Strange bedfellows: David Livingstone, Sekeletu, imported goods, and the 1853–1856 trans-African expedition

Abstract

This article explores the conflicting meanings of the trans-African expedition undertaken between 1853 and 1856 by colonial explorer David Livingstone, with the support of the African monarch Sekeletu, the young Kololo king. The Scottish explorer perceived the inter-continental journey as essential to establishing a trade route along which would flow imported goods from Europe to central Africa, and raw materials from the latter to the metropole. Livingstone held that such trade with its modern goods would not only have a ‘civilizing’ effect upon the Kololo but also make them abandon the slave trade and embrace capitalist values, Christianity, and modernity. But Sekeletu did not sponsor the expedition in question in order to jettison the normative order of Kololo society. To the contrary, he supported the trans-continental exploration to gain greater access to imported goods and, more importantly, used such goods to both boost his power and reinforce Kololo culture.

Keywords:

• David Livingstone
• Sekeletu
• Kololo
• culture
• trans-African expedition
• imported goods

Acknowledgements

I am particularly grateful to Professors John Mackenzie, Keith Hart, Bizeck Jube Phiri and Drs Giacomo Macola, Joanna Lewis, Mr Tim Jeal, and many other participants for their insightful comments on an earlier version of this article during the Imperial Obsessions International Conference in Livingstone, Zambia, on 19–22 April 2013. Similar thanks go to anonymous reviewers of this article and to Professor Robert Ross and other scholars who commented on the article during the CART V conference in Leiden on 27–30 November 2013.