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The Naming of Port Reitz
To the north-west of Mombasa island is an inlet and on its mainland side is a flat piece of land later named Port Reitz. It is now the site of Mombasa’s Moi International Airport. Why was this area called Port Reitz? In 1824 a young lieutenant in the Royal Navy set...
The First Europeans in Mombasa
The First Europeans in Mombasa Recently archaeologists have said that the wreckage of a ship discovered off Malindi may have been from legendary explorer Vasco da Gama’s final voyage across the Indian Ocean. It is a Portuguese vessel and may have been Da Gama’s Sao...
Thomson in Maasailand
Thomson in Maasailand Recently there have been articles in Old Africa about the Maasai, so it would be interesting to look at early European contacts with those peoples. In 1877 Maasai warriors had prevented Johann Maria Hildebrandt, a German botanist, from travelling...