Burundi

Burundi was a Great Lakes kingdom in the territory of present-day Burundi. Before its formation, the region contained separate political centres.

Around 1680 Ntare I united the northern and southern centres and annexed surrounding polities; his Ganwa royal clan came to rule over Hutu and Tutsi communities. Succession disputes divided the Ganwa into rival lineages. Ntare IV, who took the throne around 1795, conquered smaller kingdoms and joined Rwanda in partitioning Bugesera.