African chronicle about the origins of the Swahili city-state of Kilwa
Kilwa Chronicle
Language(s)
Arabic
The Kilwa Chronicle is a text, believed to be based on oral tradition, which describes the origins of the
Swahili city-state of
Kilwa, on an
Indian Ocean island near the
East African coast. It recounts the genealogy of the rulers of the
Kilwa Sultanate, following the foundation of the city by
Persians from
Shiraz and
Hormuz in the tenth century until the arrival of the Portuguese in the sixteenth century.[1] Subsequent ancient DNA[2] studies have confirmed much of the basis of these stories to be true.[3]
Two sources of the Chronicle exist: the Kitāb al-Sulwa in
Arabic and a
Portuguese version that is a section of the book Décadas da Ásia by the historian
João de Barros.
[1] The genealogical account is similar in both versions but other details vary substantially.[1]
Sources
João de Barros (1552) Décadas da Ásia: Dos feitos, que os Portuguezes fizeram no descubrimento, e conquista, dos mares, e terras do Oriente., Dec. I, Lib. 8, Cap. 6 (
p. 223ff)
Strong, S. Arthur (1895) "The History of Kilwa, edited from an Arabic MS", Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, January (No volume number), pp. 385–431.
online
References
^
abcDelmas, Adrien (2017). "Writing in Africa: The Kilwa Chronicle and other Sixteenth-Century Portuguese Testimonies". In Brigaglia, Andrea; Nobili, Mauro (eds.). The Arts and Crafts of Literacy: Islamic Manuscript Cultures in Sub-Saharan Africa. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter. p. 189.
ISBN9783110541441.
OCLC1075040220.