History

For those interested in detail, the Wikipedia version of the history of the area now defined as Malawi is very good.
The region has been subject to many migrations and invasions by various African tribes before becoming of interest to the colonial powers of Portugal and Great Britain.
Here is a brief timeline:
Prehistory: There is evidence of San type hominids around Lake Malawi some 50,000 years ago.
300-400 Bantu speaking peoples migrate in from Central Africa
1400 Further waves of Bantu speakers arrive to form the Maravi empire. The Maravi brought the production of iron together with slash and burn agriculture.
1616 Portuguese traders travel through what is now Malawi looking for gold, slaves and ivory.
1800s Ngoni fleeing from Shaka’s Zulu aggression in Southern Africa, brought with them Zulu fighting tactics tactics enabling them to dominate and occupy much of the North of Malawi.
1800 The Yao invaded from the East, now North Mozambique. They were encouraged and armed by Arabs and the Portuguese to take slaves and ivory. They occupied much of the East and the Lake shore facilitating the Easterly export of slaves and ivory. The slaves carried the ivory.
1859 David Livingstone’s first trip to Malawi when he ‘discovered’ a large lake. He named it Nyasa (in Chiyao the language of the Yao, Nyasa is the generic term for large body of water)
1875 Missionaries arrive to convert the people to Christianity and suppress slavery.
1878 Traders mostly from Glasgow arrive and set up The Africa Lakes Company.
1891 British establish the ‘British Central Africa Protectorate’ in part to limit Cecil Rhodes’ ambition.
1888-1899 H H Johnson, Commissioner saw off an attempt by Portugal to occupy the Lower Shire Valley and quelled various insurrections and local wars between tribes.
1885 The conclusion of the ‘scramble for Africa’ by the Berlin Conference of 1885 where Africa was carved up between competing colonial powers resulting in the borders of Nyasaland (now Malawi) being defined and placed under Great Britain’s control.
1915 Revolt by Baptist pastor John Chilembwe rapidly crushed by government forces.
1964 Independence
1964-1993 Effectively a dictatorship under the rule of Dr Hastings Banda, ‘His Excellency the Life President Ngwazi Dr H Kamuzu Banda’.
1993 Multiparty Rule
2020 The election fraudulently won by Peter Mutharika was overturned by the Malawi Constitutional Court and the current incumbent Lazarus Chakwera was elected at the re-run. One of the few occasions worldwide where ‘due process’ has overturned a rigged election result. Elections are to be held in 2025.