about 100 miles north of the Third Cataract of the Nile (and about 470 km. south of Aswan)
Here is the site of a large Neolithic settlement (dating probably from about 5000-4000 B.C.); the evidence for this was revealed in aerial photographs shown at a meeting in Lille, France, in 1994. By now it has probably been partly excavated. This would seem to be the largest, earliest "city" known in Africa (including Egypt). Here, too, is the site of a large Bronze Age town, probably dating as early as 2500 B.C. It may have been the capital of the "Kingdom of Yam" mentioned in Egyptian documents of the Sixth Dynasty. By about 2000 B.C. it seems to have been part of the early kingdom of Kush, centered at Kerma, and it remained probably the chief northern city of that state (ca. 2000-1500 B.C.), until conquered by the Egyptian pharaohs in early Dynasty 18. It was evidently called "Sha'a" (from which the modern name Sai derives); it had its own kings, whose tombs lay on the west side of the townsite and which are surrounded by hundreds of other smaller tombs. After it was conquered by the Egyptians, it became the site of an Egyptian fort and town until the Egyptians withdrew northward from the region about 1150 B.C.
Excavator: Francis Geus, Lille, France
rasol Member # 4592
posted
quote:Here is the site of a large Neolithic settlement (dating probably from about 5000-4000 B.C.); the evidence for this was revealed in aerial photographs shown at a meeting in Lille, France, in 1994
Very interesting. Wonder why we don't [haven't] heard more about this?
I was reading this 2003 paper by Philip Van Peer and colleagues, which is a quick introduction to the site 8-B-11, Sai Island, Sudan. I wanted to make a note of their description of an apparent sandstone mortar for pigment grinding:
In this Lower Sangoan level [date unclear from text], we observed the presence of a dense concentration of red and yellow ochre lumps, some with ground surfaces. An extraordinary object (Fig. 3) was found in trench 02/C, near the southern edge of the Middle Pleistocene gully (Fig. 2). The overall shape of this 10 cm thick Nubian sandstone slab is the result of human action. Steep flake negatives are present on its sides, except for the lower right part of the perimeter where oblique flake scars occur. Two of these flakes were found near the slab and refitted onto its right side. Apparently, these scars represent posterior reworking.
Except for small areas in the centre and to the right, the upper face of the slab is made perfectly flat by pecking. A large depression, of which the sides have su�ered both ancient and recent fracture, was cut out and seems to be surrounded by a series of small pits. This object may have served as a grinding stone or mortar. Several small chert pebbles with particles of yellow/red ochre adhering to one of their faces are present in this level. They are similar in size and appearance, displaying a brown/red colour with black inclusions. One of them shows a thick wear polish. Another one has streaks of red and yellow pigment applied on one of its faces. As chert pebbles of this appearance are rare in the natural gravels of the gully fill sequence, we assume that they were deliberately selected. This may suggest that their use as pigment grinders was surrounded with a degree of symbolic connotation (Van Peer et al. 2003:190-191).
Also, several quartzite cobbles in the Middle Sangoan level preserve polished surfaces with phytoliths and starch granules adhering. They interpret these as having been used to grind plant foods, such as grass seeds. This level is dated to minimally 182,000 years ago by OSL of overlying sands. References:
Van Peer P et al. 2003. The Early to Middle Stone Age transition and the emergence of modern humann behaviour at site 8-B-11, Sai Island, Sudan. J Hum Evol 45:187-193. Link: dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0047-2484(03)00103-9
Link: to referenced paper: (add http://) dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0047-2484(03)00103-9
Evergreen Member # 12192
posted
quote:Originally posted by alTakruri: Sai Island
about 100 miles north of the Third Cataract of the Nile (and about 470 km. south of Aswan)
Here is the site of a large Neolithic settlement (dating probably from about 5000-4000 B.C.); the evidence for this was revealed in aerial photographs shown at a meeting in Lille, France, in 1994. By now it has probably been partly excavated. This would seem to be the largest, earliest "city" known in Africa (including Egypt). Here, too, is the site of a large Bronze Age town, probably dating as early as 2500 B.C. It may have been the capital of the "Kingdom of Yam" mentioned in Egyptian documents of the Sixth Dynasty. By about 2000 B.C. it seems to have been part of the early kingdom of Kush, centered at Kerma, and it remained probably the chief northern city of that state (ca. 2000-1500 B.C.), until conquered by the Egyptian pharaohs in early Dynasty 18. It was evidently called "Sha'a" (from which the modern name Sai derives); it had its own kings, whose tombs lay on the west side of the townsite and which are surrounded by hundreds of other smaller tombs. After it was conquered by the Egyptians, it became the site of an Egyptian fort and town until the Egyptians withdrew northward from the region about 1150 B.C.
Excavator: Francis Geus, Lille, France
Evergreen Writes:
alTakruri, the link is not working. What is the criteria they use to define a 'city' and what makes this settlement older than some of the neolithic and mesolithic settlements from Sudan that date back to the 8th millenium BCE?
alTakruri Member # 10195
posted
Yipes stripes!!! No link there, just underscoring. When my underscoring is really a hyperlink I add this little notice ==> (clickable link).
Evergreen Member # 12192
posted
quote:Originally posted by alTakruri: Yipes stripes!!! No link there, just underscoring. When my underscoring is really a hyperlink I add this little notice ==> (clickable link).
Evergeen Writes:
Cool....so, what makes this settlement the 'oldest city' in Africa? There are settlements in other parts of Africa that are 5 thousand plus years older.
alTakruri Member # 10195
posted
I dunno. Maybe someone can contact the excavator or maybe he tells why here:
GEUS, Francis Les nouvelles fouilles de l’île de Saï Paris: Comptes Rendus de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-lettres, 1996, pp. 1165-1195. (ill., maps, plans).
This is a review of the results obtained since the resumption of excavations on the Nubian island of Sai, south of the Dal cataract. The following topics are briefly discussed: geomorphology and surface geology; the Palaeolithic; the Neolithic; Kerma and Pre-Kerma; the N.K.; the Northern Necropolis; post-pharaonic habitats. In conclusion it is noted that Sai is one of the most representative sites of all of Nubia. W.H.
Evergreen Member # 12192
posted
quote:Originally posted by alTakruri: I dunno. Maybe someone can contact the excavator....
You're the one who posted this far-fetched claim. I would expect that you would add some form of disclaimer if you disagreed.
quote:Originally posted by alTakruri: or maybe he tells why here:
GEUS, Francis Les nouvelles fouilles de l’île de Saï Paris: Comptes Rendus de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-lettres, 1996, pp. 1165-1195. (ill., maps, plans).
This is a review of the results obtained since the resumption of excavations on the Nubian island of Sai, south of the Dal cataract. The following topics are briefly discussed: geomorphology and surface geology; the Palaeolithic; the Neolithic; Kerma and Pre-Kerma; the N.K.; the Northern Necropolis; post-pharaonic habitats. In conclusion it is noted that Sai is one of the most representative sites of all of Nubia. W.H.
Evergreen Writes:
No doubt that Sai island neolithic site was an early settlement. However, there is no eveidence that this was "continental Africa's oldest city' as the person who started this thread claims.
posted
Well, guess we can't write 'im then. [R.I.P Francis, service well done.]
rasol Member # 4592
posted
Back on point - what is the best evidence for the oldest city in Africa, and based on what criterion?
Evergreen Member # 12192
posted
quote:Originally posted by rasol: Back on point - what is the best evidence for the oldest city in Africa, and based on what criterion?
Evergreen Writes:
Great question. What is the criterion for a 'City'. What seperates a 'city' from a 'town' or 'village'. Often the terms City are applied to Eurasian settlements and town or village to African settlement systems.
alTakruri Member # 10195
posted
The initial post of this thread is not my authorship. I resurrected it from the obscurity it fell into on ru2's NileValleyForum. I can't locate the source of short blurb on Sai Island where it's written "This would seem to be the largest, earliest "city" known in Africa (including Egypt)."
I continue my web search of the subject in hope of uncovering qualifiers for the statement. In the meantime those who challenge the in quotation mark notation "city" in reference to Sha'a may want to present what they have in favour of other sites' claim to the title of the continent's earliest "city."
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That word document is a rehash of much of the nonsense we have been arguing against. The idea that civilization has been developing in Sudan thousands of years prior to the emergence of dynastic Egypt is ample evidence to suggest the movement of culture and civilization NORTH. However, this whole idea of a terminal A group and other "Nubian" constructs only serves to reinforce the notion that this development was SEPARATE from the Egyptian context. For if it wasn't separate, they would have to admit that Williams was right, that Egyptian dynastic culture emerged in the South from precedents further South along the Nile. Of course the mainstream view is to deny this and act as if this Southern area of dynastic Egypt just popped up out of nowhere on its own. All of which contradicts the latest findings on the climactic conditions that forced migrations and resettlement along the Nile leading to dynastic Egypt.
alTakruri Member # 10195
posted
This is from the second supplied document.
quote: On the other hand, the best illustration of the latest stages of territorial behaviour in the Nile Valley is to be found in Predynastic Upper Egypt, yet in strong connection with the Middle Nile. There, all evidence indicates that, during the fourth millennium BC, social evolution resulted in expanding territorial units whose competition led to the making of the Pharaonic state. Most archaeological data point to the emergence of a vigorous spatial identity involving local insignia, protecting deities and centres of power. Nevertheless, although the data are plentiful, archaeologists and egyptologists have so far failed to identify the spatial limits of those units, even in the final stage, when only two survived and finally unified under the leadership of Hierakonpolis, then expanding toward Lower Egypt (Vercoutter 1992 : 243-244).
Unless I'm reading it wrong it quite plainly says that the emergence of "pharaohship" and the polity T3Wy happened in TaSty.x3st (which became the southern part of the later 2nd sepat/nome Heru's throne all of the later 1st sepat TaSty.nwt) and the vast independent territory TaSty.x3st. Then unification proceeded northward to "Lower Egypt."
Can you please supply us with quotes that led to your previous posted contrary assessment?
quote:Originally posted by Doug M: That word document is a rehash of much of the nonsense we have been arguing against.
... they would have to admit that Williams was right, that Egyptian dynastic culture emerged in the South from precedents further South along the Nile. Of course the mainstream view is to deny this and act as if this Southern area of dynastic Egypt just popped up out of nowhere on its own.
Doug M Member # 7650
posted
The following developments in Khartoum are isolated from the developments of "Lower Nubia" as well as dynastic Egypt, where the A-Group is represented as a separate buffer group between "Egypt" and "Nubia" but not part of a continuity from Khartoum, Kerma and Sai, the OLDEST sites of population centers on the Nile, into Egypt proper. That is how I read it.
quote: In Central Sudan, it is the Khartoum area, where fieldwork has been carried out permanently by several expeditions since the early seventies, that provides the most comprehensive information. Several surveys aimed at a better understanding of the socio-economic organisation of the groups that occupied peculiar sites, more particularly when it was felt that, in opposition to other areas, a favourable environment led the local hunter-gatherers to settled life. This was first suggested by Haaland (1981) and, following her excavations at Saggai, was given substance by Caneva (1983) who wrote in a more general study : «The site is stable and was presumably inhabited by a large group which, in addition, is associated with similar communities in a narrow territory, thus reaching a high concentration of people. … These groups apparently adapted to their specific environment to a certain extent by rationalizing its exploitation» (Caneva 1985 : 428) and «Paradoxically, in comparison with the usual models, the achievement here of a food-producing economy not only follows a millenarian tradition of settled life but also leads to the abandonment of sedentism in favour of seminomadic way of life» (Caneva 1985 : 427). Such an assumption, which involves a significant environmental change inducing social and territorial dynamics, has not been contradicted by later excavations and surveys (Caneva 1986; 1988 : 334-335; Haaland 1995), although they indicate regional differentiation. Nevertheless, in no case the archaeologists involved in those projects aimed at evaluating site territories as such. Their concern has mainly been to analyse the settlement patterns of the successive cultures in relation with the natural environment and its food resources, with results suggesting that "Mesolithic" hunters and gatherers' site territories were much more restricted in size than those of the subsequent Neolithic breeders and cultivators (Caneva 1986; 1988), who seem to have exploited them in a complex seasonal pattern involving a base site and temporary camps (Haaland 1981 : 5-11). On the other hand, as stated by Krzyzaniak (1995) on evidence from the large cemeteries of Kadero and El Ghaba, excavation of burials indicates a shift from a rather egalitarian society towards, «a relative high level of social differentiation and complexity including, it seems, the formation of a hereditary elite», a viewpoint suggesting that the related settlements were certainly centres of power controlling defined territories.
Then this is followed by the statements about "Egypt" as the result of developments that took place ABOVE the first cataract, with the Middle Nile being in between "Upper Egypt" and the delta and having nothing to do with areas labelled as "Nubian". This is exactly the way the sequencing was proposed by Petrie and Reisner who coined the terms Naqadan and A-Group respectively as SEPARATE complexes, which this paper, even while talking about the antiquity of sites in Sudan, does not contradict, as can be seen here:
quote: It is in Lower Nubia, where earlier occupation is so poorly documented, that appears, in the course of the fourth millennium BC, a culture that has long been considered as the most ancient of Bronze Age Nubia. Hence the name «A-Group» which was given to it by Reisner in 1907-1908 during the pioneer campaign of the Archaeological Survey of Nubia, when he worked out a cultural and chronological model that is still used by most scholars (Reisner 1910).
What makes the study of the A-Group culture interesting is that it developed in a geographical area which, since the dawn of history, had direct contacts with Egypt and that it apparently evolved from the conjunction of traditions from Predynastic Egypt and Late Neolithic Nubia.
But what makes the study of the A-Group -and of the C-Group, its follower in Lower Nubia- particularly interesting is that, contrary to all other cultures of the Middle Nile, it is related to an area that is well defined in space and that has been subject to intensive survey and excavation before being covered by the waters of Lake Nubia. Hence it is archaeologically well documented and no further field information is to be expected, except from those surveys and excavations which have not yet been published. Consequently, it has been the subject of several studies, the most comprehensive of which was worked out by Nordström (1972) after the end of the Nubian Campaign.
Note it is distinctly SEPARATING these patterns of development as "Nubian" and SEPARATE from that of Egypt. All this "A Group" and "C group" stuff is just nonsense as it only serves to create a fake continuity and identity as "Nubian" and tries to pretend that this identity STOPPED at the first cataract, where "Egyptian" identity started, even BEFORE the formation of the Egyptian state. This is absolutely ridiculous and only reinforces an attempt to SEPARATE Upper Egypt from the precursors FURTHER SOUTH. Therefore, any activities further south, even PRIOR to the formation of dynastic kemet, are always put into this "Nubian" context, as a way of saying something SEPARATE from that of "Egypt" even though "Egypt" did not exist in 4000 BC or prior. Therefore it is an attempt to cut off the Egypt as the result of developments further South FROM those developments and to pretend that the emergence of civilization in Egypt was separate from the patterns of civilization that formed thousands of years earlier further south.
Then later they discuss Bruce Williams and the qustul incense burner.
quote: Thus, except possibly for Adams who, as far as I know, did not write about the subject since his «Doubts about the "Lost Pharaohs"», where he strongly criticized William's views, pointing out that a A-Group monarchy was something which he was «by no means prepared to admit» (Adams 1985 : 189), most scholars have accepted the idea that political units emerged in the A-Group area during its Middle/Classic and Terminal phases. Whatever the name they employ to designate them, such political units must have been by nature related to specific territories, a fact that none of them clearly mentions. If we follow Williams and O'Connor, the whole of Lower Nubia became unified under the leadership of the Qustul monarchy, while Smith prefers to see two contemporary principalities centered on Sayala and Qustul. Such a political an territorial duality is apparently also favored by Nordström who postulates two chiefdoms in the same area, the latter being of higher rank and including lower rank elite cemeteries that seem to indicate subordinate local subchiefs.
All of which is a nice way of saying that they dont recognize Ta Seti as being the same territorial polity that developed in the area they identify with the "A-Group", which means that they dont have to recognize Ta Seti as the first nome of Egypt as the result of the incorporation of this polity into dynastic Egypt proper. It then makes it easy to treat Ta Seti/A-Group as separate from dynastic kmt, unlike the other city states that became PART of kmt, even though the existence of the FIRST nome being called Ta Seti directly implies that this area was INCORPORATED into dynastic kmt, not separate. Therefore, they can continue calling Ta Seti "Nubia" and not Ta Seti kmt, meaning reinforcing a fake separation between Egypt and "Nubia".
Which is seen by what they follow up with:
quote: In the course of the First Dynasty, the A-Group disappears from Lower Nubia where, except in the southernmost part of its occupation area, Nubian communities seem to have been absent for centuries. This has been considered as the result of Egyptian raids of the First Dynasty, of which one was commemorated by a famous inscription carved on Jebel Sheikh Suliman, a small hill in the northern borders of the Second Cataract, the heart of the Qustul "territory". Although its precise meaning has often been debated -a defective reading attributed it first wrongly to king Djer- all scholars agree that it is the most ancient historical inscription of Nubia, documenting the first attempt of Egypt to control its northern neighbour, and that it is the first unquestionable mention of Lower Nubia as Ta-Seti, the country of the bow, a name that, in other context, may be misinterpreted since it also designated the southernmost nome of Upper Egypt. If we relate it to the establishment of a fortified frontier site at Elephantine and to the frontier policy that prevailed in Egypt during the First Dynasty, it may also be considered as a marker -the first of its kind inside Nubia- indicating the southern limit of a vast territory that the Egyptian monarchy pretended to control. We unfortunately lack information about the later status of that territory, but it is clear that no Nubians settlers lived there any more. The foundation of an Egyptian establishment at Buhen, close to Jebel Sheikh Suliman, during the Fourth Dynasty and possibly as early as the Second Dynasty (Emery 1963; 1965 : 111-114), shows that, although Elephantine remained the official frontier post, Lower Nubia continued to be a vast uninhabited territory controlled by the Egyptian monarchy and that contacts with Nubians took place in a fortified outpost located just north of the rapids of the Second Cataract.
All of which leaves us with the impression that "Nubia" was always separate and distinct from "Egypt" and that the patterns of development in "Nubia" had nothing to do with the development of "Egypt", especially concerning kingship or royalty. Once again contradicting the flow of civiziation culture, kingship, royalty and dieties from the South as populations migrated north and East in search of wetter climes. The emergence of the polities in Upper Egypt are DIRECTLY related to this and Ta Seti being the 1st nome is also a REFLECTION of this relationship, stretching south into areas labelled by archaeologists as "A Group", but relatively unpopulated because this area was desertified and the population had already moved north.
alTakruri Member # 10195
posted
The middle Nile is not between upper egypt and the delta. The middle Nile includes southernmost Egypt and the northern Sudan. This is precisely where statehood in the sense of kingdom arose and it has everything in the world to do with T3Sty/Wawat ("Nubia").
quote:... statements about "Egypt" as the result of developments that took place ABOVE the first cataract, with the Middle Nile being in between "Upper Egypt" and the delta and having nothing to do with areas labelled as "Nubian".
alTakruri Member # 10195
posted
The author, if he if so posits it, is quite correct in implying all of T3Sty was not incorporated into T3Shmw. One of the major distinctions was centralized government which the bulk of T3Sty just wasn't having.
The first of the conspirators plotted to take central control over northern T3Sty which became T3Sty.nwt T3Wy's 1st sepat/nome and part of Heru's Throne T3Wy's 2nd sepat.
The majority of T3Sty remained outside this first conspiracy retaining the T3Sty.x3st designation. Later, as they themselves conspired to continue their independence and loose (vs central) government, T3Sty.x3st acquired the moniker Wawat (conspirators/rebels).
We both agree that A-group is a mislabel that should be discontinued but though regrettably resigning himself to Reisner's terminology here's what Geus thinks.
Seems like Geus does recognize the A-group developed in the same area that we know as T3Sty.
-------------------------------------
Because the author summarizes opinions held by others in the field doesn't mean he's saying the same thing. We can't ignore the fact that he weighs Wms in the same scale as the others and leaves the reader to chose which opinion to accept.
quote:From Geus: If we follow Williams and O'Connor, the whole of Lower Nubia became unified under the leadership of the Qustul monarchy...
Nor can we ignore the ultimate significance the author gives to OIC's Seele and Williams without whose work further examination of archaeological finds would've never been undertaken.
quote:But it is another elite burial site, Qustul cemetery L, discovered in 1964 by the Oriental Institute expedition and reported in a scholarly journal ten years later only, that changed thoroughly the approach of the A-Group social history, following the statement of its discoverer (Seele 1974 : 29) that «From the magnitude and contents of several of these L tombs, we felt convinced that they belonged to persons of great wealth and high, possible even "royal" rank».
It is not the place here to report about the stormy debate that arose when a further and provocative article titled «The Lost Pharaohs of Nubia» was published six years later in Archaeology (Williams 1980 : 21) with the challenging theory that in Lower Nubia «For nine generations or more … some twelve kings at Qustul participated with other kings in Upper Egypt in the creation of a unified culture. For Egypt, they helped fashion pharaonic civilization and thus a legacy for the First Dynasty … For Nubia, they established an early political unity and led that country to its first cultural distinction». But the full publication of the data some six years later in a volume entitled «The A-Group Royal Cemetery at Qustul : Cemetery L» that included a final chapter labeled «Conclusion : The Royal Cemetery of Ta-Seti» (Williams 1986) made it indisputable that the site was an elite cemetery displaying features that allowed it to be considered as royal.
What happened later was a reconsideration of the archaeological data in the light of what could be inferred from that astounding site. Sayala was "re-visited" by Smith (1994) who concluded that the Qustul graves «cover almost exactly the same period as the princes' burials at Sayala» and that his «own speculative preference would be for regarding «the Seyala princes as ruling a separate, if less powerful and less extensive, principality» (Smith 1994 : 376). More ordinary cemeteries, selected among the well-excavated Scandinavian sites of the Nubian Campaign published by Nordström (1972) were in their turn "re-visited" by O'Connor (1993 : 16-20), who concluded from his analysis of cemeteries 277 and 401 that «in the A-Group cemeteries considerable social and economic differentiation is evident» and that «At least in their Classic and Terminal phases, the A-Group people display considerable social complexity», and by Nordström (forthcoming), who concluded from a «qualitative and quantitative ranking of A-Group burials and cemeteries in Lower Nubia (excluding the elite tombs at Qustul)» that «the A-group culture eventually developed a rather elaborate and mature social structure» and that «a persistent pattern of the A-Group cemeteries is certainly a shift towards a more complex structure characterized by material affluence and social inequality, evident during the Terminal A-Group».
Finally, taking into account the evidence from Qustul, O'Connor (1993 : 21-23) concluded (a) that «because no other Terminal A-Group cemetery approached the importance of the Qustul cemetery, its occupants likely controlled all of Lower Nubia, which would have formed a unitary political unit», (b) that «Already then, early in the Bronze Age, at least one part of Nubia was on its way to statehood, and was a "proto-kingdom" like those found a little earlier in Egypt», (c) that «earlier -in the Classic A-Group- there were also rulers, like the one buried in an elite cemetery labeled 137» and (d) that, «Whether such Classic A ¬Group chiefs ruled only parts of Lower Nubia or all of it … political centralization was becoming a feature of Nubian society prior to the development of the royal cemetery of Qustul».
quote:DougM wrote: Then later they discuss Bruce Williams and the qustul incense burner. . . . . All of which is a nice way of saying that they dont recognize Ta Seti as being the same territorial polity that developed in the area they identify with the "A-Group", which means that they dont have to recognize Ta Seti as the first nome of Egypt as the result of the incorporation of this polity into dynastic Egypt proper.
Doug M Member # 7650
posted
Once again I agree with you, but the paper seems to straddle the fence, IMO.
alTakruri Member # 10195
posted
Also contrary to what you say, Geus does state the fact that T3Sty partly affiliates to T3Shmw
quote:... it is the first unquestionable mention of Lower Nubia as Ta-Seti, the country of the bow, a name that, in other context, may be misinterpreted since it also designated the southernmost nome of Upper Egypt.
quote:DougM wrote: ... they dont have to recognize Ta Seti as the first nome of Egypt as the result of the incorporation of this polity into dynastic Egypt proper.
alTakruri Member # 10195
posted
I guess, until we -- ES AE&E forum -- write the book this fence straddling toward the truth is the best we can expect until a new generation takes it to a higher rung. But still, it's not the samo ol okey doke Reisner school donkey fodder we've been fed by other late 20th century "Nubiologists" like Adams for instance.
quote:Originally posted by Doug M: Once again I agree with you, but the paper seems to straddle the fence, IMO.
I now suspect the quote "This would seem to be the largest, earliest "city" known in Africa (including Egypt). Here, too, is the site of a large Bronze Age town, probably dating as early as 2500 B.C.", is a corruption, by whoever wrote that piece, of the following wording by Geus himself.
"There was an inner fortified city, surrounded by massive walls and dry (?) moats, within which was a huge mud-brick temple platform surrounded by smaller temples, two palaces of different date, royal warehouses, and an extensive settlement of both rectangular and round ("African") houses."
Evergreen Writes:
I have allways had a problem with Bonnet's stereotype that traditional "African houses" are round. Are the round houses found in Medieveal Europe also "African houses"?
Djehuti Member # 6698
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quote:Originally posted by rasol: Very interesting. Wonder why we don't [haven't] heard more about this?
I have been wondering the same. Also, Evergreen is correct that there are remains of other cities/towns in other parts of Africa that date as early if not earlier.
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