African monsoons, Part 2: Synoptic-scale wave disturbances in the intertropical convergence zone over north Africa

In this part, the paper discusses several aspects of the origin, structure, development and movement of wave disturbances over the North African tropical zone during the northern summer. Analyzing the cases often actual wave disturbances which later in their life cycles developed into hurricanes over the Atlantic, it finds that though the horizontal and vertical shear of the mean zonal wind associated with the mid-tropospheric easterly jet over Africa satisfies the condition of dynamical instability under certain restrictive boundary conditions, it is the influence of a large-amplitude baroclinic wave in mid-latitude westerlies upon a stationary wave in the mountainous region of the east-central north Africa that appears to trigger the birth of a wave disturbance in the intertropical convergence zone over the Nile valley of Sudan between the Marra and the Ethiopian mountains. Physical processes likely to be important in the formation, development and movement of the disturbances are pointed out.

Egyptian Expeditionary Inscriptions of the Fourth Dynasty and Ancient Natural Landscapes of the Western (Libyan) Desert

The Middle Holocene epoch in northeastern Africa was marked by a steady trend towards aridization. However, the transformation of ecosystems and natural landscapes was gradual and had a complex nature. This change directly affected the development of the first ancient Egyptian centralized state as well as the development of its resource base beyond the Nile Valley. This study addresses the problem of using ancient Egyptian epigraphic sources (expeditionary inscriptions) for the study of both paleolandscapes and ecosystems of the Western (Libyan) Desert and the possible socio-economic impact of their change. The author studies several graffiti, which are believed to have preserved information on natural conditions near the Dakhla oasis and in the region of Wadi Toshka during the time of construction of the great pyramids (Fourth Dynasty). The author concludes that it is quite easy to make misleading assumptions when interpreting expeditionary artefacts. At the same time, as an example with an unusual toponym from the quarries near Wadi Toshka demonstrates, even the shortest graffiti can provide researchers with important additional information on possible changes in the ancient climate and landscape.

Cultural Metallurgy—A Key Factor in the Transition from the Chalcolithic to Bronze Age in the Southern Levant

The causes of the disappearance of Late Chalcolithic society (Ghassulian) in the early fourth millennium bc remain obscure. This study identifies the collapse as the consequence of a change in the approach to metallurgy from cosmological fundament (Late Chalcolithic) to a practical craft (EB1). This endogenous transition accounts for the cultural recession characterizing the transitional period (EB1A) and the discontinuity in ritual practices. The new practical approach in metallurgy is firstly observed in the southern margin of the Ghassulian culture, which produced copper for distribution in the Nile valley rather than the southern Levant. Nevertheless, the Ghassulian cultural markers visible in the newly emerging areas of copper working (southern coastal plain, Nile valley) denote the survival of the old cosmological traditions among metalworkers of the EB1 culture. Their religious expression unveils the extension of the Ghassulian beliefs attached to metallurgy and their metamorphosis into the esoteric fundaments of the Bronze Age religions.

Pauline Hopkins’ Literary Egyptology

Author Pauline Hopkins produced work in a variety of genres: short stories, novels, a musical, a primer of facts. Like other African Americans of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, she engaged with the history of the Nile Valley before the discipline of Egyptology was firmly established in the sphere of higher education in the US. Her serialized novel Of One Blood, published in 1902 and 1903, draws on a variety of sources, such as the English historian George Rawlinson, to tell a fictionalized story set in the contemporary present of the Upper Nile and to address issues related to the ancient past of that region. Her main character, Reuel, embodies links across time—ancient and contemporary—and space—the United States and the Nile River Valley. Through him, she shows the power and relevance of ancient history to contemporary life.

Application of Inculturation Criteria in Studies on the Indigenous Nature of the Church in Nubia

This article is an attempt to define the relationship between Christianity in Nubia and the local cultures of the Nubian kingdoms of Nobadia and Makuria from the 6th to the beginning of the 16th century, using the inculturation criteria theory associated with the actualization of the Church within a particular culture in light of archaeological research. The mission of the Church must be realized within a specific community of the people of God as well as in its administrative structure and the local hierarchy. The Church’s task is to accomplish its sanctifying, prophetic and teaching mission, which is accomplished through the proclamation of the Gospel, the celebration of sacraments, funeral rites, and teaching of prayer practices. Due to lack of adequate resources, this Church’s prophetic task was omitted. The Church, as archaeological research shows, also contributed to social life and the development of the material culture of the inhabitants of the Middle Nile Valley.

Organic Petrographic and Geochemical Evaluation of the Black Shale of the Duwi Formation, El Sebaiya, Nile Valley, Egypt

This study evaluates the palynologic, organic, inorganic, and petrographic properties of organic-rich black shale (Mahamid Mine) in the El Sebaiya area, Nile Valley, Egypt. Black shale is composed of quartz (50%), calcite (10%), kaolinite (25%) and montmorillonite (15%). Organic and inorganic analyses revealed that this shale was deposited under oxic to anoxic marine conditions during strong chemical weathering. Black shale has poor to very good organic richness, and poor to fair hydrocarbon potential. Organic petrography indicates that the kerogen is mixed types II/III and III and is immature to marginally mature (%VRo is 0.44 and 0.53). Liptinite macerals consist of alginite, cutinite, and bituminite. The hydrocarbon products to be generated at higher maturity are expected to be oil and gas.

Social stratification without genetic differentiation at the site of Kulubnarti in Christian Period Nubia

Relatively little is known about Nubia’s genetic landscape prior to the influence of the Islamic migrations that began in the late 1st millennium CE. Here, we increase the number of ancient individuals with genome-level data from the Nile Valley from three to 69, reporting data for 66 individuals from two cemeteries at the Christian Period (~650–1000 CE) site of Kulubnarti, where multiple lines of evidence suggest social stratification. The Kulubnarti Nubians had ~43% Nilotic-related ancestry (individual variation between ~36–54%) with the remaining ancestry consistent with being introduced through Egypt and ultimately deriving from an ancestry pool like that found in the Bronze and Iron Age Levant. The Kulubnarti gene pool – shaped over a millennium – harbors disproportionately female-associated West Eurasian-related ancestry. Genetic similarity among individuals from the two cemeteries supports a hypothesis of social division without genetic distinction. Seven pairs of inter-cemetery relatives suggest fluidity between cemetery groups. Present-day Nubians are not directly descended from the Kulubnarti Nubians, attesting to additional genetic input since the Christian Period.

Aterian

The Aterian is a North African late Middle Stone Age techno-complex. It is spread from the Atlantic coast in Morocco to the Middle Nile Valley in Sudan and from the Mediterranean hinterland to the Southern Sahara. Chronologically, it covers the period between c. 145,000 years bp and 29,000 bp, spanning across discontinuous, alternating dry (end of MIS 6 and MIS 4) and humid (MIS 5 and MIS 3) climatic phases. Few, but significant human remains indicate that the makers of the Aterian complex belong to early Homo sapiens. Their osteological features show affinities with the early anatomically modern human record in the Levant (Skhul and Qafzeh), suggesting that Aterian groups may have taken part in the initial dispersals out of Africa by Homo sapiens. Toolkits consist of a variety of implements not only made of stone but also of bone (points, spatulas, knives, and retouchers). They include tools that were lacking in earlier or other North African contemporary contexts, namely bifacial foliates, blades, perforators, burins, endscrapers, and particularly tanged pieces. Overemphasis on tanged tools often obscured the complexity of the Aterian, which instead displays a wide range of cultural and behavioral innovations. New mobility patterns and intra-site organization, as well as early symbolism with the use of Nassariidae shells and ochre, corroborate early fully complex behavior by these populations. Given the broad geographic and chronological extension of the Aterian, differences are evident at both local and regional scales. They suggest the development of a flexible and variable techno-complex mirroring considerable adaptive cognitive and behavioral plasticity derived from nonlinear processes. Such diversified behavioral experiments result from multiple and noncumulative trajectories due to different internal and external stimuli but are still part of a single cultural entity.