Kabaka Mutesa and Venereal Disease: An Essay on Medical History and Sources in Precolonial Buganda

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Periodical article

Title:	Kabaka Mutesa and Venereal Disease: An Essay on Medical History and Sources in Precolonial Buganda
Author:	Tuck, Michael W.
Year:	2003
Periodical:	History in Africa
Volume:	30
Pages:	309-325
Language:	English
Geographic term:	Uganda
Subjects:	Buganda polity traditional rulers medical history sexually transmitted diseases history traditional polities Health and Nutrition Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups) History and Exploration Bibliography/Research
About person:	Mutesa I, king of Buganda (ca. 1838-1884)
External link:	https://www.jstor.org/stable/3172095
Abstract:	In an article about the Ganda monarch Mutesa (c. 1857-1884), Richard Read (1999) argues that Mutesa likely suffered from syphilis. John Rowe (2002) concludes that the disease from which Mutesa suffered was gonorrhea. Based in part on Ganda sources, the present author explains why it was unlikely that venereal syphilis existed in the Buganda (present-day Uganda) region in Mutesa's time. He argues that Mutesa suffered from gonorrhea or a similar complaint, and suggests ways that this would have affected him. The complications of gonorrhea are not as dramatic as the mental involvement of late syphilis, but would still have had an impact on his rule. Finally, the author suggests what Mutesa's gonorrhea can tell us about health conditions at the time, and the impact on the wider population. Notes, ref. [ASC Leiden abstract]