nature Magazine – March 30, 2023 issue: Medieval people on the Swahili coast of East Africa were among the first sub-Saharan people to practise Islam. David Reich, Chapurukha Kusimba and colleagues sequenced DNA from 80 individuals buried in six medieval and early modern coastal Swahili stone towns, dating between 1250 and 1800. Their analysis shows that African women and Asian men began mixing along the East African coast before the year 1000, and that the earliest Asian migrants were of largely Persian origin. 

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