City-States of Eastern Africa

SWAHILI COAST

• By 1100, Bantu-speaking people had migrated to the east coast.

• Villages grew around trade between East Africans and traders from Persia, Arabia and India.

Language…• Arabic blended with

the Bantu language to create SWAHILI (swah-HEE-lee)

• By 1300, 35 trading cities dotted the coast, including Mogadishu, Mombasa, and Kilwa.

Trade…

• They grew wealthy by …– controlling all incoming and outgoing trade.–manufacturing goods for export.

• Islam spread through trade.

• Most rulers, government officials, and merchants were Muslim.

• The majority of the people along the coast held on to traditional religious beliefs.

Religion…

GREAT ZIMBABWE

The Shona People

• Bantu-speaking people who claimed the area of Great Zimbabwe.

• Benefits of the area….– Fertile, well-watered plateau–Well-suited for farming and cattle raising

a n d…

• Near an important trade route that linked the inland gold-fields with the coastal trading city of Sofala

• Leaders could tax traders along the route, and became wealthy

• The city was abandoned by 1450. • Left behind 60 acres of ruins.• Zimbabwe means “stone

enclosure”• The walls were 36 ft tall & 15 ft

thick

Most of what we know about the area is from studying the ruins.