Route to a regional past : an archaeology of the lower Pangani (Ruvu) Basin, Tanzania, 500-1900 c.e.
ABSTRACT: Historical narratives of coastwise East Africa rarely take account of the continental hinterland by affording it equal attention in research. This project applies historical archaeology to begin to recuperate human pasts in the lower Pangani (Ruvu) Basin (500-1900 C.E.). I emphasize lowland, interior communities and their archaeological residues within a regional framework. I employ a nineteenth century slave and ivory caravan route to trace much earlier human settlement and interaction in northeastern Tanzania. A systematic, pedestrian survey in five vicinities along the corridor documented more than 325 new archaeological localities that span the known culture history. Sites and artifacts, including those identified along the foot slopes of the Eastern Arc Mountains, signal the florescence of iron-using, farming (and mixed subsistence) communities during the Middle Iron Age (600-1000/1200 C.E.). Interior sites and site clusters near Mombo and Gonja suggest recurrent utilization of the same general vicinities as more recent caravan nodes. Evidence at multiple scales from this and later times suggests increasing connectivity, differentiating political power, and a regional economy based on more than use values alone
Thesis, Dissertation, English, 2010
University of Florida, [Gainesville, Fla.], 2010