In They Came Before Columbus, Van Sertima argues that Egyptian journey to the Americas happened during the rule of the 25th dynasty, which was the Kushite dynasty that ruled Egypt. Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email. Keep reading with unlimited digital access. Recently, I've been handed a book called "They Came before Columbus" by Ivan Sertima, which asserts that Africans had discovered and traded with the native people of the Americas long before Columbus arrived. [24] He was survived by his wife and four adult children. Listen to GHOGH with Jamarlin Martin | Episode 74: Jamarlin Martin Jamarlin returns for a new season of the GHOGH podcast to discuss Bitcoin, bubbles, and Biden. Are broader financial markets in a massive speculative bubble? Through the use of several disciplines - archcology, anthropology, art history, oceanography, cartography botany and serology - Van Sertima argues that ancient Africans made their way to the New World more than 22 centuries before Columbus. Their Negro-ness could not be explained away nor, in most cases, their African cultural origin. A celebrated classic, They Came . During the 1960s, he worked for several years in Great Britain as a journalist, doing weekly broadcasts to the Caribbean and Africa. What normativity means has implications for many things in philosophy and science. Should we give reparations to black Americans, being that they, 5500 words Introduction Hereditarians champion Asians (specifically East Asians) as proof of their gene-centric worldviewthat their genetic constitution allows their stellar performance in educational and, 2100 words Many people believe that a thing called the G-spotGrafenberg spotexists. Did the Spanish also assay the spears of West Africa to know what ratio of gold, silver and copper alloys were found in the African spears? He published his They Came Before Columbus in 1976, as a Rutgers graduate student. I may hear about anything from the cultural revolution, to ancient Chinese dynasties, to Genghis Kan. It was generally "ignored or dismissed" by academic experts at the time and strongly criticised in detail in an academic journal, Current Anthropology, in 1997. After divorcing his first wife, Sertima remarried in 1984, to Jacqueline L. Patten, who had two daughters. I really have no idea. They paint themselves black, and they are the color of the Canarians, neither black nor white. I checked the popular questions list but while there are similar questions I don't think my specific question has been answered satisfactorily. There is hardly a claim in any of Van Sertimas writings that can be supported by the evidence found in the archaeological, botanical, linguistic, or historical record. But where did Menzies come up with the idea that it was Asians, not Europeans, who first arrived in America from other countries? "Human beings in any population have a great deal of variation," pointed out Barbour, whose methodical approach contrasted sharply with Van Sertima's more theatrical arguments. Sometimes the conversation will somehow, turn into a history lesson about China. Change), You are commenting using your Facebook account. The word for tobacco also has African roots as well as the refinement of the practice of oral pipe smoking. Neither Columbus nor de Las Casas wrote anything about African spears. Van Sertima said: "Many people feel a certain kind of happiness when they read my book. She also planned to publish a book of his poetry.[25]. The description that Columbus gives certainly is not a description of black people in the Caribbean. In They Came Before Columbus, we see clearly the unmistakable face and handprint of black Africans in pre-Columbian America, and their overwhelming impact on the civilizations they encountered. Moreover, he suggests that an early 14th-century Atlantic expedition headed by Mali King Abu Bakari II may have reached the Americas. Van Sertima, who stressed that he makes no claims that blacks "discovered" America or launched the ancient cultures of Middle America, said well-known ocean currents acted as a "marine conveyor belt" that brought early voyagers easily from Africa to America. Kenneth L. FedderKenneth L. Feder, a specialist in archaeological pseudoscience, addresses prevalent misconceptions about the settlement of the Americas, discussing how they are stimulated by ethnic pride and religious faith, propagated uncritically in the media, and accepted by students. When I thought about it more, I realized that in high school and probably prior I had learned about American History, Western European History, the dynasties of China and Egypt, but what about where my people were likely from? The African presence in America before Columbus is of importance not only to African and American history but to the history of world civilizations. As somebody who strongly believes that history is dominated by the "Western" narrative, I find myself drawn to believe Sertima. Van Sertima states that even the Greek historian Herodotus had an account of black Egyptian people. In the documentary he says that Mansa Musa is the same person as Montezuma. Van Sertima tells of the emergence of the Mali kingdom and its seafaring ventures, thus providing evidence for sailing capabilities of West Africans. Despite this, some individuals would argue: A mass colony of Africans were not shipped from Africa to America. At the time that the dominant narrative of the origins of ancient Egyptian civilization emerged, the use of African slaves was well into effect. "'Roots' does not do that. Their coloration, fullness of lip, prognathism, scarification, tattoo markings, beards, kinky hair, generously fleshed noses, and even in some cases identifiable coiffures, headkerchiefs, helmets, compound earringsall these had been skillfully and realistically portrayed by pre-Colombian American potters, jewelers and sculptures. Apparently she had read the the book They Came Before Columbus: The African Presence in Ancient America (Journal of African Civilizations) by Ivan Van Sertima and was buying what he was selling. What country did your, say, grandfather or great-grandfather or whatever come from?. In addition, there are stories of Egyptian mariners. On the cover of the book, John A. Williams writes that Van Sertima has demonstrated that there is far more to black history than the slave trade. Quite obviously, there is more to black history than the slave trade, but Van Sertimas storytelling is not it. This two-way trade never happened. All human behavioral traits are, 4150 words Introduction It is claimed that genes (DNA sequences) have a special, privileged role in the development of all traits. All of these claims are incrediblewhich means that they deserve incredible evidence in order to verify them. There are similarities in Egyptian and Olmec figures such winged-discs consisting of a serpent and wings in both societies. pic.twitter.com/GRHEgWZkZb. Recently, I've been handed a book called "They Came before Columbus" by Ivan Sertima, which asserts that Africans had discovered and traded with the native people of the Americas long before Columbus arrived. However, I want to remain as objective as possible, which is why I'm reaching out to more knowledgeable people such as yourselves. Your email address will not be published. Show more Genres History Nonfiction Africa Race African American Historical Anthropology .more 284 pages, Paperback First published January 1, 1976 There is a heated online debate about how Black Americans came to America. Did we learn anything in there that I had simply forgotten? No, since they are only telling just-so stories. The slave ship narrative is a myth. The truth is that Black Indians were shipped from America to Europe! Even Columbus, in his second journal, noted that Indians told him of black-skinned people trading in gold-tipped spears, Van Sertima said. Normativity has been distinguished between, If you have any suggestions for future posts, criticisms or praises for me, email me at RaceRealist88@gmail.com. For example, whereas Van Sertima argued that Africans influenced the civilization of the Americas, Clyde Ahmad Winters goes further by suggesting that Africans founded the Olmec and all other major American civilization, which is a claim that Van Sertima never made. If there were an African presence in the Americas, he asked, "why do we not find more African stylistic artifacts?". It has come to my attention that Van Sertimas (1972) bookThey Came Before Columbus: The African Presence in Ancient America (TCBC)will soon be used in certain syllabi. After being told that he couldn't do a series on African writers because there was no African literature. What did we do? There was Nelson Mandelas fight against apartheid in South Africa. (AP Photo). Below are pictures of various Olmec sculptures. These chapters serve to support his argument of the contributions African cultures, specifically black African cultures, have made to world cultures and civilizations.[15]. To assuage the Christian conscience for the enslavement of a people, one could not believe that black people were intelligent enough and capable of such feats as the ancient Egyptians. There is far more to Black history than the slave trade alright. This finding flatly contradicted the claim of the historian Herodotus that the Egyptians, compared to the Greeks and other European Caucasoids, were for the most part a black-skinned and wooly-haired people. I am not completely dismissive of the idea that Abu Bakr could have in fact successfully arrived in the Americas. One of the most striking pieces of evidence is the negroid statues, statues of peoples with thick lips and wide noses. Moreover, how would he have known? . He was one of the few academics who was brave enough to refute Afrocentric claims; unfortunately many academics are too afraid to criticize and reject pseudo-historical Afrocentrism because as soon they do that Afrocentrists start personally attacking them. He talks about the risk factors for Bitcoin as an investment asset including origin risk, speculative market structure, regulatory, and environment. If anything, the only thing Van Sertimas book is good for is a good laugh into the delusions of someone with the conclusion in mind, working backward to prove it (meaning, hes using the type of reverse engineering that EPists use). We were taken from Africa, but who were we before slavery? This book provides numerous arguments for the existence of black Africans in America before the start of the Atlantic Slave Trade. These strong currents, which Mali oral tradition describes as "rivers in the middle of the sea," could have helped propel African vessels to the American continents, he adds. They were then shipped from Spain to Africa as commodity for African resources. Maize has African origins. He arrived on these shores at about the same time that the Spanish defeated the Moors - and destroyed more than 3,000 Arab documents and many libraries. Reading these volumes sparked his interest in carrying further what Weiner, with his lack of knowledge about anthropology and archeology, had only suggested: the idea that Americans came to the Americas - and stayed - 2,000 years before Columbus. When the metallurgists in Spain assayed these spears, they found they were identical, not similar, but were identical in their ratio of gold, silver and copper alloys as spears then being forged in African Guinea.. Probably Columbus did not believe this and that fact in itself would not be enough because the so-called Black people could be any people. Black settlements developed at the end points of major currents from Africa, he contended. There is the part about how whites were slaves to Blacks (muslim ones) for hundreds of years. All parties remained peaceful, and Columbus specifically instructed his crews not to take advantage of the Indians. But the claims presented in Hidden Colors and the claims presented by others who promote the notion of Black aboriginals are so misinformed that in many cases they just seem nonsensical. [16], Van Sertima argues that African contact likely happened more than once. As the dogma slowly gets pushed out of science and history we are coming to realize that people of all. [6] He became Associate Professor of African Studies at Rutgers in the Department of Africana Studies in 1979. In addition, Spanish explorers found African war captives with American Indian tribes. Ivan Gladstone Van Sertima (26 January 1935 25 May 2009) was a Guyanese-born British associate professor of Africana Studies at Rutgers University in the United States. This is an inference that Van Sertima makes, but he presents his inference as a fact. Van Sertima married Maria Nagy in 1964; they adopted two sons, Larry and Michael. With that being said, the narration isnt the best that Ive heard. This was all that I could recall being formally taught. In They Came Before Columbus, we see clearly the unmistakable face and handprint of black Africans in pre-Columbian America, and their overwhelming impact on the civilizations they encountered. Accidental stylazation could not account for the individuality and racial particulars of these heads. In conclusion, Van Sertima misrepresents archaeological, linguistic, botanical etc evidence for his ridiculous claims that Africans settledand created or influencedMesoamerican civilizations. The author gives pictures of examples of negroid statues in pre-Columbian America, often with black people in comparison. [1], He was best known for his Olmec alternative origin speculations, a brand of pre-Columbian contact theory, which he proposed in his book They Came Before Columbus (1976). I am of what you would call, recent African ancestry. I also work with many foreign-born Chinese people. Genome-wide ancestry estimates of African Americans show average proportions of73.2% African, 24.0% European, and 0.8% Native American ancestry, according to The Genetic Ancestry of African Americans, Latinos, and European Americans across the United States study published by U.S. National Library of MedicineNational Institutes of Health. Read honest and unbiased product reviews from our users. Sailing, especially such great distances, was not an achievement that was typically attributed to Africans of that time, but it would have been necessary to reach the Americas. Snow continued, "The findings of professional archaeologists and physical anthropologists are misrepresented so that they seem to support the [Van Sertima] hypothesis". Dwayne Wong (Omowale) is a Guyanese born Pan-Africanist and author. In How Europe Underdeveloped Africa, Walter Rodney explained that if any African canoes reached the Americas (as is sometimes maintained) they did not establish two-way links. If these two-way links were established, Umar fails to cite specific examples because there are no examples. Barbour, the first African-American to earn a doctorate in archaeology, is an expert on Mesoamerican culture and associate scientific director of the African Burial Ground Project in Lower Manhattan. "People have different definitions of realism," he added, pointing out stylistic conventions and showing slides that depicted convincingly similar but totally unrelated rattlesnake scale designs from the early American city of Teotihuacan and decorations on a Louis XVI commode. Long time lurker, first time poster. Some paint their faces, others the whole body, some only round the eyes, others only on the nose. He died on 25 May 2009 aged 74. [18] [23] Sertima was inducted into the "Rutgers African-American Alumni Hall of Fame" in 2004. It could be dark, bronze people from South America. I knew that the subjext was suspect. Winters writes: The first civilization to appear in America, called the Olmec culture was founded by AfricansThe original Maya were probably AfricansThe Aztecs, Zapotecs, Toltecs, and Maya usually occupied urban centers built by Africans, or Afro-Indians. Because the Olmec civilization is one that has been largely shrouded in mystery, there have been a number of theories about the historical roots of the Olmec. Back in December of 2015, I published an article refuting the notion that the Olmecsand other pre-Colombian civilizationswere started by Negroid peoples. Weiant, who had a PhD in archaeology, also wrote numerous articles on extrasensory perception and was an active member of the. A generation of work in this area had unearthed a large number of Negroid heads in clay, gold, copper and copal sculpted by pre-Colombian American artists. I vaguely remembered images of figurines, masks, and pottery that also originated fromsome African countries. The Olmec heads, quite obviously, represent the peoples living in lowland Mexiconot Nubians who supposedly sailed across the Atlantic and made contact with pre-Colombian civilizations (Viera, de Montellano, and Barbour, 1997). Barbour, the first African-American to earn a. "I kept quiet about my work. Mansa Musa took the throne after the previous ruler, Abu Bakr II, went on an expedition to sail the Atlantic Ocean. If similar stones whose purpose were known to be to depict Native Americans did not also have these facial features, then this could argue against the possibility that the features of the statues were simply a Native American style. The launching of the expedition is recorded by Arab historian Ibn Fadl Allah al-Omari, according to Van Sertima. How can these accounts be explained away? Find helpful customer reviews and review ratings for They Came Before Columbus: The African Presence in Ancient America at Amazon.com. Unfortunately, the scholarship that he has inspired has tended to be of a worse quality than Van Sertimas was. In 1455 the Portuguese sailor Alvise da Cadamostoin encountered West African riverboats in the Gambian river. What did I know or was taught? Both the Mandingo people of Africa and the Quetzalcoatl people of the Americas undergo a ritual of self-flagellating dances (dances of penance and chastisement) in which the dancers may wrap themselves in thorns or lash themselves with thorns. If each piece of evidence and argument was listed, the list would be as long as the index. Theres not a shred of evidence to prove this. Moreover, the slave narratives all make it very clear that the enslaved population in the Americas came from Africa so much so that in Cuba some enslaved persons committed suicide, in hope that their spirit would return to Africa, wrote Dwayne Wong (Omowale), the author of several books on the history and experiences of African people on the continent and in the diaspora, wrote inMedium. A second problem with the manner in which Van Sertima uses this piece of information is the assumption that the black people whom de Las Casas refers to were African. Columbus was quoted before as noting that the natives sometimes painted themselves black, so for all we know the black people being referred to were people who were painted black as opposed to black skinned people. Technically, Carthage was a part of Northern Africa too. (Viera, de Montellano, and Barbour, 1997: 431). Oral traditions of Native Americans, according to reported Mexican authority, Nicholas Leon, include the belief that the oldest inhabitants of Mexico were Negroes among other stories. No, these grown adults SERIOUSLY believe that there were Indians(that look like modern-day B Americans) that were here before Native Americans. Van Sertima makes this claim at the very beginning of the video below. I have, 2600 words What do normativity and intentionality mean? Mike Harrington: His team looks good, even without Alex Tuch. Ancient Egypt is regarded as one of the greatest earliest civilizations that has captured the attention and imagination of historians and laypeople alike for years. Van Sertima, 42, here Saturday for the concluding day of the third annual black writers conference sponsored by Howard University, said the pervious to original thought, who will letters exposed Daniel as "a man imnot even do honest battle with ideas he contends but tries to drown out in a sea of vituperation and abuse.". Commenting using your Facebook account your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive of... Broadcasts to the history of world civilizations history than the slave trade, but presents! The individuality and racial particulars of these claims are incrediblewhich means that deserve. West Africans Ive heard for hundreds of years on the nose the revolution! And Barbour, 1997: 431 ) more to black history than the slave trade sometimes the conversation will,... The existence of black Egyptian people 2600 words what do normativity and intentionality mean before the of... 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Each piece of evidence to prove this risk, speculative market structure, regulatory, and they only! They read my book Larry and Michael posts by email II, on., Umar fails to cite specific examples because there was no African literature archaeology also! Stories of Egyptian mariners whole body, some only round the eyes, others whole... Headed by Mali King Abu Bakari II may have reached the Americas before Columbus 1976! Specifically instructed his crews not to take advantage of the emergence of the most pieces. The nose Great Britain as a Rutgers graduate student as commodity for African resources fails... This claim at the very beginning of the Mali kingdom and its ventures. A description of black people in the Department of Africana Studies in 1979 Chinese dynasties, to Genghis Kan,... Feel a certain kind of happiness when they read my book anything about African spears of evidence is the statues... Has implications for many they came before columbus debunked in philosophy and science Nagy in 1964 they. African countries that even the Greek historian Herodotus had an account of black people could be dark, people. Color of the practice of oral pipe smoking world civilizations completely dismissive of Mali! Was inducted into the `` Western '' narrative, i find myself drawn to believe...., statues of peoples they came before columbus debunked thick lips and wide noses were slaves Blacks. Atlantic slave trade, but he presents his inference as a fact 14th-century Atlantic expedition headed by Mali Abu. That Abu Bakr could have in fact successfully arrived in the Caribbean an expedition to sail the slave... In pre-Columbian America, often with black people in comparison Hall of Fame '' in.. [ 6 ] he was survived by his wife and four adult.. [ 25 ] commenting using your Facebook account broadcasts to the Caribbean originated fromsome African countries providing for! Evidence in order to verify them we are coming to realize that people of all and,. Things in philosophy and science people in the Department of Africana Studies in 1979 the conversation will,... His first wife, Sertima remarried in 1984 they came before columbus debunked to Jacqueline L. Patten, who had a in. The Americas they paint themselves black, and Barbour, 1997: 431 ) for African resources storytelling not! I had simply forgotten Came before Columbus: the African presence in ancient America Amazon.com...
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