Zanzibar is a semi-autonomous part of Tanzania in East
Africa. It is composed of the Zanzibar Archipelago in the Indian Ocean,
25–50 kilometres off the coast of the mainland, and consists of many small islands and two large ones: Unguja (the main island, referred to informally as Zanzibar) and Pemba.
The capital is Zanzibar
City, located on the island of Unguja. Its historic
centre is Stone Town, which is a World
Heritage Site.
Zanzibar's main industries are spices, raffia,
and tourism. In
particular, the islands produce cloves, nutmeg, cinnamon, and black
pepper. For this reason, the islands, together with
Tanzania's Mafia Island, are sometimes called the Spice Islands (a term also associated with the Maluku Islands in Indonesia). Zanzibar is the home of the endemic Zanzibar
Red Colobu Monkey the Zanzibar Servaline Genet, and the (possibly extinct) Zanzibar
Leopard.
The name of Zanzibar comes from
"zengi", the name for a local people (said to mean
"black"), and the Arabic word "barr", which means coast or
shore.
The presence of microlithic tools
suggest that it has been home to humans for at least 20,000 years, which was the beginning of the Later Stone Age.
Persian traders used Zanzibar as a
base for voyages between the Middle East, India, and Africa. Unguja, the larger
island, offered a protected and defensible harbor, so although the archipelago
offered few products of value, the Persians settled at what became Zanzibar City ("Stone
Town").
Vasco da Gama's visit in
1498 marked the beginning of European influence. In 1503 or 1504, Zanzibar
became part of the Portuguese
Empire when Captain Ruy Lourenço Ravasco Marques landed and
demanded and received tribute from the sultan in exchange for peace. Zanzibar remained a possession of Portugal for almost two centuries.
Sultanate of
Zanzibar
The older settlements are quite
distinct from the later lordship of Oman and Maskat. When the Portuguese
arrived in 1498 they found on the coast a series of independent towns, peopled
by Arabs, but not united to Arabia by any political tie. Their relations with
these Arabs were mostly hostile, but during the sixteenth century they firmly
established their power, and ruled with the aid of tributary Arab sultans.
In 1698, Zanzibar fell under the control
of the Sultanate of Oman.
In 1832 or 1840 (the date varies among sources), Said bin Sultan moved his
capital from Muscat, Oman to Stone
Town in Zanzibar
City. After Said's death in June 1856, two of his
sons struggled over the succession. Said's will divided his dominions into two separate principalities, with Thuwaini to become the Sultan of Oman and Majid to
become the first Sultan of
Zanzibar.
The sultans developed an economy of
trade and cash crops in the Zanzibar Archipelago with a ruling Arab elite. Ivory was a major trade good.
During his 14-year reign as sultan,
Majid bin Said consolidated his power around the local slave trade. Malindi in
Zanzibar City was the Swahili Coast's main port for the slave trade with the
Middle East. In the mid-19th century, as many as 50,000 slaves passed annually
through the port.
British
protectorate
Control of Zanzibar eventually came into
the hands of the British Empire; part
of the political impetus for this was the 19th century movement for the abolition of the slave trade. Zanzibar was the centre of the Arab slave trade, and in 1822, the British counsel in Muscat put pressure
on Sultan Said to end the slave trade. The first of a series of anti-slavery
treaties with Britain was signed by Said which prohibited slave transport south
and east of the Moresby
Line, from Cape Delgado in Africa to Diu Head on
the coast of India.
British
Protectorate ended, self-government, and subsequent merger with Tanganyika
On 10 December 1963, the Protectorate that had existed over
Zanzibar since 1890 was terminated by the United Kingdom. The United Kingdom
did not grant Zanzibar independence, as such, because the UK had never had
sovereignty over Zanzibar. Rather, by the Zanzibar Act 1963 of the United
Kingdom, the UK ended the Protectorate and made provision for full-self
government in Zanzibar as an independent country within the Commonwealth. Upon
the Protectorate being abolished, Zanzibar became a constitutional monarchy under the Sultan. However,
just a month later, on 12 January 1964 Sultan Jamshid
bin Abdullah was deposed during the Zanzibar
Revolution. The
Sultan fled into exile, and the Sultanate was replaced by the People's Republic of Zanzibar
and Pemba. In April 1964, the republic merged with
mainland Tanganyika. This United Republic of Tanganyika and Zanzibar was
soon renamed, blending the two names, as the United Republic of Tanzania, of which Zanzibar remains a semi-autonomous region.
Unguja
The main island of Zanzibar, Unguja, has a fauna reflecting its
connection to the African mainland during the last Ice Age.
Endemic mammals with continental
relatives include the Zanzibar red colobus,
one of Africa's rarest primates, with perhaps only 1,500 existing. Isolated on
this island for at least 1,000 years, the Zanzibar red colobus (Procolobus
kirkii) is recognized as a distinct species, with different coat patterns,
calls, and food habits than related colobus species on the mainland. The Zanzibar red colobus live in a
wide variety of drier areas of coastal thickets and coral rag scrub, as well as
mangrove swamps and agricultural areas. About one third of them live in and
around Jozani Forest. The easiest
place to see the colubus are on farm land adjacent to the reserve. They are
accustomed to people and the low vegetation means they come close to the ground.
Rare native animals include the Zanzibar leopard, which is
critically endangered and possibly extinct, and the recently described Zanzibar servaline genet. There are no large wild animals in Unguja. Forested
areas such as Jozani are inhabited by monkeys, bush-pigs, small antelopes,
civets, and, rumor has it, the elusive leopard. Various species of mongoose can
also be found on the island. There is a wide variety of birdlife and a large
number of butterflies in rural areas.
Pemba
Pemba
Island is separated from Unguja island and the African continent
by deep channels and has a correspondingly restricted fauna, reflecting its
comparative isolation from the mainland. The
island is home to the Pemba
Flying Fox.
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