Kigeli IV of Rwanda

Abstract is: Kigeli IV Rwabugiri (1840? - November 1895) was the king (mwami) of the Kingdom of Rwanda in the mid-nineteenth century. He was among the last Nyiginya kings in a ruling dynasty that had traced their lineage back four centuries to Gihanga, the first 'historical' king of Rwanda whose exploits are celebrated in oral chronicles. He was a Tutsi with the birth name Sezisoni. He was the first king in Rwanda's history to come into contact with Europeans. He established an army equipped with guns he obtained from Germans and prohibited most foreigners, especially Arabs, from entering his kingdom. Rwabugiri held authority from 1853 to 1895. He died in November 1895, during an expedition in modern-day Congo, shortly after the arrival of the German explorer Count Gustav Adolf von Götzen. His adopted son, Mibambwe IV Rutarindwa, was proclaimed the next king. By the end of Rwabugiri's rule, Rwanda was divided into a standardized structure of provinces, districts, hills, and neighborhoods, administered by a hierarchy of chiefs. The chiefs were predominantly Tutsi at the higher levels and with a greater degree of mutual participation by Hutus. He defended the borders of the Rwandan kingdom against invading neighboring kingdoms, slave traders, and Europeans. Rwabugiri was a warrior king and is regarded as one of Rwanda's most powerful kings. Some Rwandans see him as the last true King of Rwanda due to the tragic assassination of his successor Rutarindwa and coup by his stepmother Kanjogera who installed her son Musinga. By the beginning of the 20th century, Rwanda was a unified state with a centralized military structure. Rwabugiri is sometimes attributed for the tactics used by the RPF during the Rwandan genocide to retain Tutsi superiority .