A part of Eastern Africa, the territory of what is known as Kenya has seen human habitation since the beginning of the Lower Paleolithic. The Bantu expansion from a West African centre of dispersal reached the area by the 1st millennium AD. With the borders of the modern state at the crossroads of the Bantu, Nilo-Saharan and Afro-Asiatic ethno-linguistic areas of Africa, Kenya is a truly multi-ethnic state. The Wanga Kingdom was formally established in the late 17th century. The kingdom covered from the Jinja in Uganda to Naivasha in the East of Kenya. This is the first time the Wanga people and Luhya tribe were united and led by a centralized leader, a king, known as the Nabongo.
Mombasa is a coastal city in southeastern Kenya along the Indian Ocean. It was the first capital of British East Africa, before Nairobi was elevated to capital status in 1907. It now serves as the capital of Mombasa County. The town is known as "the white and blue city" in Kenya. It is the country's oldest and second-largest city after Nairobi, with a population of about 1,208,333 people according to the 2019 census. Its metropolitan region is the second-largest in the country, and has a population of 3,528,940 people.
East Africa, also known as Eastern Africa or the East of Africa, is a region at the eastern edge of the African continent, distinguished by its geographical, historical, and cultural landscape. Defined in varying scopes, the region is recognized in the United Nations Statistics Division scheme as encompassing 18 sovereign states and 4 territories.
Fort Jesus is a fort located on Mombasa Island. Designed by Italian Giovanni Battista Cairati, it was built between 1593 and 1596 by order of King Felipe II of Spain, who also reigned as King Filipe I of Portugal and the Algarves, to guard the Old Port of Mombasa. Fort Jesus was the only fort maintained by the Portuguese on the Swahili coast, and is recognised as a testament to the first successful attempt by a Western power to establish influence over the Indian Ocean trade.
This is a survey of the postage stamps and postal history of British East Africa.
Malindi is a town on Malindi Bay at the mouth of the Sabaki River, lying on the Indian Ocean coast of Kenya. It is 120 kilometres northeast of Mombasa. The population of Malindi was 119,859 as of the 2019 census. It is the largest urban centre in Kilifi County.
The Imperial British East Africa Company (IBEAC) was a commercial association founded to develop African trade in the areas controlled by the British Empire. The company was incorporated in London on 18 April 1888 and granted a royal charter by Queen Victoria on 6 September 1888. It was led by William Mackinnon and built upon his company's trading activities in the region, with the encouragement of the British government through the granting of an imperial charter, although it remained unclear what that actually meant.
Lamu or Lamu Town is a small town on Lamu Island, which in turn is a part of the Lamu Archipelago in Kenya. Situated 341 kilometres (212 mi) by road northeast of Mombasa that ends at Mokowe Jetty, from where the sea channel has to be crossed to reach Lamu Island. It is the headquarter of Lamu County and a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
East Africa Protectorate was an area in the African Great Lakes occupying roughly the same area as present-day Kenya from the Indian Ocean inland to the border with Uganda in the west. Controlled by Britain in the late 19th century, it grew out of British commercial interests in the area in the 1880s and remained a protectorate until 1920 when it became the Colony of Kenya, save for an independent 16-kilometre-wide (10 mi) coastal strip that became the Kenya Protectorate.
Pate (Paté) Island is located in the Indian Ocean close to the northern coast of Kenya, to which it belongs. It is the largest island in the Lamu Archipelago, which lie between the towns of Lamu and Kiunga in the former Coast Province. The island is almost completely surrounded by mangroves.
The following is a list of the political history of East Africa.
The Segeju are a Bantu ethnolinguistic group mostly based in Tanzania's Tanga Region and Kenya's Kwale County. Most Segeju reside in the small coastal strip between the Tanzanian city of Tanga and the Kenyan-Tanzanian border. However, some Segeju have migrated to urban areas in other parts of Tanzania or Kenya, in hopes of better employment opportunities and quality of life. Segeju migration to urban areas often results in severance of community ties, leading to a lack of transmission of important cultural traditions and language.
The Sultanate of Zanzibar, also known as the Zanzibar Sultanate, was an East African Muslim state controlled by the Sultan of Zanzibar, in place between 1856 and 1964. The Sultanate's territories varied over time, and after a period of decline, the state had sovereignty over only the Zanzibar Archipelago and a 16-kilometre-wide (10 mi) strip along the Kenyan coast, with the interior of Kenya constituting the British Kenya Colony and the coastal strip administered as a de facto part of that colony.
Ali Muhsin Al-Barwani was a Zanzibari politician and diplomat under the Sultanate of Zanzibar. He was the only Arab foreign minister of an independent Zanzibar before the establishment of the People's Republic of Zanzibar. When his government was overthrown in January 1964 Barwani was held in detention centers across Tanzania until his release in 1974, when he fled to Kenya as a refugee. After obtaining refugee status, Barwani moved to Cairo then back to Kenya then to Dubai in the United Arab Emirates. In the UAE, Barwani translated the Qur'an into Swahili Qur'an for which he is most prominently known.
The Swahili coast is a coastal area of East Africa, bordered by the Indian Ocean and inhabited by the Swahili people. It includes Sofala ; Mombasa, Gede, Pate Island, Lamu, and Malindi ; and Dar es Salaam and Kilwa. In addition, several coastal islands are included in the Swahili coast, such as Zanzibar and Comoros.
The Royal East African Navy was a unified naval force of the former British colonies of Kenya, Tanganyika, Uganda, and Zanzibar. It was the colonial forerunner of the Kenyan Navy and Tanzanian Navy. Formed in 1953, it was disbanded on 30 June 1962.
The military history of Somalia encompasses the major conventional wars, conflicts and skirmishes involving the historic empires, kingdoms and sultanates in the territory of present-day Somalia, through to modern times. It also covers the martial traditions, military architecture and hardware employed by Somali armies and their opponents.
The following is a timeline of the history of the city of Mombasa, Coast Province, Kenya.
Kenya–Oman relations are bilateral relations between Kenya and Oman. Both countries are members of the Indian-Ocean Rim Association and Group of 77.
Fatuma binti Yusuf al-Alawi was a queen of Unguja in pre-Sultanate Zanzibar. A supporter of the Portuguese in their war against Oman, she sent supplies to the Europeans at the Siege of Fort Jesus. She was captured during the subsequent Omani occupation of Zanzibar and exiled to Oman. Allowed to return in 1709 she ruled the island as a client state of Oman for the rest of her life.
