A town wall, a mosque, tombs, and residences are among the several stone constructions at the Mtambwe Mkuu site in northwest Pemba.

A cache of over 2,000 gold and silver coins from the 10 and eleventh centuries were found during an excavation at the location, demonstrating Pemba's Swahili involvement in the regional trade networks at the time.

With the exception of one, all of the gold coins were either originals from the Fatimid Caliphate or exact replicas of those pieces.

To show Pemba's economic ties to the region, the coins were struck in cities all around the Mediterranean in the contemporary nations of Egypt, Tunisia, Syria, and Lebanon.

The two economies are connected by these parallels and the discovery of coins from the Mtambwe series that are similar in Kilwa.