Africa: Did you mean...?

Phoenician traders arrived on the North African coast around 900 B.C. and established Carthage (in present-day Tunisia) around 800 B.C. By the sixth century B.C., a Phoenician presence existed at Tipasa (east of Cherchell in Algeria). From...

The Mali Empire (1240-1645) of West Africa was founded by Sundiata Keita (r. 1230-1255) following his victory over the kingdom of Sosso (c. 1180-1235). Sundiata's centralised government, diplomacy and well-trained army permitted a massive...

Mauretania was an ancient kingdom in northwest Africa, encompassing regions of modern-day Morocco and Algeria. Although it shares a name with the modern country of Mauritania, they do not overlap. Ancient Mauretania was named after the Mauri...

The Wolof (aka Jolof or Djolof) Empire was a state on the coast of West Africa, located between the Senegal and Gambia rivers, which thrived from the mid-14th to mid-16th century CE. The empire prospered on trade thanks to the two rivers...

Prince Henry the Navigator (aka Infante Dom Henrique, 1394-1460) was a Portuguese prince who famously helped capture the North African city of Ceuta, sponsored voyages of exploration with the aim of building colonies in the North Atlantic...

The Bantu migration from their origins in southern West Africa saw a gradual population movement sweep through the central, eastern, and southern parts of the continent starting in the mid-2nd millennium BCE and finally ending before 1500...

A map illustrating the geopolitical situation in Africa after World War I - the continent still under European colonial domination, with only a few areas having gained independence or achieved limited autonomy. Although many African soldiers...

Juba II (c. 48 BCE - 23 CE) was a Numidian prince and the king of Mauretania from c. 25 BCE until his death in 23 CE. He was raised in the household of Julius Caesar (c. 100-44 BCE) and married Cleopatra Selene II (40 - c. 17/5 BCE), the...

The Songhai Empire (aka Songhay, c. 1460 - c. 1591) covered what is today southern Mauritania and Mali. It replaced the Mali Empire (1240-1645) as the most important state in West Africa. Originating as a smaller kingdom along the eastern...

Kilwa, an island located off the coast of East Africa in modern-day southern Tanzania, was the most southern of the major Swahili Coast trading cities that dominated goods coming into and out of Africa from and to Arabia, Persia, and India...