Zanzibar

Zanzibar was a Swahili trading polity on Unguja island off East Africa. In 1337 it was an autonomous Muslim sultanate among the coastal cities, trading goods from the African interior across the Indian Ocean.

Vasco da Gama visited in 1498. Around 1503 Zanzibar became a Portuguese tributary for nearly two centuries. Swahili elites called in the Omanis, who took Zanzibar in 1698. In 1832 the Omani sultan Said bin Sultan moved his court to Stone Town, making Zanzibar a center of trade in cloves, ivory and slaves.