Prehistory The fossil skull remains of the
Broken Hill Man (also known as Kabwe Man), dated between 300,000 and 125,000 years BC, further shows that the area was inhabited by early humans. Broken Hill Man was discovered in Zambia in
Kabwe District.
Khoisan and Batwa Zambia once was inhabited by the Khoisan and
Batwa peoples until around AD 300, when migrating
Bantu began to settle the areas. It is believed the Khoisan people originated in East Africa and spread southwards around 150,000 years ago. The Twa people were split into two groups: the
Kafwe Twa lived around the
Kafue Flats and the
Lukanga Twa who lived around the
Lukanga Swamp. Many examples of ancient rock art in Zambia, like the
Mwela Rock Paintings,
Mumbwa Caves, and Nachikufu Cave, are attributed to these early hunter-gatherers.
The Bantu (Abantu) The early history of the peoples of Zambia is deduced from oral records, archaeology, and written records, mostly from non-Africans.
Bantu origins fisherwomen in Southern Zambia. Women have played and continue to play pivotal roles in many African societies. The Bantu people originally lived in West and Central Africa around what is today Cameroon and Nigeria. Approximately 5000 years ago, they began a millennia-long expansion into much of the continent. This event has been called the
Bantu expansion; it was one of the largest human migrations in history. The Bantu are believed to have been the first to have brought iron working technology into large parts of Africa. The Bantu Expansion happened primarily through two routes: a western one via the
Congo Basin and an eastern one via the African Great Lakes.
First Bantu settlement The first Bantu people lived in villages. They lacked an organised unit under a chief or headman and worked as a community and helped each other in times of field preparation for their crops. Villages moved around as the soil became exhausted as a result of the slash-and-burn technique of planting crops. The people kept herds of cattle. .
Kalanga/
Shona rulers of this kingdom dominated trade at
Ingombe Ilede. The first Bantu communities in Zambia were highly self-sufficient. Early
European missionaries who settled in Southern Zambia noted the independence of these Bantu societies. One of these missionaries noted: "[If] weapons for war, hunting, and domestic purposes are needed, the [Tonga] man goes to the hills and digs until he finds the iron ore. He smelts it and with the iron thus obtained makes axes, hoes, and other useful implements. He burns wood and makes charcoal for his forge. His bellows are made from the skins of animals and the pipes are clay tile, and the anvil and hammers are also pieces of the iron he has obtained. He moulds, welds, shapes, and performs all the work of the ordinary blacksmith". Goods traded at the major trading hub of
Ingombe Ilede included fabrics, beads, gold, and bangles. The site itself is located at the confluence of the
Zambezi and
Lusitu rivers, making it ideal for long-distance trade. Denizens imported items from what is today southern
Democratic Republic of Congo and
Kilwa Kisiwani while others came from as far away as
India,
China and the
Arab world. The African traders were later joined by the Portuguese in the 16th century.
Second Bantu settlement The second mass settlement of Bantu people into Zambia was of people groups that are believed to have taken the western route of the Bantu migration through the Congo Basin. These Bantu people spent the majority of their existence in what is later the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Luba-Lunda states ,
Mwata Kazembe, receiving Portuguese in the royal courtyard in the 1800s The Bemba, along with other related groups such as the
Lamba,
Bisa,
Senga,
Kaonde, Swaka, Nkoya and
Soli, formed integral parts of the
Luba Kingdom in Upemba part of the Democratic Republic of Congo and have a strong relation to the
Luba people. The area which the Luba Kingdom occupied has been inhabited by early farmers and iron workers since the 300s C.E. Over time, these communities learned to use nets and harpoons, make dugout canoes, clear canals through swamps and make dams as high as . As a result, they grew a diverse economy trading fish, copper and iron items and salt for goods from other parts of Africa, like the Swahili coast and, later on, the Portuguese. From these communities arose the Luba Kingdom in the 14th century. The Luba Kingdom was a large kingdom with a centralised government and smaller independent
chiefdoms. It had large trading networks that linked the forests in the
Congo Basin and the mineral-rich plateaus of what is today
Copperbelt Province and stretched from the
Atlantic coast to the Indian Ocean coast. The arts were also held in high esteem in the kingdom, and artisans were held in high regard. This instability caused the collapse of the Luba-Lunda states and a dispersal of people into various parts of Zambia from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The majority of Zambians trace their ancestry to the Luba-Lunda and surrounding Central African states.
The Maravi Confederacy In the 1200s, before the founding of the Luba-Lunda states, a group of Bantu people started migrating from the
Congo Basin to
Lake Mweru then finally settled around
Lake Malawi. These migrants are believed to have been one of the inhabitants around the
Upemba area in the
Democratic Republic of Congo. By the 1400s these groups of migrants collectively called the Maravi, and most prominently among them was the
Chewa people who started imitating other Bantu groups like the
Tumbuka. today descends from the kalonga of the Maravi Empire. In 1480 the
Maravi Empire was founded by the kalonga (paramount chief of the Maravi) from the Phiri clan, one of the main clans, with the others being Banda, Mwale and Nkhoma. The Maravi Empire stretched from the Indian Ocean through what today is
Mozambique to Zambia and central parts of
Malawi. The political organisation of the Maravi resembled that of the Luba and is believed to have originated from there. The primary export of the Maravi was ivory, which was transported to Swahili brokers. The Maravi are also believed to have brought the traditions that would become
Nyau secret society from
Upemba. The Nyau form the cosmology or indigenous religion of the people of Maravi. The
Nyau society consists of ritual dance performances and masks used for the dances; this belief system spread around the region. The Maravi declined as a result of succession disputes within the confederacy, attack by the
Ngoni and slave raids from the
Yao. The Mutapa Empire ruled territory between the
Zambezi and
Limpopo rivers, in what is now Zambia, Zimbabwe and Mozambique, from the 14th to the 17th century. By its peak, Mutapa had conquered the Dande area of the
Tonga and Tavara. The Mutapa Empire predominately engaged in the Indian Ocean transcontinental trade with and via the
WaSwahili. The primary exports were gold and ivory for silk and ceramics from Asia. Like their contemporaries in Maravi, Mutapa had problems with the arriving Portuguese traders. The peak of this uneasy relationship was reached when the Portuguese attempted to influence the kingdoms internal affairs by establishing markets in the kingdom and converting the population to Christianity. This action caused outrage by the Muslim WaSwahili living in the capital, this chaos gave the Portuguese the excuse they were searching for to warrant an attack on the kingdom and try to control its gold mines and ivory routes. This attack failed when the Portuguese succumbed to disease along the Zambezi river. In the 1600s internal disputes and civil war began the decline of Mutapa. The weakened kingdom was finally conquered by the Portuguese and was eventually taken over by rival
Shona states. , ruler of the Lozi. Due to the flooding on the Zambezi, the Litunga has two palaces one of which is on higher ground. The movement of Litunga to higher land is celebrated at the
Kuomboka Ceremony. The Portuguese presence in the region was a reason for the founding of the
Rozvi Empire, a breakaway state of Mutapa. The ruler of the Rozvi, Changamire Dombo, became one of the most powerful leaders in South-Central Africa's history. Under his leadership, the Rozvi defeated the Portuguese and expelled them from their trading posts along the Zambezi river. But perhaps the most notable instance of this increased militarisation was the rise of the
Zulu under the leadership of
Shaka. Pressures from the English colonialists in the
Cape and increased militarisation of the Zulu resulted in the
Mfecane (the crushing). The Zulu expanded by assimilating the women and children of tribes they defeated, if the men of these
Nguni tribes escaped slaughter, they used the military tactics of the Zulu to attack other groups. This caused mass displacements, wars and raids throughout Southern, Central and Eastern Africa as Nguni or
Ngoni tribes made their way throughout the region and is referred to as the Mfecane. The arriving Nguni under the leadership of
Zwagendaba crossed the Zambezi river moving northwards. The Ngoni were the final blow to the already weakened
Maravi Empire. Many Nguni eventually settled around what is today Zambia, Malawi, Mozambique and Tanzania and assimilated into neighbouring tribes. At the end of the 18th century, some of the
Mbunda migrated to
Barotseland,
Mongu upon the migration of among others, the
Ciyengele.
Colonial period Europeans One of the earliest recorded Europeans to visit the area was the Portuguese explorer
Francisco de Lacerda in the late 18th century. Lacerda led an expedition from Mozambique to the Kazembe region in Zambia (with the goal of exploring and to crossing Southern Africa from coast to coast for the first time), and died during the expedition in 1798. The expedition was from then on led by his friend Francisco Pinto. This territory, located between
Portuguese Mozambique and
Portuguese Angola, was claimed and explored by Portugal in that period. Other European visitors followed in the 19th century. The most prominent of these was
David Livingstone, who had a vision of ending the slave trade through the "3 Cs": Christianity, Commerce, and Civilisation. He was the first European to see the magnificent waterfalls on the
Zambezi River in 1855, naming them the
Victoria Falls after
Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom. He described them thus: "Scenes so lovely must have been gazed upon by angels in their flight". Locally the falls are known as
"Mosi-o-Tunya" or "thundering smoke" in the Lozi or Kololo dialect. The town of
Livingstone, near the Falls, is named after him. Highly publicised accounts of his journeys motivated a wave of European visitors, missionaries and traders after his death in 1873.
British South Africa Company In 1888, the
British South Africa Company (BSA Company), led by
Cecil Rhodes, obtained mineral rights from the
Litunga of the Lozi people, the Paramount Chief of the
Lozi (Ba-rotse) for the area which later became
Barotziland-North-Western Rhodesia. and Mpezeni accepted the
Pax Britannica. That part of the country then came to be known as
North-Eastern Rhodesia. In 1895, Rhodes asked his American scout
Frederick Russell Burnham to look for minerals and ways to improve river navigation in the region, and it was during this trek that Burnham discovered major copper deposits along the
Kafue River.
British colonisation In 1953, the creation of the
Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland grouped together Northern Rhodesia, Southern Rhodesia, and
Nyasaland (now Malawi) as a single semi-autonomous region. This was undertaken despite opposition from a sizeable minority of the population, who demonstrated against it in 1960–61.
Independence , first president, on a state visit to
Romania in 1970 The federation was dissolved on 31 December 1963, and in January 1964, Kaunda won the only election for Prime Minister of Northern Rhodesia. The
Colonial Governor, Sir
Evelyn Hone, was very close to Kaunda and urged him to stand for the post. Soon after, there was an uprising in the north of the country known as the
Lumpa Uprising led by
Alice Lenshina – Kaunda's first internal conflict as leader of the nation. Northern Rhodesia became the Republic of Zambia on 24 October 1964, with
Kenneth Kaunda as the first president. At independence, despite its considerable mineral wealth, Zambia faced major challenges. Domestically, there were few trained and educated Zambians capable of running the government, and the economy was largely dependent on foreign expertise. This expertise was provided in part by British diplomat
John Willson. There were over 70,000 Europeans resident in Zambia in 1964, and they remained of disproportionate economic significance. Kaunda's endorsement of
Patriotic Front guerrillas conducting raids into neighbouring
(Southern) Rhodesia resulted in political tension and a militarisation of the border, leading to its closure in 1973. The
Kariba hydroelectric station on the Zambezi River provided sufficient capacity to satisfy the country's requirements for electricity, despite Rhodesian management. in 1965 – countries friendly to the nationalists are coloured orange On 3 September 1978, civilian airliner,
Air Rhodesia Flight 825, was shot down near Kariba by the
Zimbabwe People's Revolutionary Army (ZIPRA). 18 people, including children, survived the crash only for most of them to be shot by militants of the
Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU) led by
Joshua Nkomo. Rhodesia responded with
Operation Gatling, an attack on Nkomo's guerilla bases in Zambia, in particular, his military headquarters just outside Lusaka; this raid became known as the Green Leader Raid. On the same day, two more bases in Zambia were attacked using air power and elite paratroops and helicopter-borne troops. By the 1970s, Mozambique and Angola had attained independence from Portugal. Rhodesia's predominantly white government, which issued a
Unilateral Declaration of Independence in 1965, accepted majority rule under the
Lancaster House Agreement in 1979. Civil strife in both Portuguese colonies and a mounting
Namibian War of Independence resulted in an influx of refugees and compounded transportation issues. The
Benguela railway, which extended west through Angola, was essentially closed to Zambian traffic by the late 1970s. Zambia's support for
anti-apartheid movements such as the
African National Congress (ANC) also created security problems as the
South African Defence Force struck at dissident targets during external raids.
Economic troubles In the mid-1970s, the price of copper, Zambia's principal export, suffered a severe decline worldwide. In Zambia's situation, the cost of transporting the copper great distances to the market was an additional strain. Zambia turned to foreign and international lenders for relief, but, as copper prices remained depressed, it became increasingly difficult to service its growing debt. By the mid-1990s, despite limited debt relief, Zambia's per capita foreign debt remained among the highest in the world.
Democratisation In June 1990,
riots against Kaunda accelerated and many protesters were killed by the regime. In 1990, Kaunda survived an
attempted coup, and in 1991, he agreed to reinstate multiparty democracy, having instituted one-party rule under the Choma Commission of 1972. Following multiparty elections, Kaunda was removed from office after losing multi-party elections to
Frederick Chiluba. In the 2000s, the economy stabilised, attaining single-digit inflation in 2006–2007, real GDP growth, decreasing interest rates, and increasing levels of trade. Much of its growth is due to foreign investment in mining and to higher world copper prices. All this led to Zambia being courted enthusiastically by aid donors and saw a surge in investor confidence in the country. ==Politics==