Download Lecture 5: Africa: Early History to 1000 AD

Lecture 5: Africa: Early History to 1000 AD
Problems of Interpretation and Sources
The Question of Civilization: Large amounts of Africa possess long-term
sustained cultures which do not fit traditional models of civilization based on
Asian and European history.
The Sources Problem: Many African societies were stateless and had no writing
and thus left only artifacts and oral traditions behind. Few outside accounts exist
prior to 950 AD.
Physical Description of Africa
Size: Africa makes up 1/5th of the Earth's landmass. It has unusually high levels
of variation in elevation and very few harbors. The major rivers are highly
navigable, but fall over cataracts down to the coast, thus preventing egress from
the sea. In general, it has been hard for outsiders to get in and vice versa. Size
and physical variations has hampered long distance communications.
The Equator: Africa bestrides the Equator; it is very hot as a result. North and
south of the equator, there is an east-west band of tropical rain forest. North and
south of this, the forest turns to savannah (open forest and grassy plains), which
then turns into sahel (semidesert) and steppe, then into full-blown desert (the
Sahara and the Kalahari deserts), followed by Mediterranean style climates at the
north and southern fringes of the continent. The Sahara desert (largest desert on
Earth) has blocked contact with the north; the Kalahari has further isolated the far
south.
Agriculture Issues: There is little vegetable humus in African soil; it runs out of
nutrients quickly. Rainfall is very irregular. A variety of insects spread disease
and eat crops.
Seven Regions of Africa:
North Africa: The coastal regions and highlands which stretch from the
Mediterranean into the Sahara desert
Nilotic Africa: The area along the shores of the Nile River: modern
Egypt and Sudan
The Sudan: The broad belt of sahel and savannah south of the Sahara
desert.
Western Africa: The region of woods, desert, sahel, and savannah of the
western Sudean from the coast to Lake Chad.
East Africa: From the Ethiopian highlands south to modern Kenya and
Tanzania
Central Africa: The regtion north of the Kalahari from the Chad basin
south to the Zambesi river
Southern Africa: From the Kalahari desert and the Zambesi to the Cape
of Good Hope
African Peoples:
Early Human Culture: Modern humanity arose in Africa, only leaving it about
50,000 years ago. Homo Habilis and modern humanity both arose in the Great
Rift Valley of eastern Africa.
Diffusion of Lands and Peoples: Some 3,000 or more languages are spoken in
Africa. Four major families: Afro-Asiatic (Red Sea Area, including Egyptian and
Semitic languages), Nilo-Saharan (from the upper Nile across the Sahara to
Morocco), Niger-Kongo (Western to central Africa) and Koisian (southern
Africa). Koisian has lost much of its territory to the Bantu language of the NigerKongo family
Racial Distinctions: Northern Africa, the Sahara and Egypt has been dominated
by Caucasoids, the rest of Africa by darker skinned folks (Negroids). Race is
itself a rather problematic concept (some would split the central and southern
africans into two seperate races...) of relatively recent provenance; during the
periods we'll be studying, concepts of 'Caucasian' and 'Negro' won't exist for
centuries to come.
The Sahara and the Sudan to 1 AD
Early Saharan Cultures: The Sahara was a barrier, but a permeable one; the
Nile valley, caravan routes, the Great Rift Valley, and the oceanic coasts all
enabled trade to bypass it. Until about 2500 BC, the Sahara wasn't even a desert;
it was arable land with forests, lakes, rivers, grasses and a much cooler climate.
Between 2500 and 1000 BC, it dried up and turned to sand and rock.
Neolithic Sudanese Cultures: From the first millenium BC, neolithic cultures
and early Iron Age cultures were spread across the Sudan, having retreated from
the now dessicated Sahara. Their pottery is clearly related to earlier Saharan
pottery. They acquired iron working skills from North Africa and Kush, bringing
their own knowledge of animal husbandry and agriculture. This movement
transformed sub-Saharan africa, ending the long reign of hunter-gatherer cultures.
With iron smelting, these new agricultural nations could develop more complex
societies and tools.
The Early Iron Age and the Nok Culture: The Nok Culture, in modern
Nigeria, was one of the many new Iron age societies, between 900 BC and 200
AD. They cleared woodlands off the Niger river plateau and practiced agriculture
and cattle-herding. They were the first to acquire iron working in western Africa
and they were noteworthy for their tradition of burial and ritual masks, part of
their broader practice of sculptural art. They helped lay the foundation for more
sophisticated later civilizations.
Nilotic Africa and the Ethiopian Highlands:
The Kingdom of Kush: No connection to the Kushan kingdom of India (chapter
4). This kingdom lay above the Nile cataracts that interrupt navigation from
Egypt into areas south of Egypt. It was occupied by Egyptianized Nilo-Saharan
speakers. It had been ruled by the Old Kingdom, but emerged as an independent
state by 2000 BC, when its capital, Kerma, was a major trading outpost. It
reached its height around 1700-1500 BC. Under the New Kingdom, Egypt
conquered it, but it then broke free after the fall of the New Kingdom.
The Napatan Empire: This free state united the lands of Nubia from the tenth to
the fourth century BC when it fell to the Ethiopians. The Kings who ruled at
Napata and Meroe viewed themselves as Egyptians, following the customs of that
land, right down to the Napatan Pharoah marrying his sister. In the 8th century
BC, they conquered Egypt, ruling as the 25th Dynasty. The Kushite Pharoahs
were driven out of Egypt proper by Assyria around the middle of the seventh
century BC.
Meroitic Empire: After being driven out of Egypt and the sack of Napata by
Egyptians in 591 BC, the capital moved to Meroe. It was the center of a
flourishing iron industry which spread trade and knowledge of Iron working
across Africa. In the fourth century AD, it was destroyed by Nuba from the west.
Culture and Economy: Its height was from the mid-third century BC to
the first century AD, when it was able to act as the trade middleman for
African goods—animal skins, ebony and ivory, gold, oils and perfumes,
and slaves. Kushites traded with the Hellenistic-Roman world, southern
Arabia and India. Meroitic culture was noted for gendered pottery: one
kind was made by men on pottery wheels for market use; the other was
hand-thrown by women for private use.
Rule and Administration: The government was ruled by a divine king,
but he governed by customary law. Royal succession did not pass father
to son but within the Royal family, sometimes by matrilineal lines. The
priests presented several heirs and by some unknown means 'the gods
decided between them'. Women sometimes ruled and the Queen-Mother
heavily influenced the choice of heir. The provinces were ruled by other
royals.
Society and Religion: Limited sources only let us speculate, though there
were both slaves and free men, working in artisanship and agriculture.
Kushite religious practices followed Egyptian practice, though from the
third century BC, non-Egyptian gods also rose in worship.
The Aksumite Empire (1st to 9th Century AD): This was a Christianized state
which finished off the Kushite Empire. They were based in the Abyssinian
highlands, a mixture of Yemenite Semitic speakers (immigrated to the highlands
around 500 BC) with African Kushite speakers. Thus, their written language
came from Arabia. By the first century AD, their port of Adulis dominated the
ivory trade of NE Africa. Aksum was able to dominate trade between Africa and
lands to the north and east of the Horn of Africa. They also took control of some
lands in Southern Arabia by the second century AD and spread out into
neighboring lands in Africa. By the fourth century AD, they held a lot of the most
fertile lands of the ancient world and flourished.
King of Kings: Their ruler saw himself as a king of kings who ruled over tributepaying vassal monarchs. They were the first tropical African state to mint coins
of gold, silver, and copper.
Religion: Until the fourth century AD, they were polytheistic pagans much like
the Arabians, worshipping nature phenomena gods and goddesses. In the fourth
century, King Ezana converted to Christianity and began converting his kingdom.
This was the work of Frumentis, a Syrian bishop who was the king's secretary and
advisor. They became Monophysites (Christ had only one nature, which was
divine, not a mortal and a divine nature) and by the fifth century AD, replaced
Greek in the liturgy with Ge'ez, the local semitic language.
Isolation: The rise of the Moslems cut off Aksumite trade routes and the
Kingdom withdrew in on itself. Over time, everyone around them was largely
converted to Islam, while they held out in the highlands.
The Western and Central Sudan
Agriculture, Trade, and the rise of Cities: By the first century AD, most of the
inhabitants of the western Sudan had become settled farmers using iron tools and
their lifestyle was speading into the southern forests. At this time, villages
remained the largest form of organization but more were appearing in a
population boom. Trade connected them to the Mediterranean, the Nilotic Sudan
and to Egypt. By the late first millenium BC, substntial urban settlements, such
as Gao, Kumbi, and Jenne had emerged in the western sahel as foci of trade.
Jenne, settled by 250 BC, had a population of over 10,000. (Remember, ancient
cities are usually not huge, and seem tiny compared to 2007 USA cities)
The Camel: The introduction of the camel around the first century AD made
long distance trade easier and more common. Trading communites on the verge
of sahel and Sahara now rose in importance, controlling caravan routes across the
desert and trade routes south.
Formation of Sudanic Kingdoms in the First Millenium AD: Large states now
began to rise in this area to control trade routes. The kingdoms of Takrur, Ghana,
Gao and Kanem were the first of many states to flourish in the Sahel due to trade
control. Ghana became the most famous because of its control of the gold trade.
Settled farming populations provided food and soldiers for these states.
Central, Southern, and East Africa
Source Issues: There are very few sources for studying this area before 1000
AD.
Bantu Migration and Diffusion: The Bantu language family began in eastern
Nigeria and modern Cameroon; it came to encompass some 400 languages. From
the late first millenium BC to about 1000 AD, Bantu-speakers pushed south into
central and southern Africa and east into the highlands of the horn of Africa. The
Bantu tended to fuse with local cultures, imposing their languages while taking on
the customs of those they fused with. Thus, in eastern africa, they joined with
Arab miners and traders to form the Swahili culture.
East Africa: By the second century BC, Africans in this area had been long
trading with India and Arabia and Egypt. Long-distance trade came into its own
under Arab control in the ninth century AD. Many Arabs had long settled in
eastern Africa, however. Very long distance trade went as far as Malaysia and
Indonesia, bringing language, settlers, and especially staple crops (bannanas,
coconut palms and other SE Asian foods) to Africa. Ivory and slaves were
exported; foods, Persian gulf pottery, cotton cloth, and Chinese porcelain was
imported.
Inland East Africa: We know very little for sure about this region. Around
2000 BC, Kushite speakers pushed south into the area. By 1000 BC, NiloticSaharan speakers moved down into the area, driving out the Kushites. Later, the
Bantu pushed east into the area, which became a cultural melting pot. The
Maasai, part of the Nilotic-Saharan migration, survive today as cattle herders and
warriors.