In terms of settlement, the most important zone is the temperate woodland, or agroforest belt. These highland areas are where the ancestors of the current populations chose to settle when they arrived at the mountain more than five hundred years ago. Approximately 100 kilometers in length but only 12 kilometers in width, the agroforest belt wraps around the mountain’s south and east sides. It features fertile volcanic soils, thick vegetation, moderate temperatures, ample rain, and widespread surface water. The topography slopes downhill gradually, with alternating valleys and ridges that emerge in a radial pattern from the upper reaches of the mountain. These valleys, carved over millennia by swiftly flowing water, run deep by the point they reach the agroforest belt. The ridges afforded early communities protection from hostile neighbors as well as wild animals. The richness and diversity of the region are difficult to overstate. In general, temperatures fall and precipitation rises as one approaches the peaks, meaning that the highland areas receive considerably more rainfall than the foothills. Precipitation also decreases as one moves eastward along the southern slopes; it decreases even more as one turns northward along the eastern side of the mountain. Within each mountain ridge, one finds even more variation, with microclimate conditions generated by elevation, sun and wind exposure, and other factors.
One way to conceptualize the diverse conditions of the agroforest belt is to distinguish between three geographic regions: the southwest, the southeast, and the east. The southwest, known since the twentieth century as Hai, features gradual slopes, broad ridges, and a series of deep ravines formed by the mountain’s most voluminous rivers: the Sanya, the Karanga, the Kikafu, and the Weru Weru.13 It has the most surface water of any region of the mountain as well as high rates of annual rainfall, its middle-altitude areas averaging 1,500 millimeters and upper areas exceeding 2,000.14 The southeast, known as Vunjo, is more rugged and steep than Hai. It features narrower ridges with more sharply descending ravines. Its main rivers—the Mue, the Mwona, and the Himo—are less voluminous than those of Hai and lie in shallower valleys. Rainfall is similar, however, averaging 1,500 millimeters per year in middle elevations. The east is referred to as Rombo. Lying on a broad, gradual incline, it is the most distinct of the three in terms of geology and hydrology. The terrain slopes like Hai but with much shallower ravines. Annual rainfall averages are lower than the other areas, reaching around 1,000 millimeters in middle elevations and 1,400 millimeters in upper ones. The most significant difference is the relative dearth of surface water. Rombo contains only one year-round river, the Lumi. While there are a number of rivers that appear seasonally, there are fewer watercourses in Rombo than in either Hai or Vunjo. This contributes to a landscape that is lush compared with the plains but substantially less verdant than the south side of the mountain.
Another factor to consider when thinking about the lands and waters of Kilimanjaro is timing. The bimodal rainfall pattern determines growing seasons, as temperature is largely consistent year-round. During periods of normal weather, precipitation can be highly variable, falling unevenly and causing localized shortages or flooding. The mountain also experiences periodic drought conditions, which has a tremendous impact on surface water. Rivers, streams, and springs that are normally permanent experience reduced flow, while seasonal ones dry up entirely. In his study of nineteenth-century Kilimanjaro, Wimmelbücker shows that prolonged droughts often resulted in famine, leading to political destabilization and warfare between rival chiefdoms. Famines were so common that they were often named in reference to the impacts they had. In the mid-1930s, for example, a severe drought afflicted much of Kilimanjaro. In Machame, it came to be known as njaa ya mowishi, or “the famine in which people had to eat raw whatever they came across.”15 Those who settled the mountain thus came to realize that though Kilimanjaro was a place of relative water abundance, this abundance was by no means absolute. The often-unpredictable nature of rainfall is reflected in adages and fables, the most notable being kipfilepfile kirundu kechiwa mvuo kilawe. Translated as “a little rainy cloud that never became rain,” it reminds people that they should not trust that rain is inevitable, and that they should be prepared for conditions of scarcity.16
Kilimanjaro is a landscape defined by juxtaposition. It is an area of high altitude surrounded by flat grassland, an island of water abundance in a sea of aridity. The waters of the mountain generate a rich, green expanse of vegetation absent from the brown grasslands. The altitude moderates temperatures, creating an area of relative coolness in stark contrast to the intense heat of the steppe. The mountain even sets itself apart in terms of safety; its sharp slopes and cool temperatures discourage dangerous foes such as lions, leopards, tsetse flies, and mosquitoes. The hospitable conditions of the mountain have long been attractive to human communities. Given the presence of water in a region that is largely arid, it is likely that hunter-gatherer and pastoral communities had visited the mountain’s foothills for thousands of years. Around five hundred to six hundred years ago, the ancestors of the mountain’s current peoples began to settle the agroforest belt. Drawing on the resources of the mountain, they developed a highly sophisticated agrarian society.
THE PEOPLES OF KILIMANJARO
The agrarian peoples that have come to be known as the Chagga are of Bantu descent, closely related to other Northeast Bantu peoples such as the Taita and Meru, and more distantly to the Swahili.17 Throughout much of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, outsiders considered the peoples of the mountain to be a singular group who shared a common origin and spoke similar dialects of the same language. In the past thirty years, however, historical linguists such as Derek Nurse, Gérard Philippson, and J. Christoph Winter have shown that the dialects of Chagga language are distinct enough to be considered individual languages.18 The linguistic evidence paints a more complex picture of Chagga origins than had been assumed, giving the possibility of multiple migrations over a period of more than two hundred years. These migrants settled on the ridges of the agroforest belt on the southern and eastern slopes. Within each ridge, people spoke the same language, but across the mountain, dozens of different “Chagga languages” came into being. Together they formed a dialect continuum in which people on neighboring ridges could understand their immediate neighbors, but not those living further away. The linguistic diversity of the mountain is exemplified by the numerous terms for water. In 1955, J. E. Goldthorpe noted more than five “Chagga” terms for water—moha, murra, mudha, mringa, and mota—as one passed from west to east, likely a smaller number than had existed in previous centuries.19 This shows how the rivers that carved the mountain’s valleys over millennia have influenced the linguistic landscape as well.
These migrants settled the highlands of the agroforest belt because of its moderate temperatures, its fertile soils, the security provided by the rugged landscape, and the prevalence of water. By the sixteenth century, a consistent pattern of agriculture had emerged, focusing on small homesteads known as vihamba (sing. kihamba). These were 2–4 hectares in size and contained dwellings, granaries, burial plots, stalls for livestock, and gardens for cultivating crops.20 Kihamba gardens featured mixed cultivation of food crops and fodder grasses under the shade of canopy trees (fig. 1.1). For families that practiced polygamy—indicating high status in the clan—each wife possessed a separate dwelling in the kihamba and her own areas of cultivation. Families grew a wide range of crops, bananas being the most prominent. Well suited to the humid conditions of the agroforest belt, high in calories, and low in labor need, they emerged as the dominant food on the mountain. Bananas were so central to local diet that people came to identify themselves as wandu wa mbdeny, “people of the banana groves.”21 As many as twenty-one different species were grown, with varieties for cooking, brewing, and eating raw.22 They also provided shade for the other crops of the vihamba. By the nineteenth century, common staples intercropped with bananas included yams, cassava, beans, taro, sugar cane, sweet potatoes, maize, pumpkins, and papaya.23 Most homesteads also featured dracaena (masale), a spiritually significant shrub used