ONE LAND · 7 ATLASES
History of Somalia in maps
Somalia as it appears in 7 interactive history atlases, from 1890 to 2015: Somalia, Italian Somaliland / Somalia, Italian Somaliland. Each era below lists who ruled the land and when control changed, linked to the dated map that shows it.
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What was Somalia before it was Somalia? Below, every era of this land in the Maps of History atlases — who ruled it, what it was called, and when control changed — each line linked to the dated map that shows it. Modern borders stand in as an honest approximation; every atlas says so on the map itself.
Somalia · Industrial Revolution
| Colony or dependency — the opening position | |
| Colony or dependency |
INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Italian Somaliland / Somalia · Haiti and Kenya independence
Italian Somaliland in the south and British Somaliland in the north united as the Somali Republic on 1 July 1960. Its five-pointed star stood for every territory where Somalis lived, including Kenya’s north-east. When Britain left those districts inside Kenya in 1963, Somalia backed the insurgents of the Shifta War until the Arusha Memorandum of 1967.
| Other states and societies — the opening position | |
| Under colonial rule | |
| Other states and societies |
HAITI AND KENYA INDEPENDENCE: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Somalia · WWI
| Entente-aligned & imperial territories — the opening position |
Italian Somaliland (mod. Somalia) · Road to WW2
| The aggressors (Japan, Germany, Italy) — the opening position |
ROAD TO WW2: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Somalia · Cold War
| NATO & core Western allies — the opening position | |
| Non-aligned & neutral | |
| Soviet-aligned states | |
| US-aligned states | |
| Non-aligned & neutral |
COLD WAR: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Somalia · Decolonization of Africa
Italian Somaliland and British Somaliland united at independence in 1960 to form Somalia — a rare case of a single ethnic nation, and thus of irredentist ambition to gather Somalis divided by colonial borders across Ethiopia, Kenya and Djibouti. That ambition drove the 1977 Ogaden war; the frozen-border principle held, and Somalia lost. Later state collapse would make it the tragic counter-case to the OAU’s border bargain.
| Portuguese, Belgian, Spanish & Italian-ruled — the opening position | |
| Independent Africa |
DECOLONIZATION OF AFRICA: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Somalia · Feminism and the Tunisian Revolution
| Authoritarian, one-party or colonial rule — the opening position | |
| Right won in law | |
| No reform yet / outside this story |
FEMINISM AND THE TUNISIAN REVOLUTION: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
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