Precolonial History of Angola - 17th Century

17th Century

Around 1600, Portuguese merchants working on the coast south of the Kwanza River encountered Imbangala bands that were then ravaging the Kingdom of Benguela, overlord in the region. These Imbangala were prepared to sell captives they had taken in their wars to the Portuguese in exchange for European goods. In around 1615, Portuguese governors invited some of these bands to cross the Kwanza and serve in their armies. Governor Luis Mendes de Vasconcelos used these bands to good effect, when, beginning in 1618 he used them to buttress his armies and local rebels to attack Ndongo. Over the next three years, he expelled the king of Ndongo from his capital at Kabasa, forcing him to take refuge on the Kindonga Islands in the Kwanza River, captured members of the royal family, sent expeditionary forces as far inland as Matamba, and captured and exported as many as 50,000 people as slaves to Brazil and the Spanish Indies. The first Africans to arrive in the North American English colony of Virginia were taken from these captives, by English privateers attacking shipping.

In 1617, the Imbangala allied with the Portuguese in invading Ndongo. The Imbangala took control of the Kwango valley, forming a new kingdom. The Imbangala and expanded trade with regional neighbors, selling salt for goods, and with the Portuguese, selling slaves. Queen Nzinga of Ndongo traveled to Luanda in 1623 and successfully negotiated for peace. The Portuguese administrator in charge of Angola adopted Nzinga as his goddaughter, giving her the Christian name Dona Ana de Souza. Peace with Portugal however, did not affect poor relations between the Imbangala and Ndongo kingdoms. The Imbangala continued to attack and kidnap Ndongo civilians, selling them into slavery. Portugal intervened militarily, ostensibly on Nzinga's behalf, and she and many Kimbundu retreated east to Matamba. There she established a new Kimbundu kingdom and prepared for war with the Portuguese. The Portuguese declared Ari Kiluanji the new ngola (chief) as head of the Ndongo. Kiluanji lacked political and religious legitimacy in the eyes of many Kimbundu who revolted against the new establishment with encouragement from Nzinga.

In the aftermath of the war, the king of Ndongo sent his sister Njinga Mbandi to Luanda to negotiate a peace treaty in 1622. The Imbangala bands had not proved as obedient as the Portuguese hoped and were ravaging far and wide among both Ndongo's lands and those controlled by Portugal. In the terms of the agreement Njinga negotiated, Portugal agreed to withdraw a fort at Ambaca which Mendes de Vasconcelos had founded as a base for his operations against Ndongo, and to return a large number of serfs (kijiko) he had captured, to help in restraining the Imbangala operating in Ndongo, and allow the king to return to his traditional capital. In exchange Ndongo would swear vassalage to Portugal and pay 100 slaves per year as tribute. However, none of these conditions were actually met.

Mendes de Vasconcelos' successor, João Correia de Sousa agreed to the terms of the treaty, in part because he hoped to repeat his predecessors war with Imbangala help against Kongo. In 1622 he led a bloody campaign against the territory of Kasanze, located near Luanda and under Kongo's authority, then claiming that the Kongo subordinate of Nambu a Ngongo harbored runaway slaves, he invaded that region, and finally, upset that the Kongo electors had chosen Pedro II the former Duke of Mbamba to be king of Kongo, invaded Mbamba itself. In November, 1622, he met a hastily gathered Kongo army at the Battle of Mbumbi and defeated it, with Imbangala allies eating the Duke and other Kongo nobles. However, Pedro II brought down a larger army, defeated the Portuguese force and began a campaign of humiliation for the many Portuguese resident in Kongo. In the aftermath of this shock, many Portuguese resident in Luanda, who had invested money in Kongo were threatened with ruin and demanded the governor leave. Correia de Sousa was driven from Ndongo and was imprisoned in Portugal. Kongo, meanwhile, had also made an alliance with the Dutch West India Company to attack Luanda, and the junta that ran Angola in the aftermath of Correia de Sousa's expulsion, quickly made peace with Kongo, restoring some of the slaves they had seized. As a result Kongo refused to assist Piet Heyn's fleet from the Netherlands when it arrived and attacked Luanda in 1624.

Following the disaster of Correia de Sousa, the crown sent Fernão de Sousa to be governor of Angola in 1624. He had orders to make fewer unjust wars in the country, and he tried to bring some order to its fiscal system. But he insisted on keeping Portuguese positions at Ambaca and to return the captured kijiko in Ndongo, and was reluctant to recognize Njinga as ruler of Ndongo following the death of her brother by suicide in 1624. As a result of the failure of negotiations, de Sousa undertook a series of wars against Njinga. Two major wars in 1626 and 1628 drove Njinga from the Kingdonga Island to Matamba where she established her base in 1631. Fitful negotiations followed, and in 1639 Njinga concluded a peace with Portugal. At the same time Portugal established diplomatic relations with Kasanje, the Imbangala band that occupied the Kwango River valley south of Njinga's domains in Matamba.

Salvador de Sá sought to restore Portuguese authority as much as possible during his rule from 1648 to 1652. However, he made little progress, aside from forcing Njinga to retreat from her position in Cavanga to Matamba. His successors in the seventeenth century sought to renew the warfare that had expanded Portuguese authority and filled slaves ships before the Dutch interlude. However aggressive foreign policies were less successful. Following a disastrous campaign in Kisama in 1654-55 the governor was faced with widespread settler disobedience as they saw that the wars hurt their trade and killed their subjects.