Sidi Mubarak Bombay never forgot the moment he lost everything. It was the early 19th century, and he was just a child living in a remote village in the Yao territory of east Africa, which today lies on the border between Tanzania and Mozambique. He never knew his mother, who died soon after he was born, but he had a father, a family, friends, a home. All were taken from him when, as he later recalled with moving candour, a large group of men “equipped with sword and gun, came suddenly”.
These were not strangers. They had been there before, offering goods that they knew the villagers could ill afford. The Yao, Bantu-speaking peoples of east and central Africa, were far from naive: they were sophisticated agriculturalists, highly skilled ironsmiths and experienced traders. They had long worked with the Arabs, bringing ivory and enslaved people from the interior to the coast to sell to them. Bombay’s village, however, was inland and isolated, allowing its inhabitants little interaction with the outside world, and leaving them vulnerable to the traps that slave traders patiently laid.
Upon their return to Bombay’s village, the men “demanded of the inhabitants instant liquidation of their debts… or stand the consequence of refusal”. No wealthier now than they had been when they incurred the debts, and with no guns to defend themselves, the villagers had only one hope: to run. “The whole village,” Bombay remembered, “took to precipitate flight.”
Esta historia es de la edición August 2023 de BBC History UK.
Comience su prueba gratuita de Magzter GOLD de 7 días para acceder a miles de historias premium seleccionadas y a más de 8500 revistas y periódicos.
Ya eres suscriptor ? Conectar
Esta historia es de la edición August 2023 de BBC History UK.
Comience su prueba gratuita de Magzter GOLD de 7 días para acceder a miles de historias premium seleccionadas y a más de 8500 revistas y periódicos.
Ya eres suscriptor? Conectar
"It had been a tiny triumph, but it had been a British triumph"
MAX HASTINGS talks to Rob Attar about a daring airborne raid that provided a much-needed boost to Britain's morale in the darkest days of the Second World War
Dancing with the Devil
ROGER MOORHOUSE is impressed by a book that traces the fortunes of the diplomats charged with managing the west's wartime alliance with Josef Stalin
Victorian cucumber ice cream
ELEANOR BARNETT samples the delights of an unusual and refreshing version of one of the world's favourite summer treats
Anne Boleyn, ‘princess' of France
JOANNE PAUL is impressed by an account of how the Tudor queen's continental connections shaped her meteoric rise and dramatic fall
FIVE THINGS YOU (PROBABLY) DIDN'T KNOW ABOUT...Roman Britain
Rob Collins, who is teaching our new HistoryExtra Academy course, shares five surprising facts about life in Britain during the Roman occupation
War and pieces
Far from idle pursuits, games have transformed the way societies have made sense of life and death, order and conflict for centuries. Kelly Clancy picks five examples that reveal how playtime has often been a serious business
Gulbadan Begum The Mughal Jane Austen
Gulbadan Begum was meant to live a quiet life in the confines of a Mughal harem. Instead she made her mark on history twice: first, embarking on a pioneering pilgrimage to Islam’s holy cities; second, writing a remarkable history of her dynasty. RUBY LAL tells her story
Succession 1603
The passing of the English crown from Elizabeth I to James VI & I was welcomed by a nation hungry for change. But, writes Susan Doran, it wasn't long before tensions began to rise between the incoming king and his new subjects
Horror in France
On the morning of 10 June 1944, the residents of Oradour-sur-Glane were going about their lives as normally as was possible in occupied France: cooking, washing, shopping, playing. Little did they know that they were about to become the victims of one of the most infamous massacres of the Second World War.
"IT'S TIME TO WRITE WOMEN BACK INTO THESE WORLD-CHANGING ANCIENT EVENTS"
Daisy Dunn tells the story of the Greco-Persian Wars through the deeds of the extraordinary female figures who shaped them