“Africa is no historical part of the world [and] it has no development to show”
- Georg Hegel, German Philosopher.
Many more people would carry on with the thought process of Georg Hegel, considering Africa a blank slate! These thoughts had no truths in them and they were measurable to a pinch of salt.
Besides, Africa had and still has many things to offer to the world in all aspects we could think of; Politics, Economics, Architecture, Arts to mention but a few (as we shall see in future).
Africa had the first set of Kingdoms, which defined political order in medieval Africa.
“And kingdoms in Africa are indeed among the oldest political institutions. They emerged in Africa from time even before time began”
- Adopted from an essay written for Raph Uwechu.
Based on the above statement, it is clear that Africa has had kingdoms since time in memorial!
The Pharaonic Egypt.
It is believed that the first set of kingdoms arose in around 3400 B.C in the Nile Delta and the northern Nile in Egypt. These [two] kingdoms joined to form a great kingdom under the influence of the Pharaohs- this kingdom was later credited for the “daughter kingdoms” that sprung up elsewhere in Africa.
The ancient Greeks believed that the Egypt of the pharaohs was a fountain of immense knowledge, striking mathematics and philosophy; and amazing architecture. All the names of the gods in ancient Greece had been adopted from Egypt.
According to Homer, the gods of Greece flew once a year to feast with their elder gods in Egypt. This connotes the importance of the Pharaonic kingdom to the spiritual necessities of the Greeks of pre-historic west.
This belief of kingdoms in Africa did not go well with the Europeans (at least not all)- they never welcomed it. The result was separation of Egypt from the rest of Africa. All this was
brought about by the many centuries of slave trade; the belief that Africans were merely goods worth trading in! And yes, they took it in that indeed all these advancements were from Egypt, but the confusion came from not accepting that Egypt was without dispute part and parcel of the larger Africa.
brought about by the many centuries of slave trade; the belief that Africans were merely goods worth trading in! And yes, they took it in that indeed all these advancements were from Egypt, but the confusion came from not accepting that Egypt was without dispute part and parcel of the larger Africa.
“Whites are more intelligent than Negroes; intelligence is overwhelmingly the result of inheritance rather than environmental influence…..”
-Arthur Jensen, (5th/17/1969), in the theory of differentials in genetics.
The above statement just explains all about the debated in Europe and North America about Africa from the eighteenth century and onwards.
However, successors of Arthur Jensen and the rest had to come to terms with reality about where Egypt really lied in this whole web of controversy. With the help of archeology, facts showed that indeed the Egypt of the Pharaohs is part of Africa- the black people. To these, the Greeks referred to as Ethiopians [not the country we all know], aithiops is a Greek word for black people of burnt people for that matter.
The little Kingdom of Zuweila.
Zuweila was a city kingdom located in Fezzan in Tunisia. It existed around the ninth century A.D - that is before 871 A.D. Though it was short lived.
Zuweila was a famous and pivotal town in ancient Africa as it was a centre for trans-desert trade in the ninth century A.D.
Remarkable about Zuweila was a great piece of architecture- a masterpiece stood and still stands the test of time; the Bab Zuweila, a famous city gate in the west that controlled traffic to and from the city. The Bab Zuweila was constructed in 1087 A.D, to control traffic [as I mentioned earlier].
Hence, a European art specialist could not help get amused;
”One can hardly imagine anything more majestic than this monumental gateway, surmounted by minarets, built on twin towers of fine cut masonry, the mighty portal opens through a high rounded arch”
-Gaston Weit, a French Art Specialist.
Such great architecture and more existed and still exists in Africa, though to us the peoples, it is in our unconsciousness’!
