Tanzania

Overview

The East African country of Tanzania is bounded by the Great African Rift Valley and Lakes Tanganyika and Malawi in the west, passing eastwards across high plateau, mountains and plains to a narrow coastal strip and islands bordering the Indian Ocean. The 'Swahili' coast has seen a succession of Palaeolithic hunter gatherers, explorers, slave traders, ivory hunters, Indian merchants and Omani and European armies over its long history. A glimpse of this can be seen at Stone Town on Zanzibar Island, with its narrow twisted streets, old stone houses, mosques and walled courtyards. The bustling sea port of Dar es Salaam is on the mainland coast just to the south. Its eclectic mix of Swahili, German, Asian and British architecture grew up around a huge natural harbour, where traditional dhows unchanged for centuries still ply their trade between large cruise ships and cargo boats of all sizes. A succession of idyllic white sandy beaches fringed by coconut groves stretch along the coast to the north and south with a variety of popular and secluded resorts.

The spectacular mountains, valleys and plains in the interior of the country is home to an extraordinary variety of wildlife with a large number of national parks and game reserves. Kilimanjaro National Park is dominated by the great ice-capped mountain towering to 5895m above the Tanzanian plains. First climbed by a European in 1889, it is now popular with trekkers who climb from the tropical to the artic on the way to the top past a...more

History

Most of the known history of Tanganyika before 1964 concerns the coastal area, although the interior has a number of important prehistoric sites, including the Olduvai Gorge. Trading contacts between Arabia and the East African coast existed by the 1st century AD, and there are indications of connections with India. The coastal trading centres were mainly Arab settlements, and relations between the Arabs and their African neighbours appear to have been fairly friendly. After the arrival of the Portuguese in the late 15th century, the position of the Arabs was gradually undermined, but the Portuguese made little attempt to penetrate into the interior. They lost their foothold north of the Ruvuma River early in the 18th century as a result of an alliance between the coastal Arabs and the ruler of Muscat on the Arabian Peninsula. This link remained extremely tenuous, however, until French interest in the slave trade from the ancient town of Kilwa, on the Tanganyikan coast, revived the trade in 1776. Attention by the French also aroused the sultan of Muscat's interest in the economic possibilities of the East African coast, and a new Omani governor was appointed at Kilwa. For some time most of the slaves came from the Kilwa hinterland, and until the 19th century such contacts as existed between the coast and the interior were due mainly to African caravans from the interior.

In their constant search for slaves, Arab traders began to penetrate farther into the interior, more particularly in the southeast toward Lake...more