The Black Ancient Egyptians
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Consequently, Pharaonic culture has always been a source of fascination, even to those unable to understand the profunsity of a system in which everything gives an impression of permanence and unchanging wisdom. The Greeks travelers were particularly guilty of misrepresentation. They presented it as an impressive and mysterious fountainhead of human thought, where a remarkably advanced level of civilization had been achieved but they clearly regarded Egyptian civilization simply as a stage in development towards the perfect Greek version. Their descriptions of Egyptian culture were characterized both by unbridled enthusiasm and by a distinct sense of uncertainty when they were confronted by customs of which they invariably misunderstood the origins [ 2 ].
Therefore, the researcher will start the arguments by stressing that European civilization is derivation of African achievements. The researcher will then assess how the Egyptologists have interfered with the history of Africa, and Africans in general. No history of humankind has been distorted as that of Africa and the Africans. The distorted picture and the lies about Africa suited human trade handsomely and justified colonialism magnificently in the eyes of the invading Europeans to enable them rape Africa [ 4 ].
Africa has been portrayed by Euro-centric historians as a continent that is devoid of history and therefore Africa and its inhabitants Africans are not part and parcel of world history. For a long time all kinds of myths and prejudices concealed the true history of Africa from the world at large. African societies were looked upon as societies that could have no history. In fact there was a refusal to see Africans as creators of original cultures which flowered and survived over the centuries in patterns of their own making and which historians are unable to grasp unless they forgo their prejudices and rethink approach.
The mainstream of European scholarship was beginning to take an increasingly unfavourable view of non-Europeans societies and to assert that they had no history worth studying. Essentially this attitude resulted from a conjunction of streams of thought deriving from the Renaissance, the Enlightenment, and the growing scientific revolution. The result was that building upon what was regarded as a unique Greco-Roman heritages power and wealth of their society were so strong that it must prevail over all others, therefore its history was the key to understanding the history of all other societies was irrelevant.
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This attitude was applicable to Africa, since Europeans by now hardly knew Africa or Africans at all outside the context of the slave trade. Therefore, it can be argued that the 19 th century writers are trying to expose their ignorance of ancient history and seem to have forgotten that the history of Africa was still old when European history was not yet born.
So to say Africa was a Dark Continent should not arise. This is a people that came from southern Africa and the Great Lakes region that first settled between the current Sudan and southern Egypt. Egypt and Phut, and Canaan. Can't read the image? European Racism Regarding Ancient Egypt: From then on their countries became magnets attracting the inhabitants of the ill-favoured backward lands nearby, who tried to move there to improve their existence.
But at present there is none. Therefore this misconception of African history has to be re corrected by showing that African history, predicts, the emergence of Europe, by thousands of years, it is not possible for Africa to have waited in darkness, for the Europeans to bring light. So to say Africa was a Dark Continent should not arise. Europeans were ignorant about Africa. Those in darkness were the Europeans themselves and not Africans.
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For in the 19 th century they assumed that anything not known to them did not exist and therefore we are arguing that when we study early history of man, it is necessary to be objective. To Africans, Africa is a historical entity. Africans influenced the civilization of Egypt, and therefore then, it can be argued that Africans could have contributed to the world civilization.
At this point it is paramount to show that ancient Egyptians were Negroes Blacks. Archaeological and historical documents unanimously attest to the region of Egypt was always inhabited by Negroes. The examination of the documents therefore testifies as early as pre-historic times to the presence of a Negro civilization on the very spot claimed as the starting point of Egyptian civilization. Egyptian civilization remains profoundly distinctive and Africa, from the beginning to the end of pre-history and even throughout historical times [ 6 ].
Archaeologists have been able to explain the origin of man in eastern Africa, and possibly Tanzania is the cradle of man, and therefore I am trying to argue that until other evidence is found, more ancient from Africa, then the history of man has to begin from Africa, then the history of man has to begin from Eastern Africa and therefore it can be argued that the history of man started in eastern Africa or Africa and then spread to the rest of the world. There is cultural, economic and political affinity of the Africans south of the Sahara and those of North of the Sahara.
Totemism is a practice both in Egypt and the rest of Black Africa. Natural objects or animals used to represent a family or a clan. Such an animal become a taboo to the clan to be eaten or harmed by a member of the clan [ 7 ]. In many African societies social groups have identified themselves with animals as objects of solidarity.
Totemism has established a sense of continuity between nature and man. Western culture recognizes neither sacred nor profane animals. There were certain taboo animals in Egypt falcon that corresponded with those found in other African countries. Totemism is widespread in Africa, while it is a foreign culture among the Greeks, therefore it can be argued that ancient Egyptians were Negroes Black.
Among the innumerable identical cultural traits recorded in Egypt and in the present day Black Africa, it is proposed to refer to circumcision. According to Herodotus circumcision is of African origin [ 8 ]. Archaeology has confirmed the judgment of the Father of History for Elliot-Smith was able to determine from the examination of well-preserved mummies that circumcision was the rule among the Egyptians as long ago as the proto-historic era.
They transmitted this practice to the Semitic world in general Jews and Arabs. Only among Blacks does circumcision find an interpretation integrated in a general explanation of the universe. The culture is used by African historians to argue that the culture is an African origin and therefore it is established by Africans.
Therefore then we can argue that the Ancient Egyptians were Negroes Blacks. The matriarchal system is the base of social organization in Egypt and throughout Black Africa. Negro matriarchy is alive today, as it was during antiquity. In regions where the matriarchal system has not been altered by external influence such as Islam, it is the woman who transmits political rights. This derives from the general idea that heredity is effective only matrillineally. In Africa, since the woman holds a privileged position, thanks to matriarchy, it is she who receives a guarantee in form of a dowry in the alliance of marriage.
If the husband is really at fault, the marriage can be broken within a few hours to his disadvantage [ 8 ]. It can be argued that if Egyptian civilization was founded by the whites, then they would be practicing patriarchal system, therefore the civilization was started by the Blacks. Kingship concept is one of the most impressive indications of the similarity in thinking between Egypt and the rest of Black Africa.
In other regions of Black Africa, the events occur exactly as in Egypt with regard to the actual killing of the monarch. It can be attested that since there is a lot of similarities between those of Northern and Southern Sahara, then ancient Egyptians were Blacks. Extensive research that has been done has proved beyond doubt that the Kinship between ancient Egyptians and the languages of Africa for example, Wolof a Senegalese language spoken in the extreme west of Africa on the Atlantic Ocean is perhaps close to ancient Egyptian as Coptic.
Therefore Egyptians are Negroes. This is a clear manifestation that the Egyptians were black. Leakey says that it means that the whole human race had its origins in Africa and particularly Eastern Africa. Importance result of necessity the earliest men were ethnically homogenous and Negroid. This argument gives crecedence to the fact that Egyptians were Africans of black colour.
Also there are only two routes available by which these early men could move outward to people the other continents that is the Sahara and the Nile Valley both in Africa, therefore Egyptians were Negroes. Herodotus returns a few times to the Negroid character of the Egyptians and every time utilizes it as a certainty of perception to contend pretty much complex postulations. Herodotus subsequently agree that Egyptians are Negroes.
Herodotus goes above and beyond to say they has dark skin and unusual hair. Egyptians themselves are better qualified than anyone to speak of their origin. They recognize without ambiguity that their ancestors came from Nubia and the heart of Africa [ 9 ]. Therefore Egyptians were not whites but Africans of Black colour. Negro cosmogonies, African and Egyptian, resemble each other so closely that they are often complementary. This similarity of mores, customs, traditions and thinking has already been sufficiently stressed by various authorities.
The relation between Egypt and Black Africa is that they are one and the same [ 9 ]. Egypt and Phut, and Canaan. Generally, speaking, all Semitic traditions Jewish and Arab classes ancient Egypt with the countries of the blacks. The importance of these depositions cannot be ignored for these are peoples Jews which lived side by side with the ancient Egyptians and sometimes in symbiosis with them and have nothing to gain by presenting a false ethnic picture of them [ 9 ].
Egyptian civilization is the first and foremost African. Egyptologists were dumbfounded with admiration for the past grandeur and perfection they discovered. They gradually recognized it as the most ancient civilization that had engendered all others. The birth of Egyptology was thus marked by the need to destroy the memory of a Negro Egypt at any cost and in all minds.
They try in vain to find a white origin for Egyptian civilization [ 9 ]. Professor Vercoutter remarked in the Cairo symposium held from 28 th January to 3 rd February that in his view Egypt was African in its way of writing, in its culture and in its way of thinking [ 8 ]. If Egyptians were white as claimed, then all these aforementioned Negro peoples and so many others in Africa are also whites. Thus we reach the absurd conclusion that Blacks are basically Whites; which is not the case. If the Egyptian civilization had come from the south of Europe as Maspero assumes, and if it had slipped into the valley via the west or southwest to introduce elements of civilization we cannot understand why it should not have left traces in its birthplace or along its route.
It is difficult to perceive how this white race, propagator of culture could have left Europe a milieu so conducive to the development of civilization, without having created it, how it crossed the rich plains of Tell and the enormous expanse that separates North Africa from Egypt before that expanse became a desert or why it would have crossed the swampy, unhealthy region of lower Egypt, spanned the Nubian desert, climbed to the high plateaus of Ethiopia, traversed thousands and thousands of miles to create civilization on some caprice in so remote an area, so that this civilization might later return slowly down the Nile.
Assuming this is the case, how can we explain that a fraction of that race which stayed at home in an environment so favourable to the flowering of a civilization remained unpolished until the centuries just preceding the Christian era?
The ancient Egyptians were Black “Egypt was African in its writing, its culture and its way of thinking,” concludes Jean Vercoutter, renowned. The Black Egyptian hypothesis is held by various held that applying modern notions of race to ancient Egypt is.
Therefore Egyptians are Negroes not whites. It can be safely argued that the ancient Egyptians were Negroes and not whites, since evidence has been provided to prove that Egyptians were Black. Negro character of Egyptian civilization, as is recognized, rules out any possibility that this civilization was a monopoly or the white race. Numerous authors circumvent the difficulty by speaking of the whites with red skin or whites with black skin. This does not seem in congruous to them for as soon as a race has created civilization there can be no more possibility of it being Black.
We cannot rely on the quality of the hair to guarantee the whiteness of a race. The hair the regular features are not a monopoly of the white race. The European civilization is but a derivation of African achievements. It is true that the Europeans civilization is largely built on the achievements of the ancient Greeks.
Ancient Egyptian race controversy
But the ancient Greeks in turn built their civilization following in the footsteps of the ancient Egyptians. Therefore Africa was the birthplace of the earliest and greatest civilization on earth. Kathryn Bard further states that "Naqada cultural burials contain very few Nubian craft goods, which suggests that while Egyptian goods were exported to Nubia and were buried in A-Group graves, A-Group goods were of little interest further north.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Ancient Egyptian race controversy. Population history of Egypt. DNA history of Egypt. This article may be too long to read and navigate comfortably. Please consider splitting content into sub-articles, condensing it, or adding or removing subheadings. Archived from the original on February 13, Retrieved May 28, Archived from the original on February 4, Retrieved May 29, Barnes and Noble Books. Grant notes that Cleopatra probably had not a drop of Egyptian blood and "would have described herself as Greek," noting that had she been illegitimate her "numerous Roman enemies would have revealed this to the world.
Yale University Press, pp. Goldworthy notes Cleopatra "was no more Egyptian culturally or ethnically than most residents of modern day Arizona are Apaches", that Greek was her native tongue, that it was "in Greek literature and culture she was educated," and that she wore the robes and headband of a Greek monarch. Schiff writes Cleopatra was not dark-skinned, that "the Ptolemies were in fact Macedonian Greek, which makes Cleopatra approximately as Egyptian as Elizabeth Taylor ", that her Ptolemaic relatives were described as "honey skinned", that she was part Persian, and that "an Egyptian mistress is a rarity among the Ptolemies.
Price , "Was Cleopatra Black? The author cites a few examples of the claim, one of which is a chapter entitled "Black Warrior Queens," published in in Black Women in Antiquity, part of The Journal of African Civilization series. It draws heavily on the work of J. Encyclopedia of the Archaeology of Ancient Egypt.
Retrieved 28 May Mythical Pasts and Imagined Homes. Ancient Civilizations of Africa. Formation of the ancient Egyptian state". American Journal of Physical Anthropology. The World and Africa. The Destruction of Black Civilization. The African Origin of Civilization. General History of Africa. University of California Press. Introduction to African Civilizations. African Presence in Early Asia.
Black Egyptian hypothesis
The African Origins of Ancient Egypt. A Journal of Humanities and the Classics. Specialists and Afrocentrists" PDF. International Journal of Anthropology. Retrieved 15 June Edited by Redford; Oxford University Press. New Brunswick, New Jersey: African-Americans in Search of an Ancient Past.
London and New York: Etymologicum Magnum in Greek. Lefkowitz, Guy MacLean Rogers: The Kingdom of Kush. Historical researches into the politics, intercourse, and trade of the Carthaginians, Ethiopians, and Egyptians. University of Michigan Library. The Rescue of Jerusalem. Travel Fact and Travel Fiction: Studies on Fiction, Literary Tradition …. Ethnicity and Identity in Ancient Israel: Prolegomena to the Study of Ethnic …. A Commentary on Herodotus. A Very Short Introduction.
Greek Mythography in the Roman World. Egypt, the Trunk of the Tree, Vol. Yurco points also to the much more recent photographs of Dr.
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Erik Hornung as a correct depiction of the actual paintings. Horizon of Eternity , Ampim nonetheless continues to claim that plate 48 shows accurately the images that stand on the walls of KV11, and he categorically accuses both Yurco and Hornung of perpetrating a deliberate deception for the purposes of misleading the public about the true race of the ancient Egyptians. The Black Egyptian hypothesis is held by various authors [] [] []: This includes a particular focus on links to Sub Saharan cultures and the questioning of the race of specific notable individuals from Dynastic times, including Tutankhamun [] and the king represented in the Great Sphinx of Giza , [91] [97] and Greek Ptolemaic queen Cleopatra.
Early advocates of the Black African model relied heavily on writings from Classical Greek historians, including Strabo , Diodorus Siculus , and Herodotus , wherein the Greeks referred to Egyptians as "melanchroes" with woolly hair. Other points used to support the Black Hypothesis included testing melanin levels in a small sample of mummies, []: The Asiatic race theory holds that the ancient Egyptians were the lineal descendants of the biblical Ham , through his son Mizraim.
This theory was the most dominant view from the Early Middle Ages c. By the 20th century, the Asiatic race theory and its various offshoots were abandoned but were superseded by two related theories: In sharp contrast to the Asiatic race theory, neither of these theories proposes that Caucasians were the indigenous inhabitants of Egypt.
In , Samuel George Morton wrote that the Nile valley "was originally peopled by a branch of the Caucasian race", [] and acknowledged that Negroes were present in ancient Egypt but claimed they were either captives or servants.
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The similar Hamitic hypothesis, which developed directly from the Asiatic Race Theory, argued that the Ethiopid and Arabid populations of the Horn of Africa were the inventors of agriculture and had brought all civilization to Africa, and asserted that these people were Caucasians, not Negroid. It also rejected any Biblical basis despite using Hamitic as the theory's name. The Italian anthropologist Giuseppe Sergi believed that ancient Egyptians were the Eastern African Hamitic branch of the Mediterranean race , which he called "Eurafrican".
According to Sergi, the Mediterranean race or "Eurafrican" contains three varieties or sub-races: The Egyptologist Samuel Sharpe proposed that the ancient Egyptians belonged to the Turanid race , linking them to the Tatars. He was inspired by some ancient Egyptian paintings, which depict Egyptians with sallow or yellowish skin. He said "From the colour given to the women in their paintings we learn that their skin was yellow, like that of the Mongul Tartars, who have given their name to the Mongolian variety of the human race The single lock of hair on the young nobles reminds us also of the Tartars.
In the early 20th century, Flinders Petrie , one of the leading Egyptologists of his day, noted that the skeletal remains found at predynastic sites at Naqada in Upper Egypt showed marked differentiation. Together with cultural evidence such as architectural styles, pottery styles, cylinder seals, and numerous rock and tomb paintings, he deduced that a Mesopotamian force had invaded Egypt in predynastic times, imposed itself on the indigenous Badarian people, and become their rulers. This came to be called the " dynastic race theory ".
In the s, the Dynastic Race Theory was widely accepted by mainstream scholarship. Scholars such as the Senegalese Egyptologist Cheikh Anta Diop , fought against the Dynastic Race Theory with their own "Black Egyptian" theory and claimed, among other things, that European scholars supported the Dynastic Race Theory "to avoid having to admit that Ancient Egyptians were black".
Contemporary scientists agree that Egyptian civilization was an indigenous Nile Valley development see population history of Egypt. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. This article is about the history of the controversy about the race of the ancient Egyptians. For discussion of the scientific evidence relating to the race of the ancient Egyptians, see Population history of Egypt. This article's lead section does not adequately summarize key points of its contents.
Please consider expanding the lead to provide an accessible overview of all important aspects of the article. Please discuss this issue on the article's talk page. Population history of Egypt. DNA history of Egypt. The realistic Fayum mummy portraits show the diversity of Egyptians in the Roman period. Encyclopedia of the Archaeology of Ancient Egypt.
Retrieved 28 May Mythical Pasts and Imagined Homes. Formation of the ancient Egyptian state". American Journal of Physical Anthropology. Ancient Civilizations of Africa. AAA, Occasionally re-included in other volumes afterwards. Donald Redford, Oxford University Press. The origins of human society.
Merimde Beni-salame , In: Compiled and edited by Kathryn A. Ma'adi and Wadi Digla. The Destruction of Black Civilization. Journal of Craniofacial Surgery. Archived from the original on May 27, Retrieved May 1, Behind the Forensic Reconstruction". Archived from the original on October 30, Retrieved August 5, Archived from the original on February 13, Retrieved 27 December Oxford University Press, p. Price, "Was Cleopatra Black? Retrieved May 28, The author cites a few examples of the claim, one of which is a chapter titled "Black Warrior Queens", published in in Black Women in Antiquity, part of The Journal of African Civilization series.
It draws heavily on the work of J. Retrieved May 29, The Penguin Groups, , p. Archived from the original on Oxford University Press, pp. Truly Out of Africa Dr. The Times Literary Supplement. Its history in the light of recent excavations. European Racism Regarding Ancient Egypt: When I visited the sphinx Flaubert in Egypt , ed. Archived from the original on February 4, General History of Africa II: