RWANDA

	CLIMATE
	Rwanda’s high altitude keeps it cool. Wet seasons last from October to December, as well as from March through May.

A Land Divided

Historians writing about Rwanda (ruh-WAHN-duh) and its southern neighbor, Burundi, tend to agree on just one fact—that the Twa (TWAH) people have lived there longer than anyone else. The Twa are part of a family of central African peoples of short height and slight build. For thousands of years they hunted wild animals and gathered food such as fruits and honey in the forests.

Probably over one thousand years ago, a people called the Hutu (HOO-too) moved onto the Twa land. They were part of a greater movement of iron-using peoples, speakers of Bantu languages, who migrated out of western central Africa over many centuries (see CAMEROON). The Hutu were farmers, who began to clear the forests for growing crops.

By about seven hundred years ago, another Bantu people had entered the region—the Tutsi (TOOT-see), herders of long-horned cattle. The origins of the Tutsi are lost in history, but the fact remains that the Tutsi began to dominate the Hutu farmers, even though they were greatly outnumbered by them. The difference between the groups was based less on major ethnic differences than on economics and social class. The Tutsi derived their economic and social power from their wealth in cattle. The Hutu farmers were forced to work for the Tutsi herders, who controlled all use of land. Arrangements regarding farming, grazing, military service, and tribute, or taxation, were governed by binding social contracts between individual Hutu and a series of Tutsi overlords, who were responsible to the king. The territory was already crowded, and the division of the land was neither practical nor just.

The Tutsi founded a kingdom near Kigali (kee-GAH-lee) in the 1400s C.E. The Tutsi kingdom extended its control throughout central Rwanda during the 1600s. Two hundred years later Rwanda reached the height of its power as a united state. Its warriors were recruited only from the Tutsi, with the Hutu serving as porters or servants. Young Tutsi males were sent to the royal court to be trained in weapons and warfare as well as in proper manners, in dancing, and poetry. The mwami (MWAH-mee), or king, had absolute power over his subjects; indeed, he was believed to be descended from the gods.