History and Culture of Libya(Northwestern Africa) (WWII, ancient, Romans)

[kovert]

Hi all. I am very much interested in the history of Libya. This is what the ancient Greco-Romans called North Africa west of the Nile Valley.

There is much written on its history in French, Italian, Spanish and of course Arabic but unfortunately those works are inaccessible to me. Oh and since I mentioned Arabic, medieval and later Libya (particularly up to and including the Barbary Wars) info is just as welcome as pharaonic and Greco-Roman info.

Thus I would like to start this thread on cultures, civilizations and peoples of Northwest Africa. So the best starting point should be what were the backgrounds and origins of the population of Libya?

(P.S. since this is so broad a topic and there are many strands that we could get into is there anyway to have one main thread but with the ability to branch out into daughter threads. Like maybe punic period, roman period, islamic period etc?)

[JefferyT]

I used to be interested in some of the desert areas in southern Lybia, the land of the Garamentes. This was a people that lived out in the desert and traded with the Romans. There's been some interesting archeology done on them, on how they got water via these underground gallery systems.

[j_k_k]

I'm interested in the mummification at Uan Muhuggiag, though I haven't yet learned that much about it.

[kovert]

Thanks for the response and interest. Actually I was thinking about starting with the area around modern southern Libya (Fezzan/Central Sahara). A while back I watched a documentary on the History/Discovery channels called the Black Mummy. Here is a summary of its main points.
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a.
About 10,000 B.C.E, monsoons rains attracted animals and the people who hunted them from Central Africa into the Sahara (then a lush, green, savanna due to the rains) and the Meditterean coast.

b.
Then circa 7,000 B.C.E. "white people" coming from "the Near East" and the Eastern Saharan area merged with these Central African "negroids" to form the mixed race population that has characterized NorthWest Africa ever since.

c.
A "black, negroid" boy was found to have been mummified in the Central Sahara a thousand years before its 1st documented incidence in Egypt. The researchers surmise that the culture of the Sahara had probably been performing mummification operations hundreds perhaps thousands of years earlier before the boy was born.

d.
Animal headed humans, a curious feature of ancient Egypt, were depicted in Saharan rock art. Presumably before their 1st appearance in the Nile Valley (Egypt AND Nubia).

e.
Not only is there evidence of the domestication of cattle. But there seems to have been a bull or cattle cult. I'm reminded that the bull deity Amon was popular among the Libyans particularly those of the Siwa oasis.

f.
This culture extends south into the Sahara of present day Mali and Niger; northward toward the Mediterranean coasts of Algeria and Libya; and finally east reaching the Western Desert of Nile Valley.

g.
It appears the Nile Valley people may owe the Saharans for the idea or know how to make pottery.
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Not connected with the documentary but the Saharan peoples have also been credited with building the 1st megalithic monument before Stonehenge. It was at Nabta Playa in the Western Desert.

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The rock art depicting ships that were thought to have been evidence of "Near Eastern/Mesotopamian" invasions or migrations into the Nile Valley and other parts of Africa have been instrumental in debunking claims that Nile Valley civilization was not an indigneous creation.
This rock art has been found in the Eastern and Western Deserts of the Nile Valley. This book is another good source on the Western Desert, particularly its prehistory.

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[jungeon]

Originally Posted by kovert

Thanks for the response and interest. Actually I was thinking about starting with the area around modern southern Libya (Fezzan/Central Sahara). A while back I watched a documentary on the History/Discovery channels called the Black Mummy. Here is a summary of its main points.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
a.
About 10,000 B.C.E, monsoons rains attracted animals and the people who hunted them from Central Africa into the Sahara (then a lush, green, savanna due to the rains) and the Meditterean coast.

b.
Then circa 7,000 B.C.E. "white people" coming from "the Near East" and the Eastern Saharan area merged with these Central African "negroids" to form the mixed race population that has characterized NorthWest Africa ever since.

c.
A "black, negroid" boy was found to have been mummified in the Central Sahara a thousand years before its 1st documented incidence in Egypt. The researchers surmise that the culture of the Sahara had probably been performing mummification operations hundreds perhaps thousands of years earlier before the boy was born.

d.
Animal headed humans, a curious feature of ancient Egypt, were depicted in Saharan rock art. Presumably before their 1st appearance in the Nile Valley (Egypt AND Nubia).

e.
Not only is there evidence of the domestication of cattle. But there seems to have been a bull or cattle cult. I'm reminded that the bull deity Amon was popular among the Libyans particularly those of the Siwa oasis.

f.
This culture extends south into the Sahara of present day Mali and Niger; northward toward the Mediterranean coasts of Algeria and Libya; and finally east reaching the Western Desert of Nile Valley.

g.
It appears the Nile Valley people may owe the Saharans for the idea or know how to make pottery.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Not connected with the documentary but the Saharan peoples have also been credited with building the 1st megalithic monument before Stonehenge. It was at Nabta Playa in the Western Desert.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The rock art depicting ships that were thought to have been evidence of "Near Eastern/Mesotopamian" invasions or migrations into the Nile Valley and other parts of Africa have been instrumental in debunking claims that Nile Valley civilization was not an indigneous creation.
This rock art has been found in the Eastern and Western Deserts of the Nile Valley. This book is another good source on the Western Desert, particularly its prehistory.

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Bolder dash, white people did not arrive into north africa until 600 bc when the romans, greeks, persians and celts and alike started their invasions and occupations. The original inhabitants are black african, since the 1000 year turkish occupation of north africa that ended when the french italian and english split up their empire around 1800s the population of libya is essentially of mixed race(white and black) however outside of coastal areas the majority of the population is black as they were not really colonised as turks/italians/romans etc only took over the major cities. there is also a huge illegal immigrant population of libya that is mostly black african as well. Of all of the north african states Libya is the most african as even the leader identifies himself more with africa than arabs and the middle east and they gennerally look more black than their arabic counterparts

[j_k_k]

Originally Posted by jungeon

Bolder dash, white people did not arrive into north africa until 600 bc when the romans, greeks, persians and celts and alike started their invasions and occupations.

If they were reading this, that statement would come as a great shock to the Carthaginians, who set up housekeeping in modern-day Tunisia in the late 800s BCE.

[Exitus Acta Probat]

Originally Posted by kovert

Hi all. I am very much interested in the history of Libya. This is what the ancient Greco-Romans called North Africa west of the Nile Valley.

There is much written on its history in French, Italian, Spanish and of course Arabic but unfortunately those works are inaccessible to me. Oh and since I mentioned Arabic, medieval and later Libya (particularly up to and including the Barbary Wars) info is just as welcome as pharaonic and Greco-Roman info.

Thus I would like to start this thread on cultures, civilizations and peoples of Northwest Africa. So the best starting point should be what were the backgrounds and origins of the population of Libya?

(P.S. since this is so broad a topic and there are many strands that we could get into is there anyway to have one main thread but with the ability to branch out into daughter threads. Like maybe punic period, roman period, islamic period etc?)

My Italian ancestors used to own property in Tripoli, and had their Arab servants pick Olives in a large grove. Now, Libyans want reparations from Italy, despite Italy bringing Libya out of the stone age and introducing them to amenities such as paved roads and running water.

[Exitus Acta Probat]

Originally Posted by jungeon

Bolder dash, white people did not arrive into north africa until 600 bc when the romans, greeks, persians and celts and alike started their invasions and occupations. The original inhabitants are black african, since the 1000 year turkish occupation of north africa that ended when the french italian and english split up their empire around 1800s the population of libya is essentially of mixed race(white and black) however outside of coastal areas the majority of the population is black as they were not really colonised as turks/italians/romans etc only took over the major cities. there is also a huge illegal immigrant population of libya that is mostly black african as well. Of all of the north african states Libya is the most african as even the leader identifies himself more with africa than arabs and the middle east and they gennerally look more black than their arabic counterparts

Wrong, and anthropology indicates otherwise, as Nordic mummies have been found on archaeological digs. Sorry, but what was depicted in that Michael Jackson video never happened.

[WIHS2006]

Originally Posted by Exitus Acta Probat

My Italian ancestors used to own property in Tripoli, and had their Arab servants pick Olives in a large grove. Now, Libyans want reparations from Italy, despite Italy bringing Libya out of the stone age and introducing them to amenities such as paved roads and running water.

And slaughtering tens of thousands of people in the process? Need I say more then Rodolfo Graziani. The pathetic Italian Army had to resort to poison gas, concentration camps, and turncoats to beat an almost medieval Ethiopian Army and the stone age Libyan freedom fighters. When faced with a real army like with the British/British Empire, Americans, Free Belgians, the Free French, and the other allied forces in WWII they ended up surrendering by the hundreds of thousands.

We (the US) are at least benevolent rulers, hence the reason why we still have our colonial empire unlike Italy.

[jungeon]

Originally Posted by j_k_k

If they were reading this, that statement would come as a great shock to the Carthaginians, who set up housekeeping in modern-day Tunisia in the late 800s BCE.

Carthigians were black as well like most tunisians in 800 bce.