Global Currents, Local Complexity: Indian Ocean Trade and Small-Scale Societies around Kilimanjaro

Abstract

Precolonial eastern and central Africa were largely characterised by small-scale societies situated beyond the immediate influence of major state systems such as the Luba-Lunda, Marave, Lozi, Kongo, Zimbabwe Culture, and the Swahili city-states. These communities have frequently been dismissed as lacking socio-political sophistication. Archaeological evidence from the Chagga on the lower slopes of Mount Kilimanjaro, however, challenges this assumption. The Chagga constructed intricate defensive works, exercised careful management of mountain water resources, and maintained both local and regional trade networks, thereby revealing complex forms of organisation. This study employs a historical archaeological approach to investigate how such practices intersected with the expanding Indian Ocean market networks between the 17th and 19th centuries AD. By tracing the connections between Kilimanjaro societies and coastal trade, it demonstrates that small-scale communities actively contributed to the intensification of socio-political and economic complexity in north-eastern Tanzania prior to colonial intervention.