Barue, with a population famously known in the past to be ‘passionate about its independence’ (Teixeira Botelho, 1921, p. 557), has a fascinating, intriguing precolonial history, which challenges, as I hope to show in this work, many assumptions that are current in thinking about nations, states, and nation-states. The precolonial Kingdom of Barue will provide useful contrasts with postcolonial Mozambique, which it eventually became a part of. As a text, the present work is a child of two parents. One is the author’s doctoral thesis completed in 2015 at VU University Amsterdam and the African Studies Centre in Leiden, the Netherlands. The other is an additional study concerning material available at the Arquivo Histórico Ultramarino in Lisbon about precolonial Barue, along with an additional literature study. Moreover, the present work focusses more on nationalism than the original thesis, which necessitated some rewriting, although some attention to processes of electing/selecting leaders has been retained.
I am very grateful for the kind supervision I received from Professors G.J. Abbink and M.P. Meneses during my graduate studies, and for their cooperation afterwards. In the District of Barue, I was offered very generous support by Mr Carlos Firmino Mutapa, at the time Technical Officer for Culture of the Service of Education, Youth, and Technology of the District Government of Barue District. I wish to thank Gerrit Berkelder for providing help and moral support for the initial set-up of the research project, Victor Igreja for triggering a restart for the project, Alex Bolding for setting me on the path, and Harry Wels for my arrival at the present product.
Many thanks go to the following persons and institutions for a broad variety of support in Mozambique: Alberto Folowara and the ARPAC in Chimoio for help and for permission to undertake the research, Rui Carlos, Arlindo Simbine, John Chekwa, Rui António, Joyce, Benedicto, Fole, Armando, Júlio da Conceição Carlos Rui, Vicente A, Francisco Mafumbate, Sr. Guta, Nunes Bechane, Sr. Lapully, Sr. Gasolina, Joaquim Zefanias, Eusébio Lambo Gondiwa, Jaime Xavier Caetano, Agostinho Jacalaze, Sr. Maibeque, Alberto Sucueia Gudo, Sr. Janota, Fernando Taio Conde, Eduardo Macheque, Lúcia Conforme, Armando Micheque, Sr. Guerra, Castigo Rui Singano, Rângel António Mairoce, Moisés Daniel, Eliza Paulino Jequesseni, Tomé Eniasse, Sr. Pangaia, Luís Alberto Chimoio, Joaquim Mantrujar Meque and his family, Marcelino Fernando Ofice and his family, Mateus Niza and his family, Ernesto Farucai Tsanza and his family, Lorena Núñez, Jeremy Daphne, Carolijn Gommans, Richard Both, Dirce Costa, Carlos Shenga, João C.G. Pereira, Stefaan Dondeyne, José Coimbra, Gerhard Liesegang, Guilherme Saimone, Doménico Liuzzi, Luís de Brito,
I thank Jeroen Windmeijer and Dianne van Oosterhout for supervising me during my time at STOA in Leiden, where parts of the theoretical approach contained in the present work were initiated. My thanks go to the personnel of the Library of the IACM in Macau for digging up Portuguese and Mozambican legal publications. I am grateful to Marc De Tollenaere, Salvador Cadete Forquilha, Peter Geschiere, Joseph Hanlon, Kit Kelen, William Minter, and Tak-Wing Ngo for a variety of communications, information, literature, and the exchange of ideas relevant to the present work. Thanks go to the Sociedade de Geografia de Lisboa and the Arquivo Histórico Ultramarino in Lisbon for arranging to consult material in 2016. Much of the idea development and text were produced at the African Studies Centre in Leiden and the Sociology Department of the University of Macau. To the colleagues of both institutions, my deepest gratitude for practical help, and intellectual and social shelter; there are many people to be thanked, but a special mention must go to Jan-Bart Gewald, Maaike Westra, and Marieke van Winden in Leiden, and Wang Hongyu and Xu Jianhua in Macau. Thanks to Tom Leighton for rigorous copy-editing.
Frank de Zwart, Klaas van Walraven, Barbara Vis, Mohamed Salih, Lars Buur, and Inge Brinkman made up the Reading Committee for the thesis, and I would like to thank them for their helpful comments. My gratitude also goes to the anonymous reviewer who read the preliminary manuscript of the present book and provided valuable comments.
Many thanks must also go to Jan van Dokkum, Gré van Dokkum-den Harder, Ronald van Dokkum, and Ruth Eisen, who have over the decades been greatly supportive of my activities leading to the present work. To Melody Chia-Wen Lu and Nehanda, who recently came into our life, I am thankful for the tremendous help, encouragement, and joy you have brought.
To all the interviewees in Barue and elsewhere, and to all the other informants: I am greatly indebted to you for sharing with me your knowledge and reflections, which have formed the main substance of my studies over the last few years.
The responsibility for the analyses and conclusions in this work is solely the author’s and no interviewee or other informant, or person who assisted or helped should be held accountable for any views expressed herein.