UNESCO Ancient Civilizations of Africa (Editor G. Mokhtar)

East Africa
before the seventh
century
J. E. G. SUTTON
It is easier to acquire knowledge of the situation of the peoples and societies
in East Africa after +100 than during the earlier periods. A great deal
of research is now being done on these latter periods and the findings
are leading to a constant revision of all or parts of the previous conclusions.
Study of the 2000 years from —1000 to +1000 is difficult. It calls
for sophisticated methods and a vast amount of information which
archaeology has so far been unable to furnish in its entirety.
The study which follows is therefore conjectural, hypothetical or even
provocative on more than one point, in order to stimulate reflection and
research.
The approach to the early history of East Africa is therefore a cultural
one essentially, an attempt to reconstruct the way or ways of life as far
as the combined archaeological, anthropological and linguistic evidences
will allow. Reference is frequently made to language groups. In themselves
these may be less important than broader cultural and economic
considerations; but language is a part of culture and a historical thing,
something handed down (albeit continually modified) from generation to
generation in a community, and a means by which people clearly identify
themselves as groups and distinguish themselves from others. (These others
they may recognize as related in some way, should the languages be partly
intelligible or share certain common features, or conversely, should no
relationship be obvious, they may regard them as completely alien.) Largely
for these reasons, linguistic definitions and classifications of peoples are
commonly the most clear and convenient for anthropologists and historians.
Those used in this chapter are clarified in the accompanying chart and
map. They follow in general the scheme originally laid down in Zatnani
(edited by Ogot and Keiran, 1968), which was based on Greenberg's
classification of African languages.
The southern savannah hunting tradition
Throughout the savannahs and light woodlands which cover most of Africa
to the east and south of the great equatorial forest belt, the main population
for many thousands of years before the Iron Age consisted of hunter-