| There are, I'd argue, some pretty significant issues with the map used in your source, or at least the interpretation of it here. The entities described here were far from the only ones on the continent in 1885; France had already taken over Algiers and begun a colony/settlement, Egypt was independent of Ottoman rule and under the control of the British Empire, and Afrikaaners had created several political entities in modern South Africa. This is lacking the Kongo Kingdom and the smaller political entities throughout Kongo that were coming under Belgian control in 1885. Somalia is not represented despite Ali Hassan's long war against the British (who, by the way, established British Somaliland at least nominally in 1884). Gold Coast Colony had been established decades before as well. While I appreciate the difficulty of definition involved here, the above are all pretty well-established political entities that should be here, and there are likely several more. Africa was an even more dynamic continent pre-European invasion than is reflected here, though you did a very good job of combing through the autochthonous African states above. |