Contributions of Black Women to the Development of Civilization

Sis. Nubia Wardford - (Nubian Archaeological Project)

Sis. Nubia Wardford lives in Detroit , Michigan , when not touring for the Nubian Archaeological Project
giving talks on archaeological findings. Sis. Wardford has a B.A. in Anthropology and was invited by the
University of Khartoum in the Sudan , Africa to continue her studies in their Archaeology Department.
Sis. Wardford is also interested in Native American archaeology, and the cultural connections shared
between Native Americans and descendants of Africa in the U.S.

We should make sure that Black women know and understand that we are the mothers of creation. All
civilization emerged from our wombs. Cosmic energy emerged from the earth as well as our wombs.
The Dawn of human civilization started in Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania , in a totally tropical area,
approximately 6 million years ago. This area is known as the Cradle of Civilization. This was fertile
ground for human development. Many human-like beings lived along Lake Turkana . This is near where
the oldest fossil remains of an African woman, Dagnesh or Dinkinesh , was found. Dagnesh means
“beautiful woman” in the Amharic language of Ethiopia . All of the human family descended from her
lineage. Each human being on earth has the genetic code of at least five African women.

There is something particularly distinct about this region - Uganda , Kenya and Tanzania - that promoted
accelerated evolution. This Northeast area of Africa was very fertile. All living things congregated along
these three special Lakes and Rivers: Lake Turkana, Lake Nyasa, and the Hapi River . Therefore the fish,
plants, and animals became highly evolved and very well adapted to the environment. Lake Nyasa, now
known as Lake

Victoria contributed to the uniqueness of the region. Lake Nyasa is one source of the Hapi River now
known as the Nile . Hapi is the ancient name used for the Creator in this area. This region held a special
recipe for the creation of new species of plants, animals and human beings. There is carbon dated
footprint evidence that Hominids existed side by side with ape-like beings in and around Olduvai Gorge,
near Lake Turkana . Physical

evidence of stones, sticks, crude spears and knives make up the earliest evidence of weapons of war.
This also indicates that these hominids may have had wars against each other.

I theorize that burial grounds came into place at this time, because of the existence of concentrated
burials. This area may have evolved into a burial ground not long after the first hominids made Olduvai
Gorge their home. When the well known Leakey family came to Ethiopia , they asked of their Ethiopian
guide, “Take us to the burial place of the ancestors.” The location of this place was a well known fact
amongst the inhabitants of this area. Dagnesh was found as they were going through this area and
dating fossil remains. Her remains were dated as the oldest. Burial rituals indicate that this may have
been an area where these hominids came to die.

The human-like beings lived in dwellings as family groups. They hunted in groups using crude tools, flint
scrapers, stone hammers, sticks and made fires. At this time the earliest evidence of cooking and small
gardening emerges. In Ancient Africa, particularly Ancient Nubia, women were the head of the
household. Women provided the stability of the society through the production of vital food supplies,
along with their

ability to give birth. Their connection with the land as cultivators and nurturers is why matriarchy was a
natural progression of the civilization. Only through female lineage could one inherit land. Births
happened outside, in the center of the village. Births were thought of as divine acts. This caused the
status of women to elevate among Africans, introducing the first worship of Women as God. Not
goddesses, but meaning their

actual representation of God in this society was as a physical woman.

When the people migrated from Olduvai Gorge and Tanzania towards the area in Ancient Africa known
as Punt, Kush and Ancient Nubia, these names became generic terms used for all Black people. Respect
was given to women because of their ability to reproduce; Goddess was an African principle. The
Ancients also recognized that there could be no female without a male. They understood the principle
of balance: reciprocity; good and evil, and energy balances; female and male. That is why goddesses
always have a male counterpart. Cobra or snake-like images are representative of women. The woman
is represented as a snake not because of any evil,

but because she wraps her femininity around the male principle. Only part of this knowledge remains
within the biblical text, which is that the snake represented the female or the potential for evil in the
female. This is a concept which would have been totally foreign to the people of Ancient Nubia, Kush
and Punt.

The snake also represented the woman because it is a woman's nature to grasp and hold onto things.
We grasp our families, our culture, and as the first teachers, we hold innate knowledge in general. We
also grasp our nurturing abilities and hold on to them. Now when we see the negative representation of
the snake, which is what is left of our ancient history, we know that it is an incorrect rendering of our
story. The snake is not our

enemy and is not evil, it is a beautiful animal and one of the Creator's creatures.

Nut of Ancient Kemet is an ancient Goddess that represents the Cosmos. Her womb is the planetary
nebula in which stars, planets and galaxies are formed. She brings about cosmic order. She is called the
Great Mother in many civilizations; both Africans and Asians described the Mother of creation as the
Great Mother. The cosmos and earth were formed, resulting in the birth of all that we know, from the
planetary womb. The Ancients left us descriptions of these events, they are similar to the human birth
experience of leaving the warm, wet womb to emerge into the warm climate of Africa . There was
almost no distinction between the womb and the world, as described by the Ancient: “During the
foremost phase of dark, a semi liquid mass is formed of potential

energy. The wet cannot be distinguished from the dry or cold.”

The very term matter derives from mother. The mother was known as Temu in Egypt , Kali Ma or Maya
in India and Tablemat in Babylon , Census in pre-Hellenic Greece , Tahome , Syria and Canaan . All these
civilizations have connections to Ancient Punt, Kush , Nubia and Ethiopia . There is similarity in the
knowledge, creation stories, rituals, religious beliefs and representation. Everything coming from the
woman and

everything coming out of the dark was an African principle that traveled around the world, carried by
students that received teachings from African universities. African principles were adapted by the
cultures to which they were transported. All the people that practiced these principles studied in the
ancient universities of Kemet and Nubia . Women taught and studied in the African universities, unlike
in the practices of foreigners who restricted women from attending any level of academic training
outside of their home.

The principle of the woman being the Divine Creator, as well as everything coming out of the darkness
and everything emanating from the female, was of ancient African origin. The Three Cradle Theory
speaks in general to the ancient development of people in the three cradle areas of Ancient Nubia and
Kemet, Timbuktu in Mali and the universities that existed in Pretoria , Southern Africa . There was a
generous mixture of agrarian and nomadic people throughout Africa . Many people carried figures
around with them in ancient times. Archaeological evidence allows us to understand what was
important to them. Nomadic people only carry what is necessary; they only carry minimal supplies and
what is a necessity. So if small woman figures are found within known nomadic settlements we know
that they were important. We find small dolls in many nomadic sites throughout Africa, Europe and
even Asia . In particular, a very famous figure known as the Venus of Walendorf represented fertility.
This figure has “very large and protruding buttocks”; this headless form is of a black woman,
representing God and Goddess.

Women became leaders and held many positions of power in ancient times. They were trained to
command, lead and make important decisions that affected the entire society. Women were not
relegated to kitchens and nurseries then silenced, but made decisions for the growth of their families
and societies. Let's look at a specific example of a woman who ruled with strength, kindness, and
wisdom: Queen Tiye.

Queen Tiye was a leader. She was married between the ages of 12 and 14 years old. By the time she
was 14, she had unified Nubia and Kemet, and had taken over more territory of Egypt than had ever
been taken before. She was a political, mathematical and negotiating genius, and represented the
country of Nubia very well. She is depicted wearing the feather and throne of Isis ( Ast ); the small
throne representing femininity. In

statues and painted images, Queen Tiye and her husband are represented as being the same size. This
means that she was respected by her husband and considered his equal by their people. Before this
bold expression, Queens were depicted as a small figure somewhere at the Pharaohs side or near his
feet. Before Queen Tiye, Queens were not represented as the same size as their Pharaoh husbands.
Also, Queen Tiye is shown as

embracing her husband, their arms interlocked, symbolizing a bond. This symbolism is very important
and pivotal in historic records. This means he had great respect for his Queen.

As "Western" civilization took over, we lost that respect for feminine power because masculinity, and a
brutish culture, became foremost in most of our minds. Our ancient culture could not be sustained.
Ultimately, respect for women was lost. In African culture, everything was set up along matrilineal lines.
The inheritance of wealth

was very important to the maintenance of this system. When the masculine, or patriarchal, society of
the invaders took that power away from women it was a political move, because African society was
founded on this belief. Matriarchal leadership had been intertwined into the texture of the culture.
Remember, this culture, Africa, stretched all the way from South Africa through to what is now known as
Arabia .

The primary elements of civilization are something that women have brought to the world. These
elements include the interpretation of color, as well as richer perceptions, and actualities of life such as
poetry and art. Intuitive abilities and other God given perceptions are often stronger in women.

Africans fully understood that a society cannot grow beyond the development of its women. The ancient
Africans performed surgery, and so women were going to the medical schools and being introduced to
the Nile Valley principles of Healing and disease relief. “ Waset ” and “Know Thyself” was on the door of
the major medical school in ancient Kemet. The fact that Ancient Priestesses were performing surgeries
and leading institutions speaks to how far advanced the ancients were in their knowledge of balance
and of society. The first element of balanced African nationhood is contained in the statement “If you
teach a woman, you teach a nation.” They knew that if a nation's women are mentally underdeveloped
then the society is underdeveloped as well.

Terms of endearment such as Mother Heart, Mother Wit, Mother Wisdom and Mother Earth are used to
create order in many different cultures. All these terms are present throughout the world. The
Southern Cradle of civilization's invention of farming was by women. It strengthened and amplified
matriarchy, and symbolically enriched it, by the creation of fertile land and fertile food. The Ancients
related the earth and its fertility to the fertility of woman.

Out of Africa , too, spring the most formidable of leaders. When we peruse the antiquities record we
discover that man's greatest empires rested on the foundations constructed and created on the genius
of women. This has especially been proven by African and African derived civilizations. Civilization was
born and nurtured

through maturity in the matriarchal culture of Kemet and Kush . The state of Arabia for over 2500 years
was governed by Queens for as long as anyone could remember. The Islamic Allah was originally Allat ,
part of a trinity of Goddesses that included Korea the virgin, and Alusa the power of one. Together they
formed the triad known as Manat .

Pharaoh Hatshepsut was a female pharaoh who wore a beard. She wanted to be recognized as
powerful and competent, just as her husband had been. She ran Egypt for over 50 years. Queen Nzinga
organized an all woman army that fought off Portugal and kept them out of Benin , Western Africa
(known as Dahomey ) for many years. She organized this army after the male soldiers numbers were
diminished due to constant

warring. The Queen organized an army of women soldiers that successfully fought off the Portuguese
invasion. She was fighting against slavery and oppression.

In more recent history there are women of African descent that we should know and recognize. For
example, Harriet Tubman, known as Moses, facilitated and led over 30,000 people out of chattel slavery
in the United States . Fannie Lou Hammer organized women, but did not want to be included in the
women's suffrage movement because she said that black women had been head of their family for as
long as they'd been on the

earth. Ida B. Wells spoke out against lynching and documented more than 10,000 lynchings that had not
been acknowledged by the United States . Queen Mother Moore organized the Black Star Nurses in the
organization of the United Negro Improvement Association. Amy Jacques Garvey, the wife of Marcus
Garvey, was a prolific writer and facilitated the production of her husband's books, including The
Philosophy and Opinions of Marcus Garvey .

Mother Nandi groomed one of our most valiant warriors of Southern Africa , her son Shaka Zulu. Read
the history that the movie dramatized, mis-told and recreated. Hollywood gave us a skewed history of
a great leader. Shaka Zulu defeated Queen Victoria 's British Army so consistently that they studied his
techniques and

developed a new way to fight. Southern Africa was the last area in Africa to be colonized because of
Shaka Zulu's efforts.
Mother Songolo, mother of the Great Sundiata Keita of Mali , trained her son to be a great leader and
warrior. In Jamaica , Grandy Nandy understood the ancient knowledge, and created diversions that
helped to defeat the English armies that tried to take the Maroons of Jamaica back to slavery. She
remains a martyr of Jamaica because of her heroism.

My mother Mavis Wardford, the first black nurse at Henry Ford Hospital , led the way for all other black
women to work in that facility. Assata Shakur of the Black Liberation Army was so rough and tough that
she was imprisoned in a male facility. She even escaped from there, and now happily lives in Cuba . Dr.
Rosalind Jefferies is a noted historian. Marimba Ani is the one of the world's best African–centered
anthropologists.

Mary McLeod Bethune established Cookman College . We should remember Angela Davis and the
panther sisters who stood up during the 60's; and all those unnamed Black Mothers, Aunties, and
Cousins who protected their children, adopted children and families through lynching, slavery and racial
upheaval.

We give thanks to those Queen Mothers of Africa, and those beyond who could not ascend to the
throne except for through their blood lines. We give thanks to the mourners of many traditions who
used their feminine vibration to facilitate the transition of the spirit from the physical realm to the
spiritual realm.

We thank our ancestors, Mothers, Aunties, Sisters and Cousins who continue to raise their families,
teach ethical and moral behavior as sisters have done throughout our history. We continue to produce
fertile ground in which our race will progress and finally ultimately achieve success as a people unified.
We have to give thanks and praise to all these daughters of creation. The primordial elements of our
civilization have been taught to us by our great and unknown mothers and sisters who provided the
template for all civilizations.

"Contributions by Black Women to the Development of Civilization" was published in its original form at
www.TehutiOnline.com .