On this day — July 8 in African history

Painting by Gregório Lopes, c. 1524, Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga — Public Domain, Wikimedia Commons

Vasco da Gama's fleet departed Lisbon on the voyage that would round the Cape of Good Hope and open the first direct sea route from Europe to Asia.

The United States and South Africa signed a nuclear cooperation agreement that supplied South Africa with its first research reactor.

Sudan Airways Flight 139 crashed on takeoff in Port Sudan, killing all but one of the 117 people aboard.

An Egyptian army under Ibrahim Pasha defeated an Ottoman force at the Battle of Homs during the First Egyptian-Ottoman War.

The Hamburg massacre in South Carolina killed six African Americans and one white assailant in politically motivated violence ahead of the 1876 US presidential election.

Fritz Cohen, National Photo Collection of Israel — Public Domain, Wikimedia Commons

King Mwambutsa IV of Burundi was deposed by his son, Prince Charles Ndizi, who took the throne as Ntare V.