The intellectual history of pre-colonial Africa is dominated by studies of the scholarly traditions of Ethiopia, West Africa, and Sudan, where a large corpus of extant manuscripts have been collected from the old scholarly centers of Timbuktu, Djenne, Gondar, and Harar.
the learning encompassed every subject that was available at the time, going by the archives from the East African coast, there are manuscripts on grammar, poetry, history, genealogy, astronomy, commerce, law, theology, and, philosophy as well.
i mentioned the 18th century work, Al-Inkishafi, in the section on swahili scholars, Al-Inkishafi is is a work of philosophy.
I'm accustomed to thinking of Swahili as referring to the language, how did it apply to a community?
There are still Swahili people living in East Africa, mostly along the coast and in eastern Congo. So it can refer to both a language and a community.
the learning encompassed every subject that was available at the time, going by the archives from the East African coast, there are manuscripts on grammar, poetry, history, genealogy, astronomy, commerce, law, theology, and, philosophy as well.
i mentioned the 18th century work, Al-Inkishafi, in the section on swahili scholars, Al-Inkishafi is is a work of philosophy.