From Warambo to Abaramba

Mirambo, born between 1820 and 1840 in a region that would become part of the future Tanzania after the merger of Tanganyika and the island of Zanzibar in 1964, was only 20 years old when he succeeded his father as ruler of a small territory that he undertook to expand into an empire, the Urambo. His military successes based on his strategic genius and his diplomatic and political abilities earned him great renown among European observers. Sir Henry Morton Stanley, a British explorer, gave him the nickname "African Napoleon. He died in 1884, the same year as the opening of the Congress of Berlin where European powers divided Africa into colonies. The Urambo empire collapsed shortly after the death of its founder.