The anthropological and historical literature dealing with Africa abounds with references to a people called the ‘Hamites’. ‘Hamite’, as used in these writings, designates an African population supposedly distinguished by its race— Caucasian—and its language family, from the Negro inhabitants of the rest of Africa below the Sahara.

There exists a widely held belief in the Western world that everything of value ever found in Africa was brought there by these Hamites, a people inherently superior to the native populations. This belief, often referred to as the Hamitic hypothesis, is a convenient explanation for all the signs of civilization found in Black Africa. It was these Caucasoids, we read, who taught the Negro how to manufacture iron and who were so politically sophisticated that they organized the conquered territories into highly complex states with themselves as the ruling elites. This hypothesis was preceded by another elaborate Hamitic theory. The earlier theory, which gained currency in the sixteenth century, was that the Hamites were black savages, ‘natural slaves’—and Negroes. This identification of the Hamite with the Negro, a view which persisted throughout the eighteenth century, served as a rationale for slavery, using Biblical interpretations in support of its tenets. The image of the Negro deteriorated in direct proportion to the growth of the importance of slavery, and it became imperative for the white man to exclude the Negro from the brotherhood of races. Napoleon's expedition to Egypt in 1798 became the historical catalyst that provided the Western World with the impetus to turn the Hamite into a Caucasian.

Despite its basic importance for an understanding of African History, the Atlantic slave-trade still remains one of the most unexplored aspects of modern African development. Except for a few pioneer works, there have been no systematic studies of numbers, origins, mortality, routes and volume of traffic. The present study is based on archival material in Brazil and is an exploration in depth of one major route, the West African to Rio de Janeiro shipping route in the period 1795–1811. During this time some 170,000 African slaves were shipped from Africa, suffering a mortality rate of 95 per thousand.

The expansion of the Sokoto Caliphate into the lands of the diverse non-Muslim peoples of the Middle Belt area is a familiar theme in the nineteenth-century history of the Central Sudan. As the Middle Belt is known to have an overall lower population density than adjoining areas to the north and south, the explanation has been proposed that this was due to slave raiding by Muslim states. A study of the history of this area does not support this overall view, even though it might be accepted with reference to limited areas. areas. It can be shown, moreover that in certain localities populations were actually enhanced as a result of the consolidation of Muslim power, while others, currently of extremely low density, were completely unaffected. If the factors affecting population in this area are to be understood, reference to over-simplified causes such as slave raiding must be shunned. Geographical and biological factors influencing population growth may be more fertile areas of enquiry.

The reasons for Dingane's attack on Lourenço Marques in 1833 may have been (a) the policy of expansion pursued by governor Ribeiro, which Machakane of Matola and perhaps Dingane himself may have tried to check, (b) lack of caution in treating Dingane, (c) perhaps also inability to meet Dingane's demands (this may have been due to economic difficulties after the partial breakdown of the slave trade in 1830), (d) the fact that Ribeiro probably maintained relations with Soshangana (which has been stressed by Lobato). Dingane seems to have regarded the governor as one of his subjects, although the Portuguese did not regard themselves as his subjects but as depending on MoÇambique.

In the period 1830–1838, the Zulu seem to have been more important for Lourenço Marques than any other Nguni group, as they were dominating many of the territories near it. In that period the Zulu empire included people of a language different from that of the majority, who do not seem to have been integrated into the Zulu nation through the national regimental system in the same way as Nguni groups subjected by the Zulu. In 1831–4 Zulu armies fighting near Lourenço Marques consisted of a few hundred Zulu warriors assisted by groups of auxiliaries (probably totalling 2,000–3,000 men) furnished by the local chiefs.

Trade with European merchants along the Guinea Coast was very important in the history of the Yoruba in the nineteenth century. But until 1870 almost all this trade was done by the western Yoruba peoples. All the important ports (Porto Novo, Badagry and Lagos) were located on the western sea-board of the Yoruba country, and from these ports trade routes radiated inland. Moreover, along the routes, Christian missionary evangelism spread. The eastern Yoruba country remained out of the stream of these formative developments.

About 1870, however, owing to obstructions to trade on the western routes, the government of the British colony of Lagos tried to open a new route in the east as a roundabout means of tapping the main centres of trade in the west. But this route, the Ondo Road, soon became a great formative force in the lives of the peoples of the eastern Yoruba provinces. Compared with the main western routes, the trade on the new route was quite small. Nevertheless, its demands resulted in vastly increased productivity both in the agriculture and local manufactures of the people. Also it was along this route that missionary work—as evidenced by the building of mission stations, churches and schools—at last began to affect the eastern Yoruba areas.

Toute étude de la question du Haut-Nil doit aujourd'hui prendre pour point de départ l'ouvrage de M. G. N. Sanderson, England, Europe and the Upper Nile, 1882–1899. Rares sont sans doute les students of Africa qui n'ont pas encore eu entre les mains ce maître-livre: par l'ampleur de la documentation, le soin de l'analyse, l'ampleur de vues aussi, il s'est d'ores et déjà imposé comme un classique. A partir de l'époque de la révolte mahdiste jusqu'aux lendemains de Fachoda, on y suit, dévidé avec une clarté remarquable, l'écheveau des différentes politiques en présence sur le Haut-Nil: anglaise, française, italienne, allemande — sans oublier, bien entendu, celle de Léopold II.

Superficially, the nature of German rule in Togo differed from that of the other German colonies. For example, right from the start, it was administered by Imperial officials. It thereby escaped some of the worst abuses of Chartered Company rule. Again because of the peculiar nature fo the country—it was very small, not particularly suitable for European settlement and much of its agricultural land was already under peasant cultivation, to which it was best suited—Togo escaped the large-scale expropriation of the subject peoples' land that was characteristic of German rule elsewhere.

It is still assumed today that Sheikh Mohammad Abdille Hassan's rebellion between 1899 and 1920 in British Somaliland only made an impact in northern and central Somalia. In fact, however, the rebellion also influenced both the southernmost Somali and the administration of the Jubaland Province of the East Africa Protectorate. Anticipation that the rebellion would spread southwards, though unwarranted, led nevertheless to exaggerated fears and ultimately deterred further British involvement in that part of the Protectorate. These fears were not wholly unjustified, for the Jubaland Somali were inspired by Sheikh Mohammad's defiance of alien authority and probably wished to emulate him where possible. Furthermore, there was increasing contact between Mohammad Abdille Hassan's agents and the Juba region. However, it was the actual migration towards the Juba of Marehan who had fought with Sheikh Mohammad that had the most important impact on that area. Sheikh Mohammad's jihads also encouraged other Somali sections to migrate southwards. These migrations were largely responsible for the growing instability south of the Juba. They led to a large increase in the number of guns available and also encouraged inter-tribal fighting. Essentially Sheikh Mohammad's influence was political rather than religious. This distinction becomes clearer on examination of the spread of the Salihiyya tariqa as compared to those areas which were involved in political unrest.

This paper attempts an outline of the Pan-African aspect of British colonial education policies during the inter-war years. In particular, it analyses the role of the missionary statesman, J. H. Oldham, in securing the adoption of a certain style of Negro education in the Southern States of America (one based on the work of the Hampton and Tuskegee Institutes) both by the International Missionary Council and by the Colonial Office Advisory Committee on Education, of which he was a member. Oldham's interest in transferring the primarily agricultural and technical insights of the Hampton-Tuskegee model to Africa was developed in close collaboration with the Phelps-Stokes Fund of New York, and together they were responsible for directly exposing large numbers of missionaries and colonial officials to these emphases in the Southern States. The attempt to suggest the relevance to Africa of institutions which had long traditions of compromise with white supremacy in the American South inevitably cut across the Pan-African programmes of such New World Negroes as W. E. B. DuBois and Marcus Garvey, and had the effect of transplanting to the African continent some of the bitter disputes about the educational and political status of Negroes that had been common in America from the late nineteenth century conflict between DuBois and Booker T. Washington. While the article is primarily concerned with the formation of a missionary and Colonial Office consensus on the preferred Negro education for Africans, some attention is also paid to the extent to which the Hampton-Tuskegee model actually took root in Africa.