«Was Africa ever civilized ?»
By topffer
@topffer (42156)
France
August 20, 2018 1:24pm CST
It is surprising to have such a question asked by a black member thinking that it never happened. Maybe that it is not useless to speak a bit about it in a discussion and not only in a response.
Sub-Saharian, i.e. black Africa has had great kingdoms and empires in various part of Africa. I will give only one example, the Mali Empire during the 14th C, because I know it a bit better than others.
If I ask you what was the most important college city in the world at the beginning of the 14th C, would you be able to respond ? Let’s see. Paris had 50 colleges with an average 100 students/college, Oxford 9 or 10 colleges, Cambridge was a new born baby... Don’t search more, it was not in Europe. The most developed knowledge in sciences, medicine, astronomy, literature, etc could be found in Timbuktu, Mali, Africa, that had about 25000 students at the time.
If I ask you who has ever been the richest man in the world, I also doubt that you will find it. The world recordman of all times is Mansa Musa, who was an emperor of Mali, died in 1337. It is impossible to evaluate how rich he was, he did not knew himself, but his fortune was several trillions of dollars, not in green paper, but in gold, which is more serious. He went once to do a pilgrimage to Mecca and brought so much gold with him that the price of gold felt during years around the world...
I give you the Wikipedia link to the article on the Mali Empire if you want to know more about it. However it is far to be good and complete and you will have to do your own researches if you are interested.
I will express a regret to conclude. There is an obvious disinterest in many African countries for their own History and archeology, and it is often in Europe that the research is done and where are the largest African museums. Thousands of manuscripts in Timbuktu testifying of the vast knowledge of the Mali Empire have been pillaged or destroyed by radical Muslims. More, between 100000 and 300000 have been clandestinely sold, and have left the country. It is a disaster, and it will continue as long as all the citizens of these countries will not be aware of the richness of their heritage. Be sure that, yes, Africa has had some of the greatest civilizations in the world...
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16 responses
@Morleyhunt (21737)
• Canada
20 Aug 18
Interesting...something I wast aware of. Thanks for sharing.
5 people like this
@cupkitties (7421)
• United States
21 Aug 18
Out of curiosity I looked for that discussion thinking this guy must be from the US. If he did I wouldn't really be surprised because there are so many things US classes don't cover and students don't bother to learn from other sources. They hear Africa, the think slavery and poverty. Also don't know Africa is a continent. But he actually lives in Africa. I hope he learned something from you and decides to learn more
3 people like this
@topffer (42156)
• France
21 Aug 18
I do not know from where he is, but I was suspecting that he was from Africa because of another discussion. I agree that many things are not covered, and many Europeans of my age do not know anything about African history. At my time, we were learning quite only about our National History, starting with "Our ancestors the Gallics"...
2 people like this
@pgntwo (22408)
• Derry, Northern Ireland
20 Aug 18
Now that was interesting. Having spent some time in Southern Tchad, I know there has been much destruction as warring factions destroy all that was left by preceding civilizations. I have heard of Nouakchott, but that is in neighbouring (now) Mauritania, not sure when the Mali of today split apart from its neighbour.
4 people like this
@topffer (42156)
• France
20 Aug 18
The split was done by France artificially at the end of the 19th C for administrative reasons. All these countries were inside French Western Africa before 1958, and no limits had ever been put between them to fix the borders, so it created later a few conflicts between them after their independence. For Mali and Mauritania it was in 1960. There are a lot of Touaregs in Mali, and a Targhi does not care about borders. If radical Muslims are destroying a lot of monuments and manuscripts there, it is because their Islam is very different.
If radical Muslims are destroying a lot of monuments and manuscripts there, it is because their Islam is very different.4 people like this
@MarshaMusselman (38652)
• Midland, Michigan
21 Aug 18
I've never heard about this before either but did I know they had colleges with that many students that long ago.
2 people like this
@topffer (42156)
• France
21 Aug 18
@MarshaMusselman You are welcome. Timbuktu is classified as a world heritage site. The city was funded during the 5th C, but many of its monuments are in poor condition.
1 person likes this
@topffer (42156)
• France
21 Aug 18
There were more colleges than today in a city like Paris but not a lot of students in each college during the Middle Age, a lot less than today. In the 14th C Timbuktu was the #1 city in the world when it comes to scholars and intellectuals. The Mali Empire lasted 5 centuries and the estimation is that there are still about 800000 manuscripts and copies of manuscripts remaining of this period covering every domain, from poetry to astronomy. There is an effort done by the UNESCO to index and digitize them.
2 people like this
@MarshaMusselman (38652)
• Midland, Michigan
21 Aug 18
@topffer somewhen I hope to write some stories about times back then. I'll have to read up on some of that eventually. I've never looked but I thought Timbuktu was a made up place. Thanks for the info.
1 person likes this
@rsa101 (37952)
• Philippines
21 Aug 18
That’s an interesting fact you shared about Africa. I am pretty sure each civilization will have their ups in downs in time. The real problem with Africa nowadays is that they have allowed so many influences that lose their identity as distinct cultures are. They allowed to be exploited by foreign countries that almost lost their own identity.
1 person likes this
@topffer (42156)
• France
21 Aug 18
Their main problem is a deficiency of their education system (it improves slowly but not 25% of the population has had a primary education in Mali), and the fact that these countries are artificial creations.
Despite of what you tell about them having lost their identity, Mali relies on a tribal system. I have seen that when I was at college with 2 Malians who had studied to be judges : one was part of the dominant tribe ruling the country and had the higher job that a judge could get in Mali, he was member of their State Security Court. The other had the same diplomas, but was from another tribe : on the paper, he was judge, but he had never been appointed and was not expecting to be appointed, he was preparing a PhD to get a job in France. In fact, even if a coup happens times to times, Mali is a democracy, but what works in Europe cannot always work in a country where are living different tribes : the winner of the votes, the main tribe, uses the democratic system to enforce its position of leader, and at the end, for the minor tribes, it is worst than when they were living under a dictatorship, and there are insurrections in these areas. Add at that the corruption of the administration...
The initial fault relies on France. We divided Western Africa at the end of the 19th C artificially, without taking ethnicities in account. And what happens in Mali happens quite everywhere in Western Africa. The only countries where the democracy works are countries like Senegal : they have no main tribe, but several having approximately the same population, so they are forced to cooperate at their Parliament and develop the country together...
1 person likes this
I guess western influences somehow didn’t work with them well because they didn’t consider their culture
@much2say (53959)
• Los Angeles, California
7 Sep 18
I have a particular friend who would delight in knowing all this (I am not sure she knows this already). We know much about African-American history - but not so much about the far way past of Africa. I don't doubt that a lot of it has been lost, not only as a record but also the disinterest in the heritage by its people. Africa has/had riches far more than most realize!
1 person likes this
@topffer (42156)
• France
7 Sep 18
Many countries have a lot of natural resources that they do not mine. Africa will be rich when they will have solved their local problems : lack of education, corruption, tribal and religious wars... The lack of interest for their heritage is mainly due to a lack of education, but the level improves. Give them a few decades and they will make Africa great again
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@topffer (42156)
• France
22 Aug 18
Egypt is in the North, and all the North part of Africa near the sea has never been occupied by a black population. Even now, after more of a thousand year of Arabic presence, you can see blonde people with blue eyes in some local populations of Northern Africa that have never really mixed with the Arabs. I wanted to focus on black Africa in this post.
1 person likes this
@topffer (42156)
• France
21 Aug 18
I thought that I had to develop a response and write a discussion about Africa when I was asked this question. The Mali Empire lasted 5 centuries, it is not bad. That we are forced today to maintain a French army in the North of Mali to protect a city like Timbuktu, "the pearl of the desert", of fanatics, is linked to a failure of the democracy in Mali, and it is not the French army that will be able to change that.
1 person likes this
@Daljinder (23231)
• Bangalore, India
20 Aug 18
If we didn't know the history of our own country, we might have been asking a question along the same lines: "Were we always poor?" So, yes I agree that knowing the history and heritage of your country is important.
The question upon kinda brings up the underlying/subconscious sense of defeat.
1 person likes this
@topffer (42156)
• France
20 Aug 18
We are partly responsible. When France was a colonial power in this part of the world, the official research was targeted towards the Roman Era, because it was giving us a legitimacy to be there : you see, we, Europeans, were there long before you... People working on subjects like the Mali Empire were doing it on their own money.
Since these countries became independent they did not put money in culture. You will tell me that it is not a priority in Africa, but I am sometimes despaired by what I hear from curator friends going there to help them to organize their museums : between what has been stolen and what has been eaten by termites, it is not always easy to find something to exhibit... They are conscious that there is an emergency to do something to preserve their heritage, but the notion of time is not the same in Africa than elsewhere, and by extension the notion of emergency.
Mali is one of the countries of Western Africa having decided these last years to invest in education. The level of children having received a primary education climbed from 20% to about 55% today in the past 20 years. So their knowledge of their History improves, but actually most of the population know the Mali Empire only from the griots, who are still singing the fame and the exploits of its emperors...
The question would have been asked by an European that I would have classified this member as a racist and would not have responded, but in fact there are many Europeans also not knowing at all African civilizations, and I thought that it was deserving a post.
1 person likes this
@Daljinder (23231)
• Bangalore, India
23 Aug 18
@topffer That's actually .......... tragic! I don't have the right word to describe it. I get the heebie jeebies when historical things like that are destroyed, disregarded, not take care of. 
I love mystories and obviously it would bother me when the clues are taken away or destroyed. Just yesterday, I was wondering and trying to imagine how people used to communicate when they had no language. Some say they did have language. We just can't decipher it. Take for example the language of Indus Valley Civilization is indecipherable till date.
I didn't know about any African civilizations either or history for that matter except Nelson Mandela. I knew even less or nothing at all about Australian history either. Those are foreign lands and I have yet to learn so much more of my own country. I am learning slowly. Plenty to go around when there is history to concern in the world.
You are right to bring it up in discussion!
I love mystories and obviously it would bother me when the clues are taken away or destroyed. Just yesterday, I was wondering and trying to imagine how people used to communicate when they had no language. Some say they did have language. We just can't decipher it. Take for example the language of Indus Valley Civilization is indecipherable till date.
I didn't know about any African civilizations either or history for that matter except Nelson Mandela. I knew even less or nothing at all about Australian history either. Those are foreign lands and I have yet to learn so much more of my own country. I am learning slowly. Plenty to go around when there is history to concern in the world.
You are right to bring it up in discussion!1 person likes this
@topffer (42156)
• France
24 Aug 18
@Daljinder The Mali empire used Arabic and Manding languages for writings. To communicate quickly they had talking drums and a message was sent from a place to another at the speed of a telegram.
I guess you need to find a bilingual inscription like the Rosette stone to decipher your Indus valley language. In Europe the written language is not very old. We have some pictographs on a few potteries of the late Bronze Age/Early Iron Age, ca 800 BC, but all the efforts done until now to decipher them have not worked. It may succeed in the future, when the corpus will be larger.
1 person likes this
@topffer (42156)
• France
21 Aug 18
If Africans were knowing the history of their continent, they would be proud to be Africans. The oldest known humans were born in Africa, and many places have had great civilizations. There is not only Mali, but also Ghana, Sudan, etc. It should be taught in any African school.
1 person likes this
.@topffer (42156)
• France
21 Aug 18
@MACQUUNE There was another very interesting kingdom in the South of Nigeria, maybe you will be interested by this article if you did not heard about the Benin kingdom.
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@CaptAlbertWhisker (32507)
• Calgary, Alberta
30 Aug 18
I remember there are Pyramids in ethiopia, so African civilizations exists. there is also an African tribe that is advance with astronomy but I forgot their name,
1 person likes this
@YrNemo (20261)
•
22 Aug 18
And people kept telling me that Timbuktu is "no where" land (as in, not really existed). A pity that we were not friend to that wealthy Mansa Musa. Hmm, if there was such a thing as reincarnation, who would be HIM right now I wonder... (Sounds like it is a very poor country now, sad!)
1 person likes this
@topffer (42156)
• France
22 Aug 18
Timbuktu is called "the pearl of the desert" and "the city with 333 saints". It is a small town today but with a great heritage and is inscribed as a world heritage place by the UNESCO. However in the past years it lost a few mosques destroyed by radical Muslims (their Islam is not compatible), and many of its monuments are in poor state. I want to visit Timbuktu. I had an opportunity 20 years ago, and I regret to not have been there at this time.
1 person likes this
