Play the flute in Zanzibar and all Africa, as far as the Lakes, Dances Swahili Proverb
If there is a historic centre for the Swahili culture of the East African coast, Zanzibar has a good claim to be that centre. Its capital, known as Stone Town, is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and is the oldest extant ancient town in East Africa.
The word ‘Swahili' derives from the Arabic sawahil or ‘coast', and dates back at least as far as the times of the 14th century traveller Ibn Battuta, who visited the coastal cities of Mombasa and Kilwa in 1330. The Swahili language, an indigenous Bantu tongue that has incorporated a wealth of Arabic words through more than 12 centuries of contact with the Arab World, is considered to have originated in Zanzibar and nearby Mombasa, and today is the lingua franca of all East Africa, including Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, parts of Mozambique and the Democratic Republic of Congo, as well as the Comoros Islands.
The name Zanzibar derives from the Arabic zanjibar or ‘Land of the Blacks', and probably before that from the Persian zangi [black-skinned] and bar [coast]. Certainly Persian influence on the island extends back many centuries, and Zanzibar epitomizes the millennia-old blending of African, Persian, Arab and Islamic influences that today constitute Swahili culture.
In the early 16th century, after long periods of contact with Persian, Arab and even Chinese navigators attached to the fleet of Ming Admiral Zheng He who visited in 1418, Zanzibar fell under Portuguese control. Then, in 1698, it passed to the Sultanate of Oman, reinforcing cultural and linguistic links with the Arabian Peninsula. In 1832 (some sources say 1840), Sultan Said bin Sultan moved his capital from Muscat to Stone Town, ushering in a Golden Age for Zanzibar – though not for the Africans of the mainland – as the island prospered through trade in gold, ivory and slaves. Zanzibar also flourished through the production of nutmeg, cinnamon, black pepper and above all cloves, earning it the soubriquet ‘Spice Islands' – a name it shared with the Moluccas in distant Indonesia.
Slavery ended in the late 19th century, and the islands became a British protectorate in 1890, finally achieving independence in 1963. In April 1964 Zanzibar was united with Tanganyika to form the United Republic of Tanganyika and Zanzibar, which became known as Tanzania six months later. Today the former trade in slaves and ivory has been replaced by a burgeoning tourism sector, though spices also remain important.