African Societies
African Cultural Characteristics
• Certain common features
– Show an underlying cultural unity
– Some scholars have called “Africanity”
• One common cultural feature
– Concept of kingship
• Kings ritually isolated
• People arranged in age groups and kinship divisions
– Cultivation with the hoe and digging stick
– Use of rhythm in music
– Functions of dancing and mask wearing in rituals
• Hypothesis offered to explain this cultural unity
– Sub-Saharan Africans descended from people who lived
in southern Sahara during “wet period”
– Migrated south where cultural traditions developed
Sub-Saharan Africa:
A Challenging Geography
• Large area with many different environmental zones and
many geographical obstacles to movement
– Sahara Desert—North Africa
• World's largest desert
– Maghreb—northwest Africa
• Coastlands and Atlas Mountains of Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia
– Sahel—belt of grasslands south of Sahara
– Sudan—just below the Sahel
– Guinea—rainforests
• Along Atlantic coast from Guinea to Nigeria
– Congo—rainforest region of Congo River Basin
– Great Lakes—series of five lakes
– Southern Africa
Advent of Iron
and Bantu Migrations
• Bantu migrations
• Linguistic evidence
• Spread of iron and other technology in subSaharan Africa
• Original homeland of Bantu was area on the
border of modern Nigeria and Cameroon
• Spread out toward east and south through
series of migrations in first millennium CE
• Introduce cattle, iron, slash-burn agriculture
• By 8th century, Bantu-speaking people
reached East Africa
Advent of Iron
and Bantu Migrations
• Sub-Saharan agriculture
• Origins north of equator
• Spread southward
• Iron-working also began north of
equator and spread southward
• Reached southern Africa by 800 c.e.
Push Factors
• population increases
• environmental stress- resources of support
have diminished or become inadequate
• Climate changes- expanding Sahara
• Finding a better place to live
Pull Factors
• Lower temperatures
• Greater supplies and materials
• Smaller communities with less competition for
goods and land
Waves of Migration
• One wave moved through east Africa
• One wave moved through the center of the
continent
• Possible 3rd wave- Bantu ancestors of the modern
Swahili mastered sailing technology and made
canoes and boats that travel the Zambezi river
• Slow but steady- people are not speeding across
the landscape, they are moving slowly, gradually
inhabiting areas that were good for farming and
raising livestock
Bantu Migrations
Bantu Migration
• Rather than arriving all at once like conquerors, the
migrations were sporadic with small groups of people
moving from one point to another.
• It is not clear how the Bantu reacted when they came
upon existing communities but it is likely that new
groups merged with existing groups. Both groups took
on parts of each other’s cultures and practices.
• The Bantu were armed with superior weapons and
their iron tools allowed them to plant crops and clear
forests efficiently.
• Historians believe there was social interaction,
intermarrying and trade between Bantu communities.
Bantu Migration
• Bantu groups brought their ideas about
government:
– Styles of leadership- chieftaincy
– Organizing campaigns for battles
– Kinds of advanced religions- multiple gods
Evidence
• Languages
Languages spoken in some parts of eastern, central and
southern Africa show similarities with languages
originally spoken in West Africa.
• Pottery
Similar pottery technology and decoration in eastern,
southern and western Africa.
• Iron
There is little or no evidence of iron tools in eastern
and southern Africa before the arrival of the Bantu
suggesting that new technology was spread by the
migrants.
Iron Tools
Early East Africa
• Axum-Ethiopia
– Semitic Sabaeans settle along Ethiopian coasts,
highlands
– Civilization arose in Axum: records, coinage,
monuments
– Great power mentioned in Greek, Roman,
Persian records
– Controlled Bab-el Mandeb straits
– 3rd Century Christianity
– In decline after rise of Islam in
Red Sea &
Arabian Sea
Movement in Africa
• Romans and Greek
– Both knew of region: Greeks called it Periplus,
Romans called area Azania
– Greek, Roman, and Persian coins of 3rd century CE
found in area
• Three movements converge
– Polynesians of Indian Ocean
– Arabic merchants along East
Coast
– Bantu Migration down East
Coast
African
African
Movement in Africa
• Polynesian immigrants settle parts
– Introduce bananas
• Muslim Arab merchants
– Arab Muslims trade for slaves, gold, ivory
– Link East Africa to wider Indian Ocean
– Arab merchants take Bantu
– Mixed families link interior
coastal Arabs
wives
Bantu,
El Zanj: The Swahili
• separate city-states along East African
coast
• "Swahili" used by early Arabs, means "coast“
• By 1st century BCE Arab and Indian traders
• Brought bananas, cloves, cinnamon and pepper
• Left with gold, ivory and slaves
• Spoke African language enriched with Arabic
and Persian vocabulary
• 8th Century CE
• Settlement Arabs from Persian Gulf
• Small settlements of Indians
Swahili Coastal Trade
• Trade Winds
– Monsoon winds dictate all
movement
– November to February: Indians
can arrive
– April to September: Swahili go to
India
Primary Sources
• The Periplus of the Erithraean Sea, a Greek Sailors’ Guide from
Alexandria, Egypt, c. 100 CE
– "Two days' sail beyond the island lies the last mainland market
town of Azania, which is called Rhapta, a name derived from
the small sewn boats the people use. Here there is much ivory
and tortoiseshell. Men of the greatest stature, who are pirates,
inhabit the whole coast and at each place have set up chiefs.“
• From Compendium of Knowledge by the Chinese Confucian scholar,
Tuan Ch'eng-shih, 8th century CE
– “This country has not been subject to any foreign power. In
fighting they use elephant's tusks, ribs and wild cattle's horns
as spears, and they have corselets and bows and arrows. They
have twenty myriads of foot-soldiers. The Arabs are continually
making raids on them.“
Swahili History
• Swahili city-states
– Muslim and cosmopolitan
– Bantu, Islamic, and Indian influences
– Politically independent of one another
– Never a Swahili empire or hegemony
• Trade and economics
– Cities like competitive companies, corporations
vying for African trade
– Chief exports: ivory, sandalwood, ebony, and gold;
later slaves
– Trade linked to both Arabia and India; even Chinese
goods, influence reached area
Swahili History
• Social construct
–
–
–
–
–
Arabs, Persians were significant players
Cities were run by nobility that was African in origin
Below nobility: commoners, resident foreigners
Large group of artisans, weavers, craftsmen
Slavery was actively practiced
• 16th century
– Advent of Portuguese trade disrupted trade routes, made
commercial centers obsolete
– Portuguese allowed natives no share in African trade
– Began conquering Islamic city-states along eastern coast
• Late 17th century
– Oman conquered Portuguese cities along coast
– Area controlled by Omani sultanate for another 200 years
– Cotton, cloves, plantation agriculture thrived and used slaves for
labor
Swahili Cities
• Swahili garden cities
–
–
–
–
Built around palaces, mosques
Walled cities
Many markets, harbors
Wealthy
• Built homes within walls
• Endowed mosques, schools
– Muslims transplanted many different plants, crops to area
• Gaspar Correa, sailor/mercenary describing da
Gama's arrival in Kilwa, 16th century
– "The city comes down to the shore, and is entirely surrounded by a wall and
towers, within which there are maybe 12,000 inhabitants. The country all round is
very luxurious with many trees and gardens of all sorts of vegetables, citrons,
lemons, and the best sweet oranges that were ever seen… The streets of the city
are very narrow, as the houses are very high, of three and four stories, and one can
run along the tops of them upon the terraces… and in the port there were many
ships. A moor ruled over this city, who did not possess more country than the city
itself.“
Great Zimbabwe
• Swahili cities
• Wealth led to centralization
of Zimbabwean government
around 1300 CE
• Gold and copper
• Easily mined and obtained
• Capital was Great Zimbabwe
• Huge fortification surrounded by stone walls
• Economy rested on agriculture, cattle
herding, and trade
• Declined due to an ecological crisis brought
on by deforestation and overgrazing
GREAT ZIMBABWE
•200 Square Miles of control
•Built consistently from 11th
century to 15th century
•Estimates are that Great Zimbabwe had
as many as 18,000 inhabitants at its peak
GREAT ZIMBABWE
•Ruins at Great Zimbabwe are some
of the oldest and largest structures
located in Sub-Saharan Africa
East and Southern Africa
• Bantu language group
– Introduced cultivation of crops and
ironworking
– The Bantu settled into rural communities
• Commercial trade
– Egyptians may have arrived looking for trade
goods
– Rhapta a commercial metropolis
– Trade across the Indian Ocean
• Khoisan language group
©2004 Wadsworth, a division of Thomson Learning, Inc. Thomson Learning™ is a trademark used herein under license.
Ancient Africa
The Coming of Islam
• African Religious Beliefs before Islam
– Common beliefs
• Single creator god
– Sometimes accompanied by a pantheon of lesser
gods
• Most believed in an afterlife in which ancestral souls
floated in the atmosphere through eternity
• Closely connected to importance of ancestors and
lineage
• Rituals very important
– Challenge by Islam but not always replaced; synthesized
The Coming of Islam (cont.’d)
•
•
North Africa
– Arab forces seized the Nile delta of Egypt in 641
– New capital at Cairo
– Arabs welcome due to high taxes and periodic persecution of Coptic
Christians by Byzantines
– Arabs seize Carthage in 690, called Al Maghrib
– Berbers resisted for many years
The Kingdom of Ethiopia: A Christian Island in a Muslim Sea
– Axum began to decline
– Shift in trade routes and overexploited agriculture
– Muslim trading states on the African coast of the Red Sea transforming Axum
into an isolated agricultural society
• Source of ivory, resins, and slaves
– Attacked by Muslim state of Adal in early 14th century
– Became a Christian state in mid-twelfth century
East Africa: The Land of Zanj
• Legend says a Persian and his six sons founded
the trading centers on the coast of East Africa
• Self-governing city-states
– Trade with the interior
– Trade with the Indian Ocean, China, and along the
coast
• Mixed African-Arab culture
– Mixed culture and language called Swahili
– Conversion to Islam grows
©2004 Wadsworth, a division of Thomson Learning, Inc. Thomson Learning™ is a trademark used herein under license.
The Emergence of States in Africa
The States of West Africa
• Expansion of Islam has impact on political system
• Introduction of Arabic for a writing system
• Ghana
–
–
–
–
–
Majority of people were farmers
Primary reason for Ghana’s growth was gold
Trans-Saharan trade with Ghana becomes very important
Divine right monarchy assisted by hereditary aristocracy
Kings did not convert to Islam, but many of their subjects did
• Mali
– Ruinous wars by the twelfth century in Ghana
• New states of Mali, Songhai, Kanem-Bornu, and Hausa states
– Greatest state was Mali
•
•
•
•
Gold trade
Farming in the savanna region
Mansa Musa (1312-1337), king, encouraged Islam
Timbuktu becomes center of trade, religion and learning
©2004 Wadsworth, a division of Thomson Learning, Inc. Thomson Learning™ is a trademark used herein under license.
Trans-Saharan Trade Routes
States and Stateless Societies in Southern
Africa
• From the basin of the Congo River to the Cape of Good
Hope
• Stateless society
• Progress made with regional trade
• Zimbabwe (sacred house)
– Capital known as Great Zimbabwe
– Benefited from trade between interior and coast
– Evidence of great wealth, but Great Zimbabwe abandoned
• The Khoi and the San (Bushman) people
African Society
• African Society
– Urban life
– Village Life
– Role of women
– Slavery
•
African
Culture
Painting and Sculpture
– Rock paintings, wood carving, pottery, metalwork
• Music and Dance
–
–
–
–
Often served religious purposes
Wide variety of instruments
Integration of voice and instrument
Music produced for social rituals and educational purposes
–
–
–
–
Pyramid
Stone pillars
Stone buildings
Sometimes reflected Moorish styles
• Architecture
• Literature
– Written works did not exist in the early traditional period
– Professional storytellers, bards
– Importance of women in passing down oral traditions