ABSTRACT
With the decline of Maravi power at the end of the seventeenth century, Yao traders based at Lake Niassa began to redirect their commercial operations from Kilwa to Mossuril and Cabaceiras, establishing a caravan route through northern Nampula. From that time onwards, Nampula was situated at the crossroads of two major trade arteries from the interior. During the second half of the eighteenth century, when the trafficking in human beings came to dwarf all other forms of exchange, Makua chiefs in the interior established themselves as traders in slaves as well as other commodities.
