posted
Note: Re-posting because the last thread was deleted!!
Update from Schild and the gang. Basically they dig further, tracing continuity in African pottery styles from their early inception and establishing a relationship between the Arkinian of Lower Nubia and the people of Napta Playa and Egypt's western desert, claiming the latter likely emerged from some Nile Valley industry.
quote: Finds of the earliest African pottery come from the south-eastern and southern fringes of the Sahara as well as its central, mountainous regions, i.e. the areas of the Early Holocene reach of the summer rainfall, a consequence of the northward shift of monsoonal circulation. The oldest African vessels from fired clay known so far represent a very high technological level and a simple, very limited range of shapes. It is obvious that Early Holocene colonisers of the Sahara came from regions that could be settled during the arid period of the late Pleistocene. This poses yet another problem — where were they situated? Could these regions also include the mountainous central Sahara (Jesse 2003a: 43)? Most of the central Sahara data, however, indicate the onset of humid conditions as late as the Early Holocene (compare summary in Wendorf et al. 2007: 197). In short, data presently to hand exclude the possibility of human survival in the central Sahara mountainous area during the Late Glacial or early Last Termination. It is more than likely that the Early Holocene colonisers of the southern Western Desert, the El Adam hunter-gatherer-cattle keepers, came to the south-eastern fringes of the Sahara from the Nile Valley. The El Adam technology and style is almost identical to that of the Arkinian, a final Late Palaeolithic culture known from the flooded village of Arkin in Lower Nubia, some 80km to the south-east of Nabta Playa (Schild et al. 1968). The oldest known Arkinian settlements have been securely dated to the early Younger Dryas, c. 10 900–10 400 cal BC (Wendorf et al. 1979). Other sites, whilst clearly stratigraphically younger, have not yet been radiocarbon dated. Excavations of the early Arkinian occupations have not yielded pottery; however, the areas opened were limited to only around 20m2 at the oldest in situ campsite — Dibeira West 1, Concentration A (Schild et al. 1968: 654; de Heinzelin 1968: fig. 41). Here we should perhaps mention important possible parallels resulting from stratigraphies of language in north-eastern Africa. The terminology associated with cattle raising in the northern Sudanic division of the Nilo-Saharan languages was established before 8500 BC, perhaps around the same time that the first pottery-making registered in the lexical data (Ehrer 2006: 1044). Where, then, were the most likely potential African pottery inventors 112Research Maciej Jordeczka ´ et al. and pot-makers dwelling? Presumably also in the areas of natural occurrence of the extinct aurochs, in our case in the Nile Valley, in Lower Nubia, north of the tsetse fly line
Early Holocene pottery in the Western Desert of Egypt: new data from Nabta Playa (2011)
^So much for Ian Shaw's claim that the "Badarian are no longer thought to have come from the south" by virtue of their shared close affinities with the populations of the western desert (since ultimately they would have according to this new data).
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Michal Kobusiewicz, Romald Schild, Institute of Archaeology and Ethnology (2005)
... the Combined Prehistoric Expedition has discovered a massive kurgan in the Nabta Playa lake basin, towering over the fields of stone monoliths, now destroyed by the desert winds. Its small burial pit was found to contain the head of a child 2.5 to 3 years old, undoubtedly the offspring of a powerful ruler of the Nubian Desert about 3,500 years BC, just prior to the establishment of the first Egyptian state.
We already know that soon after this date, drought forced the herders to abandon these lands. Digging deeper and deeper wells proved insufficient, and people had go elsewhere in search of water. And so where might they have gone, if not to the relatively close Nile Valley? They brought with them the various achievements of their culture and their belief system. Perhaps it was indeed these people who provided the crucial stimulus towards the emergence of state organization in ancient Egypt. http://wysinger.homestead.com/20-24_20kobusiewicz.pdf also at Gebel Ramlah Reposted from E/S by Myra Wysinger http://www.egyptsearch.com/forums/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=8;t=007364
quote:Originally posted by Truthcentric: ^ From whence does Shaw think the Western Desert people came if not the south?
quote:Originally posted by Sundjata: He doesn't specify but even within his own statement he contradicts himself:
quote: For a long time the Badarian was considered to have emerged from the south, because it was thought that the Badarians had poor knowledge of chert, which would show that they came from the non-calcareous part of Egypt to the south; on the other hand, the origins of agriculture and animal husbandry were assumed to lie in the Near East. The theory that the Badarian originated in the south is, however, no longer accepted. The selection of chert is perfectly logical for the Badarian lithic technology, which seems to show links with the Late Neolithic from the Western Desert. The rippled pottery, one of the most characteristic features of the Badarian, probably developed from burnished and smudged pottery, which is present both in late Sahara Neolithic sites and from Merimda in the north to the Khartoum Neolithic sites **in the south**. Rippled pottery may thus have been a local development of a Saharan tradition. --Shaw (2003)
^People such as Hassan have already established that the rippled pottery at the Khartoum sites are older so the above makes no sense in and of its self, yet if he's claiming the main source for the Badarian population was the Western Desert, then the earlier said Western Desert culture shows origins among predecessor cultures in the "Nubian" Nile Valley (which is to the south)
quote:Originally posted by Djehutu: ^ Indeed, I've long noticed contradictions in Shaw's writings. It was the poster Melchior who recently brought this to my attention albeit unintentionally since his purpose was to cite Shaw as evidence against southern origins.
"The origins of the Badarian are equally problematic. It seems that the Badarian Culture did not appear from a single source although the Western Desert was probably the predominant one."
Yet here we have recent evidence showing the ancestors of these Western Desert people to come from the Nubian Nile Valley.
His claims for the subsequent Naqada culture which kicks starts pharaonic civilization seems even more senseless.
"The fact that the material culture of the Naqada culture was later found in northern Egypt with no Nubian elements would also seem to argue against any Nubian origin for the Egyptian state."
As as I said to Melchior, how is the later variant of Naqada in the north not having Nubian elements proof of non-Nubian origins when the earliest forms in the south do have Nubian elements??
quote: Originally posted by Truthcentric:
From whence does Shaw think the Western Desert people came if not the south?
Obviously farther west in Libya. However, being 'Libyan' does not mean having distant or even no relation to peoples to the east and south.
The period when sub-Saharan Africa was most influential in Egypt was a time when neither Egypt, as we understand it culturally, nor the Sahara, as we understand it geographically, existed. Populations and cultures now found south of the desert roamed far to the north. The culture of Upper Egypt, which became dynastic Egyptian civilization, could fairly be called a Sudanese transplant. Egypt rapidly found a method of disciplining the river, the land, and the people to transform the country into a titanic garden. Egypt rapidly developed detailed cultural forms that dwarfed its forebears in urbanity and elaboration. Thus, when new details arrived, they were rapidly adapted to the vast cultural superstructure already present. On the other hand, pharaonic culture was so bound to its place near the Nile that its huge, interlocked religious, administrative, and formal structures could not be readily transferred to relatively mobile cultures of the desert, savanna, and forest. The influence of the mature pharaonic civilizations of Egypt and Kush was almost confined to their sophisticated trade goods and some significant elements of technology. Nevertheless, the religious substratum of Egypt and Kush was so similar to that of many cultures in southern Sudan today that it remains possible that fundamental elements derived from the two high cultures to the north live on.--Joseph O. Vogel (1997)
It is possible from this overview of the data to conclude that the limited conceptual vocabulary shared by the ancestors of contemporary Chadic-speakers (therefore also contemporary Cushitic-speakers), contemporary Nilotic-speakers and Ancient Egyptian-speakers suggests that the earliest speakers of the Egyptian language could be located to the south of Upper Egypt (Diakonoff 1998) or, earlier, in the Sahara (Wendorf 2004), where Takács (1999, 47) suggests their ‘long co-existence’ can be found. In addition, it is consistent with this view to suggest that the northern border of their homeland was further than the Wadi Howar proposed by Blench (1999, 2001), which is actually its southern border. Neither Chadics nor Cushitics existed at this time, but their ancestors lived in a homeland further north than the peripheral countries that they inhabited thereafter, to the south-west, in a Niger-Congo environment, and to the south-east, in a Nilo-Saharan environment, where they interacted and innovated in terms of language. From this perspective, the Upper Egyptian cultures were an ancient North East African ‘periphery at the crossroads’, as suggested by Dahl and Hjort-af-Ornas of the Beja (Dahl and Hjort-af-Ornas 2006). The most likely scenario could be this: some of these Saharo-Nubian populations spread southwards to Wadi Howar, Ennedi and Darfur; some stayed in the actual oases where they joined the inhabitants; and others moved towards the Nile, directed by two geographic obstacles, the western Great Sand Sea and the southern Rock Belt. Their slow perambulations led them from the area of Sprinkle Mountain (Gebel Uweinat) to the east – Bir Sahara, Nabta Playa, Gebel Ramlah, and Nekhen/Hierakonpolis (Upper Egypt), and to the north-east by way of Dakhla Oasis to Abydos (Middle Egypt).--Anselin (2009)
Posts: 4021 | From: Bay Area, CA | Registered: Mar 2007
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posted
^What a mess (if I recall, astenb, zarahan, someone else and myself also contributed more data and useful replies that are forever lost, and for nothing. This thread likely can't be salvaged, so I'm going to just keep the information handy for the future and hopefully others do as well.
To hell with Egyptsearch! I'll be back bigger and stronger but for now, I'm ghost (I refuse to contribute to these people's traffic and their advertisement money). Peace. Posts: 4021 | From: Bay Area, CA | Registered: Mar 2007
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quote:Originally posted by Sundjata: Note: Re-posting because the last thread was deleted!!
For the last two days when I tried to login it would say the site was under construction to come back later....guess that's what has been going on, I.e., erasing posts and threads.
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Information on the Gebel Ramlah burial ground... Skeletal remains of 67 individuals ... Radiocarbon dates indicate that these burials were made in the fifth millennium B.C., during the last phase of Neolithic settlement in this region, which is called Bunat El Ansam (Megalith Builder) by Wendorf and Schild (2001). The undisturbed nature of the skeletal remains, grave goods, and the graves themselves facilitated the collection of important new data concerning these ancient people. A total of 896 artifacts of various types were recovered ... black-topped pottery were also recovered
From a physical anthropological viewpoint, the population sample exhibits evidence of North African and sub-Saharan admixture.
The communities using the cemeteries described above were almost the last dwellers of the dying savanna, which is today’s desert. The worsening drought soon forced them to migrate toward the Nile Valley, where they undoubtedly brought their culture, organizational system and beliefs contributing to the birth of ancient Egyptian civilization.
Source: http://www.britishmuseum.org/pdf/Kobusiewicz.pdf Michal Kobusiewicz, Jacek Kabaciński, Romuald Schild, Joel D. Irish and Fred Wendorf, British Museum Studies in Ancient Egypt and Sudan 13 (2009): 147–74
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FRED WENDORF, ROMUALD SCHILD & ASSOCIATES. The archaeology of Nabta Playa (Holocene Settlement of the Egyptian Sahara Vol. 1). xiii+707 pages, 332 figures, 320 tables. 2001. New York (NY): Kluwer Academic/ Plenum; 0-306-46612-0 hardback $145.
KIT NELSON & ASSOCIATES. The pottery of Nabta Playa (Holocene Settlement of the Egyptian Sahara Vol. 2). xiii+122 pages, 81 figures, 17 tables. 2002. New York (NY): Kluwer Academic/Plenum; 0-306-46613-9 hardback $75.
TOBY WILKINSON. Genesis of the pharaohs: dramatic new discoveries that rewrite the origins of ancient Egypt. 2003. London: Thames & Hudson;0-500-05122-4 hardback 18.95 [pounds sterling].
The volumes under discussion, while very different in nature and value, reflect a growing dissatisfaction with the application of a classic Childean paradigm to the evolution of Egyptian civilisation. An increasing number of studies are now questioning the once axiomatic importance of settled village life as the basis for early state formation, and returning to older models in which mobile groups, and particularly pastoralists, played a greater role. As they apply to Egypt, many of these models were formulated during the early twentieth century, and reflect broader assumptions of their time concerning the evolutionary potential of indigenous African populations. Accordingly, they need to be treated with critical care, even by well meaning archaeologists whose aim seems to be to turn those same ideas on their head, in order to demonstrate a pristine African genesis for such important innovations as plant cultivation or animal domestication.
Nabta Playa
For over a decade now, the fieldwork of the Combined Prehistoric Expedition in Egypt's south-western desert Has been a source of heated controversy, owing to their claim for a local domestication of African cattle in this region during the Early Holocene. The main proponents of this view, Professors Wendorf & Schild, had their fingers badly burned during the 1980s over claims for local cereal domestication in the Late Palaeolithic Nile valley, which were based upon an intrusive sample, eventually exposed through their own scrupulous application of accelerator mass spectrometry dating. Bitten, but not shy, they have expressed their views on the presence of domestic cattle at Nabta Playa during the ninth to eigth millennia cal BC in a range of high profile articles, and incorporate them into the chronological framework of this large monograph, which represents the culmination of many years' dedicated research. Both in this volume and the supplementary study of pottery that accompanies it, the contributors follow the Neolithic sequence of Nabta Playa proposed in earlier reports. This sequence commences some four millennia prior to that of the Nile valley, such that the Early Neolithic (Badarian/Khartoum Neolithic) of the latter region corresponds broadly to the Late Neolithic of Nabta Playa.
Before commenting on the validity of this framework, it is important to stress the objective contribution that these volumes make to the prehistory of the eastern Sahara. They are extremely well produced, with ample illustrations and statistics, and no detail is spared in the description of habitation sites and small finds. Important chapters by Krystyna Wasylikowa and Achilles Gautier bring the floral and faunal records of Nabta Playa up to date, and detailed studies of human skeletal and bird remains are also offered. The second volume, edited by Kit Nelson, deals with pottery, but is not a conventional ceramic report. Rather, it is a collection of essays on the typology, distribution, and technology of Early Holocene ceramic production in North East Africa. Maria Gatto's essay on 'stylistic attributes and regional relationships' is of particular importance to regional specialists, especially in its convincing, if slightly coy, back-dating of the Khartoum Variant of Lower Nubia. The striking distribution of Early Holocene impressed wares across Middle Africa, from the Atlantic to the Red Sea, is commented upon by a number of authors, but there is a disappointing reluctance to discuss their significance on anything but a local scale. There are also regrettably few insights into the function of these vessels, beyond the observation that they were probably not used for cooking (p. 3). It is also a pity that the typological system developed in this second volume, which is considerably more useful than its predecessors, has not been adopted by the excavators in the main site report.
In all respects other than the putative presence of early domestic cattle, the archaeological record of Nabta Playa appears from this report to be pretty much as one would expect. The general impression is of small forager communities exploiting a wide variety of plant resources around the shores of a seasonal lake during the Early Holocene. These groups also engaged in opportunistic hunting activities and made pottery and ostrich-eggshell beads. At some point during the seventh or early sixth millennium cal BC (all dates in the actual reports are uncalibrated) exotic sheep and goat were introduced, ultimately from a South-west Asian source, and this date for their introduction is corroborated by evidence from sites further to the east such as Sodmein Cave, en route to the Red Sea coast. This period falls within the excavators' 'Middle Neolithic', which has undergone a major revision since its original description in a number of preliminary reports. According to the final report, the evidence for this period is now reduced to a single habitation site (E-75-8), and other locales formerly assigned to it have now been dated back to the 'Early Neolithic' (i.e. the Early Holocene).
This correction makes any evaluation of the long-term development of the Nabta region and its economy difficult, particularly given the very small sample of cattle bones recovered from E-75-8. It is also disconcerting to read that the dating of the earliest sheep/goat remains at Nabta Playa is the 'most economical explanation' of their location (p. 385); the comforts of stratigraphic certainty are clearly lacking among the playa sands and silts. There is a clear reduction in the size of cattle bones during the sixth-fifth millennia BC ('Late Neolithic'), but it is unclear whether this is due to the introduction of domestic herds from further east or a gradual, local process of herd management (Gautier, p. 628). The argument that this process had already begun at Nabta Playa during the Early Holocene is based primarily upon the assertion that wild cattle could not otherwise have survived in this region, due to its aridity. Wasylikowa's chapter leaves plenty of room for doubt on this front, however. While notions of an Early Holocene 'green desert' are no doubt exaggerated, Nabta Playa was clearly located close to the northern frontier of Sahel/savannah vegetation. The implications for this debate of mitochondrial DNA sequences from Old World cattle appear to be more equivocal than the excavators imply, and it is a pity that they were unable to address the various important critiques of their theory put forward in Blench & MacDonald (2000). Finally, it seems inherently unlikely that Early Holocene cattle could have served as 'walking larders' in the way that they suggest (e.g., p. 657), as the development of regular dairying would surely not have formed part of the initial domestication process.
While earlier attempts at animal management cannot be entirely excluded, the first convincing evidence for cattle domestication seems to occur during the so-called 'Late Neolithic' of Nabta Playa, which corresponds broadly to the earliest evidence for herding economies in other parts of Egypt and Sudan, integrating this locale into a wider regional pattern. As in these other areas, it is accompanied by ritual treatments of animal bodies in the form of burials. The excavators have proposed that these burials form part of a large complex of megalithic sculpture and architecture, incorporating a solar calendar made up of small sandstone slabs (discussed by various authors in Chapters 14-7). These latter claims have been widely publicised in preliminary reports and articles, and many people will be turning to these chapters to discover the substance behind them. The result is ultimately disappointing, and I find it extremely difficult to accept either the interpretation of these extensive rock scatters (many of which are not in situ) or the evidence for their dating, which is based upon three widely varying C14 determinations and a small umber of loosely associated artefacts. Volumes 1 and 2 of Nabta Playa are a superb addition to the prehistory of the eastern Sahara, but the rich data they offer are compromised by rigid adherence to what remains a highly questionable hypothesis for the origins of herding economies in North East Africa. This hypothesis is not made more palatable by a heavy reliance upon ethnographic parallels drawn from early twentieth century studies of pastoral societies in southern Sudan, constantly described in the present tense, or by the revival of Herskovits' notion of an African Cattle Complex, already described as a 'mouldering cliche' by Lucy Mair in the 1980s (for all of these points, see Wengrow 2001).
Tourists
We turn now from the Western to the Eastern Desert of Egypt, and to a different calibre of publication altogether. Genesis of the Pharaohs wears its sensational subtitle like a fig-leaf, and demands a frank response. Its author has kept up his interest in Egypt by acting as a guide for Ancient World Tours. This company offers a package holiday set up by David Rohl. Rohl has become famous for making a pretty penny off that pre-Enlightenment underbelly of western culture which still hungers for an irrational account of its own origins. The tour involves a five day safari in the Eastern Desert, during which tourists are 'briefed on how to record petroglyphs' (p. 31). The company's Web-site states that 'Many of our passengers ... have been published for discoveries made in the desert', and this presumably includes names that keep cropping up in Genesis of the Pharaohs.
During one stopover Wilkinson claims to have discovered a 'treasure-house of images' that 'had never been recorded before' (p. 10). So what do these new discoveries consist of? Well, it is very hard to say, since all of the material illustrated in this volume is well known to archaeologists, much of it having been in print for the best part of a century. Wilkinson's methods are similarly antiquated. Discover the origins of a magic symbol, he suggests, and you unlock the key to an ancient civilisation; an approach favoured by those swastika-seekers of the early twentieth century whose 'twisted ideology' he chides in Chapter 1. Wilkinson's strategy seems to be to assert that archaeologists know much less than they actually do, in order to present his own very old ideas as original thoughts. Take, for instance, his bold claim to have solved the intractable problem of identifying predynastic imagery among Egypt's rock art, by comparing petroglyphs to images on painted pottery. This is presented as an entirely new approach, but has of course been tried--with many of the same examples, and equally unconvincing results--since the early twentieth century. In Chapter 4, rather than bother with the extensive archaeological record of the Naqada II period, Wilkinson seeks to convey 'life in predynastic Egypt' through a potted biography of a fictional character called Sen, a milk-swigging animist with bourgeois pretensions, who spends much of his time dodging crocodiles, but is none too upset when a close friend or relative is eaten by one, because (hey, shucks) 'it was simply part and parcel of the natural order' (p. 131). The pretext for this sloppiness is presumably a desire to present the reader with an 'engaging detective story' (front sleeve), but we are clearly in the intellectual territory of Enid Blyton rather than Umberto Eco.
Wilkinson's opening chapter attempts to deal with the history of scholarship on Egyptian rock art. Incredibly, there is no mention here of the Hamitic hypothesis, which first led scholars to date rock carvings of cattle to the predynastic period, on the grounds that modern pastoralists in North-east Africa are living remnants of a racial substratum that preceded the emergence of Egyptian civilisation. By failing to understand the theoretical basis of their errors, Wilkinson is fated to repeat them. The essence of the hypothesis was that indigenous Africans could not have created Egyptian civilisation, and the Hamitic substratum was believed to contain an admixture of Semitic and even Indo-European elements, introduced to Africa through pastoral migrations. This was, of course, another variant on the colonial fantasy of a 'dynastic race', coming from outside to civilise a savage Africa; a theory now revived by David Rohl, and rejected in a rather apologetic manner by Wilkinson, despite what he finds to be its 'enchanting' appeal (p. 148). But one does not have to believe in migrations to support the notion of a master race. According to Wilkinson, the Badarians of Neolithic Egypt were able to resist climatic onslaughts and become the 'ancestors of the pharaohs' because, through their seasonal movements, they 'and their descendants had developed the physical, mental and social resources to survive--to survive and prosper' (p. 185). This interpretation is offered as an antidote to prevailing archaeological theories of early state formation, which according to Wilkinson have had nothing to say on the matter other than: 'when freed from the daily search for food, the ancient Egyptians were able to devote their energies to other activities' (p. 164).
Genesis of the Pharaohs is littered with basic factual errors, anachronisms and painful omissions. The prehistoric Nile Delta is wrongly characterised as an impoverished swamp, there is no mention at all of the Fayum Neolithic, and we are asked to believe that barley was cultivated at Nabta Playa during the Early Holocene. Painted images from a predynastic linen found at Gebelein are compared to a boat carving that almost certainly dates to the New Kingdom. A painted bowl 'overlooked by generations of scholars' (p. 75) can in fact be found in recent scholarly and popular publications. Wilkinson's assertions regarding the mobile character of predynastic material culture, and the seasonal character of 'villages' in the Neolithic Nile valley appear to be taken, rather clumsily, from Wengrow (2001) without attribution (thanks, perhaps, for small mercies ...). In short, this text could easily pass as an undergraduate term paper, of the less worthy (but amusing) variety. More serious, I would suggest, are the implications of this book, and the activities out of which it arises, for Egyptian rock art. In a postscript, Wilkinson bemoans the destruction of ancient petroglyphs through mining and road construction. But surely he realises that by letting loose groups of unqualified tourists on those same images, and then claiming that they have been properly studied and dated, he is himself fuelling their destruction (and at least roads and quarries have their public uses, as opposed to holidays for a western elite). I suspect that Genesis of the Pharaohs was written with television in mind, starting Dr. Wilkinson. If Thames & Hudson are willing to line the coffers of Ancient World Tours by publishing this book, then no doubt some production company will also be lax enough to take it on. But I hope not. It should by now be obvious to everyone that there is more at stake in western representations of Africa and the Middle East than the likelihood of poor ratings.
References
BLENCH, R.M. & K.C. MACDONALD. (ed.) 2000. The origins and development of African livestock: archaeology, genetics, linguistics and ethnography. London: UCL.
WENGROW, D. 2001. Rethinking 'Cattle Cults' in Early Egypt: towards a prehistoric perspective on the Narmer Palette. Cambridge Archaeological Journal 11(1):91-04.
David Wengrow, Christ Church, Oxford, England.
COPYRIGHT 2003 Antiquity Publications, Ltd.
Nabta Playa
These monoliths were made of sandstone that had been split away from its original source, and then chipped into a sculpted form. They range in weight from tens of kilograms up to many tons. They were all originally sunk into the ground facing northwards, towards the area of the sky where the stars never die, i.e. where they never disappear from the firmament.
This is where the oldest known Egyptian beliefs, as preserved in the Pyramid Texts, maintained that people went after their death. Each group of Nabta Playa stelae most likely symbolized the souls of the deceased from an individual herdsman clan, with the smaller clusters representing specific extended families, just like at the Gebel Ramlah cemeteries. In recent years, the expedition has discovered a massive kurgan in the Nabta Playa lake basin, towering over the fields of stone monoliths, now destroyed by the desert winds. Its small burial pit was found to contain the head of a child 2.5 to 3 years old, undoubtedly the offspring of a powerful ruler of the Nubian Desert about 3,500 years BC, just prior to the establishment of the first Egyptian state. We already know that soon after this date, drought forced the herders to abandon these lands. Digging deeper and deeper wells proved insufficient, and people had go elsewhere in search of water. And so where might they have gone, if not to the relatively close Nile Valley? They brought with them the various achievements of their culture and their belief system. Perhaps it was indeed these people who provided the crucial stimulus towards the emergence of state organization in ancient Egypt.
quote:Originally posted by Sundjata: Note: Re-posting because the last thread was deleted!!
For the last two days when I tried to login it would say the site was under construction to come back later....guess that's what has been going on, I.e., erasing posts and threads.
Wouldn't be surprised. I'm not even able to make any post longer than a few sentences anymore
Posts: 1502 | From: Dies Irae | Registered: Oct 2010
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posted
I am now re-reading Keita and Co. Trying to get my get my head around "North African". Are they the modern day Arabs /Turks or the extant peoples of the Sahara?
Zakarskei(sp) et al explained that the Badari showed "Caucasoids" features but with extreme pronagthism. She speculated that the came from central Africa. Evidently these people were indigenous to Africa. But it seemed like they disappeared or morphed.
Many researchers keep using the term. Gatto et al discovered the graves in the Sahara that had sub-saharan and North Africans types. She also speculated they(both) went on to form dynastic egypt. Who are these North Africans? My guess they are the Bejas, Gullah, Fulbe, Black Berber tribes of the desert.
These authors use the term north african deliberately to decieve. ----- Quote(King): From a physical anthropological viewpoint, the population sample exhibits evidence of North African and sub-Saharan admixture.
-------------------- Without data you are just another person with an opinion - Deming Posts: 12143 | From: When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable | Registered: Jun 2007
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Maybe the Sage can help me out here. Who are these north Africans? What indigenous peoples represent " North Africans".
Reading G. Sergi(one of the most profound books I ever read after Fanon's Black Skin White Mask etc) These North Africans/Eurafricans originated in the Sahara and spread North, East and West. Why not South. Was it because the South was already explored territory? I firmly believe contemporary "Sub-Saharan" is new to the area they occupy. I am gathering data on it. Some of the studies I came across has "Bantus" and "pygmies" seperating over 60Ky and San by >90ky.
So. . .Sage or any one in the know. Who are the contemporary North Africans that is so frequently referenced by these researchers?
-------------------- Without data you are just another person with an opinion - Deming Posts: 12143 | From: When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable | Registered: Jun 2007
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quote:Originally posted by Djehuti: ^ No. I say shake the haters off!
You pretty much re-capped what was said. So let us continue!
Thanks Djehuti. Yea, I must have forgot about the maintenance thing also, so no harm no foul I guess.
quote:Originally posted by xyyman:
Many researchers keep using the term. Gatto et al discovered the graves in the Sahara that had sub-saharan and North Africans types. She also speculated they(both) went on to form dynastic egypt. Who are these North Africans? My guess they are the Bejas, Gullah, Fulbe, Black Berber tribes of the desert.
Are you cross-referencing the citations they use to make those claims? There your answer would be right there, through reference populations or description of cranial traits. If there's no associated citation then how can these researchers expect anyone to take their claims at face value, let alone understand what they mean by "North African"?
Posts: 4021 | From: Bay Area, CA | Registered: Mar 2007
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From whence does Shaw think the Western Desert people came if not the south?
Obviously farther west in Libya. However, being 'Libyan' does not mean having distant or even no relation to peoples to the east and south.
Correct, as even those populations ultimately would have been immigrants from the Nile Valley since during the onset of the post-glacial humid phase the central Saharan mountainous regions (from whence the "Black Mummy culture" sprung) were inhospitable.
"It is obvious that Early Holocene colonisers of the Sahara came from regions that could be settled during the arid period of the late Pleistocene. This poses yet another problem — where were they situated? Could these regions also include the mountainous central Sahara (Jesse 2003a: 43)? Most of the central Sahara data, however, indicate the onset of humid conditions as late as the Early Holocene (compare summary in Wendorf et al. 2007: 197). In short, data presently to hand exclude the possibility of human survival in the central Sahara mountainous area during the Late Glacial or early Last Termination."--Jordeczka et al.
^And even if he IS assuming that they ultimately came from the west, he's certainly not thinking of the Maghreb (he'd have no basis to). And remember this is just the Badarians and their predecessors, the Naqada were an entirely different cultural community and many scholars, such as Wilkonson, Kendall, and Anselin are now locating their foundations in the southeast (eastern desert or again, the mid-upper Nile valley). This all seems to spell out to me that Egypt was formed through a confederation of Saharan and Nilotic cultures who conglomerated in that part of the Nile valley around 3500 BCE pumped in to the region by strangling and rapidly changing climactic conditions.
I'd be very opened minded in considering a considerable Levantine diffusion into the area were it not for the Physical anthropology (Kemp, 2006) and archaeological data (Wetterstrom, 1993) being unsupportive of that scenario.
Posts: 4021 | From: Bay Area, CA | Registered: Mar 2007
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posted
Quote: “I'd be very opened minded in considering a considerable” Levantine” diffusion into the area were it not for the Physical anthropology (Kemp, 2006) and archaeological data (Wetterstrom, 1993) being unsupportive of that scenario”
Again. More words and names to decieve and confuse. Who were these “Levantines”. My understanding is around 5000bc the Levant was occupied by “negroid” people with some Caucasoid features LOL! ie Natufians. After 4-5yrs of intense reading I have to agree with Dana and the Sage. (and Doug to a some extent.). Saharans occupied both sides of the Medit Sea and reached as far as past Persia.(Sergi, Evans, Smith). Sergi even suggest that the early Kurgans were Saharans ie EurAfricans.
Reading a paper by Ayoub et al (?). He is suggesting that the tribes that occupy the Harappa Valley also carry African genetic markers. According to him there were two waves. One from Sub-Sahara Africa and other from North Africa. (there they go again “North Africans”). I believe they are characterizing HG- E1b1b as North Africans.
-------------------- Without data you are just another person with an opinion - Deming Posts: 12143 | From: When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable | Registered: Jun 2007
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[quote]Again. More words and names to decieve and confuse. Who were these “Levantines”.
The people residing in the Levant. How is that deceiving? What ever connotation you associate with the term has nothing to do with the term.
quote:My understanding is around 5000bc the Levant was occupied by “negroid” people with some Caucasoid features LOL! ie Natufians.
Not sure where you got this date but they'd have been swamped by autochthonous populations in the Levant since recall that the Natufians were descended from immigrants from North East Africa. Brace identified non-"Negroid" elements among the Natufian population as well, suggesting that they were beginning to assimilate. The types among whom they assimilated could be represented by the bronze age Palestinian samples shown by Kemp to be unrelated to contiguous Egyptian/African populations.
quote:After 4-5yrs of intense reading I have to agree with Dana and the Sage. (and Doug to a some extent.). Saharans occupied both sides of the Medit Sea and reached as far as past Persia.(Sergi, Evans, Smith). Sergi even suggest that the early Kurgans were Saharans ie EurAfricans.
The term "Eurafrican" makes no sense. Early Saharans were African, without the "Eur" prefix.
quote:Reading a paper by Ayoub et al (?). He is suggesting that the tribes that occupy the Harappa Valley also carry African genetic markers. According to him there were two waves. One from Sub-Sahara Africa and other from North Africa. (there they go again “North Africans”). I believe they are characterizing HG- E1b1b as North Africans.
Maybe, even though I have no idea what this has to do with the discussion.
Posts: 4021 | From: Bay Area, CA | Registered: Mar 2007
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That's some good info on the pottery. Didn't Ian Shaw entertain the possibility the Badarian to come from the Levant or something? As you mention, Hassan has shown the Khartoum sites to be older and before that Arkell made the connection of Badarian to the Khartoum (in other ways than pottery too).
I'm still trying to come to an understanding of the extent of Near Eastern influence during the Neolithic, at least from a genetic viewpoint. Have you read the report on the gene pool of El Hayez in the western desert?
-------------------- L Writes: Posts: 1502 | From: Dies Irae | Registered: Oct 2010
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quote:Originally posted by Calabooz': That's some good info on the pottery. Didn't Ian Shaw entertain the possibility the Badarian to come from the Levant or something?
He based this merely on their attainment of near eastern domesticates, but of course Keita (2005) put that issue to rest.
quote:I'm still trying to come to an understanding of the extent of Near Eastern influence during the Neolithic, at least from a genetic viewpoint. Have you read the report on the gene pool of El Hayez in the western desert?
No, I'm not sure as to which report you are referring.
Posts: 4021 | From: Bay Area, CA | Registered: Mar 2007
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quote:Originally posted by Sundjata: He based this merely on their attainment of near eastern domesticates, but of course Keita (2005) put that issue to rest.
Oh right, I see,
quote:No, I'm not sure as to which report you are referring.
OK.
Posts: 1502 | From: Dies Irae | Registered: Oct 2010
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quote:Originally posted by Sundjata: Yes, I recall addressing this as well:
quote:Originally posted by Djehuti:
quote:Originally posted by Truthcentric:
From whence does Shaw think the Western Desert people came if not the south?
Obviously farther west in Libya. However, being 'Libyan' does not mean having distant or even no relation to peoples to the east and south.
Correct, as even those populations ultimately would have been immigrants from the Nile Valley since during the onset of the post-glacial humid phase the central Saharan mountainous regions (from whence the "Black Mummy culture" sprung) were inhospitable.
"It is obvious that Early Holocene colonisers of the Sahara came from regions that could be settled during the arid period of the late Pleistocene. This poses yet another problem — where were they situated? Could these regions also include the mountainous central Sahara (Jesse 2003a: 43)? Most of the central Sahara data, however, indicate the onset of humid conditions as late as the Early Holocene (compare summary in Wendorf et al. 2007: 197). In short, data presently to hand exclude the possibility of human survival in the central Sahara mountainous area during the Late Glacial or early Last Termination."--Jordeczka et al.
Yes and I brought up these quotes:
The period when sub-Saharan Africa was most influential in Egypt was a time when neither Egypt, as we understand it culturally, nor the Sahara, as we understand it geographically, existed. Populations and cultures now found south of the desert roamed far to the north. The culture of Upper Egypt, which became dynastic Egyptian civilization, could fairly be called a Sudanese transplant. Egypt rapidly found a method of disciplining the river, the land, and the people to transform the country into a titanic garden. Egypt rapidly developed detailed cultural forms that dwarfed its forebears in urbanity and elaboration. Thus, when new details arrived, they were rapidly adapted to the vast cultural superstructure already present. On the other hand, pharaonic culture was so bound to its place near the Nile that its huge, interlocked religious, administrative, and formal structures could not be readily transferred to relatively mobile cultures of the desert, savanna, and forest. The influence of the mature pharaonic civilizations of Egypt and Kush was almost confined to their sophisticated trade goods and some significant elements of technology. Nevertheless, the religious substratum of Egypt and Kush was so similar to that of many cultures in southern Sudan today that it remains possible that fundamental elements derived from the two high cultures to the north live on.--Joseph O. Vogel (1997)
What's directly south of Egypt's western desert but Sudan? Even if one went farther west into Libya, what is south of that but Chad?
It is possible from this overview of the data to conclude that the limited conceptual vocabulary shared by the ancestors of contemporary Chadic-speakers (therefore also contemporary Cushitic-speakers), contemporary Nilotic-speakers and Ancient Egyptian-speakers suggests that the earliest speakers of the Egyptian language could be located to the south of Upper Egypt (Diakonoff 1998) or, earlier, in the Sahara (Wendorf 2004), where Takács (1999, 47) suggests their ‘long co-existence’ can be found. In addition, it is consistent with this view to suggest that the northern border of their homeland was further than the Wadi Howar proposed by Blench (1999, 2001), which is actually its southern border. Neither Chadics nor Cushitics existed at this time, but their ancestors lived in a homeland further north than the peripheral countries that they inhabited thereafter, to the south-west, in a Niger-Congo environment, and to the south-east, in a Nilo-Saharan environment, where they interacted and innovated in terms of language. From this perspective, the Upper Egyptian cultures were an ancient North East African ‘periphery at the crossroads’, as suggested by Dahl and Hjort-af-Ornas of the Beja (Dahl and Hjort-af-Ornas 2006). The most likely scenario could be this: some of these Saharo-Nubian populations spread southwards to Wadi Howar, Ennedi and Darfur; some stayed in the actual oases where they joined the inhabitants; and others moved towards the Nile, directed by two geographic obstacles, the western Great Sand Sea and the southern Rock Belt. Their slow perambulations led them from the area of Sprinkle Mountain (Gebel Uweinat) to the east – Bir Sahara, Nabta Playa, Gebel Ramlah, and Nekhen/Hierakonpolis (Upper Egypt), and to the north-east by way of Dakhla Oasis to Abydos (Middle Egypt).--Anselin (2009)
Anselin mentioned many Afrasian groups except Berber, but why not Berber if Chadic, Egyptic, Beja and perhaps Cushitic was present? In fact this further destroys the whole North vs. Sub-Sahara concept. You have Afrasian languages distributed throughout both regions not to mention Nilo-Saharan which is still spoken in isolated pockets of the Sahara!
quote:^And even if he IS assuming that they ultimately came from the west, he's certainly not thinking of the Maghreb (he'd have no basis to). And remember this is just the Badarians and their predecessors, the Naqada were an entirely different cultural community and many scholars, such as Wilkonson, Kendall, and Anselin are now locating their foundations in the southeast (eastern desert or again, the mid-upper Nile valley). This all seems to spell out to me that Egypt was formed through a confederation of Saharan and Nilotic cultures who conglomerated in that part of the Nile valley around 3500 BCE pumped in to the region by strangling and rapidly changing climactic conditions.
Of course. I very much think Shaw is looking to Libya especially with its traditions of mummification looking to be the ancestor of the tradition in Egypt. Either way there is no getting around Libya's southern origins as well. You are also right about Naqada which is an entirely different group. Archaeologically Shaw tries to disassociate Naqada from Nubia with this statement: "The fact that the material culture of the Naqada culture was later found in northern Egypt with no Nubian elements would also seem to argue against any Nubian origin for the Egyptian state." As if this changes the fact that the earliest material culture of Naqada is found in the south with many Nubian elements. In fact Naqada seems to have much in common with that of older and more advanced A-Group culture with BOTH apparently being derived from the Sudanese Neolithic.
quote:I'd be very opened minded in considering a considerable Levantine diffusion into the area were it not for the Physical anthropology (Kemp, 2006) and archaeological data (Wetterstrom, 1993) being unsupportable of that scenario.
Agreed.
Posts: 26322 | From: Atlanta, Georgia, USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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quote:Originally posted by xyyman: Maybe the Sage can help me out here. Who are these north Africans? What indigenous peoples represent " North Africans".
Reading G. Sergi(one of the most profound books I ever read after Fanon's Black Skin White Mask etc) These North Africans/Eurafricans originated in the Sahara and spread North, East and West. Why not South. Was it because the South was already explored territory? I firmly believe contemporary "Sub-Saharan" is new to the area they occupy. I am gathering data on it. Some of the studies I came across has "Bantus" and "pygmies" seperating over 60Ky and San by >90ky.
So. . .Sage or any one in the know. Who are the contemporary North Africans that is so frequently referenced by these researchers?
The earliest known North Africans were the Mechta whom Westerners identified as similar to Cro-Magnon.
You can read more about in these following threads:
posted
Bump. Also I want to draw attention to some of the maps in the study and how widespread Nilo-Saharan languages reach to the North and West. There was a particular map I was seeking that displayed the Pre-Historic hypothesize range of Nilo-Saharan languages but i was unable to find it. What I can say is it coverd a lot of the Sahara, Southern Algeria, Libya and Egypt....Niger and Chad as well. Basically nearly ALL the areas in the Sahara that have early pottery. What we are particularly focused on is the Western Desert though.
That latest author speaks on some of this in talking about The Tibbu in the Western Desert of Egypt but the maps point out the same thing. POttery:
Notice South West Egypt and Nubia.
Again South West Egypt and Nubia. Far North into Libya Excuse the photo size. Wish i could find the one on prehistoric spread. ...anyway Enjoy.
Posts: 2463 | From: New Jersey USA | Registered: Dec 2007
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quote:Originally posted by astenb: Bump. Also I want to draw attention to some of the maps in the study and how widespread Nilo-Saharan languages reach to the North and West. There was a particular map I was seeking that displayed the Pre-Historic hypothesize range of Nilo-Saharan languages but i was unable to find it. What I can say is it coverd a lot of the Sahara, Southern Algeria, Libya and Egypt....Niger and Chad as well. Basically nearly ALL the areas in the Sahara that have early pottery. What we are particularly focused on is the Western Desert though.
Drakea et al. cited evidence of Nilo-Saharan speakers residing as far northwest as southwest Morocco as well.
quote:That latest author speaks on some of this in talking about The Tibbu in the Western Desert of Egypt but the maps point out the same thing. POttery:
Notice South West Egypt and Nubia.
Again South West Egypt and Nubia. Far North into Libya Excuse the photo size. Wish i could find the one on prehistoric spread. ...anyway Enjoy.
^Excellent break down. Posts: 4021 | From: Bay Area, CA | Registered: Mar 2007
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A real eye opener Astenb, especially in regards to Chad and Libya.
Posts: 8014 | From: the Tekrur in the Western Sahel | Registered: Feb 2006
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^ I'm not at all surprised by all this. Anthropologists have long held that Nilo-Saharan speakers had a much greater range in area in ancient times than they do today. This is due not only to the pockets of Nilo-Saharan speakers in Saharan North Africa today, but also archaeology, and even the fact that many languages in the Sahara both Berber as well as ancient Egyptian show Nilo-Saharan influences.
Linguistic evidence
In addition to the archeological and paleontological evidence, recent linguistic studies indicate the presence of early pastoralists in the Eastern Sahara. Detailed analysis of Nilo-Saharan root words has provided "convincing evidence" that the early cultural history of that language family included a pastoralist and food producing way of life, and that this occurred in what is today the south-western Sahara and Sahel belt.
The Nilo-Saharan family of languages is divided into a complex array of branches and subgroups that reflect an enormous time depth. Just one of the subgroups, Kir is as internally complex as the lndo-European family of languages and is believed to have a comparable age. The Sudanese branch is of special interest here. This is particularly true of the Northern Sudanese subfamily that includes a Saharo-Sahelian subgroup, the early homeland of which is placed in northwest Sudan and northeast Chad. Today, the groups that speak Saharo-Sahelian are dispersed from the Niger river eastward to northwestern Ethiopian highlands.
The Proto-Northern Sudanic language contains root words such as "to drive," "cow, "grain,""ear of grain," and "grindstone." Any of these might apply to food production, but another root word meaning "to milk" is cetainly the most convincing evidence of incipient pastoralism.
There are also root words for "temporary shelter" and "to make a pot." In the succeeding Proto-Saharo-Sahelian language, there are root words for "to cultivate", "to prepare field", to "clear" (of weeds), and "cultivated field." this is the first unambiguous linguistic evidence of cultivation. There are also words for "thombush cattle pen," "fence," "yard," "grannary," as well as "to herd" and "cattle." In the following Proto-Sahelian period, there are root words for "goat," "sheep," "ram," and "lamb," indicating the presence of small livestock.
There are root words for "cow," "bull," "ox," and "young cow" or "heifer" and, indeed, a variety of terms relating to cultivation and permanent houses.
On the basis of known historical changes in some of the language, Ehret estimates that the Proto-Northern Sudanic language family, which includes the first root words indicating cattle pastoralism, should be dated about 10,000 years ago. He also estimates that the Proto-Saharan-Sahelian language family, which has words indicating not only more complex cattle pastroalism, but the first indications of cultivation, occurred around 9,000 years ago. He places the Proto-Sahelian language at about 8,500 years ago.
These age estimates are just that, and should not be used to suggest any other chronology. Nevertheless, the sequence of cultural changes is remarkably similar to that in the archeology of the Eastern Sahara and, with some minor adjustments for the beginning of cultivation and for' the inclusion of "sheep" and "goat," reasonably closely to the radiocarbon chronology. - Fred Wendorf & Romuald Schild, 1994.
Posts: 26322 | From: Atlanta, Georgia, USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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posted
Cool Kintampo and Dar Tichitt is roughly the same era at least the cattle part.
This commingling of sahel and forest peoples is contemporary with Middle Kingdom Egypt.
Kintampo Complex
Between 4000 and 3500 BP dessication forced a southerly expansion of the Sahel, sweeping along with it the pastoral and agro-pastoral populations accustomed to living in a semi-arid landscape. In places these groups expanded further south, perhaps only seasonally, coming into contact with indigenous hunter-gatherers and incipient vegeculturalists. The best documented record of such contacts, come from the Savannah of modern Ghana and the sites of Ntereso, Kintampo, and Daboya[.]
There, ‘Saharan’ Kintampo complex projectile points, stone arm rings, beads, small stone axes and livestock appear in the midst of indigenous Punpun Phase microlithic quartz assemblages around 3500 BP. Subsequently, it would appear that instead of population replacement there was a type of population fusion, as the Kintampo complex quickly adapted to the subsistence potentials of the savanna-forest ecoton
quote:Originally posted by Brada-Anansi: Cool Kintampo and Dar Tichitt is roughly the same era at least the cattle part.
This commingling of sahel and forest peoples is contemporary with Middle Kingdom Egypt.
Kintampo Complex
Between 4000 and 3500 BP dessication forced a southerly expansion of the Sahel, sweeping along with it the pastoral and agro-pastoral populations accustomed to living in a semi-arid landscape. In places these groups expanded further south, perhaps only seasonally, coming into contact with indigenous hunter-gatherers and incipient vegeculturalists. The best documented record of such contacts, come from the Savannah of modern Ghana and the sites of Ntereso, Kintampo, and Daboya[.]
There, ‘Saharan’ Kintampo complex projectile points, stone arm rings, beads, small stone axes and livestock appear in the midst of indigenous Punpun Phase microlithic quartz assemblages around 3500 BP. Subsequently, it would appear that instead of population replacement there was a type of population fusion, as the Kintampo complex quickly adapted to the subsistence potentials of the savanna-forest ecoton
Indeed, most data seems to suggest that West Africa was sparsely populated by the onset of the Neolithic era obviously suggesting that they'd migrated from somewhere further North, apparently Northwest Africa (proto-Fulani and Proto-Soninke presence here is already attested). Clyde seems to favor the proto-Mande as existing in the central Sahara and others entertain a Niger-kardofanian grouping suggesting affinities/ultimate origins in the Nile valley. I think populations, and therefore 3 of the main language phyla, likely diverged around 24 kya as can be inferred from Cruciani et al's dates for the divergence of haplogroup E1b1. Maybe there was some sort of refuge in east Africa around this time where people clustered to avoid volatile climates further north, or maybe the early populations of Africa were small and disparate to begin with (though reports conversely show a LACK of current diversity relative to what was present in the past).
Climate and archaeological data going back that far may reveal something interesting (or not).
Posts: 4021 | From: Bay Area, CA | Registered: Mar 2007
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quote:Originally posted by astenb: Early Cattle Maps bear out the same thing:
That most cattle raising centers are clustered in the area of North East African surrounding the Nile Valley, is telling concerning the origin cattle domestication as once you leave the Valley the sites become much more disparate.
-------------------- mr.writer.asa@gmail.com Posts: 4021 | From: Bay Area, CA | Registered: Mar 2007
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^^ Yes, and let's not forget that the cattle culture of the Delta (Fayum and Merimda) is the origin of the Harifians who migrated to the Sinai and Negev and mixed with Pre-Pottery Neolithic B culture of the southern Levant to create the Circum-Arabian Nomadic Pastoral Complex which spread pastoralism throughout Arabia.
quote:Originally posted by Sundjata: Indeed, most data seems to suggest that West Africa was sparsely populated by the onset of the Neolithic era obviously suggesting that they'd migrated from somewhere further North, apparently Northwest Africa (proto-Fulani and Proto-Soninke presence here is already attested). Clyde seems to favor the proto-Mande as existing in the central Sahara and others entertain a Niger-kardofanian grouping suggesting affinities/ultimate origins in the Nile valley. I think populations, and therefore 3 of the main language phyla, likely diverged around 24 kya as can be inferred from Cruciani et al's dates for the divergence of haplogroup E1b1. Maybe there was some sort of refuge in east Africa around this time where people clustered to avoid volatile climates further north, or maybe the early populations of Africa were small and disparate to begin with (though reports conversely show a LACK of current diversity relative to what was present in the past).
Yes. This is something Ausar has been stating for years-- that the forests and coasts of West Africa was sparsely inhabited with most populations living farther north which was once fertile steppes with rivers and lakes. This is no doubt the reason why West African cultures and those of the Nile Valley share so much in common culturally was because there was great contact between them in the central Saharan areas. Common elements like wigs, fertility belts, paddle dolls, animal masks, grass aprons, even the Bes deity.
quote:Climate and archaeological data going back that far may reveal something interesting (or not).
I really hope it does. Such data would not only strengthen the the connections West Africans have with the Nile Valley but debunk the very notion of North vs. Sub-Sahara.
Posts: 26322 | From: Atlanta, Georgia, USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Djehuti: Yes. This is something Ausar has been stating for years-- that the forests and coasts of West Africa was sparsely inhabited with most populations living farther north which was once fertile steppes with rivers and lakes. This is no doubt the reason why West African cultures and those of the Nile Valley share so much in common culturally was because there was great contact between them in the central Saharan areas. Common elements like wigs, fertility belts, paddle dolls, animal masks, grass aprons, even the Bes deity.
It is beginning to look like most Africans, West and East alike, can trace a good part of their heritage to East Saharan pastoralists. Since the domestication of food sources is often associated with social stratification and the emergence of strong leader figures, these pastoralists might just be the people who came up with the widespread African concept of divine kingship.
Posts: 7103 | From: Fallbrook, CA | Registered: Mar 2004
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posted
^We must recall as well that the Nilo-Saharan language classification in and of its self is disputed. The only group closely clustered are indeed, the east Sahelian languages (Nubian, Nara, etc..) With that said, I think linguists will find these languages very much related if they reconstructed proto-words among the various language phyla and searched for cognates. Of course historical linguistics doesn't work like that, you compare languages that are already seemingly related and extend outward to incorporate more but maybe a new method is in order. Atkinson (2010) has already come up with one and used it to verify that click languages are indeed the oldest form of extant language. This is long over due imo, linguists need to STOP relying soley on Greenberg.
Does anyone know specifically why Obenga is so neglected (besides rigid orthodoxy/bias)?
Posts: 4021 | From: Bay Area, CA | Registered: Mar 2007
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quote:Originally posted by Sundjata: We must recall as well that the Nilo-Saharan language classification in and of its self is disputed. The only group closely clustered are indeed, the east Sahelian languages (Nubian, Nara, etc..) With that said, I think linguists will find these languages very much related if they reconstructed proto-words among the various language phyla and searched for cognates. Of course historical linguistics doesn't work like that, you compare languages that are already seemingly related and extend outward to incorporate more but maybe a new method is in order. Atkinson (2010) has already come up with one and used it to verify that click languages are indeed the oldest form of extant language. This is long over due imo, linguists need to STOP relying soley on Greenberg.
You are correct since some scholars have long considered languages like Songhay as very distant outliers if classified as Nilo-Saharan at all, while other linguists have declared them language isolates. The fact that they share some proto-word constructs for certain features of life may either point to loaning or a much distant common ancestry. Even Niger-Congo shares a distant common origin with Saharian languages via Kordofanian languages. And let's not forget the Wolof language long considered Niger-Congo yet sharing many words and features with Egyptian as C.A. Diop has shown.
quote:Does anyone know specifically why Obenga is so neglected (besides rigid orthodoxy/bias)?
I personally think it is because of some diffusionist ideas like ancient Egyptians migrating to West Africa.
Posts: 26322 | From: Atlanta, Georgia, USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Djehuti: And let's not forget the Wolof language long considered Niger-Congo yet sharing many words and features with Egyptian as C.A. Diop has shown.
Uh, you might want to read this paper which criticizes Diop's methodology. I'm open to the possibility that Niger-Congo and Afroasiatic share a common heritage if you go back far enough (in fact the author of the paper I've cited suggests just that), but let's not endorse pseudoscience.
Posts: 7103 | From: Fallbrook, CA | Registered: Mar 2004
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quote:Uh, you might want to read this paper which criticizes Diop's methodology. I'm open to the possibility that Niger-Congo and Afroasiatic share a common heritage if you go back far enough (in fact the author of the paper I've cited suggests just that), but let's not endorse pseudoscience.
Wooh wooh wooh back up for a sec. lets not endedorse pseudoscience? look I don't know if Diop was right in all f his findings, science had moved on quite a bit and some concepts may have changed by new info. but pseudo science? from the same man who actively invited harsh critique in his own book? from the same man who along with Obenga put the biggest slap down on comfortable racist academia in Egyptology for decades to come,so comfortable was his opponents that they did not even prepare papers to match anywhere near what Diop and Obenga had provided as a matter of fact he challenged the young to find faults in his work and publish them without regards to appeal to his authority, wrong he maybe on some things but Pseudo he is not!
Posts: 6546 | From: japan | Registered: Feb 2009
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Diop was a native Wolof speaker and gives dozens of pages of evidence. Schuh doesn't even scratch the surface of Diop's presentation less lone refute it. I detect anti-Diop bias from someone who never even examined Diop's argument and I stand by that in the face of Brandon, Zarahan, and Bass.
See Diop's Genetic kinship of the language of Pharaonic Egypt to Black African languages which is only available in it's original French edition published in 1977.
At a UNESCO conference decades ago one participant (Sauneron) commented that Diop and Obenga's method is
quote:of considerable interest, since it could not be fortuituous that there was a similarity between the third person singular suffixed pronouns in Ancient Egyptian and in Wolof.
A comparative morphology of Ancient Egyptian and Wolof is in African ethnonyms and toponyms: report and papers of the meeting of experts organized by Unesco in Paris, 3-7 July 1978.
I'd like to see someone amass a negative case with actual examples from the involved languages them- selves, not only vocabulary but even complete sentences as well as demonstratives, phonemes, and verb forms, i.e., elements of grammar.
Until then all opposition is just offhand opinion.
I weigh this conclusions reached by the UNESCO symposium on the unassailable scholarship undertaken by the two
quote: Although the preparatory working paper sent out by UNESCO gave particulars of what was desired, not all participants had prepared communications comparable with the painstakingly researched contributions of Professor Cheikh Anta Diop and Obenga. There was consequently a real lack of balance in the discussions.
Opinion's are like anuses, everybody's got one but a linguist's opinion is far more valueable than that of someone totally unfamiliar with either language and relying on weak critiques (Schuh) obviously biased against Diop and Obenga.
The strongest point in Diop's argument for Wolof and Egyptic bearing a genetic relationship are their lexicons. To that end in his book, Parenté génétique de l’égyptien pharaonique et des langues négro-africaines, Diop presents 223 pages of lexical resemblances.
quote: It could be argued that the genetic relationship between Ancient Egyptian and Wolof afforded Diop, a native speaker of Wolof, an insight into the deciphering or translation of of Egyptian hieroglyphics at a level not available to his European counterparts. Hence, Diop's unwavering conviction in his thesis of a Negro origin for ancient Egyptian civilization.
In addition to Wolof's relationships to Egyptic here's a work on Duala of Cameroun here in PDF, not for those who only accept white is right but black is pseudo-science.
Posts: 8014 | From: the Tekrur in the Western Sahel | Registered: Feb 2006
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posted
Thanks. Mary eh DJ. Just messing with you fam. .
You can be useful when not kissing ass.
Good reading here(thread). As usually great work by AstenB and others. You are a man after my own heart. You always conect the dots.
quote:Originally posted by Djehuti:
quote:Originally posted by xyyman: Maybe the Sage can help me out here. Who are these north Africans? What indigenous peoples represent " North Africans".
Reading G. Sergi(one of the most profound books I ever read after Fanon's Black Skin White Mask etc) These North Africans/Eurafricans originated in the Sahara and spread North, East and West. Why not South. Was it because the South was already explored territory? I firmly believe contemporary "Sub-Saharan" is new to the area they occupy. I am gathering data on it. Some of the studies I came across has "Bantus" and "pygmies" seperating over 60Ky and San by >90ky.
So. . .Sage or any one in the know. Who are the contemporary North Africans that is so frequently referenced by these researchers?
The earliest known North Africans were the Mechta whom Westerners identified as similar to Cro-Magnon.
You can read more about in these following threads:
Edit. Thanks DJ. exactly what I was looking for on who are the North Africans in pre-history. Great post by Supercar.
Posts: 12143 | From: When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable | Registered: Jun 2007
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^ Your welcome, though I don't recall kissing any asses. I think nobody kisses as much ass as you and your partner anguishedofbeing, just kidding.
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