Kingdoms and Chiefdoms of Southeastern Africa: Oral Traditions and History, 1400-1830(Rochester Studies in African History and the Diaspora)

Examines indigenous oral traditions and histories in order to explain the factors propelling sociopolitical consolidation and the emergence of chiefdoms and kingdoms in nineteenth-century southeastern Africa. This study traces the social and political history of the peoples of early precolonial southeastern Africa, including the regions of modern KwaZulu-Natal, Swaziland, southern Mozambique from Maputo Bay southward, and Lesotho. Theemergence in the early nineteenth century of well-known southern African kingdoms such as the AmaZulu, AmaSwazi, and BaSotho kingdoms was the culmination of centuries of sociopolitical developments, during which political controlwas consolidated in the ruling descent lines of small-scale chiefdoms. Providing the first comprehensive scholarly examination of recorded oral traditions from southeastern Africa, Eldredge's work chronicles the events and life stories propelling this consolidation and the advent of large-scale chiefdoms and kingdoms.. Elizabeth A. Eldredge is an independent scholar and author of The Creation of the Zulu Kingdom, 1815-1828: War, Shaka, and the Consolidation of Power.

Table of Contents:
Preface History and Oral Traditions in Southeastern Africa Oral Traditions in the Reconstruction of Southern African History Shipwreck Survivor Accounts from the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries Founding Families and Chiefdoms East of the Drakensberg Maputo Bay Peoples and Chiefdoms before 1740 Maputo Bay, 1740-1820 Eastern Chiefdoms of Southern Africa, 1740-1815 Zulu Conquests and the Consolidation of Power, 1815-21 Military Campaigns, Migrations, and Political Reconfiguration Ancestors, Descent Lines, and Chiefdoms West of the Drakensberg before 1820 The Caledon River Valley and the BaSotho of Moshoeshoe, 1821-33 The Expansion of the European Presence at Maputo Bay, 1821-33 Southern African Kingdoms on the Eve of Colonization Appendix A: AmaSwazi King List Appendix B: Chronology of Conflicts, Migrations, and Political Reconfiguration East of the Drakensberg in the Era of Shaka Appendix C: Interviewees from the James Stuart Collection of Oral Traditions Notes Bibliography Index

Review :
Elizabeth Eldredge's Kingdoms and Chieftains of Southeastern Africa is a valuable addition to an extensive corpus of writings examining indigenous state formation across the southern Bantu world.