Zanj

Zanj (

Zanj in Arabic means the "country of the blacks". Other transliterations include Zenj, Zinj, and Zang.[7]^[8] Anthony Christie argued that the word zanj or zang may not be Arabic in origin: a Chinese form (僧祇 sēngqí) is recorded as early as 607 AD. Christie argued that the word is South East Asian in origin.^[9]: 33 The Javanese word jenggi means African people, specifically the people of Zanzibar.^[10]: 740

It is known that the Indonesian Austronesian peoples reached Madagascar by ca. 50–500 CE.^[11][12] As for their route, one possibility is that the Indonesian Austronesians came directly across the Indian Ocean from Java to Madagascar. It is likely that they went through the Maldives, where evidence of old Indonesian boat design and fishing technology persists until the present.^{[13][9]: 32}

Division of East Africa's coast

Geographers historically divided the eastern coast of Africa at large into several regions based on each region's respective inhabitants. Arab and

The Zanj traded with Persians, Arabs, and

The settlements in Zanzibar identified them as economically part of the cosmopolitan culture of the Indian Ocean Basin with trade links as far as Arabia, Persia, and as far east as India and China.^[4][19][20]

The main source of Zanj slaves was likely the frontier between Eastern Cushitic language speakers and Bantu language speakers, where warlike Somali pastoralists were expanding southwards and subjecting the scattered colonies of Bantu agriculturalists.^[21]

Since Arab and Persian identity is patrilineal, elite Swahili claimed, often correctly, prestigious Persian genealogy.^[22] Modern conceptions of cultural fusion or Persian origins developed from the tendency of wealthy Swahili to claim Persian patrilineal origins (which has been supported by DNA studies) and the disproportionate 19th-century importation of Omani elements to Zanzibari and Swahili society. Standard Swahili is the Zanzibari dialect and thus includes far more Arabic loanwords than the other, older Swahili dialects.^[22]

Prominent settlements of the Zanj coast included Kilwa, Kunduchi, Mbuamaji, Tongoni, Kimbiji, Kaole, Malindi, Gedi, and Mombasa. By the late medieval period, the area included at least 37 substantial Swahili trading towns, many of them quite wealthy.

The urban ruling and commercial classes of these Swahili settlements included male Arab, Persian, and Indian immigrants. However, Islamic culture prized familial origins from Persia or Arabia; consequently claims of Middle Eastern descent may be untrustworthy for modern genealogical research.^[22][23][24]

The richest and most powerful slave trader in all of recorded history is Tippu Tip, a man born in Zanzibar with mixed Bantu and Omani ancestry.

The Zanj were for centuries shipped as slaves by slave and ivory traders to all the countries bordering the

As of 2023, the Lemba people still refer to the populations of neighboring tribes as "Zenj."

Ancient DNA analysis

A study by Brielle et al in 2023 completed ancient DNA analysis of several samples from the ruins of Zanzibar. Ancient DNA (aDNA) analysis was completed for 80 individuals from 6 medieval and early modern (AD 1250–1800) coastal towns and an inland town after AD 1650 in order to determine the proportions of "African-like, Persian-like, and Indian-like" DNA sequences. More than half of the DNA of many of the individuals from coastal towns originated from primarily female ancestors from Africa, with a large proportion — sometimes more than half—of the DNA coming from Asian ancestors. The Asian ancestry includes components associated with Persia and India, with 80–90% of the Asian DNA originating from Persian men. Peoples of African and Asian (predominantly Persian) origins began to mix by about AD 1000.^[25] Samples were taken from two boxes of human remains located the in British Institute in Eastern Africa (BIEA) in Nairobi, originally excavated in the 1950s and 1960s by Chittick.^[26]

After AD 1500, the sources of male Asian DNA became increasingly Arabian, consistent with increased interactions with southern Arabia. From medieval times until the modern day, subsequent interactions with different Asian and African people have changed the ancestry of the present-day people living on the Swahili coast compared to the medieval individuals whose DNA was sequenced.^[25]

Potentially dating from 1300-1600 AD (more precise radiocarbon dating techniques were unable to be completed in time for these samples), analysis was completed of the individuals'

Kilwa is one of the most beautiful and well-constructed towns in the world. The whole of it is elegantly built. The roofs are built with mangrove pole. There is very much rain. The people are engaged in a holy war, for their country lies beside the pagan Zanj. Their chief qualities are devotion and piety: they follow the Shafi'i sect. When I arrived, the Sultan was Abu al-Muzaffar Hasan surnamed Abu al-Mawahib [loosely translated, "The Giver of Gifts"] ... on account of his numerous charitable gifts. He frequently makes raids into the Zanj country [neighboring mainland], attacks them and carries off booty, of which he reserves a fifth, using it in the manner prescribed by the Koran [Qur'an].^[32]

Zanj Rebellion

The Zanj Rebellion was a series of uprisings that took place between 869 and 883 AD near the city of Basra in present-day Iraq. Many Zanj were taken as slave soldiers, but many had earned their freedom and chose to stay in Iraq as free persons and make Iraq their home living amongst the Marsh Arabs.^[33]

M. A. Shaban explains that the Zanj Rebellion was not a slave rebellion but rather an Arab rebellion supported by East African immigrants in Iraq:

It was not a slave revolt. It was a "zanj", i.e. a Negro, revolt. To equate Negro with slave is a reflection of nineteenth-century racial theories; it could only apply to the American South before the Civil War...On the contrary, some of the people who were working in the salt marshes were among the first to fight against the revolt. Of course there were a few runaway slaves who joined the rebels, but this still does not make it a slave revolt. The vast majority of the rebels were Arabs of the Persian Gulf supported by free East Africans who had made their homes in the region.^[34]

References