Facing the sea of sand : the Sahara and the peoples of Northern Africa / Barry Cunliffe.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Cunliffe, Barry W., author.

Series:

Oxford scholarship online.

Oxford scholarship online

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Africa, North--History.

Africa, North.

Africa, North--Civilization.

Africa, Northeast--History.

Africa, Northeast.

Africa, Northeast--Civilization.

Sahara--History.

Sahara.

Sahara--Civilization.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (413 pages)

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

Oxford : Oxford University Press, 2023.

Summary:

Northern Africa is dominated now by the Sahara Desert, stretching across the continent from the Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea. This book is about the people who lived around the edges of the Desert and the different ways in which they responded to its challenges, establishing networks of communication across its expanse.

Contents:

Cover

Facing the Sea of Sand: The Sahara and the Peoples of Northern Africa

Copyright

Preface

Contents

1 The Desert, the Rivers, and the Oceans

Bedrock

The Ever-Changing Climate

The Desert

Around the Desert

Distorting Factors

The Great Rivers

Of Seas and Ocean

Enter Humans

Human Diversity

2 The Long Beginning

Finding the Hunter-Gatherers

Charting the Ever-Changing Landscape

The Spread of Homo Sapiens

The Aterian Hunter-Gatherers

The Later Hunter-Gatherers, 42,000-10,000 bc

The Greening of the Desert, 10,000-6000 bc

Settling the Desert

3 Domesticating the Land, 6500-1000 bc

The Beginnings of Pastoralism

The Spread of Near Eastern Cereal Crops

The Mediterranean Contribution

Africa's Own Contribution

The Climate Again

The Indian Ocean Interface

The Atlantic Interface

The Precocious Nile

The Rise of Pharaonic Egypt

Kerma and the First Kingdom of Kush

Standing Back

4 Creating Connectivities, 1000-140 bc

Travellers' Tales

Lands to the North of the Desert

South of the Sahara

Faces in the Savannah

The People of the Desert

The Garamantes

Egypt, 1069-30 bc

Nubia and the Kingdoms of Kush

Ethiopia and the Red Sea

Nine Hundred Years of Change

5 The Impact of Empire, 140 bc-ad 400

The Creation of Roman Africa

Exploring the Desert Fringes

Africa within the Empire

The States Without: Meroe, Aksum, and Beyond

The Garamantes Again

The World beyond the Desert

Commodities on the Move

The Peoples of the Desert

The Beginning of the End

6 An End and a Beginning, ad 400-760

Changing Elites: A Quick Sketch

The Vandals in Africa

The Byzantine Reconquest

The Eastern Front

The Arab Conquest of North Africa: First Incursions

The Arabs Arrive to Stay

Accommodation and Revolt.

The Polities of the Middle Nile

The Communities of the Western Sahel

The Desert Communities

The End and the Beginning

7 Emerging States, ad 760-1150

The Northern Polities in the Eighth and Ninth Centuries

The Rise of the Fatimids

The Fatimids in Egypt

The Indian Ocean Coast

Meanwhile, in the Maghrib

The Western Arc

The Almoravids

The Empire of Gold

Neighbouring Polities in the Western Sahel

The Communities of the Central and Eastern Sahel

The Forests of the South

The Beginning of a World System?

8 Widening Horizons, ad 1150-1400

Interfering Europeans

New Observers, New Sources

The Almohads and Thereafter

Egypt: The Ayyubids and the Mamluks

Exploring the Land of Barbur, Zanj, and Sofala

The Empire of Mali

Crossing the Desert

The Kingdoms of the Central and Eastern Sudan

Exploring the World

Stability and Intensification

9 Africa and the World, ad 1400-1600

The Chinese Arrive

The Portuguese Imperative

Into the Unknown

Exploring the Gulf of Guinea

The Kingdoms of the Forest Zone

Consolidation and Forward Again

The Empire of Songhai

The Ottomans in the North

The Maghrib and the Western Mediterranean

The Struggle for Abyssinia

Meanwhile, in Morocco

Invasion across the Desert

Disillusion

Across Two Hundred Years

10 Retrospect and Prospect

The Human Contribution

Zones of Innovation

Corridors of Communication

The Last Four Hundred Years

Climate and Population Again

A Guide to Further Reading

Some General Works

Chapter 1 The Desert, the Rivers, and the Oceans

Chapter 2 The Long Beginning

Chapter 3 Domesticating the Land, 6500-1000 bc

Chapter 4 Creating Connectivities, 1000-140 bc

Chapter 5 The Impact of Empire, 140 bc-ad 400

Chapter 6 An End and a Beginning, ad 400-760.

Chapter 7 Emerging States, ad 760-1150

Chapter 8 Widening Horizons, ad 1150-1400

Chapter 9 Africa and the World, ad 1400-1600

Chapter 10 Retrospect and Prospect

Illustration Sources

Index.

Notes:

This edition also issued in print: 2023.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (viewed on May 22, 2023).

ISBN:

0-19-267475-7

0-19-194939-6

0-19-267474-9

OCLC:

1376935165