1. African Civilizations and the Spread of Islam
AP World History

2. Marinate on this…
Earlier in this unit, we learned about Pre-Columbian Civilizations…. The Americas on the eve of European invasion.
Just as Pre-Columbian civs were forever changed by European conquest, so too were traditional African societies we learn about here.
Though many aspects of traditional African civilizations survived, Africa was irrevocably changed by the European “Scramble for Africa.” More about Euro colonization later.
Relevant to what you just learned about the Islamic World, you will see how the spread of Islam impacted African civs as well.

4. The Continent of Africa
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5. 1000 different languages; 1000+ different tribes

6. The Classical Period in Africa
The Kushites seem to have established a monarchy- divine kingship.
Kingdom of Kush was defeated by a rival kingdom called Axum by 300 B.C.E.
Axum fell to another regional kingdom, Ethiopia. Axum and Ethiopia had contacts with the eastern Mediterranean world until after the fall of Rome.
Greek-speaking merchants had considerable influence, and it was through them that Christianity was brought to Ethiopia by the 4th c C.E.
Ethiopian Christianity flourished in isolation to modern times.
For sub-Saharan Africa, the further extension of agriculture was the major development up to 500 C.E.
Toward the end of the classical era, important regional kingdoms were forming in western Africa, leading to the 1st great state in the region: Ghana.

7. African Development
Differences in geography, language, religion, and politics contribute to Africa’s lack of political unity.
No universal states, nor universal religions
Christianity and Islam do find adherents in Africa, sometimes leading to large empires.

8. Stateless Societies Organized around kinship
Lacking the concentration of political power and authority normally associated with the “state”
No taxation
Dissenters encouraged to move to other sparsely populated areas to create their own community.
External pressures, warfare, large building projects and the impact of long-distance trade causes many of these societies to move towards the formation of states.

9. Common Elements…
Bantu migrations offered a linguistic base for Africans
Different dialects
Animism: belief in the power of natural forces personified as spirits or gods in the form of dancing, drumming, and sacrifice.

10. African Diviner (Shaman)

11. Fetishes

12. Rubbing Oracle, wood

13. Economics of Africa
North Africa: involved in Mediterranean and Arab Trade system
Sub-Saharan varies from one region to the next- mostly agricultural.
Throughout the post-classical period, increased international trade was apparent

14. Arrival of Islam
Northern Africa has always been part of the classical world
After the age of the Pharaohs, Egypt was an important part of the Greek Empire, then later in the Roman Empire.

15. Arrival of Islam
Toward the end of the Roman Empire, Christianity had taken hold in Mediterranean Africa.
Between 640 and 700 CE followers of Muhammad swept across Northern Africa.
By 670, Muslims ruled Tunisia

16. Arrival of Islam
Conversion was fast and easy in North Africa with the success and unity of the Abbasid Dynasty.
This unity will break down eventually, and North Africa will divide into several separate states, but Islam endures.

17. What does Islam offer Africa?
All Muslims are equal within the community of believers made acceptance easier.
Islamic tradition of uniting the powers of the state in a ruler reinforces the concept of the African King.
The equality of the umma put Africans legally at the same level as the Arabs.

18. However… Practices differ considerably at the local level.
Social Stratification
Ethnic divisions
Gender differences

19. North African Christianity
Christian converts were made in Egypt long before the conversion of the Roman Empire.
Christian kingdom of Axum, with communities in Nubia and Egypt (Copts).
Copts maintained religious connection with the Byzantine Empire. When Egypt was conquered by the Arabs and converted to Islam, the Copts were able to keep their religion.

20. North African Christianity
The Ethiopian kingdom that grew from Axum in the 13th and 14th centuries was the most important Christian outpost.
Constant struggle with Christian Ethiopia and Muslim Somalia

22. Kingdoms of the Grasslands
Merchants and travelers spread the word of Islam from North Africa across the Sahara towards the Savanna on the southern edge of the Sahara

23. The Grasslands
The SAHEL was the extensive grassland belt at the southern edge of the Sahara.
African state of Ghana had already formed there by the 8th Century.
TRADE:
Exchange gold from the forests of West Africa for salt from the Sahara (or goods from North Africa)
Camels, introduced from Asia, had improved trade possibilities.

24. The Grasslands
The SAHEL becomes an active “coast” of trade between the forests to the south and North Africa.
States develop along with trading cities to take advantage of their position as intermediaries in the trade.

26. Ghana The “first” of the West African Kingdoms
Rose to power in the 3rd Century CE by taxing the heavy Gold-Salt trade within its borders.
By the 900’s, its rulers converted to Islam and Ghana was at the height of its power.
Almoravid armies invade Ghana in 1076, and even though it survives, its power was in decline, such that by the beginning of the 1200’s (13th Century), new states emerged in the savanna.

27. Ghana

28. Common elements in West African States
Patriarch, or council of elders as leaders
Territorial core with peoples of the same linguistic or ethnic background
Power extended over subordinate communities which were often the result of conquest
Rulers were sacred and were surrounded by rituals.
Islam was used to reinforce indigenous ideas of kingship.
Mali and Songhay fit the description of the fusion of Islamic and African culture.

29. The West African Kingdoms

30. Mali Created by the Malinke people who broke away from Ghana.
Rulers supported Islam by building mosques, and supporting preachers.
In return, sermons would encourage loyalty to the king.
Mali became a model of the Islamicized Kingdom

31. Mosque at Jenne

32. Mali Economic base was agriculture
Sundiata: Malinke leader who led towards prosperity as the state of Mali.
Mansa = emperor
Crime was severely punished (as evidenced by Ibn Batuta, the Arab traveler).
Security of travelers and trade was a key element to Mali’s success as a state where commerce plays such an important role

33. Mali Sundiata dies around 1260 CE.
Of his sucessors, Mansa Musa was the most famous (r )

34. Mansa Musa!!!
Mansa Musa’s fantastic voyage, and the history of Mali in general underlines the fact that Sub-Saharan Africa was never totally isolated from Egypt, West Asia, and the Mediterranean.
Mansa Musa's Musical Debut
Made a pilgrimage to Mecca in 1324 with 100+ camels and a blinged out entourage.
His wealth and polished manners dazzled all in his path.
Spent so much gold in the markets of Cairo and gave so much in alms that the price of gold declined due to its ample supply.

35. Mali
Cities and towns of West Africa came to be modeled after North Africa, but with a distinctive flair.
Cosmopolitan court life.
Timbuktu was a center of culture and learning.
By the 14th century Timbuktu had a population of 50,000.
Contained a library and university.
80% of the villagers lived by the agricultural lifestyle.
Labor intensive
Polygamy was common

36. Songhai
Songhai begins to form around the 7th century. By 1010, a capital had been established at Gao on the Niger River.
Rulers became Muslim
Dominated by Mali for a while
By 1370’s, had established themselves as an independent state
Under the leadership of Sunni Ali ( ) the Empire of Songhai began.
Tactical commander
Ruthless leader.
Successors known as askia’s.
Muhammad the Great expanded the borders of the empire.

37. Songhai
Remained the dominant power in the region until the end of the 16th century.
In 1591, a Muslim army with muskets crossed the Sahara and defeated the larger forces of Songhai.
Songhai split up, but other groups experienced success:
The Hausa peoples of Northern Nigeria

38. Political Life
Unified states allowed the various communities, clans, and ethnic groups to coexist.
Movement and fusion of populations was constant in the Sudanic Kingdoms
Common religion and law provided solidarity and trust to the merchants.
Organized under Muslim concept of a ruler who united civil and religious authority.

39. Political Life
Formation of large state heightened social differences and made societies more hierarchical.
Islam tended to accommodate pagan practices and beliefs. Large populations of Mali and Songhai never converted.
Many Sudanic states were matrilineal, which is contrary to patrilineal lines of kinship in the Sharia, or Islamic law.

40. Slavery
Slave trade between Africa and the Islamic World predated the arrival of Islam
Muslims viewed slavery as a stage in the process of conversion.
Slaves were used as domestic servants, laborers, soldiers, eunuchs, concubines.

41. The Swahili Coast of East Africa
From the Horn of Africa to modern-day Mozambique lay a string of Islamicized trading cities with contacts from Arabia, Persia, India, and China.
As in the Savanna Kingdoms of West Africa, Islam was slow to reach the general population in East Africa, and when it did, it was a fusion of indigenous beliefs and the new Islamic faith.

42. East Africa
Coastal cities developed from the mixture of Bantu migrants, as well as with Indonesian seaborne migrants.
Settled on the island of Madagascar, introducing bananas and coconuts.
Coastal villages of fishers, farmers dotted the coast

43. East Africa Zenj: Arabic for the East African Coast.
13th Century: urbanized East African trading ports develop.
Shared Bantu-based and Arabic Influenced Swahili (coastal) language.
Different Muslim ruling families, but similar language united them in trade.
Towns such as Mogadishu (Somalia), Mombasa, Malindi (Kenya), Kilwa, and Zanzibar (Tanzania).
Ibn Batuta said of Kilwa that it was “one of the most beautiful and well-constructed towns in the world”

44. East Africa
Kilwa was wealthy because of its access to the Gold produced in the interior.
Many port towns were tied to each other in an active trade network.
1300s-1400s: large sailing expeditions stopped at the East African coast for ivory, and gold.
After 1431, only the Arabs and Indians continued this trade.

45. Central/Southern Africa
While the impact of trade and Islam radically altered the West/North/East African “coasts”, Central and Southern Africa was developing on its own trajectory.
By 1000 CE, still small agricultural societies, preliterate, but with great strides in arts, building, and statecraft…without writing.

46. Artists…
Terra Cotta objects discovered in Nok, in the forests of Central Nigeria dating to BCE.
Terra Cotta and bronze portrait heads were found among the Yoruba people of Nigeria

47. The Yoruba
Agricultural society supported by a peasantry and dominated by a ruling family and aristocracy.
Spoke a non-Bantu language and recognized a relationship with the Hausa, who spoke Afro-Asian language.
Small city-states, each controlling about 50 miles.
Highly urbanized.

48. Benin
Similar settlement patterns as the Yoruba can be found among Edo people who formed the state of Benin.
Ewuare the Great (r ) extended Benin’s control from the Niger River to the Coast.
The Oba, or ruler, lived in a huge royal compound.

49. Central African Kingdoms
By the 5th Century CE, Bantu farmers and fishers reach central Africa.
By the 13th Century, they were approaching the southern end of the continent.
Beyond the scope of Islam
By 1000 CE, many of these groups were forming states.

50. Kongo
Late 15th Century, the Kongo was forming along the lower Congo River.
Agricultural base, with skills of weaving, pottery, blacksmithing, and carving.
Men:
Clearing the forest, producing palm oil and palm wine, building houses, hunting, long-distance trade.
Women:
Cultivation, care of animals, household duties, made salt from seawater, collected seashells which were used as currency.

51. Kongo

52. Great Zimbabwe
Farther to the east, among the farming and cattle-herding Shona-speaking peoples.
Creation of GREAT stone enclaves to serve as the capital town area.
By the 15th century, a centralized state had begun to form controlling central Africa to the Indian Ocean.

53. Great Zimbabwe

54. Works cited:
Adas, M., Gilbert, M.J., Schwartz, S.B., & Stearns, P.N. (2007). World civilizations: The global experience. (5th ed.). New York: Pearson Education.
Neater, B. (2009).