Abstract

Starting in the 8th century in southern Mozambique and ending in early medieval Cambridge, this talk will explore the connections that linked southern Africa to the wider world between 500-1500 CE. During this period the region was part of a mercantile network that expanded across the Indian Ocean and large parts of Afro-Eurasia. This network facilitated the movement of people, religions, ideas, technologies and things over vast distances. Drawing on our recent fieldwork on the Bazaruto archipelago and adjacent mainland region of Inhambane, southern Mozambique, I will explore southern Africa’s role and position in these early global networks. A comparative perspective drawn from the recent ‘global history’ turn offers the potential to examine similarities and differences in the material culture and identity of people from diverse parts of the world during the Global Middles Ages.