A revised version of this well-known university textbook provides an opportunity to review some of the tendencies in African historiography since the publication of the original version in 1978 which marked ‘the coming of age of African history’ after 25 years of research. This new version is intended to reflect ‘a new level of maturity’ in African historiography with the publication of all the 16 volumes of the Cambridge History of Africa and the Unesco General History of Africa, of which only a few had appeared by 1978. The text has been ‘reworked, updated and expanded’; the book has been redesigned and reset, and the maps have been redrawn and new ones added.