Luba people

The Luba people or Baluba are a Bantu ethno-linguistic group indigenous to the south-central region of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The majority of them live in this country, residing mainly in Katanga, Kasaï, Kasaï-Oriental, Kasaï-Central, Lomami and Maniema. The Baluba consist of many sub-groups or clans.

The Baluba developed a society and culture by about the 400s CE, later developing a well-organised community in the Upemba Depression known as the Baluba in Katanga confederation. Luba society consisted of miners, smiths, woodworkers, potters, crafters, and people of various other professions. They found relative success over time, but this eventually caused their gradual decline with the Portuguese and Omani empires led or influenced invasions.

Archaeological evidence suggests that the Baluba had settlements around the lakes and marshes of the Upemba Depression by the 5th century CE. The evidence suggesting an advanced Iron Age society came from multiple sites. The Kamilambian, Kisalian and Kabambian series of evidence has been dated to be from 5th to 14th-century, suggesting a settled stable Luba culture over many centuries. Of these, the Kisalian period (8th to 11th century) pottery and utensils found. The finds dated to pre-8th century by modern dating methods are iron objects or pottery, thereafter copper objects appear.

The archaeological studies suggest that the Luba people lived in villages, in homes made of reeds and wattle, around the shores of numerous streams and lakes found in the Upemba Depression of Central Africa. This Depression has been historically flooded from the water runoff from southern Shaba highlands for parts of the year, its water bodies filled with papyrus islands and floating vegetation, the region drying out after rains ended. As a community, the Luba people constructed dams and dikes as high as 6 to 8 feet using mud, papyrus and other vegetation, to improve the marshy soil conditions for agriculture and stock fish during the long dry season.

The metal working techniques in use by the early Luba people included drawing out thin wires, twisting them, laminating them, and plaiting them into items such as necklaces, bracelets and hooks for fishing, needles for sewing and such.

These products attracted interest and demand from far off ethnic groups, creating trade opportunities and traders amongst the Luba people. This trade and all economic activity in the villages of Luba people had a tribute system, where a portion of the hunt, fish or produce was given to the lineage head or the people guarding the borders. These were natural borders, such as that created by waters of Lake Upemba, where passage across required channels and bridges. The movement into and out of the Luba people lands was thus controlled and taxed.

Around 1500, possibly earlier, the Luba people began to coalesce into a single, unified state which historians now call the Kingdom of Luba or Luba Empire. The kingdom grew and became more sophisticated over time, reaching its peak between 18th to 19th-century. "...[I]ntegration into the forward edges of the expanding frontiers of international trade tore the Empire apart" in tandem with the advances of the 19th-century slave and ivory trade from Belgium and the Arab-Swahili chiefs such as Tippu Tip and Msiri, states Thomas Reefe.

A prominent sociopolitical system of the Luba Empire was the adoption of two layers of power, one of Balopwe (hereditary kingship) and another a council of royals or elders. These provided governmental stability through mutual balancing, when there were disputes of succession from death or other causes. This idea was adopted by the neighboring Lunda people and other ethnic groups.