ancient african social structure

From the 17th century onwards, indigenous African crops were supplemented by crops introduced from America, especially maize, cassava, beans and sweet potatoes. The findings add support to linguistics-backed theories of population structure . Here are eight of Africa's greatest ancient civilizations. By utilizing this acronym, students can compartmentalize their findings and . Cotton and woolen textiles were probably introduced at the same time, and by the 16th century cotton had become a form of currency amongst some peoples in southern Africa (for example the Shona). Ancient Grains Market Global Research Report 2023 is a comprehensive business study on the current state of industry which analyses innovative strategies for business growth and describes . It was situated between the Sahara and the headwaters of the Sngal and Niger rivers, in an area that now comprises southeastern Mauritania and part of Mali. Some stateless peoples even looked to the rulers of neighboring states to provide arbitration in their disputes village communities bordering the powerful kingdom of Benin were examples of this. Some owed their rise to the wealth gained from long-distance trade. One group of industrial workers should be mentioned in this context, although they were not strictly speaking craftsmen in the normal use of the term. Even then it had left vast tracts uncultivated, which would be gradually and incompletely settled by farmers over the next thousand years. This had probably been first introduced to sub-Saharan Africa by Portuguese or Arab visitors, but the fact that it had been picked up by local healers and spread from people to people over hundreds of miles shows how open they were to new approaches. Explain the social structure, unique aspects, and decline of Great Zimbabwe . Egyptian society was structured like a pyramid. In line with the pragmatic nature of African thought, the test for religious practices and practitioners was whether they worked, especially in relieving human misfortune or securing fertility of womb or field, prosperity, health and social harmony in the world. This process started to happen at different times according to region. The donkeys also were domesticated independently in the Ethiopian and Somalian region, but the majority of the domesticated animals came there from the regions around . The surrounding bush remained untamed, wild, a source of harm, the abode of dangerous animals and evil spirits. ODI0YWEwOGYyOTY5ZGVhNjEzMWUzOTFjMGEzYTA3ZjUzZjNkM2EyNDZhODVk - africa's social structure forms political nations that will help people from violence. Herders grew crops as a secondary activity where conditions were suitable, and cultivators also kept animals (outside the forests), fished and hunted hunters were respected, even feared, by other members of the community as they ventured into the hostile wilderness in pursuit of game. Even large towns often resembled several villages grouped together, with each lineage group in its own walled sector. However, state-building was not a straightforward process in African conditions. MjM4NWRlOGNlZmQ4MDIzY2IzMTRjYWZhNjM1N2RmNjNjZDdlMjU4N2NlNGNl eyJtZXNzYWdlIjoiYTQ3YTllNzM5MzNhY2U5MTg3MDQzZTY2YzI0NGNiOTQx To the south of the Sahara desert is the Savannah zone. ZDQwYTliY2VjMzM2YmIyZDM1ODQ4Zjc4NzY2ZWQ4NWU5YTliYzE4N2FhMTQw In cattle-herding societies, and some crop-growing societies which were in close proximity to them, the young men were grouped into an age set of junior warriors. Although they originated in the Indian Ocean, they played no major role in East African trade. Of the outlying settlements, only the more successful ones would survive. Facts about Ancient Africa 2: the important civilization Where there is a spring, a lake or a river, however, cultivation is possible, and in some areas, for example in the inner delta of the River Niger (see below), or on the shores of Lake Chad in West Africa, or the Great Lakes of central Africa, intensive cultivation has allowed concentrations of dense population to grow up. In fact, cults involving rain shrines and weather gods might command the loyalty of people over a wide area, a form of worship practiced side-by-side with that concerning the spirits of the land. Therefore, it was important to keep them happy. It offers a general survey of the geographical environments they inhabited; their settlements, social structures and economies; and their religions and cultures. As a result of these factors, throughout Africas premodern history, locations where densely-populated farming societies could emerged, and in which urban civilizations could be built, have been fewer and more scattered than most other regions of the world. Many African societies were highly competitive in the pursuit of status and wealth. This meant that, for a man to marry he must have some wealth, and since this took time to build up most men were in their thirties when they married. Many towns were centers of craft production. This caused individuals to be very sensitive to attacks on their personal honor, real or imagined. In the forests of West Africa and the Congo Basin, yams and plantains were the staple crop. It was they who provided the support and security needed to get by. NTNjZjkxMjQ0YmE1NWYxYzRjOTRkMTFjNWZkYWE5MjRjMWE1NjA0Mzk5Yzhh MzJiMzEwNzkwMzQ0MDVhMWZmOTU0NzM1MzMzMmE1ZDE4MGY5ZjkyNzY5ZDA2 Throughout sub-Saharan Africa, this often took the form of inter-generational tensions between elder males with multiple wives and younger males with no wives. As one should expect for such a vast region as sub-Saharan Africa, with its thousands of societies and cultures, religious beliefs and practices varied enormously. Dance was the most important African cultural form, central to communal festivals, religious ceremonies and masquerades. In southern Africa the kingdom centered on Great Zimbabwe was situated on a gold trade route. Such traders were men, and they ranged from single itinerant traders with perhaps a donkey to carry his goods, to those in charge of caravans of donkeys or, in the desert, of camels. 1. The majority of townsmen, like villagers, were cultivators. For cultivators in particular, any religious beliefs were underpinned by a deeply-held idea about the world in which they found themselves. The sculptural tradition in West Africa goes back to the terracotta figures of the Nok culture of the early first millennia BCE and CE, and began to reach a peak in the 13th and14th centuries in Ife, in Yorubaland (in modern day Nigeria). Through history, Africa has had an exceptionally hostile environment in terms of the diseases which could strike humans and their animals; and of the regions, West Africa was probably the most dangerous. Apart from in West Africa and on the Swahili coast, where true cities had developed, African towns tended to have the appearance of large villages, or clusters of villages. There might also be slaves who had been reduced to their lowly status through some misfortune or other famine, debt or even captivity in war. European travelers to Africa were surprised to find, even in the interior of the continent, inoculation being practiced. The resulting dissent, fueled by machismo, ambition, or desire for land, might lead to the exodus of a group of young men to a new location. However, it was also played in the more refined atmosphere of some royal courts, both in West Africa and East Africa, where the game formed part of a succession ritual. Just south of the narrow band of temperate climate in North Africa is the largest desert in the world, the Sahara. The obstacles to population growth meant that there was always plenty of land available for new settlement. The pastoralists tended to inhabit the desert and Sahel regions, leaving most of the savannah and forest regions to the farmers. In river floodplains communities have constructed mounds raised above the flood level from which to take advantage of the rich silt deposited by the river waters. The environment of sub-Saharan Africa is one of the hardest environments for human populations to thrive in. MTJmOWQxYjMzYzM3MzdkNTQ0ZDhiZWYzMWEzZThiZWJlOTZmODA5ZmM3ZDI0 In the Great Lakes region, for example, the Lega people developed a distinctive and lively series of exquisite miniature sculptures. All African towns, with but one or two exceptions such as Jenne in West Africa, were capitals of kingdoms. The ancient kingdom of Ethiopia was named after its capital city, Axum. Many captives were sold on to other peoples; there was an active slave trade in Africa. After about A.D. 500, several centrally organized, warring states appeared in parts of Africa. We also aim at promoting tourism across the African continent. Copper was also an important trade commodity, with trade routes running outwards from the copper belt in modern Zambia. State formation Ancient Africa boasts of the practice of democracy years before Lincoln and well-established governments that were able to expand and last for many centuries. Egyptian Social Structure. Cleverness, bravery, charm, charisma and aggression could provide the success to bring high status and abundant wealth in many circumstances. Connected with this, feats of memory were a key part of African religious, political and commercial life. The abundant insect life of the tropics makes for a very high prevalence of serious diseases, for both humans and their animals; this greatly constrains the rates at which populations can grow. All this has left African societies comparatively isolated from the great developments affecting other regions of the Eastern Hemisphere, and indeed from each other. Metalwork held a special place in African culture. Underpopulation, and the difficulties that this created for taxation and control, meant that the kind of bureaucracies which invented literacy in Sumer or Egypt could not emerge in the African context. African cultivators have generally taken great pride in their skills. Men were usually killed, perhaps as ritual sacrifices. The resulting dissent, fueled by, The larger the state the more resources it could commit to defense and expansion. The shores of these large bodies of water have been suitable for intensive agriculture, allowing some of Africas most notable kingdoms to flourish. Interesting Facts about Traditional Religions of Ancient Africa The people of the Mali Empire believed in a magical force called "nyama." The religious beliefs of Africans impacted all aspects of their everyday lives including their food, work, and family life. This maximizes opportunities for violent clashes with other groups, and their societies tend to be more militaristic. This situation was exacerbated by the extreme competitiveness which members of such societies displayed, in a situation where ones status was not inherited but was down to ones own abilities and cunning. They did obeisance to their overlord, forwarded tribute to his court and providing men for his army. Under Muslim influence the game of dara became popular. J. Clyde Mitchell, The Yao Village: a Study in the Social Structure of a Malawian Tribe. In the west the southern border of the savannah is formed by the equatorial rain forests of West Africa and the Congo Basin, but to the east it continues down into East Africa, skirting round the Congo rain forests and blending into the subtropical savannah grasslands of central and southern Africa. Africa has some giant lakes, including a number strung out down the spine of the continent, from Lake Turkana in northern Kenya to Lake Malawi in south-east Africa. In due course he would probably be accepted back into his community through paying a fine to, or offering to work for, his wifes father. The savannah regions of West Africa specialized in millet and fonio, and further south, where rainfall was sufficient, sorghum. But it was ancestors with whom these people directly interacted, and approaching them with sacrifices of cattle. Slavery was widespread in traditional African societies. Here, captives of both sexes were settled in royal estates and set to work there, effectively as serfs. This The Call of the Wild by Jack London Middle School reading unit and novel study is exactly what you need to teach your . There was intense competition for women, and great inequality in access to them. Africa has an exceptionally hostile disease environment, West Africa most of all; malaria, leprosy, tsetse fly and smallpox are only a few of the killer diseases of the continent, attacking not only humans but, in the last case, their animals as well. YWZkYWVmMTM2NzEyZTQ1NTBhOWQ3NWRjZGNiNDQwMTUzN2M1NjlhZjE0NzUx So too could warfare or misrule. These probably belonged mostly to hereditary groups, often closely associated with the monarchy they were sometimes high-status slaves who lived within the palace precinct; in other towns they were members of guild-like organizations under their own chiefs. On the whole, though, anthropologist have emphasized the rational, experimental nature of African medicine. Throughout sub-Saharan Africa, this often took the form of inter-generational tensions between elder males with multiple wives and younger males with no wives. Otherwise, large urban settlements were rare: Great Zimbabwe, Mbaza Kongo, and a handful of other towns were exceptional. The culture,language and customs of this empire were greatly influenced by the culture of Western African cities and the people were divided into sects or sections based on their social standing. The specifics of the caste systems in Africa vary among . Underpopulation meant that disgruntled people could always seek new land beyond the reach of royal authority. A common idea was that the founders of a particular community, on first settling the area, had made a pact with the spirits of the land in order to ensure good harvests. It began around 3400 BCE. Africa, where humans first evolved, today remains a place of remarkable diversity. The rain forests are very dense. They sought to bring shrines and cults under their authority through a mixture of threat and patronage. Apart from the Nile, all these are blocked by rapids fairly near their mouths, as a result of which seagoing craft have not been able to sail far into the interior of Africa. Today they are confined to comparatively restricted areas in and around the Kalahari desert, or in the densest forests of the Congo basin; The transition to a settled, farming way of life is quite a difficult one for many hunter-gatherers, but some of them were able to adapt to keeping cattle. The same eye for beauty and spirit, along with a zest for color and pattern, was revealed in countless textile works from all over the continent. Population growth, Gods and spirits This was that there was a fundamental distinction between the cultivated and the wild, between civilization and savagery. Together with freedom it is an important element of the economy, culture and social structure of a country. In many places herders and cultivators, or cultivators and hunter-gatherers, lived in close proximity with each other, exchanging products on a regular basis. OWNmYWU3NDdmYzFiZjMxNzdiMjg0ZDI2ZDQxMjMzZWMyNjUwZGQwZTg4Mzg0 Segmentary lineage societies are characterised by the foremost importance of kin relationships in determining individuals' social and political allegiances, as well as their patterns of residence. Men captured in war or raids were often sacrificed to the gods, and the wives, retainers and servants of dead rulers were frequently buried with him. The advancements made in the ancient world continue to influence our societies today. Hypothesis 2: Social structures cause inequity and injustice against the meaningful participating in economic decision-making and benefiting from opportunities in a society. By taxing the trade as it passed through their territory and using the wealth gained to build up a body of warrior retainers, powerful chiefs were able to bring neighboring communities under their control and form the nucleus of a kingdom. Originally, there were two Egyptian kingdoms. This bred a society in which extra-marital sex was common and accepted, and young men adopted an attitude of machismo and insolence towards their elders. So too did the more widespread infestation of tsetse fly, which set a limit of animal transport. At the top were the gods, such as Ra, Osiris, and Isis. This was greatly feared, as it could spring up in communities and tear them apart. African Kingdoms arose in a variety of ways. Younger men would set out to seduce or rape the young wives of their elders, and their elders would be determined to prevent this. Just as there is great cultural diversity so there is diversity in belief systems. What are Mali traditions? The earliest kingdoms we know of in West Africa, such as Ghana and Mali, were located at strategic points in the trans-Saharan trade network. The ancient structure is the last surviving wonder of the ancient world. Many of the market traders were local women, but above them was a class of comparatively wealthy merchants. Such famines were usually caused by drought, but plagues of locusts or unseasonably heavy rains could also devastate crops. A womans standing and access to wealth was entirely dependent upon her husband. OWM2MGJhN2I4ZTEwYzE2ZWQ2NDg2N2UzNTJhMWExYjMzMDUxMzM2ZjYzZGU0 This is most marked in eastern, central and southern Africa during the second millennium CE, at the start of which population levels were at a very low level. This categorization was not hard and fast. African kingdoms suffered severely from the divisive effects of violent competition between royal princes. The 25th dynasty was a line of pharaohs who originated in the Kingdom of Kush that reigned in part or all of Ancient Egypt for nearly a century, from 744 to 656 BC. Unlike in other parts of the world, temples and other religious buildings did not dominate townscapes the exception here being the large mosques of Muslim cities. Gradually, the hunter-gatherers were squeezed off the best lands by the incoming pastoralists and cultivators, who were able to live in larger groups. Hamilton, et al. The sheer effort of doing so, as well as the obstacles to population growth (such as the tsetse fly, mentioned above, which kills people as well as animals), meant that such clearings have formed isolated pockets of comparatively dense population surrounded by vast tracts of untamed forest. Female slaves were employed as domestic servants or concubines. NjI4MDI2ZmM3ZTBmNTYxODBhNzFhOWVhY2RlY2YxZDc2ODQwYjlkMTdhZjE3 In terms of history and culture this zone has been part of the European and Middle Eastern regions, and is therefore not covered by this article. These were the miners. Much religious activity, however, was in the hands of religious specialists adept at making contact with the spirit world in order to influence the forces of nature. - studies work with social structure to explain matters that are such as crimes or stolen things. It has therefore been comparatively isolated from the influences which have cross-fertilized and enriched historical societies elsewhere. Africa was not just the birthplace of humanity but also the cradle of early civilisations that made an immense contribution to the world and are still marvelled at today. Elsewhere, transport being limited to human porterage meant that there was little long-distance trade. Ironically, this attractive landscape posed a barrier to the spread of traditional farming southward, as sub-Saharan agriculture had adapted itself to tropical conditions. Except where influenced by Islam, most pre-modern sub-Saharan societies were non-literate. Many studies have been mostly about political centralisation. Ancient African Civilizations: East. M2M4NGNlYzZmM2IzNmFlYTA3OGFjMDcwMWRiZjdmY2UyMzM5ZDg5OTcwNjA1 OTIxY2QzNGMwMmQ0OGI0YWIzNDFhOThjNGU4ZTVhM2IzYjQyOTkzYjMwZmNk It has been noted that herding peoples had a stronger tendency to believe in a high god, whilst cultivators were more likely to worship many gods. If the demands of royal authority became too onerous, in the form of heavy taxes, say, or the demands made for public projects or service in the royal army, people could (and did) simply up and leave. First adopted by Western scholars, the notion of caste in West Africa refers to a form of hierarchical social classification of individuals into . Keywords population phratries gene citizenship metics slavery Type Chapter Information Egypt and Nubia were both complex civilizations ruled by a monarchy and the leader was often considered the god on Earth In Africa it has become clear that characteristics depend on economic development. This limited the number of children they might have in their child-bearing years, which would have been much more diminished, on average, by the incidence of infant mortality, childhood diseases and the dangers of childbirth. In the West African state of Bornu, for example, some royal women controlled extensive territories and were active in the government of the realm. NzlkMGVmMDZkZjMzN2QyN2NjYTRkMGVkOTczNzJjZGYxZTAxZDM3MjAwYWJj In agricultural communities the status of women varied greatly. Most crafts supplied local markets, even when using high levels of skill. We learn about their beliefs and religion and the important structures that still stand in Egypt today. Women of a particular lineage could live together in a close-knit group until long after they were married, while their husbands worked for their (the wifes) father until they had earned the right to take their wives back to their own communities. Only the driest and coolest regions escaped this disease. South of the forest the grasslands resume, having skirted around the Congo Basin; but further south, on the western coast of south-central Africa, lies the Kalahari desert, smaller than the Sahara but perhaps even more arid. Secondly there was the nobles, people who fought in the King's army and provided it with weapons. OGJhZDA5YWFmYzE1NjI3OGEwZTY3MmE2NDFiYjllYjg5MDM2MGFmNmNiZWRm One other consequence of African underpopulation was the prevalence of the polygamy (see below). Much craft work in Africa, as in all pre-modern societies, was done on a part-time basis by farmers, particularly women. Cutting through these landscapes are huge rivers, outstanding amongst which are the Nile, the Niger, the Congo and the Zambezi. Ancient Egypt was among the earliest civilizations.For millennia, Egypt maintained a strikingly complex and stable culture that influenced later cultures of Europe, the Middle East and Africa.After the Pharaonic era, Egypt itself came under the influence of Hellenism, for a time Christianity, and later, Arab and Islamic culture. Fewer than 30 examples have survived, all made by the lost wax process. The development of the Egyptian civilization is traced from the beginning of the settlement at the Nile river through to the uniting of Upper and Lower Egypt under one Pharaoh. Their repertoire involved rituals, spells, dances and trances, as well as more practical applications such as herbs and ointments. Canoes came in all sizes on the great rivers, and were probably the cheapest form of transport; but, of sub-Saharan rivers, only the Niger and Congo were navigable for any distance along their length. From a wider communal viewpoint, wives and children were needed to build up a lineages numbers and so help it survive into the future. ZWFhZmI1NmY5ZjVhZjJjNjYxYTFjNzUxMjgzZTE4MGZhOWIyODQyZWE4ZGIz Facts about Ancient Africa 1: the great civilization Africa is the home to some great civilizations. For cultivators in particular, any religious beliefs were underpinned by a deeply-held idea about the world in which they found themselves. It was not until the coming of iron technology that large-scale settlement of the West African and Equatorial regions, and of eastern, central and southern Africa, was able to begin. Other states were built around sacred shrines and their custodians, who enjoyed a concentration of religious authority which they were able to convert into political power. -----BEGIN REPORT----- Fear of witchcraft was particularly virulent in concentrated settlements where interpersonal tensions could be high. Together, these might kill one third to one half of an affected population, nullifying the hard come by demographic gains of a generation. In a world where land was plentiful, the poor were those who lacked the labour to work it. Skill in this field could only be obtained by long experience and involved a mastery of mysteries which was reminiscent of magic. Ghana, first of the great medieval trading empires of western Africa (fl. In river floodplains. Art, literature and culture Some European captives came the other way, ending up as slaves in the West African kingdoms of Mali and Songhai. Ancient Africa had many different societies, but they can be roughly categorized into four types. In these circumstances the population might grow to a point where the availability of good land grew short. Your access to this site was blocked by Wordfence, a security provider, who protects sites from malicious activity. In case of divorce she often lost all rights to her children, a cruel policy used to impose more rigorous female chastity than was demanded elsewhere in sub-Saharan Africa. Long experience of these diseases contributed to a remarkably deep medical knowledge amongst Africa peoples. As we have seen, different African peoples specialized in different modes of food production hunter-gathering (and fishing), nomadic or semi-nomadic pastoralism, and cultivation of crops. If you believe Wordfence should be allowing you access to this site, please let them know using the steps below so they can investigate why this is happening. One of the biggest threats to harmony within society was witchcraft. Such states could also organize the colonization of outlying areas in a more systematic fashion, perhaps under the leadership of a prince of the royal family. The land, much of which is hills and plateaux, is covered with grasslands, with some sub-tropical forests on the coast. This crosses the content from its west coast to the east coast. Some communities, especially those in rain forests, had a sacred barrier to keep the wilderness at bay. Building the dense concentrations of population necessary for the emergence of major civilizations was not an option in most locations. This close concentration of dwellings formed the core of the villages. Social There were six social classes in Ancient Ghana. These, as elsewhere in the world, had specialist activities ensuring fertility of women and soil, for example, or providing wealth. As in all pre-modern societies, infants and their mothers, the very groups upon whom the successful growth of population most depended, were most at risk. Egyptian culture has six thousand years of recorded history. Not only so, but the general health of the population was regularly weakened by famine. While a caravan was on the move, its hundreds of animal drivers and traders had to submit to an almost military discipline under the caravan-master. Holistvo Ndej Preovsk kraj otvracia doba, kontakty. NjhkMjY1MGEwZGFkNGU1MTkyY2ZlMDdlNWEwMTIxZGI5YjQwNzljMmRjOWI2 African societies never really ceased to be colonizing societies, and this profoundly influenced all aspects of African culture. In some societies the wives even retained ownership of their family property after marriage. NTlmYTU5OWZlYjIyNzk0NmRkZjAxMGZiMTRhMzBkYWViYTY4ZmNjYjlmNDMz The art of ancient African was just as diverse as its cultures, languages, and political structures. As a result, production was often labour-intensive, in a part of the world where labour was already scarce. They could make the Nile overflow, cause famine, or even bring death.