Great Black Cities Of The Ancient World

THEBES Thebes is the Greek name for a city in Ancient Egypt, natively known as NOWE, located about 800 km south of the Mediterranean, on the east bank of the river Nile within the modern city of Luxor. The Theban Necropolis is situated nearby on the west bank of the Nile. As the seat of the Theban Triad of Amun, Mut, and Khonsu, Thebes was known in the Egyptian language from the end of the New Kingdom as niwt-imn, "The City of Amun." Thebes was inhabited from around 3200 BC. ...According to George Modelski, Thebes had about 40,000 inhabitants in 2000 BC (compared to 60,000 in Mamfe (Greek ''Memphis''), the largest city of the world at the time). By 1800 BC, the population of Mamfe was down to about 30,000, making Thebes the largest city in Egypt at the time. By the Amarna period (14th century BC), Thebes may have grown to be the largest city in the world, with a population of about 80,000, a position which it held until about 1000 BC, when it was again surpassed by Mamfe (among others). With the 19th Dynasty the seat of government moved to the Delta. The archaeological remains of Thebes offer a striking testimony to Egyptian civilization at its height. The Greek poet Homer extolled the wealth of Thebes in the Iliad, Book 9 (c. 8th Century BC): "... in Egyptian Thebes the heaps of precious ingots gleam, the hundred-gated Thebes." In 664 BC, the Assyrian army sacked Thebes during their invasion of Upper Egypt.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thebes,_Egypt The City Of A Hundred Gates ''References have been made to Thebes, and they may have seemed to be almost passing references. Yet Thebes was the most important single city in the entire history of the black people. The whole series of lectures could be properly based on Thebes. The history of Black Africa might well begin at Thebes. For this was truly the "Eternal City of the Blacks" that presented the most compelling evidence that they were the builders of the earliest civilization in Kem, later called Egypt, as well as the great civilization in the South. The foundation of Thebes, like the black state of which it was the center, goes back so far in prehistory that not even a general stone age period can be suggested.'' - Dr Chancellor Williams, 'The Destruction of Black Civilization: Great Issues of a Race from 4500BC to 2000AD' Thebes In Pictures ......................... Ancient Egyptians Pharaoh Tutunkamun ''...let us never forget the central fact about Thebes, not even for a moment. For if the Blacks had never left a single written record of their past greatness, that record would still stand, defying time, in the deathless stones of Thebes, of her fallen columns from temples, monuments, and her pyramids; a city more eternal than Rome because its foundation was laid before the dawn of history, and its plan was that copied by other cities of the world . If the Blacks of today want to measure the distance to the heights from which they have fallen, they need go no farther than Nowe (Thebes) - Dr Chancellor Williams, 'The Destruction of Black Civilization: Great Issues of a Race from 4500BC to 2000AD' MEROE Meroë was the southern capital of the Napata/Meroitic Kingdom, that spanned the period c. 800 BC — c. 350 AD. According to partially deciphered Meroitic texts, the name of the city was Medewi or Bedewi (Török, 1998). Excavations revealed evidence of important, high ranking Kushite burials, from the Napata Period (c. 800 - c. 280 BC) in the vicinity of the settlement called the Western cemetery. The site of the city of Meroë is marked by more than two hundred pyramids in three groups, of which many are in ruins. They are identified as Nubian pyramids because of their distinctive size and proportions. The culture of Meroë developed from the Twenty-fifth Dynasty of Ancient Egypt, which originated in Kush. The importance of the town gradually increased from the beginning of the Meroitic Period, especially from the reign of Arrakkamani (c. 280 BC) when the royal burial ground was transferred to Meroë from Napata. Ruins of Meroe KERMA Kerma (now known as Dukki Gel, a Nubian term which can be roughly translated as "red mound" was the capital city of the Kingdom of Kerma, which was located in present day Egypt and Sudan. Kerma is one of the largest Nubian archaeological sites. It has produced decades of extensive excavations and research, including thousands of graves and tombs and the residential quarters of the main city surrounding the Western/Lower Deffufa. The Kerma site has been confirmed by archaeology to be at least 9,500 years old.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kerma Kerma Ruins The Nubian Capital and Its Artifacts In the past thirty years (1977-2003), archaeologist Charles Bonnet's systematic excavation of Nubian Kerma has presented a better picture of the site than was previously possible. We now know it held at least 10,000 inhabitants by 1700 B.C.... The evolution of its residential area is highly complex, yet it seems to correspond to a protected zone reserved for an elite population, much like African capitals further south in later periods. Unlike many other Kerma sites, the capital had spacious homes inhabited by dignitaries who monitored the trade in merchandise arriving from foreign lands, and who evidently (to judge from the numerous local-style scarab seals) supervised shipments dispatched from administrative buildings. The site reveals signs of a vibrant culture rather different from ancient Egypt not only in the subject matter of its art (featuring more sub-saharan African fauna) but in the extensive use of faience, mica, ivory and quartz, glazed quartz and innumerable bracelets and necklaces. Especially distinctive are Kerma ceramics, considered among the most elegant from the ancient world. A vast abundance of sherds of blue faience characterizes the Kerma archaeological site. This has attracted much scholarly attention. It seems that the people of Kerma developed faience technologies independently of Egypt (Julian Henderson, The Science & Archaeology of Materials, London: ROutledge 200: 54), and were manufacturing unusual new crafts such as glazed quartzite, faience pots and architectural inlays http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kerma

TIMBUKTU ''The city's maximum population during the 1400s probably numbered somewhere between 50,000 to 100,000, with approximately one-quarter of the population composed of scholars and students. During the fourteenth century, the legend of Timbuktu as a rich cultural center spread through the world.... in 1354 the great Muslim explorer Ibn Batuta wrote of his visit to Timbuktu and told of the wealth and gold of the region. Thus, Timbuktu became renown as an African El Dorado, a city made of gold...''http://geography.about.com/cs/worldfacts/a/timbuktu.htm BENIN EMPIRE The Benin Empire (1440–1897) also known as Bini Land was a pre-colonial Edo state in what is now modern Nigeria....A series of walls marked the incremental growth of the sacred city from 850 AD until its decline in the 16th century. In the 15th century Benin became the greatest city of the empire created by Oba Ewuare. To enclose his palace he commanded the building of Benin's inner wall, a seven-mile (11 km) long earthen rampart girded by a moat 50 feet (15 m) deep. This was excavated in the early 1960s by Graham Connah. Connah estimated that its construction, if spread out over five dry seasons, would have required a workforce of 1,000 laborers working ten hours a day seven days a week. Ewuare also added great thoroughfares and erected nine fortified gateways. Excavations also uncovered a rural network of earthen walls 4 to 8 thousand miles long that would have taken an estimated 150 million man hours to build and must have taken hundreds of years to build. These were apparently raised to mark out territories for towns and cities. Thirteen years after Ewuare's death tales of Benin's splendors lured more Portuguese traders to the city gates. The state developed an advanced artistic culture, especially in its famous artifacts of bronze, iron and ivory. These include bronze wall plaques and life-sized bronze heads depicting the Obas of Benin. The most common artifact is based on Queen Idia, now best known as the FESTAC Mask after its use in 1977 in the logo of the Nigeria-financed and hosted Second Festival of Black & African Arts and Culture (FESTAC 77). Fortification of Benin City The defensive fortification of Benin City, the capital, consisted of ramparts and moats, call iya, enclosing a 4000 square kilometer (2485.5 miles) of community lands. In total, the Benin wall system encompasses over 10,000 kilometres (6213.7 miles) of earth boundaries. Patrick Darling, an archaeologist, estimates that the complex was built between 800 and 1000 up to the late fifteenth century (Keys 1994: 16). Advantageously situated, the moats were dug in such a manner that earthen banks provided outer walls that complemented deep ditches. According to Graham Connah, the ditch formed an integral part of the intended barrier but was also a quarry for the material to construct the wall or bank (Keys 1994: 594). The ramparts range in size from shallow traces to the immense 20-meter-high rampart (66 feet) around Benin City (Wesler 1998: 144). The Guinness Book of World Records describes the walls of Benin City as the world's second largest man-made structure after China's Great Wall, in terms of length, and the series of earthen ramparts as the most extensive earthworks in the world. During the second half of the 15th century, Oba Ewuare the Great ordered a moat to be dug in the heart of the city. The earthworks served as a bastion and also afforded control of access to the capital which had nine gates that were shut at night. Travel notes of European visitors also described the Benin walls (e.g. Pacheco Pereira 1956: 130-147; Dapper 1668). It was finalized around 1460, at that time being the world's largest earthworks. http://wysinger.homestead.com/ogiso.html

DONGOLA Dongola is a deserted town in Sudan located on the east bank of the Nile opposite the Wadi Al-Malik. An important city in medieval Nubia, and the departure point for caravans west to Darfur and Kordofan, from the fourth to the fourteenth century Old Dongola was the capital of the Makurian state. The urban center of the population moved downstream 50 miles (80 km) to the opposite side of the Nile during the nineteenth century, becoming the modern Dongola. Dongola

KILWA Kilwa became a large city East Africa as early as 1000 AD, when the earliest stone structures were built, covering perhaps as much as 1 square kilometer (about 247 acres). The first substantial building at Kilwa was the Great Mosque, built in the 11th century from coral quarried off the coast, and later greatly expanded. More monumental structures followed, by the fourteenth century including the palace of Husuni Kubwa. Kilwa became a major trade center from the 1100s to the early 1500s..http://archaeology.about.com/od/tanzania/a/kilwa.htm Early Times "Of the original people who built Kilwa Kisiwani, the first were of the Mtakata tribe, the second the people of Jasi from the Mranga tribe. Then came Mrimba and his people. This Mrimba was of the Machinga tribe and he settled at Kisiwani." Oral tradition. 16th Century "The city comes down to the shore, and is entirely surrounded by a wall and towers, within which there are maybe 12,000 inhabitants. The country all round is very luxurious with many trees and gardens of all sorts of vegetables, citrons, lemons, and the best sweet oranges that were ever seen… The streets of the city are very narrow, as the houses are very high, of three and four stories, and one can run along the tops of them upon the terraces… and in the port there were many ships. A moor ruled over this city, who did not possess more country than the city itself." Gaspar Correa describing Vasco da Gama's arrival in Kilwa. http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/africa/features/storyofafrica/5chapter3.shtml

GREAT ZIMBABWE Great Zimbabwe is a ruined city in the southeastern hills of Zimbabwe near Lake Mutirikwe and the town of Masvingo, close to the Chimanimani Mountains and the Chipinge District. It was the capital of the Kingdom of Zimbabwe during the country's Late Iron Age. Construction on the monument by ancestors of the Shona people began in the 11th century and continued until the 14th century, spanning an area of 722 hectares (1,780 acres) which, at its peak, could have housed up to 18,000 people. It is recognised as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO. .....................................

AXUM The Kingdom of Aksum or Axum, also known as the Aksumite Empire, was an important trading nation in the area of what is now Eritrea and northern Ethiopia, which existed from approximately 100–940 AD. It grew from the proto-Aksumite Iron Age period c. 4th century BC to achieve prominence by the 1st century AD, and was a major player in the commerce between the Roman Empire and Ancient India. The Aksumite rulers facilitated trade by minting their own currency, the state established its hegemony over the declining Kingdom of Kush and regularly entered the politics of the kingdoms on the Arabian peninsula, eventually extending its rule over the region with the conquest of the Himyarite Kingdom. The Axumites erected a number of large stelae, which served a religious purpose in pre-Christian times. One of these granite columns is the largest such structure in the world, standing at 90 feet. Under Ezana (fl. 320–360), Aksum later adopted Christianity. In the 7th century, early Muslims from Mecca also sought refuge from Quraysh persecution by travelling to the kingdom, a journey known in Islamic history as the First Hijra. Its ancient capital, also called Aksum, was in northern Ethiopia. The Kingdom used the name "Ethiopia" as early as the 4th century. It is also the alleged resting place of the Ark of the Covenant and the purported home of the Queen of Sheba.

KUMBI SALEH Kumbi, also called Koumbi Saleh, last of the capitals of ancient Ghana, a great trading empire that flourished in western Africa from the 9th through the 13th century. Situated about 200 miles (322 km) north of modern Bamako, Mali, Kumbi at the height of its prosperity, before 1240, was the greatest city of western Africa with a population of more than 15,000. http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/324779/Kumbi Ruins of Kumbi Saleh