African Kingdoms

Mpongwe (Western Bantu) (Africa)

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The pre-history of Africa contains a far longer period of human habitation than any other area on Earth, thanks to it being the cradle of humankind's evolution. Much of this pre-history involves a great deal of uncertainty in which small windows of opportunity to view events can be gained through archaeology. Even more recent prehistory is shrouded in uncertainty, requiring analysis and archaeology to help define it.

The Bantu people originated in West Africa before they migrated across sub-Saharan Africa, generally helping to spread the African Neolithic as they went. The Bantu languages come from a proto-Bantu language which was spoken in the area of today's Cameroon. They are part of the Niger-Congo language family which forms the largest branch of the Southern Bantoid group of languages.

The Mpongwe are also referred to as the Bayugu, Pongo, Pongoue (the French adaptation of their name in relation to their later kingdom), and Pongwe. They are a Myèné-speaking Western Bantu tribe which occupies territory around the River Gabon estuary on the northern coast of Gabon in Central Africa. The Mpongwe include in their number an assortment of clans: on the left bank are the Agulamba (Agwèngila), Asiga, and Agwempônô, the Agegwaj (Abundanôngô) and Adyumba (Adoni), the Avèmba and Animo, and the Azuwa and Abandja.

On the right bank are the Agwènkôwa, the Agungu, the Awènda and Agwèsônô (Azunu), and the Agekaza. Many other clans have vanished over the years. Clans were ruled by oligarchies, but each clan chose as its head an oga (which term Europeans translated as 'king'). The Mpongwe practiced a traditional religion, worshipping ancestors and the forces of nature.

Myèné-speaking Western Bantu arrived in what is now Gabon in the thirteenth century where they largely replaced or absorbed the Pygmy who lived there. The Western Bantu originally formed a large number of very minor tribes, including the Mpongwe, and states with very fragmentary records.

According to tradition, the Agulamba were the first clan to arrive in the area. The Asiga followed after one tradition states that they escaped slavery in the interior. They were blocked to the east by mountains and gorillas, so they settled in the estuary region.

(Information by John De Cleene and the John De Cleene Archive, with additional information from Encyclopaedia Britannica (Eleventh Edition, Cambridge (England), 1910), and from External Links: Gabon (Rulers.org), and Gabon (World Statesmen), and History of Gabon (Encyclopaedia Britannica), and Mpongwe Origins (Cambridge University Press), and The Settlement of the Mpongwe clans in the Gabon Estuary, Henry H Bucher Jr (Persée), and 101 Last Tribes.)

AD 1200s

Myèné-speaking Western Bantu arrive in what is now Gabon where they largely replace or absorb the Pygmy who live there. The Western Bantu spread out to form a large number of very minor tribes, which includes amongst their number the Mpongwe, along with some states which have very fragmentary records.

fl 1200s?

Legendary Asiga oga. Resolved internal Orungu disputes.

According to one tradition, Re-Ntori, oga of the Mpongwe's Asiga clan, leads his people to the Gabon estuary and skilfully resolves internal disputes amongst the Orungu, a tribe in what is now Gabon which has the only organised kingdom in the area. As a result, he is able to forge an alliance between the Asiga and the Orungu.

Bantu speakers entered southern Uganda probably by the end of the first millennium AD where they developed centralised kingdoms by the fifteenth or sixteenth century

after 1600s

According to an Agekaza/Quaben tradition which is documented around 1906, after the Dutch defeat the Ndiwa in the 1600s, all males of the Agekaza clan are killed in wars around Awuna. Wéngékazé, a man who, probably, is not an Agekaza and may not even be a Mpongwe, marries the widows and refounds the clan.

In a different tradition, the Agekaza originate in Awuna and their ancestor is Rogomba from the Como area of Kongo. Rassaguiza is the father of Re-Ndoukoué. The Agekaza overpopulate Awuna, and Re-Ndoukoué leads some of them to the right bank of the Gabon estuary.

after 1600s

Legendary founder of Agekaza clan.

Alternative legendary ancestor of Agekaza.

Legendary son of Wéngékazé or Rassaguiza.

1760s - 1840s

Demand from Brazil and Cuba causes the slave trade to swell. Interior peoples in modern Gabon send undesirable members or captives to slavery. Orungu takes advantage of its location to assert control over the local slave trade while the Mpongwe clans expand their already-thriving trading activity to participate in the slave trade.

Collected in the 1950s, this is a Mpongwe house mask from Gabon with remains of kaoilin on the face, although by the time it entered the private collection of a European family the Mpongwe were integrating into urban life in the cities

At the end of the eighteenth century, according to legend, a quarrel arises between Re-Ndoukoué's twin sons, Ré-Ndambo and Ré-Bulia. Each leads half of the Agekaza to divide the right bank into two regions. This geographical division is common to all Agekaza legends.

late 1700s

Legendary son.

late 1700s

Legendary brother.

by 1840s

Six clans have disappeared by this time. Four of those - the Anigo, Agèsamba, Agondigó, and Agwenango - leave no tradition. The other two - the Adukesónó and Anangoduka - have only a few members remaining in the twenty-first century.

A forest village in Gabon in the nineteenth century, drawing of Thérond from a photograph taken by Houzé de l'Aulnoit, with the engraving being published in Le Tour du Monde, 1865

early 1800s

The Adyumba, the southernmost Mpongwe clan, engage in war with the Orungu and are nearly annihilated. Chief Répéke leads them to Lake Azingo. By 1819, they have been reduced to a population of four small villages.

The Orungu also force the Adoni clan to leave their area to the south of the River Aranyè, although it is not known whether the hostilities occur at the same time as those which affect the Adyumba.

Those people who will become the Azuwa and Abandja clans divide, and the Azuwa move down the River Gangoué to settle at Glass, probably in the early nineteenth century. The Abandja eventually join them there at the end of the nineteenth century.

early 1800s

Legendary founder of Agwempônô.

Ogwempônô settles his clan at Mina on the left bank of the River Gabon. He disinherits his son, Rogombé-Buma, and offers Ré-Mboko the eka (the stool of authority). The Asiga are thrilled with the union of the two clans.

About eighty percent of Gabon remains covered by forest which shelters a rich variety of wildlife - in 2019 the 'Central African Forest Initiative' awarded a sizeable fund to Gabon to help preserve its forest, which are so thick that in pre-colonial times they served to separate from each other the main ethnic groups

Son. Second and last Agwempônô oga.

Oga of Asiga.

The Agwènkôwa clan of the right bank move to the River Gnambour under their chief, Re-Ganambo, after whom the river is named. Then, during the tenure of Ré-Mboko, they are forced to move to the left bank under their oga, Radjéno. Today, they are back on the right bank of the Gabon estuary.

c.1839 - 1876

Son. Asiga oga. Grants French protectorate.

1839

France enters into a treaty with Denis (Anchuwe Koke Rapouchombo), head of the Mpongwe clan on the southern bank of the Gabon estuary. The Mpongwe agree to end their trading of slaves and accept French authority over their lands. The Mpongwe organise themselves into a kingdom which the French call 'Pangoue'.

1841 - 1844

France now - in 1841 - enters into a similar treaty with Louis (Angduile Dowe), head of the Agekaza-Quaben clan on the northern bank of the Gabon estuary. American Protestant missionaries in the lands of 'King Glass' (R'Ogouarowe), on the northern bank of the River Ogooué where American, German, and British activity in the area is most heavily concentrated, enforce changes at Olamba.

Bouit Willaumez arrived in Gabon in 1839, soon being instructed to carry out a punitive action following the looting of two French ships on the northern Gabon coast, which he did at the village of Re-Ntchindo (known as Kringer, now Battery IV), thereby precipitating French occupation

1849

Using freed Vili slaves from Loanda, France founds Libreville at the northern end of the Gabon estuary where it reaches the Atlantic. Libreville will become the capital of the modern state of Gabon.

by 1850

The Agegwa clan is forced by intense competition to migrate to the right bank, where they are absorbed by the Agekaza.

1876 - 1884

Oga.

1884 - 1900

Oga.

by 1884

Smallpox has hit the Mpongwe population and has ravaged it, destroying its numbers. By this stage in the nineteenth century only about three thousand of them remain alive. In the following year, 1885, they are drawn into the French Gabon colonial structure.

late 1800s

By the end of the nineteenth century, the Agekaza clan has absorbed many other Mpongwe clans, especially those which have been drastically weakened by smallpox.

Today's Gabon is flourishing in its position along the Gulf of Guinea, with its white sandy beaches highly popular amongst tourists

1900 - 1905

Oga for the second time.

1905 - 1927

Oga for the second time.

early 1900s

Fang migration into traditional Mpongwe lands induces many of the Mpongwe to adopt urban life and become leaders within the 'French Colony' and the later independent Gabon.