Chapter 8 - African Civilizations

8.1 - Diverse Societies in Africa

• Each African environment has its own set of difficulties.

  •  Deserts are often unfavorable for human life and obstruct people's migration to more hospitable climes.

• Africans formed family units to organize themselves. 

  • They also formed belief systems that aided them in comprehending and organizing data about their surroundings. 
  • Almost all of these indigenous faiths shared a belief in a single creator or god.

• The majority of Africans in the Sahel region lived in tiny communities.

  • Cities, on the other hand, began to emerge between 600 and 200 B.C.

  

8.2 - Migration 

• Aside from the human urge for change, migrations are triggered by three factors: environmental, economic, and political. 

  • Environmental influences were most likely the most powerful in the early history of human life.

• The proliferation of languages is one way that specialists can track people's travel patterns across time. 

  • When people relocate, they bring their languages with them.

• Bantu speakers were not a single people, but rather a collection of people with similar cultural traits. 

  • The ability of ironworking was established and passed down by farmers and nomadic herders. 
  • They were thought to be linked to the Nok peoples by several experts.

• Although it is hard to know for certain what drove the Bantu-speaking peoples to move, anthropologists have provided a plausible theory.

  

8.3 - The Kingdom of Aksum

• Because to its location and growth, Aksum became a crossroads for caravan routes to Egypt and Mero. 

  • Aksum's ability to trade by water in the Mediterranean Sea and the Indian Ocean aided its development as a global trading power.

• Like other ancient Africans, the Aksumites believed in a single god. 

  • Their divinity was known as Mahrem, and they believed that their ruler was a direct descendant of him.

• Following his father's death, Ezana ascended to the throne as an infant. 

  • While his mother ruled the kingdom, he was educated by a young Christian man from Syria who had been kidnapped and brought into the court.

• The inscription on Ezana's stele is written in Ge'ez, the early Arab language that was imported to Aksum. 

  • Aksum was the only ancient African nation known to have developed a written language, aside from Egypt and Mero.

  \n