CONTEXTS AND PERIODISATION

OF HISTORICAL ARCHAEOLOGY:
AFRICA
Egypt
• One of the world’s earliest civilizations
• Possesses some of the world’s earliest written
records
• System of writing known as Hieroglyphics
• Based on a system of symbols
• Thus one of earliest contexts of historical
archaeology
• Development of a specialized study
• Egyptology
Cuneiform - Mesopotamian/Sumerian
equivalent system of writing
• Egyptology largely based on extensive
excavations mostly of the myriad of pyramids
in the Nile valley
• Extensive use of historical documentation of
the various kingdoms
• Artistic representations
• Ironically, little attention paid to Sudan where
there are more pyramids than in Egypt!
• Marketing the past?
• Some discrepancies noted between the
historical documentation and the
archaeological record
• What was life like for ordinary Egyptians?
• Egyptology typical of elitist archaeology
• Monumentalist archaeology
• Marxist perspectives in archaeology
• Historical archaeology attempts to correct for
research imbalance
• Egypt and Africa – what were the relationships
• Were Egyptians black Africans?
• What does the historical record say?
• Portrayal in various Pharaoh’s tombs art is
gives impression of blacks as slaves
• Apart from slaves, Egypt was sourcing various
products from sub-Saharan Africa (gold, iron,
animal products)
• What does the archaeological record say?
• Part of Egyptian historiography even captured in
Medieval literature
• William Shakespeare
• Julius Caesar
• Anthony and Cleopatra
• Egypt and the Roman Empire
• Egypt successfully remained independent of
Roman Empire until Anthony and Cleopatra
• Egyptology, history and archaeology reconcile?
• Battle of Alexandra?
• The Triumvirate (Mark Antony, Caesar, Lepidus)
Cleopatra – Queen of Egypt
Anthony & Cleopatra
NORTHERN AFRICA
• Close relationship between northern African
and European Mediterranean world
• Part of Northern Africa under the Roman
Empire
• Literacy/historical documents earliest in
northern Africa on the continent
• Mali – Gao, Timbuktu
WEST AFRICA
• Historical documentation by Arab travelers,
Berber traders (Trans-Saharan trade caravans)
from middle of 1st millennium AD
• But emphasis of the historical records is on
trade & spread of Islam
• Development of early/proto historical
states/empires (13th/14th Century AD – 19th C)
• Ghana, Mali, Hausa, Songhai, Ashante
Slavery and slave trade 19th C
• West Africa major source for the Atlantic slave
trade
• Slaves supplied by African rulers along the
Atlantic coast & interior or sourced by
European expeditions into the interior
• Development of West African Historical
Archaeology of slave trade and slavery
comparatively slow
• Mainly on slave markets and associated slave
trade facilities on the West Africa Atlantic
coast
Historical archaeology on other aspects
• Afro-European trade 17th - 20th C
• Colonial settlement
EASTERN AFRICA
• Chronology variable
• Earliest historical record - “Periplus of the
Erithyrian Sea” 1st Century AD
• Al Masud 8th Century AD
• Reported of trade between East/Southern
Africa and the outside world
• Gold, ivory, animal skin products, iron etc
• Has been usable in reconstruction of trading
relations
• NB – focused on trade at expense of all other
aspects of life
• Interest largely on what products were
obtainable from the continent
Horn of Africa:
• Axum
• Africa’s oldest Xian kingdom
• Axumite state/kingdom
• Lalibela
• Phillipson, Alexander, Tarekegn
• Mogadishu
• Kenya
• -Malindi, Mombasa
• -C. Kusimba
Kenya
• Malindi, Mombasa
Tanzania
• Kilwa, Mafia
Madagascar
Comores Islands (AAN research project)

Interlacustrine/Great Lakes states

• Buganda, Bunyoro, Nkore, Busoga, Rwanda,
Burundi
CENTARL AFRICA
• Proto historic/historical Luba-Lunda kingdom
(Empire?)
• 17th/18th Century
• Kongo kingdom
• 18th/19th Century
Southern Africa
• Afro-Arab references 8th-9th C AD
• Focus on trade goods and trade potential of
southern African interior
• 15th C – contacts well established between southern
Africa and Arab world but limited historical records
• 16th C – Afro-Portuguese contact
• Mutapa state (Empire?)
• 17th C – Afro-Dutch contact
• Development of urbanism - Cape Town
• 19th Century
• Zimbabwe - Refuge Period/Refuge Archaeology
• Anglo-Ndebele relations
SUMMARY
• Across Africa, periodization of historical
archaeology widely varied
• Earliest north, more recent further south.
• Rates of growth/development of the sub-
discipline varied across the continent
• Overall, some kind or other of Historical
Archaeology has been undertaken across the
continent