Cingolo

Kingdom of Cingolo
Ombala ya Cingolo
c. 1670 - After 1778
StatusKingdom
CapitalCingolo
Common languagesUmbundu
Portuguese (minority)
Ethnic groups
Ovimbundu
DemonymsCingolan, Quingolan
GovernmentAbsolute monarchy
Succeeded by
Portuguese Angola
Today part of Angola

The Kingdom of Cingolo[a] was a traditional Ovimbundu kingdom in the central highlands of Angola. It was one of several independent or semi-independent Ovimbundu kingdoms that developed in the region before and during Portuguese expansion into the Angolan interior.[1]

Cingolo is particularly notable for its traditional origin story, which attributes its foundation to a woman who fled the Portuguese conquest of Pungo Andongo around 1670. According to the tradition recorded by historian Gladwyn Murray Childs, she settled on a site known as the "Little Mountain" in territory inhabited by the Va Humbi. The settlement eventually became the center of the kingdom.[2]

The kingdom remained politically independent for much of the following century. In the Portuguese campaign of 1774–1776, Cingolo fought alongside the Kingdom of Bailundo against Portuguese forces.[3] Its fortified capital was captured and destroyed during the campaign.[4]

History

Origins

Cingolo's foundation tradition differs from those of several other Ovimbundu kingdoms. While the origins of kingdoms such as Ndulu and Viye are traditionally associated with male hunters, the founding of Cingolo is associated with a woman. Maria da Conceição Neto identifies Cingolo among the Ovimbundu kingdoms whose traditions attribute their foundation to women.[5]

According to Childs, the founder of Cingolo was a woman from Pungo Andongo who fled around the time the Portuguese captured the fortress there in 1670. She settled on a place known as the "Little Mountain", in an area then inhabited by the Va Humbi. The kingdom subsequently took its name from its founder.[2]

The tradition does not establish that the kingdom was formally created in 1670. Rather, the date provides an approximate point of reference for the beginning of the settlement and the political community that later became Cingolo. The precise date at which Cingolo became a kingdom is unknown.

The Ovimbundu kingdoms

Cingolo was part of a wider group of Ovimbundu kingdoms in the central Angolan highlands. These included Bailundo, Ndulu, Viye, Wambu, Ciyaka, Ngalangi, Sambu and Kalukembe.[1]

The kingdoms were politically independent from one another, although their ruling families and communities were connected by traditions of migration, marriage, ancestry and warfare. Childs's reconstruction of Ovimbundu traditions places Cingolo between Ciyaka and Bailundo in the sequence of traditions concerning the origins of the kingdoms.[1]

The political boundaries of the kingdoms were not necessarily fixed. Authority was exercised through relationships between rulers, settlements and local communities, and those relationships could change over time.

Portuguese campaign of 1774–1776

Cingolo became directly involved in the Portuguese military campaigns against the Ovimbundu kingdoms in the 1770s.

In 1774–1776, Portuguese forces conducted a campaign against Bailundo and its allies. Cingolo fought alongside Bailundo during the conflict. Its capital was a fortified settlement located on the "Little Mountain" associated with the kingdom's foundation. The Portuguese captured and destroyed the fortified capital during the campaign.[4]

The destruction of the capital was an important event in the history of Cingolo, but it should not automatically be regarded as the end of the kingdom. The surviving sources do not provide a reliable date for the abolition of the Cingolo monarchy, and the political institutions of the Ovimbundu kingdoms continued to exist in various forms after the Portuguese campaigns of the eighteenth century.

Geography

Historical Cingolo was located in the central Angolan highlands. The kingdom is associated with the area of modern Huambo Province, particularly the present-day Cingolo area. Modern administrative boundaries, however, should not be assumed to correspond exactly to those of the historical kingdom.

The central highlands were home to numerous Ovimbundu communities and kingdoms. The region supported agriculture and livestock keeping and was connected to trade routes linking the interior with the Atlantic coast.

Society and economy

Cingolo shared many of the economic characteristics of the other Ovimbundu kingdoms. Agriculture formed an important part of the local economy, while hunting, livestock keeping and trade also contributed to the livelihood of communities.

The prominence of Cingolo's female founder is unusual among the traditional origin accounts of the Ovimbundu kingdoms. It is also significant because it shows that political authority in the region was not remembered exclusively through male founders and warrior traditions.[5]

The kingdom's location in the central highlands placed it within wider networks of movement and trade. These networks connected the various Ovimbundu kingdoms and eventually brought them into increasingly close contact with Portuguese merchants and military forces.

Rulers

The surviving sources do not provide a complete and securely dated list of the rulers of Cingolo.

Later compilations of Ovimbundu royal genealogies preserve names of rulers associated with Cingolo, but the dates assigned to some of them are approximate and are not consistently supported by the earlier sources. For this reason, a complete royal list should not be presented as established fact without further documentary evidence.

The political authority of the Cingolo ruler appears to have centered on the fortified royal settlement that was destroyed during the Portuguese campaign of 1774–1776.[4]

End of the kingdom

There is no securely established date for the end of the Kingdom of Cingolo.

The destruction of its fortified capital during the 1774–1776 Portuguese campaign marked a major defeat, but the available evidence does not demonstrate that the kingdom ceased to exist immediately afterward. Modern historical surveys continue to list Cingolo among the traditional Ovimbundu political entities, and twentieth-century ethnographic accounts also recognize Cingolo as an Ovimbundu polity.[6]

For this reason, the kingdom's chronology is best given as c. 1670 – unknown rather than 1670–1776. The approximate foundation date refers to the traditional account of the founder's settlement following the fall of Pungo Andongo, while the lack of an end date reflects the absence of reliable evidence for the formal abolition of the monarchy.

Historical significance

Cingolo is significant in the history of Angola for several reasons. It was one of the numerous Ovimbundu kingdoms that developed in the central highlands, and its history provides evidence of the region's political diversity before the consolidation of Portuguese colonial rule.

Its origin tradition is particularly notable because the kingdom is said to have been founded by a woman fleeing the destruction of Pungo Andongo. The story also provides a link between events in the Portuguese-controlled region farther north and the formation of a new political community in the Ovimbundu highlands.[2]

The history of Cingolo also illustrates the limits of the surviving evidence. Much of the early history of the Ovimbundu kingdoms was transmitted orally and recorded by researchers only later. Dates given in traditional genealogies should therefore generally be treated as approximate unless they can be supported by contemporary documentary evidence.

Legacy

Cingolo remains part of the historical and traditional political heritage of the Ovimbundu. The name survives in modern geographic usage in Huambo Province.

The kingdom is also remembered for its participation in the 1774–1776 war against Portuguese forces alongside Bailundo. Its destruction during the campaign forms an important episode in the history of Portuguese expansion into the central Angolan highlands.[4]

See also

Ovimbundu Kingdom of Bailundo Kingdom of Ndulu Kingdom of Viye Ciyaka Ngalangi Kalukembe

Notes

  1. ↑ (Ombala ya Cingolo) Also known as the Kingdom of Quingolo.

References

  1. 1 2 3 Childs 1970, pp. 241–248.
  2. 1 2 3 Childs 1970, pp. 243–244.
  3. ↑ McCulloch, Merran (2017). The Ovimbundu of Angola. London. ISBN 978-1-315-30502-8. OCLC 971613394.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  4. 1 2 3 4 Childs 1970, pp. 244–246.
  5. 1 2 Neto 2012, p. 53.
  6. ↑ McCulloch 2017. sfn error: multiple targets (2×): CITEREFMcCulloch2017 (help)

Bibliography

Childs, Gladwyn Murray (1970). "The Chronology of the Ovimbundu Kingdoms". The Journal of African History. 11 (2): 241–248. doi:10.1017/S0021853700009968. Childs, Gladwyn Murray (1949). Umbundu Kinship and Character: Being a Description of the Social Structure and Individual Development of the Ovimbundu of Angola. London: Oxford University Press. Neto, Maria da Conceição (2012). In Town and Out of Town: A Social History of Huambo (Thesis). SOAS, University of London. McCulloch, Merran (2017). The Ovimbundu of Angola. Routledge.

I’m

See also

References


This page is issued from Wikipedia. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.