Early Kenya - Portuguese Presence
The navigator Vasco da Gama called at Mombasa and Malindi on his voyage to India in 1498, initiating 200 years of Portuguese influence along the East African coast. The sultanate of Malindi quickly established friendly relations with the newcomers and opened its port to their trade.
Its rival, Mombasa, reacted with hostility to the Portuguese intrusion, however, and in 1505 the town was sacked by Francisco de Almeida, who commanded an expeditionary force that had occupied Kilwa and Sofala earlier that same year. When Mombasa became the center of Arab resistance in East Africa, the Portuguese carried out a second destructive attack on the town in 1529 with the assistance of Malindi, compelling its sultan to recognize the overlordship of the Portuguese crown and pay an annual tribute.
Portuguese control in the region, exercised at a distance by the governor of Goa through allies such as the sultan of Malindi, remained tenuous during most of the sixteenth century. Resentment against foreign influence continued to fester, until in 1589 Mombasa renounced Portuguese suzerainty and accepted the protection of the Turkish corsair Mirale Bey and his fleet. A strong Portuguese flotilla, dispatched from Goa, captured the Turkish vessels and left Mombasa to be looted by the Zimba, a marauding band of African warriors who two years before had destroyed Kilwa.
When the Zimba next turned against Malindi, however, they were defeated by the intervention of warriors from the neighboring Segeju tribe. The sultan of Malindi then employed the Segeju in taking Mombasa, moving his court there in 1592 and inviting his Portuguese friends to install a garrison.
In order to strengthen their hold on that stretch of the East African coast, the Portuguese began construction of a massive defense works, Fort Jesus, at the entrance to Mombasa harbor in 1593. For close to four decades thereafter Portuguese dominance was unchallenged until, in 1631, they temporarily lost both the town and the fort to a disaffected Arab sultan. Although these were recaptured eight years later, the Portuguese were soon challenged by the growing power of the imam of Oman (southeastern Arabia) for control of the northern coast. (The imam derived his political authority from his office as religious leader.)
In 1660 Mombasa was seized by Omani forces, although the Portuguese held Fort Jesus until 1699 when it fell after an epic three-year siege. An attempt by the Portuguese to regain the fort in 1728 failed. Not until the start of British antislaving activities in East Africa early in the next century was European influence reasserted in the region.
Throughout their 200 years on the Kenyan coast, the Portuguese showed no interest in colonization. The chief concern of the handful of Portuguese in the coastal towns was trade, and the two centuries of their presence left no permanent marks other than a few words bequeathed to the Swahili language and such monuments as Fort Jesus.
Indirectly, however, as elsewhere in East Africa, Portuguese influence had a far-reaching impact through the introduction of major food cropsfrom the New World, in particular, maize, cassava, and potatoes. These became staples in much of the region and contributed to the growth of its population.
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