The first European to come across the
Zambezi river was Vasco da Gama, in January 1498, who anchored at what he
called Rio dos Bons Sinais (River of Good Omens), now the Quelimane, a small
river on the northern end of the delta, which at that time was connected by
navigable channels to the Zambezi river proper (the connection silted up by the
1830s). In a few of the oldest maps, the entire river is denoted as such. But
already by the early 1500s, a new name emerged, the Cuama river (sometimes
'Quama' or 'Zuama'). Cuama was the local name given by the dwellers of the Swahili
Coast for an outpost
