User:Kowal2701/sandbox/History of Africa: East Africa

Horn of Africa
Medhri Bahri, Ajuran, other ethnicities

At the end of the 6th century, the Kingdom of Aksum ruled over much of modern-day Ethiopia, Eritrea, and South Arabia, with the Harla Kingdom to its east, whilst ancient Somali city-states such as Mosylon, Opone, Sarapion, Avalites, and Aromata on the Somali Peninsula continued to thrive off of the lucrative Indian Ocean trade and their preferential relations with India.

Following the birth of Islam in the early 7th century, Muslim-Akumite relations were initially positive with Aksum serving refuge for early Muslims fleeing from persecution in 613, however soured after Aksum made incursions along the Arab coast and Muslims settled the Dahlak archipelago. At the beginning of the eighth century, an Umayyad caliph had four kings drawn on the walls of his palace in Qusayr 'Amra, Jordan, which were the sovereigns of Visigothic Spain, Byzantium, Persia, and Aksum. Aksum became isolated following the Muslim conquests and the expulsion of the Byzantines from the region, experiencing a decline in prosperity. Beja nomads invaded in the 8th century and occupied modern-day Eritrea, causing Aksum to lose their access to the Red Sea, with the Beja establishing various kingdoms and soon Islamising. The Aksumite population migrated further into the highlands, moving their capital from Aksum to Kubar, and expanded southwards in the 9th century. The history is murky, however local legend holds that the Kingdom of Beta Israel endured in the Simien Mountains and finally descended in 960, with the Jewish queen Gudit defeating and killing Aksum's king, burning its churches and destroying the kingdom. According to tradition, she ruled for 40 years before they were overthrown by Mara Takla Haymanot, a general of Aksum, establishing the Zagwe dynasty in 1137. (Gebre Meskel Lalibela and Yemrehana Krestos). The pagan Kingdom of Damot contested the Christian Zagwe over regional hegemony.

During the 8th and 9th centuries Islam spread through the Somali Peninsula via proselytisation through Muslim clerics, with the Somali being some of the first non-Arabs to convert to Islam. The Harla Kingdom of Hubat also converted to Islam c. 700. The Somalis were organised into various clans, with some claiming lineage to Samaale, traditionally a descendant of Muhammad's cousin. The Dir clans, among others, formed states in the north-central Harar Plateau in the 9th and 10th centuries, including Fatagar, Dawaro, Bale, Hadiya, Hargaya, Mora, Kwelgora, and Adal, with the latter centred on Zeila (previously Avalites), neighbouring the Arab Sultanate of Shewa to their south. On the Horn's southeast coast the Tunni clan established the Tunni Sultanate, and the clans of Sarapion formed the Sultanate of Mogadishu. In 1275 the Arab dynasty of the Sultanate of Shewa was overthrown by Umar Walasma of the Walashma dynasty, who established the Sultanate of Ifat and expanded into the Harar Plateau. In the 13th century the Ajuran clan established the Ajuran Sultanate and expanded along the eastern Somali Peninsula, conquering the Tunni and vassalising Mogadishu, coming to dominate the Indian Ocean trade. Towards the end of the 13th century the Warsangali clan formed the Warsangali Sultanate on the Horn's north-eastern coast, with Mosylon becoming Bosaso.

To the west, in 1270 Yekuno Amlak, rebelled and defeated the Zagwe king in battle, and established the Solomonic dynasty of the nascent Christian Ethiopian Empire, claiming their descent from the last king of Aksum, and from Aksumite queen Makeda and the Israelite king Solomon according to the Kebra Nagast. Amda Seyon I came to the throne in 1314 and conquered Damot, Harla, and Gojjam, and campaigned in Ethiopia's northern provinces where Beta Israel had been gaining prominence. Prior to and during this time, Ifat incorporated the polities of Adal, Gidaya, Dawaro, Sawans, Bale, Mora, Hargaya, Hubat, and Fatagar among others, growing to rival the Christian kingdom. In 1320, a religious dispute between Amda Seyon and the Mamluk sultan led Ifat's Haqq ad-Din I to initiate jihad against Ethiopia. He invaded, burning churches and forcing renunciation on Christians, until the Ethiopian emperor defeated the Ifat armies and killed Haqq ad-Din, forcing the Muslim states to become tributaries and raiding their provinces. Ifat sultan Sabr ad-Din I led a widespread rebellion in 1332 seeking to rule a Muslim Ethiopia, but was defeated, ushering in a golden age for the Ethiopian Empire. Successive sultans struggled to shake off Ethiopian vassalage, moving the capital to Adal outside of Ethiopia's sphere of control.

In 1415 Sabr ad-Din III of the Walashma dynasty returned to the region from exile to establish the Adal Sultanate. He defeated the Ethiopian armies, and began the reconquest of the Muslim lands.

Swahili coast, Madagascar, and the Comoro Islands
User:Zanahary Chronicles: Kilwa (Kilwa Chronicle), Pate (Fumo Liyongo), Mombasa Vazimba kingdoms (Twelve sacred hills of Imerina)

The turn of the 7th century saw the Swahili coast continue to be inhabited by the Swahili civilisation, whose economies were primarily based on agriculture, however they traded via the Indian Ocean trade and later developed local industries, with their iconic stone architecture. Forested river estuaries created natural harbours whilst the yearly monsoon winds assisted trade, and the Swahili civilisation consisted of hundreds of settlements and linked the societies and kingdoms of the interior, such as those of the Zambezi basin and the Great Lakes, to the wider Indian Ocean trade. There is much debate around the chronology of the settlement of Madagascar, although most scholars agree that the island was further settled by Austronesian peoples from the 5th or 7th centuries AD who had proceeded through or around the Indian Ocean by outrigger boats, to also settle the Comoros. This second wave possibly found the island of Madagascar sparsely populated by descendants of the first wave a few centuries earlier, with the Vazimba of the interior's highlands being revered and featuring prominently in Malagasy oral traditions. The wider region underwent an trade expansion from the 7th century, as the Swahili engaged in the flourishing Indian Ocean trade following the early Muslim conquests. Settlements further centralised and some major states included Gedi, Ungwana, Pate, Malindi, Mombasa, and Tanga in the north, Unguja Ukuu on Zanzibar, Kaole, Dar es Salaam, Kilwa, Kiswere, Monapo, Mozambique, and Angoche in the middle, and Quelimane, Sofala, Chibuene, and Inhambane in the south. Via mtumbwi, mtepe and later ngalawa they exported gold, iron, copper, ivory, slaves, pottery, cotton cloth, wood, grain, and rice, and imported silk, glassware, jewellery, Islamic pottery, and Chinese porcelain. Relations between the states fluctuated and varied, with Mombasa, Pate, and Kilwa emerging as the strongest. This prosperity led some Arab and Persian merchants to settle and assimilate into the various societies, and from the 8th to the 14th century the region gradually Islamised due to the increased trading opportunities it brought, with some oral traditions having rulers of Arab or Persian descent. The Kilwa Chronicle, supposedly based on oral tradition, holds that a Persian prince from Shiraz arrived and acquired the island of Kilwa from the local inhabitants, before quarrel with the Bantu king led to the severing Kilwa's land bridge to the mainland. Settlements in northern Madagascar such as Mahilaka, Irodo, and Iharana also engaged in the trade, attracting Arab immigration. Bantu migrated to Madagascar and the Comoros from the 9th century, when zebu were first brought. From the 10th century Kilwa expanded its influence, coming to challenge the dominance of Somalian Mogadishu located to its north, however details of Kilwa's rise remain scarce. In the late 12th century Kilwa wrestled control of Sofala in the south, a key trading city linking to Great Zimbabwe in the interior and famous for its Zimbabwean gold, which was substantial in the usurpation of Mogadishu's hegemony, while also conquering Pemba and Zanzibar. Kilwa's administration consisted of representatives who ranged from governing their assigned cities to fulfilling the role of ambassador in the more powerful ones. Meanwhile the Pate Chronicle has Pate conquering Shanga, Faza, and prosperous Manda, and was at one time led by the popular Fumo Liyongo. The islands of Pemba, Zanzibar, Lamu, Mafia and the Comoros were further settled by Shirazi and grew in importance due to their geographical positions for trade.

By 1100, all regions of Madagascar were inhabited, although the total population remained small. Societies organised at the behest of hasina, which later evolved to embody kingship, and competed with one another over the island's estuaries, with oral histories describing bloody clashes and earlier settlers often pushed along the coast or inland. An Arab geographer wrote in 1224 that the island "comprises of a great many towns and kingdoms. Each king makes war on the other". Assisted by climate change, the peoples gradually transformed the island from dense forest to grassland for cultivation. Oral traditions of the central highlands describe encountering an earlier population called the Vazimba, thought to have been the first settlers of Madagsacar, represented as primitive dwarfs. From the 13th century Muslim settlers arrived, integrating into the respective societies, and held high status owing to Islamic trading networks.

Kilwa had grown by the 15th century to encompass Mombasa, Malindi, Inhambane, Zanzibar, Mafia, Grande Comore, and Mozambique. They first made contact with Portuguese explorers in 1497.