ABSTRACT
Angola, one of the first territories to be incorporated into a European empire, had been a Portuguese colony since the late fifteenth century when explorers looking for an all-sea route to India and China established trading posts and forts near the mouth of the Congo River and the present-day capital of Luanda. Nevertheless, Portuguese efforts to penetrate and establish hegemony over the interior of the colony were sporadic and largely ineffectual until the twentieth century.
