1. On a pilgrimage to Mecca in 1324 AD, a Malian ruler, Mansa Musa, brought so much money with him that his visit resulted in the collapse of gold prices in Egypt and Arabia. It took twelve years for the economies of the region to normalise. 2. West African gold mining took place on a vast scale. One modern writer said that: “It is estimated that the total amount of gold mined in West Africa up to 1500 was 3,500 tons, worth more than $30 billion in today’s market.” 43. The old Malian capital of Niani had a 14th century building called the Hall of Audience. It was an surmounted by a dome, adorned with arabesques of striking colours. The windows of an upper floor were plated with wood and framed in silver; those of a lower floor were plated with wood, framed in gold. 4. Mali in the 14th century was highly urbanised. Sergio Domian, an Italian art and architecture scholar, wrote the following about this period: “Thus was laid the foundation of an urban civilisation. At the height of its...

1. In around 300 BC, the Sudanese invented a writing script that had twenty-three letters of which four were vowels and there was also a word divider. Hundreds of ancient texts have survived that were in this script. Some are on display in the British Museum. 2. In central Nigeria, West Africa’s oldest civilisation flourished between 1000 BC and 300 BC. Discovered in 1928, the ancient culture was called the Nok Civilisation, named after the village in which the early artefacts were discovered. Two modern scholars, declare that “[a]fter calibration, the period of Nok art spans from 1000 BC until 300 BC”. The site itself is much older going back as early as 4580 or 4290 BC. 3. West Africans built in stone by 1100 BC. In the Tichitt-Walata region of Mauritania, archaeologists have found “large stone masonry villages” that date back to 1100 BC. The villages consisted of roughly circular compounds connected by “well-defined streets”. 4. By 250 BC, the foundations of West Africa’s oldest ...

1. The human race is of African origin. The oldest known skeletal remains of anatomically modern humans (or homo sapiens sapiens) were excavated at sites in East Africa. Human remains were discovered at Omo in Ethiopia that were dated at 195,000 years old, the oldest known in the world. 2. Skeletons of pre-humans have been found in Africa that date back between 4 and 5 million years. The oldest known ancestral type of humanity is thought to have been the australopithecus ramidus, who lived at least 4.4 million years ago. 3. Africans were the first to organise fishing expeditions 90,000 years ago. At Katanda, a region in northeastern Zaïre (now Congo), was recovered a finely wrought series of harpoon points, all elaborately polished and barbed. Also uncovered was a tool, equally well crafted, believed to be a dagger. The discoveries suggested the existence of an early aquatic or fishing based culture. 4. Africans were the first to engage in mining 43,000 years ago. In 1964 a hematite...

Did you know? STN facts 1. That Namibia employs day-light saving? 2. That the Botswanan Pula is stronger than the South African Rand? 3. That Zambia has over 72 different languages? 4. That the official currency of Zimbabwe is the US Dollar, but they only use the notes so change is a bit of an issue and so you end up receiving it as Rands or in exchange for a lollipop or 2? 5. That the most expensive game animal that has been sold in SA is a buffalo bull, for over R9 million? 6. That Namibia is the 4th least densely populated country in the world? 7. In Tanzania the time can be very confusing?  In “Swahili time”, the day starts at sunrise (6am) which is refered to as 0 o’clock. That means lunch is served at 6:30 and your post-breakfast snorkelling trip at 4 o’clock in the morning. 8. Lake Malawi has the largest variety of cichlids (tropical fish) of any lake in the world?  And over 90% of the cichlids in Lake Malawi do not occur anywhere else in the world?  Incide...