page_title: Kenya
section_title: Early Portuguese colonization
hierarchical_section_title: Kenya / History / Early Portuguese colonization
caption_attribution_description: Mombaza (Mombasa)
context_page_description: Kenya, officially the Republic of Kenya, is a country in Eastern Africa. At 580,367 square kilometres, Kenya is the world's 48th largest country by total area. With a population of more than 47.6 million people, Kenya is the 29th most populous country. Kenya's capital and largest city is Nairobi, while its oldest city and first capital is the coastal city of Mombasa. Kisumu City is the third largest city and also an inland port on Lake Victoria. Other important urban centres include Nakuru and Eldoret. As of 2020, Kenya is the third largest economy in sub-Saharan Africa after Nigeria and South Africa. Kenya is bordered by South Sudan to the northwest, Ethiopia to the north, Somalia to the east, Uganda to the west, Tanzania to the south, and the Indian Ocean to the southeast.
  According to archaeological dating of associated artifacts and skeletal material, the Cushites first settled in the lowlands of Kenya between 3,200 and 1,300 BC, a phase referred to as the Lowland Savanna Pastoral Neolithic. Nilotic-speaking pastoralists started migrating from present-day southern Sudan into Kenya around 500 BC.
context_section_description: The Swahili built Mombasa into a major port city and established trade links with other nearby city-states, as well as commercial centres in Persia, Arabia, and even India. By the 15th-century, Portuguese voyager Duarte Barbosa claimed that "Mombasa is a place of great traffic and has a good harbour in which there are always moored small craft of many kinds and also great ships, both of which are bound from Sofala and others which come from Cambay and Melinde and others which sail to the island of Zanzibar."
  Later on in the 17th century, the Swahili coast was conquered and came under direct rule of Omani Arabs, who expanded the slave trade to meet the demands of plantations in Oman and Zanzibar. Initially, these traders came mainly from Oman, but later many came from Zanzibar (such as Tippu Tip).  In addition, the Portuguese started buying slaves from the Omani and Zanzibari traders in response to the interruption of the transatlantic slave trade by British abolitionists.
  Throughout the centuries, the Kenyan coast has played host to many merchants and explorers. Among the cities that line the Kenyan coast is the City of Malindi. It has remained an important Swahili settlement since the 14th century and once rivalled Mombasa for dominance in the African Great Lakes region. Malindi has traditionally been a friendly port city for foreign powers. In 1414, the Chinese trader and explorer Zheng He, representing the Ming Dynasty, visited the East African coast on one of his last 'treasure voyages'. 
  Malindi authorities also welcomed the Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama in 1498.
caption: Portuguese presence in Kenya lasted from 1498 until 1730. Mombasa was under Portuguese rule from 1593 to 1698 and again from 1728–29.
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