The first settlers in the land of Cameroon were hunter-gatherer people such as the Baka and the Sao.
The first Europeans to arrive were the Portuguese in 1472. The sailors found a lot of shrimp in the rivers and started calling the land the Rio dos Camar?es or River of Shrimp. From this phrase Camaroon got its name. For some time the Portuguese only explored the coast.
In the late 1700's the Fulani people invaded and conquered the land. They brought the Islamic religion with them.
\In 1884 the German colony of Kamerun was established. It remained German until after World War I when it was split up between Britain and France. In 1960 the French portion of Cameroon gained its independence. A few years later a portion of British Cameroon joined Nigeria and the rest joined with the Federal Republic of Cameroon.
