Early African Civilizations

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Early African Civilizations

Overview

• African civilization began in Egypt. While much of humanity was living in Neolithic huts, the pharaohs of the great Egyptian Empire were creating the pyramids.
• The effects of Egypt’s advanced culture traveled up the banks of the Nile to the region of Nubia in present-day Sudan.
• The source of much of Egypt’s gold, Nubia was an agricultural area of fertile floodplains dotted with small farming communities.

Around 1070 BCE, the power of Egypt declined, and the area became the Kingdom of Kush. Kush grew powerful enough to seize the throne of Egypt. Kushite pharaohs established the century-long 25th Dynasty of Egypt. The Kushite pharaohs’ cemetery, containing more than 200 pyramid tombs, still stands in the deserts of Sudan. Assyrians conquered Egypt in 663 BCE, ending the Kushite dynasty.

Following the Egyptian model, grains like wheat and barley were Nubia’s predominant crops. Two varieties of rice also were grown there. The agricultural bounty of Nubia rivaled the value of its gold. Nubia was where the next center of African civilization appeared around 2500 BCE. Even under the rule of kings, few truly centralized states existed in early Africa. For the most part, small groups of people lived in scattered communities which were united in a loose confederation. The independent groups only came together for brief periods to resolve region-wide issues. This disunity allowed the Egyptian culture to infiltrate the area and take advantage of its resources.

Early African Civilizations

A network of trade roads linked Ghana to the rest of the world. Ghana’s wealth came from rich veins of gold beneath the surface of its earth and the bountiful crops growing above it.The rich farmland produced several varieties of rice and millet, along with cowpeas, pigeon peas, melons, cassava, taro root, okra, coconuts, and sorghum. The region from the Ivory Coast to Cameroon was known as the Yam Belt. Several varieties of yams were cultivated in perfect growing conditions. These foods, plus meat from livestock, supported a large population.

Civilization was spreading slowly westward. A nomadic herding society developed in central sub-Saharan Africa. Its main food source was meat from cattle, sheep, and goats. Any farming was conducted at a level of subsistence: only enough food was grown to maintain survival. Since an excess food supply lures more settlers to an area, low agricultural production kept this region less populated. Farther west, Western sub-Saharan Africa’s lakes and rivers made widespread irrigation possible. Here, the people lived a settled farming lifestyle. The kingdom of Ghana was established around the third century CE and flourished from about CE 750 to 1100, making West Africa a thriving center of commerce and culture.

Sub-Saharan Empires

In the fourteenth century, Mansa Musa took the throne and made Mali a formidable empire. He was a Muslim who established Islam as the state religion, though it remained primarily the faith of the upper-class elite. Mansa Musa made the city of Timbuktu the center of learning for the Afro-Islamic world, and under his leadership, Mali became one of the richest states in Africa.

The Ghanaians exchanged surplus crops and gold for textiles and salt brought by roving traders in an elaborate trans-Saharan trading network. Goods from North Africa were traded with Bantu and other peoples in central and southern Africa. The salt-gold trade made the kingdom very rich. There are some accounts that Ghana was subject to raids by the Almoravid (Berber) people from Morocco beginning CE 1075. Whether or not this is true, Ghana did adopt Islam, and by 1200, the kingdom was in serious decline. Just south of Ghana, the Mali Empire had been founded around CE 1000.

Sub-Saharan Empires (Continued)

African cultures produced remarkable achievements. The Dogon people of Mali were ancient astronomers. Hundreds of years ago, they knew about Jupiter’s moons, Saturn’s rings, and that the so-called “Dog Star,” Sirius, was a binary star system. In the 14th century CE, the Muslim explorer Ibn Battuta chronicled his 75,000-mile travels through Africa and Asia.

Inland to the east, the Songhai Empire came into its power around CE 1400. Sonni Ali, also known as Sunni Ali Ber, was a ruthless ruler in some ways, but his empire flourished. The Songhai created some of the first irrigation networks, which benefited farmers. Eventually, the Songhai Empire spanned the middle of Africa from Mali to Sudan. When Askia Muhammad rose to the throne, he proclaimed Islam the religion of all classes of society. The Koran was taught in schools along with law, astronomy, medicine, and philosophy. The Songhai Empire reached a great height of scholarship and intellectual thought. In Mali, literacy was nearly universal among the population.

changing powers lead to cultural advances

Other African advances included medicine and herbal remedies, such as the Egyptians using willow-tree bark as a source of salicylic acid, an important ingredient in aspirin. Those cultures that never gave up the hunter-gatherer lifestyle, such as the Bushmen and Hottentots of southern Africa, did not progress in technological or intellectual advancement. The great accomplishments of the African empires happened as an indirect result of their advanced agricultural traditions, which provided a firm foundation for advancement and expansion.

changing powers lead to cultural advances (continued)