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The Real History of Africa They Never Taught You | Full Documentary | Africa's Great Civilizations — Transcript

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0:22Host: No matter what we look like today,
0:24we're all directly descended
0:26from ancestors who evolved on the African continent.
0:31The oldest human population emerged in Africa.
0:36Africa is the home of the world's
0:37most ancient civilizations.
0:41Far too often, Africa has been thought of
0:43as isolated and static,
0:46but nothing could be further from the truth.
0:49The roots of every family tree
0:52trace here to Africa.
0:55And so does the history of civilization.
0:58In this series, we'll be going on a journey
1:01through 200,000 years of history.
1:06We'll explore great cities
1:08built along Africa's extensive trade networks,
1:11discover art of unparalleled beauty
1:13and technical brilliance,
1:16and marvel at thousands of years
1:18of breathtaking architecture.
1:21Driving all this were Africans
1:24who prospered, created, and suffered
1:27through their rich, sometimes tragic,
1:29yet endlessly fascinating history.
1:34This is a seldom-told story of how Africans,
1:37by shaping their own worlds,
1:40shaped the larger world as well.
2:17Africa's Great Rift Valley.
2:20This is where humanity's story most likely begins.
2:30Homo sapiens, anatomically modern humans,
2:33have lived here for about 200,000 years.
2:40This great geological fault,
2:42stretching 3,000 miles through Africa,
2:44from Ethiopia to Malawi,
2:47with its great lakes and savannas
2:49full of animal life,
2:50gave our ancestors the perfect environment
2:54in which to evolve.
2:58Man: The Rift Valley, it's like a crucible,
3:02like in a chemistry lab,
3:04where humans have been tested.
3:07Because nature constantly tests
3:09different parts of the species.
3:12Those who can fit the environment or the situation
3:16that is around survive and continue,
3:19and the others, you know, get replaced.
3:26[Thunder]
3:29Host: In 1997, the rains fell heavily
3:32in Ethiopia's northern Rift Valley.
3:35Layers of sediment dislodged,
3:38revealing an extraordinary find--
3:41a human skull.
3:43It's one of the oldest Homo sapien remains
3:46to be found anywhere in the world.
3:49Scientists named the skull Idaltu, meaning firstborn,
3:53and Idaltu walked these valleys
3:55160,000 years ago.
3:58Dr. Berhane Asfaw was one of the scientists
4:01who made the discovery.
4:03This is one of the few specimens
4:05that we found almost complete.
4:10The whole, the face and the brain case.
4:13And the most impressive thing about this is
4:16even at this early age,
4:19the face is modern Homo sapien,
4:21the brain case is modern Homo sapien,
4:24the shape from the back is a modern Homo sapien.
4:27It's exactly us.
4:32Host: The anatomy and age of Idaltu's skull
4:35provided the strongest evidence yet
4:38that anatomically modern humans
4:40emerged in Africa.
4:43Man: Each stage of the evolution
4:45toward modern humans,
4:47it takes place in Africa.
4:49Asfaw: When we found Homo sapien Idaltu,
4:51it's very important because it pushes the time far back.
4:56It means anatomically modern Homo sapiens
4:59started walking on this planet
5:02much earlier than we thought,
5:05and the interesting thing Is
5:07at the same time, Europe was packed with Neanderthals,
5:12which are completely different from Homo sapiens.
5:18Host: One of Africa's most respected paleoanthropologists
5:22is Dr. Richard Leakey.
5:24He and his colleagues have made groundbreaking discoveries
5:27about how our species evolved on the African continent.
5:31I've come to meet him at his institute in Nairobi, Kenya.
5:35How do we know
5:37that the first human beings
5:40evolved on the African continent?
5:42The fossil evidence and the archaeological evidence
5:45that's come to light in the last 20, 30 years
5:47is very, very substantial,
5:49testable, and real.
5:51Why do you think this idea
5:53was so disturbing in some quarters?
5:56Historically, the science of paleoanthropology
5:58or anthropology came into existence at a time when
6:02we really knew very little.
6:05Africans were considered primitive, heathen, who knows.
6:08And the origins of the subhuman status of Africans
6:14begins, really, in the 18th century.
6:16In the Enlightenment, ironically enough.
6:18They weren't really considered to be
6:21one of our species.
6:23Host: Continuing archaeological finds
6:25and now major scientific breakthroughs
6:28have confirmed that Africa absolutely
6:32was the cradle of humanity.
6:34Man: It's like if we're exploring our past
6:37and looking at where our roots are sunk down,
6:39we'll find that they're the deepest in Africa,
6:41and that's where we get most of our genetics.
6:45Host: Geneticists have identified
6:47an astonishing link to our earliest human relations
6:50through our DNA.
6:53Every living person shares a common direct
6:55maternal ancestor.
6:57She's known as Mitochondrial Eve.
7:00We believe that she was part of a small group of humans
7:03who lived in this region of Africa
7:06around the time of the Idaltu skull.
7:09Man: Our common ancestry through the Mitochondrial Eve
7:13means that our genetic differences
7:15are literally skin deep.
7:17That at the bottom, we are all
7:20descended from the same family.
7:22Host: Mitochondrial DNA, found in our cells,
7:25is the genetic signature passed down through females
7:28from mother to child.
7:30What it means is that this was a woman, hypothetically,
7:33who lived 200,000 years ago,
7:35who had enough daughters in a continuous chain,
7:38straight back so that her mitochondrial DNA survived.
7:41Absolutely right.
7:45And all of us today, no matter what we look like,
7:48are descended from Black ancestors?
7:51Yeah, that is exactly,
7:53that's what happened.
7:54All the humans, all the Homo sapiens
7:57all over the world, be it yellow, white, Black,
8:01we are descended from a common ancestor
8:04in Africa.
8:06What would life for human beings
8:08200,000 years ago have been like in this valley?
8:12200,000 years ago, I would imagine
8:14the groups were quite small.
8:16Mm-hmm.
8:18The dangers around, we had predators,
8:20things like hyenas
8:22and groups of carnivores all around.
8:24Mm-hmm.
8:25It's difficult for us to imagine
8:28prehistoric life or a world without
8:31any trappings of the things that have
8:35come to define humanness over the last 10,000 years,
8:38and so, in the modern zeitgeist,
8:40the only thing that comes close
8:42is actually the post-apocalyptic
8:44zombie shows, for example.
8:47You have small bands of people
8:50roaming the landscape, working together,
8:53fighting off predators that are trying to eat them,
8:56and worried about the other groups of humans
8:59that they might bump into.
9:01So, there are a lot of interesting parallels
9:02that could be drawn.
9:05Host: Modern Homo sapiens
9:07initially lived only in Africa,
9:09slowly spreading across the continent
9:11over 120,000 years.
9:16But between 80,000 and 50,000 years ago,
9:18they began successfully to populate
9:21the rest of the world.
9:25Host: So, what happened 80,000 years ago?
9:27Leakey: Well, I wish we knew what happened,
9:28but there's no doubt at all
9:30that a very small population
9:31somewhere in that time zone
9:33caught some adaptation that gave them a huge advantage.
9:35I have a feeling it might have been speech.
9:38I don't know what it was.
9:39But they spread very quickly out of Africa.
9:41So, 80,000 years ago,
9:43the human community was Black.
9:46Wherever they were in the world.
9:49Host: But when those early human beings
9:51migrated out of Africa,
9:52they weren't traveling alone.
9:55They were carrying something within them.
9:58And that something had developed slowly, over millennia.
10:02it was culture.
10:04That culture would develop to include
10:06the greatest achievements of human creativity,
10:10and it began here on the African continent.
10:18In 1991, archaeologist Christopher Henshilwood,
10:23exploring his grandfather's land,
10:25discovered the opening to a cave
10:27on a cliff face
10:29above the crashing waves
10:30where the Atlantic and Indian Oceans collide.
10:35Today, we call this the Blombos Cave.
10:39Inside is evidence of over 140,000 years
10:43of human habitation,
10:45and signs of the first form of human creative expression.
10:50Before this discovery, we thought
10:52the earliest examples of artwork
10:54were found in the Lascaux caves in France,
10:57dating back only 35,000 years ago.
11:00Hawks: When people began making discoveries in southern Africa,
11:03like at Blombos Cave, they realized
11:06that actually, this record of artistic production
11:09goes back much further than anyone guessed.
11:12In France, cave paintings 30,000 years old,
11:1535,000 at the oldest.
11:17In southern Africa, we're talking about
11:1890,000, 100,000 years.
11:22Woman: Blombos Cave is a relatively recent discovery,
11:25so, the more research we do in Africa,
11:30and also the more dating we conduct,
11:34this will change people's minds of how
11:38we saw human history,
11:40and the evidence shows
11:42they were already assessing the cognitive behavior
11:46that we see as defining the modern human
11:50before they left Africa.
11:53Host: Small ochre blocks found in the Blombos Cave
11:57completely changed how we understand
11:59the development of human creativity.
12:03One of these blocks, covered in curious markings,
12:06is now housed in the Iziko Museum in Cape Town.
12:11Woman: It's unique in terms of
12:14firstly where it was found
12:15and the date-- it's pretty old.
12:1777,000 years ago. Mm.
12:19What is interesting is the etching.
12:21It's almost a hashed etching on the one edge,
12:25and that is done with purpose.
12:27I've often thought that if
12:29pigment was put on it,
12:30you could use it as a stamp,
12:32which to me screams artistic expression.
12:35Mm-hmm. Meaning.
12:37Meaning. Symbolic meaning.
12:39So, this would make it one of the earliest
12:42artistic artifacts that we have.
12:45This is a sign of a group of people who
12:48had managed to emerge above
12:52immediate concerns for food
12:54and basic human survival.
12:57That says something about Africa and Africans.
13:00I think so. It shows that
13:02these people were cognizant of their surroundings.
13:06They were socially aware.
13:09It shows the birthplace
13:11of a very rich cultural heritage
13:14that has in the past not been recognized.
13:18This is artwork.
13:21Host: Alongside the ochre block,
13:23a painting kit was found.
13:26That ochre block was not only decorated,
13:28it was ground down, mixed with water and minerals,
13:32and used as paint.
13:35Lewis: Once a group is into symbolic expression,
13:39whether it be via beads or
13:41using colorants to paint the body or to paint walls,
13:44that's gonna be another very important behavior
13:47to use for communicating complex sets of ideas
13:51about group identity and also to help transmit information
13:55to other members of your immediate group.
13:57Host: Much of this early art has perished with time,
14:01but cave art provides us with the only snapshots
14:04of how early human beings lived, hunted, and even loved.
14:09Hawks: We just get the durable element,
14:11but when you're painting your skin,
14:13when you're painting hides that you might be wearing,
14:15when you're using feathers and other kinds of
14:19really special objects but perishable objects,
14:22you know, when we look at societies today,
14:24they have this incredible range
14:26of things that would never survive
14:28in the archaeological record.
14:31Host: Deep in the Libyan desert,
14:33in a remote cave at Wadi Sura,
14:36miles from any lush vegetation today,
14:39a stunning visual record reveals a quite surprising picture
14:43of daily life in the Sahara 7,000 years ago.
14:48The walls of the cave teem with depictions
14:51of people swimming and animals grazing,
14:54glimpses into a long-lost landscape.
14:57Mire: You have the Cave of Swimmers.
15:00There you have your history recording, if you like,
15:04where we are getting an idea of
15:07a place where we today cannot even imagine
15:11any life surviving.
15:12we have lakes and the depictions of the swimmers
15:17and very abundant wildlife thriving in the Sahara,
15:23a place now we know for sand dunes.
15:29Host: However, the Sahara was once
15:31a completely different environment,
15:33capable of sustaining these emerging human communities.
15:37Today, the Sahara is very barren and dry,
15:39but from rock art, we find that there are
15:41a lot of aquatic fauna, hippo, crocodile, giraffes.
15:45A very vibrant biodiversity.
15:47Host: So, in this case,
15:49art verifies archaeological evidence.
15:52Yes. It tells us more about how
15:54the landscape has changed
15:55or how the environment has changed.
15:59Abaka: Over 10,000 years ago,
16:01the Sahara was actually a green savanna.
16:04There were animals, fishes, lakes, rivers,
16:09and right across what is now the Sahara,
16:12the environment was green.
16:15Ehret: This was the kind of environment
16:16that attracts the great herbivores,
16:19the large herding animals.
16:22The hippopotamuses, rhinos.
16:24This would have been a time when those
16:26were the important animals.
16:27Host: Although early humans
16:29continued to be hunter-gatherers,
16:31over time, they began to cultivate plants,
16:34and around 10,000 years ago,
16:37across Africa and the Middle East,
16:39they began to breed animals as livestock
16:42and domesticate cattle.
16:44The Sahara became this band
16:46where these people spread their livestock grazing.
16:49Mire: Everywhere across the Sahara,
16:51you have vast scenes of paintings of these animals,
16:55but also, I think, it kind of also shows that
16:59this is them going towards the domestication of animals
17:05and settle in a sedentary society.
17:09Hawks: When you look at Africa, it's the cradle of mankind, but
17:13looking into the development of agriculture,
17:16it becomes a cradle of civilization.
17:19[Man speaking native language]
17:21Ehret: Between 4,800 and 4,200 B.C.,
17:24more than 1,000 years before the rise of ancient Egypt,
17:28in the areas west of the Nile,
17:31the first complex African society forms.
17:35It's not a settled society of towns,
17:38but it's people who raise great herds of cattle.
17:43Host: For 3,000 years, these communities,
17:46and the world around them,
17:48continued to evolve.
17:50Farming developed, and populations grew.
17:54But by 4,000 B.C.,
17:56vast areas of the lush savanna
17:59had turned into desert.
18:02Life for the people of the green Sahara
18:04is brutally transformed.
18:05Everything changes,
18:08setting civilization in Africa
18:10on a radical, new path.
18:14Woman: There was a slow change in climate,
18:17thus making traditional pastoral ways of life
18:21far more difficult for people.
18:26Host: In the face of this climate change,
18:28the populations of the Sahara dispersed.
18:32And many people migrated towards the fertile lands
18:35of the Nile Valley,
18:38becoming the ancestors of both the Egyptians
18:41and the Nubians.
18:45Abaka: The verdant valley of the Nile
18:48was an attractive place for communities to settle.
18:51Hawks: The Nile is like this green river through the desert,
18:55and the regular floods create this incredible soil,
18:59so that once you have the domestication of plants,
19:02this becomes the breadbasket of the Mediterranean basin,
19:06and you've got that happening
19:09as people are developing villages and states.
19:13Ehret: There's pressures that arise as population grows
19:16that leads to foundation of more complex societies.
19:20Bradshaw: The population becomes divided
19:22between the food-producing groups
19:24and the non-food-producing groups,
19:26and what we see with the non-food-producing groups
19:28is that they become artisans, professional builders,
19:31so they have a surplus of food,
19:34and this is the point at which
19:36we start seeing things that we might call civilization.
19:40Host: Burial pits in the Nile Valley
19:42have been the source of rare and unique artifacts
19:45dating back more than 6,000 years.
19:49They show a rich, creative culture.
19:52These prestige items were crafted by artisans
19:56to be enjoyed by elites.
19:59Host: How old is this?
20:00So, this dates about 3,600 B.C.
20:04Really? This is 6,000 years ago.
20:07Yeah.
20:08So, the brothers and sisters
20:10back in the Nile Valley
20:12were combing out their hair with an Afro comb.
20:14Yes. Just like Afro combs, these long, thick combs
20:19would've been perfect for African hair,
20:21and this is an item that would proclaim
20:23status and identity and make a statement.
20:27They're often found in the burial
20:29still in the hair, very prominently placed,
20:31so these symbols would've been visible.
20:34Just the way Black people wear them today.
20:36Absolutely.
20:38Black people were combing their hair with Afro combs.
20:40I thought we invented this in the sixties.
20:42[Laughter]
20:43Amazing. So, the burials at that date
20:45were pit burials.
20:47In the dry sand, often it preserves
20:49organic materials.
20:51We can actually do an archaeology
20:53of hairdos and hairstyles.
20:55Oh, what kind of hairstyles?
20:56They've got all sorts.
20:57They've got the use of henna and fake hair
20:59and big bouffants.
21:01There's even a suggestion we've got
21:02some Mohawks as well.
21:04That's astonishing.
21:05So, the people who made this were
21:07highly-skilled craftspeople.
21:09They were making beautiful pottery.
21:11Very skilled at making stone vessels.
21:13All up and down the Nile Valley at this time
21:16you see groups creating very vibrant,
21:19personal culture that they would wear and display.
21:22Mm-hmm.
21:24Ehret: You get this coming in of people from the Sahara,
21:26bringing ideas that even more complex,
21:29larger-scale institutions can be built,
21:32and then development of little, tiny kingdoms.
21:37Man: Different groups are uniting
21:38under powerful figures or perhaps
21:41local deities or fetishes or emblems,
21:43and then these groups consolidate.
21:45One is victorious over another.
21:47They get larger and larger
21:48and smaller in number.
21:52Host: In 1988, archaeologists discovered a tomb
21:56at Abydos, 300 miles south of Cairo.
22:01The tomb is thought to contain
22:02one of Egypt's earliest rulers,
22:05credited with consolidating the lands
22:07that would become ancient Egypt.
22:11He's known as the Scorpion King
22:13and is believed to have ruled at the end
22:15of the fourth millennium B.C.
22:21little is known about him or his reign,
22:24but his royal tomb housed 150 small ivory tags
22:29covered in carved symbols
22:31that helped to rewrite the history of civilization.
22:36These simple ivory tags revealed something astonishing.
22:40Something that overturned what archaeologists believed
22:43about how our ancestors communicated.
22:46The symbols on these tags aren't artworks.
22:50They are in fact the world's first writing.
22:54Man: Egyptian writing as we know it,
22:57as in fully developed Egyptian hieroglyphs,
23:00appear first around 3,250 B.C.E.
23:03and some of the earliest pieces
23:05are these little labels, these little ivory tags
23:09from Tomb U-j at Abydos.
23:13Host: Similar tags from this burial complex
23:16are now kept at the Petrie Museum in London.
23:19This is a formative stage of hieroglyphic writing.
23:22So, what does it say?
23:24It's been suggested that
23:25it might be a place name.
23:26This is a prestige item.
23:29And what was it used for?
23:30So, you can see there's a hole
23:32just drilled through there,
23:33and that would have been tied to a box or a bag,
23:37indicating property.
23:39So, this would've said,
23:41"This property belongs to Alice"?
23:43[Laughter] It could've done,
23:44or it could've said, "This material
23:46comes from this part of Egypt."
23:49And do you have any idea
23:51what the function of this
23:53property identification system was?
23:56This object is only being used
23:59by the elite, by royalty,
24:00and it's about royal ownership of
24:04parts of Egypt, parts of labor,
24:07over materials.
24:10Host: We used to believe the first writing
24:11began in Mesopotamia, modern-day Iraq and Syria.
24:16But these small tags proved that writing developed
24:19simultaneously and independently here in Africa.
24:23as to which language is older,
24:25there's a huge debate that continues to rage.
24:28Darnell: I think we can say that
24:30ancient Egyptian writing
24:32develops independent of writing
24:36in ancient Mesopotamia,
24:38and develops really almost at the same time,
24:41although this Egyptian writing appears to be
24:44in some frequent use a little bit before
24:49we seem to get true, fully developed cuneiform.
24:55The concentration of resources
24:57led to a concentration of power,
25:00resulting in the first kings ruling over wide areas.
25:03Maintaining that power
25:05required the ability to communicate,
25:08and maximizing the capacity to communicate
25:12led to the development of writing.
25:14Abaka: And so, writing became a tool for organizing society.
25:18Also became a tool for domination in that sense.
25:21It became a tool for ruling over people.
25:26Host: The evolution of writing
25:27enabled Egypt's rulers to maintain power
25:30and established a system of royal ascendancy.
25:34Darnell: It looks as though Tomb U-j,
25:36that has this earliest Egyptian writing in it,
25:38it's also the first tomb that can be followed
25:43in a line of development that leads us
25:45right to the pyramids of the Old Kingdom.
25:48Woman: From the first king of the First Dynasty
25:50until the pyramids is a relatively short period of time.
25:53So you have the creation of an Egyptian bureaucracy
25:57and within a few centuries, you have
26:00the construction of the pyramids.
26:03Host: And the most spectacular pyramid of all
26:07is the Great Pyramid of Giza.
26:10It's the most famous and the most iconic building
26:14in the entire world.
26:15A triumph of scientific innovation
26:18and artistic imagination.
26:20Built for the Pharaoh Khufu,
26:22who came to the throne around 2,600 B.C.
26:25and ruled for about 27 years,
26:27the Great Pyramid took his entire reign to complete.
26:31The project required 2,300,000 stone blocks,
26:37each weighing an average of 2 1/2 tons.
26:42The pyramid would remain the tallest building on Earth
26:45for nearly 4,000 years.
26:48The Great Pyramid is an African construction,
26:50and we shouldn't forget that, and I find it fantastic
26:53to think about Khufu and his courtiers sitting around
26:57and saying, "We're going to do something
26:59"that no one else has conceived of.
27:01Let's make something bigger, more impressive."
27:05Colleen Darnell: With the ancient pyramids, we really see
27:07all of the strong suits of ancient Egypt
27:09come to the fore.
27:10So you have their geological wealth of limestone
27:14and you also have the advanced Egyptian mathematics
27:17and engineering skills
27:19alongside this very large labor force.
27:22Der Manuelian: You don't pull that off with
27:24Hebrew slaves and all of these myths
27:25that really have no basis in reality.
27:27The pyramids were built by Egyptians.
27:30They were conscripted from all parts of the country.
27:32When the Nile is in flood,
27:34that, of course, plays a role, too.
27:35Colleen Darnell: During those months, farmers could do
27:37very little with their fields,
27:40and they could be employed to build the pyramids,
27:42and that was also part of the ways
27:44that you could pay your taxes in ancient Egypt.
27:50But while Egypt would dominate northeastern Africa,
27:53further south, on the banks of the Nile
27:56in modern-day Sudan,
27:58another center of power was growing.
28:02It was the capital of the ancient kingdom of Kush--Kerma.
28:09Digging in the Sudanese sand
28:11between 1913 and 1916,
28:13archaeologists led by Harvard professor George Reisner
28:17stumbled across a pit filled with human bones
28:21and the burial mound of one of the last kings of Kerma.
28:24Bradshaw: Around 322 remains of humans were found
28:28in one elite burial in the eastern cemetery.
28:32This, of course, initially was thought to be human sacrifice.
28:36Host: Reisner estimated the bodies dated back
28:39to about 1,500 B.C.,
28:41but evidence in other burial sites
28:42shows the practice of human sacrifice
28:45dates back even further.
28:47Bradshaw: Death in Kerma,
28:48particularly for the elite,
28:50seemed to be something of a spectacle.
28:52However, these may very well have been retainers
28:55who would have served the king in life
28:57and thus would serve him in death.
28:59Even the idea that these were slaves
29:01captured in foreign wars and killed
29:04as a sort of triumphal act.
29:10Host: The earliest settlement in Kerma
29:12has been dated to 4,000 B.C.
29:16Settlements in Mesopotamia
29:18formed into the earliest cities.
29:21But recent archaeological finds show that Kerma
29:24was developing into a complex society
29:27at the same time.
29:29By 2,500 B.C., it's estimated
29:32that the city's population
29:34had grown to over 10,000,
29:37and its power and wealth
29:39rivaled that of its Northern neighbor Egypt.
29:45Today, little remains of what was once
29:48a magnificent planned city,
29:50built around monumental architecture
29:52as grand as that of early Egypt.
29:54Bradshaw: The archaeology of the city itself
29:56centered around what seems to be
29:59a vast structure.
30:00This is known as the Deffufa.
30:02Different scholars have different ideas
30:04about what it could be.
30:08In terms of mud brick architecture,
30:10it certainly seems to be the largest
30:11and earliest in Africa.
30:14Host: The Nubian kingdom
30:15had its own distinct culture and religion
30:18and was renowned for its deadly archers.
30:52Host: For over 2,000 years,
30:54the kingdoms of Kush and Egypt
30:56prospered and grew
30:58as kindred civilizations
31:00at opposite ends of the Nile valley.
31:02By 1,500 B.C., Egypt was the world's greatest power,
31:07controlling trade routes to the Middle East.
31:10But Egypt's gateway to the precious resources
31:13of the interior of Africa was Kush.
31:18Kush supplied luxury items such as gold
31:21to Egypt's flourishing 18th dynasty.
31:24From Tutankhamen's face mask
31:27to the trading expeditions led by Hatshepsut
31:30and the wealth amassed by Queen Nefertiti,
31:34Egyptian pharaohs required
31:35endless supplies of exotic goods
31:38to help their passage into the afterlife.
31:41It's difficult to imagine any people anywhere
31:44who resisted the finality of death more lavishly
31:48than did the Egyptians.
31:50The king's sacred tomb
31:52would be filled with every conceivable luxury
31:55to accompany him through the afterlife.
31:59Leopard skins, ostrich feathers, ivory, precious stones,
32:04and gold from Nubia's bountifully laden mines.
32:08Darnell: Gold is the skin of the gods.
32:10The goddess Hathor, as face of the sun,
32:13is the woman's face en face
32:15with the cow ears as gold.
32:19Colleen Darnell: It is a metal that never corrodes,
32:22and so they recognized this as being
32:26the perfect material for funerary goods.
32:31Bradshaw: We see the royals being adorned with gold
32:34and we find from myriad, even lesser elite houses,
32:38we see gold objects.
32:40Darnell: the gold mining regions of the eastern desert
32:42really force the ancient Egyptians
32:45and the ancient Nubians to continue
32:48the close associations they already culturally had.
32:51It's one of the reasons why Egypt can't let go of Nubia
32:56and it's one of the reasons Nubia is
32:58both so attractive and potentially dangerous.
33:01The relationship between Egypt and the Kushite kingdom
33:04was one of intimacy, proximity, and bitter rivalry.
33:10The Egyptians felt threatened by Nubia
33:12and wanted to control the gold mines themselves.
33:16Bradshaw: The kingdom of Kerma and Egypt
33:18seemed to have had what you might call
33:19a difficult relationship.
33:21At this point, the Egyptians were writing of Nubia
33:24as "vile Kush," so we know there was certainly
33:27a lot of venom from the Egyptian side.
33:29Eventually, rivalry led to conflict,
33:33culminating in a war that would bring to an end
33:3715 centuries of independent Kushite rule.
33:42Hawks: Every time you have civilizations
33:44develop in the world,
33:45what you have is warfare and bloodshed.
33:48Because other people want the stuff that you've got.
33:51And that becomes a part of the history of civilization.
33:55Host: Around 1,500 B.C.,
33:57standing at the prow of a flotilla of ships,
34:00Pharaoh Thutmose I
34:02led his troops to war
34:04against the Kushite kingdom.
34:07Thutmose I, not born of royal blood,
34:11had served as a general to the previous pharaoh
34:14and earned a reputation as a formidable military strategist.
34:22For the Egyptians, Nubia was a very strategic location.
34:26Bradshaw: What we see is Thutmose is going
34:28very determinedly to the south.
34:31He sacks the city of Kerma.
34:33To sack the capital city of this kingdom
34:37was truly a feat.
34:38The Nubians were well-Known warriors and fighters.
34:42There are stories of thousands
34:44of captured prisoners of war
34:46being executed in a variety of different ways.
34:49Lest anyone doubt the finality of the conquest,
34:52Thutmose strapped the body of the fallen Nubian King
34:56to the front of his ship.
34:58"Egypt is the chief," he declared,
35:01"while peoples across the whole Earth are her servants."
35:07Colleen Darnell: Nubia became a second part of Egypt.
35:10Bradshaw: The 18th Dynasty is really a period of time when
35:13the Egyptian presence in Nubia expands.
35:16Host: For 400 years, the people of Kush
35:19would struggle under and against Egyptian rule
35:22while Egypt plundered the kingdom's gold mines
35:25through annual tribute.
35:27Kushite royal traditions survived,
35:30South of the regions that Egypt ruled.
35:34Darnell: All of Nubia is incorporated
35:36into Egypt more fully than ever before.
35:40Nubia gets a shadow government
35:43that mirrors pharaonic Egypt.
35:45You get a viceroy of Kush,
35:47the king's son of Kush,
35:49who, like pharaoh, is in charge of all of Nubia.
35:53Host: The Egyptians also brought along
35:56their culture and their gods.
35:59Colleen Darnell: We know that already in the 18th dynasty,
36:01the ancient Egyptians were building temples in Nubia
36:04to Egyptian gods, but
36:06Egyptians gods that had a local relevance
36:09for the Nubians.
36:11Host: Amun, god of gods in Egypt for 400 years.
36:17700 years later, the Kushites made this all-powerful deity
36:22their own,
36:23incorporating him
36:25into their pantheon
36:27alongside their lion-headed god Apedemak.
36:30The Egyptians built an awe-inspiring temple to Amun
36:34at the southernmost tip of their Nubian empire
36:38at the holy site of Jebel Barkal.
36:41This would also become a sacred place
36:43for the Kushites.
36:45Man: For the ancient Egyptians and the ancient Kushites,
36:47this pinnacle symbolized a serpent
36:50that was a protective deity
36:52on the crown of the pharaoh
36:53that spit fire and poison at the pharaoh's enemies.
36:56So, this is what gave Jebel Barkal
36:59its mystical association that led Egyptians and Kushites
37:03to build and rebuild and expand
37:05their temples over the centuries.
37:07Host: But after 1,100 B.C.,
37:09parts of Kush regained their independence,
37:12and by 750 B.C., Egypt,
37:15following invasions by Libyan tribes,
37:18was greatly diminished and fragmented.
37:21Around 750 B.C., Piye,
37:25a new Kushite king,
37:26came to the throne.
37:28He was brilliant and ambitious,
37:31driven in part by his fervent worship
37:33of the god Amun.
37:36Emberling: He clearly made Jebel Barkal an important place.
37:39Uh, he built a palace here,
37:41he very significantly expanded the temple,
37:44and, uh, Barkal was very clearly the center
37:47of his symbolic assertion of kingship.
37:52Host: Piye turned his sights northward to Egypt,
37:55portraying Kush as the champion of Amun.
37:58Darnell: Nubia appears to see itself
38:01as the real Egypt
38:04because they're the real worshippers
38:07of the Egyptian gods.
38:09Colleen Darnell: It's remarkable that the Nubians
38:12adopted Egyptian culture and religion and civilization
38:16to the point that they believed
38:18that they were better Egyptians than the Egyptians who were
38:21currently in control of the Nile Valley.
38:23So, when Piye invades Egypt,
38:26he does so in the name of the god Amun.
38:30Piye essentially casts his invasion of Egypt as a holy war,
38:34of the re-establishment of the proper worship of the god Amun.
38:41At the head of a powerful army,
38:43Piye set sail north down the Nile,
38:46ready to invade the once impregnable
38:49empire of Egypt.
38:50He ordered his men to purify themselves in the river.
38:54"I shall let Egypt," he said,
38:57"taste the taste of my fingers."
39:03In a campaign that lasted nearly a year,
39:05Piye's army conquered Egypt as far north as the Nile Delta.
39:10Triumphant, Piye was crowned pharaoh of Nubia and Egypt
39:15and founder of the 25th Dynasty of Egypt's pharaohs.
39:19The Kushites, once the conquered,
39:22now became the conquerors,
39:24reuniting fragmented Egypt under their rule.
39:28Colleen Darnell: We can see the Nubian conquest of Egypt
39:31as both a holy war
39:32and a strategic expansion to the north,
39:34and obviously, it was a great prize
39:37to rule both Egypt and Nubia.
39:39Ehret: They're ruling over an empire
39:41that runs from Meroe down in the south,
39:44clear up to the delta,
39:46larger than any territory Egypt itself ever ruled.
39:50Darnell: In some ways, it can be seen as a turning of the tables
39:53that Nubia, who's always the underdog,
39:55now has Egypt as the underdog.
39:57It simply shows, I think, over and over again,
40:01how Upper Egypt and Nubia
40:04are so closely associated, ideologically.
40:09Host: This was the start of a new era in Egypt
40:12which would see it ruled by a dynasty
40:15that historians call the Black Pharaohs of the Nile,
40:20restoring prosperity and stability
40:22back to Egypt.
40:30But across Africa, in the lush forest
40:33of modern-day Central African Republic,
40:36new radical technological innovations
40:39were laying the foundation for other civilizations.
40:43Sometime between 1,800 B.C. and 1,500 B.C.,
40:48small communities of craftspeople
40:50gathered to stoke furnaces, intending to fire ceramic.
40:56But in the lateritic African soil,
40:59the craftsmen discovered a by-product--iron.
41:04Iron is one of those inventions that
41:07actually has a tremendous impact.
41:09Ehret: We suspect the first usages
41:11were for decoration, for ornamentation.
41:14But very quickly, people began to see,
41:17"Oh, hey, we can shape this."
41:19Woman: Each metal has a certain quality--
41:21iron for its strength,
41:23and the kind of tools that one can create with it.
41:26Fourshey: In terms of converting economies
41:30from hunting and gathering to agriculture,
41:33iron began to be used particularly as currencies,
41:36but also in terms of agricultural production.
41:39Host: We previously thought that iron had been discovered
41:42in Turkey, around 1,500 B.C.,
41:45but new evidence reveals that iron working emerged
41:48at the same time in Africa.
41:51Bradshaw: For a long time,
41:52the idea that iron could be smelted
41:55in sub-Saharan Africa was completely dismissed.
41:58Ehret: The new evidence is that ironworking
42:01begins right in the heart of Africa.
42:04We find dates of around 1,000
42:07in the Lake Chad area.
42:09900 as we get towards the middle of Nigeria.
42:13700 B.C. to 500 B.C. over in Mali.
42:16Showing the spread of iron coming out of that area.
42:19Fourshey: Even with the kinds of technology that we have today,
42:22it's incredibly difficult to produce a smelt
42:27in the way that people would have,
42:29you know, 3,000 years ago.
42:30People talk about civilizations,
42:33and they think everything new and exciting
42:35begins in the civilization.
42:37Turns out when you look at history,
42:39human beings create advanced new technologies
42:44out of their own experiences.
42:46They don't have to live
42:47in this kind of society
42:48or that kind of society.
42:51Host: The ironworking communities of Central Africa
42:54left little tangible evidence of their existence behind,
42:58but they did leave their technological legacy,
43:01together with the sophisticated artistic heritage
43:04unique to this part of Africa.
43:08Near the center of modern-day Nigeria
43:10during the first millennium B.C.,
43:13a remarkable artistic tradition of terracotta sculpture emerged.
43:17These pieces are highly sophisticated,
43:19intricately detailed, and technically accomplished.
43:23Yet much of the culture from which they were created
43:25remains a mystery.
43:27They're known as the Nok terracottas
43:30and they are sublime.
43:33In 1943, a farmer from a village called Nok
43:38gave archaeologist Bernard Fagg the head of a scarecrow.
43:42On closer inspection, Fagg estimated
43:45that the finely sculpted head dated back to around 900 B.C.,
43:50making it, outside of Egypt,
43:52the earliest sculptural art found in Africa.
43:55They have this very elaborate hairstyles
44:00and every heavy jewelry around the neck.
44:04So, we assume it depicts people,
44:07maybe high ranking people, in ceremonial attire.
44:13Preston Blier: The current thinking is that it was probably
44:15traveling artists who were moving around
44:17creating these works for individuals.
44:20It could have been courts
44:21or distinctive religious traditions.
44:23That certainly makes a lot of sense
44:25simply because of the breadth of the distribution of these works.
44:31Ehret: The height of the Nok period
44:32is during the last thousand years B.C.
44:35this is the period in the archaeology
44:36we know the iron working is reaching this area.
44:42Host: Throughout Central Africa,
44:44new communities were taking shape.
44:46From 3,000 B.C., an incredible
44:49movement of people and technologies unfolded
44:52that would change the face of Africa.
44:55It's known as the Bantu migration.
44:58Fourshey: The migration is particularly significant because
45:01about 2/3 of sub-Saharan Africa is populated by Bantu speakers.
45:06By 1,000 B.C.E., Bantu have entered into eastern Africa
45:11and societies like the Swahili society that we know of
45:14and the Zulu that we know in southern Africa start to emerge.
45:19Host: While the people of Central Africa were building
45:21new societies based on iron,
45:24this great technological advancement
45:26was also transforming the civilizations along the Nile,
45:30and nowhere more so than in Meroe.
45:34Built on what was once a fertile green island
45:36on the banks of the Nile,
45:38Meroe by 500 B.C. had become
45:42the new capital of the independent Kingdom of Kush.
45:46Woman: It was an area that supported agriculture,
45:50that had the royal city there.
45:51So, life was probably
45:53relatively comfortable for most of the population at Meroe.
45:58Host: The rulers of the Third Age of Kush
46:01created a powerful kingdom,
46:04evidence of which can still be seen
46:07in their monumental legacy at Meroe.
46:11These pyramids were burial chambers
46:12for the kings and queens of Meroe.
46:15More than 100 dot the skyline on this island.
46:21The wealth of Kush had been founded
46:23on its abundant reserves of gold,
46:25which it could trade with the ancient world.
46:28But there was another resource
46:30that would generate wealth for the state
46:32and would come to define Meroe.
46:35Yellin: It's long been known that Meroe
46:36was an ironworking center
46:38because there were these enormous slagheaps
46:41in their urban part of the town
46:43that was used for weapons, iron blades, iron spearheads.
46:49Host: And those weapons would be needed to defend Kush
46:51in the face of a new threat.
46:54In 31 B.C., Cleopatra's Egypt--
46:58once the greatest empire in the Mediterranean--
47:01was defeated by the Romans.
47:04The Roman military machine
47:06was the most powerful in the ancient world,
47:09annexing territories from Britain
47:11to the Middle East and Africa.
47:14Now it turned its sights onto Kush.
47:17Yellin: One of the things the Romans did
47:19is they pushed the southern boundary of Egypt
47:22further into Meroitic territory,
47:24and what we do know is that
47:27the Meroites started to push back.
47:30Host: Halting this Roman advance
47:32would call for strong and decisive leadership from Meroe.
47:37One of the most unusual things about the Kingdom of Kush
47:40is the surprising number of queens that ruled.
47:43They were known as Kandakes.
47:45Yellin: In about 100 years,
47:47we have 4 of these tremendously powerful Kandakes
47:51and they are terrifically effective.
47:55Host: Without doubt the most famous of those queens
47:58was a one-eyed warrior named Amanirenas,
48:02who risked her life in battle
48:04to defend her kingdom
48:06and make sure that her people could live securely.
48:10Amanirenas reigned from 40 B.C. to 10 B.C.
48:14said to have the figure of a man
48:16by the Greek philosopher Strabo,
48:18she had a fearsome reputation
48:20as a military leader and strategist.
48:23For 5 years, Amanirenas led attacks into Roman Egypt,
48:28preventing the Romans from invading Kush.
48:31These battles were recorded in Roman documents,
48:34but a firsthand account written by the Kushites themselves
48:37was recorded in their own Meroitic script.
48:41Host: When does this stela date from?
48:44Man: It dates from the second half
48:46of the first century B.C.
48:48so... during the reign of the Queen Amanirenas.
48:51In the case of Meroitic,
48:53the writing system has been deciphered
48:55already a century ago,
48:57but it is the language that is a problem.
49:01So, why with all...
49:03computer technologies,
49:04why can't we crack the one African written script
49:09from the ancient world?
49:10It is a bit as if I was
49:12asking you as an English native speaker
49:15to read me a text in Polish.
49:16You would be able to read it perfectly,
49:19but probably you won't
49:20be able to understand it,
49:21except place name and names.
49:23This is where we are with Meroitic script.
49:26Well, it's about a particular battle with the Romans.
49:28Exactly. So, this is giving us
49:31the narrated version of the story
49:33of the war against the Romans.
49:34Unfortunately, we are not able yet
49:36to see what they are saying.
49:39Host: Amanirenas showed her utter disdain
49:42for the Roman emperor Augustus Caesar
49:44by capturing his bronze bust during an attack on his forces
49:48and placing it beneath the threshold of her grand temple
49:52to be trodden under foot by all who entered.
49:56So, all the people in the kingdom
49:57are stepping over the great
49:59Caesar Augustus, is that it?
50:00Man: Yes. According to the archaeological evidence
50:04we have, it's, uh, clear.
50:07She brought back the head of Augustus,
50:09of his bronze statue.
50:13Host: Despite the might of the Roman empire,
50:15Amanirenas' clever military tactics
50:18eventually brought both sides to the negotiating table,
50:22where the formidable Nubian queen
50:24successfully brokered a peace treaty
50:26with Augustus Caesar himself.
50:29Host: Are you telling me
50:31a one-eyed Black woman
50:34was able to defeat the most powerful army
50:36on the face of the Earth in 23 B.C.,
50:40here in the Kingdom of Kush?
50:42Yes. Yeah, that's what happened.
50:45Host: Amanirenas, the victorious African queen,
50:48would ensure the independence of the Kushite kingdom
50:51and its splendid culture
50:53for another 400 years.
50:56Human history was born on the African continent,
51:00which makes Africa the well spring from which
51:03all of the world's history flows.
51:08Africa is the birthplace of art and music,
51:11the first writing, agriculture,
51:14and systems of laws.
51:17Africa gave us the blueprint for civilization itself.
51:21These records speak to us across millennia
51:24as profound refutations of the claim
51:27that Africans lacked a history
51:29before Europeans arrived.
51:31This is the true history of Africa,
51:34and it's only just begun.
51:38In the following centuries, the world's great religions,
51:42Christianity and Islam,
51:44molded in their infancy in Africa,
51:47would grow and transform the fate of the world.
51:50Great empires would prosper
51:52and cultures would blossom as a result,
51:55but they would also draw the continent into bloody conflict.
52:09"Africa's Great Civilizations" is available on Blu-ray and DVD.
52:13To order visit shoppbs.org or call 1-800-Play-PBS.
52:18This series is also available for download from iTunes.

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