Bunyoro

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Flag of the Kingdom of Bunyoro

Bunyoro (Unyoro), also: Bunyoro-Kitara , is a kingdom in East Africa, northwest of the Kingdom of Buganda in the west of what is now Uganda .

Location and territory

Red: The current Kingdom of Bunyoro in Uganda

The historical Bunyoro at the end of the 19th century includes almost all areas immediately east of Lake Albert as well as a small area strip that was added to the Belgian Congo , today's Democratic Republic of the Congo , in 1910 . Bunyoro was bounded by the Victoria Nile to the north and east . Before the borders of Bunyoro were determined by the British colonial rulers in 1896, the affiliation of areas and groups of people to the kingdom depended on the influence of the respective native king . Apparently large stretches of land between the Great Lakes and the Nile were disputed between the kingdoms of Bunyoro and Buganda during the 19th century.

1891 ended the last affiliation of the southwestern kingdom of Toro (old center Fort Portal in the Kabarole district ) to Bunyoro, when on August 14, 1891 Captain Lugard for the British Rukirabasaija Daudi Kasagama Kyebambe VI. proclaimed King of Toro. The kings of Toro come from the same dynasty (Babiito) as the rulers of Bunyoro.

Culture and history

Bunyoro was ruled by the Bahima who kept cattle . The people of Bunyoro, the Banyoro , were characterized by a differentiated culture, with remarkable skills in iron and woodworking as well as pottery. The salt production of Kibiro , whose products were important commercial goods, meant particular wealth .

The native language is Runyoro-Rutoro , also called Bunyoro or Banyoro, a Bantu language .

Time of independence

Bunyoro originated in the 15th century in the area of ​​Lake Albert. Precursors are the legendary empire of the Batembuzi dynasty and the empire Kitara of the Bachwezi . This was followed, probably in connection with an invasion of the Luo , by the Babiito dynasty, under which Bunyoro was the most powerful empire in present-day Uganda from the 16th to the 19th centuries, until Buganda gained increasing influence. Bunyoro was also called Bunyoro-Kitara. The ruler ("king") of Bunyoro was the Omukama , who had no permanent seat of government in the empire. The graves of the last Omukama (" Mparo Tombs ") are in Mparo , four kilometers outside of Hoima , today's capital of the Ugandan district of the same name. The sovereign rights over the individual regions of the empire were handed over by the Omukama to chiefs , who, among other things, took over jurisdiction and tax collection. At the time of the first European visitors around 1860, King Kyebambe, the predecessor of the later King Kabarega , ruled Bunyoro . In Kamurasi's time, Bunyoro comes under the influence of ivory and slave traders, nominally of Egyptian origin.

British advance and Uganda protectorate

The first Europeans in Bunyoro include JH Speke , JA Grant (both 1862) and the discoverers of Lake Albert, Sir and Lady Baker (both 1864).

Organization of the British Uganda Protectorate. Borders from 1926: In the red areas and the blue Buganda the traditional empires were retained. In the areas marked in yellow, an administration based on the Buganda model was introduced. There were no single empires in the khaki areas.

On May 14, 1872, Bunyoro is officially assigned to the Anglo-Egyptian domain (" Sudan ") by Baker, the governor-general of the British equatorial provinces. The Anglo-Egyptian influence in Bunyoro declined temporarily at the latest with the withdrawal of Emin Pasha in 1888, who had an important base in Wadelai . While the north of Bunyoro came under the influence of the Mahdists in the following years , King Kabarega tried to defend himself against the British advance from the south under Captain Lugard. However, the stronger isolation of Bunyoro from European influence ultimately led to Buganda being able to take over all leadership positions in the later British protectorate of Uganda and receiving various preferred treatments compared to Bunyoro. In 1896 Great Britain established a protectorate over Bunyoro ; at the beginning of the 20th century, Bunyoro formed the south-western part of the northern province of the British Uganda Protectorate. King Kabarega was captured by the British in 1899 and deported to the Seychelles . One of Kabarega's sons, Yosia, who was still a minor, was recognized by the British as the new head of Bunyoro, but given very limited rights. After the submission of Bunyoro by Gerald Portal , part of Bunyoro was separated and then incorporated into Buganda in the Buganda Agreement by Henry Hamilton Johnston .

After Uganda's independence

In the heated atmosphere shortly after independence in 1967, a referendum promoted by Bunyoro on the return of the lost provinces led to a state crisis in Uganda, in which President Milton Obote finally suspended the constitution and abolished the traditional kingdoms in Uganda. It was not until 1993 under Yoweri Museveni that the kingdoms were culturally recognized again, and for the first time since 1967 there was an Omukama in Bunyoro: His Royal Highness Solomon Gafabusa Iguru I, the 27th Omukama of Bunyoro-Kitara.

Around three percent of today's Ugandan population of 27.27 million (2005) belong to the banyoro.

Bunyoro today consists of three districts (from north to south) with a total of 1,232,422 inhabitants (according to the 2002 census):

  • Masindi (district capital : Masindi ), 2002: 469,865 inhabitants
  • Hoima (district capital : Hoima ), 2002: 349,204 inhabitants
  • Kiba (a) le (district capital: Kiba (a) le), this district was re-established in the early 1990s, 2002: 413,353 inhabitants

List of Omukama from Bunyoro (-Kitara), Babiito dynasty

  1. Rukidi - late 15th century
  2. Ocaki - from the 15th to the 16th century
  3. Oyo Nyiba - early 16th century
  4. Winyi I. - early 16th century
  5. Olimi I. - mid-16th century
  6. Nyabongo - mid 16th century
  7. Winyi II - from the 16th to the 17th century
  8. Olimi II - mid 17th century
  9. Nyarwa - mid 17th century
  10. Cwamali - mid 17th century
  11. Masamba - late 17th century
  12. Kyebambe I. - late 17th century
  13. Winyi III. - early 18th century
  14. Nyaika - early 18th century
  15. Kyebambe II - early 18th century
  16. Olimi III. - approx. 1710-1731
  17. Duhaga - 1731- circa 1782
  18. Olimi IV. - approx. 1782–1786
  19. Nyamutukura Kyebambe III. - 1786-1835
  20. Nyabongo II - 1835-1848
  21. Olimi V. - 1848-1852
  22. Kyebambe IV. - 1852-1869
  23. Kabalega (= Kabarega) - 1869-1898
  24. Kitahimbwa (also: Yosia) - 1898–1902
  25. Duhaga II - 1902-1924
  26. Winyi IV - 1925-1967

There was no monarchy between 1967 and 1994.

27. Solomon Iguru I. - since 1994 as Solomon Gafabusa Iguru I.

See also

literature

  • John HM Beattie: Understanding an African Kingdom: Bunyoro (Studs. In Anthropol. Method.) . Holt, R & W, 1965, ISBN 0-03-052465-2
  • Graham Connah: Kibiro: The Salt of Bunyoro, Past and Present (British Institute in Eastern Africa, Memoir, No 13) . British Institute in Eastern Africa, 1996, ISBN 1-872566-08-1
  • Archibald Ranulph Dunbar: A history of Bunyoro-Kitara . Nairobi 1965.
  • Kenneth Ingham: The Making of Modern Uganda . Greenwood Press, Westport CT 1983, ISBN 0-313-23114-1
  • Samwiri Rubaraza Karugire: A Political History of Uganda . Nairobi 1980
  • Immaculate N. Kizza: Africa's indigenous institutions in nation building. Uganda . Lewiston NY 1999
  • Werner Kreuer: The change in the social structure in the three East African kingdoms Ankole, Bunyoro and Buganda . Bonn 1965 (dissertation)
  • John William Nyakatura: Anatomy of an African kingdom: A history of Bunyoro-Kitara . Garden-City NY 1973, ISBN 0-385-06966-9
  • Viera Pawliková-Vilhanová: History of anti-colonial resistance and protest in the kingdoms of Buganda and Bunyoro . Prague 1988
  • Edward I. Steinhart: Conflict and Collaboration. The kingdoms of western Uganda 1890–1907 . Princeton 1977, ISBN 0-691-03114-2
  • Archived material. SOAS, University of London: Uganda (Bunyoro) Materials, MS 380513 Copies of papers from the years 1944–1971, concerning parties and politics in Uganda and especially in the (then) Bunyoro District. Roger Southall (Collector). 1 box. Handlist.
  • Unyoro . In: Encyclopædia Britannica . 11th edition. tape 27 : Tonalite - Vesuvius . London 1911, p. 782 (English, full text [ Wikisource ]).

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