Chronicle
The Kings of Buganda
Basekabaka be Buganda
Apolo Kagwa · 1901
Synopsis
A chronicle of the kings of Buganda, written in Luganda by the kingdom's prime minister. It begins with Kintu and Cwa, whom tradition places at the head of the dynasty, then follows reign after reign the twenty-nine sovereigns who precede Mutesa, before dwelling at length on the period the author lived through himself. The account gathers what he collected from the keepers of the royal tombs and from the traditions of the clans.
Context
Published in 1901 and reissued in 1912 and 1927, the chronicle fixed the list of kings that historians subsequently took up almost without discussion; the historian Christopher Wrigley notes that the administrator Harry Johnston relegated its first two kings to prehistory. The accounts of the earliest reigns are reported there as the author collected them, without his having invented them. M. S. M. Kiwanuka published an annotated English translation of it in 1971, with the Luganda text.
Who it is for
A dense chronicle, made up of reigns and genealogies; Kiwanuka's annotated English translation makes it easier to approach.
Prizes and reception
It remains the primary source for the dynastic history of Buganda, cited by all work on the region.
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