Zanzibar's Swahili Poets and the Lost Art of Ngoma

The spice and slave trades brought more than goods to Zanzibar: they brought poets. In this episode, Lucas and Luna explore the Swahili ngoma tradition — the sung poetry that served as news, gossip, protest, and praise on the clove shambas of Unguja and Pemba. They meet Muyaka bin Haji al-Ghassaniy, the 18th-century Mombasa poet whose verses were carried to Zanzibar by Omani dhows, and trace how his style blended with local rhythms to create a new art form. Through the poems of the Muyaka tradition, we hear the voices of enslaved watoro workers, Gujarati merchants like Jairam Sewji, and Omani walis. In one famous poem from the 1840s, a clove picker sings of the ache in her back and the price of cloves in Bombay — history from the ground up. We also revisit the 1859 succession crisis through a satirical ngoma that mocked both Majid and Barghash bin Said. No written records survive of these performances; they were passed mouth to ear. This episode is about what history sounds like when you listen for song. #Zanzibar #SwahiliPoetry #Ngoma #Muyaka #OralTradition #CloveTrade #SaidBinSultan #Watoro #SlavePoetry #IndianOceanHistory #StoneTown #Pemba #Bombay #GujaratiMerchants #19thCentury #EastAfrica #History #FexingoHistory Keep every episode free: buymeacoffee.com/fexingo