Warfare in African History

This book examines the role of war in shaping the African state, society, and economy by tracing shifts in the culture and practice of war.

Richard J. Reid (Author)

9780521123976, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 16 April 2012

212 pages, 8 maps
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.2 cm, 0.31 kg

'Only Richard Reid has the grasp of the sweep of African history, and the place of conflict in it, to write this book. I only wish it had been available when I began to research the subject. Students, scholars and interested general readers will all profit from its timely appearance.' Bruce Vandervort, editor of the Journal of Military History and author of Wars of Imperial Conquest in Africa, 1830–1914

This book examines the role of war in shaping the African state, society, and economy. Richard J. Reid helps students understand different patterns of military organization through Africa's history; the evolution of weaponry, tactics, and strategy; and the increasing prevalence of warfare and militarism in African political and economic systems. He traces shifts in the culture and practice of war from the first millennium into the era of the external slave trades, and then into the nineteenth century, when a military revolution unfolded across much of Africa. The repercussions of that revolution, as well as the impact of colonial rule, continue to this day. The frequency of coups d'états and civil war in Africa's recent past is interpreted in terms of the continent's deeper past.

1. The contours of violence: environment, economy, and polity in African warfare
2. Arms in Africa's antiquity: patterns and systems of warfare, to the early second millennium CE
3. The military foundations of state and society, to c.1600
4. Destruction and construction, c.1600–c.1800
5. Transformations in violence: military revolution and the 'long' nineteenth century
6. Revolutions incomplete: the old and the new in the modern era.

Subject Areas: Military history [HBW], African history [HBJH], History [HB]