Artistry Permits and Custom May Ordain - Northwestern University

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outward marks of social status. A coral house—a sign of permanence and economic
confidence—served as a patina for its owner, and a family’s coastal ancestry and knowledge
of its society were seen as yardsticks Swahili respectability (heshima). The surviving
records show that a man was denied political office if he “had not been long in the country
and had no relations there.” 78 Indeed, in most royal succession disputes the “greater and
lesser mouros,” as described in Sofala, elected an “heir of the land,” so that in the Sofalan
case the nephew of the Sultan became the new ruler. 79 Those having heshima were not
constant as a social group. On the contrary, respect and station in society could be won
and lost, as witnessed by the fact that lower-status individuals could “Swahilize” by
gaining the physical and social trappings of coastal society or conversely “de-Swahilize” by
losing such distinctions. By displaying belongings rich in cultural meaning, such as
prestigious cloth, ungwana defined and proclaimed their position in society. 80 In the
fifteenth century, ungwana displayed wealth through personal adornment and sumptuous
living in order to concentrate clientele. As circulators of large accumulations of cloth, the
ungwana empowered their political voice to the extent that many successfully challenged
the royalty’s claims to authority or carved out political niches of their own.
Royal personages—generally sultan(a)s, their family, and a core of officials—were
the most materially endowed and politically powerful figures in Swahili society. 81 Though
78 “Arabic History of Kilwa, c. 1520,” in SD, 85. This aspect of ungwana society was of great importance in the
sixteenth century. Numerous Swahili chronicles demonstrate that remembering a lineage’s history and “placing”
a family on the coast from a certain period of time was a strong legitimating factor in its claims to power or
political saliency. For example, Hajj Muhammad Rukn al-Din, the notary of the Sultan of Kilwa’s treasury, was
backed by the Portuguese as the new Sultan of Kilwa in 1505; yet, since he was a recent immigrant and had few
familial relations in the town, he had to work very hard to gain the respect of the “principal mouros of the land.”
After his death it was “declared that it was not conducive . . . that such a man of low origin as the son of Mohamed
Ancony [Hajj Muhammad] should reign.” In the end, the cousin of Sultan Ibrahim (the Sultan of Kilwa when the
Portuguese arrived) was favored by the “chief men of the land” as he was “of the royal line of kings who founded
and populated the town.” De Barros, 1:liv. 10, cap. 4.
79 “Auto passado por Pero Sobrinho e Diogo Homem, escrivães da feitoria de Sofala, Sofala, 1512 Abril 15,”
DPMAC. 3:244. Sobrinho calls this person “Quyunbe,” or kiyumbe (jumbe?)—an administrative official.
80 After M. Weber’s “Class, Society, Party” in From Max Weber. Eds. H. Gerth and C. Mills. New York, 1946. 189.
81 In large city-states like Kilwa, the offices of amir, wazir, and qadi were hereditary. See G. Freeman-Grenville, The
Medieval History of the Tanganyikan Coast. Berlin, 1964. Also, it was not uncommon for women to occupy the
office of sultan. Faza and Zanzibar both had very famous female rulers and there did not seem to be any
restriction against women in powerful state positions anywhere on the coast in this period. J. Strandes, The
Portuguese Period in East Africa. In 1615, Nzwani was governed by “an ould woeman Sultanness . . . to whom they
repayre for Justice both in Ciuill and Criminall causes.” Three of the Sultana’s children, one of them a woman,
were “Subsultans” at Mwali. William Foster, ed., The Embassy of Sir Thomas Roe. 18. Less than fifty years earlier
(1567-8), the ruler of Domoni had been a man. G. Freeman-Grenville and B. G. Martin, “A Preliminary Handlist
of the Arabic Inscriptions of the Eastern Coast of Africa,” in The Swahili Coast, 2nd to 19th Centuries: Islam,
Christianity and Commerce in Eastern Africa. London, 1988. 122.