Ukarimu Safaris and Tours: TANZANIA

The United Republic of Tanzania (Kiswahili: Jamhuri ya Muungano wa Tanzania), is a country found in East Africa bordered by Kenya and Uganda to the north, Rwanda, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the west, and Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique to the south. Eastern is bordered by the Indian Ocean.

Tanzania is a result of united of Tanganyika (mainland) and the Zanzibar islands on 26th April 1964, forming the United Republic of Tanzania. Tanganyika became independent from the British on December 1961 and Zanzibar became free through a revolution on 12th January 1964.

Some of the oldest human settlements have been found in Tanzania. The oldest human fossils where found in and around Olduvai Gorge (Oldupai) in northern Tanzania, an area referred to as “The Cradle of Mankind”. It is believed to be the birth place of humanity. Fossils found in this area include Paranthropus bones thought to be over 2 million years old, and the oldest known footprints of the immediate ancestors of humans, the Laetoli footprints, estimated to be about 3.6 million years old.

About 10,000 years ago, Tanzania was populated by hunter-gatherer communities who spoke Khoisan. They were joined by Cushitic-speaking people who came from the north about 5000 years ago. The Khoisan peoples were slowly absorbed. Cushitic peoples introduced basic techniques of agriculture, food production, and later cattle farming. About 2000 years ago, Bantu speaking people began to arrive from western Africa in a series of migrations. They further developed iron working skills, introduced different ideas of social and political organization. Later, Nilotic pastoralists arrived, and continued to immigrate into the area through to the 18th century.

NORTHERN CIRCUIT