An Archaeologist's History of Early Complex Societies in West Africa
The first of three videos for Black History Month, where I talk about the earliest complex societies in West Africa. Sources: Adekola, Kola. "Dynamics of Metal Working Traditions in West Africa," African Diaspora Archaeology Newsletter 9 vol 1 , no. 5. (2011). https://scholarworks.umass.edu/adan/v... Arazi, Noémie. “Tracing history in Dia, in the Inland Niger Delta of Mali : archaeology, oral traditions and written sources.” (2006). Bocoum, H.. “The origins of iron metallurgy in Africa : new light on its antiquity, West and Central Africa.” (2004). Brass, Michael. “Reconsidering the emergence of social complexity in early Saharan pastoral societies, 5000 - 2500 B.C.” Sahara 18 (2007): 7-22 . Brass, Michael. “The Emergence of Mobile Pastoral Elites during the Middle to Late Holocene in the Sahara.” Journal of African Archaeology (2019): 53-75 Breunig, Peter and Nicola Rupp. “An outline of recent studies on the Nigerian Nok culture.” Journal of African Archaeology 14 (2016): 237-255. Coutros, Peter R.. “The Malian Lakes Region redefined: archaeological survey of the Gorbi Valley.” Antiquity 91 (2017): 474 - 489. Champion, Louis, Dorian Q. Fuller, Sylvain Ozainne, Eric Huysecom and Anne Mayor. “Agricultural diversification in West Africa: an archaeobotanical study of the site of Sadia (Dogon Country, Mali).” Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences 13 (2021): 1-23. Champion, Louis & Höhn, Alexa & Neumann, Katharina & Franke, Gabriele & Breunig, Peter. “A question of rite—pearl millet consumption at Nok culture sites, Nigeria (second/first millennium BC).” Vegetation History and Archaeobotany (2022): 1-21. 10.1007/s00334-022-00902-0. D'andrea, A. C., Marlies Klee and John G. Casey. “Archaeobotanical evidence for pearl millet (Pennisetum glaucum) in sub-Saharan West Africa.” Antiquity 75 (2001): 341 - 348. Dueppen, Stephen & Gallagher, Daphne. . Adopting agriculture in the West African savanna: Exploring socio-economic choices in first millennium CE southeastern Burkina Faso. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 32 (2013): 433–448. 10.1016/j.jaa.2013.08.001. Dueppen, Stephen A.. “Cattle in the West African savanna: evidence from 1st millennium CE Kirikongo, Burkina Faso.” Journal of Archaeological Science 39 (2012): 92-101. Dueppen, Stephen A. “Early Evidence for Chickens at Iron Age Kirikongo (c. AD 100–1450), Burkina Faso.” Antiquity 85, no. 327 (2011): 142–57. doi:10.1017/S0003598X00067491 Dueppen, Stephen A. “From Kin to Great House: Inequality and Communalism at Iron Age Kirikongo, Burkina Faso.” American Antiquity 77, no. 1 (2012): 3–39. doi:10.7183/0002-7316.77.1.3. Dunne, Julie & Höhn, Alexa & Franke, Gabriele & Neumann, Katharina & Breunig, Peter & Gillard, Toby & Walton-Doyle, Caitlin & Evershed, Richard. “Honey-collecting in prehistoric West Africa from 3500 years ago.” Nature Communications 12 (2021). 10.1038/s41467-021-22425-4. Dunne, J., Höhn, A., Neumann, K. et al. Making the invisible visible: tracing the origins of plants in West African cuisine through archaeobotanical and organic residue analysis. Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences 14 no. 30 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12520-021-01... Dupuy, Christian. “Cereals and Milk in the Sahara and the Sahel, from the Epipalaeolithic to the Metal Age.” (2014). Franke, Gabriele. “A Chronology of the Central Nigerian Nok Culture — 1500 BC to the Beginning of the Common Era.” Journal of African Archaeology 14, no. 3 (2016): 257–89. http://www.jstor.org/stable/44295242. Franke, Gabriele, Alexa Höhn, Annika Schmidt, Sylvain Ozainne, Peter Breunig and Katharina Neumann. “Pits, pots and plants at Pangwari — Deciphering the nature of a Nok Culture site.” Azania: Archaeological Research in Africa 55 (2020): 129 - 188. Fuller, Dorian Q., Kevin C. Macdonald and Robert Vernet. “Early Domesticated Pearl Millet in Dhar Nema (Mauritania): evidence of crop processing waste as ceramic temper.” (2007). Gilbert, Michelle. "Bura Funerary Urns: Niger Terracottas: An Interpretive Limbo?" African Arts 53, no. 1 (2020): 66-75. muse.jhu.edu/article/748893. Höhn, Alexa, Gabriele Franke and Annika Schmidt. “Pits at Pangwari: Charcoal Taphonomy at a Multi-phased Nok Site, Central Nigeria.” (2018). Höhn, Alexa, and Katharina Neumann. “The Palaeovegetation of Janruwa (Nigeria) and Its Implications for the Decline of the Nok Culture.” Journal of African Archaeology 14, no. 3 (2016): 331–53. http://www.jstor.org/stable/44295245. Holl, Augustin Ferdinand Charles. “Coping with uncertainty: Neolithic life in the Dhar Tichitt-Walata, Mauritania, ( ca. 4000-2300 BP).” Comptes Rendus Geoscience 341 (2009): 703-712. Holl, Augustin Ferdinand Charles. “Dhar Tichitt, Walata and Nema. Neolithic cultural landscapes in the South-West of the Sahara. (2012).
