Africa is the world’s oldest inhabited continent, filled with the richest recourses and perhaps the richest history. However, in order to truly understand Africa’s amazing culture and society, we must first start at the very beginning. We must first look at how Africa came about, why it looks the way it does and why it’s location makes it such a unique place.
Before the continent of Africa existed, the earth was comprised of just one single supercontinent called Pangaea. To understand how Pangaea was formed we first look at how the earth was formed. Billions of years ago our solar system was made up of nothing more than dust particles. The explosion of a nearby star caused these dust particles to form a solar nebula (a huge spinning disk).
Like many other continents in the world Africa has a lot of differences in itself for example there are differences in geography ,language, politics, religion and other things in life due to Africa’s lack of political government over an extended period of time.
Ancient civilizations have had profound effects of what we know as the modern world today. The primary purpose for anything that lives is to survive. Throughout history animals, plants and humans have adapted to their surroundings. All living things have changed throughout time. The thing that differs humans from rest is, humans are more cognitively advanced. Over the course of time the shape and size of the human skull has changed. The size of the human brain has increased, which has allowed humans to adapt more to their surroundings. To survive, humans were making tools for hunting and to cut with. The closer you lived to the equator the darker your skin may have been, so you could adapt to the intensity of the sun’s rays. If you lived further
The theory of Pangaea suggests that the continents were once stuck together into one huge continent. Eventually they started drifting into separated landmasses, which gave birth to the modern continents.
Well the government in ancient Mali was lead by the emperor called the Mansa. The Mali Empire was divided up into providence and each were led by a governor. Present day Mali is one of the least densely population of Africa. The people who live in Mali live in small villages. People pursue traditional occupations such as farming, fishing, herding, crafts, and trade. Nomadic groups of Berbers, Tuareg, and Moors live north of the Niger River. As a herder you mostly raise cattle, sheep, and goats and are always on the move in search of
Ancient Ghana was originally found in the 830 AD. They built their capital on the edge of the Sahara and the city quickly grew into a thriving trade market and became a very wealthy place. the city turned into one of the most wealthy places on earth and made its wealth from gold and silver.
How to eat in ancient Ghana. The Ancient Ghana civilization lasted from about 300-1200 A.D.. The Ancient country lies in Western Africa where the modern countries of Mali, Mauritania, and Senegal are today (Kingdom of Ghana). The people of Ghana ate what they could provide by farming. They farmed crops such as corn and rice. The Niger river ,which cut across ancient Ghana, flooded like the Nile during the rainy season bringing water and nutrients to their fields (Social Aspects of Ancient Ghana) . They raised animals such as Goats, chickens, and sheep to eat. The people mostly ate several different types of soup with fufu, plantain, bread, rice, and potatoes. The soups were nut based with different meats such as fish, mutton, goat, or chicken added (Ancient Ghana Environment).
What can be so appealing about the continent Africa? Well it has been studied that Africa has many resources such as wheat, millet, ivory, copper, metals, routes, basins, and most importantly, its unlimited availability of strong laborers (pgs. 44-45). These are resources that are useful in early trade markets that added to wealth as well as the distribution of power. These resources are abundant in Africa and it is not surprising that the group of countries who wanted it the most were European countries. This imperial power mostly lay in the hands of the French Empire and Great British.
Africa’s past was shaped by many different influences. The evolutionary theory and traditions/myths of origin played a big part in contributing to the reconstruction of Africa’s past. The PowerPoint, “The peopling and early history of Africa” explains in detail the reasons how these items influenced the reconstruction of Africa. The PowerPoint describes the idea that evolutionary theory was one the main reasons the reconstruction occurred. The second idea explained in the PowerPoint was the myths and traditions that were spoken in story form thousands of years ago. The third explanation for the reconstruction that was described in the PowerPoint was that the Stone Age era had effects that played a big part in shaping African traditions.
In the early years, long before humans roamed the earth, there was a protocontinent it’s name was Gondwana. And of course Gondwana wasn’t as big or as mass as Pangaea was, that’s because Gondwana wasn’t alone. In fact, there was another protocontinent
A reason that the emergence of the First Civilizations was a negative development for humankind was that it lead to many inequalities.
The one thing that made civilization possible was the digging stick. The digging stick tool made holes into the ground to plant seed. Afterward, animals where worked to cover the seed with soil.
Pangea was a supercontinent that consisted of seven continents, it existed until the Triassic period where the continents started to drift 200-225 millions years ago. The theory was thought of by Abraham Ortelius. Evidently, three centuries later in 1912 by German scientist Alfred Lothar Wegener had a theory about how South America and Africa could fit together. Following in Wegener’s footsteps, Alexander Du Toit, a professor of geology, and his supporters theorized that Pangea first split into two separate into 2 large continents. Laurasia, in the north, and Gondwanaland in the south. Laurasia and Gondwanaland later split into the 7 continents we know today.
Africa has transitioned from being dismantled, torn to pieces, and ruled by many european countries to now being its own and unique continent. The continent itself might not be thriving the way some would like it to, but it has made great strides since the colonial period for its independence. Due to the effort of its hard working people and its relentless determination to prosper, Africa has become one of the most influential countries of the modern world. Overcoming obstacles of slavery of its citizens, abuse by its government, and attack by the militia, Africa, in a way still has managed to stay afloat and survive through decades of mistreatment.
Pangaea was one major landmass. It is the hypothesis that vast landmasses used to be framed together in one extensive mainland, and that as the plates moved it separated the continents that were joined together to spread out. Pangaea started shaping about 300 million years back, and was completely together by 270 million years prior and started too partitioned around 200 million years back. However, fossils of a Meosaurus were also founded in South Africa and Brazil. A Mesosaurus was a little reptile that lived 275 million years ago and it swam in shallow waters. It couldn't cross into the sea. These remains of the fossils spotted in these two different continents tell us that South America and Africa must’ve have once been connected together and then divided.
Welcome to Africa, or better yet welcome home. Examining fossils that date back several million years, scientific data supports the fact that human life began somewhere in Africa. This isn’t known by everyone though, in fact, unless some sort of archaeology is studied, or an ancient civilizations class, many are unaware of this. What people aren’t unaware of however, when it comes to Africa as a whole, are the issues. Words such as AIDS, war, strife, poverty, hunger, corruption, slavery, piracy, and genocide are all synonymous with Africa.