Monneba

Who is Monneba?

Monneba, also spelled Moneba and other ways, was a local Duala leader on the Cameroon coast in the 1630s. Dutch sources from the 1660s say that Monneba ran a trading post on the Cameroons River at the present location of Douala. His people dealt primarily in ivory, with some slaves. Modern scholars equate Monneba with a Duala ruler named Mulobe a Ewale or Mulabe a Ewale. Assuming this is true, he is the earliest Duala leader of whom we have corroboration in written sources. It is quite possible that Monneba/Mulobe was the ruler who set into motion the transformation of the Duala into a trading people and the most influential ethnic group in early Cameroonian history.