North Africa : The Arabs.

After the birth of Islam early in the 7th century the armies of the Semitic Arabs
quickly conquered the whole of the Middle East, including Egypt in 642. Later in the
century they went on from Egypt to the rest of North Africa, converting the Berbers
as they went. By the end of the century the Arab empire had reached Morocco. The
conversion was generally peaceful, the Berbers readily accepting Islam. About the
only section of the population not converted were Jewish communities (which had
been in North Africa for several centuries) and which were tolerated and treated well
by the Arabs.
The Arab invasions, however, were not unopposed. Byzantine resistance resulted in
the complete and final destruction of Carthage; and further west, in Algeria, there
was considerable Berber opposition. Though the Berbers accepted Islam, there was a
long period of anarchy and warfare.
From Morocco the Arab armies, reinforced with Berbers and led by the Berber Tariq,
moved on to Spain and conquered most of the county between 710 and 720. Apart
from some areas in the north the Moors, as they were called, remained masters of
the Iberian peninsula until late in the 11th century, and were not finally driven out
until the 15th century.* As time went on, and more came to Spain from Africa, the
Moors in Spain became more Berber than Arab.
Meanwhile in Morocco the Berber tribes united in a series of Moorish dynasties, under
the first of which Fez was founded as the capital towards the end of the 8th century.
Fez became - and still is - the great intellectual and religious centre of Morocco.
When the Moors were finally expelled from Spain intellectual refugees gathered in
Fez.
In the Arab world divisions soon appeared. Rival families fought for the Caliphate
(leadership of Islam), and there was a serious split between the Shiites and the
Sunnites. The Shiites held that the head of Islam must be a descendant of Ali and his
wife Fatima (Mohammed's nephew and daughter)**. There was also a third sect, the
Kharijites, who held that the Caliph could be any believer fit for the office. They were
at first numerous in North Africa, but few still remain.
These family and religious rivalries are exemplified by events in Tunisia. At the end
of the 8th century a dynasty was founded by the Aghlabids, who broke away from
the ruling Abbasid Caliphate and extended their control over some of Algeria and
Tripolitania. (The Aghlabids also conquered Sicily, which became another main outlet
for Arab learning into Europe.) At the beginning of the 10th century the Aghlabids
were overthrown by the Shiite Fatimids, who claimed descent from Fatima. (later in
the century the Fatimids conquered Egypt and founded Cairo, from which they ruled
for the next 200 years.)
In the 11th century there was a renewal of Islamic energy in North Africa,
accompanied by a further wave of Arab immigration. And at this time there arose in
the Sahara a sect of fanatical Berber Moslems, the Almoravids. In about 1060 they
founded Marrakesh and conquered Morocco, and then went on to Spain where they
temporarily arrested the Christian re-conquest.
In the middle of the 12th century some even fiercer and more intolerant Berber
Moslems issued from the region of the Atlas mountains in western and central
Morocco - the Almohades. They extinguished the power of the Almoravids, and
extended their empire in North Africa from Morocco as far as Tripolitania. (Cyrenaica
in these times was generally tied to the fortunes of Egypt.) The Almohades also
followed in the footsteps of the Almoravids in Spain, from which they were not
expelled until the middle of the 13th century (leaving the whole Iberian peninsula in
Christian hands except for Granada in the south).
The empire of the Almohades in Africa then declined and gradually broke up.
Separate dynasties were established in Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Tripolitania.
*In the middle of the 8th century the state of Cordoba, in Andalusia in southern
Spain, was founded by Abd al Rahman, son of an Arabian prince and a Berber
princess. In the following centuries Cordoba became the centre of a renaissance in
art, science and literature in which, while Europe was in a state of virtual intellectual
stagnation the,Arabs led the.western world. Cordoba became the leading intellectual
centre of Europe where students came from far and wide to study medicine,
mathematics, science, philosophy and music under Moslem Christian and Jewish
professors.
** The split still exists; but the great majority are Sunnites. The Shiites are strong
only in Persia and southern Iraq.
Chapter 5. The Early Kingdoms of the Western and
Central Sudan.
In early times the peoples of the western and central Sudan were subject to many
outside influences - from the Egyptians, the Kushites, the Carthaginians - but mainly
from the Berbers of the North African coastlands. The links were the trade routes
across the Sahara.
The Berber trade was largely for gold from the district south of the western Sudan, in
exchange for salt and manufactured goods. The greatly increased trade after the
introduction of the camel about A.D. 700 led to the formation of Berber states south
west of the Sahara. This helped to cause a greater degree of co-ordination between
the Negro tribes and the creation of the first large West African kingdom, probably
some time in the 4th century A.D. This was ancient Ghana, formed by the Soninke
people who lived in the grasslands of the western Sudan north of the headwaters of
the Senegal and Niger rivers. (Ancient Ghana was - rather confusingly in present-day
Mali, and a quite different land from modern Ghana.)
The empire of Ghana dominated West Africa for seven centuries, reaching its peak in
the 11th century. Based on the gold trade, the Kings of Ghana were immensely rich,
and powerful. King Tunka Manin, who ruled in the middle of the 11th century, had a
magnificent court in his stone-built capital of Kumbi Saleh, and is said to have been
able to field an army of 200,000 men.
Ghana, however, was unable to withstand Moslem invasions in the second half of the
11th century. The Moslem Arabs had been infiltrating the settlements in the Sahara
oases since the 7th century. Then, in the 1070s, Ghana was attacked by the armies
of the Almoravids of Morocco. Though the Almoravids retired or were driven out,
after destroying Kumbi Saleh, Ghana was permanently weakened. In the course of
the next 150 years it was absorbed and its place as the leading West African power
taken by the Kingdom of Mali.
Mali, of the Mandinka people, was the great empire in West Africa for about two
centuries, from the middle of the 13th to the middle of the 15th. Its territories
extended well beyond those of ancient Ghana. It rose to prominence under Mari-
Djata (the Lion Prince) and was at the height of its power under the Emperor
Kankan Musa early in the 14th century. On the way to a pilgrimage to Mecca,
Kankan Musa exchanged greetings and presents on equal terms with the Mameluke
Sultan of Egypt. (The kings of Mali had embraced Islam - and so became members of
a world civilisation.) Mali was famous for the wealth of its rulers, the peace and order
in its territories, and for its learned men - influenced by Islamic studies in law,
government and business affairs.
These advances made society more complex - and more divided. At the bottom were
those who had lost the right to be treated as free men, either through some serious
offence or by capture in war. They were "rightless persons" or "permanent servants'
and subject to sale, in effect slaves, but it was usually a form of slavery which was
tolerant and allowed them to work in much the same way as other people.
The pre-eminence of Mali was followed by that of the Songhay people of the central
Sudan, with their capital at Gao. The Songhay had her trading connections with the
Berbers for many centuries, and their Kings of Gao had accepted Islam early in the
11th century. At various times they had been subject to Ghana, and then to Mali; but
towards the end of the 14th century they threw off the over-lordship of Mali, and
then their power increased as that of Mali declined. Their prosperity grew as gold
began to come from the forest country south of Gao (modern Ghana).
The main founder of the Songhay Empire of Gao was Sunni (King) Ali, a warrior king
who reigned from about 1464 to 1492. He transformed a small trading kingdom into
a large empire, including in his domains the rich trading centre Timbuktu, which had
been one of the main cities of Mali. In the Songhay times Timbuktu became a
renowned centre of learning, known throughout the Moslem world.
Under Askia Mohammed (c 1493-1528) the empire expanded further, becoming as
extensive as Mali had been at its peak. A source of weakness in the empire, though,
was a conflict of beliefs and interests between the Moslem traders of the towns and
the country people who remained true to their old Songhay religion.**
Late in the 16th century Songhay came into conflict with the Sultan of Morocco, who
in 1590 sent an army across the Sahara to seize the sources of gold. The Moroccans
captured and looted Gao and Timbuktu, sending back much gold - and slaves - but
they failed to win control of the trade routes to the south. Twenty years later the
Moroccan leader in Timbuktu threw off allegiance to the Sultan, and the "Niger
Moors" remained as rulers there for nearly 200 years quarrelling among themselves
and oppressing the Negro tribes. The Songhay Empire was destroyed, and so was
the culture of Timbuktu.
As well as the three great empires of Ghana, Mali and Songhay there were many
other kingdoms in the grasslands of the Sudan. One was Kanem-Bornu, around Lake
Chad; and between Kanem-Bornu and the Songhay - in the central and western part
of present-day northern Nigeria - were the many city states of the Hausa people.
Kanem-Bornu and the Hausa kingdoms were created in about the 10th century, and
like the other empires in the Sudan were dependent for their prosperity on the
Berber trade. Kanem-Bornu reached its zenith at about the same time as Songhay.
The Hausa cities were noted for their leather goods and textiles. The most famous of
them was the walled city of Kano. The Hausa political and social organisation was
much influenced by the penetration of Islam in the 13th-14th centuries.
Another people who succeeded in remaining independent of the great Sudanese
empires were the Mossi, who occupied the basin of the upper Volta, south of the
bend in the Niger river. They are said to have a line of kings who have ruled for a
thousand years.
**Each African people had its own religion. Most of them believed in a single God in
Heaven who made the world, and also in lesser gods and spirits. They also believed
in the power of evil, as the work of witchcraft. The 'witch doctors' were fighters
against evil anti-witchcraft specialists.

North Africa until the 7th Century A.D.

 :
Carthage : Rome : The Vandals : Byzantium.
North Africa in this history refers to what is now Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Libya.
In Roman times Mauretania (the land of the Mauri - or Moors) coincided roughly with
modern Morocco. It is not to be confused with present day Mauritania; which is
further south. And the Roman name for part of what is now Tunisia and Algeria was
Numidia. Western Libya was (and still is) called Tripolitania, and eastern Libya
Cyrenaica.
The Berbers of North Africa in ancient times were largely nomadic, and never united
into a single state. There were also many traders, engaging particularly in the trans-
Saharan trade with the peoples of the Sudan. The traders settled in towns, which
often developed into kingdoms.
During the second millenium B.C. Libyan chiefs periodically raided Egypt. Then,
during the time of Egypt's weakness after the power of the Pharaohs collapsed in the
11th century B.C, Libyan mercenaries in the Egyptian army established the Libyan
Dynasty in Egypt, about 950 B.C. The dynasty lasted for two centuries (followed by a
further period of confusion in Egypt and its conquest by the Kushites).
In the 7th century, B.C. the Greeks colonised Cyrenaica, building the city of Cyrene,
which became famous for its intellectual life, notably its schools of philosophy and
medicine. The Greeks continued to rule there until the Persians conquered Egypt and
Cyrenaica towards the end of the 6th century. In the 330s B.C. the Persian Empire
was destroyed by Alexander the Great; and on the division of Alexander's empire
after his death Egypt and Cyrenaica passed to the Greek Ptolemies.
Meanwhile in Tunisia the sea trading Semitic Phoenicians from Tyre (in Lebanon) had
founded the colony of Carthage about 800 B.C. near the present day city of Tunis. By
the 5th century Carthage had become the capital of a huge trading empire on the
coasts and islands of the western and central Mediterranean, in places, particularly
Sicily, rivalled by Greek colonies.
In Africa, Carthaginian trading ports extended all along the coast from Tunisia to
Morocco, and their ships went through the Straits of Gibraltar and down the Atlantic
coast in search of trade. (They also went as far as Britain, where they traded for tin
from the Cornish mines.) They founded settlements on the west African coast in
Senegal and Guinea. They also took part ill the trans-Saharan trade.
By the 3rd century B.C. Carthage - a republic ruled by an aristocracy based on
wealth - came into conflict with the rising power of Rome, which had taken over from
the Greek colonies as Carthage's main rival in the central Mediterranean. Two long
wars between Rome and Carthage ensued, from 264 to 241 B.C. and 219 to 201
(known as the Punic Wars).
The result of the first war was the cession of Sicily to Rome. There was then a period
of uneasy peace. Carthage had to deal with a revolt of her African mercenaries, who
formed the bulk of the rank and file of her armies and had not been paid. Rome took
advantage of this to seize Corsica and Sardinia. Then the Carthaginian Hamilcar
Barca, having quelled the mercenaries' revolt, proceeded during the next ten years,
until his death in 228 B.C, to build up an empire in Spain (where the Carthaginians
were already established as traders) as a base for a land attack on Rome.
Carthage was now at the height of her prosperity. Her population is said to have
been about a million, fed from the very fertile surrounding district; and her trade and
manufactures were thriving.
In 221 B.C. Hamilcar’s son, the 26 year old Hannibal, became Commander-in-chief in
Spain. As a child he had pledged to his father his dedication to the cause of revenge
against Rome. In 219 he picked a quarrel with Rome and led an army of some
25,000 African and Spanish troops - and some war elephants - through Gaul and
across the Alps to Italy, raising an army of Gauls on the way as his ally.
For 14 years the brilliant Hannibal campaigned against vastly more numerous Roman
forces without defeat; but without siege equipment he could not capture Rome.
Meanwhile the Roman general Scipio had evicted the Carthaginians from Spain, and
in 204 B.C. he invaded Africa. Allied to the African King Massinissa of eastern
Numidia, Scipio defeated the Carthaginians. The oligarchy of Carthage recalled
Hannibal from Italy, but with a hastily levied army he suffered his first and only
defeat, at Zama in 202 B.C. This concluded the Second Punic War and Carthage lost
all except her African possessions to Rome.
Hannibal became head of the Carthaginian government, so ably that Rome - which
feared a Carthaginian recovery - forced him to be exiled. After many adventures, in
which he acted as adviser to enemies of Rome, he committed suicide, in 182 B.C, to
avoid falling into Roman hands.
Carthage's commercial ability, however, enabled her revival to continue, to the
extent that she again became a source of fear and envy to Rome. In 149 B.C. Rome
found an excuse for launching the Third Punic War, Carthage having been provoked
into breaking a clause in the previous peace treaty by the aggressive action of the
now aged King Massinissa. Rome sent an army to Africa, and after a heroic
resistance the city of Carthage fell in 146 B.C. The Romans totally destroyed the city,
and the site was ploughed over and salted so that the land would remain infertile.
Only about 50,000 of the population survived, many to be sold to slavery. So ended
the Carthaginian Empire, and all its possessions passed to Rome.
From this time until early in the 5th century A.D. the whole of North Africa was under
varying degrees of Roman rule or influence. Egypt was virtually a Roman
dependency from 168 B.C, and became formally a province of the Roman Empire
after the defeat and suicide of Cleopatra in 30 B.C. Cyrenaica became a Roman
province in 74 B.C, after being bequeathed to Rome by one of the later Ptolemies.
Tripolitania, after the defeat of Carthage, fell to Massinissa and was ruled by
Numidian kings until annexed by Julius Caesar in 46 B.C. Pezzan, the Libyan desert
area where the native Garamantes had for several centuries dominated the Sahara
caravan route, was conquered by Rome in 19 B.C. Numidia, under King Jugurtha
(Massinissa’s grandson), gave Rome a lot of trouble in a war from 111 to 106 B.C.
After Jugurtha’s defeat Numidia went through various vicissitudes until it finally
became a Roman province. Mauretania appears in history as a kingdom at the time
of the Jugurthine war. The degree of Roman control was less here, with native
kingdoms surviving as allies or subject states of Rome.
North Africa as a whole flourished during the Roman period. Roads and towns were
built, and Tunisia provided a granary for the sustenance of the Roman armies. The
population was a mixture of the indigenous Berbers, the remaining Phoenicians from
the Carthaginian era, and Roman colonists - who intermarried with the Africans.
Carthage itself was rebuilt, the first colonists being sent there by Julius Caesar a
hundred years after its destruction. It became the capital of Roman Africa; and in the
early centuries A.D. it was a Roman/African centre of learning. Among those who
worked there were the writer and philosopher Apuleius and the Christian theologians
Tertullian, Cyprian and Augustine, In the early history of Roman Christianity North
Africa was more important than Rome.
Another great city was Leptis Magna in Tripolitania. Originally the most important
Phoenician settlement in Libya (when its name was Lepcis) it became in Roman
times the largest city in Africa after Alexandria and Carthage. Its ruins are now the
remains of many imposing Roman buildings.
In Cyrenaica, Cyrene continued to be a leading city until it declined after repressive
measures taken by the Romans against a Jewish revolt, in the course of which some
of the city was destroyed, in A.D. 115.
The Romans were not great traders, and do not seem to have taken much interest in
the Sahara trade routes. However, it was during the Roman period, about A.D. 300,
that the Arabian camel was introduced into North Africa. This greatly boosted the
Saharan trade, the camel being much more efficient for desert transport than the
horse or donkey.
In the 3rd and 4th centuries the Roman Empire in Europe was increasingly
threatened by the German tribes in the north. At the beginning of the 5th century
one of these tribes - the Vandals took advantage of a weakening of Roman defences
in western Europe, and swept through Gaul into Spain. From Spain a vast horde of
Vandals, under their leader Gaiseric, set sail for North Africa in A.D. 429 - and the
"Roman peace" of the previous centuries was broken.
The Vandals by-passed much of Mauretania, which reverted to Berber chieftains, but
went on through Numidia, Tunisia, Tripolitania and Cyrenaica. After five years of
warfare Gaiseric made terms with the Western Roman Emperor*, leaving only
Carthage in Roman hands. In 439 Gaiseric seized Carthage, which he made the
headquarters of a pirate fleet which dominated the western Mediterranean. In 455 an
expedition under Gaiseric looted Rome itself (and 20 years later another German
tribe finally extinguished the Western Empire).
The Vandal kingdom lasted for a hundred years, until in 533 the Byzantine Emperor
Justinian sent an army under his brilliant general Belisarius to re-conquer North
Africa. Belisarius did so, and the Vandals then disappear from history, having left
little impression an Africa. Roman North Africa, except for Mauretania, returned to
Roman (Byzantine) rule until the coming of the Moslem Arabs in the 7th century.
*The Roman Empire had by now split into two - the declining Western Empire with
Rome as capital, and the Eastern, or Byzantine, Empire with its capital at
Constantinople.

The Kushites : Meroe : Nubia.

During the time of ancient Egypt's glory - during the third and second millenia B.C. -
the influence of Egyptian civilisation was strong in the land to the south, the eastern
or Egyptian Sudan, often called Nubia and known to the Egyptians as Kush. The
northern Nubians, darker skinned than the Egyptians, may have originally come from
Asia; those further south were Negroes. Egypt traded with, fought with, and to some
extent ruled over these peoples.
A Kushite civilisation in Nubia, with its capital at Napata, flourished from the 11th
century B.C; and at the same time Egypt entered into a long period of weakness and
divided rule. About 750 B.C. the Kushites began the conquest of Egypt, and in 715
established there a Kushite dynasty (misleadingly known as the Ethiopian Dynasty).
But about 50 years later the Kushites were driver out of Egypt, after some
tremendous battles, by invading Assyrians.
The Kushite kings retired to their old capital at Napata, where they continued to rule
until early in the 6th century B.C. They then transferred their capital to Meroe, 300
miles further south, perhaps because Meroe was situated in an area rich in iron ore.
The Kushite Kingdom of Meroe lasted for eight centuries, until about A.D. 320, when
it was destroyed by the King of Axum, the rising power in Ethiopia. The Kushite
civilisation vanished completely. It was not until very recently that knowledge of it
has been compiled, from inscriptions in tombs and the ruins of Meroe and Napata.
The Meroitic writing has been partly deciphered, though the language is dead.
The Kushites were great traders - from Red Sea ports to the east, and through Egypt
where their relations with the Ptolemies in the last centuries B.C. were generally
friendly. The Kushites were skilled iron workers; and their armies gained strength
from their horsed cavalry and their taming and use of the elephant. Meroe was a
splendid city, with a magnificent palace and a beautifully decorated Temple of the
Sun.
About 200 years after the destruction of Meroe the Nubian descendants of the
Kushites were converted to Christianity by missionary monks from Egypt (where at
that time Christianity was widespread). There then existed for many centuries
Christian kingdoms in Nubia, where the people appear to have led a comfortable life.
Good farmers and craftsmen, they were also greatly interested in learning. They
developed a modified form of Greek writing suitable for their own language, and built
schools and libraries.
After the Moslem conquest of Egypt in the 7th century (see chapter 4) the Nubian
Christians continued on friendly terms with Egypt until about 1250, when their
kingdoms were invaded by Moslem Arabs and African neighbours who had been
converted to Islam. By the 14th century this Nubian Christian civilisation had faded
out.

The Races of Africa

.
The two main races inhabiting Africa in early times were the Berbers of the
Mediterranean coastlands and the Negroes of equatorial Africa. The Berbers (and the
ancient Egyptians) were of Hamitic stock - racially Caucasian, with “European" facial
characteristics. The Negroes included the small-statured Pygmies. The pygmies, and
a third race - the rather yellow skinned Bushmen - may have been widely spread
over central and southern Africa until they were driven from the most fruitful lands
by the Negroes. The descendants of the Pygmies now inhabit the forests of central
Africa. Only small numbers of Bushmen now survive, mainly in the Kalahari desert in
the south.
Between the northern coastlands and equatorial Africa is the Sahara desert. Until the
end of the last Ice Age (about 8000 B.C.) the Sahara was a fertile grassland. It then
started to dry up, much of it remaining habitable until about 2000 B.C. The early
inhabitants of the Sahara were probably a mixture of Berbers and Negroes. Recently
discovered rock paintings show that cattle keeping was a major occupation in what
appears to have been a peaceful life. The paintings also show that music and dancing
were important to these ancient Africans - as they are to the modern Negroes.
Between about 4000 and 2000 B.C, as the desert spread, the peoples of the Sahara
gradually emigrated to the north, east and south though some remained, learning to
live with little water: their descendants are the Berber Tuareg of the desert today
(whose men wear veils).
Those who went South settled in the western and central Sudan. (The term Sudan
relates to the wide strip of grassland stretching across Africa, south of the Sahara
and Egypt. The western Sudan is separated from the coast to the south by a belt of
dense forest.) In the Sudan the newcomers mixed with other Negro tribes to form
the Bantu-speaking peoples, who gradually spread into central, eastern and southern
Africa.
In the eastern Sudan, south of Egypt, another civilisation arose, starting about 1000
B.C. - that of the Kushites, probably a mixture of Hamitic and Negro stock. Further
east is Ethiopia. The Ethiopians were probably of Hamitic origin, mixed later with
Arabs from Arabia.
Historical times, that is when history is known with reasonable accuracy and some
detail, started on widely different dates in the different regions of Africa, very
roughly as follows:-
Egypt - about 3000 B.C.
Nush - about 1000 B.C.
Berber North Africa - about 1000 B.C.
Ethiopia - about A.D. 0
Western and Central Sudan - about A.D. 300.
East Africa - about A.D. 700.
The Forest lands south of the Western Sudan - about A.D. 1000.
As mentioned in the foreword, Egypt and Ethiopia (and modern Dutch and British
South Africa) are the subjects of separate histories. The following chapters deal with
the early histories of the peoples in the other five regions