text: In East Africa the sultanate of Kilwa, extending along the major portion of Africa's East Coast, was a center of political and commercial power. From the tenth century onward it carried on a very profitable trade with Arabia and India, a trade which probably dated from a considerably earlier period than the actual settlement by the Arabs. Even far-off China was within the area covered by these enterprising East Coast merchants. Thus, long before the European penetration into Africa, large sections of the continent were in actual contact with the then dominating Eastern world.  
  But Arabs influenced the life of Africans beyond the boundaries of their conquests. Mohammedan ascetics, the almovarides or marabuts, spread their creed among millions of non-Moslems, and Arab traders traveling far into the interior and often settling among the Africans, although outwardly adjusting themselves easily to the life of the natives, deeply affected Negro institutions. New techniques in weaving and leather working, new types of furniture such as elevated beds, new styles of architecture and architectural details, new garments, ornaments, food, all these found their way into many of those sections of the continent which fell into the commercial orbit of the Arabs.