africa 124 South Sudan’s

How 1960 transformed the continent with Brutal Birth
independence and democracy movements The beginnings of the wor;d’s youngest nation 100

118
106

124

“Mandela hadn’t
had a photo
taken in 27
years and this
added to his
legend”
 Modern

Haile
Selassie The Global
Rastafarian
Movement
The creation of the Rastafarian faith was
spearheaded by activist, businessman
Under Emperor Haile Selassie’s leadership, and pan-African scholar Marcus Garvey.
Garvey once prophesied: “Look to Africa
Ethiopia rose to international prominence, and where a Black king shall be crowned,
he shall be the Redeemer.” That man
he became a god to men in the process was Emperor Haile Selassie, also known
as Ras Tafari Makonnen. Notably, the
religious movement that spread across
the Caribbean and influenced pop
culture hinged on the idea of a Black
he legend of the last emperor nation. He was also considered to be unreliable

T
king being the reincarnated messiah and
of Ethiopia is one shrouded in and a poor leader. For about three years, the God on Earth.
mystery and religious mysticism, Christian majority worked to depose him. The All emperors of Ethiopia were believed
that elevated him to a status greater throne was essentially emptied, leaving Zauditu, to be descendants of the Israelite King
than a mere man or ruler. Before Menelik’s daughter, to serve as empress in 1917. Solomon, and Abyssinian Queen Sheba.
he was named Haile Selassie, he was known Tafari Makonnen was named heir apparent. On a visit to Israel, Solomon and Sheba
as Tafari Makonnen. He was born in a hut on Zauditu died on 2 April 1930, and Makonnen fell in love during what was meant to
the outskirts of the country on 23 July 1892, in was crowned emperor under the regnal name be a diplomatic meeting of two ancient
Ejersa Goro. Makonnen was the great-grandson Haile Selassie (‘Might of the Trinity’) seven leaders of states. Sheba returned to
of former ruler Sahle Selassie of Shewa. His months later. In terms of politics, he was far Abyssinia (now Ethiopia) with a child
father Ras (Prince) Makonnen was a senior more progressive than Zauditu. Makonnen that would lead to a divine line of future
adviser to Emperor Menelik II. ushered in a new, modern age in Ethiopia by kings and queens.
Originally, Tafari Makonnen was not the primarily attempting to gain international For many Rastas, Ethiopia was seen
next in line to succeed the Ethiopian throne. recognition from foreign powers. He worked as a religious paradise. The hope was to
Menelik II’s heir was his grandson Lij Iyasu. In tirelessly to gain admission to the League return and escape the ‘hell’ that was the
1913, Menelik died, leaving the throne and the of Nations despite not ending slavery in the Caribbean. Terms like ‘Lord of Lords’,
country in disarray. Seen as an outsider of the country – a League requirement. ‘King of Kings’, and ‘Conquering Lion of
Ethiopian monoculture and national religious Under his rule, the new emperor expanded the tribe of Judah’ were synonymous
zeal, his grandson was not very popular. For one, the rights of citizens by spearheading the with Haile Selassie. Notably, the Emperor
Lij Iyasu was a Muslim in a majority Christian creation of Ethiopia’s first modern constitution did not publicly acknowledge the faith,
but the new world religion is a pop-
Queen Elizabeth II with culture phenomenon.
Selassie at Tissisat Falls during
a royal visit to Ethiopia, 1965

Crowds of Rastafarians await the arrival of

Haile Selassie in Kingston, Jamaica, 1966

100
 Haile Selassie

on 16 July 1931. But in order to do this, he had

to challenge some of the cultural and political
norms in Ethiopian society. Throughout his
reign, Selassie was constantly challenged by
nobles and other high-ranking rivals. The
constitution, in effect, gradually decreased the
traditional power of the nobility.
Selassie’s leadership pushed for the country’s
modernisation – factories, cars, and more
technological advances – because he believed
that if Ethiopia did not do so, it would succumb
to European imperialism and colonialism. “We
need European progress only because we are
surrounded by it,” he said. “That is at once a
benefit and a misfortune.”
This proved to be true. The 1930s were a
time of political progress and darkness, as the
fascist Italian army under Benito Mussolini
began its invasion into Ethiopia. Mussolini saw
it as a chance to avenge the Italian defeat in the
war of 1895-96, and the conquest of Ethiopia
would provide a bridge between Italy and its
Somaliland possessions. The invasion began in
December 1934, and in the war that followed,
Ethiopia’s forces were outmatched by Italy’s air
force and superior weaponry. In 1936, Mussolini
declared an ‘Italian Empire’ and withdrew from
the League of Nations.
After two years of fighting, Selassie was forced
into exile and left with no choice but to seek
the aid of the League of Nations in Geneva. He
managed to build an international coalition and
alliance with the British to launch a counter-
invasion. Together, they inspired insurgents to
rebel as forces liberated the country. By May
1941, the Italians were defeated. He said of the
invasion: “Throughout history, it has been the
inaction of those who could have acted; the
indifference of those who should have known
better; the silence of the voice of justice when it
mattered most; that has made it possible for evil
to triumph.”
Near the end of his reign, Selassie’s popularity
began to dwindle. Nobles were losing power
under his new constitution created in 1955.
While slavery was officially abolished in 1942,
the quality of life for many was still poor.
By the 1960s and 1970s, there was rising
unemployment and administrative failures,
leading to the rise of a new communist regime
called the Derg. Selassie was deposed on 12
September 1974 and imprisoned. He died the
following year, supposedly of respiratory failure,
but it was later discovered to be an assassination
ordered by the new leadership.
Selassie’s legacy is a complicated one. He was
one of the founding members of the African
Union. He put Ethiopia on the world stage and
managed to create political stability for decades.
However, his rule was one of pain too. Human
rights violations were common and there were
Emperor Haile Selassie is a
descendant of Menelik I of tendencies towards megalomania. The emperor
© Getty

Ethiopia, the alleged son of the was one of the world’s most interesting leaders –
Biblical King Solomon of Israel
for better or worse.

101
 Modern

Everywhere from
shops and schools
to outdoor spaces
was segregated in
apartheid South
Africa, with signs
such as this common

102
 Apartheid

South Africa’s policy of racial segregation made it an

outcast on the world stage until the 1990s
Written by April Madden

n the 1980s, South Africa was a pariah Whites were at the top of the social food little to no healthcare or entertainment. People

I state. Vilified in the global media and

with protests a regular occurance
outside many of its embassies, its
government and people were the
subject of trade embargoes from countries
around the world, with the sale of everything
from guns to well-known brands forbidden to
chain, followed by the Indian immigrants
and their families who had been so vital to
South Africa’s industrialisation. Those who
were called ‘Coloureds’ were next – this wide
grouping encompassed everyone from those
of mixed race to a range of non-white, non-
African nationalities. At the bottom of the pile,
were forbidden to mix, to make friends, or to
form romantic or sexual relationships outside
of their racial group.
Under increasing pressure from the
international community, the South African
government finally began to discuss
dismantling apartheid with the predominantly
the embattled nation. The reason was South disenfranchised and dispossessed, were Black Black African National Congress party
Africa’s racist authoritarian policy of apartheid. people. in 1987. In 1990, one of the ANC’s most
Apartheid was enacted in 1948, at a time Apartheid was divided into two kinds: petty, prominent activists, Nelson Mandela, was
when other countries that had employed which governed public spaces like shops, freed from prison, and in 1991 South Africa
segregationist policies were beginning to beaches, and social settings; and grand, which finally repealed apartheid legislation.
rethink them in the wake of World War codified the kind of job you could get or Today South Africa has a democratically
II. The USA, which had begun its process house you could live in based on your race. In elected government, which since the 1990s
of desegregation in the 1950s, was one of practice, it meant that white people had access has been dominated by the ANC. The last
South Africa’s keenest critics, despite having to the best schools, jobs, goods, healthcare, white president of South Africa was FW de
only fully ended its own racial separation neighbourhoods and leisure spaces, while Klerk, under whose presidency apartheid
policies in 1964. Under apartheid, the rights Black people lived in poverty, with poor was abolished, and who served as a deputy
and privileges of white people in South educational outcomes, few employment president to Nelson Mandela after his landslide
Africa were prioritised over those of others. opportunities other than menial service, and election win in 1994.

103
 Modern

The

of

1960 was a momentous year for the African continent,

as independence movements made a key push towards
liberation and equality
Written by April Madden

Barricades in the streets of

Algiers during the Algerian
War of Independence,
when the North African
country sought its freedom
from France, January 1960

104
 The Year of Africa

he wind of change is blowing through message of unification amongst the African million of our people cry out with one voice

T this continent. Whether we like

it or not, this growth of national
consciousness is a political fact.” So
said British prime minister Harold
Macmillan in his famous ‘Winds of Change’
speech to the South African parliament in Cape
Town in February 1960. It was actually the
diaspora at home and abroad. Its message was
to unite, and to rise up against the colonial
shackles that had oppressed Indigenous Africans
for so long. In 1960 that dream became a reality.
Guinean politician Caby Sory’s reaction to
Macmillan’s notorious speech was to say “Guns
and bayonets can no longer prevail in the face
of tremendous power. And what do they say?
We do not ask for death for our oppressors;
we do not pronounce wishes of ill-fate for our
slave-masters; we make an assertion of a just
and positive demand; our voice booms across
the oceans and mountains, over the hills and
valleys, in the desert places and through the vast
second time he’d made the speech, but here in of the strong conscience of the populations of expanse of mankind’s inhabitations, and it calls
apartheid South Africa it had much more impact Africa, which are determined to put an end to out for the freedom of Africa. Africa wants her
on the watching world than it did when he colonialism.” This opinion was echoed across freedom. Africa must be free.”
originally voiced this opinion in Accra, Ghana the continent. By the end of 1960 17 African The events of 1960 – which became known as
over a month before. In Cape Town it was met nations had achieved independence from France, the Year of Africa – changed how the continent
with stony silence from the authoritarian white Britain and Belgium. Ghanaian president Kwame and its nations were perceived around the
minority that governed the segregated nation. Nkrumah addressed the United Nations on the world for the better, and while many countries’
In Accra, however, it was an acknowledgement subject, saying that Africa didn’t seek to punish post-colonial struggles are still ongoing, the
of a movement that had begun to electrify the the nations that had colonised it, but that it did events of 1960 lit a beacon not just for Africa,
African continent. demand its freedom: but for oppressed peoples across the globe to
From country to country, the Pan-African “Africa does not seek vengeance. It is against strive towards equality and independence from
movement had swept across the land, with its her very nature to harbour malice. Over two colonialism. That journey continues today.

105
 Before he became a
prisoner of conscience
and a beloved Nobel
laureate, young Nelson
Mandela abandoned the
ideals of non-violence for
a guerilla revolution
106
 Mandela’s Revolution

n 26 May 1948, roughly one leader, ran on a platform of institutionalized

O million white South Africans

went to the polls to cast ballots
in parliamentary elections.
Their decision was between
the incumbent Union Party, which had thrust
South Africans into a wildly unpopular World
War II, and an upstart coalition of right-wing
apartheid or ‘apart-hood’, an aggressive credo
of racial segregation and white dominion. Jan
Smuts, the sitting prime minister, fumbled
over the ‘black question’, proposing a series of
murky ideas involving racial integration. White
Afrikaners, the descendants of Dutch-speaking
settlers who fought two bloody land wars
nationalists called the Reunited National Party with the British, were sick of supporting the
(NP). Although no blacks and few mixed-race Crown and saw the Union Party as itslackeys.
South Africans participated, the vote was a It’s no accident that apartheid is an Afrikaans
naked referendum on race. D F Malan, the NP word – racial segregation was key to Afrikaner

107
 Modern

The laws that

divided a country
Educational apartheid
Education under apartheid was
separate and wildly unequal. Under the 1953
Bantu Education Act, schools and universities
were labelled either ‘white’ or ‘tribal’ and all
were put under direct government control.
Spending on black schools was one-tenth of
that invested in white education, resulting in
hundreds of black schools without electricity
or running water. National Party leaders saw
no need to spend money on an education
that black South Africans would never use.
A 1974 law forcing black students to learn
Afrikaans as well as English was the spark
that ignited the 1976 Soweto Uprising that
resulted in hundreds of deaths, many of
them high school students.

Medical apartheid
From the early days of Dutch and
British colonial rule, there were two medical
systems in South Africa: one for whites and Nelson Mandela grabs some refreshments during
one for blacks. The segregation of hospitals a break in the Treason Trial in Pretoria, 1958
was so entrenched by 1948 that the
National Party didn’t need to write it into
law; it was already the policy at every public “Mandela was handsome and
medical facility in the country. When medical
facilities were finally integrated in 1990,
only 10 per cent of South Africa’s five million
unabashedly vain, insisting on the best
whites were using public hospitals compared
with 90 per cent of the country’s 27 million
suits from exclusive white tailors”
blacks. The result was a huge surplus of
beds in white hospitals and dangerous
overcrowding in black facilities.
nationalism and its fervent belief in a white state. townships of Johannesburg only seven years before
Sexual apartheid Apartheid won the day. The conservative NP those fateful 1948 elections, a college dropout
Fears surrounding sexual joined forces with the ultra-nationalist Afrikaner escaping an arranged marriage. After a brief stint
‘impurity’ have always fuelled the argument Party to take an eight-seat majority in parliament as a night watchman in the mines, Mandela the
for segregation of the races. In white South and Malan ascended to prime minister. Afrikaners country boy had the good fortune to meet Walter
Africa and elsewhere, the black man was saw the victory as nothing short of a declaration of Sisulu, a young real-estate agent who would grow
portrayed as a deviant sexual animal with
independence, from Britain and from blacks. “For to become one of Mandela’s greatest mentors,
an insatiable appetite for white women.
The South African parliament passed the
the first time since Union,” declared Malan, “South supporters and, ultimately, his prison companion.
Immorality Act in 1927, outlawing sexual Africa is our own.” By 1948, the oppression and Sisulu got Mandela a job as a clerk in a progressive
relations between whites and blacks with a subjugation of the black majority in South Africa Johannesburg law firm, one of the few that served
punishment of five years in jail for men and was already a centuries-old story, but the rise of both black and white clients and even introduced
four years for women. Mixed marriages were apartheid would further raise the stakes and set the him to his future wife, when Mandela met his
banned outright in 1949 and amendments scene for a confrontation between the government young cousin Evelyn; the couple married in 1944.
to the Immorality Act in 1950 and 1957
and those who believed that their country should It was in Sisulu’s home in the black suburb of
extended the prohibition to all coloured
races and increased the jail time to seven be for all – people like Nelson Mandela. Orlando where Mandela first met the outspoken
years for anyone convicted of ‘immoral or Mandela was speechless when he first heard Zulu activist Anton Lembede, who would recruit
indecent acts.’ the election results. The 29-year-old activist and the young idealist studying for a law degree and
law student had believed that South Africa was dreaming of his own practice to an organisation
on the cusp of a very different kind of change. In that would shape the rest of his life: the African
America, legal challenges to segregation were being National Congress (ANC).
organised and in India Ghandi and his followers The ANC was founded in 1912 to unify feuding
had used the tools of non-violent resistance and African tribes in the struggle for black rights
civil disobedience to overthrow centuries of British in the newly christened Union of South Africa.
rule. Even with the NP in power, Mandela refused Decades before apartheid, the small, underfunded
to assume the worst from the nationalist regime, organization fought racist laws like the Urban Areas
but this meant that he initially underestimated Act of 1923, which forced all black men to carry
the fervour with which the white power structure passbooks proving their identity. Failure to show
would clamp down on black freedoms. your pass when entering a white district meant
A young black man, in an act of resistance to Raised in a tiny Xhosa village in the remote arrest and expulsion from the city. Right from the
apartheid, rides a bus reserved for whites Transkei region, Mandela had arrived in the black formation of the ANC there was internal debate

108
 Mandela’s Revolution

over the most effective way to fight for change. groups were staging their own strikes and mass
In 1919, the ANC supported a militant strike of actions and recruiting some of the brightest young
70,000 miners north of Johannesburg, which was black activists to their cause. Mandela counted
ultimately crushed by police and armed white communists and Indians as friends, but fervently
civilians. In the aftermath, the ANC leadership opposed any attempt to muddy the clear nationalist
chose a more diplomatic path, but these efforts agenda of black Africans with ‘foreign’ ideologies.
were equally fruitless. Then came 1948 with Malan and his National
The ANC languished through much of the Party coalition sweeping to power on a platform of
Twenties and Thirties as a stuffy, ineffective old- harsh racial segregation. While the Youth League
boys club. Anton Lembede planned to change and ANC leaders quibbled over joining forces with
all of that. He recruited Mandela and Sisulu to rival opposition groups, the NP regime set out to
help him found a new youth wing of the ANC, legalise a far-reaching system of institutionalised
a radically rebooted civil-rights organisation apartheid. Malan and his ministers set the
dedicated to the ideals of African nationalism. groundwork for a nationwide system of racial
The group called for taking the fight to the classification. Every citizen would be categorised as
streets in mass demonstrations and coordinated white, black, coloured or Indian and required to live
acts of civil disobedience. ANC president Alfred and work in racially ‘pure’ sections of every city.
Xuma appreciated the enthusiasm of the young As the full scope and intensity of apartheid law
firebrands, but didn’t want to scare off his became clear, Mandela and his Youth Leaguers
supporters in white society as he was still trying to acted with a new urgency. Together, they drew Mandela was a staunch critic of apartheid and gave
play the political game. up plans for an ambitious Programme of Action. many speeches detailing its injustice
Despite some resistance from the ANC’s old Despite the Youth League’s resistance to foreign
guard, the ANC Youth League officially launched influence, the Programme of Action was inspired that passive resistance could apply the political
in April 1944 with Lembede as president and by passive resistance campaigns of the Indian and moral pressure to topple tyranny without
Mandela, Sisulu and Oliver Tambo – a brilliant Conference in 1946 and mine strikes organised by resporting to violence.
young teacher and organizer that Mandela knew the communists. The Programme of Action called The annual ANC conference in 1949 marked a
from his school days – on the executive committee. for an end to passive negotiation with the enemy dramatic shift from the ANC as an association of
Mandela wasn’t a leader yet, just a tall, whip-smart and the launch of an active resistance campaign old-guard liberalism into a radical revolutionary
activist swept up in the infectious personality of using tactics of non-violence, civil disobedience, machine. The Youth Leaguers staged a coup,
Lembede, the camaraderie of his friends, and the boycotts and strikes. Mandela and the Youth deposing the staid ANC president Xuma with a
justness of the cause. The Youth League grew in League were vehement about non-violence as the no-confidence vote and replacing him with a hand-
prominence and influence within the ANC, but only viable force of opposition. They knew that any picked successor. Mandela’s good friend Sisulu was
Mandela and his ideologue companions weren’t the attempt at armed insurgency would be brutally elected secretary-general of the revolutionised ANC
only organisation vying for the minds and hearts of crushed by the regime and pave the way for even and Tambo and other Youth Leaguers were called
oppressed South Africans. Communists and Indian harsher apartheid restrictions. Mandela believed to executive roles. Mandela would soon join them

Mozambique Bantustans
The National Party government viewed black and coloured
Botswana Thohoyandou South Africans as a political ‘problem.’ Apartheid created
separate rules for whites and non-whites governing
Giyani
every sphere of life, but the ultimate goal was to drive
Lebowakgomo all non-whites out of the country. In 1951, parliament
passed the Bantu Authorities Act to create eight new
KwaMhlangu
‘homelands’ called Bantustans where blacks could live in
Mmabatho Pretoria ‘freedom.’ Over the next three decades, 3.5 million people
were forced from their homes to live in impoverished
Johannesburg Swaziland rural communities ruled by hand-picked tribal chiefs. By
becoming citizens of a Bantustan, blacks gave up their
rights to live and work in South Africa proper.

Phuthaditjhaba Ulundi

Bophuthatswana Ciskei
Lesotho
South Afria Transkei Venda

Umtata Qwaqwa Gazankulu

KwaZulu KwaNdebele
Bisho
East London Lebowa KaNgwane
Cape Town Port Elizabeth Former Bantustan Current political
boundaries boundaries
Indian Ocean

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 Modern

on the ANC’s front lines. underground bars called shebeens and spoke a coalition of leading communist and Indian
Today’s public perception of Mandela is of a with a reserved formality fitting of his chiefly opposition groups. When Mandela spoke of South
patient peacemaker and master strategist who upbringing in the Transkei. But Mandela’s polite Africa’s future, he spoke of freedom for all “non-
wrought unthinkable concessions from his worst formality belied an innate fearlessness. The same European” people, not just the black majority.
enemies and displayed amazing forgiveness fearless streak that drew him into the boxing ring Mandela had high expectations for the Defiance
towards them. However, it is worth noting that the would suit Mandela well during the increasingly Campaign and offered to serve as Volunteer-in-
Mandela of the late Forties and early Fifties was heated opposition to the apartheid regime. Chief. In this role, he travelled for months across
a mere player in a much larger struggle for black In 1951, Mandela was elected national president black South Africa, knocking on doors and giving
freedom – but that’s not to say that he didn’t stand of the Youth League, his first taste of real power. speeches to rally the masses to powerful acts of
out. At 183 centimetres tall (6 feet), he towered At the ANC convention, Mandela’s friend Sisulu, civil disobedience. The plan was simple; to organise
over the other black intellectuals, jazz musicians, still the secretary-general, proposed a non-violent groups of people to peacefully violate minor
artists and activists packing the thriving cultural Defiance Campaign against the flood of oppressive apartheid laws like curfew, get arrested and clog
Johannesburg district of Orlando West. Mandela race laws. The ANC would demand that the the prisons with the cause. The Defiance Campaign
was handsome and unabashedly vain, insisting on government repeal certain laws that made black lasted six months, during which more than 8,000
the best suits from exclusive white tailors. He ran South Africans feel like prisoners in their own people were arrested and jailed for non-violent acts
daily and trained as a boxer to improve his strength country. When the regime refused, they would take of civil disobedience. Getting arrested became a
and physique, which became imposing. to the streets in mass actions of passive resistance badge of honour. Membership in the ANC exploded
Friends and associates from those early and civil disobedience. By this point, both Mandela and Mandela was awarded much of the credit for
days describe him as supremely confident and and the larger ANC had abandoned their fierce the best-organised and most effective campaign in
charming, but also somewhat distant and aloof. He African nationalism and embraced the idea of ANC history. His standing continued to grow.
didn’t drink with the other activists in the raucous a united front against apartheid that included However, the celebrations were short-lived.

The Sharpeville
Massacre
The passbook was one of the most hated signs of white
rule in apartheid-era South Africa, with all black people
required to carry and present the ID to authorities. The
ANC decided to hold a mass demonstration against the
pass on 31 March 1961, but a splinter group called the
Pan Africanist Congress (PAC) wanted to steal the ANC’s
thunder. The PAC hastily organized its own non-violent anti-
pass demonstration on 21 March, calling for supporters to
leave their passbooks at home and march on police stations
to be arrested en masse. The PAC was less influential than
the ANC, but organisers went door-to-door on the morning
of 21 March, conscripting people to join the cause. By
midday, a crowd of roughly 5,000 demonstrators marched
on the Sharpeville police station south of Johannesburg.

4. Tension rising 5. Massacre

The police grew Without warning, a
increasingly nervous. gunshot rang out, followed
Only weeks earlier, nine by a barrage of automatic
policemen were killed by weapons fire. Bodies
a mob of protestors near crumpled to the streets Key
Durban. Witnesses say that as the crowd fled. Police
no arrests or attempts at continued firing, shooting
Life lost
arrest were made. protestors in the back.
CS Gas The aftermath of the Sharpeville massacre
Barricade in which 69 people lost their lives

Police

1. Peaceful Aftermath
protest Sixty-nine people were killed at Sharpeville and 180
Singing protest songs,
the crowd of men,
wounded. Rather than admit fault, the government banned
2. Police line 3. Sabre jets women and children public gatherings, outlawed both the PAC and ANC, and
Instead, protestors Low-flying jets roared hoped to be arrested, passed a law that indemnified all police from civil lawsuits.
were met by a line of overhead in an attempt clogging up the jails and
grinding the machinery In 1996, Mandela chose Sharpeville as the site to announce
300 policemen and to disperse the crowd,
five armoured vehicles. but it pressed forward. of the city’s bustling life the signing of South Africa’s first democratic constitution,
to a grinding halt. and in 2012, work was completed on a memorial garden
that contains the names of all who lost their lives.

110
 Mandela’s Revolution
Key players in the battle
for South Africa

Oliver Tambo Daniel Francois Malan

Oliver Tambo was a lifelong leader of the ANC DF Malan was a leading figure in the
and one of Mandela’s most loyal partners in National Party’s rise to power in South
the fight against apartheid. With Mandela, African politics and a founding father of
Tambo helped found the ANC Youth League apartheid. An Afrikaner, Malan fought hard
and create the 1949 Programme of Action for the rights of white South Africans, both
that transformed the ANC from an isolated against the remnants of Dutch and British
political organisation into a radical liberation colonial rule and the black ‘natives.’ Malan
movement. Tambo and Mandela founded a was the first editor of Die Burger, the NP
law firm to advocate for the poor and were newspaper, and held high government
arrested countless times for staging protests posts when the party seized power in the
and breaking apartheid laws. After the 1960 Twenties. Malan defected to form his own
Sharpeville Massacre, Tambo and the ANC ‘purified’ nationalist party, campaigning on
went into exile, forging key partnerships with a platform of institutionalised apartheid
other African nations. Tambo headed for in 1948, winning 86 of the 150 seats in
London to mobilise opposition to apartheid. parliament. During his six and a half years
He lived there until he retuned to South as prime minister Malan passed numerous
Africa in 1991, to attend the first ANC national apartheid laws and when he eventually
conference inside South Africa in three retired in 1954, aged 80, apartheid had
decades, where he was elected National been firmly established and his successors
Chairperson. He died from a stroke in 1993. carried on down the same path.

Joe Slovo
The Jewish communist was
a close ally of Mandela and a
commanding officer in the Spear
of the Nation. Slovo first met
Mandela at Wits University,
when a young Mandela wanted
nothing to do with communists
and other ‘foreign’ influences.
The two ended up fierce allies
in the fight of ‘the people’
against the oppressive rule
Hendrik Verwoerd
Known as the chief architect of apartheid,
of apartheid. Both men were
HF Verwoerd served as minister of native
repeatedly arrested and banned affairs under Malan and eventually as the seventh
from public appearances and prime minister of South Africa. As minister of native
went underground to plan acts affairs, Verwoerd was instrumental in crafting the most
of sabotage against the regime. insidious apartheid laws, including the Population Registration
When Mandela was imprisoned, Act, the Group Areas Act and the Pass Laws Act. As prime minister,
Slovo went into exile in Britain he engineered the forced relocation of blacks in ‘homelands’ and the
and elsewhere, returning in 1990 reclassification of white South Africa as its own Republic. After surviving two
to negotiate an end to apartheid. bullets to the face in 1960, Verwoerd was fatally stabbed six years later.

111
 Modern

The National Party responded to the insolence from the streets to the courts. legal work, the police state was hugely effective
of the opposition with mass arrests — Mandela The stairs leading to their office were packed at smothering organised opposition. Isolated from
included — on charges of ‘communism’. Found day and night with poor Africans desperate for an other banned ANC leaders, Mandela feared an
guilty, the men received a suspended sentence advocate against unjust laws. As Mandela recounts all-out ban on its existence. The ANC, he decided,
of nine months of hard labour, which they never in his autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom:  “...it needed to have a plan to go underground. In 1953,
served. However, the government imposed strict was a crime to walk through a Whites Only door, Mandela crafted the so-called ‘M-Plan’ that called
bans on Mandela and 51 other ANC leaders. They a crime to ride a Whites Only bus, a crime to use for an underground network of secret ANC cells
were forbidden to attend meetings with more than a Whites Only drinking fountain, a crime to walk across South Africa. While the M-Plan was never
one person or even leave Johannesburg without on a Whites Only beach, a crime to be on the implemented, it set the groundwork for the not-too-
police permission. Meanwhile, parliament passed streets past eleven, a crime not to have a pass book distant day when Mandela and his freedom fighters
new laws against deliberate lawbreaking carrying and a crime to have the wrong signature in that would be driven into the shadows.
sentences of years in prison and even flogging – a book, a crime to be unemployed and a crime to When Malan’s National Party strengthened its
brutal punishment that illustrated just how archaic be employed in the wrong place, a crime to live in position in parliament in the 1953 general election
the white government was. certain places and a crime to have no place to live.” it became clear that the United Party were failing
The bans effectively sidelined Mandela from Mandela proved a capable and charismatic to propose a viable alternative to apartheid. The
active involvement in the ANC for the next two courthouse lawyer, while Tambo – the more ANC called for all enemies of apartheid, regardless
years and he fell back on his day job. Somehow, reserved and studious of the two – handled the of race or creed or political ideology, to convene in
while dedicating countless hours to the Youth legal research. With his tailored suits, imposing a massive Congress of the People. The mission of
League, Mandela managed to earn his law degree. physical stature and handsome grin, Mandela the this Congress was to produce a Freedom Charter,
In August 1952, together with Oliver Tambo, crusading lawyer earned a celebrity following in a ‘constitution’ that called for racial equality and
Mandela rented a cramped space in downtown black Johannesburg and an army of enemies in liberty in South Africa. The Congress met in 1955
Johannesburg and opened the law offices of the white establishment. He was routinely followed with Mandela in secret attendance.
Mandela & Tambo, the first and only black law by plainclothes government security officers and As the Freedom Charter was read in three
partnership in South Africa. The pair swapped barred from leaving Johannesburg for important languages, approving cries of “Afrika!” reverberated
fighting the cruelties and absurdities of apartheid cases. Despite Mandela and Tambo’s pioneering from the 3,000 delegates in attendance. However,

Mandela’s Prisons
1. Robben Island 1962-1982 3. Victor Verster Prison 1988-1990
For 18 excruciating years, Mandela slept on a thin straw Arriving at Pollsmoor, Mandela complained about the
mat on the concrete floor of a bare cell measuring 2.1 by prison’s damp conditions. By 1988 he was regularly
2.4 meters (7 by 8 feet). After the Rivonia trial, where suffering coughing fits and unexplained vomiting.
Mandela and nine ANC compatriots were found guilty Transferred to a whites-only hospital and housed on his
of sabotage, the men were flown to Robben Island, own floor, Mandela underwent an emergency operation
a remote prison for political enemies and common to remove dark fluid from his lungs, an early sign of
criminals since the mid-16th century. For the first year, tuberculosis. Fearing that Mandela would become a
Mandela was woken at 5:30am, given a bucket of cold worldwide martyr for the anti-apartheid cause if he was
water to wash, fed a breakfast of corn mush and led to die in prison and the news coverage it would cause,
into the courtyard, where he would spend all day — the authorities allowed him to recuperate in an expensive
with breaks for two more bowls of mush and grisly private hospital. Then, instead of shipping him back
meat — hammering stone into gravel. Conversation was to Pollsmoor, the regime transferred Mandela to the
forbidden, but Mandela was allowed to read law texts at low-security Victor Verster Prison outside Cape Town.
night before retiring under the perpetual The conditions were vastly different to those he had
blaze of a naked 40-watt bulb. In experienced since 1962. Mandela wasn’t confined to a
1965, Mandela began labouring in cell, but given one of the guard’s private cottages which
the lime quarry in the relentless afforded him much more space than he was used to. Still,
heat of summer and the bone- even though it had all the trappings of home, nothing
chilling cold of winter. The could hide the fact that his cottage was still a prison.
burning glare from the quarry Gratefully, it would be his last.
walls damaged his eyesight.

2. Pollsmoor Prison 1982-1988

Despite the backbreaking labour and wretched conditions
on Robben Island, Mandela was initially disappointed to be
transferred to the modern mainland fortress of Pollsmoor
Prison. During his 18 years on the island, Mandela had
formed deep friendships with fellow prisoners and guards
and missed the fresh air and camaraderie denied by the
steel doors and closed quarters of Pollsmoor. But there
were major improvements, too. Mandela was transferred to
Pollsmoor with three close friends, including Walter Sisulu,
and the four lived in a shared cell with a separate reading
room and even a television. Eventually, the men were
allowed to spend a portion of each day on a rooftop, where
Mandela convinced the warden to give him steel drums and
soil to plant a vegetable garden.

112
 Two men hide from the police in Johannesburg, 1955. If
caught without a pass, black citizens were subject to arrest

blacks entirely out of white South Africa. As this

“The government tried to paint move to further segregate the country played out,

the accused as communist plotters the Treason Trial involving Mandela and other
ANC leaders droned on and ideological rifts in
aiming to topple the regime through the ANC – never far from the surface – broke out
between those who saw black statehood as the
violent uprising” ultimate goal and those who believed in a free and
equal South Africa for all. This eventually led to
leading Africanist Robert Sobukwe splitting from
the ANC to form the Pan Africanist Congress (PAC)
in 1959. The rivalry between the two opposition
on the second day of meetings, armed Afrikaner raising money for their defence. groups would lead to the hasty organisation of
detectives raided the meeting hall and seized the Early in the Treason Trial, Mandela returned a PAC-sponsored protest march in Sharpeville, a
microphone, telling all in attendance that they were home from the courtroom to find that his personal Johannesburg suburb, in 1960, which ended in the
part of an investigation into acts of treason. Most in life was also in turmoil as Evelyn, his wife and police massacre of unarmed black protestors.
the ANC dismissed this as a publicity stunt and few mother of his two young children, had left. Soon The Sharpeville Massacre brought the
took the investigation seriously. However, early on after the divorce, Mandela fell in love with a simmering conflict between the NP regime and
a December morning in 1956 Mandela awoke to the charming 22-year-old social worker named Winnie the black opposition to a boiling point. Expecting
banging of fists on his door and was met with three Nomzamo Madikizela. Sixteen years younger than an outpouring of anger against the killings,
white policemen with a warrant for his arrest on Mandela, Winnie was exceptionally bright — the Verwoerd took the offensive, issuing a State of
charges of high treason. It wasn’t an isolated event. first black social worker hired at Baragwanath Emergency and detaining 18,000 people deemed
Over 155 ANC leaders and Congress attendees of all Hospital — and fascinated by fashion, not politics. enemies of the state. In the process, both the
races were rounded up, arrested, and held for two She was smitten by Mandela the handsome ANC and PAC were banned outright. If there was
weeks before the infamous Treason Trial began. lawyer, not Mandela the political firebrand. Winnie, ever a time to implement Mandela’s M-Plan and
Using more than 12,000 documents collected who also grew up in the Transkei, was in awe of go underground, this was it, but with 2,000 ANC
during a three-year investigation, including Mandela’s chiefly carriage. Despite objections from leaders among the detained, there was too much
snippets of public speeches and the text of the Winnie’s family the two married in 1958 during a confusion to do so.
Freedom Charter itself, the government tried to break in the Treason Trial. Unlike Evelyn, Winnie The Treason Trial finally ended in March 1961
paint the accused as communist plotters aiming would eventually be drawn deeply to politics and with all charges dropped against Mandela and
to topple the regime through violent uprising. earn her own fame and controversy. the 29 others accused. Faced with the constant
The trial was rife with incompetent testimony In 1958, Hendrik Verwoerd, minister of threat of bans, arrests and more trumped-up
and flimsy evidence, ultimately failing to convict native affairs under Malan and proud architect charges, Mandela decided that he would be most
Mandela and his co-defendants, but the criminal of apartheid, took over as prime minister and effective to the cause by going underground. After
proceedings stretched on for an interminable five parliament passed the Promotion of Bantu Self- a tearful goodbye with Winnie, he left his home
years and the ANC directed much of its efforts to Government Act in 1959, which aimed to drive and family and entered one of the darkest and

113
 Modern

Nelson Mandela emerges from the court

after his acquittal in the Treason Trial

“For Mandela, the struggle for a free on 16 December 1961. The ragtag group of MK foot
soldiers still knew very little about military tactics,
South Africa was no longer political: it but were anxious to make their presence felt. They
vowed not to kill anybody, if possible, but to target
was a matter of life and death” the most visible institutions of apartheid. In three
separate bombing attacks, MK targeted government
offices across the country. The only casualty was
one of the saboteurs, and the attacks did little to
strike fear in the white populace, but Mandela
most transformative phases of his life. Moving held a gun, let alone fired one. thought it was a tremendous success.
from safehouse to safehouse, Mandela put all of his Mandela’s new militancy reflected other parts The regime condemned the MK as communist
efforts into organising a peaceful, three-day stay-at- of the nation. By 1961, the PAC already had its own terrorists and Mandela the activist lawyer was
home strike and arranged secret meetings with the militant squad, as did the communists. Mandela now effectively an underground rebel commander.
South African press, who began to recognise him was adamant that the time was ripe to organize With a price on his head, he went deeper into
as the unofficial mouthpiece of the underground a militant wing of the ANC. Publicly, the ANC hiding, favouring a remote farm called Lilliesleaf
revolution. When the day of the strike arrived, would admit no ties to the guerilla organisation, in the Johannesburg suburb of Rivonia. When he
however, the regime responded with an impressive but the armed rebels would act in accordance travelled to meet ANC leaders and Winnie, he did
military show of force. Crushed, Mandela cancelled with ANC leadership to achieve strategic political so in disguise, sometimes as a chauffeur, a night
the strike after a single day. goals. Mandela the amateur military commander watchman or a mechanic. The swooning press
Soon after this the despondent 43-year-old was now in charge of the ANC’s fledgling sabotage dubbed him the ‘Black Pimpernel.’
was interviewed by a journalist and warned: “If squad, Umkhonto we Sizwe or ‘Spear of the Nation,’ With the blessing of the banned ANC leadership,
the government is to crush by force our non- best known by the initials MK. Mandela slipped out of South Africa in late 1961 to
violent demonstrations, we will have to seriously Mandela recruited Walter Sisulu and their white garner support for the armed struggle. He received
reconsider our tactics. In my mind, we are closing a communist friend Joe Slovo as joint commanders a hero’s welcome at the Pan-African Freedom
chapter on this question of non-violent policy.” of MK. The communists were crucial to the MK’s Conference in Ethiopia. In London, Tambo begged
For Mandela, the struggle for a free South Africa success, since many of them had fought in WWII Mandela to stay there or travel to America, but he
was no longer political; it was a matter of life and and had experience with guns and explosives. was insistent that he wanted to face his enemy
death. If the regime was going to respond to strikes Wolfie Kodesh, another white communist ally, head on. Mandela was as good as his word and
and protests with bayonets and machine guns, the remembers accompanying Mandela on their first returned to Africa to attend an intensive six-
opposition had a simple choice: take arms or die. bomb test. Deep inside a Johannesburg brickworks, month military training camp in Ethiopia where
Non-violence alone had reached its limits. White the men gingerly detonated a homemade canister he handled a pistol and automatic rifle for the first
South Africa would need to be blasted out of its bomb built by an experienced ‘desert rat’ named time and learned to make explosives.
complacency. With a warrant out for his arrest, Jack Hodgson. After a misfire, the force of the While Mandela was away, back in South
Mandela was branded as an outlaw, a label he wore explosion produced a mushroom cloud of dust. Africa, the PAC military wing had begun to
with pride. From his safehouse he embraced his Convinced they would be caught by police, assassinate whites out of retaliation for government
newfound militancy with a lawyer’s zeal. He read Mandela and Kodesh sped away in their ’48 Chevy, crackdowns, something Mandela and the MK had
every book he could find on armed revolution and giggling like schoolboys. vowed never to do. In response, the parliament
guerrilla warfare but despite his change in attitude The first act of sabotage personally planned by passed the Sabotage Act in 1962, making any act
the practicalities were different; Mandela had never commanders Mandela, Slovo and Sisulu occurred of political sabotage, no matter how petty, a capital

114
 Mandela’s Revolution

Mandela boxing on a Johannesburg rooftop

during a break at the Treason Trial in 1957

Mandela with Congolese politician Emmanuel Dungia in 1997

Jubilant scenes at Mandela’s first ANC rally after his release

115
 Modern

Road to freedom: Why Mandela was freed

FreedomFest 11 June 1988 Internal resistance to apartheid
In 1988 more than a billion people worldwide Seventies and Eighties
tuned in to watch a star-studded 11-hour
For South Africans, Mandela’s imprisonment was symbolic
concert celebrating Mandela’s seventieth
of the larger oppression and subjugation of blacks under
birthday. Live acts included some of the
apartheid. As Mandela rose to prominence as a prisoner
biggest pop stars of the day and several
of conscience, his name and image were invoked by
prominent African musicians. Promoter Tony
organisations intent on toppling the racist regime. Student
Hollingsworth and the British Anti-Apartheid
groups like the South African Students’ Movement were
Movement spearheaded the organisation of the
some of the first to stage mass protests and strikes like the
event at London’s Wembley Stadium, which
Soweto Uprising of 1976, in which police shot 23 students
proved a logistical and political nightmare. At
dead in a mass revolt against the decree that black students
first, musicians refused to commit unless the
learn Afrikaans in school. Labour unions were another
bill was stuffed with A-list acts. Once the acts
force of internal resistance, particularly after black trade
were booked, Hollingsworth had to negotiate
unions were legalised in 1979. Unions could effectively fill
between ANC leaders demanding a politically-
the vacuum left by banned political organisations and since
charged event and Western broadcasters who
unions met inside factory walls, they were immune to public
wanted to strip the concert of any overtly
meeting laws. Churches and religious coalitions were another
anti-apartheid messaging. In the end, the
powerful anti-apartheid force. Anglican bishop Desmond
concert was promoted as a pro-freedom rally
Tutu led the outcry as secretary-general of the South African
celebrating Mandela’s birthday, but political
Council of Churches, helping to earn him the Nobel Peace
speeches were banned. With violent clashes on
Prize in 1984 for his international call to conscience. Some
the news, the viewers clearly understood the
white South Africans also rallied against apartheid. In
political significance of the concert. The event
parliamentary elections during the Seventies and Eighties, 15
helped bring the anti-apartheid movement into
to 20 per cent of whites voted for the Progressive Party, the
the world’s living rooms.
only South African political party opposing apartheid.

While Mandela was imprisoned O Kennedy visit

U.S. senator Edward
Kennedy, brother of JFK
O Assassination of Verwoerd O Release Mandela campaign and RFK, visits South
Prime minister Hendrik Verwoerd, the ANC president Oliver Tambo, still Africa and meets with
architect of apartheid, is assassinated in exile, launches an international anti-apartheid leaders
in the House of Assembly by an campaign to free Mandela. The like Winnie Mandela
enraged parliamentary messenger. Sunday Post of Johannesburg and Desmond Tutu,
His National Party successors would circulates a public petition for his the Nobel Peace Prize
gradually soften the regime’s vice-like release, which is signed by dozens recipient in 1984.
grip on power. of South African opposition groups. January 1985
6 September 1966 9 March 1980

1966 1970 1975 1980 1981 1982 1983 1984 1985

O Soweto Uprising
20,000 students take to the O Release of first political prisoner O Coetsee meets Mandela
streets to protest the obligatory Breyten Breytenbach, a white anti- Minister of justice Kobie Coetsee appears
use of Afrikaans in classroom apartheid activist convicted of treason, at Mandela’s hospital bed while the
instruction alongside English. is released early from his life sentence imprisoned leader recovers from prostate
Heavily armed riot police kill after a massive international campaign. surgery. Together, they begin to forge
hundreds, mostly teenagers. In the The Botha government starts to a compromise by which the ANC would
aftermath, the ANC rises to power quietly reassess its strict policy on retreat from violence in exchange for
as a student-organising group. political prisoners. relaxing apartheid laws.
16 June 1976 2 December 1982 15 August 1985

Economic sanctions 1986 F W de Klerk 2 February 1990

The United Nations were an early and vocal opponent of In his first address to parliament after assuming the presidency de
apartheid and in 1963 called on all member states to stop Klerk shocked his supporters and critics by unbanning the ANC
shipments of arms, ammunition and military vehicles. and other opposition groups and announcing the imminent release
However, calls for further economic sanctions met resistance, of Mandela from prison. De Klerk was an unlikely ally for the ANC.
particularly from the US and UK, which held longstanding Born to National Party royalty he rose to prominence as an old-
political and economic ties with the ruling regime. British school Afrikaner politician but ultimately came to see apartheid
prime minister Margaret Thatcher labelled the ANC and as an unsustainable solution. De Klerk initially supported the
its supporters “terrorists.” The Eighties saw increased Bantustan campaigns to relocate blacks to ‘native’ homelands, but
TV news coverage of apartheid resistance, and many US admitted that whites made a mistake by retaining too much land.
corporations, colleges and universities pulled investments. As sanctions mounted and shifting global politics threatened to
The most devastating economic blow came when the US further isolate the country economically, he decided that the only
Congress passed the Comprehensive Anti-Apartheid Act in way to save his country was to transition to an open democratic
1986. President Ronald Reagan claimed they hurt the very society. In negotiations with Mandela, before and after his release,
people the US was trying to help and vetoed the bill, but the de Klerk fought hard against the socialist-communist factions
Congress voted to override his decision. The South African within the ANC and won support for a free-market economic
economy lost hundreds of millions of pounds each year in policy. In 1993 he shared the Nobel Peace Prize with Mandela for
global investment until sanctions were repealed in 1991. his role in ending apartheid.

116
 Mandela’s Revolution

crime. Mandela knew that a return to South Africa

meant almost certain arrest or even death, but he
made little effort to disguise his identity when he
crossed the border, wearing only military khakis
and a patchy beard of a Sixties revolutionary.
As he must have known would happen, on 5
August 1962, Mandela’s transport from Durban to
Johannesburg was overtaken by police and he was
arrested and charged with incitement to strike and
leaving the country without a passport. In one of
the most memorable and theatrical moments of his
public life, he appeared in the Pretoria courthouse
bare-chested wearing his native Xhosa garb, a
leopard-skin kaross draped over one shoulder.
Mandela freely admitted to his crimes, but
used the platform to deliver an hour-long speech
justifying his actions in the name of revolutionary
democracy. He was found guilty and sentenced
to five years of imprisonment, at the time the
harshest sentence handed down for a political
offence in South Africa. After six months in
Pretoria prison, Mandela was transferred to Robben
Island. While serving his sentence of hard labour
A crowd of demonstrators calling for the
release of Nelson Mandela from prison there, police investigators hunted down his MK
co-conspirators at the farm hideout in Rivonia.
The careless revolutionaries, Mandela included,
had left a treasure trove of documents implicating
themselves in the planning and execution of acts of
O US sanctions O Mandela’s mentor freed
After a delegation of 13 The new president of South Africa, de Klerk, sabotage and guerilla warfare against the regime.
US congressmen is denied releases Mandela’s political mentor, Walter Sisulu, Mandela was transferred from the Robben
permission to visit Mandela, the and seven other prominent Robben Island prisoners Island prison back to the same Pretoria courtroom
Senate passes a comprehensive a month after succeeding Botha. Their release is
sanctions bill aimed at crippling a clear sign that the South African government in October 1963 to face capital charges related to
the South African economy. realises the current situation in their country is 221 acts of sabotage. He was joined in the Rivonia
President Reagan tries to veto untenable and that the ANC has to be allowed to
it, but is overruled. reenter the political system.
Trial by Sisulu and nine other MK members. The
July 1986 October 1989 evidence against the saboteurs was overwhelming,
but the most damning testimony came from Bruno
Mtolo, a former saboteur who struck a plea deal and
recounted detailed conversations with Mandela and
1986 1987 1988 1989 1990
his co-conspirators.
In lieu of a defence strategy, Mandela delivered
O Mandela has tea with Botha O De Klerk lifts ban on the ANC one of the most famous speeches of his life.
The world’s most famous prisoner After months of secret negotiations Mandela’s ‘Speech from the Dock’ lasted four
is snuck through the back door of with Mandela, president de Klerk
the president’s residence for tea and addresses parliament and calls for
unbroken hours, detailing his beatific life in
conversation. Botha serves Mandela, the immediate lifting of the ban the Transkei, the blind nationalism of his early
a remarkable gesture in apartheid on the ANC, an end to the state of activism, his evolution to all-inclusive opposition,
South Africa, and the path to peace emergency and the release of Nelson
is begun. Mandela. and his ultimate abandonment of the principles of
5 July 1989 2 February 1990 non-violence in the face of brutal oppression.
Mandela famously concluded his speech with
the following words: “During my lifetime I have
Mandela released from prison dedicated myself to this struggle of the African
11 February 1990 people. I have fought against white domination,
By 4pm, thousands of ecstatic supporters packed the small and I have fought against black domination. I have
plaza outside of Victor Verster prison where Mandela had
cherished the ideal of a democratic and free society
been kept since 1988. The crowd were there to catch a
glimpse of their ‘king,’ but few even knew what he looked in which all persons live together in harmony and
like anymore. The 71-year-old Mandela hadn’t had a photo with equal opportunities. It is an ideal, which I
taken in 27 years and this unknown quality has added to hope to live for and to achieve. But if needs be, it is
his legend. Then, a tall, stately figure with salt-and-pepper
an ideal for which I am prepared to die.” Mandela
hair, wearing a prim grey suit, stepped through the prison
gates and into the blazing South African summer sun. did not ultimately die for that ideal, but he would
© Corbis; Alamy; Getty; Mary Evans

At first, Mandela looked overwhelmed; after nearly three lose the next 27 years of his life to imprisonment
decades in solitude, he was thrust into the spotlight, because of it before he could take his first faltering
watched by millions the world over. Then with one hand steps as a free man. His steps may have been
clasped in Winnie’s, Mandela raised a fist into the air in a
shaky, but he was walking out to a South Africa
defiant and proud ANC salute. The crowd roared, Mandela
smiled, and the prisoner took his first steps on a journey to that was on the cusp of a seismic change, and a
becoming South Africa’s first black president. change that would see him at its very heart.

117
 For two years Ethiopia and Eritrea fought over a rugged border in what
became the 20th century’s last great conventional war.
But the question remains: who won?

he 1990s offered little respite for together under the People’s Front for Democracy demographics. During the 1970s the Eritrean

T Africa, with bloodshed and disorder

carving a destructive path from
Freetown to Mogadishu. As the
decade neared its end one of the
continent’s youngest states was proving to be a
difficult neighbour. Eritrea gained its independence
in 1993 after 32 years of struggle against Ethiopia,
and Justice (PFDJ) and its taciturn strongman Isaias
Afwerki. But as ideal as the country’s territory
looked on the map – flanked by the Red Sea on
one side and a tranquil land border with Sudan
on the other – Eritrea was soon bickering with
neighbouring countries over unclaimed land, first
with Djibouti over their overlapping geography, next
People’s Liberation Front (EPLF), which was
perhaps the finest guerrilla army since the Viet
Minh, sought to roll back the Derg regime’s control
over its homeland. Eritrean resistance began as
a revolt against the late Emperor Haile Selassie’s
inept governance over the former Italian colony.
The EPLF emerged from a collection of rebel
which had itself almost collapsed following the with Yemen because of uninhabited islands, and groups with a pan-Eritrean nationalist agenda.
overthrow of its Soviet-backed Marxist Derg regime then with its former nemesis Ethiopia, as a new Even the Australian novelist Thomas Keneally,
in 1985 and the subsequent internal conflicts that border couldn’t be drawn up between them. who undertook a precarious trip to Eritrea in
followed. The borders of Eritrea and Ethiopia did resemble a the 1980s, couldn’t stop himself from praising
When Eritrea’s tough freedom fighters, clad in jagged scrawl on any map. Stretching almost 1,000 the organisation’s civic virtues and unfailing
their iconic leather sandals, seized the colonial kilometres (621 miles) from end to end, it followed a discipline. The Eritrean patriots he met dug caves
city of Asmara in 1991, a new state was cobbled colonial-era boundary that didn’t reflect the region’s out of mountainsides to turn them into hospitals

118
 “In what proved the most intense
fighting in East Africa since
WWII, the Ethiopians sought
to drive away the entrenched
Eritreans with Soviet-vintage
tanks and artillery, but these
To prosecute the war, Ethiopia
efforts were blunted by
mobilised thousands of
reservists and militiamen,
determined resistance”
who were thrown straight into
battle. Many perished during
the conflict

and provided free schooling for the fighters, whose were good and Eritrea could possibly assume the Eritrean soldiers triggered a belligerent response
apparel was often made form sacks and assorted role of transit hub for landlocked Ethiopia, which from Ethiopia, and a protracted battle was soon
clothing. was now governed by Tigrayan reformists. underway. Within weeks the meagre air forces of
As the EPLF’s power grew in the fortified But the once-budding relationship soured over both countries struck each other. Ethiopian jets
mountains of northern Eritrea, it slowly forged a town called Badme, located along the western attacked the airport in Asmara while the Eritreans
an alliance with the Tigray dissidents in Ethiopia edge of a border region known as the Yirga bombed a school in the city of Mekelle.
who were also chafing under the Derg’s harsh rule. Triangle. Exactly where did this bothersome In what proved the most intense fighting in East
When the EPLF finally drove back the Derg forces settlement fall? In the Eritrean capital Asmara the Africa since WWII, the Ethiopians sought to drive
from Eritrea’s cities, the Tigrayan rebels launched regime made it clear, through official statements away the entrenched Eritreans with Soviet-vintage
the final push that drove the hated dictator and the local press, that Badme was Eritrean. tanks and artillery, but these efforts were blunted
Mengistu Haile Mariam into exile and supplanted Whatever the arguments, in May 1998 thousands of by determined resistance. The Eritreans, whose
the regime dominated by the Amhara ethnic group. Eritrean troops converged on the town to enforce veteran leadership had fought in the long and
In that moment of tumult, two new countries Asmara’s will just days after Ethiopian guards difficult struggle for independence, were not going
were fashioned, and the near future looked shot a delegation of visiting Eritrean officers. To to back down, and sent thousands more troops to
promising. Prospects for trade and co-operation nobody’s surprise, the arrival of thousands of the front. As the fighting dragged on for weeks,

119
Modern

the international community barely mustered a fighting. At the time Eritrea was ranked among when the Ethiopian air force’s assorted MiGs were
response to this latest African quagmire. It had the ten poorest countries in the world. This was showing their age.
been just four years since the Rwandan genocide understandable, since its underdevelopment In 1999 the war entered a new phase, as
and in 1998 the drama of Kosovo’s own struggle was caused by decades of civil strife. But to put Ethiopia had sufficiently mobilised its reserves
against Serbia commanded Western primetime its economy in perspective, Eritrea’s only rail and replenished its arsenal. It now had, on paper,
news coverage. network – a late 19th-century relic from its colonial 250,000 soldiers ready with hundreds of tanks and
But at the very least the United States, through past under Italian administration – was revived armoured vehicles. Not to be outdone, the Eritreans
its State Department, tried in vain to diffuse the by the persistent efforts of elderly workers with mustered an equal number and fielded heavy
war. A ceasefire drawn up with help from the help from the army. Local industries were little weapons cannibalised from leftover stocks from
Rwandan government sought to cool Asmara and more than sweatshops for basic goods and so little the war of independence. True to the egalitarian
Addis Ababa’s grievances. Yet a settlement couldn’t infrastructure was usable. values of their independence movement, women
be agreed on beyond the promise of an ‘air strike At the outbreak of the war, neighbouring were deployed alongside men in the Eritrean
moratorium’, where both capitals swore to avoid Ethiopia had an annual GDP below $10 billion and military, and foreign journalists grew a habit of
bombing each other’s populated areas. half its population lived in poverty, but its size mentioning how one-fifith of those conscripted
Fighting continued for the rest of the year as and positive demographics compensated for its for national service were women. Asmara also
the armies hurled artillery rounds at each other underdevelopment. Under the leadership of Meles scrambled to strengthen its arsenal and imported
from fixed positions, with the Eritreans using Zenawi and the Ethiopian Peoples Revolutionary vast quantities of munitions from Eastern Europe.
captured stocks of howitzers seized during the war Democratic Front (EPRDF) relations with the West Little could be done, however, to blunt Ethiopian
of independence. As a means of further retaliation, were restored and Addis Ababa was seen as a key airpower on the frontlines since there weren’t
mass deportations were carried out on Eritreans actor in regional stability. But the unexpected sufficient anti-aircraft weapons available.
living in Ethiopia. Of course, Eritrea responded in border conflict with Eritrea dimmed its aspirations, But Ethiopia’s war plans quickly bogged down
kind by forcing Ethiopians to leave the country. and the state’s precious supply of foreign exchange owing to its shabby logistics. Fleets of trucks had
went to arms shipments from China and Eastern to be commissioned for transporting its manpower,
Operation Sunset Europe. The biggest expense went to 14 advanced who were often ill-trained and carried no rations,
As the war dragged on for months, the penury of Sukhoi Su-27 multirole fighters. These twin-engine and when motor transport was lacking thousands
the belligerents had a strange effect on the actual aircraft were seen as critical investments at a time of pack animals were gathered in long caravans

An Ethiopian soldier carries a

PSL sniper rifle as he moves
along the disputed border
 AREAS CLAIMED BY
ETHIOPIA BUT FOUND TO LIE
WITHIN ERITREA
AREAS CLAIMED BY ERITREA
BUT FOUND TO LIE WITHIN
ETHIOPIA ASMARA

BADME TSERONA
Above: Eritrean President
Isaias Afwerki has been in
power since 1993. Known for
ZALAMBESSA his prickly disposition, under
his leadership Eritrea became
OM HAJER a regional pariah
ADIGRAT

“It was difficult to

ascertain the war’s
definitive outcome
beyond the hysterical ETHIOPIA
propaganda spread ASSAB

by the belligerents” BURE

COUNTING LOSSES
To this day it remains unclear if the conflict should belligerents. defences almost collapsed.
be called the ‘Eritrean-Ethiopian War’ or vice versa. An even thornier issue is accurate figures for The UN reports that the war killed 80,000-
Which country emerged victorious is still unclear. losses on both sides. The Eritreans never hesitated 100,000 and displaced 1 million people. But
With press access tightly controlled before the UN to publicise the immense casualties they inflicted unverified claims from Ethiopian and Eritrean
finally forced a ceasefire and a peace treaty, it was on the Ethiopians during battles from 1998-1999. sources suggest actual losses were two or even
difficult to ascertain the war’s definitive outcome But the Ethiopian military also insisted Eritrean three times as high as estimated.
beyond the hysterical propaganda spread by the manpower was so depleted that their border
Modern

The dismal economies of Strong discipline and coordination

the belligerents meant the allowed the Eritrean military to hold
war was punctuated by their own against the numerically
many long pauses where superior Ethiopians. An offensive by the
neither side could afford to latter in February 1999 collapsed within
attack the other days in the face of determined resistance

to haul food and ammunition. Despite the modern named Tsorona. Once again, the Eritreans held fast. the Tsorona campaign was. If the Ethiopians
weaponry it moved against the Eritreans, the A precise account of the events in this battle has had prevailed, their army would have seized
forthcoming battles seemed closer in spirit to the yet to surface, but what has been pieced together the roads leading to Asmara, allowing them to
doomed Italian campaigns against the Abyssinian from disparate reportage offers up a chilling threaten the very existence of the Eritrean state.
empire in the late 19th century. chronicle. Like Operation Sunset before it, the While the Ethiopian commanders did fail to meet
In what was named Operation Sunset, on 23 Ethiopians massed their forces and sent them in any objective, once a new round of peace talks
February 1999 thousands of troops were thrown waves against the enemy. The outcome was grisly, was opened the Eritreans were more receptive
into battle against the Eritreans in the Yirga as the Eritreans – young men and women with than during the previous year. Owing to the
Triangle, who had put their own knowledge to just weeks of training – witnessed the first human impenetrable propaganda broadcast by Eritrean
good use by building elaborate fortifications along wave get annihilated by land mines. The assaults television and government-controlled newspapers,
the border. After four days of combat, Addis Ababa that followed were mowed down by artillery and it’s still a matter of speculation if the Eritrean
made sure to inform the international press that the machine-gun fire. During the night and early military was indeed broken in Tsorona – having
offensive had resulted in an overwhelming victory. morning the combat moved to close quarters, and suffered their own crippling losses during the days
But there was scant evidence of this on the when the Eritreans began their counterattack they of hard fighting, and no longer having enough
frontlines, which were unchanged. One of the wiped out the remaining Ethiopian units, including supplies to prosecute the war.
curious encounters of the battle was a minor air their baggage train of donkeys and horses. As the months dragged on the Eritreans seemed
engagement. As neither country had sizable air The battle for Tsorona may have seen the overjoyed at symbolic instances such as collecting
forces, the few jets that were utilised often played complete loss of several Ethiopian divisions. prisoners of war or downing the occasional enemy
cat and mouse over the sun-drenched terrain. In Apparently, the high command in Addis Ababa aircraft. In the middle of 1999 an Ethiopian Mi-24
one particular duel, an Ethiopian Su-27 intercepted never conceived a plan of using their attack attack helicopter was destroyed over the eastern
a MiG-29UB and shot it out of the sky with its aircraft, helicopters and tanks to pierce the Eritrean border running parallel to the Red Sea. Journalists
cannon. Upon landing, the Sukhoi pilot was hailed lines. Groups of journalists who were given tours were immediately transported to the site and
for a unique distinction: Captain Aster Tolossa around the Tsorona front witnessed the carnage. shown the burnt wreckage, including the charred
became the first woman to confirm an air-to-air Thousands of uncollected bodies were left strewn bodies of its crew. The Eritrean soldiers present,
kill in a fighter jet. Distinctions were scarce on on the sand and rocks, sometimes piled in dreadful attired in their motley uniforms, danced around the
the ground, however, as the fighting usually left rows, baking under the unforgiving heat. The fallen helicopter and celebrated as if a mortal blow
staggering body counts and murky outcomes. Ethiopian army didn’t have a proper system for had been dealt to their foes.
A much larger assault took place a month collecting its war dead, and the horrific losses
after Operation Sunset in a different location 100 were broadcast and published by the world’s press A reluctant peace
kilometres (60 miles) east of the Yirga Triangle. The agencies. The fighting did come to a halt after the UN
objective this time was another border settlement Both sides were loathe to admit how crucial successfully brokered a ceasefire in Algiers on

Old Soviet T-55 medium tanks proved

invaluable in the gruelling stalemate of
the 1998-2000 war. Both sides used tanks
as mobile fortifications to shore up their
ever-shifting defensive lines
 ERITREAN
EXODUS
One of the war’s unexpected outcomes was
to entrench a peculiar siege mentality in the
Eritrean government that led to it imposing
indefinite national service. This required all
adult citizens to serve in the military for at least
18 months, and often longer. Although national
service was useful during the 1998-2000 war, its
overall impact on society has been negative.
With so many students and professionals
trapped in uniform, the Eritrean state has
managed to cripple its economy and free
enterprise. The resulting stagnation, matched
with often-brutal recruitment practices, left
many citizens with no choice but to flee.
Eritrean men and women now risk life and limb
to reach either Europe or the United States, even
if this constitutes a serious brain drain for their
homeland. The UNHCR reported that there were
474,296 Eritrean asylum seekers and refugees
scattered across the globe in 2015. It’s ironic how
165,000 fleeing Eritreans have sought refuge
in Ethiopia since the war ended. This exodus is
significant considering Eritrea’s population is
less than five million people.

Eritrean migrants gathered in

huge numbers in ‘The Jungle’
camp in Calais, fleeing
poverty and repression in
their home country

18 June 2000 and a token unit of peacekeepers ended in 2008, and since then the border has This already happened in June 2016 when a
arrived in Ethiopia to separate the belligerents. On become tense once more. pitched battle was fought in Tsorona, the same
12 December that same year a peace agreement was One of the war’s more problematic outcomes is settlement that was the site of the last war’s most
signed, ending the war. An absurd condition of the ascertaining who won. To this day, Eritrea insists it gruelling battle. The clash couldn’t have come at
agreement was keeping the useless arms embargo emerged victorious because its troops slaughtered a worse time, as both Eritrea and Ethiopia were
on Eritrea and Ethiopia in place. In Ethiopia, for thousands of Ethiopians, and Eritrean propaganda – and still are – reeling from domestic troubles.
example, the embargo was shelved a few years later claims that armed citizens blunted a full-scale In the latter’s case, decades of one-party rule by
when Addis Ababa agreed to help the US military invasion to re-occupy their land. But Eritrea fared the EPRDF inflamed tensions between ethnic
pacify Somalia as part of the Bush administration’s worse in the years after the war. Isaias Afwerki’s Amhara and Oromo, who feel they’ve been harshly
‘War on Terror’. This meant Ethiopia could import iron grip on the PFDJ allowed him to rule as a marginalised by the current Tigray-dominated
weapons again and even receive free deliveries dictator for life, and the country embraced a bizarre government.
sanctioned by the US, and had a mandate to send economic program focused on self-sufficiency. In 2018 the spectre of widespread civil unrest
its army abroad. The oppressive national service led to widespread spreading across Ethiopia’s cities forced the
As part of the Algiers agreement a small discontent as many Eritreans were torn from their EPRDF to fast-track the rise of a new leader, Prime
peacekeeping force was deployed to Badme and families and jobs, disappearing for years in the Minister Abiy Ahmed, who is tasked with charting
other disputed areas to guarantee that both sides dreadful conscription system. a way out of the current crisis. Unfortunately, in
demobilised. The effort had limited success. Even But Ethiopia prospered in the ensuing decades what amounts to a standard ploy by less-than-
when the Hague ruled that Badme was inside as a magnet for foreign investment and a model of democratic regimes, the EPRDF has also assigned
Eritrean territory an Ethiopian garrison remained stability in a rough region. It was Eritrea that turned some blame to Eritrea for its present troubles.
in the town. This frustrated the work of the 5,000 rogue, keeping its army mobilised for years on The ultimate consequence of the bloody two
peacekeepers who formed the UN Mission to end and burning its bridges with the international years Ethiopia and Eritrea spent fighting each other
Images: Alamy, Getty

Ethiopia and Eritrea (UNMEE). The unit’s mission community. In what amounts to a complete failure was how much was left unresolved despite the
was to preserve the Algiers agreement and to reconcile, 20 years after the Badme question losses incurred by each side. Like so many other
demilitarise the shared border. But as logistical neither Asmara or Addis Ababa bothered to frozen conflicts, the murky borderlands separating
support from Eritrea and Ethiopia dwindled, so convene and establish new borders, which means Eritrea and Ethiopia will likely remain a flash point
did the project’s long term feasibility. UNMEE was the same conflict could erupt again at any point. for years to come.

123
 Modern

SOUTH SUDAN’S

The world’s newest nation emerged from five

decades of separatist war only to be plagued
by renewed ethnic violence that has killed
thousands and threatens famine

he latest news from Africa’s bloodiest is inhabited by such groups as the Murle, Luo, Bari in Juba on the eve of the fifth anniversary of

T conflict does not bode well for the

future. Already the four year conflict,
ostensibly between the two largest
ethnic groups, the Dinka and Nuer, is
creating famine conditions.
In February 2017, General Thomas Cirillo Swaka,
a member of the Bari ethnic group, resigned as
Shilluk and Azande.
On 9 July 2011, after six years of autonomy, the
world’s youngest nation came into being with
street parties in every town and jubilation among
its 11 million people. But border clashes with Sudan
persisted along with internal ethnic clashes. In
late 2013, Kiir fired his entire cabinet, accusing his
independence. Around 300 people, including two
UNIMSS staff, were killed and 40,000 displaced.
Riek once again fled the capital and resumed
leading the SPLM-IO.
At the start of 2017, conservative estimates put
the death toll at 100,000. One in three members of
the population has been displaced and 1.5 million
deputy chief of staff of South Sudan’s Army. He former Nuer deputy Riek Nuer of fomenting a coup have fled to neighbouring countries, particularly
has accused President Salva Kiir, a member of the against him. Uganda; South Sudan has the world’s third biggest
Dinka group, of recruiting militias and engaging Violence spread out from the capital, Juba as the refugee population after Syria and Afghanistan. In
in ethnic cleansing. Now Cirillo plans to join the Dinka-dominated ruling Sudan People’s Liberation camps for the displaced, an estimated 70 per cent
Nuer-dominated rebellion, and some estimates put Movement (SPLM) clashed with Riek’s largely of women have been raped. With famine conditions
the number of fighters in his new militia at 30,000, Nuer SPLM In Opposition (SPLM-IO) and its allied now reported in some areas, this new African
potentially a force for terrible destruction. ‘White Nuer’ militia. Over 400,000 civilians were nation has had a truly nightmarish infancy marked
In theory, Africa’s longest-running civil displaced in the first month of conflict alone. Kiir by hatred and suffering.
war ended in 2005 with the signing of the controversially called in Ugandan troops to assist in
Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), which suppressing the uprising. Since 2011, approximately Long road to independence
allowed autonomy for the ten southernmost states 12,500 troops and staff have been deployed as part An old local saying goes: ‘Aktul al-abid bil abid’ (kill
of Sudan. of the United Nations in South Sudan (UNIMISS). the slave through the slave) and this illustrates
Bordered by six nations and rich in oil, the Although a peace deal was worked out in how the seeds of the current conflict were planted
region is ethnically diverse; over 60 languages are August 2015, and Riek temporarily rejoined the in the long struggle for independence from the
spoken. Aside from the Dinka and Nuer, the region government as vice president, violence flared Islamic north. Under Anglo-Egyptian colonial rule,
the Muslim north and the Christian and Animist
south were ruled as two distinct entities. By 1947
they were unified, but the south has been badly
SUDAN’S 1956 1969 1972 neglected; even today, the new nation has very
VIOLENT Sudan becomes
independent of Britain.
Military officers led by
Colonel Jafaar Mohammed
A peace deal in
Addis Ababa
little infrastructure. Many towns and air strips
HISTORY Deep divisions are Numeiri seize power agrees to southern
become inaccessible in the rainy season. One in
evident between the in Khartoum. Initially autonomy and ends seven children dies before the age of seven.
Muslim north and the espousing a socialist and the first phase of Promises by the newly independent Sudan to
Christian and Animist Pan African ideology, the the war. Oil is later create a federal system of government were never
south. Southern regime promises southern discovered in the honoured. The first civil war broke out in 1955
rebellion gets underway. autonomy. region.

124
 “Cirillo
plans to join Founded as a guerilla

the Nuer- movement in 1983, the

SPLA is thought to be
around 150,000 strong
dominated
rebellion,
and some
estimates put
the number of
fighters in his
new militia
at 30,000,
potentially
a force for
terrible
destruction”
 Modern

and ended with the 1972 Addis Ababa Agreement. billion. Drought struck in 1983-84, causing mass
Fundamental to the peace was a promise to grant hunger. This hastened the overthrow of Numeiri in
autonomy for the south. But such promises were 1986, bringing to power Sadiq al-Mahdi as prime
shelved after oil was discovered near Bentui in the minister. As the head of a northern coalition, he
Upper Nile region in 1978. The American company was fully committed to the further ‘Islamisation’
Chevron eventually spent $1 billion on exploration of Sudan.
and two large oil fields were established, called Not surprisingly, the SPLM refused to enter
Unity and Heglig respectively. a ceasefire. Thus Sadiq’s regime armed Baggara
Around the same time, President Jafaar Numeiri Arab militias from western Sudan. Known as
sought to consolidate his support among northern murahalin, they were licensed to attack Dinka and
Muslims by bringing two prominent Islamic Nuer areas. By this time, Chevron had ceased its
politicians into government. The first was Umma activities at Unity and Heglig. The oil fields were
Party leader Sadiq al-Mahdi, great-grandson of the largely in Dinka and Nuer areas and the murahalin
famous Mahdi who had fought the British during committed ethnic cleansing in the territories
the 19th century. The second was Hasan al-Turabi, around them.
leader of the Muslim Brotherhood and founder of The predominantly Dinka SPLM was opposed
the Islamist National Islamic Front (NIF). by rival factions that acted both independently and
In 1983, Numeiri declared an Islamic revolution, with Khartoum’s support. Among the Nuer, some
imposing curbs on western fashions and music. On factions supported the SPLM and others opposed it.
one occasion, he publicly poured $11 million worth The consequence of such internecine warfare was
of alcohol into the Nile. entirely predictable. In 1988, Sudan was wracked
A regional government in the south was by the worst famine seen in modern times. At least
dissolved and south Sudan split into three regions, 250,000 people perished due to starvation and
effectively terminating the 1972 agreement. three million were displaced.
Mutinies now broke out in army garrisons in the Food was used as a weapon of war. Both sides
southern towns of Bor and Pibor. Many southern attacked cattle herds, destroyed crops and blocked
troops deserted and regrouped across the eastern convoys of foreign aid. When aid did get through
border in Ethiopia, where they formed the SPLM. to the south, it was frequently commandeered
The SPLM was led by Colonel John Garang by SPLA guerillas. Combined with the military
de Maboir, a Dinka officer with a doctorate in aid they were already receiving, the SPLM soon
agricultural economics from Iowa State University controlled much of the southern countryside. With
and military training at Fort Benning Georgia. But the army forced back into garrison towns, Sadiq
Garang sought not southern succession but the was forced to negotiate with Garang. This was too
creation of a secular socialist regime for all much for Islamic hardliners in the north and the
of Sudan. Army was discontent with his handling of the war:
He found many willing recruits for his military a coup took place on 30 June 1989 that put General
wing, the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA) Omar al-Bashir in power.
and remarked that: “The marginal cost of rebellion
in the south became very small, zero or negative; Enter Riek Machar
that is, it pays to rebel.” The SPLM-IO leader, Riek Machar has described
This was no glib remark. As with other African himself as “a political animal” whose formative
conflicts, foreign powers were quick to intervene. years witnessed the “betrayal” of the South after
The Ethiopian Mengistu Haile Mariam and Libyan the failed peace of 1972. He was born in 1952, the
Muammar Gaddafi regimes backed the SPLM in 26th son of a village headman in Ler, Unity State
revenge for Khartoum’s sponsorship of separatist in the Upper Nile region. Attending college in the
and opposition groups on their soil. Despite its grim UK in the 1980s, he married his first wife Angelina,
reputation for human rights violations, Washington now a prominent politician.
poured aid into Numeiri’s regime to the tune of By 1984 he had relocated to Ethiopia to be
$1.5 billion as a bulwark against the pro-Soviet trained by John Garang. But he was leery of
Ethiopian junta and the reviled Gaddafi. Garang’s ideological project, which essentially
During the 1980s, the Sudanese regime involved emulating the Marxism of his Ethiopian An SPLA soldier salutes
attempted to boost agricultural production by patron, Colonel Mengistu. In August 1991, Machar during celebrations held in
investing heavily in mechanization. But the effort and two other SPLA commanders, Lam Akol and Juba to mark three years of
independence in July 2014
back-fired and the nation accumulated debts of $12 Gordon Kong, attempted to seize control of the

1983 30 June 1989 August 1991 July 2002 January 2005

In response to growing With famine raging Nuer commander Under the terms The Comprehensive Peace
Islamic influence, the and the SPLM gaining Riek Machar and of the Machakos Agreement (CPA) is signed,
South Sudan Liberation ground in the south, others attempt to seize Protocol signed in which allows for a six
Movement (SPLM) renews General Omar al-Bashir control of the SPLM. Keyna, the South is year period of autonomy
the separatist struggle led stages a coup. Splits Thousands of ethnic granted the right to ahead of a ballot on full
by John Garang. Ethiopia form within the SPLM Dinka are slaughtered self-determination. independence. Disputes
and Libya provide military over the movement’s by Riek’s brutal forces Riek Machar rejoins over the oil-rich border
support. objectives. in Bor that November. the SPLM. areas ensue.

126
 South Sudan’s brutal birth

The body of a dead rebel killed movement. Known as the SPLA-Nasir faction, after
by South Sudanese soldiers their main stronghold, the split turned Dinka-Nuer
lies next to a wrecked military tensions into outright war. Weeks later, Machar’s
vehicle near Bor Airport
forces slaughtered over 2,000 Dinka in the town
of Bor and displaced 100,000 more. Once again
warfare and famine wiped out thousands.
By 1997 Machar had broken away from the SPLM
altogether and reached an accommodation with
Khartoum, forming his own independent militia.
There were hints of a share in oil revenues should a
lasting peace be realized in the South.
Meanwhile, Sudan’s neighbours were becoming
alarmed by Bashir’s vision of international Jihad.
Since Uganda acted as a conduit for most of the
arms to Garang’s forces, Bashir’s regime funnelled
money to the odious Lord’s Resistance Army led by
Joseph Kony. This militia kidnapped and brutalised
children, forcing them to participate in further
attacks throughout rural Uganda.
After the 9/11 attacks, Bashir found himself under
even more pressure from the Bush administration
to curb Islamic radicalism. Sudan had been a haven
for the Osama bin-Laden in the early 1990s before
his departure for Taliban-ruled Afghanistan.
The same month as the attacks, Bush appointed
the former Missouri Senator John Danforth as his
special envoy in Sudan. The peace process was
criticised at the time as focusing too much on the
NIF-dominated government and the SPLM and
excluding other factions. But by 2002, the year a
protocol was signed in Machakos, southern Kenya,
2 million South Sudanese were dead and 4 million
displaced. The Machakos Protocol allowed for a
ceasefire and a ballot on independence.
Thus, in January 2005 the CPA was signed and a
six year period of autonomy commenced. It ended
with scenes of national exhilaration in July 2011
after 98 per cent of the electorate voted to secede.
But the joy was tempered by the loss of Garang,
killed in 2005 when the Ugandan Mi-172 helicopter
returning him from a meeting with his long-time
ally Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni, crashed
near the Kenyan border.

Troubled independence
Like many other resource-rich nations, the
discovery of oil has almost seemed more of a curse
than a blessing. In the late 1990s, the Khartoum
government arranged for the setting up of a new
oil consortium called the Greater Nile Petroleum
South Sudan has one of
the most heavily armed Operating Company. In defiance of southern
populations on Earth, objectives it did not set up a new refinery on
with weapons flooding in Southern soil but built a 1,540-kilometre pipeline to
from around the world
a specially constructed Red Sea marine port. Since

August 2005 March 2008 9 July 2011 6 May 2012 July 2013 15 December
SPLM leader John Arab militias from South Sudan A peace conference President Kiir 2013
Garang, recently Sudan and the becomes the world’s convenes in dismisses the cabinet, Clashes erupt in
sworn in as first vice SPLA clash over youngest nation Bor following having stripped the capital Juba
president, dies in the oil-rich Abyei after 98 per cent of several years of Riek of powers as his between Dinka
a helicopter crash region, an area the population vote intermittent clashes deputy. Key SPLM and Nuer fighters.
while returning disputed since the for independence. between the Murle, party structures Kiir accuses Riek
from Uganda. signing of the CPA. Salva Kiir Mayardit is Lou-Nuer and are dissolved in and others of
elected president. Dinka groups. November. attempting a coup.

127
 Modern

independence, South Sudan has accused Sudan of Along with weapons built
charging exorbitant transport costs for use of the in Sudan, arms have been
pipeline. The fighting has caused oil production to imported from Israel,
China, and South Africa
decline by one-third since 2013. among other states
Moreover, under the terms of the CPA, there
would supposedly be a referendum on secession
for two disputed areas still held by Sudan: the
provinces of South Kordofan and Blue Nile, along
with the oil-rich Abyei regions. But the votes have
been repeatedly postponed and clashes between
the two armies have taken place in Abyei.
To make matters worse, the period leading up
to the outbreak of the civil war was characterised
by endemic corruption by Kiir’s regime. An
independent report in 2012 estimated that at
least $4 billion in government funds had simply
disappeared into the ether.
The SPLA military hierarchy continued to
dominate government. South Sudan’s political
culture was weakened by the lack of an effective
opposition and a constitution that was unclear
about the distribution of power among the various
government departments.
And so it was that in December 2013 a political
“In April, the SPLM-IO captured
struggle within the movement degenerated into Bentiu and went from house to
outright warfare.
house, separating Dinka from other
Ethnic clashes and groups and slaughtering them”
a failed peace
On 16 December 2013, President Kiir addressed
the nation on television. Significantly, he had
swapped his trademark suit and cowboy hat for
military fatigues. He announced that a coup led by
Riek Machar had been foiled and that the plotters
had also included John Garang’s widow, Rebecca
Nyandeng de Maboir. The initial rebellion had
begun four days earlier when gunmen clashed
with the Presidential Guard in Juba. Kiir’s generals
then ordered the ‘Tiger’ battalion to disarm, but
once this happened weapons stores were raided by
Dinka soldiers. The SPLA split along ethnic lines
and Nuer soldiers occupied the capital’s military
headquarters before being dislodged.
Fighting raged around Juba throughout
December and 13,000 civilians took refuge in two
UNIMISS compounds there. Kiir declared a state of
emergency in Jonglei and Unity State, where the
SPLM-IO held the capitals. By January, the town of
Bor had changed hands three times between the
government and rebels.
By now three V-22 Osprey aircraft were airlifting
US nationals from Bor. Fighting erupted in Malakal
and Bentiu in January 2014 as the first attempt at a
ceasefire was negotiated with the help of an eight-

January 2014 15 April 2014 August 2014 16 May 2015 April 2016 November 2016 December 2016
A ceasefire is signed Nuer forces Peace talks Assisted by the Riek Machar returns The UN Secretary A UN commission
but it is repeatedly massacre hundreds begin in Ethiopia Shilluk warlord to Juba following General sacks the Kenyan of human rights
broken over the next of civilians in but drag on for Johnson Olony, the a peace deal and commander of the United concludes that ethnic
few weeks. Hundreds Bentiu after weeks over the SPLM-IO capture is sworn in as Nations Mission in South cleansing is occurring
of thousands of capturing the conditions for the second largest vice president. By Sudan (UNMISS) over the throughout South
people are displaced. town. Riek Machar a transitional city, Malakal, and July, amid further failure to protect civilians Sudan, although
Fighting spreads denies the SPLM-IO government of destroy most of its violence, he is again during the Juba clashes. the government
outside of Juba. were responsible. national unity. infrastructure. sacked. vehemently denies this.

128
 South Sudan’s brutal birth

Bearing tribal markings, a nation African trade bloc known as within the Nuer community between those loyal to
South Sudanese riot policeman the Intergovernmental Authority on Riek Machar and those supporting his replacement
watches over the 2011 Development (IGAD). as vice president, Tabang Deng Gai, also a Nuer.
independence celebrations
In April, the SPLM-IO captured Bentiu and went
from house to house, separating Dinka from other Famine
groups before mercilessly slaughtering them. They Already afflicted by two years of drought, famine
also killed civilians found sheltering in a hospital, conditions in Unity State were reported by the
mosque and Catholic church. UN in February 2017. UN officials have also accused
The horrendous brutality of the SPLM-IO Kiir’s regime of blocking attempts to deliver
prompted two commanders, Gabriel Tang and food aid, a charge the President denies. In any
Peter Gadet, to realign with Kiir after August 2015, case, attempting to mediate peace or conduct a
although Tang was killed in an ambush in early humanitarian operation has been difficult
2017. Another militia, the South Sudan Democratic and dangerous
Movement, drawn from the Murle group, also rose A possible way forward could be the
in rebellion although its leader, David Yau Yau, renegotiation of the 2005 CPA, this time worked
who later reconciled with Kiir in return for Murle out to be more inclusive and far-sighted. The
autonomy in Pibor State. However, a splinter group removal of the two antagonists, Riek Machar and
known as the ‘Cobra’ faction has allied itself with Salva Kiir, also seems imperative. The former is
Riek Machar since September 2016. now in exile in South Africa, and although there is
In August 2015, again with IGAD mediation, talk of disillusionment with his rule of the SPLM-
a peace deal was worked out: Uganda agreed to IO, and with the rebels running out of weapons,
withdraw its troops and Riek Machar was offered there are enough ethnic opportunists like Carillo
the post of vice president. But over the next few to reignite the violence. Salva Kiir, meanwhile, has
months, Kiir appointed staunch loyalists to his postponed a 2015 election for at least three years.
cabinet. His plan to increase the number of states When South Sudan became independent in 2011,
from ten to 28 caused tensions with the Shilluk amid justifiable optimism and joy, the new nation
and Azande groups. adopted South Sudan Oyee as its national anthem.
By July 2016 violence returned to Juba, and Contained in the song are the lines: “South Sudan/
two months later Machar again called for the The land of great abundance/Uphold us united in
SPLM-IO to take up arms against Kiir. Throughout peace and harmony.”
2016-17 fighting has spread through the Equatoria While there is no doubting the country’s
and Greater Upper Nile regions. In addition to the potential abundance, peace and harmony remain a
original rebellion, there is now increasing violence long way off.

DANGEROUS MISSION
79
AID WORKERS HAVE BEEN
KILLED BY REBELS OR
GOVERNMENT FORCES

SPLA soldiers occupied

Sudan’s main oil field at
Heglig for ten days in
April 2012, nearly

2 3 RUSSIANS KILLED WHEN

triggering a wider conflict

REBELS SHOT DOWN A

MI-8 HELICOPTER
20 February 2017 CHINESE UN
The United Nations declares
PEACEKEEPERS
Images: Alamy, Getty

famine conditions are

5
afflicting Unity State and WERE KILLED INTERNATIONAL AID WORKERS
spreading to other areas. IN A ROCKET GANG RAPED WHEN DOZENS OF
Up to 5.5 million people, ATTACK IN JULY SPLA SOLDIERS ENTERED THE
half of the population, may 2016 IN JUBA
experience food shortages
TERRAIN HOTEL IN JUBA
within six months.

129
 HISTORY OF

AFRICA Future PLC Quay House, The Ambury, Bath, BA1 1UA

History of Africa Editorial

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