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Ruganzu II Ndoli
Photograph via Wikimedia Commons
Statecraft & Independence Peerless

Ruganzu II Ndoli

c. 1510 – 1543

Came back from eleven years in exile and rebuilt the Rwandan kingdom

Peerless is level 1 of 4 in the Rwanda Hall of Fame: changed the field itself. Tell the country's story without them and the story breaks. See how the levels work.

Why they are here

He spent eleven years exiled in Karagwe while foreigners held his country, returned in 1510, and reconstituted the kingdom that every later Rwandan state was built on.

Ruganzu II Ndoli was Mwami of the Kingdom of Rwanda from 1510 until his death in 1543.

He had spent eleven years in exile in the kingdom of Karagwe, hidden as a fugitive before he got there by the poetess Nyirarumaga, who later became his adoptive mother and queen mother. He returned in 1510 to drive out the foreign powers occupying the country and rebuild the kingdom, and the Nyiginya state that followed traces to his reign.
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