How to Create Advanced Civilizations in Africa?

Ceranthor

Banned
Sub-Saharan Africa hasn't had much by way of large, advanced civilizations, for a variety of reasons. What could allow it to spawn nations culturally on par with Greece, or militarilly on par with Rome? Maybe the eradication of the tsetse fly, or less hostile environments in the Congo?
 

Chairwoman Roxelana

Ceranthor said:
Sub-Saharan Africa hasn't had much by way of large, advanced civilizations, for a variety of reasons. What could allow it to spawn nations culturally on par with Greece, or militarilly on par with Rome? Maybe the eradication of the tsetse fly, or less hostile environments in the Congo?
Click to expand...


Remove the existance of the Sahara and *Poof* you have an africa thats advanced.
 
Cuāuhtemōc

Cuāuhtemōc

Banned
White men.

Serious response you need something way back in the BCs to pull something off. Maybe a prolonged Nubian domination of Egypt.
 

freodhoric

Some of what they had was pretty awesome. I think maybe their problem was that they didn't have very many connections with other civilizations, just over the Sahara AFAIK. I'm thinking of Songhai and Empire of Mali, but there were others i know next to nothing about, like Great Zimbabwe and Empire of Ghana.

I'm getting a stupid idea about a remnant of Carthage booted out of the Mediterranean, but holding the Canaries and trading up and down the Atlantic coast.
 

The Sandman

Banned
Eliminate the tsetse fly and make the Congo navigable along the bulk of its length. Starter crops to allow the independent development of agriculture in the Congo basin and South Africa wouldn't hurt either.

And maybe a geologic event that diverts part of the Nile's flow towards the Red Sea. Above the First Cataract would be ideal, since you want to have water travel between the Med and Red without relying on man-made canals.
 

wolf_brother

Banned
Ceranthor said:
Sub-Saharan Africa hasn't had much by way of large, advanced civilizations, for a variety of reasons. What could allow it to spawn nations culturally on par with Greece, or militarilly on par with Rome? Maybe the eradication of the tsetse fly, or less hostile environments in the Congo?
Click to expand...

Obvious troll is obvious :rolleyes:
See:
african-empires-wiki.jpg

​
Source: Wikipedia (this board won't display .SVG images)
 
Last edited:
TapReflex

TapReflex

Requirements for a large subsaharan civilization

Well,
You'd need a navigable river for both irrigation and trade.
The Extermination of Protozoan parasites (like Malaria and Yellow Fever)
You'd require a bit more edible crops and forage,
abundant and renewable rescources much greater than today,
domesticatable animals,
A culture that is monotheistic and embracing,
A mild unchanging climate,
and metal weapons wouldn't hurt.
 

MNP

wolf_brother said:
See: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e7/African-civilizations-map-pre-colonial.svg :rolleyes:
Click to expand...
I don't think he was obviously trolling, just ignorant.

On a somewhat related note I came across an interesting theory for why the population of Sub-Saharan Africa stayed fairly low relative to other parts of the world. Because humans evolved there, it was our biological niche and that means nature limited our numbers to keep us from being an invasive species. When we left Africa we were like rabbits in Australia--massive eventually destructive population explosion.
 
Beedok

Beedok

MNP said:
I don't think he was obviously trolling, just ignorant.

On a somewhat related note I came across an interesting theory for why the population of Sub-Saharan Africa stayed fairly low relative to other parts of the world. Because humans evolved there, it was our biological niche and that means nature limited our numbers to keep us from being an invasive species. When we left Africa we were like rabbits in Australia--massive eventually destructive population explosion.
Click to expand...

That's a cool idea. Though aren't Australian Aborigines thought to be the most 'truly human'?
 

mosodake

Beedok said:
That's a cool idea. Though aren't Australian Aborigines thought to be the most 'truly human'?
Click to expand...

Why is that? They are thought to be one of the first groups to leave Africa I think, but the roots of all DNA haplogroup mutations are found in Africa, making it where we evolved. IIRC, genetic diversity is also highest in Africa. Interestingly, though Africa abounds in diseases that are very good at killing us (HIV to name one), most of the major epidemic diseases are from Asia, possibly because large scale domestication of animals was more pronounced there.
 

Codae

wolf_brother said:
Obvious troll is obvious :rolleyes:
See:

​
Source: Wikipedia (this board won't display .SVG images)
Click to expand...
How would Eurasia look with the same criteria as that map for state inclusion?

What if you restricted the timeframe to something a bit more manageable?
 

Midas

To be fair to the peoples who inhabit these regions many large empires have sprung up that probably remained technologically on par with lots of the world via. trade and local innovation. The problem was a lot of this gets whitewashed in the ra-ra Eurocentric history that tends to dominate our train of thought. The empires in Axum and Mali were pretty significant, and the Kingdom of Kongo had trade relations with Portugal for hundreds of years before being colonized.

If you want an "advanced civilization" in Africa you probably just want more writing, documentation, and preservation of said documentation if foreign invaders colonize the regions as iotl. Plenty of these states existed, we just have so little information on them.
 

wolf_brother

Banned
Codae said:
How would Eurasia look with the same criteria as that map for state inclusion?

What if you restricted the timeframe to something a bit more manageable?
Click to expand...

Well you just hope into Photoshop and create such an image. ;) I was merely using an available resource from Wikipedia. If you have a complaint with the image, I'd take it there.

Though honestly I don't understand your point. Judging from the states shown the time-frame is something akin to 1000 BCE to 1500 CE. Though now as great as Eurasia, I'd venture to guess a similar time-frame for a map of the Americas would show the same amount of states and civilizations. The idea that Africa was somehow 'left behind' in human history is something that deserves to be (and has been) mentioned in the historical misconceptions thread.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top
Top