Before proceeding further in a description of this interesting coast-line, perhaps it would be as well to explain that on the first arrival on this coast of the Portuguese discoverers, at the commencement of the sixteenth century, they found existing in the interior a large kingdom called Mocoranga, which reached to the coast, along which it extended from the northern portion of Delagoa Bay to the mouths of the river Zambesi, being bounded on the north by that river.
This kingdom was fast falling into decay, and appears to have been the remains of a much greater one, which was partially destroyed or broken up, at some remote period, by the invasion of a warlike people known as the Lindens.
At the principal places along the coast the Portuguese found Arab settlements established, which appeared to be under the dominion of a Sultan at Kilwa, to whom they all looked up as their common local head, while the Kotba, or prayer on Friday, was offered for the head of the Arab family, who at that time was Kansu-el-Ghauri, Soudan of Cairo, called also the Mamlook Sultan of Egypt.
The Sultan of Kilwa was immensely rich in consequence of the vast quantity of gold which he obtained from his dependency of Sofala, which from time immemorial had been the great gold field of the Hebrews and Phœnicians, and even at that time yielded gold in great abundance.
In the course of a few years the Portuguese made themselves masters of these Arab settlements, and thus the Portuguese kingdom of Algarves was formed.
The enterprising Portuguese of those days, having obtained a footing on the coast, soon pushed into the interior, for the purpose of discovering the gold and silver mines of the country; and the natives, instructed by the Arabs, did all in their power to baffle the enterprising Europeans.
During this struggle, the Portuguese made themselves acquainted with the country, and formed settlements on the Zambesi, such as Seña, Tete, and Zumbo, and indeed others, from some of which they were driven to the coast by the natives.
These discoverers and conquerors learned that the kingdom of Mocoranga was very powerful, and the neighbouring vast territory under the Monomotapa more powerful still.