Eastern Africa and the Indian Ocean World in the First Millennium CE: The Glass Bead Evidence

Abstract

The glass beads that were imported into eastern Africa in the first millennium CE have the potential to add significant detail to our understanding of eastern Africa’s interaction with the Indian Ocean World. This study will show that proposed evidence for interaction with Rome in the first half of the first millennium that is based on the presence of glass beads is inconclusive. However, a good deal of insight about East African trade with the Indian Ocean in the second half of the first millennium has come to light based on glass beads recently found at Unguja Ukuu in Zanzibar. Beads of two main glass types were recovered and, based on glass chemistry and method of manufacture, it appears likely that one type was made in Sri Lanka (or possibly South India) while the other was made of Near Eastern glass that was probably traded to Southeast Asia where it was made into beads before arriving in Zanzibar via Sri Lanka. Meanwhile the glass beads traded into southern Africa in this period appear to have been made in the general region of the Persian Gulf and were brought to the south by ships from Oman and the Gulf.