Beyond Decline
The Kingdom of the Kongo in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4772979 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Susan Herlin Broadhead (corresponding author) |
| Year | 1979 |
| Volume | 12 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 615 |
| Publication date | 1979-01-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | The International Journal of African Historical Studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0361-7882 • E-ISSN: 2326-3016 |
| Publisher | JSTOR (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.2307/218070 |
| OpenAlex | W183871990 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 21 |
In the years between 1709 and 1715 the kingdom of Kongo under Pedro IV emerged politically in its modem, precolonial form after two generations of uncertainty and change. The defeat in 1665 of Kongo armies under Ant6nio I by the Angolan Portuguese1 weakened the power of the dominant royal establishment at the capital, San Salvador (Mbanza Kongo), setting the stage for a showdown with its only internal rival, Mbanza Sonyo.2 A protracted struggle followed for control of the central institutions of the kingdom, during the course of which those institutions were dramatically altered from a strong, centralized monarchy based on a large urban center to a weak rural-based monarchy whose titular head was only primus interpares. By 1715 Pedro's occupation of the capital and his right to the kingship were widely accepted by the provincial nobility.3 The political system which operated for the next 175 years was characterized by great fluidity of structure, especially in the provinces where there was a tendency toward the multiplication of locally autonomous political units, a process which I have called Kongo syndrome.4 This only marginally affected the kingdom in the eighteenth century because as we shall see nobles used the Christian cult
Ancient history · Genealogy · Kingdom · African history and culture studies · Colonialism, slavery, and trade · Global Maritime and Colonial Histories · History · Geology · Paleontology
Knowledge is Power
The Institutions Curse
The Making of Kongo Identity in the American Diaspora
Kongo Cosmopolitans in the Nineteenth Century
The Eastern Border of the Kongo Kingdom
A Central African Kingdom
The Origins of Kongo
From America to Africa
From Image to Grave and Back
Introduction
Ceramics Decorated with Woven Motifs
‘To Make Book’
Soyo and Kongo
The Kongo Kingdom
The Atlantic Slave Trade from West Central Africa, 1780–1867
Catolicismo e poder no Congo
Reis do Congo no Brasil, séculos XVIII e XIX
The Development of an African Catholic Church in the Kingdom of Kongo, 1491–1750
African Voices From the Congo Coast
Kongolese Sacred Sovereignties and Legalities in the Early Modern Trans-Atlantic
Constructing a Kongo Identity
| Unique citing works | 21 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,5 |
| Citation span | 1984 - 2025 (42) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 20 |