We had a very long thread on this a while back: I'll try to find it. From what I know, the Arab invasions have actually had little impact on the demographics of Egypt as well as many other so-called "Arab" countries such as Syria, Lebanon or Iraq. These countries already spoke Semitic languages such as Coptic or Aramaic, so it was very easy for them to adopt a related language -Arabic, as the lingua franca of commerce, and eventually to start speaking it exclusively. The actual number of Arabs who migrated to Egypt was probably too smal to really affect the way that Egyptians looked. Same goes for the Greeks and Romans who were confined exclusively to urban areas. The Egyptians of today probably look a lot like they did 3000 years ago; and some Egyptians you will meet are black because current-day Egypt covers areas which were historically part of Nubia as well (also because Nubians, possibly even more so than the Greeks mixed in with the Egyptians).

Just because the Egyptians were African (because that's the continent they're on after all!), that does not make them "black". Africa has a bewildering variety of people, and it so happens that the people inhabiting the northern areas (Egyptians and Berbers) are a good deal more fair-skinned than say people from Nigeria. This does not make them "white". The distinction is very arbitrary and arguable. I actually think that Afrocentrists who say that Egyptians were black because they were African are guilty of a form of racism towards black-people themselves because they are implcitly denying the vast variations in appearance which occur among the so-called "black people" (it's kind of like saying that "they all look the same"). Just compare the appearance of Ethiopians with that of Congolese people or of the Khoisan and you'll see what I mean.

Also, such statements deny the evidence present in all of Egyptian art, which clearly differentiated Egyptians (who were depicted with reddish skin for men and pale skin for women) from other people such as Nubians who were very black, but also from lighter-skinned people from the Middle East.

White people (Caucasoids) have existed in Africa since the beginning of times. There are some theories that place the origin of whites in Africa itself. Other shows back-immigration into Africa in neolythical times of people that resembled Berbers and Canarian settlers (the ancestors of the Carthagians and Moors). Even today you can find blue eyed peoples in North Africa as in ancient tims. So what's the big deal.

Well, I believe in the theory that the origin of mankind were the Indo-Europeans... and they were once located around the Black Sea. See my Atlantis theory in the intellectual discussion.

What? Jericho is a wall or building? It's a building... but I don't see your point...

If I were to make a statement such as "Hebrews' original homeland was in Asia, therefore the Hebrews are Asian and they have an Asian culture", then pretty much everyone would point out that this is a wildly inaccurate and misleading statement because Asia is so large and diverse. For some reason, Afrocentrists don't have a problem making a similar statement about Egyptians in Africa though...

Here's the problem the way I see it: during colonial times, Europeans were looking for an explanation for their supposed superiority and they divided humanity in some convenient but very inaccurate divisions called races. All the Sub-Saharan Africans were termed "blacks". This of course came at a time when European knowledge of African peoples, cultures and civilizations was extremely limited, so the generalization is not only arbitrary, it is also ignorant. During post-colonial times, Afrocentrists, instead of pointing out the vast variations which occur in the Africans' appearance and culture (Africa being the most diverse continent from that point of view, being the original home of mankind), instead accepted the racist classification of all Africans as black. They tried to show afterwards that Egypt was a "black" and "African" culture (whatever that means) and that all other cultures, especially the European ones borrowed from it. So you see, by accepting this arbitrary and racist division and turning it back on the Europeans, the Afrocentrists are in fact guilty of taking the same attitude as the old-time racist Europeans but in reverse. Instead of the old racist motto of "Africans did not have a civilization of their own and borrowed everything from the Europeans and Arabs", the Afrocentrists say "Europeans did not have a civilization of their own and borrowed everyhting from the Egyptians who were black". The two statements are very similar, wouldn't you say?

The crux of the Afrocentric racist argument rests on the assumption that Egyptians were "black" and "culturally African", ignoring the fact that there is no such thing as a black race and an African culture. Rather Africa is the most diverse continent in terms of the peoples' appearance and it is also extremely diverse culturally. This is natural because Africa is the oldest continent as fas as human habitation is concerned. Anyway, to prove that the Egyptians were "black", they point to a few statues of pharaohs (which don't show skin color anyway) and some of their features (such as thick noses or broad lips). Of course, those traits are not the exclusive appanage of Sub-Saharan Africans, who have a wide variety of facial features; also many Middle-Easterners, Asians, Indians,etc, have them as well. Rather, what has happened is that most Afrocentrics are from the United States or other parts of the Americas, where most African people come from West Africa and are therefore more homogenous in appearance. They assume therefore that all African people must look like them, and they look for features such as frizzy hair, broad lips and thick noses in the Egyptians. They ignore however the fact that not only are those features not exclusive to black people, but also the fact that many Africans don't even have them. What's worse, Afrocentrists ignore the overwhelming evidence against their argument which is evident in Egyptian painting and most sculptures besides the ones they hold as proof of the Egyptians' "blackness".

AfrikaJamaika and viola, instead of wasting your energies on proving an argument which is flawed from the beginning and racist to boot, why not concentrate insted on spreading the word about the rich cultures and civilizations of Africa? Instead of appropriating a culture as "African", why not explore the variety of all the cultures in Africa?

Egyptians of the ancient times and the present are actually the same people, with some admixture from mediterraneans and southerners, of course, because time does not pass in vain, but not much as one could think. That's what genetics shows anyways.

The only people who focus on such things as the color of ancient Egyptians are the extremists: Afrocentrists who want to prove that Egyptians were black, or white supremacists who want to prove the exact opposite. Most modern academics don't bother writing articles about it, but instead there is a general consensus that ancient Egypt was a multiracial society.

Some of these pages would be useful:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Racial_characteristics_of_ancient_Egyptians - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Racial_characteristics_of_ancient_Egyptians

Take a look at the map which depicts the range of skin colors of humanity. You will notice that Africa is by far the most diverse continent in this respect. How can we say then that being from the African continent automatically means being "black"?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Unlabeled_Renatto_Luschan_Skin_color_map.png - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Unlabeled_Renatto_Luschan_Skin_color_map.png

I don't know if you can read French, but the French Wikipedia is a lot better than the English one:

http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origine_des_anciens_%C3%89gyptiens - http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origine_des_anciens_%C3%89gyptiens

Swiss archaeologist digs up West Africa's past

A Swiss:led team of archaeologists has discovered pieces of the oldest African pottery in central Mali, dating back to at least 9,400BC.

The sensational find by Geneva University's Eric Huysecom and his international research team, at Ounjougou near the Unesco:listed Bandiagara cliffs, reveals important information about man's interaction with nature.

The age of the sediment in which they were found suggests that the six ceramic fragments : discovered between 2002 and 2005 : are at least 11,400 years old. Most ancient ceramics from the Middle East and the central and eastern Sahara regions are 10,000 and between 9:10,000 years old, respectively.

"At the beginning, the very first piece we found stayed in my desk drawer for years, as I didn't realise how old it was," Huysecom told swissinfo.

Huysecom heads a 50:strong interdisciplinary team, composed of 28 international researchers ? mainly from Germany, Mali, Switzerland, France and Britain : on the largest current archaeological research project in Africa, entitled "Human population and paleo:environment in West Africa".

Ounjougou was selected as the location, "as everything led us to believe that there we could follow the evolution of man, the environment and the climate", explained Huysecom.

The site is an archaeologist's dream: a ravine made up of layers of easy:to:date sediment rich in West African history.

Significant findings

Since the launch of the project in 1997, the team has made numerous discoveries about ancient stone:cutting techniques and tools, and other important findings that shed light on human development in the region.

But the unearthing of the ancient fragments of burnt clay is one of the most significant to date. Huysecom is convinced that pottery was invented in West Africa to enable man to adapt to climate change.

"Apart from finding the oldest ceramic in Africa, the interesting thing is that it gives us information about when and under what circumstances man can invent new things, such as pottery," he explained.

"And the invention of ceramic is linked to specific environmental conditions ? the transformation of the region from desert into grassland."

Grasslands

Some 10,000 years ago, at the end of the ice age, the climate is thought to have fluctuated between warm and cold periods. This led to the formation of an 800:kilometre:wide band of tropical vegetation extending northwards from the Sahel region, which attracted people who slowly moved north from southern and central Africa.

Wild grasses and pearl millet started sprouting on the former desert land. But for man to be able to eat and properly digest the new plants, they had to be stored and cooked in pots.

"Man had to adapt his food and way of life by inventing pottery," said the Geneva professor.

The invention of ceramic also coincided with that of small arrowheads : also discovered by the team ? and which were probably used to hunt hares, pheasants and other small game on the grassy plains.

To date, East Asia ? the triangle between Siberia, China and Japan ? is the only other area where similar pottery and arrowheads have been found which are as old as those in West Africa, explained Huysecom.

"This is important, as they both appear in same way, at the same time and under similar climatic conditions, which indicates that man has certain modes of adaptation to cope with environmental changes," he commented.

Ahead of the final publication of the team's research findings this year, Huysecom is returning to Ounjougou to rejoin his colleagues, in particular those from West Africa "who are extremely proud of the discovery".

He plans to scour the region for caves and other settlement sites to try and find out exactly where the pottery came from so as to determine more precisely the age of the fragments.

"We know [from the sediment] that they are at least 11,400 years old, but they could be 50 or even 1,000 years older

I still can't get why Blacks Americans are so concerned with Egypt.

lol this topic is jokes

Interesting.

And what if so?