Africa is portrayed as a continent without history before slavery and colonialism. African History isn't known by many people compared to the history of Europe, Americas, and Asia.
Some of the world's great civilisations such as Mali flourished in Africa.
A THREAD!
In the early periods(1500s), Africans participated in extensive international trading networks and intrans-oceanic travel.
"Until the lion learns how to write, every story will glorify the hunter"
African Proverb
THE MALI EMPIRE
Founded by King Sundiata Keita, and also known as the richest civilisation in
West Africa. It boasted excellent law & order, agriculture and mining, the largest library in Africa, and the richest man in history: Mansa Musa!
The Mali kingdom at one point accounted for half of the world's gold supply; and housed over a million manuscripts so you could argue academia in the continent really began here.
THE KINGDOM OF KUSH
Kush was a part of Nubia, ancient Nubian cultures were sophisticated and cosmopolitan, as the region served as a major trading center for goods from the African interior, Arabian desert and Mediterranean basin.
It corresponds to the region of 'Nubia' - modern day Sudan.
There are different ideas for what 'Nubian' means:
Some say that the term 'Nubian' is derived from the ancient Egyptian word 'nub' meaning 'gold'.
Others have stated that the term comes from the earliest settlers of the region, being a tribe called the 'Nuba' or ' Noba'.
THE KINGDOM OF WAGADU (GHANA)
This kingdom was an important stop along the trans-Saharan trade route which connected African societies in the Sahel to the markets found along the coastlines of the Mediterranean Sea and the trans-Saharan gold trade.
They specialized in the trade of gold and kola nuts (the latter of which became the secret ingredient in Coca-Cola centuries later). The Kingdom of Ghana’s decline was cemented when it became part of the kingdom of Mali around the year 1240 CE.
ALMOHAD EMPIRE
The Almohad empire was a moorish dynasty that controlled most of North Africa and all of southern Spain during their reign.
BENIN EMPIRE
It was founded by Edo-speaking people. The name "Benin" (& "Bini") is a Portuguese corrupted word, ultimately from the word "Ubini", which came into use during the reign of Oba Ewuare the Great, 1440.
"Ubini", an ancient Edo word meaning beautiful people, was used to describe the royal administrative centre or city or capital proper of the kingdom, Edo.
Benin is said to have begun as family clusters of hunters, gatherers, and agriculturalists who eventually created villages. By 1300, Benin was heavily involved in trade and the arts, using such mediums as copper, bronze, and brass.
The Benin bronzes eventually became some of the most famous art pieces produced in Africa.
Britain stole over 6,000 Benin bronzes, which they display in their museums. 1 of them was sold for $13.5 million in 2015.
Their Royal horsemen patrolled the great Benin 1075-1350 CE wall which was the longest man-made structure in the world (about 16,000 km in length).
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Before Florence Nightingale we had Mary Seacole!! A woman who did more to advance the cause of nursing - and race relations - than almost any other individual.
Mary Seacole (1805–1881) was a pioneering Jamaican nurse, healer, and businesswoman whose contributions during the Crimean War have long been overlooked. After being rejected by British military and nursing authorities, she used her own resources to travel to the war zone, where she established the “British Hotel” near Balaclava.
The British Hotel was not a traditional hospital, but it provided food, supplies, shelter, and hands-on medical care to wounded and sick soldiers. Seacole was known for going directly onto the battlefield to tend to injured troops, earning deep respect and admiration from the men she cared for.
Florence Nightingale did not support Seacole’s work and declined to include her among her nurses. While Nightingale and some of her supporters viewed Seacole’s establishment critically—often dismissing it as overly commercial—there is no solid evidence that Nightingale directly called it a brothel. These tensions reflected racial, class, and ideological differences about who was considered “legitimate” within the emerging nursing profession.
Did you know Sesame Street was originally created for black and brown inner city kids?
A THREAD
Children usually spend a lot of time watching a lot tv and technically it was sort of a babysitter. It was even worse for inner city children whose parents spent endless hours at work, thus their kids were usually exposed to long hours of mindless programs.
Lloyd Morrisett, regarded as the father of Sesame Street and vice-president of the Carnegie Corporation with a Ph.D. in experimental psychology from Yale University developed
a special interest in children's education.
In 1963, 15 black girls were arrested for protesting segregation laws at the Martin theatre. Aged 12-15, they were locked in an old, abandoned stockade for 45 days without their parents knowledge. They came to be known as The Leesburg Stockade Girls,
A THREAD
The girls marched from Friendship Baptist Church to the Martin Theater, attempting to buy tickets at the front entrance, defying segregation laws. Police attacked with batons and arrested them, transporting them to a Civil War-era stockade in Leesburg, Georgia, 15 miles away.
The stockade had no beds, a broken toilet, and only hot water from a shower. The girls slept on concrete floors in sweltering heat, ate undercooked burgers, and drank from a single cup. Parents were not informed of their location for weeks, heightening their fear and isolation.
On this day in 1923, a lie by a white woman that she’d been sexually assaulted by a black man, led to the destruction of the predominantly African American town of Rosewood, Florida, thus the Rosewood Massacre.
A THREAD
Rosewood was a quiet, self-sufficient town in Florida. By 1900 the population in Rosewood had become predominantly African-American. Some people farmed or worked in local businesses, including a sawmill in nearby predominantly white town.
A rumour spread by a white woman, Fanny Taylor, sparked a massacre in the predominantly black town. Taylor claimed she was sexually assaulted in her house by a Black man. A group of white men believed her claims that she was raped by Jesse Hunter, a recently escaped convict.
The Watch Night Services in Black communities can be traced back to gatherings on December 31, 1862, also known as “Freedom’s Eve.”
THREAD
On that night, black people came together in churches and private homes all across the nation, anxiously awaiting news that the Emancipation Proclamation actually had become law.
Just a few months earlier, on September 22, 1862, President Abraham Lincoln issued the executive order that declared enslaved people in the rebelling Confederate States legally free. However, the decree would not take effect until the start of the new year.
In 1780, Paul Cuffee, his brother & 5 other Black men petitioned the Massachusetts legislature demanding the right to vote.
He won free black men the right to vote in Massachusetts on the basis of "No Taxation Without Representation."
THREAD
Paul Cuffee was born Paul Slocum on Jan. 17, 1759, Cuttyhunk Island, Massachusetts, to Kofi Slocum, a farmer & freed slave, and Ruth Moses, a native American of the Wampanog nation.
In 1766 he & his brother John inherited a 116 acre farm from their father in Buzzard's Bay, Massachusetts, near Dartmouth. He changed his surname to Kofi, spelled "Cuffee." The name Kofi suggests that his father came from the Ashanti or Ewe people of Ghana.