Includes bibliographical references (p. 301-311) and index.

The oral sources -- 1. Central Rwanda on the eve of the emergence of the kingdom -- The country and its inhabitants -- Fields and herds: su bsistence activities -- Kinship and society -- Polities -- 2. The Rwand a of Ndori -- The foundation of the kingdom -- Subsequent military camp aigns: conquest or raids? -- Government: the ritual institutions -- Ins truments of government: the corporations -- The realm -- 3. Toward the centralization of power -- The seizure of the herds and the land -- The armies -- At the hub: court, king, and elites -- The recasting of roya l ideology during Rejugira's reign -- The weight of the state -- 4. Gov ernment in the eighteenth century -- Government from Gisanura to Rwaka -- Government under Rujugira and Ndabarasa -- Foreign relations under G isanura and Mazimpaka -- Foreign relations under Rujugira and Ndabarasa -- 5. Social transformations in the nineteenth century -- The transfor mations of society -- Hutu and Tutsi -- 6. The triumph of the great fam ilies and its consequences -- Civil war and the supremacy of the elites -- Struggles for power at Gahindiro's and Rwogera's courts -- Expansio n of the kingdom eastward and international trade -- A spontaneous expa nsion toward Lake Kivu and the land of the volcanoes? -- 7. Nightmares: the age of Rwabugiri (1867-1897) -- Political crisis and wars from 186 7-1889 -- Isolation breached and the hatching of a coup d'Etat -- The n ightmare of violence used as a political tool -- A balance sheet -- His tory and the present.

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