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Africa: A continent of "Land-Lubbers" ??
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[QUOTE]Originally posted by zarahan: [QB] [QUOTE]All forum members I'm not generalizing or anachronistically flattening all eras into one dimension. There are specific things I want to know and no one has helped me to learn them. I'm talking recorded trade (routes) not sociology. 1 - lack of contact with Mediterranean Africans 2 - hiring of Lebanese ships, shipping, and shippers 3 - primary documents of trade with _____ Cyrenaica _____ Tripolitania _____ Tunisia _____ Algeria _____ Morocco Please explain to me the lack of Egyptian contact with other Africans along the Mediterranean shore if they sailed that sea themselves. And I would also like to know why they hired the ancient Lebanese to do so much ship sailing stuff for them if they were so adept at it themselves. I mean I can't find any evidence of major trade even between Egypt an Cyrenaica less lone Egypt and Carthage. Am I looking in the wrong sources (Heeren's more than a century old "trade" book)?[/QUOTE]Documented sources are thin on wide ranging AE maritime expeditions in the sense you refer to. Perhaps specialized academic sources might show more but Time-Life has an older 1981 book out called “The Ancient Mariners.” It doesn’t show continent-spanning voyages by the AE’s like famous Chinese Admiral Cheng Ho, but it does indicate that there was extensive trade and contact throughout the Eastern Mediterranean, and also into the Aegean and the Persian Gulf. There is little information on Northwest Africa in the book or even on the web re direct Egyptian trade. Perhaps the northwest region had to await expansion of supply and demand, and better ships before it was drawn more fully into overall Mediterranean commerce. The Phonecian and Greek expansion, coming long after Egyptian developments may have provided the impetus. The rise of Carthage certainly boosted trade in the Northwest area, not to mention the resources of inland Africa drawn upon by that city state- for trade or war (Hannibal's famous Numidian cavalry is just one example). As for documents, the book does mention papyrus journals kept by AE merchants and or officials. One documents a shipwreck in the Red Sea, another a clash with pirates near Byblos. Carved inscriptions on stone also record Egyptian vessels, trade and movements, and clay models have been found in Mesopotamia similar to Egyptian boats. There is some documentary evidence suggesting that the Egyptians bought entire vessels from Greek or Lebanese (today’s terms) suppliers. In the Armana letters for example, is a request from a pharoah to the King of Alashiya (Cyprus) to build ships for the Egyptian navy. However it should be noted that the Egyptians built a large number of sea-going vessels themselves during the New Kingdom, using imported lumber. Most likely the pharoahs found it cheaper to simply contract out a portion of their building program to foreigner builders who had ample supplies of suitable wood and workers in their native countries. It would make perfect sense in a land where heavy forestation for supplies of lumber were scarce. http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/navy.htm You are generally correct that the AEs stayed in the eastern Mediterranean zone, compared to say the Chinese, or even the Polynesian mariners, who in their canoes, not only spanned massive areas of Pacific, but even reached the frozen wastes of Antartica ( a Maori war canoe according to the 1984 Encyclopedia Britannica article ‘Antartica’). [/QB][/QUOTE]
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