Tropical Tropical AfricaAfrica

Geography• Tropics have the sun year

round• Africa is almost entirely on

the tropics (like southern Arabia, most of India and Southeast Asia)

• Monsoons from the Indian Oceans (wet season)

• Rainforests in West Africa and west-central Africa

• Sahara is the world’s largest desert

• Grasslands of East Africa

Sub-Saharan Sub-Saharan AfricaAfrica

Divided by the Sahara

• Africa is divided by the Sahara Desert

• Most of the Saharan Africa and northern Africa were heavily affected by the Islamic world

• Sub-Saharan Africa is more complex

Diverse EthnicityDiverse Ethnicity• Sub-Saharan Africa is more diverse and has

over 2,000 languages and dialects spoken

Common Thread

• Few things are common between all tribes• One thing that is: most are descendants of the

Bantu tribes

Bantu Tribes

• Around 1,000 B.C.E. the Bantu began moving from their homeland in west central Africa

• Descendants settled all parts of the continent south of the Sahara

• With time, all these groups developed into their own group, with distinct languages and cultural traditions

Basics of Sub-Saharan Societies:

• Most communities are small

• Social life revolved around the village

• Food: hunting, herding, and limited agriculture

• Metalworking (gained this skill on their own, were not taught)

Sub-Saharan Women

• Women were below men• Rolls: Valued for their field work, story-telling ability,

role in education, and for producing heirs• African lineage is matrilineal, not patrilineal– Women inherited property, and the husband was required

to move into his wife’s house

Sub-Saharan Art• Skills: carving, sculpture (especially in wood

and ivory, bronze and iron)

Architecture• Impressive stone building and walls (ex: Great

Zimbabwe)• Used timber as skeletons in reinforcing mud

mosques that still stand today (ex: Mali)

Literature

• Literature preserved by oral traditions

• Professional storytellers told history and social customs– Also acted as entertainers

and served as advisors to the king

Contact with North Africa

• As time passed, trade, linked the north and south of Africa

• This trade, also included slavery

• Arab slavers penetrated south in Africa and forced many Africans into bondage

• Some traders owned thousands of slaves

Contact with Islam• Islam became part of the sub-Saharan life,

sometimes by force (ex: Ghana) and sometimes peacefully (ex: Mali)

West Africa:

Ghana• Founded in 500 C.E.• Major supplier of gold to Europeans

when Europe began minting coins• Muslim community of merchants

linked to the trans-Saharan trade route

• Overtime, Ghana society weakened because of the demographic conditions and as its population grew and its food production failed to meet demands

• All this left Ghana vulnerable to Muslim conquest (the immediate cause of Ghana’s downfall)

Central Africa: Great Zimbabwe

• 1000-1400 C.E.• Name means: “sacred graves of

the chiefs”• Crucial as a political and religious

center• Great walled city encircled 193

acres and home to 20,000 people• Immensely wealthy

(archaeologists have found evidence of this)

• Traded all over the world

Mali• Important north-south

trade route for centuries• Founded in 1200’s by a

conqueror and soon became a center of trade in western and northern Africa

• Conversion was beneficial to having good trade relations with Arabs

• Products: gold, salt, ivory, animal skins, and slaves

Timbuktu

• Chief commercial outposts (although not the capital of Mali)

• Stopping point for caravans and traders going in all directions

• Main commodity: salt• Also renowned center

of religious studies and Islamic scholarship

Mansa Musa• Mali’s most powerful ruler

• (1312-1337)• Took pilgrimage to Mecca to

display Mali’s wealth• Famous in Europe and Africa

as one of the world’s richest monarchs

• Systemized the government• By the early 1400’s, Mali was

under foreign attack, which eventually led to its collapse

Mansa Musa Song

Crash Course: Mansa Musa

East Africa:• Urban centers along coast

(nearly 40)• All multiethnic: diverse in

population, language, culture and religion

• Persians and Arabs pushed southward and mixed with local Africans

• Islam became important but did not replace local religions

• Trade among these regions goes back to days of Rome

Swahili• Most widespread language in the

region was Swahili• Became the “lingua franca”=

common tongue• Most common language on eastern

coast

Swahili

Spread of Islam to Africa

• Islam reached parts of North Africa (especially Egypt) in the 600’s and 700’s

• Most in North converted, but some remained Christian(some in Nubia, Kush, Ethiopia and Egypt)

Islam in Africa• Brought by Arab traders (by either

overland caravan or sea)• Most of the time, conversion was

peaceful, but sometime it was forced

• Why were the Arabs coming? Arab Arab Slave TradeSlave Trade– Trade going northward: slaves, salt, ivory

and animal skins– Trade going southward: manufactured

goods like glass, metalwork, and pottery

Islam in Africa

• Many of the Swahili city-states on Africa’s eastern coast were large Muslim communities

• West coast, Sahara and sub-Saharan Africa

• More dedicated converts were the BerbersBerbers, desert nomads and hardened warriors

• Copts, a Christian minority, formed communities in Egypt and Sudan

Indian Ocean Trade

Network• East African coast• Desirable goods: ivory, slaves• Commercial ties: India, Mediterranean, China• Indian Ocean region was the world’s largest maritime

trading network and an area of rapid Muslim expansion

Quick Review

• 1. Which of the following helps explain why the development of strong and sizable political units occurred later and more slowly in sub-Saharan Africa than in many other regions of the world?– A. language was not yet developed– B. People in Africa had not yet evolved– C. There were many cannibals in this part of Africa– D. There was a vast array of languages and dialects

spoken– E. None of the above

Answer: D: The remarkable ethnic and linguistic diversity of sub-Saharan Africa made it difficult for stable, united states to take shape

Answer: B

• 2. How did women in the small communities of sub-Saharan Africa tend to be treated?– A. They were seen as political equals– B. They were valued as fieldworkers and for

education children.– C. There were treated as goddesses– D. More women served as chiefs than men– E. Women tended the cattle and so had a lot of

power

Answer: A

• 3. African literature of this period was preserved through– A. oral tradition– B. scroll paintings– C. writings on large slabs of stone– D. stories written on bronze statues– E. manuscripts kept in pyramid-shaped archives

Answer: D: long term was environmental changes, but short term was the Muslim invasion from the north

• 4. The immediate cause of Ghana’s downfall was…– A. environmental calamity– B. the Crusades– C. its takeover by the Portuguese– D. Muslim conquest– E. the slave trade

Answer: C

• 5. How do researchers know that the Great Zimbabwe was so wealthy at one time?– A. it left behind written accounts of history– B. Explorers testified of its wealth– C. Gold, jewelry, and other valuable items were

found in its ruins– D. It still exists today and has remained wealthy

for hundreds of years– E. None of the Above

Answer: E

• 6. As far back as what era did East Africa already have commercial ties with India and the Mediterranean region?– A. the 1700’s– B. the 1400’s– C. the Sumerian era– D. the Egyptian Old Kingdom– E. the Roman era

Answer: B

• 7. Which of the following is an accurate statement about East African cities during this period?– A. The area was no ethnically diverse– B. The most widely used language was Swahili– C. The area unfortunately never enjoyed a booming

economy– D. Islam had not reached the shores of East Africa yet– E. East African city-states were all under the rule of a

single Arab sheik

Answer: C

• 8. The Copts were and still are a ______ minority in predominantly Islamic Egypt– A. Jewish– B. Buddhist– C. Christian– D. Muslim– E. agnostic

Answer: A• 9. Which of the following is an accurate

statement about slavery at the time in sub-Saharan Africa?– A. By the 1200’s, some traders owned more than a

thousand slaves apiece.– B. Slavery was confined to Timbuktu, at least until the

1400’s– C. Only Muslims could own and sell slaves– D. The people who were enslaved tended to live in

East Africa– E. Slavery had not yet arrived in this region of the

world yet

Answer: D

• 10. How did African societies gain the skill of metalworking?– A. Muslims taught Africans the skill– B. Western Europeans taught Africans this skill– C. African societies learned this skill only after

they were enslaved– D. They gained it on their own without outside

help– E. None of the above.

Answer: D

• 11. Which of the following places in Africa remained Christian despite the spread of Islam on the continent?– A. Marrakesh– B. Swahili city-states– C. Mali– D. Ethiopia– E. Tunisia

Answer: B

• 12. Timbuktu was renowned for its– A. gold and its role in opposing the slave trade– B. salt reserves and Islamic scholarship– C. large harbor– D. glass and ceramic architecture– E. many Gothic churches