Machiia (Muhembo; Kiungani / Saadani; Utondwe)??
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This place is only mentioned by Ibn Majid (1470).
Among several Bantu tribes in N-Tanzania Masiya is the name for the hearth (=fire-place) in the house. The centre post rises beside the hearth which consists of three soft stones (masiya) arranged in a triangle. The hearth has domestic and ritual significance as the wife's primary domain. The word is also used in Ibn Majid as name of several islands in S Tanzania: Machihuabili; Literally the two Masiya; and Al Masiya also an island. All three are islands close to Mafia island.
Gerald R. Tibbetts is the only Author who puts this place on the map. He puts it on the mainland (although this
is not clear from the text) and at two places. He adds question marks.
-His first place would indicate the Swahili towns just south of the Pangani river (Muhembo; Kiungani). But who could still use the Pagani valley as their commercial hinterland.
-The second place would mean the ruins of Sadani and Utondwe with as commercial hinterland the river valleys of Sadani river and Wami river.
Taken from: The Medieval History of the Coast of Tanganyika: With Special Reference to Recent Archaeological Discoveries, Issues 55-57 1962
First Place
Muhembo (Just north of Pangani)
Spread over some ten acres of dense bush are many traces of foundations and shards of a coarse pottery with a red glaze, which may have been local. A section of the foundation of a wall, eighteen inches thick and about six feet long, was stated by an inhabitant of Pangani to be all that remained of the ngome. Muhembo is in local tradition the old Pangani, the present Pangani having been occupied from Muhembo during the 18th and 19th centuries, the former site now being completely deserted. The reason for this change is that the Pangani river estuary silted up and moved to its present course four miles south. The connection by water with the interior was used from Pangani by Burton when he visited Sultan Kimwere of Vuga in 1857. There remains standing one small mosque 15 feet broad by thirty feet in length, with a room seven feet broad running down the whole of the west side. There is no trace of a well. The remains of the mihrab resemble that of the second mosque on Toten island. North of the mosque is a small group of more recent tombs. E. J. D. Pollard gives as dating of the site (based on more recent research) 13th to 14th century.
The next site Bweni Ndogo is also old enough but a mile upstream and so not visible from the ocean.
Kiungani
30 km south of Pangani but still a place from where the Pangani river valley could be used to easily transport inland but the first place to see on the continental shore when sailing passed Zanzibar Island. On the headland known as Kiungani, are the ruined remnants of two pillar tombs. One of these, which is remarkable for its height, has a doorway in its south - east corner, which is an unusual feature in a tomb of this type. Kiungani would seem to have been the site of a settlement in the 14th - 15th century. A further large pillar tomb, also in a poor state is to be seen some four miles to the north at Stahabu.
Taken from: When Did the Swahili Become Maritime?: A Reply to Fleisher et al. By Chapurukha M. Kusimba and Jonathan R. Walz in American Anthropologist Vol. 120, No. 3 September 2018.
About the commercial hinterland of the Pangani river. This has fortunately been investigated.
Systematic investigations at Mombo (at the foot of the Usambara Mountains) one hundred kilometers inland from Pangani found: Coastal finds included sixty marine shells, multiple aragonite (fossilized giant clam shell) beads, sixteen worked tubes of marine shell, and other non-local objects.
Other artifacts, of foreign origin, include thirty-four glass beads and beads of semiprecious stone (e.g., rock crystal, carnelian, and agate). The elemental signatures of eleven glass beads indicate Zhizo Series glass (eighth to tenth century CE) from Iran or Iraq, and later beads (post-1000 CE) of Indo-Pacific varieties made at localities in South Asia (Walz 2010). Specimens of hatched Sgraffiato ware (of Middle East origin) and coastal Swahili ceramics also were recovered, including red burnished and graphited feasting bowls typical of Swahili settlements during the middle second millennium. At Gonja (on the North side of the Pare Mountains) 200 km from Pangani were found: Pieces of rock crystal and a small number of Indo-Pacific glass beads and shards of glass typical at Swahili urban sites. Beads recovered from the overall project: 195 bead types generated 149 of imported glass and forty-six of other materials.
Taken from: A History of Tanzania (Historical Association of Tanazania, 1997, 288 p.) by I. N. Kimambo.
The customers for these luxury products:
In North Pare Mountains a kingdom led by the iron smiths was already existing. The power of the iron-smiths centered on their control of the supply of iron for making tools and agricultural implements on which prosperity depended and for making iron weapons to defend the community. Around these activities revolved the ideas connected with divine ritual functions ensuring continuity and success in society. But at the same time the iron-smiths were obliged to leave most administrative functions in the hands of appointed commoners and clan elders who were not strongly supervised from the center. It is likely that similar developments were taking place in Kilimanjaro and Usambara Mountains.
Taken from: The Medieval History of the Coast of Tanganyika: With Special Reference to Recent Archaeological Discoveries, Issues 55-57 1962.
Second Place
Saadani
At the north end of the village, not far from the ruins of the German boma, are the remains of a very large building. It is correctly orientated for a mosque. On the central axis of the building at the south end are three pillars. The external walls are nowhere more than 3’ above ground. There are two small cemeteries, with tombs of the 18th and 19th centuries, No pottery or porcelain
was found. E. J. D. Pollard gives as dating of the site (based on more recent research) 13th to 15th century.
From a later date. The house in which the slaves were held in Saadani village.
Utondwe
Ingrams says that Utondwe was an organised state in 1501, and that in 1697 Queen Fatima of Zanzibar, who was married to ‘Abdullah, King of ‘Otondo’ wrote a letter to the Governor-General of Goa. Unfortunately, he does not give references for these statements, nor does he mention the site on the coast other than 30 miles north of Bagamoyo. There is a small ruined mosque, with a long inscription dated 1782. So only a small congregation was anticipated. On the west side of the mosque are four walled tombs with a gap on the south side as entrance. Inside are two graves. To the left of the entrance are twenty-five cavities showing that formerly it had been decorated with porcelain bowls.
The whole site is covered with almost impenetrable bush, and it is stated locally that there are the relics of many other buildings in the area. The site may cover as much as twenty acres. About 150 yards west of the mosque is a creek.
If one reads Zanzibar: The Island Metropolis of Eastern Africa By W.H. Ingrams, you will find out the place used to be important at least during early Portuguese times participating in all possible political intrigues.
Left: Atondo (Utondwe) on the coast in this anonymous map from 1650.
Right: Arondo (Utondwe) on the coast in this Linschoten 1596 map.
Taken from: The Tanzanian Coast in the First Millennium AD by FELIX CHAMI
About the hinterland connected to these last places: Kiwangwa; 40 km inland from the coast. Local Triangular Incised Ware (TIW) pottery was the predominant material. Of the 3377 sherds, 571 (16.9%) were decorated. Four bead-grinders, 27 fragments of tuyere (for iron smelting), 198 fragments of slag, 19 fragments of iron, six copper beads, six Sassanid sherds and three glass fragments were recovered. The finds on this site clearly demonstrate closer littoral-hinterland links in the middle of the first millennium AD than were previously conceived. The site has also yielded obvious transitional pottery, shedding light on the link between the TIW and the EIW (Early Iron Working) tradition.
TIW pottery is associated with imported artefacts. These include the Sassanid ware, glass and beads. (The Sassanids were the rulers in Persia before the arrival of Islam.
The use of such products continued throughout the Sassanid period (c. 226--642) and in the early Islamic period to about AD 750 . The absence of any typical Islamic goods associated with the TIW materials at the site indicates a date before the 8th century, the period before Islamic art came into existence. The association of the EIW elements and the Sassanid pottery would therefore mean a date between the 4th century and the end of the 7th century AD.