zimbahttp://www.oed.com/dictionary/zimba_n%3Ftab%3Dmeaning_and_useZimba, n.
Revised 2022

Zimbanoun

historical.
  1. 1625–
    A member of an East African people of the Zambezi valley who came into conflict with the Portuguese in the late 16th cent.
    1. 1625
      Before Tete, on the otherside of the Riuer within Land to the East and North-east, are two kinds of Man-eating Cafres, the Mumbos and Zimbas or Muzimbas [Pg. Zimbas, ou Muzimbas], who eate those they take in warre, and their slaues also when they are past labour, and sell it as Beefe or Mutton.
      translation of J. dos Santos in S. Purchas, Pilgrimes vol. II. ix. xii. §iv. 1551
    2. 1733
      Most of the Cafres on the Coast of Barbary are Anthropophagites also, and particularly those call'd Zimbas.
      in translation of Ancient Accounts India & China Remarks 6
    3. 1817
      They [sc. the Portuguese] had a series of terrible wars to sustain, from an inroad of the Mumbos or Zimbas, a tribe described as resembling the Giagas.
      J. Leyden & H. Murray, Hist. Account Discov. & Trav. Africa vol. II. ii. vi. 364
    4. 1913
      The Zimba, a powerful tribe of barbarians who lived N.E. of Tete on the Zambezi, are now first heard of in these parts. In 1588 they invaded Kilwa, and the next year passed up the coast and invaded Mombasa.
      C. A. Stigand, Land of Zinj i. 17
    5. 2012
      The military campaigns in southeast Africa launched in the late sixteenth century by the people known as the Zimba.
      A. J. Andrea & J. H. Overfield, Human Rec. vol. II. (ed. 7) i. iii. 88

Zimba, n. was revised in June 2022.

Zimba, n. was last modified in September 2024.