African Civilization

EQs:

1) How did geography influence Africa’s development?

2) Where were Africa’s trading kingdoms?

3) How was Islam introduced to Africa?

4) Who was Mansa Musa?

Africa’s Geography & Its Effects

• Remember, 40-40-10-10 (varied climates & terrains)!

• Hardly any usable natural harbors

• Interior is a high plateau = rivers flow down to the coast & are filled w/ rapids

• Travel is difficult & done mainly to trade

• Geographic diversity & natural barriers lead to numerous cultures being developed

Traditional Societies

• Village gov’t– Power shared among community members– Village decisions made by consensus & open

discussion

• Family Patterns; group over the individual– Nuclear families = parents & children work & live

together as a unit– More commonly, several generations lived in one

household; extended families form clans– Community values enhanced by clan identification

Religion

• Variety of beliefs across Africa

• Early Africans were polytheistic

• Some believe spirits of the dead are present among the living

• Animism: every living & nonliving thing in nature has a spirit

• Islam: becomes an important social and religious force as kingdoms rise and fall

Trading Kingdoms

• West Africa– Ghana (800-1000)– Mali (1200-1450)– Songhai (1450-1600)

• East Africa– Axum

• Located on Red Sea• Merging of cultures• Judaism & Christianity

introduced

• What was traded?– Salt & Gold– Salt from the Sahara

traded for gold from the savanna regions

– Iron, copper & other minerals

MANSA MUSA & TIMBUKTU• Mansa Musa was

Mali’s most powerful ruler

• Borders were extended & his warriors protected & controlled the land

• Mansa Musa converted to Islam & made a pilgrimage to Mecca

• Mansa Musa builds a university in Timbuktu & students of Islam travel from all over the Muslim world to study there

• By the 1400s, Timbuktu is a leading center of learning

Mansa Musa: Depiction of him holding a gold nugget, created c.

1375

Sankore Mosque in Timbuktu

Discovery of Timbuktu by westerners; c. mid-1800s

Africa & Global Trade

• Seas link continents– Mediterranean– Red Sea

• Ocean– Indian ocean

• Goods make their way to African coasts and then traded across the seas

• Hausa-1300s-the Hausa people built city-states in present day Nigeria– Caravans across the

Sahara– Dominate Saharan trade

routes by 1500

• Benin-people from coastal rainforest in Guinea– Trade ivory, pepper, &

slaves– Cast bronze & brass

East African City-States• 600CE=Arab &

Persian merchants set up trading communities

• 1000CE=port cities (like Mogadishu) trading w/India

• Slaves captured inland and sold to Persian merchants

• Trade leads to mixing of cultures

• Swahili = the language spoken by the people of this blended culture– Arabic words mixed

with Bantu words