Center of History and Cultural Anthropology
Institute for African Studies of The Russian Academy of Sciences
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August-September 2020 The third season of field research in the United Republic of Tanzania

In August-September 2020 Anastasia A. Banshchikova, Oxana V. Ivanchenko and Valentine N. Bryndina accomplished the third season of field research in the United Republic of Tanzania, dedicated to the historical memory of the Arab slave trade. The researchers have conducted interviews in Dar es Salaam, Bagamoyo and Zanzibar, with parishioners of the Anglican Church of Zanzibar. The latter interviews are of particular interest, since a significant part of the worshippers are descendants of slaves.

In the course of research several historical monuments related to the slave trade were visited. The most significant sites were: St John’s Anglican Church in Mbweni (Zanzibar) including missionary church, where girls were trained in the spirit of Christian faith; an underground compound at Mangapwani, Zanzibar, where, according to oral tradition, smuggled slaves were hidden; 19th century cemetery on the island Chapwani (Zanzibar archipelago) – the burials of British sailors who died fighting Arab slave traders during anti-slave raids in the Indian Ocean, including Captain of H.M.S. "London" Charles Brownrigg. There is also the grave of the correspondent of the Lyon Geographical Society, Henri Graffuel, who wrote the memoirs "Voyage de Lamooà Zanzibar" in 1878 and the burials of British sailors from the "Pegasus" ship sunk by the German cruiser "Königsberg" in the Zanzibar harbor in 1914.

The research was supported by the Russian Foundation for Basic Research, grant # 20-09-00361 “Cultural Memory about 19th Century Arab Slave Trade and its Influence on Interethnic Relations in Modern Tanzania.”