Africa may have been a secondary center for domestication, that was also influenced very early by domesticates and possibly movements of people from Southwest Asia. Plants indigenous to Africa (in a band running from east to west south of, and including much of, the Sahara desert) include African rice and African yams (a related but different species than the rice and yams found in eastern Asia), sorghum, bulrush and finger millet, the oil palm, and of course coffee. (At least some of us regard this last plant as an essential food group!) For animals, the donkey and possibly cattle were indigenous to northern Africa; without question the donkey was first domesticated in Africa as early as 5,000 B.C.
Today the Sahara Desert covers some 3.5 million square miles across the entire northern part of Africa, stretching from the Red Sea in the east westward to the Atlantic Ocean, and including parts of the southern Mediterranean coastline. Semi-arid areas to the south of the desert (called the Sahel) abruptly are replaced by the wetlands even further to the south. The contrast is very evident from space, as indicated below.
NASA Photo of Africa (public domain photo)
After the end of the Pleistocene however, and up to approximately 3000 BC, much of the Sahara and the semi-arid lands to the south were lush areas, with numerous lakes and rivers that were home to crocodiles and Nile perch that could weight up to 300 pounds. It was in this area that foragers in the immediate post-Pleistocene began utilizing the wild grains of African rice,millet, and sorghum, as well as African yams. At some point subsequent to 8000 B.C. they may well have started to domesticate these plants. The entire area is poorly known archaeologically, with many sites either buried by shifting sand dunes, or totally eroded away.
One area that has been excavated may contain both evidence of early cattle pastoralism, and a megalithic calendar. This is Nabta Playa, located in extreme southern Egypt in what is today part of the Sahara.
Nabta Playa is located in the red circle in southern Egypt
In the area of Nabta Playa (not required--but at least look at the photos) small seasonal camps of cattle herders are found as early as 8,000 BC, and the domestication of cattle may possibly have been an indigenous development. By 6,000 BC sheep and goats had been introduced from southwest Asia. Pottery was also very early in the area, and though rare it is dated beginning approximately 8,500 B.C. This is before farmers occupied the Nile River valley in northern Egypt. These early cattle herders may have regarded cattle in much the same way as the more recent pastoralists in Africa, a kind of walking refrigerator that provides people with meat and blood for food, but which are only killed and eaten for ceremonial reasons. In the actual campsites, cattle bones are rare. Nabta Playa eventually became a major regional ceremonial area, and here are found eight burials of adult cows. At least one of the burials was in a large tomb dug into the ground, with a clay frame and a wooden roof. The burial was then covered by a mound of rocks some 24 feet in diameter, and 3 feet high. The other burials were not as elaborate, but were covered by stones. Dating on the bones indicates the cattle were buried around 4,500 BC.
Also found at Nabta is a circular stone calendar, made from sets of upright stone slabs, each approximately ten feet high, and brought more than a mile to their present location.
Sketch of Stone Circle at Nabta Playa, as it may have looked originally
Studies of this site indicate that at the summer solstice, the sun rises over a specific pair of large stones; this may have been an important date because normally the summer monsoon rains would soon follow.
In the same area are 30 complex stone structures, made of large elongated unshaped, or roughly shaped, upright sandstone blocks. Each structure is an oval of about 15 by 12 feet, were built over eroded tablerock, and served an unknown function. There are no associated artifacts.
By 3,000 BC, the monsoon rains no longer came so far north, and the area was abandoned. There is considerable speculation that at last some of these cattle herders moved north and influenced the development of the early Egyptian political state, where cattle were deified. There will be more on the developments in Africa in the next unit.
In general, the development of horticulture in Europe follows much the same story as in other areas, with the rise of population, various sorts of technological innovation, and the ultimate development of competing chiefdoms. In general horticulture, pottery, and many innovations appeared first in southeastern Europe, borrowed or brought from southwest Asia, and then worked their way to the northwest corner of Europe. The earliest horticultural sites appear in southeastern Europe prior to 7,000 BC, while horticulture did not arrive in northwestern Europe until close to 3,000 BC.
Horticulture moved into Europe via two paths, earliest along the Mediterranean coasts of Greece and its related islands (see text on Franchthi Cave, p. 511), and very shortly afterward from the mouth of the Danube River in the Black Sea northwest into much of Europe.
Map illustrates the two routes from Turkey and SW Asia: 1)Via coast of Greece and Italy, and 2) Via the Danube (shown in red)
Some of the earliest farmers in Europe have been identified as the Bandkeramik culture , (sometimes called the LinearBandkeramik, or Danubian culture) a people known for a particular style of pottery decorated with incised lines. It is still debated as to what extent this culture represents and invasion of peoples from southwest Asia via the Danube River. The alternative hypothesis would stress diffusion via the Danube River. In all likelihood, both an invasion of people and the adoption of horticulture by local foragers were involved.
Within a few hundred years of its appearance in the middle Danube valley at about 5,700 BC, the culture spread into Belgium and eastward into the Ukraine. Dependent upon domesticated cattle, these people probably also independently domesticated pigs. [The pig is one of the few animals with several centers of domestication, since the wild ancestors were found in many locations across the Eurasian land mass.] Horticultural practices had to be continually adjusted to the shorter growing seasons of northern Europe; the main crops were wheat and lentils. People lived in villages of 60 or more people, building rectangular wood and thatch houses up to 46 feet long, which sheltered families, their grain, and perhaps their animals.
. On the whole the spread of the small communities of Bandkeramik appears to have been peaceful, with many groups moving into unoccupied heavily forested areas. There was some trade, as shells from the Mediterranean are found at many sites, as well as axes made from a stone found only in Poland. Some of the relatively small sites appear to have specialized in the manufacture of pottery, flint blades and stone axes, and traded extensively with other areas. At one site, in northern Belgium named Darion, a ditch and a large palisade were built around the community, perhaps indicating conflict with more northern foraging peoples.
By the time horticulture reached the Atlantic coast in Europe, many groups had began to build large stone burial chambers, called megaliths, or more specifically, dolmens. Most dolmens appear to date from between 4,500-2,000 BC, though it is possible some were not actually used for burials. In most, however, a burial area in or on the ground was surrounded by a chamber of large stones laid without mortar, usually with a large stone placed on top; the entire chamber was then buried by an earthen mound. Some contained a stone covered passage at one end, and were the recipient of multiple burials. (Your text, p. 526) refers to these types as passage graves and gallery graves; all are generally contained in the term dolmen.
Dolmen in Ireland (2,500 BC) The earth mound which once covered it is gone. (From The Last Two Million Years, Readers Digest,1973, p.35)
Picture and Drawing of Multiple Burial Tomb, England. Forty-five individuals were buried here at different times around 2,500 BC (From The Last Two Million Years, pp. 34-35.)
These structures are found literally by the tens of thousands along the coast of the Atlantic and in England, Scotland and Ireland. Since dolmen sites are often widely scattered, and are accompanied by a variety of different pottery styles, and house construction types in different areas, it is often assumed that different cultures were united by religious beliefs that involved the burial practices. Grave goods are rare, so it is difficult to determine if the burials were only that of important chiefs, and representative of status differentiation like the grave at Varna (p. 513 in your text.) Archaeologists have often found evidence in that pots of food and drink were regularly placed near the entrance of the tombs. This may indicate that people returned over many generations to honor their ancestors.
Distribution of Megalithic Tombs in Europe (From Images of the Past, Price and Feinman, 1993, p.465)
In addition to the dolmens, large standing stones called menhirs are found (text p. 524-527). Often individual stones, though sometimes involving several stones standing in a line, the largest menhir known (in Locmariaquer, France) stood 75 feet high (like a six story building) and weighed as much as 350 tons. The largest lines of more than 3,000 stones is found at Carnac, also in France (check the link for photos.)
Probably the best known of the megalithic monuments in Europe built by early farmers are the henges. Sometimes of wood, but often of both stone and wood, these circular arrangements are believed to have astronomical significance, and like Nabta Playa in Egypt (but 1000 years later), marked the summer solstice. The most famous of these, Stonehenge in England, is discussed in the text on pages 528-531.)
The difficulty of erecting the megalithic monuments, and the labor involved, may well indicate that in many areas of Europe chiefdoms had developed our of the horticultural tribes prior to 2,500 BC. This story will be continued in the last unit.