Africa from the 17th-18th Century

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ca. 1600

  • Niger Delta peoples organise themselves into trading states as landward partners of European maritime traders, whether English, Dutch, Portuguese or French.
  • This trade develops into large and continuing sale of captives, for enslavement in the Americas. Here, as at many other points between the Congo estuary and Senegal, the Atlantic slave trade gets into stride, expands until 1750, remians at high level until 1800, gradually dwindles until it diappears in 1880s.
  • Firearms do not become an important political factor until 1700, but are of growing significance after 1650.

ca. 1600

Seventeenth century opens against background of great changes, along the eastern and south-eastern coasts through Portuguese invasion, and in the inland countries by further development of Iron Age structures.

1607

Dutch attack Portuguese on Mozambique I., fail here, but erode Portuguese control of Indian Ocean.

1628

Portuguese expedition against Mwanamutapa: beginning of desintegration of that state.

1631

Mombasa rebels against Portuguese; fails.

1632

Basilides king of Ethiopia: Gondar period. reorganisation of kingship, eviction of Jesuits.

1650

Rise of Fon state (Dahomey) under Wegbaja; Akaba continues expansion after 1685; Agaja after 1708.

1650

Portuguese loose Muscat in South Arabia: Rise of Omani power there.

ca. 1650

  • New constellation of power in Western African inland countries, largely unrelated to Atlantic slave trade but more and more interest in firearms
  • Expansion of Yoruba state of Oyo
  • Foundation in northern Ghana of Gonja, Buna, Wa; and, in south, of Denkyira and Akwamu; all states more centralised than earlier states.
  • Songhay desintegrates after invasion by Maroccan army under Judar Pasha.

1651

Courlanders build James Fort on island of Gambia estuary.

1652

Dutch settle and establish colony at Cape of Good Hope, South Africa; and colonizing Boers ("farmers"), or Afrikaners, begin settling large farms at the expense of San and Khoikhoi, non-Bantu speakers of the region.

1654

Portuguese evicted by Maroccans from seaboard footholds (Agadir, Safi, etc.). Songhay invaded and loosely held through Pashas resident in Timbuktu.

1661

James Fort seized by British Royal Africa Company.

1661

Competing with Portuguese at sea, the Omani raid them at Mombasa, and (1670) at Mozambique I.

1671

First Dey of Algiers: Ottoman suzerainty reduced.

1677

Expansion of Akwamu (south-eastern Ghana) under Ansa Sasraku; expansion continues until 1702, when Akwamu briefly occupies Ouidah.

1680

Asante foun strong state in forest of central Ghana, especially under first king of united Ashanti states, Osei Tutu (1690-1712).

1681

Ships from Brandenburg reach the coast of Guinea; first trade and protection treaties with African rulers. First warships from Brandenburg in the Caribbean.

1682

Founding of the Trade Society Brandenburg-African Company, first shipping of slaves from Africa to Hamburg. Instruction from the Elector of Brandenburg regarding the transporting of 40 slaves to Hamburg.

1684

Visit of Prince Jancke of the Gold Coast (today Republic of Ghana) to Berlin to the Elector of Brandenburg, Prince Friedrich Wilhelm (reign 1640-1688).

1685

Treaty between the Danish West-Indian Guinea Company and Brandenburg for a trade concession and the sale of slaves on the Caribbean island of St. Thomas.

1689

Tenth Dey of Algiers, Ali Chaouch, achieves title of Pasha; autonomy from Ottomans again increased.

1695

Changamire Dombo evicts Portuguese traders from his kingdom of Urozwi (Zimbabwe Culture). Northwards, in Zambezi valley, Portuguese settlers expand plantation economy (prazos).

1696

Memorandum on the delivery of slaves by three ships from Brandenburg to St. Thomas.

1698

Omani evicts Portuguese finally from Mombasa.

18th c.

Height of Atlantic SlaveTrade: Between the years 1650 and 1900, historians estimate that at least 28 million Africans were forcibly removed from central and western Africa as slaves (but the numbers involved are controversial). A human catastrophe for Africa, the world African Slave Trade was truly a "Holocaust."

1700 - 1717

Asante (or Ashante) Empire of Akan peoples is unified under Osei Tutu on the "Gold Coast"; dominates with control of gold-producing zones and supplying slaves in exchange for firearms (to 1820s).

1700

  • New patterns of power and organisation in many areas of Central Africa.
  • Origins of Lunda kingships in south-western areas of Congo Basin; of Bemba and Lozi polities in Zambia; of gradual extension of use of certain trans-Atlantic food plants, notably cassava;
  • apparent general increase of population at less slow rate than before.
  • Portuguese now in loose control of seaboard peoples of Angola from main base at Sao Paolo de Loanda (Luanda).

1701

Asante defeat Denkyira, secure direct trade with Dutch as Elmina.

1702

Ashanti expands to control territories of most of Ghana under Opoku Ware (1720-50), Kwasi Obodun (1750-64), Osei Kwadwo (1764-77). Power reinforced under Osea Kwame (1777-1801) and Osei Bonsu (1801-24); latter greatly develops state organisation.

ca. 1707

Training of Moors (In the 18th century the word “Moor" (Mohr in German) was used to describe dark skinned Africans.) as military musicians by the Prussian military at the instigation of the king; naming of "Mohrenstrasse" (Moors' Street).

1710

Bey of Tunis recognised as enjoying hereditary succession, another reflection of waning Ottoman power.

1711

The Brandenburg-Prussian Trading Company becomes the exclusive property of the monarch.

1717

Treaty with Holland on the sale of the Prussian trading base in West Africa at the instigation of King Friedrich Wilhelm I von Preussen (1713-1740).

1720s

Kingdom of Dahomey of Fon (or Aja) increases power, based on slaving and firearms (into the 19th c.). The Abomey plateau, an early center of Aja and Yoruba populations, became the capital of the Dahomey monarchy beginning in the 17th century.

1724

Oyo reassert Yoruba suzerainty in South Dahomey; again in 1730, 1739, 1748.

1725

Imamate of Futa Djallon (Guinea) founded: complex reorganisation of Muslim states in West and Central Sudan foreshadowed.

1725

Sale of the Brandenburg-Prussian Trading Company property in Emden.

1727

Dahomey king Agaja embarks on conquest of small seaboard states which monopolise trade with Europeans (Gt. Ardrah, Ouidah, Jakin). Builds strongly centralised monarchy, maintains Ouidah as 'port of trade' with Europeans.

1727

Auction of the property of the Brandenburg-Prussian Trading Company on St. Thomas.

1729

Disputation DE JURE MAURORUM IN EUROPA ... (Text on the Rights of Moors in Europe) by Anton Wilhelm Amo published in Halle, Germany.

1729

Jesus II king of Ethiopia: period of feudal wars and prelude to political reorganisation in nineteenth century.

1736

Admittance of Anton Wilhelm Amo as a lecturer at the Philosophical Faculty of Halle University.

1739

Admittance of Anton Wilhelm Amo as a lecturer at the Philosophical Faculty of the University of Jena.

1750

Baoulé kingship in Southern Ivory Coast founded by Akan immigrants.

1765 - 1783

British Province of Senegambia (maritime Senegal and the Gambia).

1770 - 1789

Oyo under Alafin Obiodun, after whom state power begins to crack under external and internal strains.

1775

Imamate of Futa Toro (northern Senegal) founded: end of Denianke Dynasty in Futa Toro (1776).

1776 - 1783

American War of Independence.

1779

First of many wars of expansion, along the 'inland frontier', against Xhosa and other peoples established along the east of Great Fish River.

1780s

Slave trade at its peak.

1787

Sierra Leone founded.

1787

Thoughts and Sentiments on the Evil of Slavery by Quobna Ottobah Cugoano published. Foundation of the Society for the Abolition of Slave Trade.

1789

Second Expansion War in South Africa against Xhosa and other peoples.

1789

French Revolution Life of Olaudah Equiano published.

1791

Slave uprising in Haiti (Saint Domingue) led by Toussaint L'Ouverture.

1791

Bey of Tunis recognised as enjoying hereditary succession, another reflection of waning Ottoman power.

1794

Slavery abolished in Prussian States by the "General Land Rights Laws."

1796

Mungo Park reaches Niger at Segu.

1798

Egypt briefly invaded by French under Napoleon.

1799

Third Expansion War in South Africa against Xhosa and other peoples.

Late 18th c.

West African religious poetry of Abdullah ibn Muhammed Fudi, emir of Gwandu, reflects familiarily with pre-Islamic Arabic poetry as well as North African religious writing.