The Scramble for Africa, 1870–1914

Timeline

Layers

Britain: effective control (West Africa) · Britain: effective control (East Africa) · Britain: effective control (southern Africa) · France: effective control (North Africa) · France: effective control (West Africa) · France: effective control (Equatorial, Madagascar, Somali coast) · Portugal: effective control · Germany: effective control · Leopold II's Congo Free State → Belgium (1908): effective control · Italy: effective control · Spain: effective control · Sultanate of Morocco (after 1912: unsubdued regions) · Beylik of Tunis (to 1881) · Ottoman Tripolitania and Cyrenaica (to 1912) · Sanusi order and Libyan resistance · Khedivate of Egypt (Ottoman suzerainty) and its Sudan · Egypt under British occupation (1882); Anglo-Egyptian Sudan (1899) · Mahdist state (1881–98) · Sultanate of Darfur · Sultanate of Wadai · Ethiopian Empire · Dervish state (Mohammed Abdullah Hassan, 1899) · Republic of Liberia · Sokoto Caliphate · Borno (to 1893) · Rabih az-Zubayr's state (1893–1901) · Toucouleur (Segu Tukulor) Empire · Wassoulou Empire (Samori Ture) · Asante · Kingdom of Dahomey · Kingdom of Buganda · Sultanate of Zanzibar · Swahili-Arab Manyema (Tippu Tip) · Lunda Empire · Lozi kingdom (Barotseland) · Ndebele kingdom (Matabeleland) · Gaza Empire · Zulu kingdom · Boer republics (Transvaal, Orange Free State) · Merina kingdom (Madagascar) · Other African states and polities (north and west) · Other African states and polities (centre) · Other African states and polities (east) · Other African states and polities (south) · Britain: claim (West Africa) · Britain: claim (East Africa) · Britain: claim (southern Africa) · France: claim (North Africa) · France: claim (West Africa) · France: claim (Equatorial, Madagascar, Somali coast) · Portugal: claim · Germany: claim · Leopold II's Congo Free State → Belgium (1908): claim · Italy: claim · Spain: claim

Events

• 1870, Suez Canal opens: Opened on 17 November 1869. The short route to India made Egypt and the Red Sea coast strategic for Britain, and Egypt's debts for building it opened the door to European control.
• 27 Oct 1871, Diamond fields annexed: Britain annexed Griqualand West, with the new diamond diggings at Kimberley, over Orange Free State protests.
• 4 Feb 1874, Kumasi burned: Wolseley's expedition took and burned the Asante capital. The Treaty of Fomena cost Asante its southern tributaries; Britain proclaimed the Gold Coast Colony that July.
• 16 Nov 1875, Battle of Gundet: Yohannes IV's army destroyed an Egyptian column invading Ethiopia from Massawa; a second Egyptian army was routed at Gura in March 1876.
• 12 Apr 1877, Transvaal annexed: Shepstone proclaimed the South African Republic British territory, part of Carnarvon's plan for a South African confederation.
• 22 Jan 1879, Battle of Isandlwana: A Zulu army of about 20,000 overran the British camp; some 1,300 men of the invading column died. It was the worst British defeat by an African army in the period.
• 4 Jul 1879, Battle of Ulundi: The British burned oNdini and captured King Cetshwayo in August. Zululand was split into thirteen chiefdoms, which fought a civil war.
• 27 Feb 1881, Battle of Majuba Hill: Boer victory in the First Anglo-Boer War. The Pretoria Convention (3 August 1881) restored the Transvaal's self-government under British 'suzerainty'.
• 12 May 1881, Treaty of Bardo: With French troops at his palace, the Bey of Tunis accepted a French protectorate. Italy, which had hoped for Tunisia, turned to Germany and Austria.
• 29 Jun 1881, The Mahdi's call: Muhammad Ahmad declared himself the Mahdi on Aba Island and rose against Egyptian rule in the Sudan.
• 13 Sep 1882, Battle of Tel el-Kebir: Wolseley defeated Ahmed Urabi; British troops entered Cairo the next day and stayed until 1956. Egypt remained nominally Ottoman.
• 5 Nov 1883, Battle of Shaykan: The Mahdi's forces annihilated Hicks Pasha's Egyptian army of about 10,000 in Kordofan. Darfur's governor Slatin surrendered in December.
• 26 Jan 1885, Fall of Khartoum: After a ten-month siege the Mahdists stormed the city and killed Gordon, two days before a British relief force arrived. The Mahdist state ruled the Sudan for 13 years.
• 26 Feb 1885, Berlin Act: the Congo basin: The Berlin Conference (Nov 1884 to Feb 1885) set rules for claiming African coasts ('effective occupation'), declared free trade in the Congo basin and accepted Leopold II's International Association. No African ruler was invited.
• 1 Jul 1885, Congo Free State proclaimed: Leopold II became sovereign of the Congo as his personal possession, not a Belgian colony.
• 20 Sep 1886, Witwatersrand gold: Johannesburg was founded on the richest goldfield in the world, which made the Transvaal the economic centre of southern Africa.
• 22 Sep 1888, Abushiri revolt: Coastal towns rose against the German East Africa Company weeks after it took over the Swahili coast. Wissmann's troops crushed the revolt; Abushiri was hanged in December 1889.
• 2 May 1889, Treaty of Wuchale: In the Italian text Ethiopia had to conduct its foreign relations through Italy; in the Amharic text it only could. Italy claimed a protectorate, which Menelik denounced in 1893.
• 11 Jan 1890, British Ultimatum to Portugal: Britain forced Portugal to withdraw from the Shire Highlands and Mashonaland, ending the 'Rose-Coloured Map' that would have joined Angola and Mozambique.
• 1 Jul 1890, Heligoland–Zanzibar Treaty: Germany recognised British protection over Zanzibar and the Uganda sphere; Britain gave Germany Heligoland and the Caprivi Strip.
• 12 Sep 1890, Fort Salisbury: The British South Africa Company's Pioneer Column raised the flag in Mashonaland.
• 20 Dec 1891, Msiri killed: The Stairs expedition shot the Yeke king Msiri at Bunkeya, securing copper-rich Katanga for the Congo Free State ahead of the British South Africa Company.
• 17 Nov 1892, Abomey taken: Dodds's column took the Dahomean capital after hard fighting with the king's army, including its women soldiers. King Béhanzin surrendered in January 1894.
• 22 Apr 1893, Congo Arab war: Congo Free State forces took Nyangwe and Kasongo, breaking the Swahili-Arab trading states of the upper Congo (1892–94).
• 4 Nov 1893, Bulawayo taken: Company columns with Maxim guns defeated the Ndebele; Lobengula fled and died early in 1894.
• 1895, Congo Free State: rubber terror: Rubber quotas enforced by hostage-taking, flogging, mutilation and killing. Casement's 1904 report and a campaign led by E. D. Morel exposed the system; the population loss, often put in the millions, is debated.
• 30 Sep 1895, Antananarivo taken: A French expedition, which lost thousands of men to disease, shelled the palace; Madagascar was annexed in August 1896 and Queen Ranavalona III exiled in 1897.
• 28 Dec 1895, Gungunhana captured: Mouzinho de Albuquerque seized the Gaza king at Chaimite after the battle of Coolela; he died in exile in the Azores.
• 1 Mar 1896, Battle of Adwa: Menelik II's army of about 100,000 destroyed an Italian army of 17,000. By the Treaty of Addis Ababa (Oct 1896) Italy recognised Ethiopia's full independence.
• 24 Mar 1896, Ndebele and Shona risings: The First Chimurenga: risings against company rule in Matabeleland and Mashonaland, crushed by 1897.
• 18 Feb 1897, Benin City sacked: A British punitive expedition burned the city and looted thousands of bronzes and ivories, many still in European museums. Oba Ovonramwen was exiled.
• 2 Sep 1898, Battle of Omdurman: Kitchener's Anglo-Egyptian army killed about 12,000 Mahdist soldiers in a morning, for fewer than 50 dead of its own.
• 18 Sep 1898, Fashoda crisis: Kitchener met Marchand's small French force on the Upper Nile. France backed down in November; the 1899 convention gave the Nile basin to Britain and Wadai to France.
• 29 Sep 1898, Samori captured: After 16 years of war with France, Samori Ture was captured at Guélémou; he died in exile in Gabon in 1900.
• 11 Oct 1899, Second Boer War begins: Boer commandos invaded Natal and the Cape and besieged Ladysmith, Kimberley and Mafeking.
• 28 Mar 1900, War of the Golden Stool: Led by Yaa Asantewaa, Asante besieged the British fort at Kumasi after the governor demanded the Golden Stool. Asante was annexed on 1 January 1902.
• 22 Apr 1900, Battle of Kousséri: Three French columns met at Lake Chad and defeated Rabih az-Zubayr, who was killed; his son Fadlallah fought on in Borno until August 1901.
• 1 Dec 1900, Concentration camps: Britain burned Boer farms and interned civilians. About 26,000 Boer women and children and at least 14,000 Black Africans died in the camps, most of disease.
• 31 May 1902, Peace of Vereeniging: The Boer republics became British colonies. Black Africans' political rights were left for later and were never granted by the Union.
• 15 Mar 1903, Sokoto taken: The British occupied the capital of the Sokoto Caliphate, the largest state in West Africa. Caliph Attahiru I was killed at Burmi in July.
• 12 Jan 1904, Herero rising: The Herero under Samuel Maharero rose against land seizures and abuse by settlers.
• 11 Aug 1904, Battle of Waterberg: Von Trotha's troops encircled the Herero, leaving open only the way into the Omaheke desert.
• 2 Oct 1904, Herero and Nama genocide: Von Trotha's extermination order; Herero were driven into the desert, then survivors and Nama were held in camps such as Shark Island. Commonly cited estimates: some 65,000 of 80,000 Herero and 10,000 of 20,000 Nama died. Germany acknowledged it as genocide in 2021.
• 31 Mar 1905, Tangier crisis: Wilhelm II landed at Tangier to back Moroccan independence against France; the Algeciras conference followed.
• 31 Jul 1905, Maji Maji rising: A rising against forced cotton growing spread across southern German East Africa. German scorched-earth tactics caused a famine; estimates of the dead range from 75,000 to 300,000.
• 7 Apr 1906, Algeciras Act: The powers confirmed Moroccan independence on paper but gave France and Spain control of its police and finances.
• 15 Nov 1908, Belgium annexes the Congo: Under international pressure Leopold II handed the Congo Free State to Belgium.
• 2 Jun 1909, Abéché taken: The French took Wadai's capital; Sultan Dud Murra fought on until 1911.
• 31 May 1910, Union of South Africa: The Cape, Natal, Transvaal and Orange River colonies formed a self-governing dominion with a whites-only parliament outside the Cape.
• 1 Jul 1911, Agadir crisis: Germany sent the gunboat Panther to Agadir; in November it accepted French control of Morocco in exchange for 'Neukamerun', strips of French Equatorial Africa.
• 5 Oct 1911, Italy lands at Tripoli: Italy invaded Ottoman Tripolitania and Cyrenaica; by the Treaty of Ouchy (Oct 1912) the Ottomans withdrew, but Libyan and Sanusi resistance continued.
• 30 Mar 1912, Treaty of Fez: Sultan Abd al-Hafid accepted a French protectorate; Spain got the north and the far south in November. Much of the country fought on for two decades.
• 28 Jul 1914, Ethiopia: independent: One of two African states that kept their independence through the Scramble, recognised by Italy after Adwa.
• 28 Jul 1914, Liberia: independent: Independent since 1847, though it lost territory claims to Britain and France in 1885–1910.