In:
The Journal of African History, Cambridge University Press (CUP), Vol. 9, No. 1 ( 1968-01), p. 35-56
Abstract:
The Swahili community of modern Mombasa is composed of an amalgam of the descendants of the city's early ‘Shirazi’ settlers and more recent immigrant Swahili groups, most of which migrated south to Mombasa Island during or after the sixteenth century. It appears likely that the ‘Shirazi’. dynasty and its retainers were themselves derived from older Swahili settlements along the southern Somali coast. After the ‘Shirazi’ polity was destroyed by. the Portuguese and their local allies in 1591–93, Mombasa's accretions of foreign Swahili gradually reorganized themselves into twelve mataifa or ‘tribes’. These twelve mataifa grouped themselves into two separate and sometimes hostile confederations, the Thelatha Taifa (The Three) and the Tisa Taifa (The Nine). Political unity was maintained by means of a loosely structured state system in which foreign dynasties of Omani Arabs, first the Mazrui and later the Busaidi, bridged the gap between the two confederations. During the Mazrui period (approximately 1735–1837), Mombasa was an independent city-state which enjoyed political hegemony over much of the Kenya and north Tanzania coasts. Under Busaidi rule (1837–95) the city lost its independence and was incorporated in the Zanzibar Sultanate. Differences between the Thelatha Taifa and the Tisa Taifa slowly faded during the Busaidi period and have almost disappeared since 1900. Though precolonial social and political structure is still perceptible in the modern Swahili community of Mombasa, it has for the most part become vestigial.
Type of Medium:
Online Resource
ISSN:
0021-8537
,
1469-5138
DOI:
10.1017/S0021853700008343
Language:
English
Publisher:
Cambridge University Press (CUP)
Publication Date:
1968
detail.hit.zdb_id:
300909-9
detail.hit.zdb_id:
1466474-4
SSG:
8
SSG:
6,31
