HISTORY138 - Africa Part 1: From the Cradle of Civilization to European Dominance
My last several blogs have been about the history of Greenland, China, and Iran - all in the news for months, and conveniently all prominent in this year’s Great Decisions Discussion Program on international relations, in which I participated. I finished that program wishing that I had known more about the history of each country involved. The final subject of discussion was Africa - a continent and history that I knew very little about. So, following my driving objective of researching and writing about subjects of interest that I know little about, this blog and the next, will discuss the history of Africa. In Part 1, after an introduction to the continent of Africa, I will discuss the prehistory of Africa, including the origin of human beings, and evolution from hunter-gatherers to settled farmers; followed by a discussion of the precolonial history of Africa in five convenient geographical regions: northern, western, central, eastern, and southern Africa. ...