"I would like to see above all a greater number of researchers — Afro-Americans — young Americans — even whites. Why not? Because it’s the young who are least prejudiced. As a consequence, they are the most capable of making triumph ideas which frighten the older generation.
Also, I think that it will be necessary to put together polyvalent scientific teams, capable of doing in-depth studies, for sure, and that’s what’s important. It bothers me when someone takes me on my word without developing a means of verifying what I say ... We must form a scientific spirit capable of seeing even the weaknesses of our own proofs, of seeing the unfinished side of our work and committing ourselves to completing it. You understand? Therefore we should then have a work which could honestly stand criticism, because what we’ve done would have been placed on a scientific plane."
—Cheikh Anta Diop, Interview with Harun Kofi Wangara (Harold G. Lawrence), 1974.
Posts: 5905 | From: The Hammer | Registered: Aug 2008
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It is very important that a new generation picks up where pioneers left. There is a lot more to be discovered and unraveled. People can't thrive off on studies that are 30 years old, and look at them like oh those great scholars.
Posts: 22234 | From: האם אינכם כילדי הכרית אלי בני ישראל | Registered: Nov 2010
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Indeed, and the thing is Diop was always big on evidence and data, Unfortunately some folk forget this and focus on the the mystical and rhetorical, with the rhetorical especially being an easy way out because it requires very little work or study. There is a place for rhetoric and mysticism to be sure, but they provide little concrete to confront the many enemies of a balanced African biohistory, in both their "soft" or "hard" manifestations. This is one of the significant divides in the field.
Diop also did not expect that things would be static and unchanging, forever locked in stone. BUt ever so often you run into cats who still have not moved beyond Chancellor Williams, for example, circa 1970- valuable as background to be sure, but the field has moved on. A good grasp of the factual and evidentiary database is necessary for progress, and this is critical in expanding knowledge, as well as critiquing either patronizing liberals, right-wing propagandists, or the plain i'gnant.
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I would say that the narrative in the African Origins of Civilization follows evidence that Western scholars have simply decided to ignore. This migration narrative is the basis of my thread over on Egyptsearch reloaded. Diop's theme book "The African Origins of Civilization" details many ancient events in a context that Western scholars have feared acknowledging in a brave unapologetic way. This book detailed the migrations of Africans from Kemet/Sudan/the Sahara desert going back to the Natufians (Ricaut 2008) of the end of the ice age and into later European migrations of the Pelasgians and even later migration of Thutmose's armies. This book made the brave assertion of Africans migrating into the Americas prior to the notion being thoroughly explored and validated by Ivan Van Sertima. The very title/claim of the book was something that was not "scholastically" concrete until the discovery of the incense burners in Qustul 5 years after it was published, and Diop's narrative was complete without it. Simply put every claim from the book has been verified through contemporary research.
Chancellor Williams book details an ancient race war between the original melaninated Africans of the upper Nile and the Set type mulattoes of northern Kemet that lead to the formation of Dynastic Kemet under Menes when those mulattoes were defeated and expelled. From a historical viewpoint this reigns true the fact that further down the line a Set worshiping group of mulattoes SUDDENLY appears at the door steps of Kemet begging for entrance known as the Hyksos. The Hyksos would have had to have an earlier Kemetic origin of sorts to come back in worshiping a Kemetic deity. Egyptology does not tackle such issues. They wish to take the racial context out of this segment of history, because coming from such humble origins is not flattering to their egos.
Posts: 348 | From: Atlanta | Registered: Jan 2014
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Agreed in part- many Western scholars want to minimize, deny or distort. As for Williams, I disagree with his notion of a Race War- light skinnad on one side and dark-skinnad on the other. That's too simplistic given that many so-called 'Asiatics" at the time might have been almost as dark as various Nubians, and some Nubians were just as brown as any "Asiatic." William's "mulatto" format, rigidly applied in the Nile Valley is a strained straitjacket based on the 1960s American race scene.
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Tukuler
multidisciplinary Black Scholar
Member # 19944
posted
Wms covered the parallel complexion issue and its use as a pretext -- maybe similar to merchants of today who'll say "Me black, me black."
Wms also commends the 'whites' who went black.
No. There weren't no overt race war. Not even a conscious clash of races. Nonetheless through time the darker filter southward. This is observable across the whole expanse of Northern Africa. Beydane are brown skinned, yet their ethnonym declares 'white' identity. Same social process laid out in Wms. Except Beydane say Abu Bakr flat out expelled blacks from the desert.
The big plus of Destruction is Chancellor Williams' 'plans' section. I choose to build on what was left, not sanctify it. I'll throw out the bathwater but keep the baby and the tub too. Lol
Apartheid ended what 35 years ago? And Jim Crow 50? Political colonialism 50? Before that? 300 years of oppression. Yes, it's a hella burden but I can't act like it didn't happen nor that without the 1960-70s era struggle I wouldn't have the tools/skills to post as I do today.
Posts: 8179 | From: the Tekrur straddling Senegal & Mauritania | Registered: Dec 2011
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True what you say. I have read Williams. His solutions section is candid and his call for unity against a common foe is as relevant then as it is now, based on certain situations prevailing at present. Likewise his blunt exposure of the open or veiled supremacist agendas of that foe, whether it be in the history books, or political battlefields.
There are several points that modern data calls into question. He says for example that Africa's geography made it easier for various invaders to conquer it, but this is not necessarily so. Africa's great rivers are unnavigable for large stretches, with many cliffs, cataracts, sandbars and rapids, unlike the easy transport routes moving technology, material and knowledge on many great rivers of Eurasia. It took the steamships of the 19th century to finally overcome many of these problems. Likewise Africa's relatively smooth coastline means a lack of good natural harbors- unlike the massive number of such harbors in Europe. Such easy transport factors made conquest of parts of Europe much easier as well as enabled Europeans to massively borrow and copy technology and knowledge from outside EUrope. Writing for example was not invented in Europe, nor the key animal and plant domestications, etc etc. Europeans benefited massively by importing knowledge, people and tech from outside.
This is part of why Egypt could never be the hegemon equivalent of Rome or Greece in Africa. Compare the broad transmission belt of the MEditerranean, or the easy navigation of so many of Europe's great rivers, to the chopped up, blocked Nile as just one example. Rome could move tens of thousands of troops, grain, weapons, material etc from Syria to Spain at will, using the Mediterranean, over 2000 miles of easy, straight-shot water transport. Egypt had no such advantages in Africa- and aside from the problems with the Nile it was surrounded by hundreds of miles of inhospitable desert, which by the way served as a protective barrier. Africa's Sahara likewise was a barrier in many ways to easy conquest and slowed down Arab incursions and imperialism somewhat- though not totally stopped them. The list can go on.
Nevertheless that is the nature of knowledge. It doesn't stand still, and those coming after must take up the torch. And of course Williams had to work with the info he had at hand, at the time - heavily 1960s, with some early 70s stuff.
Posts: 5905 | From: The Hammer | Registered: Aug 2008
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The very title/claim of the book was something that was not "scholastically" concrete until the discovery of the incense burners in Qustul 5 years after it was published,
Tukuler
multidisciplinary Black Scholar
Member # 19944
posted
quote:Originally posted by Tukuler: I choose to build on what was left, not sanctify it. I'll throw out the bathwater but keep the baby and the tub too. Lol
This means retain and build on what remains valid and factual while discarding the other stuff.
Who throwd out Copernicus and Newton 'cos we got astrophysics?
We need to get to them or look at them (have them under our belt) to move on and understand science today.
Same with Wms, Diop, Doc Ben, Karenga, Madhubuti, van Sertima, Snowden, Hansberry, Rogers, Osei, Jackson, Ajayi, P Goldman, et al.
This comes natural for other peoples not to start from square one each succeeding generation. They move forward from an accumulated base of knowledge with no shame.
For example they been running the same white man's north and east Africa game since the Napoleonic Expedition and refined it with each new tool/methodology that's come along since. Interpretation is key.
But we lack the womb to tomb institution system to ingrain a weltanschauung. In fact we tear down what was built for us to inherit.
We try to build on anti-this or anti-that never realizing we must define on the positive.
If ones goal is simply countering negatives one becomes dependent on that negative to exist. Remove that negative and ones whole reason for being is swept from under them.
Besides Square Oneing, these generations never experienced a liberation struggle and many imagine the playing field is level. As if somehow a mere 50 years of 'independent' Africa, purported equal rights and a physically half Luo potus, completely erased or even healed the 500 year legacy of the Triangular Trade, colonialism, genocide, apartheid, Jim Crow, etc; and the 1500 year weight of the Hham Mythos.
No. We don't have the luxury to divorce ourselves from reality. Our very quality of life is impacted by the way our history, ethnology, molecular biology, and so on is perceived by those matriculating European and Semitic institutions.
At least give our own a chance as we try our best to objectively develop an authentic Africana of a World Class status without skewing interpretation toward self bias.
quote: Page opening posted by don Cardova : We must form a scientific spirit capable of seeing even the weaknesses of our own proofs, of seeing the unfinished side of our work and committing ourselves to completing it. You understand? Therefore we should then have a work which could honestly stand criticism, because what we’ve done would have been placed on a scientific plane."
—Cheikh Anta Diop, Interview with Harun Kofi Wangara (Harold G. Lawrence), 1974
.
PS just imagine form schools where the tested and best from our past scholars are taught, learned, and launched from. Wow! To enter college with that and the brightest and best of all the ES opinions no matter from who? Already multidisciplinary and multi ethnic minded.
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COurse there is only so much guys like us on the web can do. But if there is cooperation with the cats coming along in universities, together with the old heads, such teams can be built. A loose network structure can work- no need for monolithic agreement on all points. There is plenty of room for disagreements, but a rough "tactical cooperation" can be put in place that expands the field. That cooperation can also also extend to open-minded white specialists/enthusiasts in the field of which we've seen a few such as Gatto and some others. Even Yurco at one point, was talking about a rough accommodation with Asante.
Genuine folk can work their different angles and venues, yet exhibit a generous spirit not automatically geared to tearing one another down. Simple examples- acknowledging points of agreement with someone, giving people credit for a particular piece of work or effort, sharing info, etc etc. None of this requires total agreement. In fact, given the diversity of perspectives, disagreement is to be expected.
COurse there are several obstacles to good cooperation- it may never come to pass- and the same folk in the field for years will not be around forever.
(1) Hostile Eurocentrics, combining deception and stealth with outright opposition- these include various racists or "hereditarian" types, and associated troll and diversionary tactics we have seen so often.
(2) Various "Afro-enthusiasts" who don't do much research, but are quick to jump on "consciousness" or mystic type bandwagons, even as they flood the zone with inaccurate info or untenable claims. A mystic angle is its own creature- the problem is when some folk insist that their mystic claim is the only "true" scholarship or research, an flood the zone accordingly.
(3) Various patronizing, condescending and "establishment" types from academia- who while talking a good game bout science and objectivity have their own set of slippery agendas. They too can run "zone flood" games, that will need teams to deconstruct.
(4) Various factional leaders afflicted with the HNIC syndrome, or who see their particular ideology or approach as the only "true" way.
COurse, these teams could also be built in academia to some extent becoming a mostly college student thing but there is a massive base out there not in college.
Posts: 5905 | From: The Hammer | Registered: Aug 2008
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posted
Tukler said: No. We don't have the luxury to divorce ourselves from reality. Our very quality of life is impacted by the way our history, ethnology, molecular biology, and so on is perceived by those matriculating European and Semitic institutions.
At least give our own a chance as we try our best to objectively develop an authentic Africana of a World Class status without skewing interpretation toward self bias.
And to realize your vision, there needs to ne more moderation of the forums. Why do assorted racists like "Real tawk" get a free hand, when the brothers, who are way less offensive and are not hurling epithets left and right, are banned from Forum Biodiversity, and other such? We are not even taking steps to at least ensure a minimum standard in our own forums. Your mailbox is usually full. Are you moderating at all? --------------------------------------------------------
Real tawk Member Member # 20324 Ish Gabor posted 28 May, 2017 08:22 AM ASSHOLE, Neanderthal descends from homoeretus of Europe and Asia. Fvck off, n1gger.
posted
Oh he's calling people THAT now? He ain't even tryin to pretend he's black no more LOL.
Posts: 2508 | From: . | Registered: Nov 2011
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Tukuler
multidisciplinary Black Scholar
Member # 19944
posted
quote:Originally posted by zarahan- aka Enrique Cardova: Tukler said: No. We don't have the luxury to divorce ourselves from reality. Our very quality of life is impacted by the way our history, ethnology, molecular biology, and so on is perceived by those matriculating European and Semitic institutions.
At least give our own a chance as we try our best to objectively develop an authentic Africana of a World Class status without skewing interpretation toward self bias.
And to realize your vision, there needs to ne more moderation of the forums. Why do assorted racists like "Real tawk" get a free hand, when the brothers, who are way less offensive and are not hurling epithets left and right, are banned from Forum Biodiversity, and other such? We are not even taking steps to at least ensure a minimum standard in our own forums. Your mailbox is usually full. Are you moderating at all? --------------------------------------------------------
Real tawk Member Member # 20324 Ish Gabor posted 28 May, 2017 08:22 AM ASSHOLE, Neanderthal descends from homoeretus of Europe and Asia. Fvck off, n1gger.
For like 5 yrs I poured my $$$ into TNV. A party I threw for our target demographic. Shee-it. Not even crickets.
ESR's up and running with all you want already in place. Where are the academics collegians hi-schoolers informed amateurs?
Since the end of the Liberation Struggle interest in 'hard' Africana has damned near died.
In this 21st century Information Struggle we don't even need cadres anymore. We each are an Army of 1. No matter wor' 'bout the anti. Just keep pumping the pro.
The intelligent will have their 'ear to the wise' weed whacking words of woo out da damn way. Is it a waste of their time chasing ghosts and lingering fatalities unless it brings new info to light (likes being done via the Tin Man). Outdo the Geno-hamiticists. Challenge each other so as to tighten up that backstroke till weeze all a swimming like Flipper.
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"The early Askumites built in stone. They erected massive carved monoliths over the graves of their leaders (one was 33 meters long and weighed over 700 tonnes, arguably the largest single piece of worked stone ever hewn." --John Reader, 1998. Africa: The Biography of the continent. pg 208).
"Perhaps the best -known symbols of the Aksumites' particular ideas and style are the great carved monoliths, some of which still stand, erected to commemorate their dead rulers; they also record the considerable skill of the Aksumite quarrymen, engineers, and stone-carvers, being in some cases among the largest single stones ever employed in ancient times." --Stuart Munro-Hay 1991. Askum: An African Civilisation of Late Antiquity
“The exquisitely carved monolithic stelae dating from the 3rd and 4th centuries AD are unique masterpieces of human creative genius. “ UNESCO World Heritage citation 1980
"an intricate network of over 16,000 kilometers of banks and ditches (iya) enclosed a 4000 kilometer cluster of community lands- a vast legacy on earth.. The earthworks run four to five times longer than the Great Wall of China, and involve moving more material than the Great Pyramid of Cheops." --PJ Darling, A Legacy in Earth- Ancient Benin and Ishan, Southern Nigeria in: Historical Archaeology in Nigeria, 1998. ed k. Weaver. p143
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posted
2017 study finds sub-Saharan influence around Roman period. Ancient samples drawn from later period of Dynastic Egypt -taken from the farther north- downplaying the south, and excluding nearby Nubia & Sudan
Ancient samples from Abusir, near Faiyum in the north
Samples from Late period-of Egypt- which have more foreign influence quote:
“According to the radiocarbon dates .. the samples can be grouped into three time periods: Pre-Ptolemaic (New Kingdom, Third Intermediate Period and Late Period), Ptolemaic and Roman Period."
Sampling from the far north- quote: Written sources indicate that by the third century BCE Abusir el-Meleq was at the centre of a wider region that comprised the northern part of the Herakleopolites province, and had close ties with the Fayum.. We aim to study changes and continuities in the genetic makeup of the ancient inhabitants of the Abusir el-Meleq community .. since all sampled remains derive from this community in Middle Egypt and have been radiocarbon dated to the late New Kingdom to the Roman Period..”
Limitations of study candidly admitted by authors - Quote:
“However, we note that all our genetic data were obtained from a single site in Middle Egypt and may not be representative for all of ancient Egypt. It is possible that populations in the south of Egypt were more closely related to those of Nubia and had a higher sub-Saharan genetic component, in which case the argument for an influx of sub-Saharan ancestries after the Roman Period might only be partially valid and have to be nuanced. Throughout Pharaonic history there was intense interaction between Egypt and Nubia, ranging from trade to conquest and colonialism, and there is compelling evidence for ethnic complexity within households with Egyptian men marrying Nubian women and vice versa 51,52,53. Clearly, more genetic studies on ancient human remains from southern Egypt and Sudan are needed before apodictic statements can be made." --Schuenemann 2016 Ancient Egyptian mummy genomes suggest increase of Sub-Saharan African ancestry in post-Roman periods. NatComm, 8:15694
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The earliest burials known in the Nile Valley are those at Nazlet Khater and Kubbaniya, mentioned above. A group of three slightly younger burials was found at Deir el-Fakhuri, near Esna. All of these skeletons are of fully modern Homo sapiens sapiens, but they were very robust, with short wide faces and pronounced alveolar prognathism. They have been compared with a type known as Mechtoid (from the site of Mechta el-Arbi), which are found in Late Paleolithic sites throughout North Africa, and particularly in the Maghreb.
In the Nile Valley there are three Late Paleolithic graveyards, all associated with Qadan assemblages: Jebel Sahaba, a few kilometers north of Wadi Haifa on the east bank of the Nile, with 59 burials; Site 6-B-36, on the west bank almost opposite Wadi Haifa, with 39 burials; and Wadi Tushka, north of Abu Simbel in southern Egypt, with 19 burials. The radiocarbon dates range between 14,000 and 13,000 BP. All of the skeletons are Mechtoid, indicating a long and unbroken history for this type in the Nile Valley.
North of the el-Badari district, no Predynastic sites are known for over 300km. Archaeological evidence in the Fayum of both Nagada and Ma'adi culture wares now seems to suggest that this region was where peoples of the Predynastic cultures of Upper and Lower Egypt first came into contact. The best known Predynastic site in the Fayum region is the small cemetery at Gerza, from which the term Gerzean (Nagada II) is derived. Excavated by Petrie, this cemetery contained 288 burials with (Upper Egyptian) ceramics which are typically Nagada II. A later Predynastic cemetery with several hundred burials, excavated by Georg Moller, is located at Abusir el-Meleq, about 10km west of the present Nile. Ma'adi culture ceramics are found at the cemetery of es-Saff on the east bank opposite Gerza, and a site near Qasr Qarun in the southwestern region of the Fayum, excavated by Caton Thompson and E.W.Gardner in the 1930s.
Archaeological evidence clearly demonstrates the existence of two different material cultures with different belief systems in Egypt in the fourth millennium BC: the Nagada culture of Upper Egypt and the Ma'adi culture of Lower Egypt. Evidence in Lower Egypt consists mainly of settlements with very simple burials, in contrast to Upper Egypt, where cemeteries with elaborate burials are found. The rich grave goods in several major cemeteries in Upper Egypt represent the acquired wealth of higher social strata, and these cemeteries were probably associated with centers of craft production. Trade and exchange of finished goods and luxury materials from the Eastern and Western Deserts and Nubia would also have taken place in such centers. In Lower Egypt, however, while excavated settlements permit a broader reconstruction of the prehistoric economy, there is little evidence for any great socioeconomic complexity.
State formation
Archaeological evidence points to the origins of the state which emerged by the 1st Dynasty in the Nagada culture of Upper Egypt, where grave types, pottery and artifacts demonstrate an evolution of form from the Predynastic to the 1st Dynasty. This cannot be demonstrated for the material culture of Lower Egypt, which was eventually displaced by that originating in Upper Egypt.
By circa 3050 BC the Early Dynastic state had emerged in Egypt. One result of the expansion of Nagada culture throughout northern Egypt would have been a greatly elaborated (state) administration, and by the beginning of the 1st Dynasty this was managed in part by the invention of writing, used on sealings and tags affixed to state goods. The early Egyptian state was a centrally controlled polity ruled by a (god-)king from the newly founded capital of Memphis in the north, near Saqqara. What is truly unique about the early state in Egypt is the integration of rule over an extensive geographic region. There was undoubtedly heightened commercial contact with southwest Asia in the late fourth millennium BC, but the Early Dynastic state in Egypt was unique and indigenous in character.
posted
^ Yep, the origin is Central Sudan, a tropical African people. And magically white controlled sources claim the people were cold adapted Central Europeans.
Posts: 22234 | From: האם אינכם כילדי הכרית אלי בני ישראל | Registered: Nov 2010
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We already have ancient DNA results from Kush and the Tasian site of Kadruka (precusor to Badarian/Naqada):
From Genetic Patterns of Y-chromosome and Mitochondrial DNA Variation, with Implications to the Peopling of the Sudan (Hassan 2009)Posts: 2981 | Registered: Jan 2012
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quote:Originally posted by Ish Gebor: ^ Yep, the origin is Central Sudan, a tropical African people. And magically white controlled sources claim the people were cold adapted Central Europeans.
lol
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quote:Originally posted by zarahan- aka Enrique Cardova:
quote:Originally posted by Ish Gebor: ^ Yep, the origin is Central Sudan, a tropical African people. And magically white controlled sources claim the people were cold adapted Central Europeans.
lol
Eurocentric supporters never explained where all these African populations where to begin with.
Posts: 22234 | From: האם אינכם כילדי הכרית אלי בני ישראל | Registered: Nov 2010
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"In the 1980s, genetic and fossil evidence began to call attention to Africa’s preeminence in the origins of modern human populations (1), but this evidence could be interpreted in two fundamentally different ways (2). Was Africa’s role greater than other continents because it always harbored a larger human population (size) or because modern humans arose in Africa first and subsequently expanded their range across the world (time)? In the 2000s, improvements in DNA sequencing technology and genetic sampling of more present day human groups made it possible to accurately characterize the genetic diversity of groups from different regions of the world, and it became clear that within- group genetic diversity decreased predictably with increased geographic distance from sub-Saharan Africa (3, 4).
Subsequently, similar, albeit weaker, relationships were found between within-group variation in aspects of skeletal morphology (cranial, dental, and pelvic measurements) and distance from sub-Saharan Africa (5⇓⇓–8)."
--Weaver 2014-Tracing the paths of modern humans from Africa-PNAS v111-n20,7170-7171
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The big picture is that we are predominantly of recent African origin, and RAO is not just about the sources of our shared modern morphology and most of our genes; it is also about the genesis of our shared patterns of behaviour. Inferred behavioural gaps between Neanderthals and modern humans have certainly narrowed from recent research, but in my view they have not disappeared. I think that the pre-eminence of Africa in the story of modern human origins was primarily a question of its larger geographic and human population size, which gave greater opportunities for morphological and behavioural variations, and for innovations to develop and be conserved, rather than the result of a special evolutionary pathway. By contrast, genomic data suggest that the lineages of the Neanderthals and Denisovans had much greater demographic attrition [25], perhaps related to the challenges posed by the unstable climates of Eurasia, and this might well have inhibited their cultural as well as physical evolution [6].
‘Modernity’ was not a package that had a single African origin in one time, place, and population, but was a composite whose elements appeared, and sometimes disappeared, at different times and places and then coalesced to assume the form we see in extant humans [6]. However, during the past 400 000 years, most of that assembly took place in Africa, which is why a recent African origin still represents the predominant (but not exclusive) mode of evolution for H. sapiens. Rather than saying ‘we are all multiregionalists trying to explain the out-of-Africa pattern’ [1], it would be more appropriate to say ‘we are all out-of-Africanists who accept some multiregional contributions’."
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posted
Egyptian writing distinctly African per conservative Egyptologist Yurco
"Vestigial traces of the dynastic race theory still linger in the writings of some scholars, who hint at a "Mesopotamian stimulus" to Egyptian culture through writing or other cultural aspects. But it has now been definitely shown that Mesopotamian writing arose from clay tokens used in early invoices for livestock transshipments (Schmandt-Besserat 1992, 1-13, 93-1298, 120-65, 184-99). Later, indeed scribes in Mesopotamia predominated in the temple and palace economies; but kings and royalty were rarely literate. In Egypt, by contrast, writing arose from the deisre of early chieftains and kings to commemorate their deeds and accomplishments (Arnett 1982; Hassan 1983, 1, 7-8; Williams and Logan 1987, 245-85). Its roots lay in the painted buffware of Naqada II, whose totemic emblems for divinities show forms recognizable in later hieroglyphic script (hoffman 1991, 31, fig. 7; Arnett 1982).
Thus Egyptian and Mesopotamian writing systems have totally disparate origins. In later Egyptian Dynastic times literacy extended from the top of society downward. Egyptian kings and royalty had to be literacy- in sharp contrast to those in Mesopotamia - and the bureaucracy that arose around the early Dynastic rulers encouraged in spread of writing, as did the religious needs of lower-ranked Egyptians (Baines 1983; Ray 1986). A scribal class evolved from the Archaic Period to the Old Kingdom, basically as account keepers for the elite and as bureaucrats for the government's taxing and documentary functions. During all periods the means of social advancement to the elite was through literacy (Baines 1983).
The ancient Egyptian writing system was therefore a distinctly African development, and the evidence for this does indeed contradict some of the diffusionist reasoning that grew out of the Aryan Model, as well as the prominent position ascribed to Mesopotamian influence."
-- Yurco, F "An Egyptological Review" IN Mary R. Lefkowitz and Guy MacLean Rogers, Black Athena Revisited, 1996, Univ of North Carolina Press, p. 62-100
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EGYPTOLOGIST BARRY KEMP ON HOW ANCIENT EGYPTIANS ARE MISREPRESENTED BY SKEWED STUDIES
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Recent 2016 book by Zakrewski et al, offers primer on scientific techniques that might be profitably applied in "Egyptology broadly, and in Egyptian archaeology in particular."
PUB DESCRIPTION: There is a notable lack of archaeological science used in Egyptology and Egyptian archaeology today. The reasons behind this are twofold: one, the discipline started with the early translation of Hieroglyphs which, combined with the large amount of written and pictorial material available, has long overshadowed the study of the material culture, including archaeology. Second are the practical and bureaucratic challenges to be found in obtaining access to material. In the light of these challenges, the lack of application of archaeological science in Egypt is hardly surprising.
Science in the Study of Ancient Egypt demonstrates how to integrate scientific methodologies into Egyptology broadly, and in Egyptian archaeology in particular, in order to maximise the amount of information that might be obtained within a study of ancient Egypt, be it field, museum, or laboratory-based. The authors illustrate the inclusive but varied nature of the scientific archaeology being undertaken, revealing that it all falls under the aegis of Egyptology, and demonstrating its potential for the elucidation of problems within traditional Egyptology.
-------------------- Note: I am not an "Egyptologist" as claimed by some still bitter, defeated, trolls creating fake profiles and posts elsewhere. Hapless losers, you still fail. My output of hard data debunking racist nonsense has actually INCREASED since you began.. Posts: 5905 | From: The Hammer | Registered: Aug 2008
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posted
^^^^ please delete spam/trolling. The irony is that I was going to post more on Abusir el Meleq. The tombs there were reported to have Hebrew names.
But to expand on Zarahan's original post:
quote:Originally posted by zarahan- aka Enrique Cardova: 2017 study finds sub-Saharan influence around Roman period. Ancient samples drawn from later period of Dynastic Egypt -taken from the farther north- downplaying the south, and excluding nearby Nubia & Sudan
Ancient samples from Abusir, near Faiyum in the north
Samples from Late period-of Egypt- which have more foreign influence quote:
“According to the radiocarbon dates .. the samples can be grouped into three time periods: Pre-Ptolemaic (New Kingdom, Third Intermediate Period and Late Period), Ptolemaic and Roman Period."
Sampling from the far north- quote: Written sources indicate that by the third century BCE Abusir el-Meleq was at the centre of a wider region that comprised the northern part of the Herakleopolites province, and had close ties with the Fayum.. We aim to study changes and continuities in the genetic makeup of the ancient inhabitants of the Abusir el-Meleq community .. since all sampled remains derive from this community in Middle Egypt and have been radiocarbon dated to the late New Kingdom to the Roman Period..”
Limitations of study candidly admitted by authors - Quote:
“However, we note that all our genetic data were obtained from a single site in Middle Egypt and may not be representative for all of ancient Egypt. It is possible that populations in the south of Egypt were more closely related to those of Nubia and had a higher sub-Saharan genetic component, in which case the argument for an influx of sub-Saharan ancestries after the Roman Period might only be partially valid and have to be nuanced. Throughout Pharaonic history there was intense interaction between Egypt and Nubia, ranging from trade to conquest and colonialism, and there is compelling evidence for ethnic complexity within households with Egyptian men marrying Nubian women and vice versa 51,52,53. Clearly, more genetic studies on ancient human remains from southern Egypt and Sudan are needed before apodictic statements can be made." --Schuenemann 2016 Ancient Egyptian mummy genomes suggest increase of Sub-Saharan African ancestry in post-Roman periods. NatComm, 8:15694
-To offer a bit more context, the authors of Schuenemann 2016 admit to large scale migration before any of their mummies existed:
quote:Especially from the second millennium BCE onwards, there were intense, historically- and archaeologically documented contacts, including the large-scale immigration of Canaanite populations, known as the Hyksos, into Lower Egypt, whose origins lie in the Middle Bronze Age Levant
-Most of the foreign inflow and Second Intermediate period conquest of Egypt took place in the north.
The Egyptians themselves admit to large scale migration and rule of northern Egypt by foreigners centuries before the first mummies of Abusir el Meleq:
Egyptian Propaganda from the Prophecy of Neferti describes Asiatic immigration.
quote: "All good things have passed away, the land being cast away through trouble by means of that food of the Asiatics who pervade the land. Enemies have come into being in the east; Asiatics have come down into Egypt, for a fortress lacks another beside it, and no guard will hear."
Some who are more unfamiliar with Asiatic rule of Egypt believe it only extended to the Delta. Kamose's inscription describes Asiatic control having extended much further south of Abusir el-Meleq and into Cusae. Specifically the Egyptian nobility say:
quote:"Behold, it is Asiatic water as far as Cusae...we are a ease in our (part of) Egypt. Elephantine is strong, and the middle (of the land) is with us as far as Cusae...He holds the land of the Asiatics; we hold Egypt. Should someone come and act against us, then we shall act against him." (CT-5-7)
Tl;dr: Southern Egyptians saw the north of Cusae as "land of the Asiatics" centuries before the first of these mummies to enter Abusir el Meleq. This site does not provide data during such a critical period of Egyptian history to understand the degree to which demographic change took place due to these migration patterns.
-Another problem: the authors admit upon peer review that they have no comparable data from the Old Kingdom and Middle Kingdom and that the site was not really populated until the Late period:
quote: Q5. Lines 75-77. “In particular, the site holds much promise for studying changes in its population structure from the late Dynastic Period to the present day.” Why is this the case? Is it due to the better DNA preservation in the later mummies?? Please explain!
Answer:Unfortunately, mummies from the Old till early New Kingdom are not present at the site or and not included in our data set, which focusses on the three consecutive periods. The site is mainly occupied during the Late Period till Roman times according to written sources, and thus would allow the study of an extended temporal transect. We furthermore find in more than 50% of all remains authentic ancient DNA preserved, suggesting this to be an ideal site for further studies.
The authors concede there's no way of knowing where these mummies came from or how much mixing had happened during the intermediate periods if they descended in part from natives. They don't have data from the site that precedes documented evidence of Asiatic migration into northern Egypt. And even if they did have it, they concede the site was before the Late Period wasn't very populated, leaving it questionable if the site would've ever (even in Old Kingdom times) been a worthy location to search for a representational model of Egyptian diversity.
The authors also describe foreign names being in the site they selected:
quote:Importantly, there is evidence for foreign influence at Abusir el-Meleq. Individuals with Greek, Latin and Hebrew names are known to have lived at the site and several coffins found at the cemetery used Greek portrait image and adapted Greek statue types to suit ‘Egyptian’ burial practices. The site’s first excavator, Otto Rubensohn, also found a Greek grave inscription in stone as well as a writing board inscribed in Greek46. Taken together with the multitude of Greek papyri that were written at the site, this evidence strongly suggests that at least some inhabitants of Abusir el-Meleq were literate in, and able to speak, Greek.
Egyptologist SOY Keita in his response to the research study (more highlights from his rebuttal later) notes that in spite of what data is available or absent for comparison (some of which noted above), the research team make great assumptions to arrive to their conclusions:
quote:The socio-cultural dynamics are not fully considered: the information on the origin and social status is incomplete, or unknowable in fact. The mummies are clearly assumed to be representative of the local population based on an incomplete archaeological report, in spite of the historical information provided about northern Egypt’s interaction with the Near East since the Predynastic, and the known settlements of Greeks, and others, in northern Egypt in later periods.
In peer review, the authors downplay existing data from southern sites that show southern African ancestry:
quote:Q13. Conclusions. I agree that in other sites, especially in the south of Egypt, there could be a much higher influence of Sub-Saharan populations. It is well known that there were close trading connections to Nubia and other Sub-Saharan areas during the Middle and New Kingdom. What does this mean for the interpretation of your findings?
Answer: We have addressed this point in our revised discussion (see lines 395-405). As an alternative explanation this would only mean that modern-day Egyptians might resemble more closely ancient Egyptians from the south. However, in the absence of data from southern sites, this also remains speculative.
Egyptologist SOY Keita review of Schuenemann et al. has so many points to cover that I highly suggest it is read. I'll cover some highlights:
Egyptologist SOY Keita responds to sample size and contributors to the field like Schuenemann et al. whose focus on using northern samples and publicly overstating their representation of a "true Egyptian," ignores a reality of the north being assimilated and integrated to Egyptian culture by the south during the predynastic:
quote:All of the samples are from the northern half of Egypt, from one nome which is 2.4% (1/42) of AE nomes. Ancient Egyptian culture originated southern Upper Egypt.
Egyptologist SOY Keita responds to Schuenemann et al.'s dismissal of data suggesting southern African (or Sub Saharan Afrian) genetic connections to southern Egypt.
quote:Schuenemann et al. seemingly suggest, based largely on the results of an ancient DNA study of later period remains from northern Egypt, that the ‘ancient Egyptians’ (AE) as an entity came from Asia (the Near East, NE), and that modern Egyptians “received additional sub-Saharan African (SSA) admixtures in recent times” after the latest period of the pharaonic era due to the “trans-Saharan slave trade and Islamic expansion.” In spite of the implied generalization about ‘origins’ the authors do offer the caveat that their findings may have been different if samples had been used from southern Egypt, and this is a significant admission. Their conclusions deserve further discussion from multiple perspectives which cannot be fully developed due to space limitations.
quote: The authors completely dismiss the results of PCR methods used on AE remains. As a Habicht et al. 4 states, PCR based methods were used successfully on mummified Egyptian cats and crocodiles without creating extensive debate..."
"... Our analysis of STRs from Amarna and Ramesside royal mummies with popAffiliator⁸ based on the same published data 5,6 indicates a 41.7% to 93.9% probability of SSA affinities (see Table 1); most of the individuals had a greater probability of affiliation with “SSA" which is not the only way to be "African" a point worth repeating."
Keita criticizes Schuenemann et al.'s implication of "SSA" ancestry in modern Egyptians as the result of the slave trade:
quote: Furthermore, SSA groups indicated to have contributed to modern Egypt do not match the Muslim trade routes that have been well documented as SSA groups from the great lakes and southern African regions were largely absent in the internal trading routes that went north to Egypt.
-Adding to Keita's points, evidence of the site's associations to the north include data that suggests Abusir el-Meleq during this Late Period of the samples was referred to by the Egyptians as a northern or Lower Egyptian site. It was frequently compared to Abydos due to the site's Osiris worship. Abydos was considered a southern epicenter of Osiris worship, while Abusir el Meleq was considered a site of worship associated with the north or Lower Egypt. Specifically, the research finds that it was translated and described as "Ꜣbḏw mḥt/mht(y)t" or "Northern Abydos/Abydos of the Lower Egypt, while Ꜣbḏw was the Abydos of Upper Egypt (s wr Ꜣbḏw sm) was the Osiris worship center of the south. You can read more about it here:
posted
Will be adding the sources so just chill as I edit. Carrying on:
The Dakhleh Oasis being used as a proxy for southern Egypt (despite the Oasis' Egyptian contacts being mostly northern) and described as supporting the Abusir study.
Genes 2017, 8(10), 262; doi:10.3390/genes8100262 Complete Mitochondrial Genome Sequencing of a Burial from a Romano–Christian Cemetery in the Dakhleh Oasis, Egypt: Preliminary Indications
J. Eldon Molto 1,* , Odile Loreille 2,†, Elizabeth K. Mallott 3, Ripan S. Malhi 4, Spence Fast 2, Jennifer Daniels-Higginbotham 2, Charla Marshall 2 and Ryan Parr 5
quote:Abstract: The curse of ancient Egyptian DNA was lifted by a recent study which sequenced the mitochondrial genomes (mtGenome) of 90 ancient Egyptians from the archaeological site of Abusir el-Meleq. Surprisingly, these ancient inhabitants were more closely related to those from the Near East than to contemporary Egyptians. It has been accepted that the timeless highway of the Nile River seeded Egypt with African genetic influence, well before pre-Dynastic times. Here we report on the successful recovery and analysis of the complete mtGenome from a burial recovered from a remote Romano–Christian cemetery, Kellis 2 (K2). K2 serviced the ancient municipality of Kellis, a village located in the Dakhleh Oasis in the southwest desert in Egypt. The data were obtained by high throughput sequencing (HTS) performed independently at two ancient DNA facilities (Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory, Dover, DE, USA and Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL, USA). These efforts produced concordant haplotypes representing a U1a1a haplogroup lineage. This result indicates that Near Eastern maternal influence previously identified at Abusir el-Meleq was also present further south, in ancient Kellis during the Romano–Christian period.
Immediately we can notice the time period is very late. Also, the Oasis has an interesting history. Plenty of inbreeding, close contacts with northern Egypt, Libyan influences:
1. The Oasis dwellers were heavily inbred, and genetically drifted from standard Egyptians, creating a distinct phenotype.
quote:Since then, the oasis population, as characterized by the Kellis assemblage, appears to have diverged from Nile Valley groups as a result of genetic drift. The results of the present and previous intracemetery analyses suggesting a high level of homogeneity and inbreeding within the Dakhleh Oasis may also explain the phenetic distinctiveness of the Kellis assemblage in relation to Nile Valley groups.
2. The people of ancient Dakhleh did NOT consider themselves Egyptians but when they did interact with Egypt, they were known to primarily make contacts with Middle (northern) Egyptians.
quote:While texts from Kellis indicate that the inhabitants of the oasis considered themselves as separate from Egypt, personal correspondence and receipts for economic transactions recovered from several houses indicate that male residents of Kellis often travelled to the Nile Valley for work and trade (Gardner et al. 1999:13). Close links between the oasis and Middle Egyptian centres such as Aphrodite, Antinopolis, Hermopolis and Siaout (modern Assyut) are evident in the papyri, with some Kellis males apparently residing permanently in the Nile Valley (Gardner et al. 1999; Worp 1995). Such links would have provided ample opportunity for the exchange of genes as well as goods. This perspective is supported by a preliminary analysis of mitochondrial DNA sequences derived from a subset (N=13) of the Kellis 2 skeletal sample, which appears to demonstrate a high level of maternal genetic diversity (Parr 2002). Two isotopic studies also indicate that at least eight individuals from the Kellis 2 cemetery came from outside of the oasis (Dupras 1999; Dupras and Schwarcz 2001). In light of these previous studies, the primary aim of the present study is to explore the biological relationships of the Kellis skeletal assemblage to other ancient groups in Egypt and beyond, as well as to provide new data for the analysis of kingroup areas and sex-based differences within the Kellis skeletal assemblage.
Dental Morphological Analysis of Roman Era Burials from the Dakhleh Oasis, Egypt
quote:The presence of Libyans in the oasis is first alluded to by depictions in 18th Dynasty Nile Valley tombs of the inhabitants of the southern oases as foreigners paying tribute (Winnicki 2009:30). Later, during the 25th Dynasty, inscriptions on the smaller Dakhleh stela in the possession of the Ashmolean Museum make specific reference to Libyan tribes residing in the oasis (Janssen 1968). In addition, the authors of a compilation of personal names found in Greco-Roman texts from Kharga and Dakhleh suggest that some names may derive from Berber or other non-Egyptian/Greek languages (Salomons and Worp 2009).
quote:Recently, however, archaeological evidence for the existence of a Roman castrum (fort) has been discovered beneath Qasr, a town in the Dakhleh Oasis; this fort is also alluded to on an ostrakon recovered from the nearby site of Amheida (ancient “Trimithis”) (Bagnall and Ruffini 2012).
-To offer a bit more context, the authors of Schuenemann 2016 admit to large scale migration before any of their mummies existed:
quote:Especially from the second millennium BCE onwards, there were intense, historically- and archaeologically documented contacts, including the large-scale immigration of Canaanite populations, known as the Hyksos, into Lower Egypt, whose origins lie in the Middle Bronze Age Levant
-Most of the foreign inflow and Second Intermediate period conquest of Egypt took place in the [b]north.
The Egyptians themselves admit to large scale migration and rule of northern Egypt by foreigners centuries before the first mummies of Abusir el Meleq:
Egyptian Propaganda from the Prophecy of Neferti describes Asiatic immigration.
quote: "All good things have passed away, the land being cast away through trouble by means of that food of the Asiatics who pervade the land. Enemies have come into being in the east; Asiatics have come down into Egypt, for a fortress lacks another beside it, and no guard will hear."
Some who are more unfamiliar with Asiatic rule of Egypt believe it only extended to the Delta. Kamose's inscription describes Asiatic control having extended much further south of Abusir el-Meleq and into Cusae. Specifically the Egyptian nobility say:
quote:"Behold, it is Asiatic water as far as Cusae...we are a ease in our (part of) Egypt. Elephantine is strong, and the middle (of the land) is with us as far as Cusae...He holds the land of the Asiatics; we hold Egypt. Should someone come and act against us, then we shall act against him." (CT-5-7)
Tl;dr: Southern Egyptians saw the north of Cusae as "land of the Asiatics" centuries before the first of these mummies to enter Abusir el Meleq. This site does not provide data during such a critical period of Egyptian history to understand the degree to which demographic change took place due to these migration patterns.
-Another problem: the authors admit upon peer review that they have no comparable data from the Old Kingdom and Middle Kingdom and that the site was not really populated until the Late period:
quote: Q5. Lines 75-77. “In particular, the site holds much promise for studying changes in its population structure from the late Dynastic Period to the present day.” Why is this the case? Is it due to the better DNA preservation in the later mummies?? Please explain!
Answer:Unfortunately, mummies from the Old till early New Kingdom are not present at the site or and not included in our data set, which focusses on the three consecutive periods. The site is mainly occupied during the Late Period till Roman times according to written sources, and thus would allow the study of an extended temporal transect. We furthermore find in more than 50% of all remains authentic ancient DNA preserved, suggesting this to be an ideal site for further studies.
The authors concede there's no way of knowing where these mummies came from or how much mixing had happened during the intermediate periods if they descended in part from natives. They don't have data from the site that precedes documented evidence of Asiatic migration into northern Egypt. And even if they did have it, they concede the site was before the Late Period wasn't very populated, leaving it questionable if the site would've ever (even in Old Kingdom times) been a worthy location to search for a representational model of Egyptian diversity.
The authors also describe foreign names being in the site they selected:
quote:Importantly, there is evidence for foreign influence at Abusir el-Meleq. Individuals with Greek, Latin and Hebrew names are known to have lived at the site and several coffins found at the cemetery used Greek portrait image and adapted Greek statue types to suit ‘Egyptian’ burial practices. The site’s first excavator, Otto Rubensohn, also found a Greek grave inscription in stone as well as a writing board inscribed in Greek46. Taken together with the multitude of Greek papyri that were written at the site, this evidence strongly suggests that at least some inhabitants of Abusir el-Meleq were literate in, and able to speak, Greek.
Egyptologist SOY Keita in his response to the research study (more highlights from his rebuttal later) notes that in spite of what data is available or absent for comparison (some of which noted above), the research team make great assumptions to arrive to their conclusions:
quote:The socio-cultural dynamics are not fully considered: the information on the origin and social status is incomplete, or unknowable in fact. The mummies are clearly assumed to be representative of the local population based on an incomplete archaeological report, in spite of the historical information provided about northern Egypt’s interaction with the Near East since the Predynastic, and the known settlements of Greeks, and others, in northern Egypt in later periods.
In peer review, the authors downplay existing data from southern sites that show southern African ancestry:
quote:Q13. Conclusions. I agree that in other sites, especially in the south of Egypt, there could be a much higher influence of Sub-Saharan populations. It is well known that there were close trading connections to Nubia and other Sub-Saharan areas during the Middle and New Kingdom. What does this mean for the interpretation of your findings?
Answer: We have addressed this point in our revised discussion (see lines 395-405). As an alternative explanation this would only mean that modern-day Egyptians might resemble more closely ancient Egyptians from the south. However, in the absence of data from southern sites, this also remains speculative.
Egyptologist SOY Keita review of Schuenemann et al. has so many points to cover that I highly suggest it is read. I'll cover some highlights:
Egyptologist SOY Keita responds to sample size and contributors to the field like Schuenemann et al. whose focus on using northern samples and publicly overstating their representation of a "true Egyptian," ignores a reality of the north being assimilated and integrated to Egyptian culture by the south during the predynastic:
quote:All of the samples are from the northern half of Egypt, from one nome which is 2.4% (1/42) of AE nomes. Ancient Egyptian culture originated southern Upper Egypt.
Egyptologist SOY Keita responds to Schuenemann et al.'s dismissal of data suggesting southern African (or Sub Saharan Afrian) genetic connections to southern Egypt.
quote:Schuenemann et al. seemingly suggest, based largely on the results of an ancient DNA study of later period remains from northern Egypt, that the ‘ancient Egyptians’ (AE) as an entity came from Asia (the Near East, NE), and that modern Egyptians “received additional sub-Saharan African (SSA) admixtures in recent times” after the latest period of the pharaonic era due to the “trans-Saharan slave trade and Islamic expansion.” In spite of the implied generalization about ‘origins’ the authors do offer the caveat that their findings may have been different if samples had been used from southern Egypt, and this is a significant admission. Their conclusions deserve further discussion from multiple perspectives which cannot be fully developed due to space limitations.
quote: The authors completely dismiss the results of PCR methods used on AE remains. As a Habicht et al. 4 states, PCR based methods were used successfully on mummified Egyptian cats and crocodiles without creating extensive debate..."
"... Our analysis of STRs from Amarna and Ramesside royal mummies with popAffiliator⁸ based on the same published data 5,6 indicates a 41.7% to 93.9% probability of SSA affinities (see Table 1); most of the individuals had a greater probability of affiliation with “SSA" which is not the only way to be "African" a point worth repeating."
Keita criticizes Schuenemann et al.'s implication of "SSA" ancestry in modern Egyptians as the result of the slave trade:
quote: Furthermore, SSA groups indicated to have contributed to modern Egypt do not match the Muslim trade routes that have been well documented as SSA groups from the great lakes and southern African regions were largely absent in the internal trading routes that went north to Egypt.
-Adding to Keita's points, evidence of the site's associations to the north include data that suggests Abusir el-Meleq during this Late Period of the samples was referred to by the Egyptians as a northern or Lower Egyptian site. It was frequently compared to Abydos due to the site's Osiris worship. Abydos was considered a southern epicenter of Osiris worship, while Abusir el Meleq was considered a site of worship associated with the north or Lower Egypt. Specifically, the research finds that it was translated and described as "Ꜣbḏw mḥt/mht(y)t" or "Northern Abydos/Abydos of the Lower Egypt, while Ꜣbḏw was the Abydos of Upper Egypt (s wr Ꜣbḏw sm) was the Osiris worship center of the south. You can read more about it here:
The irony is that I was going to post more on Abusir el Meleq. The tombs there were reported to have Hebrew names.
DO you have any info on the Hebrew graves in the area? Does dating match up with various Israel in Egypt narratives?
-------------------- Note: I am not an "Egyptologist" as claimed by some still bitter, defeated, trolls creating fake profiles and posts elsewhere. Hapless losers, you still fail. My output of hard data debunking racist nonsense has actually INCREASED since you began.. Posts: 5905 | From: The Hammer | Registered: Aug 2008
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quote:Importantly, there is evidence for foreign influence at Abusir el-Meleq. Individuals with Greek, Latin and Hebrew names are known to have lived at the site and several coffins found at the cemetery used Greek portrait image and adapted Greek statue types to suit ‘Egyptian’ burial practices
It says Hebrew names were found and Abusir el-Meleq was not occupied in large amount until the later periods according to them so it's likely there may have been some historical overlap in time period. They cite two sources (although I think only one deals with that answer specifically). I wasn't able to get very far from the previews of Broux online but this is what they sourced.
sources cited:
Broux, Y. & Depauw, M. in Social Informatics (eds Aiello, L. M., McFarland, D.) 304–313 (Springer, 2015).
Riggs, C. The Beautiful Burial in Roman Egypt: Art, Identity, and Funerary Religion Oxford University Press (2005).
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Distinctive "Bushman canine" dental feature, found most frequently in sub-Saharan Africa, also appears among Ancient Egyptians. Dental data confirmed by DNA analysis showing Haplogroup L0f, a southern African marker, also appearing in Egyptians. Quote:
"It is important to note that “SSA” influence may not be due to a slave trade, an overdone explanation; the green Sahara is to be considered as Egypt is actually in the eastern Sahara. SSA affinities of modern Egyptians from Abusir El-Meleq might be attributed to ancient early settlers as there is a notable frequency of the “Bushmen canine”- deemed a SSA trait in Predynastic samples dating to 4,000 BC9 from Adaima, Upper Egypt. Haplogroup L0f, usually associated with southern Africans, is present in living Egyptians in Adaima and could represent the product of an ancient “ghost population” from the Green Sahara that contributed widely. " [Crubézy, E. Le peuplement de la vallée du Nil. Archéo-Nil 20, 25-42 (2010).] --FROM: Ancient Egyptian Genomes from northern Egypt: Further discussion Gourdine1, Keita, Gourdine and Anselin. 2017
'Bushman canine' feature primarily African, and oft falsely reported in other populations. Quote:
The mesial lingual ridge is an almost invariant feature of the upper canines while tuberculum dentale is polymorphic. In some cases, a large tuberculum dentate coalesces with the mesial lingual ridge to form what Morris (1975) calls the Bushman canine. This fact is most evident when one antimere exhibits the ‘Bushmen canine’ while the other exhibits a large free-standing tuberculum projection. This trait is most common in African populations, especially the Bushmen, but it has been observed in populations from other geographic areas, in some cases falsely so (Irish and Morris, 1996).
-- Scott and Turner. 2000. The Anthropology of Modern Human Teeth: Dental Morphology and Its Variation.. p31-33
Africans have the highest ancestral dental diversity. Distinctive traits by SOME Africans are part of an INDIGENOUS range not stereotypical "Previous research by the first author revealed that, relative to other modern peoples, sub-Saharan Africans exhibit the highest frequencies of ancestral (or plesiomorphic) dental traits... The fact that sub-Saharan Africans express these apparently plesiomorphic characters, along with additional information on their affinity to other modern populations, evident intra-population heterogeneity, and a world-wide dental cline emanating from the sub-continent, provides further evidence that is consistent with an African origin model." (Irish JD, Guatelli-Steinberg D.(2003) Ancient teeth and modern human origins: an expanded comparison of African Plio-Pleistocene and recent world dental samples. Hum Evol. 2003 Aug;45(2):113-44. )
African populations have a broad range of characteristics- the most diverse in the world. Distinctive dental traits in one place do not mean ALL Africans are "supposed" to have the same thing, at all times, in all places. Nor does the absence of a unique trait in one area make the people "non-African". Some Africans have the feature, others do not, but all categories are still Africans. With these caveats noted against stereotypical claims that "only" Africans with said feature are true" Africans, the Bushman Canine feature registers notable frequencies in Africa and appears in Egypt, which too, is in Africa.
"Because over one-third of Blacks manifest this condition, while it is rare in Whites and Asians, the presence of this feature supports an attribution of a skull to this ancestral group. The Bushman canine also is useful for attributing a skull to Black. In this trait, an additional cusp appears on the lingual side of the crown of the maxillary canine, making this tooth similar in configuration to a lower first premolar (Figure 7.1 lb). Because its frequency in Blacks is three times higher than other ancestral groups, the presence of this trait in the dentition of forensic remains generally implies Black ancestry." --By Steven N. Byers. Introduction to Forensic Anthropology. p. 141
"This range of variation is compatible with those obtained by genetic, craniometric, and odontometric data. Subsaharan Africans show the largest intra-regional diversity among the groups compared.. Regardless of different population structures in each geographic region, the gradients of the diversity presented herein indicate that geographic distance from subsaharan Africa is a significant and primary determinant of nonmetric dental variation observed on the vast Eurasian, Australian, and New World regions .. the geographic distance from subsaharan Africa along likely colonization routes is one of the strongly supported predictors for not only genetic but also phenotypic diversity of modern human populations. The pattern of decrease in dental variation with distance from East Africa is more or less smooth and provides no suggestion for major discontinuities that could be interpreted as evidence for a second or multiple origin(s) of modern human populations. Therefore, the globally distributed populations can be explained by an expansion from subSaharan Africa." --Tsunehiko Hanihara*. 2008. Morphological variation of major human populations based on nonmetric dental traits. AJPA 136:169–182
-------------------- Note: I am not an "Egyptologist" as claimed by some still bitter, defeated, trolls creating fake profiles and posts elsewhere. Hapless losers, you still fail. My output of hard data debunking racist nonsense has actually INCREASED since you began.. Posts: 5905 | From: The Hammer | Registered: Aug 2008
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Tukuler
multidisciplinary Black Scholar
Member # 19944
posted
Originally posted by zarahan- aka Enrique Cardova:
EGYPT'S PIONEERING DEVELOPMENT OF WRITING- NON-ALPHABETICAL AND ALPHABETICAL
Egypt a pioneer of writing before Mesopotamia "The earliest known Sumerian writings date back to 3000BC while the German team's find shows that Abydos inscriptions date to 3400BC. The first Pharaonic dynasty began in 2920BC with King Menes. The earliest known writing in Dynasty Zero is much earlier than the oldest writing discovered in Mesopotamia." --Gaballa Ali Gaballa, Secretary-General of the Egyptian Supreme Council of Antiquities: 1999. IN: Nevine El-Aref, "Did writing originate in Egypt?" Al-Ahram Weekly: 1 - 7 April 1999, Issue No. 423
Certain writing forms in Mesopotamia and only understandable from Egyptian perspective
"[Archaeologist] Dreyer asserted that the obsidian used to make this bowl came from Ethiopia suggesting significant cultural contacts among Nile Valley populations. He concluded his presentation by noting similarities between specific Egyptian and Mesopotamian objects and suggesting that perhaps there is an initial influence of Egyptian writing on Mesopotamia because there are signs on Mesopotamian objects that are only "readable" from the standpoint of the Egyptian language, but not the Mesopotamian language." -- German archaeologist Gunther Dreyer. 2000. "Beginnings of Writing in Ancient Egypt" IN: - "Recent Finds in Predynastic Egypt." ANKH Journal 8/9: 1999-2000.
Africa's Nile Valley shares in creation of the historic alphabet
"Discoveries by Gunter Dreyer of the German Archaeological Institute suggest that the origin of Egyptian writing needs to be reexamined, offering the possibility that the idea of writing was developed in Egypt several centuries before it occurred in the Near East. Inscriptions from hundreds of pots and labels found at the royal cemetery at Abydos show some hieroglyphic writing as far back as 3400 BCE, with most occurring about 3200 BCE. Sumerian writing seems to have begun about 3100 BCE. The Egyptians formed and used writing in a different way than the Asians. The linguistic pictographs of Sumer were rudimentary were used primarily used for commerce. Those of Egypt were more representational of real objects and were primarily employed to identify kings, tombs and the like.
A remarkable find involving early experiments with alphabetic writing in Egypt has been recently made by John C. Darnell, an Egyptologist at Yale University, and his wife Deborah. Inscriptions discovered in the limestone cliffs on an ancient road between Thebes and Abydos, a route once heavily traveled by Asian traders and mercenaries in the Egyptian desert, are in a Semitic script with Egyptian influences. Dated between 1900 and 1000 BCE, they are two or three centuries older than previous evidence of an alphabet in the Semitic-speaking territory of the Sinai Peninsula or in the Syria-Palestine region occupied by the Canaanites. While there have always been indications that Semites were inventors of the alphabet, researchers had heretofore assumed that it was developed in their own lands by borrowing and simplifying Egyptian hieroglyphs. Instead Darnell's discovery now suggests that, working with Semitic speakers in Egypt, native scribes simplified formal pictographic Egyptian writing and modified the symbols into an early alphabet using a semi-cursive form commonly used in the Middle Kingdom."
--Martin Isler (2001). Sticks, stones, and shadows: building the Egyptian pyramids. Univ of Oklahoma PRess. p. 56
The Egyptian Western Desert- location of Egyptian military scripts adopted by both Egyptian scribes and Semitic speakers into alphabetic forms http://www.codex99.com/typography/11.html
"However, now with the recovery of alphabetic writing from the Egyptian Western Desert, the fairly high degree of literacy in Egyptian (knowledge of hieratic, and a hybrid of hieratic and hieroglyphic scripts as well) presumed by these texts, and the well known Asiatic pres-ence within Egypt proper from the early Dynastic periods onwards, strongly suggest that it is to Egypt itself that we must look for the geographi-cal home of alphabetic writing. More specifically, the Bebi inscription and its immediate neighbors offer tantalizing clues about the context in which Semitic-speaking Asiatics adopted and adapted certain aspects of the Egyptian writing system for the needs of their own language(s). The Egyptian military, known both to have employed Asiatics (as the Bebi inscription so wonderfully attests) and to have included scribes, would provide one likely context in which Western Asiatic Semitic language speakers could have learned and eventually adapted the Egyptian writing system. Indeed, the prominence of lapidary hieratic, the form of hieratic utilized by army scribes, as models for alphabetic forms at the Wadi el-Hõl (and at Serabit).." --J. Darnell et al. 2005. Two Early Alphabetic Inscriptions from the Wadi el-Hol: New Evidence for the Origin of the Alphabet from the Western Desert of Egypt, Annual of the American Schools of Oriental Research 2005.
Shakes up some commonly accepted assumptions, and explores key themes on Egypt seen in books, articles and even online forums.
FROM THE INTRODUCTION:
"At the mention of ancient Egyptian society, our minds most often conjure images of pyramids, golden funerary masks, and militant kings. Yet this socio-historical narrative is rooted in Egyptology’s colonial origins and is replete with ingrained and oft-repeated adages:
Egypt is the gift of the Nile. Egypt is Kemet, the Black Land: a land without cities, a land of gold, whose king was a god and smote his foreign enemies to defeat chaos. The ancient Egyptians were obsessed with death and religion, feasted on bread and beer, treated women relatively well (by ancient standards), and despite the wealth of preserved material culture, had no true art. Ancient Egyptian society featured a pyramid-like hierarchy with the king at the top, followed by the elites, administrators, craftsmen, and peasants. They were an inward-looking society, rejecting outside people and practices.
Most people who have read an introductory book, taken a class, or watched a documentary about Ancient Egyptian society will fnd all of this familiar—yet to difering extents, all of these adages stem from assumptions, some true, some questionable, some changing according to time and circumstance, but all ingrained into the study of ancient Egypt. Indeed, the very discipline of Egyptology has only just begun to grapple with its colonial foundations, and its scholarship has long prioritized the state’s grand royal artistic and textual production over all else. Indeed, the agenda of political elites is often so convincing that it is easy to accept the narrative provided by these select communities, making it difficult to fnd or “read” evidence to the contrary. It is therefore important to recognize that ancient Egypt had many societies at any given time, all of them overlapping, mixed and interacting."
ref: Danielle Candelora, Nadia Ben-Marzouk, Kathlyn M. Cooney. (2022) Ancient Egyptian Society_ Challenging Assumptions, Exploring Approaches-Routledge. pg 3
CONTENTS
Introduction 1 1 Investigating Ancient Egypt’s Societies: Past Approaches and New Directions 3 Danielle Candelora, Nadia Ben-Marzouk, and Kathlyn M. Cooney
SECTION I Power 9 2 Power and the Study of Ancient Egyptian Society 11 Nadia Ben-Marzouk 3 Hidden Violence: Reassessing Violence and Human Sacrifce in Ancient Egypt 17 Roselyn A. Campbell vi Contents 4 Making the Past Present: The Use of Archaism and Festivals in the Transmission of Egyptian Royal Ideology 29 Jefrey Newman 5 Divine Kingship and the Royal Ka 40 Jonathan Winnerman 6 Trade, Statehood, and Confgurations of Power in Ancient Egypt (Early-Middle Bronze Age) 49 Juan Carlos Moreno García 7 The Social Pyramid and the Status of Craftspeople in Ancient Egypt 62 Caroline Arbuckle MacLeod 8 Ancient Egyptian Decorum: Demarcating and Presenting Social Action 74 John Baines 9 Co-regency in the 25th Dynasty: A Case Study of the Chapel of Osiris-Ptah Neb-ankh at Karnak 90 Essam Nagy
SECTION II People 101 10 The Egyptianization of Egypt and Egyptology: Exploring Identity in Ancient Egypt 103 Danielle Candelora
11 Ancient Egyptian “Origins” and “Identity” 111 S. O. Y. Keita
12 Eight Medjay Walk into a Palace: Bureaucratic Categorization and Cultural Mistranslation of Peoples in Contact 122 Kate Liszka Contents vii 13 The Value of Children in Ancient Egypt 140 Caroline Arbuckle MacLeod 14 Orientalizing the Ancient Egyptian Woman 152 Jordan Galczynski 15 The Ancient Egyptian Artist: A Non-Existing Category? 163 Dimitri Laboury and Alisée Devillers 16 Hellenistic Warfare and Egyptian Society 182 Christelle Fischer-Bovet 17 Revealing the Invisible Majority: “Hegemonic” Group Artefacts as Biography Containers of “Underprivileged” Groups 195 Gianluca Miniaci 18 Reevaluating Social Histories: The Use of Ancient Egypt in Contemporary Art 210 Nicholas R. Brown
SECTION III Place 223 19 People of Nile and Sun, Wheat and Barley: Ancient Egyptian Society and the Agency of Place 225 Kathlyn M. Cooney 20 Shifting Boundaries, Conficting Perspectives: (Re)establishing the Borders of Kemet Through Variable Social Identities 235 Danielle Candelora 21 Urban versus Village Society in Ancient Egypt: A New Perspective 248 Nadine Moeller viii Contents 22 Reassessing the Value of Autobiographical Inscriptions from the First Intermediate Period and “Pessimistic Literature” for Understanding Egypt’s Social History 265 Ellen Morris 23 Othering the Alphabet: Rewriting the Social Context of a New Writing System in the Egyptian Expedition Community 279 Nadia Ben-Marzouk 24 Language Policy and the Administrative Framework of Early Islamic Egypt 299 Jennifer Cromwell 25 New Methods to Reconstruct the Social History of Food in Ancient Egypt: Case Studies from Nag ed Deir and Deir el Ballas 313 Amr Khalaf Shahat 26 Stop and Smell the Flowers: A Re-Assessment of the Ancient Egyptian “Blue Lotus” 325 Robyn Price 27 The Body of Egypt: How Harem Women Connected a King with his Elites 336 Kathlyn M. Cooney, Chloe Landis and Turandot Shayegan
-------------------- Note: I am not an "Egyptologist" as claimed by some still bitter, defeated, trolls creating fake profiles and posts elsewhere. Hapless losers, you still fail. My output of hard data debunking racist nonsense has actually INCREASED since you began.. Posts: 5905 | From: The Hammer | Registered: Aug 2008
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