Excavations of graves in the Upemba Depression show that as early as the eighth century A . D ., a social stratification had developed in the region: some of the tombs show more wealth than others and contain artifacts that are nowadays connected with power (ceremonial axes, hammers/anvils). Power was probably transmitted hereditarily, as some children were buried with a great number of valuable objects. Archaeological research has revealed an outstanding cultural continuity from that era until now.
According to the genesis tradition of the kingdom, an aristocratic hunter hero coming from the East (Mbidi Kiluwe) met an aboriginal ruler (Nkongolo); unaware of the demanding customs of sacred kingship, notably of the meal rituals, he married the two sisters of this ruler and went back alone to his country. One of the sisters gave birth to a son (Kalala Ilunga) who eventually became a mighty warrior whom the ruler planned to kill. The young man had to flee to his father's country. Later, he came back, beheaded his maternal uncle, and became the first king of the Luba. These traditions gave rise to a controversy between, on the one hand, structuralists, who argue that the epic is representative of mythic ground shared by many Bantu-speaking peoples, and on the other hand, Africanist historians, who consider either that the epic contains traces of ancient historical facts or that it is a political charter legitimizing the prerogatives of the dynasty. However that may be, the Luba Kingdom was founded in the eighteenth century or before, in the vicinity of the present town of Kabongo. It exerted a strong political influence on its neighbors and was the main reference point for many rulers' genealogies and many religious institutions of the Eastern Savanna peoples. Until 1870, the Luba king—the mulopwe (pl. balopwe )—had at his disposal a powerful army able to wage war hundreds of kilometers from the capital. But the kingdom did not rest on a firm centralized administrative apparatus: royal authority was mostly effective in the capital's region; beyond that center lay "chiefdoms," which had more autonomy the farther they were from the capital. Each was governed by a local rulers—also called a mulopwe—whose ritual life was similar to the king's. These chiefs had to bring tribute to the king as acknowledgment of his hierarchical seniority. The kingdom began to collapse by 1870 on account of an unending succession struggle and of repeated attacks by Angolan slave traders and Tanzanian conquerors who took advantage of their firearms. Belgian colonizers settled around 1900 and hastened the fall of the kingdom by dividing its center into two large territories, the government of which was assigned to two rival heirs from the ancient dynasty: Kabongo and Kasongo Nyembo. Moreover, about twenty Luba chiefdoms were acknowledged as fully independent from those two rulers.
After the independance of the Congo, the Luba led a harsh war against their southern neighbors who supported the Katanga secession (1960-1963).
The expansion of the kingdom (up to an area of about 200,000 square kilometers) and of long-distance trade stimulated contacts between the Luba and their neighbors. Nowadays political ties have come to an end, but Luba influence is still noticeable, notably in the regalia and religious practices.