Volume IV covers the history of Africa from the twelfth to the sixteenth century. This period constitutes a crucial phase in the continent’s history in which Africa developed its own culture and written records became more common. There were several major characteristic themes: the triumph of Islam; the extension of trading relations, cultural exchanges and human contacts; the development of kingdoms and empires. The book first describes the Almohads. There follow chapters on the various civilizations of West Africa – Mali, Songhay, the Niger Bend, the Volta Basin, Chad, the Hausa and the coastal peoples from the Casamance to modern Cameroon. It then covers (Chapters 15 onwards) North-east and East Africa, starting with Egypt and going on to Nubia, Ethiopia and the States of the Horn of Africa, including material on the development of the Swahili civilization. Central Africa is represented by chapters on the area between the coast and the great lakes, the inter-lacustrine region and the basins of the Zambezi and Limpopo rivers. There are chapters on Equatorial Africa and Angola, southern Africa and Madagascar and neighboring islands.