|
EARLY
MEROITIC PERIOD: 270 - 90 BC |
| The move to
Meroe weakened the Egyptian influence and enlivened
the Sudanese character of Kush. Trade with Egypt (Now
under the rule of the Ptolomies) and with Asia (India
especially) was growing, and Kush even entered into
joint building projects with Egypt at their common
border. |
|
MIDDLE
MEROITIC: 90 BC - 1 AD |
Trade routes
from the interior of Africa passed through Kush and up
the Nile to the Mediterranean and apparently through
Kush to Asia as well. Images of the Kushite god
Apedemak from this era show strong Indian influence as
they were rendered in a classic Indian style. Kush
enjoyed an economically strategic position, bolstering
its power and importance in the Classical World.
This time marks the height of Meroitic Civilization.
Kush is ruled by both kings and queens equally, with
the queen, or Kandake (from which we get the present
day female name of Candice) often taking the leading
role in civil and international affairs.
Rome gained control of Egypt and all of the north
African coastline and exacted tribute from Kush. Kush,
called "Aethiopia" by the Romans (not to be
confused with the present Ethiopia which was called
Abyssinia by the Romans - see Axum), seeing Rome edge
into lower Nubia, attacked and sacked the Roman
outposts at Elephantine and Syene. the Romans
retaliated and conquered the Kushite towns of Dakka
and Premnis. Then Rome marched on Napata where the
queen was in residence. She sued for peace and was
refused. Rome then attacked Napata and razed it to the
ground, making slaves of their captives. After that
Rome fortified Premnis and kept it as their
southernmost border while waging a three year war with
Kush.
Finally, the Kandake marched upon Premnis and sued for
peace, appealing to August Caesar. Impressed with the
Kandake's appeal, and probably being aware that Rome
had overextended itself at so distant a border, He
accepted at about 20 BC. Kush was freed from further
tribute, the borders were established at their
Ptolemaic location, and Premnis was returned to
Kushite control. |
|
LATE
MEROITIC: 1 - 350 AD |
While the
Kushite kingdom was economically and politically
strong at the beginning of the Late Meroitic period,
it was soon to enter a cycle of decline. With the rise
of Axum, trade routes shifted, and Kushite commercial
interests faded. Decline was further complicated with
an ecological decline of the area causing less
agricultural production and the gradual migration of
the population from the area. Border skirmishes with
tribal factions and internal struggles also added to
the decline.
With Rome trading with Axum and shifting its interests
from Kush, the Kushite Kingdom became more and more
isolated. In 298 AD, Rome finally evacuated the
northern borders of Kush. In an apparent bid to regain
some economic parody, Kush seems to have attacked
Axum, in retaliation for which Axum over-ran Kush,
occupied Meroe, and brought about the total
collapse of Kush as a civilization in 350 AD. |
~ Axum (Aksum)
~
"The Axum (Aksum)
people developed when Kush speaking people in Ethiopia
migrating from the Sahara and Semitic speaking people from
southern Arabia (the Sabaeans) settled in the
area known as the Abyssinian Plateau around 500 BC and
intermingled into one culture. This was a strategic position
in the trade routes between Asia and Kush affording easy
access to Arabic trade routes and the Mediterranean via the
Red Sea. The area was agriculturally well suited,
politically defensible, and allowed the possibility of
undisturbed cultural development. They spoke a Semitic
language and wrote in a Semitic "alphabet".
We have scant knowledge about the early Axumite kingdom.
Apparently following a feudal system, they had a single king
(the "Negus"), who ruled over princes who paid him
tribute. By the first century A.D. the principal city was
Axum, and the port city of Adulis became a major trading
port that attracted Greek and Jewish traders and merchants.
Adulis served as a crossroads to a variety of cultures:
Egyptian, Kushite, Sudanic, Arabic, Middle Eastern, and
Indian.
In the second century A.D., Axum acquired tribute states on
the Arabian Peninsula across the Red Sea, overtook northern
Ethiopia, and then finally conquered Kush. The conquest and
destruction of the Kushite Empire gave Axum complete control
of the most important trade routes and one of the most
fertile regions in the world.
The original Axumite religion was a polytheistic religion
which believed in gods that controlled the natural world. In
the fourth century, King Ezana, converted to Christianity
and declared Axum to be a Christian state, and began
actively proselytizing the population. Not many of the
people accepted Christianity at first, but Christianity
gradually supplanted the old religion. The move was
politically and commercially beneficial to Axum in that Rome
was undergoing similar conversion, and the Roman capital was
being relocated to Constantinople.
Axum remained a strong empire and trading power until the
rise of Islam in the seventh century AD. As Islam spread,
the trade routes changed and commercially isolated Axum. The
fall of Rome spelled out a fall for Axum as well as Axum
could not maintain the linking trade routes that Rome had so
long maintained. By the end of the seventh century, Axum as
a power had ended giving rise to the modern Ethiopian
people.
~
North Coast ~
Carthage
Early indigenous
Libyan and North coast cultures have left few clues and no
written history. Prior to the Phoenician invasion, there
seem to have been mostly Neolithic, pre-bronze age
cultures. Since these cultures were introduced to iron by
the Phoenicians, they never passed through a bronze age of
their own.
The founding of Carthage was precipitated by Phoenician
migration into the western Mediterranean (traditionally from
Tyre) in search of raw materials, principally metals such as
gold, silver, copper and tin. The Phoenician
name for Carthage was "Kart Hadasht", "New
City". Earliest archaeological evidence places
settlement at the middle of the 8th century BC, while
tradition places it's founding at 814 BC.
For about the first two hundred years, it remained little
more than a small settlement, but the loss of influence of
Tyre, and Tyre's subjugation by Babylon, and growing
competition from Greek settlements (starting in about 580
BC) in Sicily (principally Selinus and Syracuse) thrust
Carthage into the need to enter into alliances with other
Phoenician settlements in the western Mediterranean and
Spain, and with the Etruscans on the west coast of Italy.
Joint victories in repelling the Greeks propelled Carthage
into a position of power. From this point, Carthage began to
hire mercenary troops (mostly native Libyans) as its
citizenry was too small to maintain the burden military of
regional leadership. A final defeat of a Carthaginian
invasion of Sicily in 480, and the Persian invasion of
Greece brought seventy years of peace and a western
Mediterranean trading monopoly for Carthage.
For Carthage, trade seems to have been the singular
industry, and since very little archaeological evidence of
the legendary wealth of Carthage remains, it would seem that
their trade was in raw materials and non-durable goods. At
this point, Carthage maintained control of settlements in
northern Africa and in southern Spain, and controlled the
shipping routes through most of the Mediterranean.
Rome
The three Punic
Wars (264 to 146 BC) gradually whittled away Carthage's
dominance of the Mediterranean, and ended in the utter
destruction of the city of Carthage, the enslavement of it's
citizens, and the creation of the Roman province of Africa.
The first Punic War gave the Roman Republic undisputed
control of Corsica and Sicily, and of the western
Mediterranean sea lanes. The second Punic War resulted in
Carthage's loss of Spain all its island outposts, and its
entire navy. The third Punic War finished Carthage and
established Rome as the military, political, and economic
power in the western Mediterranean and north Africa.
From 146 to 30 BC, Rome gradually overtook the northern
African coastal lands. The small portion of Tunisia that
Rome took with the destruction of Carthage was largely held
as an after-thought, while recognizing a series of client
kingdoms that Rome largely left to their own devices.
Finally, alliances with the Pompeian side of the Roman Civil
Wars which destroyed the Roman Republic (and left the Roman
Empire in its place) brought Rome's final conquest of
northern Africa. The last to fall was Egypt in 30 BC when
the Octavian (Roman Emperor Augustus) defeated Marc Antony
and Cleopatra VII in the Battle of Actium in 31 BC and
opened the door to the conquest of Ptolemaic Egypt.
~
Southern & Southwest Africa ~
Iron work seems to
first appear as early as the first century AD, apparently
resulting from diffusion of Bantu people who migrated from
what is now Nigeria and Cameroon into Southern Africa. Their
skill in metal working seems to have been learned from trade
with Kush and achieved a high order of craftsmanship.
The Khoisan People (formerly referred to as Bushmen or
Hottentots) were already settled in the area as
"stone-age" hunter-gatherer societies. As the
Bantu people moved into the area, the Khoisan People
gradually moved west but never completely vacated the area.
The earliest settlements at Great Zimbabwe date from the
fourth century. Agriculturally favorable land and rich
mineral deposits, along with the ability of the Bantu
speaking people to mine, smelt, and work metals like iron,
tin and gold, gave the Bantu a strong foothold resulting in
the kingdoms of Great Zimbabwe and Mutapa and wide
dispersion of Bantu people throughout the southern region of
Africa.
Bibliography
**Pre-Colonial Africa: Her Civilizations and Foreign
Contacts F.J. Nothling BSL DT20 N67
1989
**The Atlas of Africa Regine Van
Chi-Bonnardel BSL Oversize G2445 N45 1973
**Kush, the Jewel of Nubia: Reconnecting the Root System of
African Civilization Miriam Ma'at-Ka-Re Monges
BSL DT159.6 N83 M66 1997
**Atlas of African History Colin McEvedy
BSL G2446 S1 M3
**General History of Africa / UNESCO International
Scientific Committee for the Drafting of a General History
of Africa BSL DT20 G45 1981 |
