Antecedents to Modern Rwanda: The Nyiginya Kingdom

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Univ of Wisconsin Press, Mar 9, 2005 - History - 320 pages
To understand the genocide and other dramatic events of Rwanda’s recent past, one must understand the history of the earlier realm. Jan Vansina provides a critique of the history recorded by early missionaries and court historians and provides a bottom-up view, drawing on hundreds of grassroots narratives. He describes the genesis of the Hutu and Tutsi identities, their growing social and political differences, their bitter feuds, revolts, and massacres, and the relevance of this dramatic history to the post-genocide Rwanda of today.

2001 French edition, Katharla Publishers
 

Contents

Introduction
3
1 Central Rwanda on the Eve of the Emergence of the Kingdom
14
2 The Rwanda of Ndori
44
3 Toward the Centralization of Power
67
4 Government in the Eighteenth Century
99
5 Social Transformations in the Nineteenth Century
126
6 The Triumph of the Great Families and Its Consequences
140
The Age of Rwabugiri 18671897
164
History and the Present
196
Chronology
207
Predynastic Fairy Tales Central Rwanda before Ndori
217
Notes
221
Works Cited
301
Index
313
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About the author (2005)

Jan Vansina is the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Professor and the Vilas Professor in History and Anthropology at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. His many books include his 1994 memoir Living with Africa, Oral Tradition as History, Kingdoms of the Savanna, and The Children of Woot, all published by the University of Wisconsin Press.

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