History of Africa

This article contains oral traditions intended to be performed orally and not suited to literary form.
Major pre–colonial states in Africa, (excluding East African states such as Ajuran, Adal, Buganda, Rwanda, Nkore, Kilwa, Imerina, and Iboina,
Central African ones such as Kuba, Kasanje, Mbunda, and Utetera, and Southern African ones such as Mapungubwe, Rozvi, Maravi, Mutapa, Uukwanyama, Mthethwa, Mthwakazi, and Zulu)

Archaic humans emerged out of Africa between 0.5 and 1.8 million years ago. This was followed by the emergence of modern humans (Homo sapiens) in East Africa around 300,000–250,000 years ago. In the 4th millenium BC written history arose in Ancient Egypt,[1] and later in Nubia’s Kush, the Horn of Africa’s Dʿmt, and the Maghreb's and Ifrikiya's Carthage.[2] Sub-Saharan societies are generally termed oral rather than literate civilisations, owing to their reverence for the oral word and use of oral tradition even when a writing system has historically been adapted or developed; for example the jeli tradition in the Mali Empire and the oral recordation of the Kouroukan Fouga while having adapted the Arabic script to be used in scholarly pursuits.[3][4][5]: 142–143  Between around 1000 BC and 1000 AD, the Bantu expansion swept from north-western Central Africa (modern day Cameroon) across much of sub-Saharan Africa in waves, laying the foundations for states in Central, Eastern, and Southern regions.[6]

Many kingdoms and empires came and went in all regions of the continent. Lots of states were created through conquest and insecurity, while others developed through the borrowing and assimilation of ideas and institutions, and some through internal, largely isolated development.[7] Many societies are horizontal and maintained an egalitarian way of life while others did not centralise their proto-states further and stratify into complex societies, and are rarely discussed in political history. In historiography, the conventional 'universal' narrative of social and technological progress towards capitalism through continuous time has come under persistent criticism in recent decades.[8] In African societies, the historical process is largely a communal one, with eyewitness accounts, hearsay, and reminiscences all crafted into oral traditions.[9]: 12 [10]: 48  Time is occasionally mythical and social,[a] and truth relativist.[11][10]: 43–53  At its peak it is estimated that Africa had up to 10,000 different states and autonomous groups having distinct languages and customs, with most following traditional religions.[12]

Many empires achieved hegemony in their respective regions, such as Ghana, Mali, Songhai, Bamana/Ségou, Massina, Sokoto, and the Toucouleur in West Africa; Ancient Egypt, Kush, Carthage, the Fatimids, Almoravids, Almohads, Ayyubids, and Mamluks in North Africa; Aksum, Ethiopia, Adal, Kitara, Kilwa, and Imerina in East Africa; Kanem-Bornu, Kongo, Luba, Lunda, and Utetera in Central Africa; and Mapungubwe, Zimbabwe, Mutapa, Rozvi, Maravi, Mthwakazi, and Zulu in Southern Africa.

From the 7th century CE, Islam spread west from Arabia via conquest and proselytisation to North Africa and the Horn of Africa, and later southwards to the Swahili coast assisted by Muslim dominance of the Indian Ocean trade, then from the Maghreb traversing the Sahara into the western Sahel and Sudan, catalysed by the Fulani Jihad in the 18th and 19th centuries. Systems of servitude and slavery were historically widespread and commonplace in parts of Africa, as they were in much of the ancient, medieval, and early modern world.[13] When the trans-Saharan, Red Sea, Indian Ocean and Atlantic slave trades began, many of the pre-existing local slave systems started supplying captives for slave markets outside Africa, creating various diasporas around the world.[14][15]

From 1870 to 1914, driven by the great force and voracity of the Second Industrial Revolution, European colonisation of Africa developed rapidly from one-tenth of the continent being under European imperial control to over nine-tenths in the Scramble for Africa, with the major European powers partitioning the continent in the 1884 Berlin Conference.[16][17] European rule had significant impacts on Africa's societies and the suppression of communal autonomy disrupted local customary practices and caused the irreversible transformation of Africa's socioeconomic systems.[18] While Christianity has a long history in north and east Africa, there were few Christian states preceding the colonial period, other than Ethiopia and Kongo. Widespread conversion occurred in southern West Africa, Central Africa, and Southern Africa under European rule due to efficacious missions, with peoples syncretising Christianity with their local beliefs.[19]

Following struggles for independence in many parts of the continent, and a weakened Europe after the Second World War, waves of decolonisation took place across the continent. This culminated in the 1960 Year of Africa and the establishment of the Organisation of African Unity in 1963 (the predecessor to the African Union), with countries deciding to keep their colonial borders.[20] Traditional power structures remain partly in place in many parts of Africa, and their roles, powers, and influence vary greatly between countries, especially regarding governance.

  1. ^ "Recordkeeping and History". Khan Academy. Retrieved 2023-01-22.
  2. ^ "Early African Civilization". Study.com. Retrieved 2023-01-22.
  3. ^ Sall, Mamadou Youry (2020). Abidogun, Jamaine M.; Falola, Toyin (eds.). "African Ajami: The Case of Senegal". The Palgrave Handbook of African Education and Indigenous Knowledge. Cham: Springer International Publishing. pp. 545–557. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-38277-3_25. ISBN 978-3-030-38277-3. Retrieved 2024-09-10.
  4. ^ "How Timbuktu Flourished During the Golden Age of Islam". HISTORY. 2022-06-06. Retrieved 2024-09-10.
  5. ^ Vansina, Jan (1981). "Oral tradition and its methodology". General History of Africa: Volume 1. UNESCO Publishing.
  6. ^ "History of Africa". Visit Africa. Archived from the original on 2020-06-04. Retrieved 2020-05-27.
  7. ^ Southall, Aidan (1974). "State Formation in Africa". Annual Review of Anthropology. 3: 153–165. doi:10.1146/annurev.an.03.100174.001101. JSTOR 2949286.
  8. ^ Feierman, Steven (1994-11-29). "Chapter 2. Africa in History: The End of Universal Narratives". Chapter 2. Africa in History: The End of Universal Narratives. Princeton University Press. pp. 40–65. doi:10.1515/9781400821440.40/html. ISBN 978-1-4008-2144-0. Retrieved 2024-09-13.
  9. ^ Vansina, Jan (1985). Oral tradition as history. Internet Archive. Madison, Wis. : University of Wisconsin Press. ISBN 978-0-299-10214-2.
  10. ^ a b c Hama, Boubou; Ki-Zerbo, Joseph (1981). "The place of history in African society". General History of Africa: Volume 1. UNESCO Publishing.
  11. ^ Wiredu, Kwasi (2005). Wiredu, Kwasi (ed.). "Introduction: African Philosophy in Our Time". A Companion to African Philosophy (1 ed.). Wiley. pp. 1–27. doi:10.1002/9780470997154.ch1. ISBN 978-0-631-20751-1. Retrieved 2024-09-14.
  12. ^ Meyerowitz, Eva L. R. (1975). The Early History of the Akan States of Ghana. Red Candle Press. ISBN 978-0-608390352.
  13. ^ Stilwell, Sean (2013). "Slavery in African History". Slavery and Slaving in African History. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. p. 38. doi:10.1017/cbo9781139034999.003. ISBN 978-1-139-03499-9. For most Africans between 10000 BCE to 500 CE, the use of slaves was not an optimal political or economic strategy. But in some places, Africans came to see the value of slavery. In the large parts of the continent where Africans lived in relatively decentralized and small-scale communities, some big men used slavery to grab power to get around broader governing ideas about reciprocity and kinship, but were still bound by those ideas to some degree. In other parts of the continent early political centralization and commercialization led to expanded use of slaves as soldiers, officials, and workers.
  14. ^ Lovejoy, Paul E. (2012). Transformations of Slavery: A History of Slavery in Africa. London: Cambridge University Press.
  15. ^ Sparks, Randy J. (2014). "4. The Process of Enslavement at Annamaboe". Where the Negroes are Masters : An African Port in the Era of the Slave Trade. Harvard University Press. pp. 122–161. ISBN 9780674724877.
  16. ^ Chukwu, Lawson; Akpowoghaha, G. N. (2023). "Colonialism in Africa: An Introductory Review". Political Economy of Colonial Relations and Crisis of Contemporary African Diplomacy. pp. 1–11. doi:10.1007/978-981-99-0245-3_1. ISBN 978-981-99-0244-6.
  17. ^ Frankema, Ewout (2018). "An Economic Rationale for the West African Scramble? The Commercial Transition and the Commodity Price Boom of 1835–1885". The Journal for Economic History. 78 (1): 231–267. doi:10.1017/S0022050718000128.
  18. ^ Mamdani, Mahmood (1996). Citizen and Subject: Contemporary Africa and the Legacy of Late Colonialism (1st ed.). Princeton University Press. ISBN 9780691027937.
  19. ^ Walls, A (2011). "African Christianity in the History of Religions". Studies in World Christianity. 2 (2). Edinburgh University Press: 183–203. doi:10.3366/swc.1996.2.2.183.
  20. ^ Hargreaves, John D. (1996). Decolonization in Africa (2nd ed.). London: Longman. ISBN 0-582-24917-1. OCLC 33131573.


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