The African continent is presumably the place where a modern man’s direct ancestors appeared in the prehistoric period. With the development of the human population, Africans succeeded in colonizing “an especially hostile region of the world on behalf of the entire human race” (Iliffe 2007, 1). The unique history of the colonization of the continent by early humans explains the nature of later processes in Africa and around the world. However, the continent only caught scientists’ attention in the 19th century, so “African prehistory is a puzzle on a grand scale, still only partly solved” (Diamond 1999, 377). Thus, the peopling of Africa, early human evolution, and migrations and diversity are essential in explaining many historical processes, including modern ones.
The Peopling of the Continent of Africa
The American evolutionary biologist and biogeographer Jade Diamond made a significant contribution to the study of the history of Africa’s people. In his book “Guns, Germs, and Steel,” he comprehensively examines the reasons for the rise of the Eurasian civilization throughout the world. The continent occupies a special place in this study because “humans have lived in Africa far longer than anywhere else” (Diamond 1999, 377). According to research, Homo sapiens appeared in Southeast Africa about 200 thousand years ago, and their continental expansion began 80-100 thousand years ago (Iliffe 2007, 6-8). For many modern people, native Africans are black, while white Africans are European colonizers, but a couple of thousand years ago, the situation was different. Diamond (1999, 377) mentions that previously, Africa was inhabited by representatives of the five major divisions of humanity, three of which are native to the continent. Moreover, blacks themselves are a heterogeneous people, formed due to long prehistory and unique geography.
The composition of the African population has historically been mixed. Diamond (1999, 378) argues that by 1000 AD, the continent was already inhabited by the so-called blacks, whites, African Pygmies, Khoisan, and Asians. The indigenous peoples of Africa were blacks, African Pygmies, and Khoisan, while whites and Asians lived mostly outside of it. The author further reports that the black occupied most of the territory. The whites mainly inhabited the north of the continent, and African Pygmies were distributed in the central part, Khoisan, in the north (Diamond 1999, 378-380). Of particular interest are Madagascar’s population, which is a mixture of African blacks and Southeast Asian people. The white people of Africa are explained by the constant migrations of people between Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa. Over time, the habitats of different groups changed, leading to the expansion of agricultural blacks and reduction in the habitat of Pygmy and Khoisan hunter-gatherers (Diamond 1999, 383-384). Thus began the Bantu migration, the largest settlement of blacks in Central and South Africa.
Early Human Evolution and Migration
With the advancement of archeology, researchers can learn much more about the history of Africa’s human population. Diamond, in his book, however, relies not only on archeological data but also on linguistic analysis and research on the domestication of plant cultures and animals. Linguistic research is based on the assumption that “languages of a given language family tend to be spoken by distinct people” (Diamond 1999, 382). Thus, through changes in the language, the development of its speakers can be traced. Based on the addition of geographic and linguistic data, it can be concluded that blacks occupied the lands of African Pygmies, who lost their native language. Further, they evicted the Khoisans much to the south of their previous position (Diamond 1999, 383-384). Analysis of the Bantu languages indicates that the Bantu, which are blacks, originated in West Africa, from where they began to settle in most of sub-equatorial Africa (Diamond 1999, 384). Thus, there was a prehistoric Bantu occupation of the lands of other indigenous peoples of Africa.
The development of agriculture and animal husbandry has also played a large role in history. The expansion of the Bantu to the continent’s central and southern parts, which began about 3000 BC, is explained by more advantageous position, domesticated plants, and cattle (Diamond 1999, 388). The Bantu gradually moved the Congo Basin’s equatorial jungles, increasing their population and displacing the Pygmies into isolated forest enclaves. Around 1000 BC, they reached the Great Lakes region and occupied the more humid areas in East Africa for agriculture due to the moisture-loving plants from the west. They then mastered the iron tools of labor, which led to the creation of a military-industrial complex, which was stronger than other populations of subequatorial Africa (Diamond 1999, 393-394). During the expansion, the black Bantu spread across the entire continent.
Linguistic and geographical data, supported by archeological findings, provide information on Africa’s human evolution and migration. Thereby, it can be concluded that blacks did not always inhabit sub-Saharan Africa. Pygmies inhabited the rainforests of Central Africa, and Khoisans lived in a subequatorial part of the continent. The expansion of the Bantu occurred due to their more favorable geographical location, which allowed them to increase the population, becoming stronger and more widespread than their neighbors.
African diversity
As noted earlier, geographic location plays an essential role in the development of particular people. Diamond (1999, 377) states that “no other continent approaches this human diversity.” This is primarily due to the unique geographical position of the continent. Africa is oriented along the north-south axis, which makes the climatic zones extremely different from each other. All this is reflected in flora and fauna, amount of precipitation, length of daylight hours, and diseases (Diamond 1999, 399). Such climatic features are present because the African rocks did not fold in chains, which would affect the climate. Lateral bands of temperature and rain stretch north and south of the equator; thus, rain forests confine with savanna turning into desert. It is worth mentioning that before the Sahara desertification in the third millennium BC, Africa had conditions similar to Eurasian (Iliffe 2007, 4). Africans have managed to adapt to the extreme conditions of their continent, which deserves special admiration.
The Importance of Features of Historical Development
The study of history is important because it directly impacts the current state of a region and can explain many occurring processes. A change in any of the factors could affect the entire continent; then, the world would be completely different now. Africa’s unique development path has also shaped its relationship with Eurasia and other continents (Iliffe 2007, 4). Given that Africans have endured the hardships of hostile environments and a long history of slavery, they deserve real admiration as ancestors of modern humanity as we know it today. Unfortunately, many people are only familiar with Africa’s late history, which limits the perception of the real picture.
Jade Diamond has contributed to expanding people’s understanding of how the modern world was formed. He demonstrated this especially clearly on the example of the evolution of the African continent population. His theory about the geographical determinism of the rise of a particular people, simple luck or bad luck, clarifies how surprising circumstances can be. Moreover, it becomes evident that everything in the world has an impact on the surrounding world.
References
Diamond, Jared. 1999. Guns, Germs, and Steel. New York: W. W. Norton.
Iliffe, John. 2007. Africans: The History of a Continent. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.