4 ideas
In 1622 Njinga, then envoy for her brother Ngola Mbandi, met Portuguese governor João Correia de Sousa in Luanda. Offered only a floor mat while he sat in a chair, she had an attendant kneel and sat on her back, putting herself at eye level. She then negotiated as an equal, refused tributary status for Ndongo, and accepted baptism as Dona Ana de Sousa to seal the alliance.
Njinga treated religion as an instrument of alliance rather than a fixed identity. She accepted Catholic baptism when she needed Portuguese recognition, then adopted Imbangala war rites and ancestral Mbundu ritual when she needed to command warriors and claim legitimacy at home. In the 1650s she returned to Catholicism to win a peace treaty, secure her captive sister's release, and protect the succession.
Njinga faced rivals who said a woman, and the daughter of a slave wife, could not rule Ndongo. She answered by taking the male title of king, leading troops in male dress, and keeping male consorts who dressed as women. Because she redefined the gender categories themselves rather than accepting them, the objection that a woman could not hold the office lost its force.
Njinga built her Matamba state by absorbing runaway slaves, refugees, and Imbangala war bands. She also funded her wars and diplomacy by capturing and selling people to the same Atlantic trade she fought the Portuguese to control. Seen this way, her struggle was over who held sovereignty and trade profits, not over whether people could be sold. That separates resistance to foreign domination from any moral opposition to slavery.