The Kilwa Sultanate was a sultanate, centered at Kilwa, whose authority, at its height, stretched over the entire length of the Swahili Coast. According to the legend, it was founded in the 10th century by Ali ibn al-Hassan Shirazi, a Persian prince of Shiraz.
Principal cities of East Africa, c. 1500. The Kilwa Sultanate held overlordship from Cape Correntes in the south to Malindi in the north.
Sultan is a position with several historical meanings. Originally, it was an Arabic abstract noun meaning "strength", "authority", "rulership", derived from the verbal noun سلطة sulṭah, meaning "authority" or "power". Later, it came to be used as the title of certain rulers who claimed almost full sovereignty without claiming the overall caliphate, or to refer to a powerful governor of a province within the caliphate. The adjectival form of the word is "sultanic", and the state and territories ruled by a sultan, as well as his office, are referred to as a sultanate.
Suleiman the Magnificent, the longest-reigning sultan of the Ottoman Empire
Ottoman Sultan Mehmed IV attended by a eunuch and two pages.
The valide sultan (sultana mother) of the Ottoman Empire
Tuman bay II, last of the Mamluk Sultans.