Afrocentric history...anything to this?

Narcopuppy

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Afrocentrism, traditionally, concentrates mostly on claiming that the Egyptians and various other black African nations invented all civilization, that whites "stole" it from them. It's silly, but the following site goes much further:

http://realhistoryww.com/world_history/ancient/Etruria_the_Etruscans_celts.htm

http://stewartsynopsis.com/Real World History.htm

The main points (or at least the ones that stand out the most to me) are:

1. White people are the descendants of albino Africans

2. Western and Northern Europe were mostly black until Germanic invasions in 300-600 A.D. (the Celts and Slavs were black)

3. The Qin dynasty was mostly black

4. The founders of all the "big five" religions were black


These are all very intriguing assertions. They're also fairly troubling, and look to be well thought out (ie., none of the tabloid-sized text and outrageous incoherency that revisionist sites are usually filled with).

Anyone think there's anything to this?
 
It's too laughable to take seriously. The evidence they claim to have for example is humorous at best. I met one guy who claimed the Vikings were black.
 
Basically what you've got is a bunch of people who believe that history has been whitewashed by white people and have decided to right that wrong by painting it black. And they have done so, by pretty much turning every ancient civilisation into a black one.

Lets take the first link as an example. So we have what they call a "black family" that was found in Germany. I have no clue how they've declared the people buried in that grave to be black. I seriously don't, I'm assuming that they believe the skulls aren't white so they are therefore automatically black.

Such thinking is blatantly erroneous because in this sense not white does not automatically mean that they are black. Especially when you base that on a blurry close up of two skeletons and compare that to a caucasian skull. This blurry picture method is used to "prove" that Wetwang Woman is black.

They then try and argue that the DNA haplogroupings must be wrong because these are clearly black people, the nasal bones say so, and then try and claim "cover-up" because one of the hypotheses is that Y-R1a most likely first appeared in Asia and not Europe. I notice that they don't bother talking about mtDNA haplogroup K, probably because along with South Asia and Europe it's also present in Northern Africa, so clearly that means they are black and not white or asian. In fact if you look at it there is more evidence that these people were from Asia then Africa.

If you want the clearest evidence that the site creator doesn't understand anthropology at all, compare the clearer pictures further down. I have no idea how they can say that the Stonehenge Archer is black compared to the, presumably, white Roman. Again their evidence is "look at the nasal bridge". The most blatant of these is right below it with Cheddar Man. Right, there's a skull that we know is from a white person, it looks pretty similar doesn't it? Especially when you compare Cheddar Man to a known black skull (the middle one).

Basically whoever wrote that page started with a conclusion and in the end probably does more to belittle black people with their comments about the Ivory Bangle Lady. The author doesn't really care that this find changes our understanding of race in Roman society, instead its viewed as part of a cover-up, the white man suppressing the true history.
 
Narcopuppy said:
What about the pictures of the ancient skulls? They do look pretty African in shape...
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In the sense that an African skull would look similar, yes. So would and Asian skull, however. You can't determine someones' race by simply looking at the skull. You most certainly can't determine a race of a skeleton by looking at a pixelated image of its' skull.

McHrozni
 
As I recall, much of this nonsense was started up by well-meaning individuals who wanted to lift the self-esteem of young Black children. The idea was to aggrandize their "heritage"... As it were.
However, the folks involved rapidly got carried away with ridiculous assumptions much in the manner of Von Danniken.
I recall one bit... In one of the Egyptian tombs a small bird-sculpture was found. This rapidly became a "glider", and there was even a children's book published showing "black" Egyptians flying around on hang-gliders....
 
Out of Africa. We were all "black" at one point. However, much longer ago...
 
Scholars and theoreticians like to put things into nice, neat categories, but reality goes on its merry way messing up their neat theories.

Hominids originated in Africa, including the genus Homo, from which they spread out to populate the earth. Nineteenth century ethnographers had what we'd call a Eurocentric streak. A lot of African history is unknown to the general Western population because either it wasn't written down, or it was marginalized while focusing on European (i.e., British if you're in an English-speaking country) issues.

"Who invented civilization?" has a lot of answers, including the cop-out "What do you mean by civilization?". Even if we limit it to the ability to build and maintain large centralized populations, we find that happening seemingly independently in the Middle East, Southeast Asia, China, South America, Mexico and Africa. Maybe it's just something people do when they get to a certain population density.

As for claiming an individual is of race or group X based on a skull: it's true that populations that have been separated for long enough do show certain characteristics others don't. Native Americans tend to have a particular type of teeth that are rare in Europeans and Africans, IIRC. But there are always outliers: if you had a graveyard full of people with this dentition you could reasonably conclude it was a Native American settlement. One individual - maybe.

People have a tendency to move around: they set up trade routes, and some of them decide to settle down at the other end or produce offspring with people along the way. We know the Romans had some trade with sub-Saharan Africa, as well as colonies in Germany and England: they didn't seem as reluctant to marry foreigners as some peoples, so I can easily see how a few individuals with African traits could end up in Northern Europe.

I think the answer to the original question is in the middle: Africans did not invent all of civilization, but they did a lot more than most people know or give them credit for.
 
McHrozni said:
You most certainly can't determine a race of a skeleton by looking at a pixelated image of its' skull.

McHrozni
Click to expand...

True. But I did some googling for all the skeletons mentioned; some I couldn't find pictures of, the others looked plausible.
 
I'd say civilization happens as a result of agriculture and good storage and planning, and with a reason for large groups of people to gather. A nexus of trade routes, via terrestrial or by port. There wasn't an original civilization that inspired all the the others. it's an emergent thing. There were periods in North America where thousands of people lived and made grand structures, in the Missouri region for instance.

Race is a blurry issue.There are many shades of skin color, and it's not easy to draw a line. As far as I know, the contemporary Caucasian look of Europeans is possibly less than 20,000 years old where it came about from the climates of Europe. You have to account for the time it took for these traits to develop. It's silly to think less than 2,000 years ago all of humanity looked like African blacks I'd say. We have descriptions of ancient Roman traits as well as vivid and fully colored mosaics showing their skin color and features.
 
Bikewer said:
As I recall, much of this nonsense was started up by well-meaning individuals who wanted to lift the self-esteem of young Black children. The idea was to aggrandize their "heritage"... As it were.
However, the folks involved rapidly got carried away with ridiculous assumptions much in the manner of Von Danniken.
I recall one bit... In one of the Egyptian tombs a small bird-sculpture was found. This rapidly became a "glider", and there was even a children's book published showing "black" Egyptians flying around on hang-gliders....
Click to expand...

The Cleopatra and Hannibal were Black claims are the ones that crack me up.
Cleopatra was Greek....the Greeks were the ruling class of Egypt since the Time of Alexander thanks to Ptolemy and Hannibal was Phoenician,since Cathage was a Phonecian colony.
 
Puppycow said:
Can we tell the race of a person from their skull?
Click to expand...


Mummy.jpg

No!​
 
Narcopuppy said:
. White people are the descendants of albino Africans
Click to expand...

This is most certainly wrong. Albinism has nothing to do with it.

I will say this though: white people are probably the descendants of black people, and the first people to arrive in Europe or Mongolia were probably black, and then gradually evolved to be lighter skinned.
 
Narcopuppy said:
1. White people are the descendants of albino Africans
Click to expand...

Nope. Whites have far more Melanin than albinos do. See also hair colour.

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Albinistic_girl_papua_new_guinea.jpg

2. Western and Northern Europe were mostly black until Germanic invasions in 300-600 A.D. (the Celts and Slavs were black)
Click to expand...

Not consistent with bog body finds.

3. The Qin dynasty was mostly black
Click to expand...

Given china's isolation that seems unlikely.

4. The founders of all the "big five" religions were black
Click to expand...

We have no idea who the founders of hinduism, chinese traditional relgions or were. Christianity and islam? well that depends on how broad a defintion of black you are looking for.

Anyone think there's anything to this?
Click to expand...

Depends if "Africans may have had more impact on european history than generaly thought" counts as anything.
 
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