Prehistoric West Africa
[14] The emergence and expansion of ceramics in the Sahara may be linked with the origin of Round Head and Kel Essuf rock art, which occupy rockshelters in the same regions (e.g., Djado, Acacus, Tadrart).[20] As a result of increasing aridification of the Green Sahara, Central Saharan hunter-gatherers and cattle herders may have used seasonal waterways as the migratory route taken to the Niger River and Chad Basin of West Africa.[37] Consequently, the human habitation areas in Jos Plateau, which is only composed of Middle Stone Age sites, has been distinct in terms of culture and environment in comparison to the Falémé River Valley.[13] The emergence and expansion of ceramics in the Sahara may be linked with the origin of both the Round Head and Kel Essuf rock art, which occupy rockshelters in the same regions (e.g., Djado, Acacus, Tadrart) as well as have a common resemblance (e.g., traits, shapes).[58][59][60] Amid the early Sahara, Round Head rock artists, who had a sophisticated culture and engaged in the activity of hunting and gathering, also developed pottery, utilized vegetation, and managed animals.[20] Desertification may have resulted in migrations from the Central Saharan region, where the Round Head paintings are located, toward Lake Chad, the Niger Delta,[72] and the Nile Valley.[79] West Africans, bearing the Benin sickle cell haplotype, may have migrated into the northern region of Iraq (69.5%), Jordan (80%), Lebanon (73%), Oman (52.1%), and Egypt (80.8%).[25] Preceded by assumed earlier sites in the Eastern Sahara, tumuli with megalithic monuments developed as early as 4700 BCE in the Saharan region of Niger.[85] Ancient Egyptian pyramids of the early dynastic period and Meroitic Kush pyramids are recognized by Faraji (2022) as part of and derived from an earlier architectural “Sudanic-Sahelian” tradition of monarchic tumuli, which are characterized as “earthen pyramids” or “proto-pyramids.”[85] Faraji (2022) characterized Nobadia as the “last pharaonic culture of the Nile Valley” and described mound tumuli as being “the first architectural symbol of the sovereign’s return and reunification with the primordial mound upon his death.”[85] Faraji (2022) indicates that there may have been a cultural expectation of “postmortem resurrection” associated with tumuli in the funerary traditions of the West African Sahel (e.g., northern Ghana, northern Nigeria, Mali) and Nile Valley (e.g., Ballana, Qustul, Kerma, Kush).Some of these civilizations and cultures defined by Sudanic sacral kingship were Wadai, located east of the Lake Tchad, Kwarafara which dominated the Benue River from the 13th to 18th century CE, the 14th century CE Nri civilization, northeast of Igala in Nigeria, the medieval Songhay empire, built from Gao, the Hausa city-states, and the Soninké founders of the Wagadou empire.[86] According to Michael Rowlands, there are basic commonalities between the function of Pharaohs and the Mfon of the Bamiléké people in the possession of negative and highly dangerous powers that could be put to ‘good use’ in maintaining order.[85] According to al-Bakrī, “the construction of tumuli and the accompanying rituals was a religious endeavor that emanated from the other elements” that he described, such as “sorcerers, sacred groves, idols, offerings to the dead, and the “tombs of their kings.””[85] Faraji (2022) indicated that the early dynastic period of ancient Egypt, Kerma of Kush, and the Nobadian culture of Ballana were similar to al-Bakrī’s descriptions of the Mande tumuli practices of ancient Ghana.[85] Cultural similarities were also found with a Malinke king of Gambia, who along with his senior queen, human subjects within his kingdom, and his weapons, were buried in his home under a large mound the size of the house, as described by V.[85] Between the 6th century CE and 14th century CE, stone tumuli circles, which at a single site usually encircle a burial site of half-meter that is covered by a burial mound, were constructed in Komaland; the precursors for this 3rd millennium BCE tumuli style of Komaland, Ghana and Senegambia are regarded by Faraji (2022) to be Kerma Kush and the A-Group culture of ancient Nubia.[90] The Agades cross, a fertility amulet worn by Fulani women, may be associated with the hexagon-shaped carnelian piece of jewelry depicted in the rock art at Tin Felki.[92] The annual Lotori ceremonial rite, held by Fulani herders, occurs at a selected location and period of time,[93] and commemorates the ox and its origination in a source of water.[93] The interpretation of composition six as portraying the Lotori ceremonial rite, along with other forms of evidence, have been used to support the conclusion that modern Sub-Saharan West African Fulani herders are descended from peoples of the Sahara.[39] Cultural experience with the desertification of the Green Sahara may have contributed to adept adjustment to the drying of the Sahelian and West Sudanian savanna regions of Sub-Saharan Africa by agropastoralists.[39] Amid the 1st millennium BCE, agriculture spread, not only near Lake Chad, but near the Niger Delta, Senegal Valley, Jos Plateau, and the southern region of Cameroon.[39] Due to the complexity of pottery patterns and vastness of the area, where interactions between peoples occurred during the mid-Holocene, specifying which linguistic group (e.g., Niger-Congo, Nilo-Saharan, Afroasiatic) is the first settling population is challenging.[103] Another possibility (as via report of Hanno the Navigator) is that, via maritime trade from the Gulf of Guinea, to the eastern region of the Mediterranean, along the Incense Route, into the Near East.[8] Consequently, seasonal interaction likely occurred between Saharan pastoralists and agropastoralists and West African hunter-gatherers, who also practiced basic agriculture via vegetable cultivation.[8] Domesticated crops (e.g., pearl millet, cowpea, large amounts of oil palm) and undomesticated flora were availed in rockshelters (e.g., B-sites, K6), near the Guinean forest-savanna mosaic, in the southern region of central Ghana.[109] As a result, subsistence techniques were adapted to the natural environment of the forest region, and local crops (e.g., oil palm, yams), may have been introduced into what was usually farmed.[110] Mortars and grindstones as well as a linear arranged set of cupules within a cave with a rock in the center, which could have served as a ceremonial altar, were also found at an archaeological site.[110] From a nearby village, potsherds and more fifty stone circles were created and utilized by Neolithic Africans, who were also likely the creators of the engraved rock art.[4] Prior to initial encounter with migrating populations from further north, West African hunter-gatherers may have already engaged in basic agricultural production of tubers as well as utilizing Elaeis guineensis and Canarium schweinfurthii.The other migration from the northeast consisted of iron metallurgists from Niger who spread concave matting techniques for ceramics into West Africa that originated along the Sudano-Tchadian border.[118] Peoples of the Niger Bend practiced “fishing, hunting, herding, agriculture, iron metallurgy, interregional (or even long-distance) commerce, and sometimes – hierarchical social organization.”[118] A comparative archeological analysis of artifacts at the Cairo Museum and the Theodore Monod Museum of African art in Dakar, Senegal reveals a deep material culture kinship between contemporary West Africans and the Pharaonic civilization that has traversed space and time.[124] In 1990 BP, a "Negroid" agriculturalist (indicated via dental evidence from the skeletal remains) occupied Rop rock shelter, in the northern region of Nigeria.
Round Head rock artBarbary sheepWest Africapopulation history of West AfricaAcheuleanarchaic humansMiddle PleistocenePleistoceneMiddle Stone AgeIwo Eleru peopleAteriansLast Glacial MaximumLate Stone Age peoplesWest African forestWest African hunter-gatherersCentral AfricaShum Lakacoastal West AfricaHoloceneNiger-CongoOunjougoubows and arrowsAcacusTadrartantelopedomesticatedKel Essuf PeriodRound Head PeriodPastoral PeriodaridificationGreen Saharahunter-gatherersherdersNiger RiverChad BasinThiaroyestatuetteSub-SaharanfertilitySenegambiacomplexly organizedpastoral societiesNsibidiWest African scriptIkom monolithsNigeriasavannasforestsdomesticationhelmeted guineafowlDioscorea praehensilisoryza glaberrimaInner Niger DeltaCenchrus americanuscowpeasforest-savannaagriculturalistsBantu-speaking agriculturalistsCentral African hunter-gatherersIron metallurgyNok cultureClimate of AfricaWest African monsoonFalémé RiverstadialEast AfricaclimateAtakora mountainousJos PlateauAfricawetlandsgrasslandshrublandNorth AfricaLake ChadSaharadroughtLower PaleolithicspheroidsIwo Eleru skullFaléméWest Sudanian savannaLate PleistoceneforestcoastalBaie du LevrierSenegalSenegal RiverDahomeyBingervilleNilo-SaharanNile ValleyMaghrebAterianNiger-SaharanMechtoidsWest African populationsLibyco-Berberepigraphyhaplogroup E1b1a-V38Mende peopleTaforaltsMoroccoradiocarbon datedNatufianSub-Saharan AfricanYorubabasal West AfricanIberomaurusianSahelianBerbersTunisiamicrolithic industriesKordofanhelmeted guineafowlsBantu expansionSub-Saharan AfricaSouthern AfricaAfrican Great LakesS. mansoniS. haematobiumNile RiverYoruba peoplemigratoryBantu-speaking peoplespyrotechnology