The hills and miombo woodland between Lake Tanganyika and the central plateau, with the southern half of the Burundi highlands.
Bantu farmers of the Great Lakes group, forebears of the Ha, Rundi, Vinza and Tongwe, with Twa foragers and potters; the brine springs of Uvinza on the Malagarasi were a salt source in the Early Iron Age and later. In the highlands, roulette-decorated pottery spreads from about the eleventh century with new herding ways. The kingdoms of Burundi and the Ha chiefdoms are of the seventeenth century and later.
Who holds it
- Name
- Not known: no leader is named for this date
- Title
- Heads of lineages, villages and clans
- Since
- Not pinned
- Confidence
- low
How things stand that morning
Independent. North of about 3 degrees south (northern Burundi, Rwanda, the Kagera) is the neighbouring researcher's ground; across the lake lies the western shore (Western Tanganyika shore).
Assemblies
Village and lineage elders settle disputes and allocate land; there is no chief over the whole people that the evidence can show for 1200.
What the year holds
What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.
- Through 1200No dated event is known.
Where the sources disagree
Evidence: Archaeology of the interlacustrine Later Iron Age (thin here) and language history.
On the map: Drawn from modern language areas, physical geography and a few dated sites; the 1200 extent is a rough guess.
Sources and studies
- Ehret, An African Classical Age (1998) and Nurse and Spear, The Swahili (1985), on the language history of the East African interior and coast (cited from memory of the literature)
- UNESCO General History of Africa, vol. 4, and Cambridge History of Africa, vol. 3, chapters on East Africa and the interior (cited from memory of the literature)
Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.