Swahili Origins: Swahili Culture and the Shungwaya Phenomenon
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Swahili origins: Swahili culture and the Shungwaya phenomenon http://www.aluka.org/action/showMetadata?doi=10.5555/AL.CH.DOCUMENT.sip200016 Use of the Aluka digital library is subject to Aluka’s Terms and Conditions, available at http://www.aluka.org/page/about/termsConditions.jsp. By using Aluka, you agree that you have read and will abide by the Terms and Conditions. Among other things, the Terms and Conditions provide that the content in the Aluka digital library is only for personal, non-commercial use by authorized users of Aluka in connection with research, scholarship, and education. The content in the Aluka digital library is subject to copyright, with the exception of certain governmental works and very old materials that may be in the public domain under applicable law. Permission must be sought from Aluka and/or the applicable copyright holder in connection with any duplication or distribution of these materials where required by applicable law. Aluka is a not-for-profit initiative dedicated to creating and preserving a digital archive of materials about and from the developing world. For more information about Aluka, please see http://www.aluka.org Swahili origins: Swahili culture and the Shungwaya phenomenon Author/Creator Allen, James de Vere Date 1993 Resource type Books Language English Subject Coverage (spatial) Northern Swahili Coast, Tanzania, United Republic of, Kilwa Kisiwani Source Smithsonian Institution Libraries, DT365.45 .S93A45 1993X Rights By kind permission of David C. Sperling and James Currey, Ltd.###Hard copies of this book can be ordered from James Currey, Ltd. at the following address: 73 Botley Road, Oxford OX2 0BS, UK; James Currey can also be contacted at: http://www.jamescurrey.co.uk/. Description Using a wide range of historical and anthropological evidence, the author traces the origins and substance of Swahili culture along the east coast of Africa. A central thesis focuses on the emergence of a lost state--Shungwaya--out of which most Swahili successor states emerged. 9 illustrations; 4 maps. Format extent 289 pages (length/size) http://www.aluka.org/action/showMetadata?doi=10.5555/AL.CH.DOCUMENT.sip200016 http://www.aluka.org Swahzl Origins .4 Na QP QP EASTERN AFRICAN STUDIES Abdul Sheriff Slaves, Spices & Ivory in Zanzibar Abdul Sheriff & Ed Ferguson (Editors) Zanzibar Under Colonial Rule Isaria N. Kimambo Penetration & Protest in Tanzania T.L. Maliyamkono & M.S.D. Bagachwa The Second Economy in Tanzania Tabitha Kanogo Squatters & The Roots of Mau Mau 1905-1963 David W. Throup Economic & Social Origins of Mau Mau 1945-1953 Frank Furedi The Mau Mau War in Perspective David William Cohen & E.S. Atieno Odhiambo Siaya Bruce Berman &John Lonsdale Unhappy Valley Bruce Berman Control & Cfisis in Colonial Kenya James de Vere Allen Swahili Origins Thomas Spear & Richard Wailer (Editors) Being Maasai* Holger Bernt Hansen & Michael Twaddle (Editors) Uganda Now Changing Uganda Bahru Zewde A History of Modem Ethiopia 1855-1974 *foftkcming 5 45LS93A4-5993XAFA Swahili Orzgins Swahili Culture & the Shungwaya Phenomenon James de Vere Allen .x James Curry LONDON E.A.E.P NAIROBI Ohio University Press ATHENS James Currey Ltd 54b Thomhill Square Islington London NI IBE, England East African Educational Publishers P0 Box 45314 Nairobi, Kenya Ohio University Press Scott Quadrangle Athens, Ohio 45701, USA © The Literary Executors of the late James de Vere Allen, 1993 First published 1993 929394959654321 British Cataloguing in Publication Data Allen, James de Vere Swahili Origins: Swahili Culture and the Shungwaya Phenomenon. (Eastern African Studies Series) I. Title I. MiddletonJohn III. Series 967.6 ISBN 0-85255-075-8 (Paper) ISBN 0-85255-076-6 (Cloth) Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Allan, J. de V Swahili origins : Swahili culture & the Shungwaya phenomenon I James de Vere Allen. p. cm. -- (Eastern African studies) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-8214-1030-X. -- ISBN 0-8214-1044-X (pbk.) 1. Swahili-speaking peoples--History. 2. Swahili-speaking peoples--Ethnic identity. I. Title. II. Series: Eastern African studies (London, England) DT365.45.S93A45 1993 960'.0496392--dc2O 92-14316 CIP Typeset in 10/10.6 pt Baskerville by Opus 43, Cumbria, Great Britain Printed and Bound in Great Britain by Villiers Publications, London N6 Contents List of Maps/Abbreviations vi Preface by John Middleton vii Acknowledgements x Note on the Orthography of Swahili Names & Technical Terms xi Glossary xii Illustrations xiii-xvi & 164 FOREWORD The Problem of Swahili Identity 1 1. The Earliest Coastal Settlements 21 2. Shungwaya. The Setting 38 3. Early Trade & Trade-Routes 55 4. Swahili Traditions & Metaphors 77 5. Segju Traditions 99 6. Shirazi Traditions & the Composition of Shungwaya 114 7 Great Shungwaya & its Successor-States 135 8. The First Swahili Diaspora & the Coming of Islam 165 9. Shirazi Islam & the Shirazi & Arab-Wangwana Modes of Dominance 193 10. Shungwaya & the Swahili Settlement 213 AFTERWORD Swahili Identiy Reconsidered 240 Index 263 v List of Maps Drawn by Shelley White with the advice of Mark Horton Map 1 Early East Africa 20 Map 2 Early Trade in Cloth and Cinnamon 56 Map 3 Shungwaya Region 78 Map 4 Swahili World 166 Abbreviations Journals and documents referred to repeatedly in the notes at the end of each chapter are abbreviated as follows: AARP Arts and Archaeology Research Papers HA Histoy in Afiica 1JAHS International Journal of African Historical Studies JAil Journal of Aflican History JAS Journal of the African Society JRAI Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute JRAS Journal of the Royal African Society JRGS Journal of the Royal Geographical Sociey NC Numisinatic Chronicle SUGIA Sprache und Geschichte in Afrika TNR Tanganyika Notes and Records ZES Zeitschrfiifr Eingeborenen Sprachen Preface John Middle ton James de Vere Allen was born in Nairobi in 1936 and educated in Kenya and England. After taking a degree at Oxford he joined the Kenya Ministry of Education, teaching at what is today the Lenana School and, after a spell at the University of Malaya, at Makerere University and the University of Nairobi. In 1970 he joined the Kenya Museums and founded the Lamu Museum. He retired in 1980 and near Kwale, on the top of a hill with a distant view of Mombasa and the Indian Ocean, designed and built a charming house with a small farm. Here he wrote this book, but due to perennial lack of water could not make the farm profitable. This worry and ever-worsening sickness made his determination to finish the book the more impressive; but it remained uncompleted at the time of his death in June 1990. A year or so before he died he paid me the honour of asking me to edit for publication his over-long typescript on the history of the Swahili people. He was already seriously ill; he had his farm to run; he had to write and revise papers under difficult conditions; and he had neither the will nor the energy to shorten it himself. I had met Jim in 1985 in Washington, before beginning my work in Lamu, and during the following years when in Kenya I always met with him either in his house in Lamu or at his farm in Kwale. He was hospitable, friendly, enthusiastic about anything to do with the coast and its peoples, and had a sharp sense of humour when observing the world around him which gave him so little recognition or support. Many people were puzzled by Jim, not knowing whether he was an eccentric amateur historian often scorned by professionals (he had neither a doctoral degree nor a university position), or whether he was an original and learned scholar who had devoted more years to the study of Swahili history than almost anyone else in that field. Jim was a frustrated man in his career, his writing, and his farm, and was always secretive about his work. He felt Preface he had been cheated by other writers, many of whom he considered to be lightweight. He was difficult to work with, as he trusted so few people, and concealed most of his ideas until he could publish them himself without fear of their being appropriated by others. Jim Allen was a scholar of great ability and exciting enthusiasm, although often holding ideas that were rather bizarre. He did not think much of either professional historians or linguists, and I recall his often muttering that we anthropologists thought merely about cognative descent and missed everything else. He was also bitter about his failure to obtain research grants whereas everyone else seemed to come to Kenya with seemingly unlimited funds: I had every sympathy with him, knowing how much he could have done with proper support. When he asked me to help him I knew how ill he was, and agreed to do so both as an act of respect and friendship to a kind man, and also as a way of ensuring publication of what I suspected might be a valuable and unique work, although I had not at that time read it. I am glad that I have done so, although it has had to wait until I finished an ethnographic book of my own on the Swahili. In my view Jim's book is a remarkable work of learning, enthusiasm, and intellectual courage. I have read most - not all - of the same sources, and he saw much in them that I had not. He, has set the historiography of the Swahili people and their coast on a track which no one can ever now abandon. And any social anthropologist interested in the region will need to take Jim's hypotheses very seriously. Some critics will doubtless sneer at them as 'conjectures' Jim knew this and refers to it in the book: with lack of firm evidence what else can anyone do but surmise? What Jim has done is to put known 'facts' and 'events', generally agreed upon hypotheses, and his own insights and suggestions together so as to form a single dosely knit argument with a solidly based structure.