ABSTRACT
Salt and iron were two articles of trade which were essential to everyday life. But there were other indigenous products which were traded over considerable distances for their luxury value. The first of these was bark-cloth. From at least the reign ofSemakokiro onwards, the making of bark-cloths was a vigorous domestic industry in Buganda, and they had become standard clothing for the common people by the late nineteenth century. Plain and dyed bark-cloths were exported to Karagwe, Rwanda, Busoga, and Bunyoro, for none of these countries produced cloth of comparable quality. Outside Buganda, bark-cloth was generally worn only by the wealthy, but the Baganda were assured a steady demand since bark-cloths were apparently worn out in a month (1: pp.403, 434; 2: pp.1l9-20; 3: II, p.251).
