Azania

Azania (Ancient Greek: Αζανία) is the name that has been applied to various parts of southeastern tropical Africa. In the Roman period and perhaps earlier, the toponym referred to a portion of the Southeast African coast extending from Kenya, to perhaps as far south as Tanzania.

Ancient Azania

Pliny the Elder mentions an "Azanian Sea" (N.H. 6.34) that began around the emporium of Adulis and stretched around the south coast of Africa.

The 1st century AD Greek travelogue the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea first describes Azania based on its author's intimate knowledge of the area. Chapter 15 of the Periplus suggests that Azania could be the littoral area south of present-day Somalia (the "Lesser and Greater Bluffs", the "Lesser and Greater Strands", and the "Seven Courses"). Chapter 16 clearly describes the emporium of Rhapta, located south of the Puralean Islands at the end of the Seven Courses of Azania, as the "southernmost market of Azania". The Periplus does not mention any dark-skinned "Ethiopians" among the area's inhabitants. They only later appear in Ptolemy's Geographia, but in a region far south, around the "Bantu nucleus" of northern Mozambique. According to John Donnelly Fage, these early Greek documents altogether suggest that the original inhabitants of the Azania coast, the "Azanians", were of the same ancestral stock as the Afro-Asiatic populations to the north of them along the Red Sea. Subsequently, by the 10th century AD, these original "Azanians" had been replaced by early waves of Bantu settlers.

Azania (disambiguation)

Azania may refer to:

Places

Fiction

People

Other uses

Jubaland

Jubaland State of Somalia, also known as Jubaland (Somali: Jubbaland, Arabic: جوبالاند‎), the Juba Valley (Somali: Dooxada Jubba) or Azania (Somali: Azaaniya, Arabic: آزانيا‎), is an autonomous region in southern Somalia. Its eastern border lies 40–60 km east of the Jubba River, stretching from Gedo to the Indian Ocean, while its western side flanks the North Eastern Province in Kenya, which was carved out of Jubaland during the colonial period.

Jubaland has a total area of 87,000 km² (33,000 sq mi). As of 2005, it had a total population of 953,045 inhabitants. The territory consists of the Gedo, Lower Juba and Middle Juba provinces. Its largest city is Kismayo, which is situated on the coast near the mouth of the Jubba River. Bardera, Afmadow, Bu'aale, Luuq and Beled Haawo are the region's other principal cities.

In antiquity, the Jubaland region's various port cities and harbours, such as Essina and Sarapion, were an integral part of global trade. During the Middle Ages, the influential Somali Ajuran Empire held sway over the territory, followed in turn by the Geledi Sultanate. From 1836 until 1861, parts of Jubaland were nominally claimed by the Sultanate of Muscat (now in Oman). They were later incorporated into British East Africa. In 1925, Jubaland was ceded to Italy, forming a part of Italian Somaliland. On 1 July 1960, the region, along with the rest of Italian Somaliland and British Somaliland, became part of the independent republic of Somalia.