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Jugernot
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Topic: Werer the Egyptians white or black? Posted: 22-Jul-2007 at 17:04 |
Originally posted by Tk101
pinguin you should back your rhetoric with actual data...and not heresay |
Exactly. People can say whatever they wish. But I'd rather go along with what most mainstream Egyptologists think. Saying that they were a Mediterranean culture or whatever else, is hearsay and not at all what Egyptologists think.
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Aster Thrax Eupator
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Posted: 22-Jul-2007 at 17:17 |
Good stuff Jugernot (Oh, I spelt your username wrong in my last post!), but where do you get all of this university material?
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Jugernot
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Posted: 22-Jul-2007 at 17:25 |
Originally posted by Earl Aster
I would agree with the general thing that Juggernaught and Edgewaters have been discussing (obviously they have their differences, but I think they're on the right track...) - skin colour does not neccesarily divide a civilization (as it has ours for a long, long time...). Egyptians, black, white, olive-skinned, or brown are...well...Egyptian. People keep diving into genetics, but frankly, all of us here are mish-mashes. There is no "solid" ethnic group which you can call "Egyptians" - they are, like all peoples, a mixture. The "English", of whom I belong - we are traditionally a mix of various ethnicities of Northern Europe. Because Upper Egypt and Lower Egypt both have highly different skin colours, which just happen to be in closer proximity to each other, it doesn't mean that they are all any less "Egyptian". |
co-sign. I agree with this post 100%
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Jugernot
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Posted: 22-Jul-2007 at 17:37 |
Originally posted by Earl Aster
Good stuff Jugernot (Oh, I spelt your username wrong in my last post!), but where do you get all of this university material? |
lol, it's not your fault. I spell it differently (wrong) on purpose. I can't blame you for wanting to spell it correctly. This is all from the book I recommended in my first post (Egypt in Africa). The Frank Yurco emails are just emails. Different people ask him different things and he responds sometimes. For instance, there's an email where he proves Lepsius' copy of the Ramesses III tomb relief that most Afrocentrics still use, to be false. And says the real one (which was posted on the first page of this thread) is the real one (which he does in greater detail in the book).
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Aster Thrax Eupator
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Posted: 22-Jul-2007 at 17:41 |
Exactly! Our civilization today is so interested in skin colour, and that skin colour must mean a different ethnicity. Many people still call black Britons in my country "of African descent". If that's so, all Britons can be labeled "of Frankish decent", "of saxon decent" ad infinitum. It's interesting that people still feel that way about black Britons- they are Britons, despite their skin colour! The human race is so intermingled that people can't judge race (apart from in an obvious pan-continental context) by colour. We are effectively all related and the barriers that we put up are those of an ethno-linguistic nature. Because everyone here forum views blacks and whites (inadvertantly) as representing different cultures, we still find it hard to see how people of a different colour could be in the same ethno-lingustic group. It's simple - Egypt is, and Egypt proves it.
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Posted: 22-Jul-2007 at 17:49 |
Originally posted by Jugernot
Originally posted by pinguin
Co-sign. Egypt mas a Mediterranean culture and also one of the extremes of the Fertil Crescent. |
No it wasn't.
Egypt in Africa, 1996, pp. 25-27
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Pinguin
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Jugernot
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Posted: 22-Jul-2007 at 17:53 |
Originally posted by pinguin
Originally posted by Jugernot
Originally posted by pinguin
Co-sign. Egypt mas a Mediterranean culture and also one of the extremes of the Fertil Crescent. |
No it wasn't.
Egypt in Africa, 1996, pp. 25-27
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Pinguin |
I'm very sorry, but you're misinterpreting the picture. Read whats under the picture to find the truth. Here: "The speakers of the
earliest Afrasian languages, according to recent studies, were a set of
peoples whose lands between 15,000 and 13,000 B.C. stretched from Nubia
in the west to far northern Somalia in the east."
Edited by Jugernot - 22-Jul-2007 at 18:06
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Aster Thrax Eupator
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Posted: 22-Jul-2007 at 18:06 |
Very interesting pcture. It shows the AfroAsiatic languages originated just across Arabia into the Red Sea. In other words, it belong to the place we always knew it was: to the Fertile Crescent region |
Pinguin, just because they are across the gulf from the Fertile Crescent, that doesn't justify any claims of a link to there - anyway, the area across the gulf on that map is Arabia, which is clearly not part of the fertile crescent. By your logic, Magan (Ancient Oman) must have had cultural links to Elam - "Because it's opposite them on a gluf". The area opposite the origins of Afroasiatic on that map is ...desert...lots....of...it. The most logical crossing place for people from the Levant to bring Afroasiatic languages would be the Sinai, and as you can see, that area indicated to be the origins is nowhere near, proving Jugernot's point...
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Guests
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Posted: 22-Jul-2007 at 18:17 |
Originally posted by Earl Aster
Very interesting pcture. It shows the AfroAsiatic languages originated just across Arabia into the Red Sea. In other words, it belong to the place we always knew it was: to the Fertile Crescent region |
Pinguin, just because they are across the gulf from the Fertile Crescent, that doesn't justify any claims of a link to there - anyway, the area across the gulf on that map is Arabia, which is clearly not part of the fertile crescent. By your logic, Magan (Ancient Oman) must have had cultural links to Elam - "Because it's opposite them on a gluf". The area opposite the origins of Afroasiatic on that map is ...desert...lots....of...it. The most logical crossing place for people from the Levant to bring Afroasiatic languages would be the Sinai, and as you can see, that area indicated to be the origins is nowhere near, proving Jugernot's point... |
Whatever. I preffer to speak Mapudungun
By the way, everyone is invited to my forum. See my signature, thanks
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Posted: 23-Jul-2007 at 03:33 |
Whatever. I preffer to speak Mapudungun |
I don't quite see the reason for that inane giggling, Pinguin - your point has been decimated and I think that it is Jugernot and I who have the right to laugh now - although being a gentleman will refrain from doing so.
...Also, I'm not being rude, or arrogant or anything like that, but putting endless LOLs in your signature doesn't do your character any credit.
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gcle2003
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Posted: 23-Jul-2007 at 07:51 |
Originally posted by Jugernot
Originally posted by Tk101
pinguin you should back your rhetoric with actual data...and not heresay |
Exactly. People can say whatever they wish. But I'd rather go along with what most mainstream Egyptologists think. Saying that they were a Mediterranean culture or whatever else, is hearsay and not at all what Egyptologists think.
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Civilisation begins with the development of settled agricultural communities domesticating plants and animals. There are only nine areas of the world where this happened independently - i.e. by the domestication of local species, rather than the introduction of already domesticated varieties from elsewhere.
These are, in Asia, the 'Fertile Crescent' of south-west Asia and China; in Africa, the Sahel, West Africa and Ethiopia; in the Americas, Middle America, the Andes, and the eastern part of what is now the US; and New Guinea. Of them the oldest is the Fertile Crescent.
All the domesticated plant and animal species (except possible the donkey) found in Egypt are immigrants from the Fertile Crescent: they don't occur in the wild version in Egypt. That includes wheat, barley, peas, lentils, sheep, goats and flax (for linen and linseed oil). None of those found in early Egypt come from the more southerly African areas of independent food production.
Irrespective of race or skin colour or language, the civilisation of Egypt is a descendant culture from that of the Fertile Crescent, just as the European ones are, and, as someone already pointed out, its entire history is one of interaction with the rest of the middle east and the other countries of the mediterranean area.
The only case for calling ancient Egypt an 'African' civilisation is similar to that of calling Hollywood and 'American' culture - i.e. that's the continent it happened to lie on.
Or of course, you may want to call it an 'African' civilisation because after all homo sapiens is an African species.
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Aster Thrax Eupator
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Posted: 23-Jul-2007 at 11:50 |
...But surely not linguistically - I'm aware that much of the rudiments of civilization came from the fertile cresent, but not Afroasiatic language - that's been proven
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Posted: 23-Jul-2007 at 12:05 |
Originally posted by Earl Aster
Whatever. I preffer to speak Mapudungun |
I don't quite see the reason for that inane giggling, Pinguin - your point has been decimated and I think that it is Jugernot and I who have the right to laugh now - although being a gentleman will refrain from doing so.
...Also, I'm not being rude, or arrogant or anything like that, but putting endless LOLs in your signature doesn't do your character any credit. |
Well, I won't continue arguing that point. It is just a matter of definitions, anyways. Any child in primary school knows social evolution started in the old world by the interaction of NETWORKS of civilizations, rather that by the genial idea of just a group. We know the people of Mesopotamia traded with India, Turkey, Arabia, etc. We know Arabs were never isolated of Horners, and that Egyptians were not isolated of Horners either. Afroasiatic languages are shared by Arabs, Jews, Egyptians and Africans because they share the same region.
So what's the point of claming something was "African"?
Now for giggling? Mapudungun is the language of the natives of my country. That's all.
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King John
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Posted: 23-Jul-2007 at 14:43 |
I think that the main problem here is how people decide to define civilization as well as how it is classifyied. Was the Egyptian civilization located in Africa yes. However that doesn't make it black since that is the actual question at the heart of this thread. At the same time they are not white. They are Egyptian nothing more nothing less. Although they spoke a language that belonged to a group of languages expanding out of modern Ethiopia and Kenya (see map above) this again doesn't make them black. The same is true for Pinguin's argument just because they share elements of civilization with Mesopotamia or other Middle Eastern societies doesn't make them Middle Eastern. Given the location of the civilization I think it is safe to say that the Egyptian civilization is a synthesis of African and Asian civilizations. All this however is irrelevant because the question at hand is whether the ancient Egyptians were white or black. Where there civilization/language evolved from is irrelevant to this discussion (in my eyes).
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Seko
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Posted: 23-Jul-2007 at 15:08 |
As requested by King John, going back to the original question seems like a good thing to do.
Originally posted by asdfghjkl
As the question stated, were they white or black? I'm very critical and upset of this dispute, that afrocentrics are trying to rewrite history. But if they are wrong..... |
... afrocentrists are not the only ones blinded by skin color.
I get the feeling that a hint of desired superiority is hidden in such perspectives.
Aside from linguistic theories and Atlantean mysteries ancient Egypt was peopled in an African Mediterranean land susceptible to climatic influences. I assume apart from catastrophies of biblical proportions the climate of Egypt had alot to do with her civilization. At times semi-tropical and arid, this productive land around the Nile also produced crops that would sustain large populations. Harvesting and storing grain was of huge importance. This was a sign of power and survival. The weather was conducive to this type of commodity. The inventions may have even revolved around the type of static geography. Plumbing and mining come to mind. Trade also was a focal point since Egypt was a gateway to the Middle East and Africa. Shipping from the med or indian oceans was a boon to commerce.
As we can see the color of skin has very little to do with reacting to the environment.
Edited by Seko - 23-Jul-2007 at 15:16
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Aster Thrax Eupator
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Posted: 23-Jul-2007 at 15:49 |
...Well, we all seem to have an agreement here then
Well done everyone! We seem to have answered the question very well!
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elenos
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Posted: 23-Jul-2007 at 21:54 |
Africa is a continent, not a country! How simplistic can some people get than to say all people in Africa are the same. Even without the presence of other race. there are more ethnic types in Africa that evolved differently in the ecological niches of savannas and jungles than anywhere else on earth.
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elenos
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Jugernot
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Posted: 23-Jul-2007 at 22:58 |
Originally posted by elenos
Africa is a continent, not a country! How simplistic can some people get than to say all people in Africa are the same. Even without the presence of other race. there are more ethnic types in Africa that evolved differently in the ecological niches of savannas and jungles than anywhere else on earth.
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Yes my friend, I think you understand! Africa is the most diverse place on earth. It's critical for one to read Keita's piece called "the diversity of indigenous Africans" (it's on the keita page in my first post). For instance, people used to describe the Ethiopians, Somalis and Nubians as "Caucasoid". We now know that Africans can have "Caucasoid" features without any non-African ancestry. These types developed in Africa because it suited their surroundings more. There is no "true negro", such stereotypes led people like brace to come up with flawed findings (brace now corrected his mistakes). Most anthropologists and egyptologists don't even use the terms "Caucasian" or "Negro" to describe the Egyptians anymore, because it can be very misleading. I cant force anyone to change their opinion. I
can only give you information and show you what current Egyptologists think. Their conclusion is that Egypt was an African civilization.Why this is so hard to accept, I do not know.
No one skin complexion made one more Egyptian than the other, they were all Egyptian. No one skin complexion made them any more African than the other, they were all African (Again, as Dr Yurco said, not all Africans are black).
"This modern population still echoes Nile Valley
diversity, where people of the lightest and darkest complexions within Africa are found (Trigger 1978; Yurco 1989). Nonetheless,
these Nilotic populations are all Africans, so was the population, religion,
culture, and other aspects of pharaonic Egypt" (Yurco). Edit:
Let me try to make this easier to understand for everyone. First of all,
throw this race nonsense out the window (Caucasian, Negro). Know this;
biologically theres no such thing as race. We all started out in Africa. So why then dont we all look the same? Simple,
we developed to best suit the environment we live in. The whole Hamitic hypothesis
has long since been proven to be false (at least 11 years now). So what does
this mean? Once people moved out of Africa theres no evidence to suggest large
migrations moved back in to create the Caucasians and blacks with Caucasoid
features in Africa. These peoples all
developed in Africa to suit their diverse environments.
This is why Egypt
is an African civilization (already gave ample evidence), but not a black civilization (they were diverse and
not all indigenous Africans are black).
Edited by Jugernot - 24-Jul-2007 at 03:49
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elenos
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Posted: 24-Jul-2007 at 01:15 |
Country;
land of a region.
Continent, continuous
land, mainland, one of the main bodies of land. (Europe, Asia, Africa, N & S America, Australia, Antarctica.)
Egypt is a land in the north of African the
continent in the Mediterranean region. Nothing personal here its just a matter
of using the accepted terminology. I remember not so long ago, some people from Southern Spain got together to say they were Latinos
and not Europeans. It didnt work of course for Spain is part of the EU. They would have
a better case by saying they were Mediterraneanos. But Northern Spain faces the
Bay of Biscay so perhaps we could call them Biscuits!
Italy and
Greece are in the EU Trouble is nobody has really thought up a good word that
can roll off the tongue to cover those of Mediterranean descent and many want to
be known as Europeans despite any technical niggling about the terminology. Now
Turkey is pushing to join the EU so what would you
call them?
Edited by elenos - 24-Jul-2007 at 02:38
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elenos
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Jugernot
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Posted: 24-Jul-2007 at 02:02 |
delete
Edited by Jugernot - 24-Jul-2007 at 03:55
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