Do you think that African societies and civilizations are unceremoniously dismissed unfairly if they lack these two elements of "civilization"?
I think so, I think that is exactly what people have against African history, that it is not a history of civilized peoples but a history of people who should be ignored.
The part about writing is bogus, obviously, Tifinagh, yoruba carvings, nsbidi(which is a completely independent writing system), ancient egyptian, meriotic, ge'ez, amharic, ancient somali script,etc. Variations of Arabic in the Sahel: Ajami, Sudani,etc. Alfonso of Kongo in the 15th century adopted the Latin alphabet, so Africans are obviously capable of both creating their own writing systems, as well as adopting and ADAPTING new scripts in their local languages.
There are other scripts i am not entirely sure of as to their origin(bassa script,etc), so I'll leave em out. But besides that, there are plenty to chose from.
Even societies without writing were sophisticated and advanced, we've learned so much from the benin kingdom for example, whose beautiful bronzes tells us so much about their society. History can be expressed thru art as well as writing, people need to accept that.
If you look at Africa without looking at it through the eyes of a African, you will never truly understand Africa. Stop comparing them to Europe, Asia, or the Americas, all that does is cause everything to become convoluted. Especially when you try to measure Africa up to the standards of European or Asian civilizations. This is not to say Africa is inferior, Africa is different, simply put. It is as unique from Europe as Europe is from Asia and as Asia is from the Americas, despite whatever diffusion may have occured.
As for the wheel, here is where things get tricky, ancient egypt and nubia are both documented with using the well, but I've found little info on the maghreb, the Sahel, East Africa, Ethiopia, or Southern/Central Africa. Obviously the wheel was invented in a few scarce locations and spread from there, like writing, but diffusion in Africa was limited, apparently. I don't know this for sure, the wheel may have been present in other parts of Africa, as most of the continent has had load bearing animals for thousands of years.
Here's the thing, topography may prevent diffusion, deserts, tropical forests(with crippling diseases), mountain ranges, large bodies of water, so that may just be the answer.
If I'm wrong, and if anyone knows of the wheel being used outside of Egypt and Nubia(I do know of saharan rock paintings that are thousands of years old depicting chariots and the wheel, as well as the Garamentes civilization using them as well) please feel free to add to what I hope will be a stimulating and long-lasting thread.
Posted by PreColonialAfrica13 (Member # 21589) on :
Also, navigable rivers also help with diffusion. The three greatest in Africa are the Niger, Nile, and Congo, but large swathes of the continent are without rivers and the tsetse fly kills horses and cattle as well.
Africa's rivers: Posted by Clyde Winters (Member # 10129) on :
Precolonial this is a great topic. I am sorry to tell you this but you have been lied yoo. Africans invented writing and the use of the wheel.
The horse period is dated between 2000 and 1200 BC. These dates correspond to the archaeological research.There were two horses common to Africa. A horse introduced to Africa by the Hysos and a native small size horse common to much of North and West Africa.Most researchers believe the horse was introduced to Africa/Egypt by 1700BC. This is an interesting date, and far to late for the introduction of the horse given the archaeological evidence for horses at Maadi and the Saharan zone.Saharan Africans used the donkey and later horses as beast of burden. A domesticated Equus was found at Hierakonpolis dating to around the 3600 BC at Maadi in the Sahara (Fekri A Hassan, The predynastic of Egypt, Journal of World Prehistory,2(2) (1988) .145; J. McArdle, Preliminary report on the predynastic fauna of the Hierkonpolis, Project Studies Association, Cairo. Publication No.1 (1982), p.116-120.)
The archaeological evidence of horses in the Sahara at this early time make it clear that horses were in Africa years before the Hysos arrived on the Continent, and that a horse native to Saharan Africa was already in existence before this time as well.
Secondly we have Kushites horsebackriding at Buhen in 4th millennium BP. This shows that while Asians used the horse for chariots Africans had long recognized that they could ride the horse. As a result, the presence of writing and Saharans horseback riding support a probably much earlier origin than the late horse period (e.g., 700 BC) assigned these inscriptions by some researchers.
The fact that the chariots found in West Africa resemble those of Crete does not mean that the riders of these chariots had to have come from Crete. In fact Greek traditions make it clear that the ancient Cretans, called Minoans came from Africa
The Dravidian and African languages share similar names for the wheel. For example:
Galla makurakura Tulu gali, tagori Swahili guru, dumu Mande koli, kori, muru-fe Tamil kal, ari, urul , tikiri Ka. gali tiguri, tigari
It would appear that the proto-African-Dravidian term for wheel was *-ori / *-uri *go/uri and *ko/uri. The proto-South Dravidian term for wheel *tigu/ori . The linguistic evidence suggest that in the proto- language the speakers of proto-African-Dravidian used either the vowels o/u or a/i after the consonants. It is also evident that the l and r, were interchangeable in the construction of the term for wheel.
It is clear that African people employed chariots in aadition to boats to travel long distances in many parts of Africa.
Horseback riding did originate in Africa.
At Buhen, one of the major fortresses of Nubia, which served as the headquarters of the Egyptian Viceroy of Kush a skeleton of a horse was found lying on the pavement of a Middle Kingdom rampart (W.B. Emery, A master-work of Egyptian military architecture 3900 years ago" Illustrated London News, 12 September, pp.250-251). This was only 25 years after the Hysos had conquered Egypt.The Kushites appear to have rode the horses on horseback instead of a chariot.
This suggest that the Kushites had been riding horses for an extended period of time for them to be able to attack Buhen on horseback. This supports supports the early habit of Africans riding horses as depicted in the rock art.This tradition was continued throughout the history of Kush.
The Kushites and upper Egyptians were great horsemen, whereas the Lower Egyptians usually rode the chariot, the Kushite calvary of the Twenty-Fifth Dynasty usually rode on horseback (W.A. Fairservis, The ancient kingdoms of the Nile (London,1962) p.129).
.
Posted by Clyde Winters (Member # 10129) on :
The first syllabic writing system of Africans was the Thinite script. This writing was used first by Blacks in Nubia, like the Niger-Congo people who migrated out of this region into the rest of Africa.
The Thinite script provides many of the signs that are included in later scripts used by Africans.
In Nubia, Black Africans were using Thinite symbols before the rise of Egypt to record their ideas and report on important events.
At this time your people may have been living in the caves of the Caucasus mountains.
This writing was later used by Africans to write inscriptions throughout Middle Africa.
The evidence of this writing is found throughout the Sahara. By the time Mande speaking people settled Dar Tichitt they left numerous inscriptions.
The people of Dar Tichitt were Mande speakers. These Mande speaking people also lived in the Fezzan where they were called Garamante/Garamandes. The Garamante settled Crete and are recognized as the Eteo-Cretans or Minoans.
As you can see from the above chart the Linear A signs and Mande/Manding signs are identical. If you look careful you will note that Africans, or Black people had also taken their writing system to Anatolia were your ancestors were living in the Caucasus mountains as hunter-gatherers.
The Minoans, who were Africans introduced Linear A, whose signs are identical to the writing left by Africans throughout the Sahara, like those found at Tichitt and presently represented in the Vai and several other West African scripts.
Your people adopted this writing to write business documents and we know it as Linear B.
Europeans only got writing from the Egyptians. The Greeks who obtained writing from the Blacks of Africa and Phonesia passed on writing to the Romans. With the fall of Rome Western Europeans got writing from the African Muslims who taught them the arts and sciences. .
Posted by Firewall (Member # 20331) on :
African Kingdom of Benin
quote: Written Language: We don't know much about the early days of Benin, as the people did not have a written language until the Portuguese arrived. They learned Portuguese from the traders - both how to speak it and how to write it.
The akan had writing too.
Posted by PreColonialAfrica13 (Member # 21589) on :
Yeah, should've mentioned that.
By akan writing do you mean the symbols they put on their cloth patterns? I considered that too but wasn't sure what it meant.
Posted by zarahan- aka Enrique Cardova (Member # 15718) on :
If you look at Africa without looking at it through the eyes of a African, you will never truly understand Africa. Stop comparing them to Europe, Asia, or the Americas, all that does is cause everything to become convoluted. Especially when you try to measure Africa up to the standards of European or Asian civilizations.
There is nothing wrong per se in comparing civilizations, as long as you are clear on what parameters you are using. The key point to keep in mind is that (a) Africa has produced civilization equal to any of the other continents, and (b) Africa need not follow various European or Asian models to validate its civilizations. Africa stand by itself in head to head comparisons, AND African civilizations stand on their own as unique expressions of the African environment or peoples, without necessarily adhering to some Euro models. For example, a neat linear shift from hunter-gathering, to herders, to farmers need not define every African development. There were large sedentary African cultures in place and eating quite well in the Nile Valley BEFORE intensive one-place agriculture came along. Likewise the ancient religions of Africa do not need to borrow patterns from the "Middle East" to become more elaborate. The king as divine priest, the numerous animal gods, regalia like grass skirts, masks and other trappings, etc etc are from the deep cultural foundations of Africa. No allegedly "universal" Eurasian "mother goddess" and such is needed as claimed by some Euro writers.
As for the wheel, here is where things get tricky, ancient egypt and nubia are both documented with using the whell, but I've found little info on the maghreb, the Sahel, East Africa, Ethiopia, or Southern/Central Africa.
What's tricky? The wheel is old news in Africa. It is old news in Egypt, Nubia, Ethiopia, and the Sudan, and the Sahara. As for the Maghreb, well the wheel is known there as well- Tunisia and Libya- not only Carthage but Saharan rock art in Libya shows wheeled vehicles with skeletal remains resembling Upper Egyptians (fentress 1997). It is old news in the West African Saharan kingdoms like Mali. Indeed art reliefs showing wheeled vehicles are found in Mali, in Goundam, about 50 miles from Timbuktu. And ox-drawn carts appear in the central Sahara. All this is BEFORE the Islamic incursion, so "Arabs" aren't needed to explain the appearance of the wheel in Africa (Robin Law, The Horse in West African History, 1980). The wheel is/was independently invented or spread to many different cultures in the Old World- in Africa as well as Europe and Asia. Ancient Greece did not invent the wheel- it comes from someplace else- outside Greece. Furthermore the spread of the Sahara desert southward obscures the nature of developments in Africa, making numerous places NON "sub-Saharan" that once had been "sub-Saharan." Pyramids for example are found in the Sudan, but the shift of the desert now moves such pyramids "out" of "sub-Saharan" Africa.
Here's the thing, topography may prevent diffusion, deserts, tropical forests(with crippling diseases), mountain ranges, large bodies of water, so that may just be the answer.
^^True, and old news indeed to students of Africa. The wheel is just another tool, and like any tool unless it can find practical use, it is not of much value. Hunters in West Africa's deep rain forest have little need of the wheel, and slash and burn horticulturalists or flood plain, or hoe terrace farmers nearby likewise do not need it much. The wheel for transport depends on large load-bearing draught animals, AND even when such are in place if you don't have to haul a lot of stuff for shelter and food its has little utility.
The Tsetse-flybelt in Africa limited the use of such load-bearing animals in many places. Without them, the wheel is of little value, even more so when shelter could be easily and quickly built from materials close at hand such as grass or reeds for making huts. Zulu cattle herders for example could easily erect shelter including building thorn-bush barricades from materials right at hand with no need for carts piled high with tenting and building material. Likewise in Egypt, the massive pyramid blocks did not move on wheeled carts, although such were known. Such carts would break, or sink into sandy terrain. 20-ton blocks of stone move by sled much more efficiently.
It is actually more efficient to float the massive blocks into place down the Nile or various canals and then use sledges, ramps, and even the circular motion of logs which provide part of the rotary motion of the wheel played a part. And Nubians and Egyptians are old hands at the wheel as in their use of pulleys and the lathe for example
If I'm wrong, and if anyone knows of the wheel being used outside of Egypt and Nubia(I do know of saharan rock paintings that are thousands of years old depicting chariots and the wheel, as well as the Garamentes civilization using them as well) please feel free to add to what I hope will be a stimulating and long-lasting thread.
Use of the wheel outside Egypt and Nubia is nothing special. Ethiopia, the savannah/ Saharan kingdoms towards the West like Mali, etc, all used the wheel. They used it like any other tool, when it was practical.
Also, navigable rivers also help with diffusion. The three greatest in Africa are the Niger, Nile, and Congo, but large swathes of the continent are without rivers and the tsetse fly kills horses and cattle as well.
True to a certain extent. Africa does not have the navigable rivers, or the natural harbors other continents have. Many African rivers are blocked by cataracts and sandbars, hindering the movement of ideas, people and technology. This has in part limited the diffusion of knowledge from elsewhere into certain parts of Africa. Europe by contrast has a network of rivers spanning cross peninsula routes, including the Rhine and the Danube. Also of critical importance that allowed Europe to borrow, copy and adapt technologies and ideas developed outside is Europe's favorable coastline, almost 23,000 miles, more than enough to gird the earth, with numerous natural harbors. Added to this would be the broad highway belt of the Mediterranean. Good water transport is one reason Europeans have been able to borrow and copy from elsewhere so successfully from others. Nevertheless, when Africans have good water access they have made the most of it. The Nile River is the foremost case in point. This does not mean Africans elsewhere did not use the rivers- they surely did, just that compared to other places with long navigable rivers leading to the sea, Africa did not have similar advantages.
Posted by PreColonialAfrica13 (Member # 21589) on :
Thanks for the reply zarahan, very informative!
Posted by the lioness, (Member # 17353) on :
The Egyptian chariot betrayed its Asiatic origin in a number of ways, by the names of its parts which were Semitic and by its decorations which often took the form of date palm branches or animals opposing each other, both Syrian motifs. However, by the 15th century BC, Pharaoh Tutmoses III had over a thousand chariots at his disposal; by 1400 BC the Great King of the Mitanni had amassed several times that number. We can picture these huge numbers of vehicles charging across the plain straight towards the enemy; the psychological impact of such a charge would have been enormous on untrained and unsteady troops.
Evidence of wheeled vehicles appears from the mid-4th millennium BC, near-simultaneously in Mesopotamia(Sumerian civilization), Indus Valley (Mohenjodaro), the Northern Caucasus (Maykop culture) and Central Europe, so that the question of which culture originally invented the wheeled vehicle remains unresolved and under debate. The Ljubljana Marshes Wooden Wheel, the world's oldest known wooden wheel, dating from 5,250 ± 100 BP as part of Globular Amphora Culture, was discovered by Slovenian archeologists in 2002.[3]
The earliest well-dated depiction of a wheeled vehicle (here a wagon—four wheels, two axles) is on the Bronocice pot, a c. 3500 – 3350 BC clay pot excavated in a Funnelbeaker culture settlement in southern Poland.[
Nubians from after about 400 BC used wheels for spinning pottery and as water wheels.[9] It is thought that Nubian waterwheels may have been ox-driven[10] It is also known that Nubians used horse-driven chariots imported from Egypt.[1
The tricky thing about the wheel is not conceiving of a cylinder rolling on its edge. It's figuring out how to connect a stable, stationary platform to that cylinder.
"The stroke of brilliance was the wheel-and-axle concept," said David Anthony, a professor of anthropology at Hartwick College and author of "The Horse, the Wheel, and Language" (Princeton, 2007). "But then making it was also difficult."
To make a fixed axle with revolving wheels, Anthony explained, the ends of the axle had to be nearly perfectly smooth and round, as did the holes in the center of the wheels; otherwise, there would be too much friction for the wheels to turn. Furthermore, the axles had to fit snugly inside the wheels' holes, but not too snugly — they had to be free to rotate.
Whoever invented it must have had access to wide slabs of wood from thick-trunked trees in order to carve large, round wheels. They also needed metal tools to chisel fine-fitted holes and axles. And they must have had a need for hauling heavy burdens over land. According to Anthony, "It was the carpentry that probably delayed the invention until 3500 B.C. or so, because it was only after about 4000 B.C. that cast copper chisels and gouges became common in the Near East."
The invention of the wheel was so challenging that it probably happened only once, in one place. However, from that place, it seems to have spread so rapidly across Eurasia and the Middle East that experts cannot say for sure where it originated. The earliest images of wheeled carts have been excavated in Poland and elsewhere in the Eurasian steppes, and this region is overtaking Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq) as the wheel's most likely birthplace. According to Asko Parpola, an Indologist at the University of Helsinki in Finland, there are linguistic reasons to believe the wheel originated with the Tripolye people of modern-day Ukraine. That is, the words associated with wheels and wagons derive from the language of that culture.
Horses were introduced into Egypt during the Second Intermediate Period (about 1700-1550 BC). The earliest remains of horses are a few bones from Avaris and the skeleton of a horse found at Buhen. The Buhen remains date to the early Second Intermediate Period, but this date is disputed. In the wars between the Theban 17th Dynasty and the Hyksos both sides used horses. In later times, the kingdom of Kush in the Sudan was famous for its horses, perhaps from good grazing grounds in areas of Upper Nubia: in the Victory Stela of king Piy, special mention is made of the royal attention to horses.
Posted by Son of Ra (Member # 20401) on :
@Zaharan
Great post! I loved it!
Do you have sources where it states West Africa specifically Mali had the wheel before the arrival of Arabs??? Because man this will be the final nail to the so called Arab contribution to Sahel Africa
So far we know.
1. Arabs didn't bring civilizations. Around 2000 BC or earlier there were urban towns/cities like Tichit Walate and Gao. 2. Arabs didn't bring Islam but North Africans like Berbers and even still Muslim were an elite minority. 3. Arabs were not responsible for the education or writing.
Posted by the lioness, (Member # 17353) on :
quote:Originally posted by Son of Ra: @Zaharan
Great post! I loved it!
Do you have sources where it states West Africa specifically Mali had the wheel before the arrival of Arabs??? Because man this will be the final nail to the so called Arab contribution to Sahel Africa
So far we know.
1. Arabs didn't bring civilizations. Around 2000 BC or earlier there were urban towns/cities like Tichit Walate and Gao. 2. Arabs didn't bring Islam but North Africans like Berbers and even still Muslim were an elite minority. 3. Arabs were not responsible for the education or writing.
Islam was invented in Arabia
Africans didn't speak Arabic language until it was taught to them by Arabs.
Posted by Son of Ra (Member # 20401) on :
@Lioness
If I stated otherwise than I would be an idiot...I know that Islam was invented in Arabia by an Arab. I said Arabs DID NOT bring Islam to West Africa like people usually think, but most likely African Berbers, since early Sahelian African states like Ghana Empire and North Africans had close relations.
Posted by the lioness, (Member # 17353) on :
quote:Originally posted by Son of Ra: @Lioness
If I stated otherwise than I would be an idiot...I know that Islam was invented in Arabia by an Arab. I said Arabs DID NOT bring Islam to West Africa like people usually think, but most likely African Berbers, since early Sahelian African states like Ghana Empire and North Africans had close relations.
You didn't say West Africa before you just said Africa.
Posted by Son of Ra (Member # 20401) on :
^^^
Um...In my post I clearly hinted that I was talking mainly about Sahel West Africa.
Posted by PreColonialAfrica13 (Member # 21589) on :
Ibn Battuta wrote in a passage that the trek across the Sahara(towards the lands of Mali) was extremely dangerous and treacherous. Only hardened berber nomads could safely traverse the sands via caravans. Some of the Arabs who went with him got lost, some went mad. Arabs are desert nomads, originally anyway, but the Sahara desert is as large as China, and is the hottest desert on Earth. I highly doubt any foreigner could cross it, even with plentiful supplies and knowledge of trade routes, without help from the natives.
Posted by the lioness, (Member # 17353) on :
Containment: Ghana and the Takrur The early presence of Islam was limited to segregated Muslim communities linked to the trans-Saharan trade. In the 11th century Andalusian geographer, Al-Bakri, reported accounts of Arab and North African Berber settlements in the region. Several factors led to the growth of the Muslim merchant-scholar class in non-Muslim kingdoms. Islam facilitated long distance trade by offering useful sets of tools for merchants including contract law, credit, and information networks. Muslim merchant-scholars also played an important role in non-Muslim kingdoms as advisors and scribes in Ghana. They had the crucial skill of written script, which helped in the administration of kingdoms. Many Muslim were also religious specialists whose amulets were prized by non-Muslims.
Merchant-scholars also played a large role in the spread of Islam into the forest zones. These included the Jakhanke merchant-scholars in [name region], the Jula merchants in Mali and the Ivory Coast, and the Hausa merchants during the nineteenth century in Nigeria, Ghana, and Guinea Basau,]. Muslim communities in the forest zones were minority communities often linked to trading diasporas. Many of the traditions in the forest zones still reflect the tradition of Al-Hajj Salim Suwari, a late fifteenth-century Soninke scholar, who focused on responsibilities of Muslims in a non-Muslim society. His tradition, known as the Suwarian tradition, discouraged proselytizing, believing that God would bring people around to Islam in his own ways. This tradition worked for centuries in the forest zone including the present day, where there are vibrant Muslim minority communities.
Although modern Ghana is unrelated to the ancient kingdom of Ghana, modern Ghana chose the name as a way of honoring early African history. The boundaries of the ancient Kingdom encompassed the Middle Niger Delta region, which consists of modern-day Mali and parts of present-day Mauritania and Senegal. This region has historically been home to the Soninken Malinke, Wa’kuri and Wangari peoples. Fulanis and the Southern Saharan Sanhaja Berbers also played a prominent role in the spread of Islam in the Niger Delta region. Large towns emerged in the Niger Delta region around 300 A.D. Around the eighth century, Arab documents mentioned ancient Ghana and that Muslims crossed the Sahara into West Africa for trade. North African and Saharan merchants traded salt, horses, dates, and camels from the north with gold, timber, and foodstuff from regions south of the Sahara. Ghana kings, however, did not permit North African and Saharan merchants to stay overnight in the city. This gave rise to one of the major features of Ghana—the dual city; Ghana Kings benefited from Muslim traders, but kept them outside centers of power.
From the eighth to the thirteenth century, contact between Muslims and Africans increased and Muslim states began to emerge in the Sahel. Eventually, African kings began to allow Muslims to integrate. Accounts during the eleventh century reported a Muslim state called Takrur in the middle Senegal valley. Around this time, the Almoravid reform movement began in Western Sahara and expanded throughout modern Mauritania, North Africa and Southern Spain. The Almoravids imposed a fundamentalist version of Islam, in an attempt to purify beliefs and practices from syncretistic or heretical beliefs. The Almoravid movement imposed greater uniformity of practice and Islamic law among West African Muslims. The Almoravids captured trade routes and posts, leading to the weakening of the Takruri state. Over the next hundred years, the empire dissolved into a number of small kingdoms.
quote:Originally posted by PreColonialAfrica13: Ibn Battuta wrote in a passage that the trek across the Sahara(towards the lands of Mali) was extremely dangerous and treacherous. Only hardened berber nomads could safely traverse the sands via caravans. Some of the Arabs who went with him got lost, some went mad. Arabs are desert nomads, originally anyway, but the Sahara desert is as large as China, and is the hottest desert on Earth. I highly doubt any foreigner could cross it, even with plentiful supplies and knowledge of trade routes, without help from the natives.
Posted by PreColonialAfrica13 (Member # 21589) on :
Hehe, love that gif. As for lioness, yeah the ghana kingdom kept the Muslims at arms length for quite some time, they lived in segregated cities on two hills, one for the king and his subjects, the other for muslims. The Muslims also were uncomfortable with being in close proximity to practitioners of west african tribal religions, some of which involved the use of witchcraft. The Muslim part of the city was inhabited mainly by merchants, in essence it was the "business/financial hub" of the capital.
Still, any Arab or foreigner who visited the Sahelian kingdoms had nothing but praise for their piety, sophistication, and honor.
Muslims take the practice of witchcraft VERY seriously, lol. It's punishable by death in Iran and Saudi Arabia today.
In the land of Ghana one enjoys complete safety, of all peoples the Negroes abhor injustice the most, belongings of foreigners are passed along to other foreigners to safeguard rather than being repossessed,etc. All quotes attributed to the Sahelian kingdoms.
Posted by Clyde Winters (Member # 10129) on :
Sadly many Blacks have an inferiority complex when it comes to history.It is a myth that you can not measure African civilization to Asian and European civilizations because CIVILIZATION was taken to Asia and Europe by Africans. That is obvious in the earlier post on writing and the chariot.
The absence of navigable rivers in Africa is a recent phenomena, that is why we find engravings of boats throughout the Sahara dating to periods before the Sahara became a desert.
The idea that Africans did not have navigation knowledge is a myth. As early as 12kya Africans already had canoes.
It was African people who spread boating and boat technology around the world, not Europeans.
In ancient times a wonderful civilization existed in the Highland regions of Middle Africa. In this wonderful civilization 6000 years ago lived the ancestors of the Dravidians, Black Africans, Elamites and the Sumerians. Today we call this Proto-Saharan civilization the "Fertile African Crescent", because the highland regions in which the Proto-Saharans l lived formed a crescent shape across the Saharan region of middle Africa.
The ancestors of the Dravidians, Manding and Sumerians were organized into a federal system during the neolithic subpluvial. These early Proto- Saharans made adequate uses of local game and plant life and they established permanent and seasonal settlements around well stocked fishing holes. They lived on plains, punctuated by mountains and numerous points of inundation due to the frequency of rain in the ancient Sahara.
The Proto-Saharans were great sailors. They used celestial navigation to make long voyages. The Proto-Saharans also used boats called PS *kalam.
As a result, we find numerous engravings of boats throughout the Sahara.
.
Posted by Firewall (Member # 20331) on :
quote:Originally posted by PreColonialAfrica13: Yeah, should've mentioned that.
By akan writing do you mean the symbols they put on their cloth patterns? I considered that too but wasn't sure what it meant.
I believe most or all those civilizations in southern west africa had writing one way or the other from either the islamic states north and the west trading with them like portugal etc.. and some had native writing.
_______________________________________ Here something about the akan.
I got this from the other website.
The Ashanti
Surprises in Kumasi, the Ashanti capital
Sir Garnet Wolseley commanded the British forces in their Third Ashanti War in west Africa, 1873-1874. After winning several victories over the Ashanti Wolseley and his army occupied their capital of Kumasi; finding it abandoned, they explored it for a little while and then burned it.
They made two discoveries of note - one macabre and one fascinating. Supposedly there was extensive evidence of human sacrifice. How important was this tradition in Ashanti culture, how and why was it done? I have not come across many references to human sacrifice in African history.
Secondly, the British supposedly found 'rows of books' in a multitude of languages. How did the Ashanti come to own this library, and what were some of these languages? To what extent were the Ashanti people literate? Had they commited their own tongue to writing?
_______________
Quote: Because of the long history of mutual interaction between Ashanti and European powers, the Ashanti have the greatest amount of historiography in sub-Saharan Africa. The British touted the Ashanti as one of the more civilized African peoples, cataloguing their religious, familial, and legal systems in works like R.S. Rattray's Ashanti Law and Constitution.
Quote: Ashanti was one of the few African states able to offer serious resistance to European colonizers
Do you have sources where it states West Africa specifically Mali had the wheel before the arrival of Arabs??? Because man this will be the final nail to the so called Arab contribution to Sahel Africa
So far we know. <<file://C:\Users\quango\AppData\Local\Temp\bkbqfy31.bmp>>
1. Arabs didn't bring civilizations. Around 2000 BC or earlier there were urban towns/cities like Tichit Walate and Gao. 2. Arabs didn't bring Islam but North Africans like Berbers and even still Muslim were an elite minority. 3. Arabs were not responsible for the education or writing.
Ra see Robin Law, The Horse in West African History, 1980- pg 160, 155-163) "Heavy draught work in these early times had therefore to be done by oxen rather than horses; and there are, in addition to the horse-drawn chariots, numerous rock engravings depicting ox-drawn carts in both the central and the western Sahara. However by the Islamic era wheeled transport had apparently gone completely out of use in the Sahara... "
then it talks about the engravings in Mali:
"The most southerly depiction of a wheeled cart in Saharan rock art is an engraving at TOndia, near Goundam to the northwest of the Niger bend: unfortunately the engraving is too stylized for it to be clear whether the draught animals shown are intended to be horses or oxen."
And you are right- Africa had writing and education long before Arabs showed up. A lot of people seem to think that EUrope invented writing, but this is not so. Europe copied the invention from non-Europeans elsewhere. Egyptian writing systems appear before that of Mesopotamia, and variants of this were modified by Phonecians (a Middle Eastern people) to produce their version of alphabetic script (see book by Yale scholar David Sacks 2003, Language Visible) It is from this Middle Eastern variant that European alphabets are derived. Europe never invented writing.
lioness said: Nubians from after about 400 BC used wheels for spinning pottery and as water wheels.[9] It is thought that Nubian waterwheels may have been ox-driven[10] It is also known that Nubians used horse-driven chariots imported from Egypt.
Keep in mind that Nubians are the closest cousin of Egyptians and were involved in Egypt since pre-dynastic times. Limiting "Nubia" to 400 BC is probelmatic, for Egyptians were deploying wheeled vehicles long before then.
"Interestingly, the earliest representation of wheeled vehicle from Egypt (tomb of Sebeknekht at El Kab, Dynasty XIII) shows sledges, mounted on four disk wheels rather than rollers."
-- Wheeled vehicles and ridden animals in the ancient Near East (1997), By M. A. Littauer, J. H. Crouwel. p14 -------------------------------------------------------- "Little is known about the raising of loads using ropes, but stone grooves and pulleys, around which ropes would have passed, are preserved from the 4th Dynasty, and wooden wheels for simple rope pulleys existed from the Middle Kingdom onwards."
------------------------------------- "Much earlier forerunners are shown in tomb paintings of the late Old Kingdom and the 11th Dynasty showing siege towers with wheels; depictions of movable siege towers exist from the 6th Dynasty onwards.) This indicates that the wheel was used in the transport of heavy loads more frequently than assumed.. The use of wheeled equipment in building is not yet attested to but may have been fairly common. The soft surface of the desert sand and the mud of the cultivation may have been a serious obstacle for heavy carriages but not so much for sledges."
--The encyclopaedia of ancient Egyptian architecture By Dieter Arnold. 2002. p 195 -------------------------- "In all probability wheels would have been of little practical use, for the building blocks used were far too large and too heavy to be carried on a wooden-wheeled cart. The relative scarcity of wood in ancient Egypt would have made the building of such carts difficult and overcoming the practical and technical difficulties of building carts to carry and move great weights would have probably proved impossible.
Wheels would have been, in any event, a far from practical method of transport on either agricultural land or the desert where they would have become quickly bogged down in either mud or sand."
--R. Partridge. (1996) Transport in ancient Egypt. p76
CLyde says: The absence of navigable rivers in Africa is a recent phenomena, that is why we find engravings of boats throughout the Sahara dating to periods before the Sahara became a desert.
Climate/enviro factors no doubt has changed the watery landscape once allowing boats in the Sahara. The time periods & amount of change varies over time. Africa has always had navigable rivers but the crucial point is (a) how far they were navigable internally before being interrupted by sandbars, rapids or cataracts, and (b) their access to the sea without continual interruption. Other factors include unpredictable rainfall that makes water levels fluctuate problematically. Another is how navigable by large vessels. It has been estimated that long stretches of the Niger Riger can only handle barges below 20 tons during the low-water level dry season. Whereas the Yangtse River in China can handle huge barges weighing in at 10,000 tons going hundreds of miles inland without interruption at any time. All the above just points out that substantial movement of materials and technology is not as easy in many parts of Africa as in other places. It does not mean Africans did not master boat technology. They did, long before others. And it is true that Africans had navigation knowledge as well.
Posted by blingdogg (Member # 21572) on :
I also read that the Asantehene ruler had a large collection of books that the British found when they attacked. As nice as it sounds, I don’t believe that there was much literacy within the Asante empire, at least among the Asante people. The Asante were known for using Islamic talismans and portions of scriptures from the Quran (even though they didn’t know Arabic) sewed into clothing, or worn, for their spiritual properties and belief that they brought good fortune.
They did however, encourage Hausa scholars and Hausa people in general, to settle in Asante because they were literate in Arabic. The Asante assigned various positions in government to Hausa for helping in administration, so maybe some of those books could have been brought by Hausa from the north.
However, it’s not to discount that the Asante themselves never learned to read also.
One thing I really admire about the Asante is the extremely developed and complex government structure they had, without literacy (their use of drums also helped in communication across distances). It impressed the British tremendously, and dispelled their myths of “African savages”. The Asante really showed that a civilization doesn't require literacy, and that pre-literate African states were just as complex as the Islamic ones, and those of the rest of the world.
Posted by Firewall (Member # 20331) on :
Here something about early african mathematics.
quote: The Lebombo bone is the oldest known mathematical artifact. It dates from 35,000 BCE and consists of 29 distinct notches that were deliberately cut into a baboon's fibula.
The Ishango bone is a bone tool, dated to the Upper Paleolithic era, about 18,000 to 20,000 BCE. It is a dark brown length of bone, the fibula of a baboon, with a sharp piece of quartz affixed to one end, perhaps for engraving or writing. It was first thought to be a tally stick, as it has a series of tally marks carved in three columns running the length of the tool, but some scientists have suggested that the groupings of notches indicate a mathematical understanding that goes beyond counting. These are the function postulated about the Ishango bones: 1. A tool for multiplication, division, and simple mathematical calculation; 2. A six-month lunar calendar;. a construct of a woman, keeping track of her menstrual cycle;
In the book How Mathematics Happened: the First 50,000 Years, Peter Rudman argues that the development of the concept of prime numbers could only have come about after the concept of division, which he dates to after 10,000 BC, with prime numbers probably not being understood until about 500 BC. He also writes that "no attempt has been made to explain why a tally of something should exhibit multiples of two, prime numbers between 10 and 20, and some numbers that are almost multiples of 10." see History of mathematics
Nile Valley
quote:
The earliest attested examples of mathematical calculations date to the predynastic Naqada period, and show a fully developed numeral system. The importance of mathematics to an educated Egyptian is suggested by a New Kingdom fictional letter in which the writer proposes a scholarly competition between himself and another scribe regarding everyday calculation tasks such as accounting of land, labor and grain. Texts such as the Rhind Mathematical Papyrus and the Moscow Mathematical Papyrus show that the ancient Egyptians could perform the four basic mathematical operations—addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division—use fractions, compute the volumes of boxes and pyramids, and calculate the surface areas of rectangles, triangles, circles and even spheres[citation needed]. They understood basic concepts of algebra and geometry, and could solve simple sets of simultaneous equations.
Mathematical notation was decimal, and based on hieroglyphic signs for each power of ten up to one million. Each of these could be written as many times as necessary to add up to the desired number; so to write the number eighty or eight hundred, the symbol for ten or one hundred was written eight times respectively. Because their methods of calculation could not handle most fractions with a numerator greater than one, ancient Egyptian fractions had to be written as the sum of several fractions. For example, the fraction two-fifths was resolved into the sum of one-third + one-fifteenth; this was facilitated by standard tables of values.[ Some common fractions, however, were written with a special glyph; the equivalent of the modern two-thirds is shown on the right.
Ancient Egyptian mathematicians had a grasp of the principles underlying the Pythagorean theorem, knowing, for example, that a triangle had a right angle opposite the hypotenuse when its sides were in a 3–4–5 ratio. They were able to estimate the area of a circle by subtracting one-ninth from its diameter and squaring the result:
Area ≈ [(8⁄9)D]2 = (256⁄81)r2 ≈ 3.16r2,
a reasonable approximation of the formula πr2.
The golden ratio seems to be reflected in many Egyptian constructions, including the pyramids, but its use may have been an unintended consequence of the ancient Egyptian practice of combining the use of knotted ropes with an intuitive sense of proportion and harmony.
Based on engraved plans of Meroitic King Amanikhabali's pyramids, Nubians had a sophisticated understanding of mathematics and an appreciation of the harmonic ratio. The engraved plans is indicative of much to be revealed about Nubian mathematics.
Sahelian
quote:
All of the mathematical learning of the Islamic world during the medieval period was available and advanced by Timbuktu scholars: arithmetic, algebra, geometry, and trigonometry.
Other African traditions
quote: One of the major achievements found in Africa was the advance knowledge of fractal geometry and mathematics. The knowledge of fractal geometry can be found in a wide aspect of African life from art, social design structures, architecture, to games, trade, and divination systems. With the discovery of fractal mathematics in widespread use in Africa, Ron Eglash had this to say,
"We used to think of mathematics as a kind of ladder that you climb, and we would think of counting systems – one plus one equals two – as the first step and simple shapes as the second step. Recent mathematical developments like fractal geometry represented the top of the ladder in most Western thinking. But it's much more useful to think about the development of mathematics as a kind of branching structure and that what blossomed very late on European branches might have bloomed much earlier on the limbs of others. When Europeans first came to Africa, they considered the architecture very disorganized and thus primitive. It never occurred to them that the Africans might have been using a form of mathematics that they hadn't even discovered yet."
The binary numeral system was also widely known through africa before much of the world. It has been theorized that it could have influence western geomancy which would lead to the development of the digital computer.
I found something about ancient trigonometry.
History of trigonometry
quote: Sumerian astronomers studied angle measure, using a division of circles into 360 degrees. They and later the Babylonians, studied the ratios of the sides of similar triangles and discovered some properties of these ratios, but did not turn that into a systematic method for finding sides and angles of triangles. The ancient Nubians used a similar method. The ancient Greeks transformed trigonometry into an ordered science.
quote:
Classical Greek mathematicians (such as Euclid and Archimedes) studied the properties of chords and inscribed angles in circles, and proved theorems that are equivalent to modern trigonometric formulae, although they presented them geometrically rather than algebraically. Claudius Ptolemy expanded upon Hipparchus' Chords in a Circle in his Almagest. The modern sine function was first defined in the Surya Siddhanta, and its properties were further documented by the 5th century Indian mathematician and astronomer Aryabhata. These Greek and Indian works were translated and expanded by medieval Islamic mathematicians. By the 10th century, Islamic mathematicians were using all six trigonometric functions, had tabulated their values, and were applying them to problems in spherical geometry. At about the same time, Chinese mathematicians developed trigonometry independently, although it was not a major field of study for them. Knowledge of trigonometric functions and methods reached Europe via Latin translations of the works of Persian and Arabic astronomers such as Al Battani and Nasir al-Din al-Tusi. One of the earliest works on trigonometry by a European mathematician is De Triangulis by the 15th century German mathematician Regiomontanus. Trigonometry was still so little known in 16th-century Europe that Nicolaus Copernicus devoted two chapters of De revolutionibus orbium coelestium to explain its basic concepts.
Note-in time this form of greek learning came to ancient nubia and sudan and some other areas in africa. In the middle ages of course islam and west africans advanced trigonometry and this info spread. In the other thread i should have said that meroe was known as a african athens and nubian alexandria.
Alexandria is in africa.
Ancient African Math/Science Shatters Stereotypes
quote:
Thousands of books and manuscripts uncovered in what is now Mali, especially around Timbuktu, are just being studied, with stunning results: African scholars in an unfathomably wealthy civilization independently developing sophisticated math, astronomy,and other sciences, even while Europe was still crawling out of the Middle Ages...
From the world's oldest astronomical observatory to Timbuktu scholar Abul Abbas, who commented in 1723 on much earlier scholars' work in the same city - thus showing they were building an independent body of work (and whose conclusions
show his lack of contact with, hence independence from, Europe),African mathematical and science achievements have heretofore been African mathematical and science achievements have here to fore been largely kept in the dark. All this, and so far only 14 out of more than 18,000 manuscripts have been translated and examined.
quote:
Timbuktu ... was one of the major cities of West Africa from 800 until just over400 years ago.It was very prosperous, and had many learning centers, with people collecting and writing books on law, poetry, astronomy,optics,mathematics. This history of scholarship in Africa extended over large parts of the continent. Ancient manuscripts are found all over West Africa and even in East Africa. They are written in Arabic and in local African languages. ...In Mali alone, there are around 200 private libraries, and literally hundreds of thousands of books.
But most powerful in their refutation of the Eurocentric view of scientific development perhaps are the Mali manuscripts, some dating back 600 years, including beautifully drawn diagrams of the orbits of the planets in a geocentric universe, which demonstrate complex mathematical calculations and algorithms that were as accurate in some cases as anything we have today. And when as Muslims they needed to accurately determine the location of Timbuktu and Mecca, they surpassed the Greeks by inventing the functions of trigonometry.
Posted by zarahan- aka Enrique Cardova (Member # 15718) on :
Some of the info above is not quite accurate. Are you sure about the following below for example? WHat's your source?
" And when as Muslims they needed to accurately determine the location of Timbuktu and Mecca, they surpassed the Greeks by inventing the functions of trigonometry."
^^Questionable. The Egyptians can be said to have developed or at least pioneered trig based on their need for building pyramids, temples, and other structures. It is unclear how Muslims invented trig. The Egyptians had it going on long before Muslims appeared. QUOTE:
"The Rhind Papyrus, and Egyptian collection of 84 problems in arithmetic, algebra and geometry dating from about 1800 BCE, contains five problems dealing with the seked. A close analysis of the text, with its accompanying figures, reveals that this word means the slope of an incline- essential knowledge for huge construction projects such as the pyramids... This [example] is actually the "run-to-rise" ratio of the pyramid in question- in effect, the cotangent of the angle between the base and the face. It shows that the Egyptians had at least some knowledge of the numerical relations in a triangle, a kind of "proto-trigonometry." --Britannica Educational Publishing (2010). The Britannica Guide to Algebra and Trigonometry. p 203
Posted by Firewall (Member # 20331) on :
quote: " And when as Muslims they needed to accurately determine the location of Timbuktu and Mecca, they surpassed the Greeks by inventing the functions of trigonometry."
Yeah because it shown from the post i posted that nubians, etc.. knew trigonometry.
From the history of trigonometry info i posted above it seems that the nubians invented it on thier own like the chinese.
That quote should be the Muslims and west africans advanced trigonometry further.
Like this one.
quote: All of the mathematical learning of the Islamic world during the medieval period was available and advanced by Timbuktu scholars: arithmetic, algebra, geometry, and trigonometry.
Posted by the lioness, (Member # 17353) on :
quote:Originally posted by zarahan- aka Enrique Cardova:
lioness said: Nubians from after about 400 BC used wheels for spinning pottery and as water wheels.[9] It is thought that Nubian waterwheels may have been ox-driven[10] It is also known that Nubians used horse-driven chariots imported from Egypt.
Keep in mind that Nubians are the closest cousin of Egyptians and were involved in Egypt since pre-dynastic times. Limiting "Nubia" to 400 BC is probelmatic,
the quote is specific to the horse drawn chariot in Nubia. For examples of other wheeled vehicles used by Nubian prior to that you need evidence
quote:Originally posted by zarahan- aka Enrique Cardova: for Egyptians were deploying wheeled vehicles long before then.
"Interestingly, the earliest representation of wheeled vehicle from Egypt (tomb of Sebeknekht at El Kab, Dynasty XIII) shows sledges, mounted on four disk wheels rather than rollers."
-- Wheeled vehicles and ridden animals in the ancient Near East (1997), By M. A. Littauer, J. H. Crouwel. p14 -------------------------------------------------------- "Little is known about the raising of loads using ropes, but stone grooves and pulleys, around which ropes would have passed, are preserved from the 4th Dynasty, and wooden wheels for simple rope pulleys existed from the Middle Kingdom onwards."
"Much earlier forerunners are shown in tomb paintings of the late Old Kingdom and the 11th Dynasty showing siege towers with wheels; depictions of movable siege towers exist from the 6th Dynasty onwards.) This indicates that the wheel was used in the transport of heavy loads more frequently than assumed.. The use of wheeled equipment in building is not yet attested to but may have been fairly common. The soft surface of the desert sand and the mud of the cultivation may have been a serious obstacle for heavy carriages but not so much for sledges."
--The encyclopaedia of ancient Egyptian architecture By Dieter Arnold. 2002. p 195
"In all probability wheels would have been of little practical use, for the building blocks used were far too large and too heavy to be carried on a wooden-wheeled cart. The relative scarcity of wood in ancient Egypt would have made the building of such carts difficult and overcoming the practical and technical difficulties of building carts to carry and move great weights would have probably proved impossible.
Wheels would have been, in any event, a far from practical method of transport on either agricultural land or the desert where they would have become quickly bogged down in either mud or sand."
--R. Partridge. (1996) Transport in ancient Egypt. p76
The noble family, of which the above-mentioned Sebeknekht was a member, managed to make itself extremely powerful during the Hyksos rule. The Hyksos first appeared in Egypt c.1800 BC, during the Eleventh Dynasty, and began their climb to power in the Thirteenth Dynasty, coming out of the second intermediate period in control of Avaris and the Delta. By the Fifteenth Dynasty, they ruled Lower Egypt, and at the end of the Seventeenth Dynasty, they were expelled (c. 1560 BC). The Hyksos introduced the horse drawn chariot to Egypt.
The Egyptians used wheels for rope and pulley systems and on siege towers
[/url]
apart from this there's no evidence wheels were in common use until they were used in chariot warfare but were not used for non-military use like carts. Scarcity of wood ? maybe. Sand too soft? The chariots worked
off topic: Do you live in Uganda currently or have lived in Uganda?
Posted by zarahan- aka Enrique Cardova (Member # 15718) on :
apart from this there's no evidence wheels were in common use until they were used in chariot warfare but were not used for non-military use like carts.
^^Not quite. While the siege towers attract more attention, some Egyptologists note that wheeled vehicles exist as far back as the Old Kingdom like 4 wheeled carts or carriages used to move coffins or religious regalia (a bark or ship for a particular god for example) during his festival processions. FOr example:
"The solid wooden wheel existed from the Old Kingdom, but it was too heavy for regular transport use over rough ground surfaces and was only employed on four wheeled carriages, which sometimes carried coffins or the god's sacred bark during his festival procession." --Rosalie David 1999. HANDBOOK TO LIFE IN ANCIENT EGYPT. p260
And of course, the wheel was also used in pottery, in pulleys and in lathes in the Nile Valley. Heavy deployment for transport duty was no doubt limited by the primary loads to be moved- like 20 ton blocks - for which water transport, ramps, and sleds were better.
It is also known that Nubians used horse-driven chariots imported from Egypt.[1
They did, but there is also some evidence that some chariots themselves were manufactured in Nubia. Indeed Nubian mercenaries were sometimes key agents in the dissemination of new war tech in the Nile Valley.
"Nubia, too, must have benefited from the international arms trade. Although battle scenes show Nubian enemies conventionally as bowmen with relatively little equipment, other sources show the use of chariots by the elite, and the "tribute" scenes show weaponry and armor that was manufactured in Nubia... the inclusion of chariots as part of the Kushite tribute to Egypt suggests that they, too, were eventually being manufactured in Nubia itself". --R. Morkot 2003. Historical Dictionary of Ancient Egyptian Warfare p26
PS: I love Uganda Posted by the lioness, (Member # 17353) on :
why do you love Uganda?
Posted by zarahan- aka Enrique Cardova (Member # 15718) on :
Why do you love pretending to be a "black" woman?
Posted by the lioness, (Member # 17353) on :
SOLID WHEEL CARTS
detail of the "Standard of Ur", ca. 2500 BC. Sumerian 2500 BC
. Hand-propelled wheel cart, Indus Valley Civilization (3000–1500 BCE). Housed at the National Museum, New Delhi.
. Cart Pulled by a Bull (Niuche). Terra Cotta. Sui Dynasty (581 – 618).. China
Greece 1903
Posted by Troll Patrol aka Ish Gebor (Member # 18264) on :
quote:Originally posted by PreColonialAfrica13: Yeah, should've mentioned that.
By akan writing do you mean the symbols they put on their cloth patterns? I considered that too but wasn't sure what it meant.
Wheeled Transport in Pre-Colonial West Africa Robin Law Africa: Journal of the International African Institute Vol. 50, No. 3 (1980), pp. 249-262 Published by: Cambridge University Press
"Africa is assailed for not inventing the wheel as if (to imply that) it were a European invention. The fact remains, though, that Greek and Roman wheeled vehicles and chariots are the directs heirs of Mesopotamian ingenuity. Moreover, African Saharan rock paintings reveal chariots and wheeled vehicles of great antiquity." --Gloria Emeagwali, Professor of History, History Department, CCSU
quote:Originally posted by zarahan- aka Enrique Cardova: Why do you love pretending to be a "black" woman?
lol. Too funny.
Google these,
General History of Africa: Ancient civilizations of Africa
By G. Mokhtar,Unesco. International Scientific Committee for the Drafting of a General History of Africa
Page 263
An Economic History of West Africa by A. G. Hopkins George Dalton
African Economic History No. 1 (Spring, 1976)
Page 63
Posted by the lioness, (Member # 17353) on :
Posted by the lioness, (Member # 17353) on :
quote:Originally posted by Troll Patrol aka Ish Gebor:
quote:Originally posted by PreColonialAfrica13: Yeah, should've mentioned that.
By akan writing do you mean the symbols they put on their cloth patterns? I considered that too but wasn't sure what it meant.
Wheeled Transport in Pre-Colonial West Africa Robin Law Africa: Journal of the International African Institute Vol. 50, No. 3 (1980), pp. 249-262 Published by: Cambridge University Press
Is it the Bassa script a lefit pre-colonial script though? I've heard otherwise.
Posted by Troll Patrol aka Ish Gebor (Member # 18264) on :
quote:Originally posted by the lioness,:
quote:Originally posted by Troll Patrol aka Ish Gebor:
quote:Originally posted by PreColonialAfrica13: Yeah, should've mentioned that.
By akan writing do you mean the symbols they put on their cloth patterns? I considered that too but wasn't sure what it meant.
Wheeled Transport in Pre-Colonial West Africa Robin Law Africa: Journal of the International African Institute Vol. 50, No. 3 (1980), pp. 249-262 Published by: Cambridge University Press
Also, what's up with the lioness, I've been hearing some pretty crazy things about her.
Posted by the lioness, (Member # 17353) on :
quote:Originally posted by PreColonialAfrica13: Sorry meant legit*
Also, what's up with the lioness, I've been hearing some pretty crazy things about her.
don't believe the hype- Chuck D
Posted by the lioness, (Member # 17353) on :
quote:Originally posted by Troll Patrol aka Ish Gebor: I could help out, if you were truly a sistah.
thats what that other brutha told me and I looked in his wallet and there was nothing in it and an expired credit card
Posted by alTakruri (Member # 10195) on :
5th Dynasty Old Kingdom wheels on a scaffold.
A fuller view of the wheeled device depicted in Kaemheset's tomb appears to be a builder's scaffold rather than a war machine. Note the men on it have contractor's tools not weapons. Also nothing going on on the four floors inside the building remotely suggest a siege is happening,
12th Dynasty Middle Kingdom potters' wheels
How old is the myth about Khnum sculpting freshly conceived children on a turntable.
Posted by Clyde Winters (Member # 10129) on :
^^ Super post!
.
Posted by the lioness, (Member # 17353) on :
quote:Originally posted by alTakruri: [QB] 5th Dynasty Old Kingdom wheels on a scaffold.
A fuller view of the wheeled device depicted in Kaemheset's tomb appears to be a builder's scaffold rather than a war machine. Note the men on it have contractor's tools not weapons. Also nothing going on on the four floors inside the building remotely suggest a siege is happening,
you would think the peasanst would have had carts used to move moderate loads, sacks of grain, crops, etc. but they seem not to be in the art, just this ladder thing, chariots and zarahan said coffin wheels. Need to see if in some other piece of Egyptian art there's a mobile seige tower with wheels as written about
Posted by alTakruri (Member # 10195) on :
quote:Originally posted by Clyde Winters: ^^ Super post!
.
Asante sana ndugu.
It's a blast from the past in response to something Ausar posted here.
Posted by the lioness, (Member # 17353) on :
[QB]
quote:Originally posted by alTakruri: [QB] 5th Dynasty Old Kingdom wheels on a scaffold.
A fuller view of the wheeled device depicted in Kaemheset's tomb appears to be a builder's scaffold rather than a war machine. Note the men on it have contractor's tools not weapons. Also nothing going on on the four floors inside the building remotely suggest a siege is happening,
Warfare in the Ancient Near East to 1600 BC: Holy Warriors at the Dawn of ... By William J. Hamblin
Ancient and Medieval Siege Weapons: A Fully Illustrated Guide to Siege ... By Konstantin Nossov Posted by the lioness, (Member # 17353) on :
(^same as above) A watercolor copy of a scene from the tomb of Intef at Thebes, 11th Dynasty (2nd half of the Dynasty, during the Middle Kingdom). Defenders are Asiatic: beards, long hair with fillets, colorful kilts
___________________^^^ curve here supposed to be a wheel Posted by Troll Patrol aka Ish Gebor (Member # 18264) on :
quote:Originally posted by the lioness,:
quote:Originally posted by Troll Patrol aka Ish Gebor: I could help out, if you were truly a sistah.
thats what that other brutha told me and I looked in his wallet and there was nothing in it and an expired credit card
lol this is coming from a black woman impostor with a old outdated mac-computer.
Nice to know that hypothetical "brutha", called you a black woman impostor as well.
It's always interesting to look at science and understand how things develop, evolve and lead from one thing to another...you should try it sometime. In your weird mind the wheel popped out of nowhere, and there it was.
NEW RADIOCARBON DATES ON THE CEREALS FROM WADI KUBBANIYA
Science 10 August 1984: Vol. 225 no. 4662 pp. 645-646 DOI:10.1126/science.225.4662.645
quote: Fred Wendorf et al. 1988. New radiocarbon dates and Late Palaeolithic diet at Wadi Kubbaniya, Egypt. Antiquity 62
Vegetable remains are a rarity in Palaeolithic contexts. These new determinations on material from southern Egypt establish securely the date of an intensive grass-tuber and fish economy in the Nile Valley towards 20,000 years ago.
In 1978, during test excavations at a group of Late Palaeolithic sites in Wadi Kubbaniya, near Aswan, Egypt, several grains of barley and one grain of einkorn were found, seemingly firmly associated with a buried hearth (E-78-4) (Wendorf et al. 1979; 1980). Because of the potential significance of this discovery, a major effort was made in 1981-4 to recover more remains of food plants, particularly cereals. Large-scale excavations were conducted at three localities (E-78-3, E-78-4 and E-81-1), and 24 others were partially excavated or tested. Our discussion here will be limited to sites in one geomorphic settings: those in the massive field of dune sand and interfingering lenses of Nile silt. The stone artefacts at the sites are characterized by an abundance of Ouchtate bladelets, which sometimes make up over 80% of the retouched tools, occasional, well-made burins (often on Levallois flakes), scaled pieces, notches, denticulates and truncations.
Flotation could not be used for plant recovery because most of the remains were extremely fragile and disintegrated on contact with water. Instead, several hundred cubic metres of dry sediment were processed through specially constructed sets of graded screens. This yielded a large quantity of plant remains, including barley grains from near the surface of site E-78-3 and date-stones from E-78-3 and E-81-1. Some of the barley grains were blackish in colour, but neither they nor the date-stones were actually charred. Numerous grinding-stones, presumed to have been used for processing the cereals, were found in the sites, often deeply buried, and reinforced the supposed association of the cereals with the Late Palaeolithic occupations. Radiocarbon dates on associated wood charcoal placed the occupations between 18,500 and 17,000 b.p. These finds led some of us to suggest an early origin of food production, with subsequent implications for the initial development of complex societies.
While the Kubbaniya excavations were still under way, it became possible to date very small samples, even individual cereal grains, by the then-new technology of the tandem accelerator mass spectrometer (AMS), and the Kubbaniya cereals and date-stones were among the first materials dated by this technology. The cereal grains were dated at the University of Arizona, Tucson, and the date-stones at the Oxford University facility; all were shown to be relatively modern contaminants. The idea that cereals and dates had been important components of the Late Palaeolithic economy of Wadi Kubbaniya was therefore abandoned (Wendorf et al. 1984; Gowlett 1987).
Although we are still unable to agree on how apparently undisturbed archaeological horizons were contaminated by relatively modern plant materials, this experience demonstrates that we must be extremely cautious in evaluating the association of isolated plant fragments with archaeological contexts. At the very least, all such materials found outside their expected areal or temporal ranges should be subjected to direct (AMS) dating, and many of those within their expected ranges should also be dated (Harris 1986; 1987; Legge 1986).
The charred plant remains recovered at the Kubbaniyan sites consisted mostly of wood charcoal, all of which has been identified as tamarisk (Tomczynska, in press). There was also a significant collection of food plant preserved by charring, among which most of the identified specimens are purple nut-grass tubers (Cyperus rotundus). Other identified remains include tubers of club-rush (Scirpus sp. of the S. maritimus or S. tuberosus type), a fern, seeds of chamomile, asparagus, club-rush, an umbell, the receptacle from a flower-bud of a water-lily and fruit fragments of dom palm (Hyphaene thebaica) and Tribulus; identified seeds from human coprolites include club-rush and chamomile (Hillman et al. in press; Hillman in press). These plants still occur today along the Nile and grow either on the terraces and banks, or in marshy areas adjacent to the river.
After the experience with the cereals and data-stones, it seemed prudent to submit several samples of the most abundant class of charred plant-food remains for AMS dating. Twelve specimens were selected, including 11 tubers of purple nut-grass and one tuber of a club-rush. Three specimens were selected from each of two sites and six from the third, all of them indisputably charred. The results are shown in TABLE 1.
Prior to the accelerator measurement, the samples were combusted to CO2, which was then converted by a catalytic process to graphite powder. The graphite powder was packed under pressure into an aluminum target holder and mounted in the ion source of the accelerator. The ratios of 14C/13C in the target samples and in standard samples made from, NBS oxalic acid were made in the manner described by Donahue et al. (in press). the ages given in TABLE 1 are radiocarbon ages calculated from 14C half-life of 5568 years, and the uncertainties are standard deviations of the average of several measurements of each quantity. The measurements were not corrected for variation in 13C/12C ratios. Such corrections would not change the results by more than 25 years.
The results thus confirm that the charred Cyperus tubers were contemporaneous with the Late Palaeolithic occupations. They are in general agreement with the radiocarbon dates given in TABLE 2, which were obtained by traditional methods on wood charcoal from the same layers of the same sites (Haas in press).
However, the AMS and conventional dates do not correspond entirely: statistical analysis shows that AMS dates are definitely younger at site E-81-1, tend to be rather younger at Site E-78-3, and tend to be rather older at Site E-78-4 (Hietala in press). Further research will be needed to resolve this discrepancy.
The excavation techniques used at Kubbaniya resulted not only in the recovery of plant-remains, but also of a much more complete faunal collection than had previously been known from the Nile Valley. This is particularly true of the fish fauna, which includes the fragile remains of young animals and smaller species. Together, the faunal and floral collections recovered from the Kubbaniyan sites provide our first glimpse of what must have been a very complex and seasonally diverse diet during the Late Palaeolithic in the Nile Valley (Gautier & Van Neer in press; Hillman et al. in press; Hillman in press).
When mature, the wet-land tubers are rich in carbohydrates, but they must also contain toxins and an excess of fibre and must be processed before they can be consumed in quantity. The processing includes roasting, crushing, grinding and perhaps leaching to eliminate the toxins and to make the fibre more digestible. We suggest that the grinding stones in the sites were used primarily for this purpose, and for the grinding of other fibrous foods, such as reed rhizomes and Hyphaene fruits (Hillman et al. in press). Such use is also indicated by the chemical analysis of traces of organic compounds on one of the grinding-stones, showing high values for cellulosics (which could indicate starch, as well as cellulose sensu stricto) and low values for proteins (Jones in press).
The collections of fish bones from the Kubbaniyan sites in the dune field consist primarily of adult catfish (Clarias), with an occasional Tilapia and eel (Gautier & Van Neer in press). this is interpreted as reflecting a massive harvest of catfish during the spawn, which in the Nile Valley begins with the onset of the seasonal flood (in July) and ends just before the water begins to recede (in early September). The excavations also yielded numbers of bird bones, many of which are of sucks and geese which today winter in Egypt, plus rather less frequent bones of large mammals (essentially wild cattle, hartebeest and gazelle). there were occasional shells of Unio abyssinicus, an edible freshwater mussel.
The floral and faunal remains from the dune sites also provide our best clues to the seasonal use of these localities. The yearly round in the Nile Valley begins with the seasonal flood, which rises gradually in early July but then expands rapidly to reach its peak, 7m or more above low water, in mid-August and early September. There is an almost equally rapid decline, with the season of lowest waters from February through June. At peak flood, the water spreads far beyond its normal limits and covers the broad floodplain. In the Late Palaeolithic, the channels of the main river were several metres higher than today and the seasonal rise was at least as great. Thus, during the season of the maximum flood, the floodplain extended several kilometres up Wadi Kubbaniya, over and beyond the massive dunefield in which the sites occur.
It was probably during the period of rising water, from perhaps mid-July until just before the peak of the flood in mid-August, the the intensive harvest of spawning catfish occurred (Gautier & Van Neer in press). The quantities of fish taken during the spawn harvest were so large (one site yielded 130,280 fish bones) that they may have exceeded immediate needs and some of the fish may have been dried or smoked for later consumption.
When the floodwaters covered the dune sites, the people either shifted to the sandstone escarpments on either side of the wadi or, more likely, simply moved up the wadi ahead of the flood to continue the fish-harvest at the edge of the water. Sites that might have been occupied during the highest-water phase are not known; they have presumably been destroyed by deflation. There may also have been some large mammal hunting at this time. The rising water would have forced the animals from the lowland areas to the edge of the floodplain where there was less cover and beyond which there was neither food nor shelter.
As the floodwaters began to recede, fishing probably continued in the swales and cut-off ponds, although we have no direct evidence of this. Such evidence would be extremely difficult to detect among the numerous bones resulting from the spawn-harvest, although distinctive fish spectra, indicating post-flood fishing in cut-off pools, were recovered at some earlier Late Palaeolithic sites in the area.
Plants were also important components of the diet after the seasonal flood. Among the first may have been seeds of annuals, including chamomile, which are available in October soon after the flood recedes. The gathering of nut-grass and club-rush tubers could have begun at about the same time, at which point they would have required only rubbing and roasting to be edible (Hillman et al. in press). However, they reach their maximum food-value only at maturity, in December and January, when they also require complex processing, including grinding or pounding. The grinding-stones and carbonized tubers in the dune sites suggest occupation during the winter months. Purple nut-grass probably grew as a dense carpet over much of the wadi, including the dune areas, and a surplus beyond immediate needs could have been gathered at this time and stored for later consumption; once dried, the tubers retain their food value for several months. It was probably also during the winter that the ducks and geese were taken.
Use of the dunes sites still later in the year is indicated by the presence of dom palm fruits, which mature in February and March, and by the occasional shells of Unio abyssinicus; the Unio probably could be gathered only in the period between February and the end of June. However, there is no evidence that these sites were much used in the driest part of the year (from March until July), and, indeed, it seems likely that most settlements at that time were inside the valley, close to the deeper channels. Such sites are unknown at Kubbaniya and will be rarely found elsewhere, since most of them were destroyed by the down-cutting by the river during the Holocene.
Large mammals were probably taken throughout the year, but they were not so important as fish as sources of protein and fats. Despite the larger size and greater density of mammal bones, they represent only about 1% of all bone in the dune sites. It is possible that these sites were not used during the major hunting periods, but the fish and floral remains indicate some use of them during most of the year.
It is important to note that we are not suggesting semi-permanent or permanent occupations, but rather a settlement system which involved the re-use of key areas to exploit a variety of seasonal resources. Hillman and others (in press) have observed that the plant-food resources which would have been locally available could have supported occupation in one location for most of the year, even without food-storage, but there is no direct evidence for the use of all these potential resources. Instead, the evidence suggests a new economic system in the Nile Valley, based upon the intensive exploitation of a few seasonally available foods which lend themselves to processing and storage for later consumption. Such intensive exploitation is evident in the summer when large quantities of spawning catfish were taken, and in the autumn, winter and spring when wet-land tubers were gathered and processed. Together, these two foods could have provided all the basic components of a balanced diet: the catfish are rich in protein and fat and the wet-land tubers and dom palm fruits contribute the carbohydrates and dietary fibre. Other sources of food were certainly known and used, but their contribution to the diet may have been not essential and less important.
References Donahue, D.J., et al. In press. Some results from the Arizona TAMS facility: AMS ages of athletic, artistic and animal artifacts. Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research
Gautier, A. & Van Neer, W. In press. Animal remains from the Late Palaeolithic sequence at Wadi Kubbaniya, in Wendorf, Schild & Close (in press)
Gowlett, J.A. & Hedges, R.E.M (ed.). 1986. Archaeological results from accelerator dating. Oxford: Oxford University Committee for Archaeology
Haas, H. In press. The radiocarbon dates from Wadi Kubbaniya, in Wendorf, Schild & Close (in press)
Harris, D.R. 1986. Plant and animal domestication and the origins of agriculture: the contribution of radiocarbon accelerator dating, in Gowlett & Hedges (1986): 5-12
Harris, D.R. 1987. The impact on archaeology of radiocarbon dating by accelerator mass spectrometry, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, London Series A 323: 23-43
Hietala, H.J. In press. Contemporaneity and occupational duration of the Kubbaniya sites: an analysis and interpretation of the radiocarbon dates, in Wendorf, Schild & Close (in press)
Hillman, G.C. In press. Late Palaeolithic plant diet and seasonality in a riverine environment: the charred remains of wild plant foods from Wadi Kubbaniya. In Harris, D.R. & Hillman, G.C. (eds.), Foraging and farming: the evolution of plant exploitation. London: Allen & Unwin
Hillman, G.C., et al. In press. Wild plant-foods and diet at Late Paleolithic Wadi Kubbaniya: the evidence from charred remains, in Wendorf, Schild & Close (in press)
Jones, C.E.R. In press. Archaeochemistry: fact or fancy?, in Wendorf, Schild & Close (in press)
Legge, A.J. 1986. Seeds of discontent: accelerator dates on some charred plant remains from the Kebaran and Natufian cultures, in Gowlett & Hedges (1986): 13-21
Tomczynska, Z. In press. Identification of charcoal fragments from Late Palaeolithic sites in Wadi Kubbaniya, in Wendorf, Schild & Close (in press)
Wendorf, F., Schild, R. & Close, A.E. (eds.) 1980. Loaves and fishes: the prehistory of Wadi Kubbaniya. Dallas: Department of Anthropology. Institute for the Study of Earth and Man, Southern Methodist University
Wendorf, F., et al. In press. Prehistory of Wadi Kubbaniya Volume 2: paleoenvironment and stratigraphic studies. Dallas: Southern Methodist University Press
Wendorf, F., et al. 1984. New radiocarbon dates on the cereals from Wadi Kubbaniya. Science 225: 645-6
Wendorf, F., et al. 1979. the use of barley in the Egyptian Late Paleolithic. Science 205: 1341-7
The first breakthroughs to civilization took place in the Fertile Crescent, in the area between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, and in the valley of the Nile River during the middle of the fourth millennium BC. The land is flat, and the climate there alternated between the hot and the dry and the very wet, the latter producing flooding of the rivers and swamps. In Mesopotamia, the behavior of the rivers was violent and unpredictable, while in Egypt, the flooding of the Nile was more predictable. The problem facing these peoples inhabiting these lands was to control the water of these rivers by constructing a complex system of canals, dikes, ditches, and reservoirs.
Egyptian Pump.
There were, in short, challenges to be overcome by human skill and ingenuity. Once the rivers were more or less under control, then agriculture flourished, providing the sustenance for a large and growing population. Invented in the process were the ox-drawn plow, the wheel and axle, and the sail. They also developed metallurgy, learning to use copper, tin, and bronze. Sumerian and Egyptian civilizations share a number of feature, some of which will be noted in the course of this class. Important differences also exist. In Mesopotamia, life was uncertain (the rivers were difficult to control and the land was open to invasion) and the outlook of the people was pessimistic; in contrast, the Egyptians were more optimistic (the Nile was predictable and the desert shielded them from invasion).
^^^^^ this is from the Univeristy of North Carolina at Pembroke.
I'm not sure if that particular model is an ancient design or if it's a variation on the sakia mentioned below, could be a mistake
Giovanni Battista Belzoni ( 1778 – 1823), sometimes known as The Great Belzoni was barber, circus performer, a prolific Italian explorer, tomb robber and pioneer archaeologist of Egyptian antiquities.
At the age of 40 in 1812, Belzoni left England with his wife Sara. They journeyed to Malta, where Belzoni learned from a Captain Ishmail that the Pasha of Egypt, a former Macedonian mercenary named Muhammed Ali, needed a hydraulic engineer. Ali was very Western-minded, desiring modern knowledge to develop his poverty-stricken country. Belzoni wrote of Cairo, "It was barbarous, really barbarous, and it remains so to this day." Of course, he came to the city when it was torn apart by plague.
When Belzoni finally got an audience with the Pasha, Ali was less than enthusiastic about his plans for a new ox-driven water pump (designed by a man by the last name of Allmark) but he did award Belzoni a tiny government allowance which permitted him to live a while longer in Egypt.
Recent scholarship suggests that the water wheel originates from Ptolemaic Egypt, where it appeared by the 3rd century BC.[44][45] This is seen as an evolution of the paddle-driven water-lifting wheels that had been known in Egypt a century earlier.[44] According to John Peter Oleson, both the compartmented wheel and the hydraulic Noria may have been invented in Egypt by the 4th century BC, with the Sakia being invented there a century later. This is supported by archeological finds at Faiyum, Egypt, where the oldest archeological evidence of a water-wheel has been found, in the form of a Sakia dating back to the 3rd century BC. A papyrus dating to the 2nd century BC also found in Faiyum mentions a water wheel used for irrigation, a 2nd-century BC fresco found at Alexandria depicts a compartmented Sakia, and the writings of Callixenus of Rhodes mention the use of a Sakia in Ptolemaic Egypt during the reign of Ptolemy IV in the late 3rd century BC.
Örjan Wikander (2008). "Chapter 6: Sources of Energy and Exploitation of Power". In John Peter Oleson. The Oxford Handbook of Engineering and Technology in the Classical World. Oxford University Press. pp. 141–2. ISBN 0-19-518731-8
^ Jump up to: a b Adriana de Miranda (2007). Water architecture in the lands of Syria: the water-wheels. L'Erma di Bretschneider. pp. 38–9. ISBN 88-8265-433-8
Good stuff from Intef and do! Been trying to find KV155 art these past few days.
Posted by Djehuti (Member # 6698) on :
Nice to know folks are dispelling the nonsense that the Egyptians never had a "wheel". Even predynastic graves yielded stone circles with hollow centers and sticks. I don't know how the notion that Egyptians never had a wheel ever got promoted. But then there is also the nonsense that other Africans didn't have a wheel until Europeans came along. Posted by Truthcentric (Member # 3735) on :
I already posted this, on the age before this.
Posted by Troll Patrol aka Ish Gebor (Member # 18264) on :
G. Mokhtar,Unesco. International Scientific Committee for the Drafting of a General History of Africa
Ancient Civilizations of Africa
Page 263
Posted by Clyde Winters (Member # 10129) on :
The fact that the chariots found in West Africa resemble those of Crete does not mean that the riders of these chariots had to have come from Crete. In fact Greek traditions make it clear that the ancient Cretans, called Minoans came from Africa
The Dravidian and African languages share similar names for the wheel. For example:
Galla makurakura Tulu gali, tagori Swahili guru, dumu Mande koli, kori, muru-fe Tamil kal, ari, urul , tikiri Ka. gali tiguri, tigari
It would appear that the proto-African-Dravidian term for wheel was *-ori / *-uri *go/uri and *ko/uri. The proto-South Dravidian term for wheel *tigu/ori . The linguistic evidence suggest that in the proto- language the speakers of proto-African-Dravidian used either the vowels o/u or a/i after the consonants. It is also evident that the l and r, were interchangeable in the construction of the term for wheel.
It is clear that African people employed chariots in aadition to boats to travel long distances in many parts of Africa.
.
Posted by Clyde Winters (Member # 10129) on :
In addition to chariots West Africans also used ox carts at Dhar Tichitt. Holl says these ox carts date back to the Early Iconographic Tradition at Dhar Tichitt.
The presents of ox-carts at Dar Tichitt highlight the early use of wheeled transportation in West Africa.
This is evident in an examination of the Mande and Dravidian (Tamil) words for wheel and round. The words for wheel are Mande koli, kori, muru-fe; and Tamil kal, ari, urul , tikiri, in Kanada: gali tiguri, tigari. The term for cart in Tamil is Kal. In the Mande languages the word for round is Kuru,kulu, the word for carriage is is also Kulu and Kuru. The existence of Kal in Tamil for wheel and cart, and in the Mande languages: Koli for wheel and Kulu for carriage indicate that the original Proto-Dravido-African term for cart was probably *Kali or kuli. .
Posted by Tukuler (Member # 19944) on :
Posted by the lioness, (Member # 17353) on :
quote:Originally posted by Clyde Winters:
In addition to chariots West Africans also used ox carts at Dhar Tichitt. Holl says these ox carts date back to the Early Iconographic Tradition at Dhar Tichitt.
The presents of ox-carts at Dar Tichitt highlight the early use of wheeled transportation in West Africa.
This is evident in an examination of the Mande and Dravidian (Tamil) words for wheel and round. The words for wheel are Mande koli, kori, muru-fe; and Tamil kal, ari, urul , tikiri, in Kanada: gali tiguri, tigari. The term for cart in Tamil is Kal. In the Mande languages the word for round is Kuru,kulu, the word for carriage is is also Kulu and Kuru. The existence of Kal in Tamil for wheel and cart, and in the Mande languages: Koli for wheel and Kulu for carriage indicate that the original Proto-Dravido-African term for cart was probably *Kali or kuli. .
Hol says the carts date 620-380 BC according to Munson and Munson 1971
Posted by Clyde Winters (Member # 10129) on :
quote:Originally posted by the lioness,:
quote:Originally posted by Clyde Winters:
In addition to chariots West Africans also used ox carts at Dhar Tichitt. Holl says these ox carts date back to the Early Iconographic Tradition at Dhar Tichitt.
The presents of ox-carts at Dar Tichitt highlight the early use of wheeled transportation in West Africa.
This is evident in an examination of the Mande and Dravidian (Tamil) words for wheel and round. The words for wheel are Mande koli, kori, muru-fe; and Tamil kal, ari, urul , tikiri, in Kanada: gali tiguri, tigari. The term for cart in Tamil is Kal. In the Mande languages the word for round is Kuru,kulu, the word for carriage is is also Kulu and Kuru. The existence of Kal in Tamil for wheel and cart, and in the Mande languages: Koli for wheel and Kulu for carriage indicate that the original Proto-Dravido-African term for cart was probably *Kali or kuli. .
Hol says the carts date 620-380 BC according to Munson and Munson 1971
The date for the ox cart does not really matter. The fact that it was found is evidence they were used in West Africa.
The existence of Kal in Tamil for wheel and cart, and in the Mande languages: Koli for wheel and Kulu for carriage indicate that the original Proto-Dravido-African term for cart was probably *Kali or kuli. This is important because it indicates that wheeled vehicles were already in use in Africa before the Dravidians and Mande speaking people entered Eurasia 5kya.
.
Posted by the lioness, (Member # 17353) on :
Hol says the carts date 620-380 BC according to Munson and Munson 1971 (Phd Dissertation)
The Tichitt tradition : a late prehistoric occupation of the southwestern Sahara Muson and Munson 1971
quote:Originally posted by Clyde Winters: The date for the ox cart does not really matter. The fact that it was found is evidence they were used in West Africa.
The existence of Kal in Tamil for wheel and cart, and in the Mande languages: Koli for wheel and Kulu for carriage indicate that the original Proto-Dravido-African term for cart was probably *Kali or kuli. This is important because it indicates that wheeled vehicles were already in use in Africa before the Dravidians and Mande speaking people entered Eurasia 5kya.
^^^ this paper was put up earlier but it's only the first page. haven't read the whole thing
The rock art however is notoriously difficult to date however
I dont know much about this topic. So if there's these pictures of carts in West Africa isupposedly in 620-380 BC can it be assumed they invented them independantly there? I don't know. if they did their use should continue into later dates.
Posted by zarahan- aka Enrique Cardova (Member # 15718) on :
Wheeled vehicles found in ancient West Africa- in Niger for example
Robin Law, The Horse in West African History, 1980- pg 160, 155-163) "Heavy draught work in these early times had therefore to be done by oxen rather than horses; and there are, in addition to the horse-drawn chariots, numerous rock engravings depicting ox-drawn carts in both the central and the western Sahara. However by the Islamic era wheeled transport had apparently gone completely out of use in the Sahara... "
then it talks about the engravings in Mali:
"The most southerly depiction of a wheeled cart in Saharan rock art is an engraving at TOndia, near Goundam to the northwest of the Niger bend: unfortunately the engraving is too stylized for it to be clear whether the draught animals shown are intended to be horses or oxen."
"Interestingly, the earliest representation of wheeled vehicle from Egypt (tomb of Sebeknekht at El Kab, Dynasty XIII) shows sledges, mounted on four disk wheels rather than rollers."
-- Wheeled vehicles and ridden animals in the ancient Near East (1997), By M. A. Littauer, J. H. Crouwel. p14 -------------------------------------------------------- "Little is known about the raising of loads using ropes, but stone grooves and pulleys, around which ropes would have passed, are preserved from the 4th Dynasty, and wooden wheels for simple rope pulleys existed from the Middle Kingdom onwards."
------------------------------------- "Much earlier forerunners are shown in tomb paintings of the late Old Kingdom and the 11th Dynasty showing siege towers with wheels; depictions of movable siege towers exist from the 6th Dynasty onwards.) This indicates that the wheel was used in the transport of heavy loads more frequently than assumed.. The use of wheeled equipment in building is not yet attested to but may have been fairly common. The soft surface of the desert sand and the mud of the cultivation may have been a serious obstacle for heavy carriages but not so much for sledges."
--The encyclopaedia of ancient Egyptian architecture By Dieter Arnold. 2002. p 195 -------------------------- "In all probability wheels would have been of little practical use, for the building blocks used were far too large and too heavy to be carried on a wooden-wheeled cart. The relative scarcity of wood in ancient Egypt would have made the building of such carts difficult and overcoming the practical and technical difficulties of building carts to carry and move great weights would have probably proved impossible.
Wheels would have been, in any event, a far from practical method of transport on either agricultural land or the desert where they would have become quickly bogged down in either mud or sand."
--R. Partridge. (1996) Transport in ancient Egypt. p76
WHeeled carts also seen in movement of material during religious processions
"The solid wooden wheel existed from the Old Kingdom, but it was too heavy for regular transport use over rough ground surfaces and was only employed on four wheeled carriages, which sometimes carried coffins or the god's sacred bark during his festival procession." --Rosalie David 1999. HANDBOOK TO LIFE IN ANCIENT EGYPT. p260
Nubians may have manufactured wheeled vehicles- chariots
"Nubia, too, must have benefited from the international arms trade. Although battle scenes show Nubian enemies conventionally as bowmen with relatively little equipment, other sources show the use of chariots by the elite, and the "tribute" scenes show weaponry and armor that was manufactured in Nubia... the inclusion of chariots as part of the Kushite tribute to Egypt suggests that they, too, were eventually being manufactured in Nubia itself". --R. Morkot 2003. Historical Dictionary of Ancient Egyptian Warfare p26 -----------------------------------------
quote:Originally posted by alTakruri: 5th Dynasty Old Kingdom wheels on a scaffold.
A fuller view of the wheeled device depicted in Kaemheset's tomb appears to be a builder's scaffold rather than a war machine. Note the men on it have contractor's tools not weapons. Also nothing going on on the four floors inside the building remotely suggest a siege is happening,
12th Dynasty Middle Kingdom potters' wheels
How old is the myth about Khnum sculpting freshly conceived children on a turntable.
^Excellent example Tukler.
Posted by Clyde Winters (Member # 10129) on :
^^Great Post
.
Posted by PreColonialAfrica13 (Member # 21589) on :
I read that cog-wheels and gears were used in somalia, particularly in deeply dug wells, which were needed as parts of somalia are very arid and can see very little rain. Just goes to show, if the wheel is needed, it'll be used, adapted, or independently invented.
Posted by HidayaAkade (Member # 20642) on :
*delete*
Posted by HidayaAkade (Member # 20642) on :
There's a book on African written scripts by Saki Mafundikwa. I have it and it's a good book.
Posted by Amun-Ra The Ultimate (Member # 20039) on :
quote:Originally posted by HidayaAkade: There's a book on African written scripts by Saki Mafundikwa. I have it and it's a good book.
The book is called Afrikan Alphabets: The Story of Writing in Afrika. It's a good book. Very visual. I like it. It is also appropriate for children imo (especially those who likes arts, forms, history, drawing and curious in general). It is the type of book some children could read/browse fast, but never forget it, if you know what I mean.
Posted by typeZeiss (Member # 18859) on :
quote:Originally posted by blingdogg: I also read that the Asantehene ruler had a large collection of books that the British found when they attacked. As nice as it sounds, I don’t believe that there was much literacy within the Asante empire, at least among the Asante people. The Asante were known for using Islamic talismans and portions of scriptures from the Quran (even though they didn’t know Arabic) sewed into clothing, or worn, for their spiritual properties and belief that they brought good fortune.
They did however, encourage Hausa scholars and Hausa people in general, to settle in Asante because they were literate in Arabic. The Asante assigned various positions in government to Hausa for helping in administration, so maybe some of those books could have been brought by Hausa from the north.
However, it’s not to discount that the Asante themselves never learned to read also.
One thing I really admire about the Asante is the extremely developed and complex government structure they had, without literacy (their use of drums also helped in communication across distances). It impressed the British tremendously, and dispelled their myths of “African savages”. The Asante really showed that a civilization doesn't require literacy, and that pre-literate African states were just as complex as the Islamic ones, and those of the rest of the world.
The Akan writing system (Adinkra) is very much writing and they were very much literate in it, though they are not the originates of it. I believe it came from Cote D'Ivore and I forget who created it. Adinkra isn't syllabic though, it is a logographic, like Chinese and Japanese for example. There was a great peer reviewed article on the subject I read some months ago. I will post the name of it, when I get a chance.
Posted by typeZeiss (Member # 18859) on :
quote:Originally posted by Amun-Ra The Ultimate:
quote:Originally posted by HidayaAkade: There's a book on African written scripts by Saki Mafundikwa. I have it and it's a good book.
The book is called Afrikan Alphabets: The Story of Writing in Afrika. It's a good book. Very visual. I like it. It is also appropriate for children imo (especially those who likes arts, forms, history, drawing and curious in general). It is the type of book some children could read/browse fast, but never forget it, if you know what I mean.
I just checked Amazon. They want 500 dollars for that darn book.
Posted by Amun-Ra The Ultimate (Member # 20039) on :
quote:Originally posted by typeZeiss:
quote:Originally posted by Amun-Ra The Ultimate:
quote:Originally posted by HidayaAkade: There's a book on African written scripts by Saki Mafundikwa. I have it and it's a good book.
The book is called Afrikan Alphabets: The Story of Writing in Afrika. It's a good book. Very visual. I like it. It is also appropriate for children imo (especially those who likes arts, forms, history, drawing and curious in general). It is the type of book some children could read/browse fast, but never forget it, if you know what I mean.
I just checked Amazon. They want 500 dollars for that darn book.
Sorry, I didn't know about that. When I bought it, it didn't cost nearly as much (they put it on the rare item category i guess). Maybe there's some other places online with some better prices.
Here's a link to a video presentation by Saki Mafundikwa:
Why so damn expensive??? Anyways I am watching the video and this mans seems to know his stuff when it comes to writing in Africa. The book has good reviews on Amazon. It seems to focus on the less known writing scripts of Africa. But one reviewer asked why the book didnt include the Nubian Meroiric script.
Posted by Son of Ra (Member # 20401) on :
03:14 into the video and its damn interesting! He talks about the many writing scripts and them being used by secret society. He talks about the Nsibidi script. I thought it was a recent script created in the 19th century, but I did research and found that its origin is unknown and that it is centuries old...
Does anyone know the origins of it?
Posted by typeZeiss (Member # 18859) on :
quote:Originally posted by Amun-Ra The Ultimate:
quote:Originally posted by typeZeiss:
quote:Originally posted by Amun-Ra The Ultimate:
quote:Originally posted by HidayaAkade: There's a book on African written scripts by Saki Mafundikwa. I have it and it's a good book.
The book is called Afrikan Alphabets: The Story of Writing in Afrika. It's a good book. Very visual. I like it. It is also appropriate for children imo (especially those who likes arts, forms, history, drawing and curious in general). It is the type of book some children could read/browse fast, but never forget it, if you know what I mean.
I just checked Amazon. They want 500 dollars for that darn book.
Sorry, I didn't know about that. When I bought it, it didn't cost nearly as much (they put it on the rare item category i guess). Maybe there's some other places online with some better prices.
Here's a link to a video presentation by Saki Mafundikwa:
Ahhh this guy! I saw that video when it was first released. Wish that book wasn't so much, very disappointing Posted by typeZeiss (Member # 18859) on :
quote:Originally posted by Son of Ra: 03:14 into the video and its damn interesting! He talks about the many writing scripts and them being used by secret society. He talks about the Nsibidi script. I thought it was a recent script created in the 19th century, but I did research and found that its origin is unknown and that it is centuries old...
Does anyone know the origins of it?
That is the "problem" with trying to track the history of African scripts. Most if not all are associated with secret societies. My family is from Southern Sierra Leone where Poro society is strong and there is a script there. This seems to be a African tradition of having scripts in the societies. Herodotus made the claim that the Egyptians had a Hidden script only known by the priest and another for the general public.
Posted by Son of Ra (Member # 20401) on :
quote:Originally posted by typeZeiss:
quote:Originally posted by Son of Ra: 03:14 into the video and its damn interesting! He talks about the many writing scripts and them being used by secret society. He talks about the Nsibidi script. I thought it was a recent script created in the 19th century, but I did research and found that its origin is unknown and that it is centuries old...
Does anyone know the origins of it?
That is the "problem" with trying to track the history of African scripts. Most if not all are associated with secret societies. My family is from Southern Sierra Leone where Poro society is strong and there is a script there. This seems to be a African tradition of having scripts in the societies. Herodotus made the claim that the Egyptians had a Hidden script only known by the priest and another for the general public.
Why are the scripts only confined to secret societies?
Also what can you tell me about the Bassa script? There are claims that say its as old Hannibal/Carthage.
Posted by Amun-Ra The Ultimate (Member # 20039) on :
quote:Originally posted by typeZeiss:
quote:Originally posted by Amun-Ra The Ultimate:
quote:Originally posted by typeZeiss:
quote:Originally posted by Amun-Ra The Ultimate:
quote:Originally posted by HidayaAkade: There's a book on African written scripts by Saki Mafundikwa. I have it and it's a good book.
The book is called Afrikan Alphabets: The Story of Writing in Afrika. It's a good book. Very visual. I like it. It is also appropriate for children imo (especially those who likes arts, forms, history, drawing and curious in general). It is the type of book some children could read/browse fast, but never forget it, if you know what I mean.
I just checked Amazon. They want 500 dollars for that darn book.
Sorry, I didn't know about that. When I bought it, it didn't cost nearly as much (they put it on the rare item category i guess). Maybe there's some other places online with some better prices.
Here's a link to a video presentation by Saki Mafundikwa:
Does anyone have any info on "proto-saharan" writing?
Yea, I coined the term Proto-Saharan. The Proto-Saharan script is based on the Thinite writing system.
The first syllabic writing system of Africans was the Thinite script. This writing was used first by Blacks in Nubia, like the Niger-Congo people who migrated out of this region into the rest of Africa.
The Thinite script provides many of the signs that are included in later scripts used by Africans.
In Nubia, Black Africans were using Thinite symbols before the rise of Egypt to record their ideas and report on important events.
At this time your people may have been living in the caves of the Caucasus mountains.
This writing was later used by Africans to write inscriptions throughout Middle Africa.
The evidence of this writing is found throughout the Sahara. By the time Mande speaking people settled Dar Tichitt they left numerous inscriptions.
The people of Dar Tichitt were Mande speakers. These Mande speaking people also lived in the Fezzan where they were called Garamante/Garamandes. The Garamante settled Crete and are recognized as the Eteo-Cretans or Minoans.
As you can see from the above chart the Linear A signs and Mande/Manding signs are identical. If you look careful you will note that Africans, or Black people had also taken their writing system to Anatolia were your ancestors were living in the Caucasus mountains as hunter-gatherers.
The Minoans, who were Africans introduced Linear A, whose signs are identical to the writing left by Africans throughout the Sahara, like those found at Tichitt and presently represented in the Vai and several other West African scripts.
Your people adopted this writing to write business documents and we know it as Linear B.
Europeans only got writing from the Egyptians. The Greeks who obtained writing from the Blacks of Africa and Phonesia passed on writing to the Romans. With the fall of Rome Western Europeans got writing from the African Muslims who taught them the arts and sciences. .
Posted by DD'eDeN (Member # 21966) on :
First the round domeshield/magal/mongolu of woven wicker, and then the wheel/kolo/gulu
Posted by DD'eDeN (Member # 21966) on :
Apparently the Baka use leaves of Megaphrynium, "ngongo" different from the mongongo nut tree of Kalahari, I thought they were the same tree, since books confused the two.
Note: The Flores Hobbits are called Ebu Gogo by today's villagers there, probably means "ancestors NgoNgo ~ Co-Ngo".
I see the Pygmies are being driven out of the Congo rainforest "for their safety", the real reason is mining for Coltran mineral used in high-tech industry. When there are no more Pygmies living traditionally in the Ituri forest, the extinction of Homo will begin, though it may not end for a long time.
Posted by Punos_Rey (Member # 21929) on :
Can anyone repost the fifth dynasty wheel imagex Tululer posted? They no longer show up in the quoted post
Posted by Tukuler (Member # 19944) on :
Will reinsert to original post when time allows.
Posted by Punos_Rey (Member # 21929) on :
Does anyone have depictions of the wheel from Sub-Saharan Africa? I'm currently arguing with a known troll and racist on FB who at first said only Egypt had the wheel, then when I beat him back with Saharan rock art that:
"No there is not. Sub sahran Africans never discovered the wheel. That along with other things is why they never advanced like the rest of the world."
"Still not seen an authentic pic of wheel use in sub Saharan Africa. Looks like more Afrocentric bs."
I cited sources regarding wheel use in Sudan and he dismissed it as requiring outside help, lmao.
Posted by Clyde Winters (Member # 10129) on :
quote:Originally posted by Punos_Rey: Does anyone have depictions of the wheel from Sub-Saharan Africa? I'm currently arguing with a known troll and racist on FB who at first said only Egypt had the wheel, then when I beat him back with Saharan rock art that:
"No there is not. Sub sahran Africans never discovered the wheel. That along with other things is why they never advanced like the rest of the world."
"Still not seen an authentic pic of wheel use in sub Saharan Africa. Looks like more Afrocentric bs."
I cited sources regarding wheel use in Sudan and he dismissed it as requiring outside help, lmao.
There are numerous depictions of wheeled vehicles throughout West Africa along the chariot routes from the Fezzan into the Niger Valley.
The fact that the chariots found in West Africa resemble those of Crete does not mean that the riders of these chariots had to have come from Crete. In fact Greek traditions make it clear that the ancient Cretans, called Minoans came from Africa
The Dravidian and African languages share similar names for the wheel. For example:
Galla makurakura Tulu gali, tagori Swahili guru, dumu Mande koli, kori, muru-fe Tamil kal, ari, urul , tikiri Ka. gali tiguri, tigari
It would appear that the proto-African-Dravidian term for wheel was *-ori / *-uri *go/uri and *ko/uri. The proto-South Dravidian term for wheel *tigu/ori . The linguistic evidence suggest that in the proto- language the speakers of proto-African-Dravidian used either the vowels o/u or a/i after the consonants. It is also evident that the l and r, were interchangeable in the construction of the term for wheel.
It is clear that African people employed chariots in aadition to boats to travel long distances in many parts of Africa.
.
In addition to chariots West Africans also used ox carts at Dhar Tichitt. Holl says these ox carts date back to the Early Iconographic Tradition at Dhar Tichitt.
The presents of ox-carts at Dar Tichitt highlight the early use of wheeled transportation in West Africa.
This is evident in an examination of the Mande and Dravidian (Tamil) words for wheel and round. The words for wheel are Mande koli, kori, muru-fe; and Tamil kal, ari, urul , tikiri, in Kanada: gali tiguri, tigari. The term for cart in Tamil is Kal. In the Mande languages the word for round is Kuru,kulu, the word for carriage is is also Kulu and Kuru. The existence of Kal in Tamil for wheel and cart, and in the Mande languages: Koli for wheel and Kulu for carriage indicate that the original Proto-Dravido-African term for cart was probably *Kali or kuli. .
Posted by Punos_Rey (Member # 21929) on :
Dr. Winters could you give me the locations of those rock arts you posted? Trying to keep all of thus information handy wanting stuff that predates tbe hittites
Posted by Clyde Winters (Member # 10129) on :
quote:Originally posted by Punos_Rey: Dr. Winters could you give me the locations of those rock arts you posted? Trying to keep all of thus information handy wanting stuff that predates tbe hittites
I will try and find my sources I got them off the WWW years ago.
.
Posted by Oshun (Member # 19740) on :
quote:CLyde says: The absence of navigable rivers in Africa is a recent phenomena, that is why we find engravings of boats throughout the Sahara dating to periods before the Sahara became a desert.
Climate/enviro factors no doubt has changed the watery landscape once allowing boats in the Sahara. The time periods & amount of change varies over time. Africa has always had navigable rivers but the crucial point is (a) how far they were navigable internally before being interrupted by sandbars, rapids or cataracts, and (b) their access to the sea without continual interruption. Other factors include unpredictable rainfall that makes water levels fluctuate problematically. Another is how navigable by large vessels. It has been estimated that long stretches of the Niger Riger can only handle barges below 20 tons during the low-water level dry season. Whereas the Yangtse River in China can handle huge barges weighing in at 10,000 tons going hundreds of miles inland without interruption at any time. All the above just points out that substantial movement of materials and technology is not as easy in many parts of Africa as in other places. It does not mean Africans did not master boat technology. They did, long before others. And it is true that Africans had navigation knowledge as well.
A friend asked me for more data on this and it made me think about the new suggestions of African agriculture and urbanization dating back very far. so I'm back. Just wondering Do you have any studies on the problems with African rivers? How much China's rivers can hold and stuff. I tried to give them some but I'd like to know if you've got any more.
Posted by Clyde Winters (Member # 10129) on :
quote:Originally posted by Oshun:
quote:CLyde says: The absence of navigable rivers in Africa is a recent phenomena, that is why we find engravings of boats throughout the Sahara dating to periods before the Sahara became a desert.
Climate/enviro factors no doubt has changed the watery landscape once allowing boats in the Sahara. The time periods & amount of change varies over time. Africa has always had navigable rivers but the crucial point is (a) how far they were navigable internally before being interrupted by sandbars, rapids or cataracts, and (b) their access to the sea without continual interruption. Other factors include unpredictable rainfall that makes water levels fluctuate problematically. Another is how navigable by large vessels. It has been estimated that long stretches of the Niger Riger can only handle barges below 20 tons during the low-water level dry season. Whereas the Yangtse River in China can handle huge barges weighing in at 10,000 tons going hundreds of miles inland without interruption at any time. All the above just points out that substantial movement of materials and technology is not as easy in many parts of Africa as in other places. It does not mean Africans did not master boat technology. They did, long before others. And it is true that Africans had navigation knowledge as well.
A friend asked me for more data on this and it made me think about the new suggestions of African agriculture and urbanization dating back very far. so I'm back. Just wondering Do you have any studies on the problems with African rivers? How much China's rivers can hold and stuff. I tried to give them some but I'd like to know if you've got any more.
My major thoughts about these issues are found on my blog:
Bumping again with another question: What about the potter's wheel? Any insight as to why that still hasn't taken off in many parts of SSA compared to other methods of pottery?
Posted by Thereal (Member # 22452) on :
Probably because the methods they used were sufficient for their needs. Here's a video showing African pottery making from different regions in West Africa, it's long.
What I wanted to know is: what makes these techniques more efficient than the potter's wheel among African potters, that the wheel still lacks the popularity it has in "Eurasia?"
Posted by Thereal (Member # 22452) on :
I said SUFFICIENT for their needs and it doesn't matter the method as they required something so they developed it.
Posted by Oshun (Member # 19740) on :
I know what you said but that isn't what I intended to ask, so I clarified.
Posted by Elmaestro (Member # 22566) on :
quote:Originally posted by Oshun: What I wanted to know is: what makes these techniques more efficient than the potter's wheel among African potters, that the wheel still lacks the popularity it has in "Eurasia?"
Go to 18:30 in the video he sent you and listen Edit: Ignore this. Your question relates to the wheel, which wasn't directly addressed. Though it's implied that the techniques they used gave them more stylistic/artistic freedom.
Posted by DD'eDeN (Member # 21966) on :
quote:Originally posted by Oshun: Bumping again with another question: What about the potter's wheel? Any insight as to why that still hasn't taken off in many parts of SSA compared to other methods of pottery?
---
Mass industrial quantities of pots outside central Africa (Arid) gave incentive to speed-up production along slow river bends, while in South Africa ostrich eggshells worked better, in SEAsia bamboo did too, so no strong support for Potter's wheels.
Posted by DD'eDeN (Member # 21966) on :
Originally posted by Oshun: What I wanted to know is: what makes these techniques more efficient than the potter's wheel among African potters, that the wheel still lacks the popularity it has in "Eurasia?" - I think the oldest "slow" potters wheel was found in Nubia, not sure where the "fast" potters wheel developed. The huge water/food storage jars might be more easily and efficiently made by coiling than spinning. If few were made per year, why bother making a high-precision turntable? Stamping the pots with emblems was common in EurAsia, perhaps instead other types of signing was used in central Africa?
Posted by DD'eDeN (Member # 21966) on :
Originally posted by Oshun:
"It does not mean Africans did not master boat technology. They did, long before others. And it is true that Africans had navigation knowledge as well." ---
In my opinion, coracles were the oldest reusable watercraft, simply inverted dome huts (before doorways, a domi.cile was a round shield of wicker and broadleaves), common in Africa and EurAsia. The oldest longboats & canoes were invented in Papua as a result of sago palm processing, the inner pith removed with a proto-adze, leaving the rind in the form of a canoe. From that developed bark canoes (used in Australians, Tasmanians, Yahgan@Tierra del Fuego, Ojibwe@Great lakes, Beothuk@Newfoundland, Piraha@Amazon) and then the true adze was invented to craft wooden dugout canoes and catamarans (katu maram@Tamil: tied (& planed) logs. Reed boats & rafts with floats probably developed along with other longboats.
Posted by Tukuler (Member # 19944) on :
Can't guess why wheeled pottery would be a superior technique.
Usually don't do vids but good exceptions like this (wait for the humongous jar coiling technique) https://youtu.be/52HKSwkI1hs?t=1499 To me, those art & practical pieces seem impossible to wheel. Big ups Thereal
I wonder if wheeled pottery was limited for the same reason ferrous metallurgy rarely industrialized, hobbled by tradition.
Posted by Fourty2Tribes (Member # 21799) on :
The inventor of the wheel
Posted by the questioner (Member # 22195) on :
The wheel is an Ancient Egyptian invention along with civilization itself.
Posted by Ish Gebor (Member # 18264) on :
The Greek researcher Herodotus of Halicarnassus (fifth century BCE) describes the country as follows:
Salt traders (Ghirza, Mausoleum South C) There is a hill of salt, a spring, and a great number of fruit-bearing date-palms, and the men who dwell here are called the Garamantes, a very great nation, who carry [humid] earth to lay over the salt and then sow crops. ... Among them also are produced the cattle which feed backwards, because they have their horns bent down forwards, and ... cannot go forwards as they feed, because the horns would run into the ground. Except for this, and the firmness of their hide, they do not differ from other cattle. With their four-horse chariots, these Garamantes hunt the Cave-dwelling Ethiopians, who are the swiftest of foot of all men.
Posted by Baalberith (Member # 23079) on :
quote:Originally posted by Punos_Rey: Does anyone have depictions of the wheel from Sub-Saharan Africa? I'm currently arguing with a known troll and racist on FB who at first said only Egypt had the wheel, then when I beat him back with Saharan rock art that:
"No there is not. Sub sahran Africans never discovered the wheel. That along with other things is why they never advanced like the rest of the world."
"Still not seen an authentic pic of wheel use in sub Saharan Africa. Looks like more Afrocentric bs."
I cited sources regarding wheel use in Sudan and he dismissed it as requiring outside help, lmao.
Puros_Rey, here is something that you might find interesting, a depiction of the Kongolese using the wheel during a funeral procession.
(View of the Cabinda mountain taken from the North, and Interment of the masouc, Andris Poncouta, macaye)
Nsibidi is also an ancient African script from Nigeria. It looks like Chinese writing. Maybe that's where the Chinese got their writing from???
Posted by Punos_Rey (Member # 21929) on :
Thank you for the post Baal, definitely appreciate the heads up and the link!
Posted by Ebony Allen (Member # 12771) on :
What does anyone know about or think of Nsibidi?
Posted by Ish Gebor (Member # 18264) on :
@ Baalberith, how far does this tradition date back?
Posted by Clyde Winters (Member # 10129) on :
quote:Originally posted by Clyde Winters: Precolonial this is a great topic. I am sorry to tell you this but you have been lied yoo. Africans invented writing and the use of the wheel.
The horse period is dated between 2000 and 1200 BC. These dates correspond to the archaeological research.There were two horses common to Africa. A horse introduced to Africa by the Hysos and a native small size horse common to much of North and West Africa.Most researchers believe the horse was introduced to Africa/Egypt by 1700BC. This is an interesting date, and far to late for the introduction of the horse given the archaeological evidence for horses at Maadi and the Saharan zone.Saharan Africans used the donkey and later horses as beast of burden. A domesticated Equus was found at Hierakonpolis dating to around the 3600 BC at Maadi in the Sahara (Fekri A Hassan, The predynastic of Egypt, Journal of World Prehistory,2(2) (1988) .145; J. McArdle, Preliminary report on the predynastic fauna of the Hierkonpolis, Project Studies Association, Cairo. Publication No.1 (1982), p.116-120.)
The archaeological evidence of horses in the Sahara at this early time make it clear that horses were in Africa years before the Hysos arrived on the Continent, and that a horse native to Saharan Africa was already in existence before this time as well.
Secondly we have Kushites horsebackriding at Buhen in 4th millennium BP. This shows that while Asians used the horse for chariots Africans had long recognized that they could ride the horse. As a result, the presence of writing and Saharans horseback riding support a probably much earlier origin than the late horse period (e.g., 700 BC) assigned these inscriptions by some researchers.
The fact that the chariots found in West Africa resemble those of Crete does not mean that the riders of these chariots had to have come from Crete. In fact Greek traditions make it clear that the ancient Cretans, called Minoans came from Africa
The Dravidian and African languages share similar names for the wheel. For example:
Galla makurakura Tulu gali, tagori Swahili guru, dumu Mande koli, kori, muru-fe Tamil kal, ari, urul , tikiri Ka. gali tiguri, tigari
It would appear that the proto-African-Dravidian term for wheel was *-ori / *-uri *go/uri and *ko/uri. The proto-South Dravidian term for wheel *tigu/ori . The linguistic evidence suggest that in the proto- language the speakers of proto-African-Dravidian used either the vowels o/u or a/i after the consonants. It is also evident that the l and r, were interchangeable in the construction of the term for wheel.
It is clear that African people employed chariots in aadition to boats to travel long distances in many parts of Africa.
Horseback riding did originate in Africa.
At Buhen, one of the major fortresses of Nubia, which served as the headquarters of the Egyptian Viceroy of Kush a skeleton of a horse was found lying on the pavement of a Middle Kingdom rampart (W.B. Emery, A master-work of Egyptian military architecture 3900 years ago" Illustrated London News, 12 September, pp.250-251). This was only 25 years after the Hysos had conquered Egypt.The Kushites appear to have rode the horses on horseback instead of a chariot.
This suggest that the Kushites had been riding horses for an extended period of time for them to be able to attack Buhen on horseback. This supports supports the early habit of Africans riding horses as depicted in the rock art.This tradition was continued throughout the history of Kush.
The Kushites and upper Egyptians were great horsemen, whereas the Lower Egyptians usually rode the chariot, the Kushite calvary of the Twenty-Fifth Dynasty usually rode on horseback (W.A. Fairservis, The ancient kingdoms of the Nile (London,1962) p.129).
.
.....
Posted by Clyde Winters (Member # 10129) on :
quote:Originally posted by Clyde Winters:
In addition to chariots West Africans also used ox carts at Dhar Tichitt. Holl says these ox carts date back to the Early Iconographic Tradition at Dhar Tichitt.
The presents of ox-carts at Dar Tichitt highlight the early use of wheeled transportation in West Africa.
This is evident in an examination of the Mande and Dravidian (Tamil) words for wheel and round. The words for wheel are Mande koli, kori, muru-fe; and Tamil kal, ari, urul , tikiri, in Kanada: gali tiguri, tigari. The term for cart in Tamil is Kal. In the Mande languages the word for round is Kuru,kulu, the word for carriage is is also Kulu and Kuru. The existence of Kal in Tamil for wheel and cart, and in the Mande languages: Koli for wheel and Kulu for carriage indicate that the original Proto-Dravido-African term for cart was probably *Kali or kuli. .
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
I loved it!
[/url]
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
![[Roll Eyes]](rolleyes.gif)
![[Eek!]](eek.gif)
![[Frown]](frown.gif)
