List of Sultans of Zanzibar -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Sultans_of_Zanzibar
Early Iranian & Arab rule
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Zanzibar
Ancient pottery demonstrates existing trade routes with Zanzibar as far back as the ancient Sumer and Assyria. [1] An ancient pendant discovered near Eshunna dated ca. 2500-2400 BC. has been traced to copal imported from the Zanzibar region. [2]
Traders from Arabia (mostly Yemen), the Persian Gulf region of Iran (especially Shiraz), and west India probably visited Zanzibar as early as the 1st century AD. They used the monsoon winds to sail across the Indian Ocean and landed at the sheltered harbor located on the site of present-day Zanzibar Town. Although the islands had few resources of interest to the traders, they offered a good location from which to make contact and trade with the towns of the East African coast. A phase of urban development associated with the introduction of stone material to the construction industry of the East African coast began from the 10th century AD.
Traders began to settle in small numbers on Zanzibar in the late 11th or 12th century, intermarrying with the indigenous Africans. Eventually a hereditary ruler (known as the Mwenyi Mkuu or Jumbe), emerged among the Hadimu, and a similar ruler, called the Sheha, was set up among the Tumbatu. Neither had much power, but they helped solidify the ethnic identity of their respective peoples.
The Yemenis built the earliest mosque in the southern hemisphere in Kizimkazi, the southernmost village in Unguja. A kufic inscription on its mihrab bears the date AH 500, i.e. 1107 AD.
Villages were also present in which lineage groups were common.
In 1698, Zanzibar became part of the overseas holdings of Oman, falling under the control of the Sultan of Oman. The Portuguese were expelled and a lucrative trade in slaves and ivory thrived, along with an expanding plantation economy centring on cloves. The Arabs established garrisons at Zanzibar, Pemba, and Kilwa. The height of Arab rule came during the reign of Seyyid Said (more fully, Sayyid Said bin Sultan al-Busaid), who in 1840 moved his capital from Muscat in Oman to Stone Town. He established a ruling Arab elite and encouraged the development of clove plantations, using the island's slave labour. Zanzibar's commerce fell increasingly into the hands of traders from the Indian subcontinent, whom Said encouraged to settle on the island. After his death in 1856, his sons struggled over the succession. On April 6, 1861, Zanzibar and Oman were divided into two separate principalities. Sayyid Majid bin Said Al-Busaid (1834/5–1870), his sixth son, became the Sultan of Zanzibar, while the third son, Sayyid Thuwaini bin Said al-Said, became the Sultan of Oman.
The Sultan of Zanzibar controlled a substantial portion of the east African coast, known as Zanj, and trading routes extending much further across the continent, as far as Kindu on the Congo River. In November 1886, a German-British border commission established the Zanj as a ten-nautical mile (19 km) wide strip along most of the coast of East Africa, stretching from Cape Delgado (now in Mozambique) to Kipini (now in Kenya), including Mombasa and Dar es Salaam, all offshore islands, and several towns in what is now Somalia. However, from 1887 to 1892, all of these mainland possessions were lost to the colonial powers of the United Kingdom, Germany, and Italy, although some were not formally sold or ceded until the 20th century (Mogadishu to Italy in 1905 and Mombasa to Britain in 1963).
Zanzibar was famous worldwide for its spices and its slaves. It was East Africa's main slave-trading port, and in the 19th century as many as 50,000 slaves were passing through the slave markets of Zanzibar each year.[3] (David Livingstone estimated that 80,000 Africans died each year before ever reaching the island.) Tippu Tip was the most notorious slaver, under several sultans, and also a trader, plantation owner and governor. Zanzibar's spices attracted ships from as far away as the United States, which established a consulate in 1837. The United Kingdom's early interest in Zanzibar was motivated by both commerce and the determination to end the slave trade.[4] In 1822, the British signed the first of a series of treaties with Sultan Said to curb this trade, but not until 1876 was the sale of slaves finally prohibited.
Zanzibar had the distinction of having the first steam locomotive in East Africa, when Sultan Bargash bin Said ordered a tiny 0-4-0 tank engine to haul his regal carriage from town to his summer palace at Chukwani.
Ingrams, William Harold (1967). Zanzibar, its history and its people
Meyer,, Carol; Joan Markley Todd, Curt W. Beck. "From Zanzibar to Zagros: A Copal Pendant from Eshnunna". Journal of Near Eastern Studies 50 (4): 289–298.
http://www.jstor.org/pss/545490
Finlay, Hugh, and Mary Fitzpatrick, Matthew Fletcher, Nick Ray. Lonely Planet: East Africa. Lonely Planet Publications, 2000.
Horton, Mark, and John Middleton. The Swahili: The Social Landscape of a Mercantile Society. Blackwell Publishers, 2000.
Kusimba, Chapurukha M. The Rise and Fall of Swahili States. Sage Publications, 1999.
Middleton, John. The World of the Swahili: An African Mercantile Civilization. Yale University Press, 1992.
Nurse, Derek, and Thomas Spear. The Swahili: Reconstructing the History and Language of an African Society, 800-1500. University of Pennsylvania Press, 1985.
Pearson, Michael. Port Cities and Intruders: The Swahili Coast, India, and Portugal in the Early Modern Era. Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998.
Sheriff, Abdul. Historical Zanzibar: Romance of the Ages. HSP Publications, 1995.
Sheriff, Abdul. The History and Conservation of Zanzibar Stone Town. Ohio University Press, 1995.
Siravo, F. and A. Pulver. Planning Lamu. National Museums of Kenya, Nairobi, 1986.
