African History

What is African pre-history? Our studies begin with the era called "prehistoric," meaning before the era known as "historic" (meaning written records). It is an important era. Mostly because it includes the very great majority of the total time on earth that humankind has spent developing basic human abilities and culture. "The main change throughout all of mankind was the change to bi-pedalism (Dr. Agorsah)". The traditional "Stone Age" name comes from the stone tools and weapons first made during that time.

Archeology in Africa shows that man is linked to pre-hominids (Ancestoral to both Apes and man). Australopithecus is the earliest Hominid related to us (humans). Hominid meaning "Humans and their direct and near-direct ancestors (Wikpedia.com)".

The dating of the artifacts plays a pivotal part in history. There are many ways to determine what time frame a piece of history (such as fossils or pottery) was used or alive in. There are two major ways to determine how old something is, Relative and Absolute. Relative uses Stratigraphy, which means the study of where the object is laying and the study of the dirt and rocks around it. Using Absolute dating involes, C14(CARBON) or K/A (Potassium) dating, as well as Thermoluminesoence and Dendrochronology (Tree ring) dating.

Another form of dating in Africa is Oral Tradition. It is something unique in Africa compared to the rest of the world. Because Africa is so old and has the first man traced back, it is rich in tradition and in history. In African societies Oral Tradition is the method in which history, stories are passed on from generation to generation. Oral is spoken and tradition is something from your culture or heritage that you pass on. For the African people, Oral tradition is linked to their way of life. Most African Societies place a lot of honor and pride In oral tradition.

"Most African people did not Invent an alphabet for the art of reading and writing. Therefore they could not keep written records of their history instead they passed on information from one generation to another by word of mouth (www.blackandchristian.com)".

To know when something took place you have to understand the way things where dated. The BCE is the new way of writing BC; BC stands for "Before Christ," while BCE stands for "Before Common Era." Similarly our current era, traditionally called AD (Anno Domini) meaning "in the year of our Lord" with years dating from the time of Christ's birth is now usually refered to as CE, or Common Era.

The earliest hominids are those called Australopithecines. Scientists believe that Australopithecines were bipedal - able to walk upright, using only their hind legs. So what was so valuable about walking upright? What makes this the characteristic that puts some "super Apes" into the hominid category togther with human species, and separate from regular 4-legged apes? Well, most clearly walking upright frees the forelimbs, which then can be used to carry things (extra food, for example). Free forelimbs also meant that they could make better use of what regular apes also had: at least the beginnings of opposable thumbs plus flexible digits (in humans, called fingers). So what conditions might spark a new whole species whose new identity came from picking up its forefeet and walking upright? "Most scientists guess it was the beginning of a many million year period of colder weather on earth, which began about 10 million years ago (and, again, peaked for almost all of the last 2 million years in an age that was so cold we call it the Great Ice Age). Plant patterns changed, forests expanded or retreated, animals adapted to certain physical environments found those environment shrinking, etc. Ape-like primates in Africa found the forests retreating and their 4-footed ability to swing through trees was of less and less use to them (www.Princetonol.com)".

One if not the biggest discoveries in the study for the begginging of man was the Discovery of the Lucy fossil. Lucy was a Austalopithecus afarensis. She was found in the region of Hadar in East Africa. It is said that she was bi-pedal. One of the big reasons why it was such a huge find besides the fact that its an old fossil, is that they where able to recover about 40 percent of her fossils. Lucy was said to live around 4 to 2.7 million years ago.

A new hominid -and the earliest human species - Homo is thought to have first emerged somewhat before 2,000,000 BCE, and disappeared (it is assumed, having been replaced by its successor, Homo erectus), by 1,000,000 BCE.. Evolutionists believe H. habilis's appearance was - like the australopithecines' earlier bipedalism - probably sparked by stress of Ice Age changes in physical environment. Like the australopithecines,