Rhapta Archaeology
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Taken from: East Africa: The Emergence of a Pre-Swahili Culture on the Azanian Coast by Philippe Beaujard. 2019
Archaeology provides only limited evidence for artifacts from the Greco-Roman world and from India on the coasts of East Africa. Twenty kilometers away from the mouth of the Rufiji River, the site of Mkukutu-Kibiti has yielded beads considered to be “Roman” by Chami (1). However, similar beads have been attested for the ninth–tenth century (Sinclair 2008), and M. Wood has rejected these identifications.
A bead made of monochrome glass has been found in the Machaga cave excavated at Zanzibar: it may come from Arikamedu (2) (near Pondicherry). Red pottery similar to Roman pottery attested at Ras Hafun has also been unearthed in the Zanzibar cave, as well as green/yellow pottery also excavated in the Rufiji delta and at Ras Hafun (Chami and Kwekason 2003: 41). M. Boussac, however, has identified the red pottery as an Indian copy of Roman pottery. Allibert and Vérin (1993b: 66) write that: “Shards of Greco-Roman pottery of a similar type have been found at Ras Hafun (Opōnē in the Periplus), at Arikamedu (near Pondicherry) in India, and at Chibuene in Mozambique.” In fact, no Greco-Roman pottery has ever been identified at Chibuene, a coastal trading station dating to the late first millennium and early second millennium. It is likely that “Roman” trade went beyond Rhapta, perhaps as far as Natal, but evidence for this is still missing.
(1) Chami 1999b: 239. According to Chami, one of the four beads found (a segmented bead) was produced on the island of Rhodes between 100 BCE and 200 CE (2002: 41; 2006: 134). This bead may actually be dated to the second half of the first millennium CE (Sinclair 2008).
(2) It has been dated by M. Boussac (Lyon) to between 100 BCE and 400 CE. A carnelian bead has also been excavated. As already mentioned, glass beads have been unearthed in a cave on Juani Island (near Mafia) (see above). “Roman” and “Partho-Sassanid” glass beads have been discovered on the Horn of Africa (Axum and Ras Hafun) (Chami 2002: 41).