The Swahili, meaning coastal dwellers, are a Bantu ethnic group. Most of the culture's 1.3 million people live in the coastal areas of Kenya and Tanzania but once inhabited the strip of shoreline from Mogadishu, Somalia south to Sofala, Mozambique. The Swahili people settled on the East African coast around the first century AD. The earliest Swahili were farmers, fishermen and hunters. By 800 AD, they were eminent shipbuilders and navigators. The Swahili grew rich from the trade of gold, ivory and slaves. Their stone towns, each ruled by a sultan, were for centuries independent city-states. The Swahili culture, greatly influenced by interaction with other peoples, is today a fusion of African, Arab and Asian traditions. The Swahili people follow a strict form of Islam but also believe in spirits called djinns. Swahili art and architecture are a mix of old traditions and imported customs. Even the Swahili language is a combination of things. Kiswahili, based on Bantu grammar, has lots of loanwords from other languages, such as Arabic, English, German and Portuguese.