Afonso I of Kongo

King of Kongo (r. 1506-1543)

• Born: c. late 1450’s or early 1460’s
• Birthplace: Probably Mbanza Kongo, Kongo (now M'banza Congo, Angola)
• Died: 1543
• Place of death: São Salvador, Kongo (now M'banza Congo, Angola)

Afonso I expanded the economic and political power of the Kingdom of Kongo by forming strategic trade alliances with the Portuguese and by accepting and adopting Christianity, thereby encouraging Portuguese colonization.

Early Life

Afonso (a-FOHN-sew) I was the son of King Nzinga Nkuwa and his principal wife. He was most likely born at the royal compound in Mbanza Kongo, the Kongo capital. His father was the first Christian monarch of the kingdom, which had developed over the previous century from a federation of chiefdoms.

At its peak in the early sixteenth century, the kingdom straddled the delta region of the Congo (or Zaïre) River, extending along the Atlantic coast from what is now called Cabinda in the north to Luanda (now in Angola) in the south. The kingdom ranged inland along a corridor of land between the Congo River and the northern Angola plateau, occupying an area about the size of Austria. It had a population of several million people.

In the fifteenth century, the Portuguese pioneered voyages of discovery down the Atlantic coast. By 1483, they reached the mouth of the Congo River. Their wealth and power impressed King Nzinga Nkuwa, who adopted their religion, Roman Catholicism, for himself and his entourage. He assumed the name and title of John I, king of Kongo, addressed the Portuguese king, John IV, as “brother,” and changed the name of the Kongo capital to São Salvador do Congo. During this period, he appointed Nzinga Mbemba, who now bore the Christian name of Afonso, as governor of the copper-rich, northeastern province of Nsundi.

Nsundi was of great interest to the Portuguese because they believed its mineral wealth might also include gold and that it could be a stepping-stone to a lost Christian kingdom lying farther east. Under pressure from Kongo traditionalists, Afonso’s father relaxed his support of Catholicism, and he may even have recanted his support. Afonso continued to support the new religious faith, however, which stabilized his position in Nsundi, where the Portuguese supported him strategically.

Life’s Work

The death of Afonso’s father created a crisis in the royal succession. Followers of Kongo tradition supported Prince Mpanzu a Kitima, Afonso’s half brother, to become king. Afonso, however, backed by the Portuguese and Catholic clergy, argued that he was the legitimate heir. Moving south to the capital with a small band that included well-armed Portuguese, he confronted his opponents, whom he defeated and slaughtered in a battle outside São Salvador do Congo in 1506. Because his forces had been smaller than those of his enemies, he believed his victory was a divine miracle. The strength of the kingdom he inherited derived from sources considerably older and less spiritual.

Legend relates that a century earlier, Kongo tribesmen had migrated across the Congo River to settle an area south of where they located their capital, Mbanza Kongo. Situated on a plateau, the area would dominate two important trade routes. It commanded trade between the coast and the interior, a trade in salt and seashells valued as currency for goods such as ivory, animal hides, and cloth made of palm tree fiber. The city also intersected another major trade route, which moved high-quality copper mined north of the Congo with lesser quality copper, iron, and metalworking of the south.

Kongo developed into a distinct realm through alliances among the participating regions along these trade routes. A council (the mwissikongo), made up of representatives of participating districts, governed the region and chose the manikongo, or lord of the Kongo.

Kongo society was divided into a small elite of nobility, many of whom lived in the capital, and a majority of peasants, who lived in rural villages. The lowest class consisted of slaves, who were mostly individuals captured in war. Warfare was not, however, a dominant feature of Kongo society. To defend the realm, the king could depend only on a levy of warriors from district chiefs.

On becoming king in 1506, Afonso I strengthened his political position by allying himself with the economic and religious authority of the Portuguese. The Kongo kingship had grown based on its control of trade routes. The kingship levied taxes on trade goods and received tributes from the territories the trade routes traversed. Also, the king maintained lordship over the mwissikongo by distributing luxury goods and trade goods among them, appointing them to district and court offices, and ensuring territorial security over the region’s trading network.

Afonso secured a monopoly of trade with the Portuguese. They were especially interested in obtaining high-quality copper, for which they traded luxury European products. This monopoly was further strengthened as he sponsored the foundation and spread of Catholicism in the kingdom. A son that he sent to study in Portugal was consecrated a bishop; he built a cathedral in São Salvador do Congo, dedicated to Our Lady of Victory, rising over the sacred grove of the king’s ancestors; and Catholic churches were built in district capitals and villages.

Through Portuguese trade and Catholicism, Afonso I internationalized the power of the Kongo kingship. A threat to this power rose in the 1520’s as the Portuguese changed their trading interests from copper to slaves. Because Afonso had only a limited number of captives to sell, the Portuguese sought sources beyond his control, which threatened his monopoly on commerce. Afonso became a vehement opponent of slavery, denouncing to the Papacy the trade’s moral repugnance.

By the following decade, however, increasing warfare in the upper Congo River interior produced a growing number of captives, who were sold as slaves at the Kongo frontier, below the Malebo Pool, an expansion of the Congo River, where Afonso had firm control. They were then moved through São Salvador do Congo to the coast for shipment abroad.

Afonso reversed his opposition to slavery, as the trade came to comprise an ever larger portion of his and the nobility’s wealth. The kingdom expanded as territories and chiefs paid him homage in order to participate in Kongo wealth and avoid capture and enslavement. Afonso I died in 1543, and his reign is still commemorated for its prosperity and power.

Significance

The thirty-seven-year reign of Afonso I established the most prosperous and powerful Christian kingdom of its time in sub-Saharan Africa. Based on extensive trade, especially of slaves, through the region of the lower Congo River, the kingdom’s prosperity solidified Afonso’s political position.

Moreover, by basing his rule on international trade and a “foreign” religion, he changed the nature of Kongo kingship and society. Succession to the monarchy was now determined by descent from Afonso rather than by selection by the mwassikongo.

Furthermore, the hierarchical separation of nobility, peasant, and slave became more marked as new wealth was concentrated in the hands of the ruling class supporting the monarchy. Class and religious tensions would grow in Kongo after Afonso’s reign. The wealth of the kingdom attracted invaders who occupied and debilitated it. The reign of Afonso I offered a few decades of glory for an isolated African kingdom that inaugurated centuries of slave-trading from southern Africa, across the Atlantic, and to the Americas.

Bibliography

Blier, Susanne Preston. The Royal Arts of Africa: The Majesty of Form. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1998. Chapter 5 analyzes the iconography and regalia of Kongo monarchy, presenting a rich array of illustrations that frame Kongo within the context of other African kingdoms.

Hilton, Anne. “Family and Kinship Among the Kongo South of the Zaire River from the Sixteenth to the Nineteenth Centuries.” Journal of African History 24, no. 2 (1983): 189-206. Discusses the role of family and kinship among the peoples of the Kingdom of Kongo.

Hilton, Anne. The Kingdom of Kongo. Oxford, England: Clarendon Press, 1985. Analytical history, supported by maps and tables, of Kongo over a peak period from the fifteenth to seventeenth centuries, with a summary of events to the twentieth century.

Thornton, John. “The Development of an African Catholic Church in the Kingdom of Kongo, 1491-1750.” Journal of African History 25, no. 2 (1984): 147-167. Reexamines the question of the authenticity of Christianity in Kongo and changing European views of its African Catholicism’s orthodoxy.

Thornton, John. “The Origins and Early History of the Kingdom of Kongo, c. 1350-1550.” International Journal of African Historical Studies 34, no. 1 (2001): 89-120. Detailed examination of historical texts to determine a more precise chronology of Kongo origins.

Vansina, J., and T. Obenga. “The Kongo Kingdom and Its Neighbors.” In Africa from the Sixteenth to Eighteenth Century. Vol. 5 in UNESCO General History of Africa, edited by B. A. Ogot. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992. Details the socioeconomic and geopolitical factors determining Afonso’s reign.