Sofala

Sofala was a Swahili port on a marshy estuary of the Mozambique coast, linked to the inland gold trade. Kilwa took the town in the 1180s, and Sofala remained the dominant port south of Kilwa.

Sheikh Isuf made a treaty with the Portuguese in 1502. Pêro de Anaia built Fort São Caetano in 1505, but fever devastated its garrison and shifting sandbanks impeded ships. After taking Mozambique Island in 1507, the Portuguese moved their base there; Sofala's old goldfields were already largely exhausted.