Introduction

As a result of the Renaissance and the industrial revolution, Europe got the desire to explore the unknown parts of the world and East African coast was among the areas targeted. This was in search for raw materials and newmarket.

The Portuguese were the first Europeans to establish contacts at the East African coast in 1497.

In November 1497, the Portuguese navigator Vasco da Gama (1460-1524), commissioned by king Manuel I the Fortunate to open the route to the Indies, was the first European to sail round the Cape of Good Hope. The Portuguese arrived in Mombasa on the 7th of April 1498, where the Arabs repelled them cutting their anchors.

The expedition went on Northward and docked at Malindi one week later. The sailor came to terms with the local sultan, who supplied a pilot that knew the route to Calcutta, the most important commercial port in Southwest India at the time. He left Malindi for India and arrived May 20^th 1497.

Tension increased and Vasco da Gama was bound to leave Calicutta, and after a long and tough trip during which scurvy decimated the crew, the expedition arrived back in Malindi on the 8th of January 1499, where da Gama ordered to burn his vessel San Rafael, since the available crew was insufficient.

The strategic importance of the East African harbours prompted the Portuguese Crown to seize this region. Within ten years, the Portuguese Navy sieged and conquered all the coastal cities save their ally Malindi. Mombasa gained its reputation of rebel city since it resisted invasion, being destroyed three times, in 1502, 1528 and finally in 1588, when it finally fell under Portuguese control.

Why the Portuguese came to the East African coast

The Portuguese had a number of reasons why they had to control the East African coast but the major ones are trade, religion and exploration. Firstly, they wanted to spread Christianity at the coast. This was motivated by the desire to revenge against the Arabs who had invaded their area in 711 A.D. and forced the Portuguese to accept Islam.

Connected to the above, the Portuguese hoped to get assistance from the legendary King Prester John IV who was believed to be living in North East Africa (Ethiopia).  Therefore, their desire to associate with the Ethiopians forced them to occupy the coast.

Thirdly, they wanted to stop the spread of Islam along the coast of East Africa. They had identified Islam as a potential danger to the strategic interests of Portugal. Therefore destroying the spread of Islam would lead to their success in their investment without a strong religion and civilization that would oppose.

Fourthly, the Portuguese wanted to control the Indian Ocean trade and participate directly in it. Since the Portuguese were traders by plan, they wanted to have monopoly over the Indian trade in order to earn high profits at the expense of the Arabs who would be their competitors.

They also hoped to obtain wealth from East Africa like gold, which was mined by Makalanga people of Mwenomotapa in the present day Zimbabwe. They also hoped to obtain silk from East Africa for their industrial development.

The Portuguese wanted to prevent other European countries from gaining access to the Indian Ocean trade, which would bring stiff competition. At that time the level of industrialization was starting in Europe and many countries were searching for market and trade in profitable zones so the Portuguese had control the coast to stop any other country to think of coming to occupy it.

They were also attracted by the good natural harbours where ships could obtain fresh supply of water, food and drugs and their ships would be repaired from these harbours.

The Portuguese also hoped that their occupation on the coast could prevent the Turks and Egyptian forces from obtaining help at the coast.  Turks in the near future became a problem to the Portuguese because they competed for the coast with them.

More so, they wanted to make them pay taxes and tributes to the Portuguese king. This was actually the most important for the Portuguese mission on the East African coast. Portugal was a poor country that wanted revenue for national development by taxing the people of the coast. This was done with success in all the Portuguese colonies in East Africa, West Africa and South America.

Strategically, the Portuguese wanted to control and capture places of strategic importance like the islands on the East African coast to provide bases for ships and trade caravans.

The Portuguese also wanted to explore new areas. The Renaissance was a period of excitement and adventure. It was a revival in science, art, literature, philosophy, commerce and all aspects of human development. Many Europeans made voyages of exploration in order to seek more knowledge about the world and the unknown areas. The Portuguese therefore took lead in this event through their man Henry the Navigator. So by reaching the East African coast they found the area economically viable.

They also wanted to establish the shortest sea route to India where they believed to obtain more wealth.

More still, Portuguese wanted to gain fame and prestige among the Europeans. Since they were controlling a very large area from Mozambique to Somalia, they would be seen with respect and honour as a very powerful people.

The Portuguese had some selfish motive after realising that East African coastal towns were rich, they hoped to loot all the wealth and works of art to Portugal.  This was partly done for the enrichment of Portugal.

Finally the Portuguese wanted to stop slave trade and slavery, which was being practised by the Arabs.

In conclusion therefore, the Portuguese like any other European country were being driven by more of economic factors than any other reason.

Steps of the Portuguese conquest of the East African coast

The Portuguese captured the East African coast by force. The conquest began in 1487 and it completed in 1509.  When Vasco da Gama came, in 1497, he was treated half-heartedly at Mozambique by the residents.  At Mombasa he met open hostility but at Malindi he was welcomed because of the rivalry between Mombasa and Malindi.  He even obtained a pilot to India.

The conquest of the East African coast began in 1497 when Vasco da Gama made his successful journey to the coast of India. He reported back about the profitable business in spices with the Far East and the gold trading in the interior of East Africa.

The conquest of the coast took many steps from 1487-1510 A.D. It took the form of force on most areas that resisted except Malindi that gave the Portuguese the initial support. The following steps should be noted as the most important:

Interest began during the first half of the 15^th Century and actual conquest took place between 1498 to 1510.

In 1487 – 91, Pedro da Covhila was sent using an overland route via Egypt, Aden and Goa to collect information to King John of Portugal.

1494 – Treaty of Tordesilas with European countries gave Portugal the right to establish a commercial empire in the East.

1498 – First Portuguese ships under the command of Vasco da Gama landed at the East African coast on their way to India.

Pedro Alvares Cabral, a Portuguese captain made an attempt in 1500 to capture Sofala but he failed. In 1502, Vasco da Gama returned to East Africa with 19 ships and he captured Kilwa and forced sultan Ibrahim to pay tributes every year to the king of Portugal.  The sultan was imprisoned and later released.

1503 -Laurenco Ravasco captured Zanzibar, Pemba and Mafia which he forced to pay tribute to the king of Portugal.  In spite of this, the East African coast was effectively conquered. In 1504, Francisco d’ Almeida sent by Emmanuel the Fortunate as the Viceroy of India. Over twenty ships attacked Mombasa, Sofala and Kilwa. In 1505, Mombasa was attacked and burnt down by Francisco D’ Almeida and Mozambique was taken over in 1507 other coastal towns like Malindi, Pate, and Lamu were also occupied by the Portuguese without much resistance because they surrendered to the new comers.

The conquest was completed by 1509 when Socotra on the Red Sea was captured by the Portuguese. Almeida also occupied Ormaz on the Persian Gulf was also taken up later on the areas because Portuguese bases in the Middle East. In 1510, the entire East African coastline from Socotra to Sofala was under Portuguese rule. Two Portuguese captains accountable to the Portuguese viceroy base at Goa in India were appointed to rule East Africa.

Vasco da Gama  

Vasco da Gama played a very important role in the establishment of Portuguese rule at the East African Coast. He first came in 1498, looking for a Sea route to India and discovered the economic prosperity of the East African coast.

He discovered that gold at Sofala, good harbours for ships that most people are hostile, that they could be defeated by Portuguese forces.

Vasco da Gama also discovered that the coastal people were not united to could not easily unite to fight the Portuguese.

With such an account of commercial prosperity, Vasco da Gama convinced King Emmanuel of Portugal to develop interest in the East African coast.

In 1502, Vasco da Gama came back with 15 warships ready to control the coast.

Kilwa, which the Portuguese believed was the most important town on the coast due to its gold trade, was the first to be captured by Vasco da Gama.

Vasco da Gama put the Sultan Ibrahim of Kilwa in prison and forced him to accept Portuguese and even pay tribute to the King of Portugal. However, when Vasco da Gama left for India, Kilwa refused to pay taxes and that is why Francisco Almeida was sent and played a very important role in the conquest of East African coast.

Francisco da Almeida

Among the Portuguese conquerors, Francisco da Almeida played the most effective role in the conquest and control of the East African coast. With an army of 1540 soldiers, he declared an attack on the coast settlements. Sofala with her gold trade was the target to attack. However no resistance was received because Sofala preferred Portuguese rule as compared to that of Kilwa.

Next on his list of Conquest was Kilwa which had misbehaved after the departure of Vasco da Gama to India. A lesson was given to Kilwa. It was destroyed and looted of anything of value.

Moving Northwards, Mombasa followed Kilwa. Mombasa put the toughest resistance but they could not manage the military force of Portuguese.

Similarly, in the next two years, Francisco da Almeida’s instructions most of the islands and towns North of Mombasa were brought under Portuguese rule.

Why the Portuguese Captured the Coast with Ease.

Firstly disunity among the coastal people made the Portuguese succeed in capturing the East African coast. The coastal inhabitants were disunited for example Malindi was in bad terms with Mombasa. These weakened them further to resist the Portuguese.  Kilwa and Mombasa were traditional enemies.

Secondly use of surprise attacks made the Portuguese to succeed in capturing the East African coast. The Portuguese attacked the coastal cities by surprise and found the people there unprepared to fight.

Superior weapons used by the Portuguese made them succeed in capturing the East African coast. On the other hand, the coastal people were very disorganised militarily. The Portuguese were better equipped than their enemies.

Naval strength of the Portuguese made it easy for them to capture the East African coast. Portuguese had bigger and strong ships called carracks that carried canoes. In addition, the Portuguese soldiers had enough musks which they used to cover their faces and heads.

Portuguese conquered the East African coast very easily because they had experience in fighting.

The Portuguese had brave chiefs who efficiently commanded the forces that captured the coastal town. These were in the names of Vasco da Gama,   D’ Almeida, Ruy Laurenco and Pedro  da Covhila among others.

They also succeeded because they had strong will and determination to take over the coastal towns at all cost.

The Portuguese were well trained, strong and experienced soldiers compared to the natives of the East African coast.

The Arabs at the coast got little or no assistance from Africans in the fight against Portuguese invaders.

Due to persistent warfare, food production declined and therefore famine and disease weakened coastal states.

Portuguese applied a kind of divide and rule method to capture the East African coast. For instance the Portuguese made friendship with Malindi against Mombasa.

Compared to the East African coastal towns the Portuguese had strong and better ships for naval warfare. They were also many in numbers.

The Wazimba’s influence led to the success of the Portuguese. Some towns like Kilwa and Mombasa had been weakened by fear and attacks from brutal and cannibal Zimba. The Wazimba ate human beings, looted property and burnt down towns.

Life under the Portuguese on the East African coast

For 200 years, they stayed at the coast there was total decline and delay in the way of life. They did not establish good relationship with the people at the East African coast.

The Portuguese did not mix freely with the Arabs and the Africans. They were highly discriminative; they concentrated on activities to enrich themselves and their country Portugal.

They divided the Coastal strip into parts for easy administration which were under the captains based in Mozambique.

The Portuguese were involved in religious struggles with an intention to reduce the influence of Islam although they did less to promote Christianity as well.

The Portuguese administrators were harsh and brutal. They mistreated many Africans through corporal punishments that created sustainable tension between the two peoples.

Economically, trade was the major activity and focal point of interest, the trading towns included Mombasa, Malindi, Zanzibar, Sofala and Mozambique dealing in major items like gold, copper, ivory and tortoise shells.  It has been said that gold trade was not effective due to war among the people in mining areas.

These wars interrupted the mining of gold which was the major trade item.  Much of the gold and other trade items were smuggled by Africans because of the high taxes imposed.

Agriculture was also carried out mainly on the islands of Mafia, Zanzibar and Pemba.  Crops grown included cocoa, pumpkin, maize among others

On the trading items the Portuguese levied heavy taxes in the people accompanied with brutality in the collection and this led to trade decline.

There was a high rate of Economic deprivation: All works of Art, splendours, the people of East Africa had were looted an taken to Portugal.

Famine was greatly experienced as farmlands were burnt down during Portuguese expedition.

There were economic hardships highly experienced. Due to decline in trade, bad economic conditions came up that resulted into the following economic hardships: unemployment, limited incomes, poverty due to high taxation, smuggling, poor standards of living.

Politically, the Portuguese’s administration was full of brutality and arrogance, they were never accepted by their subjects.

For the first 9 years of their rule, they were characterised of constant wars of conquest. There was always a political fear at the coast caused by the suspension of Turkish pirates who were always disturbing the coast. Ali Bey is the best example.

The above resulted into political instability at the coast.  His activities encouraged revolts against the Portuguese from Mogadishu to Mombasa in 1685. Here Moslem leaders attacked Portuguese settlements.

Following these rebellions, towns were destroyed into ashes. Fort Jesus was built as a garrison to ensure obedience along the coastal area.

The Portuguese administration was not effective because of lack of enough administrators hence they could not over see the entire coastline.

There was Insecurity at the east African coast. Portuguese expeditions and brutality led to the death of many coastal peoples and made life generally difficult at the coast.

There was gradual depopulation as many Arabs left for fear of their life and property.

Generally the political way of life at the East African coast was characterised by persistent revolts against Portuguese rule backed by Turkey and Oman.

 

Loss of Control of the East African Coast by 1700 AD

The Portuguese were disrupted by both internal and external factors among which there was Low manpower. Portugal was too small a country to provide enough men of quality to administer its overseas possession.  They did not even involve the local people in the administration of the coast.

Corruption was another factor that led to Portuguese loss of control of the East African coast by 1700 AD. Both the Portuguese soldiers and officials were corrupt.  This meant that Portugal was running the coastal empire at a loss. The political authority was left in the hands of corrupt officials whose main aim was to make as much money as possible instead of putting up profit making projects.

Internal rebellion or revolution by coastal settlement weakened and destabilised Portuguese rule. For example Persia regained Ormuz, Mombasa remained rebellious throughout their rule.  Oman raids between 1660 -1729 and Pate gave a lot of trouble to the Portuguese.

Long coastline also led to loss of control of the coast by the Portuguese. The coastline was too long to be effectively controlled.   This required strong military machinery that Portugal could not manage to raise.

Military weakness further undermined Portuguese rule towards the end of the 17^th century and the beginning of the 18^th century.  The Portuguese failed to suppress the several coastal uprisings and to defend themselves against Oman and Turks.

Frequent smuggling of the goods by the coastal people disrupted Portuguese monopoly of trade.  The coastal traders sometimes evaded the payment of tribute and tributes that were collected were also embezzled.

Stiff rivalry and competition from the English, the French and Dutch merchants further destroyed the Portuguese monopoly in the Indian Ocean trade.  The English and Dutch merchants even had a more efficient navy than the Portuguese.

The union of Spain and Portugal between 1580 and 1640 gradually forced Portugal to lose control of her Eastern Empire.  Spain was less interested in financing the local administration of the empire.  Hence Portugal found rebellions increasingly difficult to put down and problems harder to solve.

The external constant attacks from the Turkish pirates disrupted shipping in the Indian Ocean.

There was destruction of many Portuguese settlements and also death of Portuguese from time to time. For example the Zimba raids from Mozambique were very destructive, the Galla tribe also drove the Segoju and Nyika from their cradle. Therefore the effects of this migration on coastal towns were very disturbing.

There was a problem of long distance between Portugal and East Africa. Portugal was far away from East Africa therefore they could not send their enforcement in time

Portugal nursed strategic interests in other colonies. Portugal had other colonies such as Brazil, Angola, Cape Verde and therefore some other administrators went to administer such colonies instead of East Africa.

The Portuguese suffered from many tropical diseases especially malaria that left many of the administrators weak and psychologically insecure.

Portuguese were rude, arrogant and brutal thus coastal people hated them.

Most coastal towns were made up of Moslems, thus would not interact freely with Christians whom they referred to as infidels.

The Portuguese government lacked sufficient funds to finance the administration of the coast.

The climate of East Africa proved too harsh. Many Portuguese died and therefore reduced in number.

The decline of Gedi and other towns was also attributed to acute shortage during the 16^th century.  This could not support the increasing population.

Results of Portuguese rule on the East African coast.   

The two hundred years of Portuguese rule on the East African coast left behind both negative and positive impacts.  But when properly analysed, it remains quite clear that the impact was almost entirely negative. There was little positive contribution to make much impression on the coastal people. Thus the following observations.

Among the negative effects were that the Portuguese rule led to depopulation of the coastal towns.  Their primitive and constant raids on coastal settlements caused death of many people.

There was mass destruction of most coastal towns which tried to put up resistance like Kilwa, Mombasa, Oja, and Brava. These were consistently looted and thereafter dilapidated.

Portuguese rule left the coastal people economically poor.  This was due to imposition of heavy taxes on the people.  To worsen matters the coastal people were eliminated from the Indian Ocean trade, which had been a basis of their livelihood.

The East African coast was left undeveloped. This was mainly due to lack of efficient and centralised administration of the coastal settlements, corrupt officials who never thought of developing the commercial and agricultural resources of the coast.  Much of the revenue collected was embezzled and little was sent to the Portuguese king’s treasury.

Both the Arabs and the Africans remained uncooperative to the Portuguese rule because of their ruthlessness and brutality to the coastal people.  Hence their subjects hated everything about them and copied nothing from them. Even in their architecture, dress, customs and language-totally nothing.

Their attempt to convert the coastal Moslem people to Christianity failed.  Whereas they were the first people to introduce Christianity in East Africa, their religion made almost no mark on the coastal civilisation.

The Portuguese policy of divide and rule intensified the disunity of the coastal settlement for example Malindi, became too hostile to Mombasa, Mogadishu, Brava, Oja, Kismayu, Pate and Lamu.

Portugal’s rule discouraged the incentive of local traders to revive their traditional export and import trade example led to decline of the craft trade.  The strong links between the middle-east were broken. The heavy customs duties imposed by the Portuguese further discouraged smuggling of goods for example the profitable gold trade through Sofala steadily declined.

There were also a few positive impacts which need to be mentioned, they include the following: Fort Jesus which was built in 1592 by the Portuguese has continued to play an important role in the history of the East African coasts and Kenyan government.  It stands out as a tourist attraction and has earned a lot of revenue to the government.

The Portuguese are remembered for the introduction of some food crops from Europe and America which have enriched the diet of the people, These include maize, groundnuts, cassava, sweet potatoes, pineapples, papaws and guavas. The Portuguese brought maize to East Africa.  Most Europeans at the time called maize “Indian corn”.  The word “Indian” refers to Americo-Indians (Red Indians, rather than Hindustan).  To the present day, the name for maize in Kiswahili is hindi (singular) or mahindi (plural).  A salute to Montezuma, the Emperor of Mexico.

The Portuguese added a number of words to the Swahili language that is words like meza, pesa among others. Words borrowed from Portuguese include the big one – pesa, meaning money.  It is borrowed from pesos, the Iberian currency. Other Portuguese words:  sapatu (slippers), shimizi (female undergarment), kandirinya (water kettle).   They also attempted to translate the Bible into Kiswahili language.  Up to today Kiswahili remains a national language for both the governments of Kenya and Tanzania.

They established strong links between the East African coasts and India. Many traders and crafts men came to East Africa especially between 1500 and 1700 example the men who built Fort Jesus.

In conclusion, the Portuguese rule was more destructive than constructive to the people of East Africa. Their work according to the historians was “first to plunder the Indian Ocean trade, secondly to put the sea board towns in tribute, thirdly to accumulate personal loot.”