ABSTRACT
It is now widely accepted that the period between 700 and 1500 ce was the era when Asia was the world (Abu-Lughod 1989, 1991; Gordon 2009). This was a time when the Old World global economic, social, and political order was vested in Buddhist and Islamist states, kingdoms and empires. Interactions were dominated by regions that were connected by the Silk Road commercial complex (Comas et al. 1998; Wood 2002; Broadman 2007). Eastern Africa, which for millennia had been embroiled in its own peculiar ways of making a living, was ‘recruited’ into this global network and became a regular partner. Its highly desirable resources included ambergris, aromatic products, iron bloom, gold, ivory, leopard skins and rhinoceros horns among others (Kusimba and Kusimba, this volume). We address eastern Africa’s participation in these transformative early global networks using archaeological data gleaned from the ancient Swahili polity, Manda.
