Africa
Highlights - Essential Info - History - Hotels
The island of Zanzibar has a long and colourful history with records of Arab and Persian traders visiting the area since the 1st Century. Over the next fifteen hundred years Zanzibar became the powerful centre of an extremely rich and lucrative trade route with Asia supplying gold, ivory, slaves and mangrove poles in exchange for glass and textiles. During the 16th Century the Portuguese gained control of the East African coast, but their period of tenure was soon cut short by the Omanis who forced their withdrawal from the area by the early 18th Century.
Oman consolidated Zanzibar as a major power base of extreme commercial importance to the extent that, in 1832, the Sultan of Oman moved his court from the Gulf to Zanzibar. Zanzibar became the largest exporter of cloves in the world as well as a prominent base for the supply of slaves and ivory. The island also became the gateway to the mainland for a number of the European explorers such as David Livingstone and other missionaries who were keen to see the slave trade abolished. Zanzibar became a British Protectorate with the Sultans still ruling, but over the next hundred years the influence of the Omanis started to diminish until 1963 when independence was finally granted.
Just one month later in January 1964 the Sultan was overthrown in a revolution that saw him seek exile and the rise to power of the black Africans under Abeid Karume. The new President signed a declaration of unity with the Tanganyika mainland and in April 1964, Tanzania was born. Despite the occasional rumbling of political tension on Zanzibar over the last few decades, there has been relative stability for the remarkable cauldron of different races and creeds that live together on this beautiful island. Fringed by coral reefs and sandy beaches, steeped in history and culture with its narrow streets, bustling fruit markets and wafting aroma of spices, Zanzibar remains a wonderfully mysterious and fascinating island to visit.
