BLACKNESS in Egyptian Art, murrals, etc.

[Eric Silver]

I've been following this discussion for some time and have a few questions:

Re: Katherine Griffis
>>They are *distinct* from the Egyptians, just as the
> Egyptians ****themselves**** show themselves as *distinct from the
> Nubians/Nehesi*, or sub-saharan African blacks.

American Blacks are physically distinct from Africans yet they are of the
same race and cut from the same fabric. That appears to be true of
Egypt/Nubia -- except the those societies had MUCH more in common than
Africans and American Blacks have today.

I agree -- with the known facts and my own eyes -- that the Egyptian Delta
was inhabited by a substantial number of asiatic/semitic. Narmer's tablet
shows him slaying one, as well as the decapitated bodies of many others,
when he united "Upper" and "Lower" Egypt into one nation. However, what is
also apparent is that those Asiatic/Semitic people appear to have
contributed little more than genetic material to Egyptian society.
Although Egypt maintained contact with with many near eastern and
mediterranean kingdoms (Tanslation: colonized them), foreign influence
NEVER superseded the African basis of Egyptian culture.

Re: Katherine Griffis
> the pre-dynastic Egyptian culture of 8000 BCE (and likely before) was
> as diverse and multi-grouped as it is TODAY.

Pre-dynastic culture was Nubian. If we refer to the Delta dwellers as a
viable element of Eqyptian culture at that time, then your comment is
correct. But once again, there is nothing in the historical or
archeological record to prove that Egypt was anything more than an
extension of Nubia -- just like the US can be considered an extension of
England. The intermingling with other cultures, as in the U.S.,
invigorated Egypt and was the basis of its wealth, but the foundation and
superstructure of the society was Black African, just as the foundation and
infrastructure of U.S. culture is essentially Anglo-European.

Re: Katherine Griffis
>> No, but I DO ask that you show me *actual evidence* beyond your
>> senses....where is the *objective proof* of your assertions??

The New York City Police Department's top forensic specialist did a
reconstruction of the Sphinx' face for a program about the Sphinx on the
Discovery Channel (or the Learning Channel?). The end result was what can
only be considered a pure, black African.

Also, when it comes to judging people's ethnicity, one's senses are usually
enough. Again, Black Americans are as diverse -- if not more so -- than
ancient Egyptians. Do you question their ethnicity?

RE: Katherine Griffis
>> I believe this is Williams' theory, which as Troy Sagrillo pointed
>> out, has been thoroughly discredited due to lack of any *real
>> evidence* from either artifact evidence, or any ancient contemporary
>> text that indicates such an origin.

From the Hunefer Papyrus: "We come from the beginning of the Nile, where
the God Hapi dwells, in the foothills of the Mountain of the Moon."

The beginning of the Nile is in Uganda, and the foothils of the Mountain of
the Moon are the Ruwenzori mountain range in Uganda/Zaire. (The mountain
of the moon is, of course, Kilimanjaro.) Most people from that region --
past and present -- are blacker than the ace of spades (no offense
intended).

RE: Katherine
>> the issue of whether the evidence supports
>> your *interpretation* or mine. I rely more on the artifact and
>> remains evidence that *multiple and diverse peoples existed in the
>> Nile Valley* and existed in harmony, to the point where the Egyptian
>> civilization was created. The other viewpoint, of the *dominance* of
>> one group/class/race over all others is *not shown by the evidence*
>> that *I* have seen/read/researched and otherwise encountered.

I refer you back to Narmer's Tablet where he is shown disrupting this
harmony with a club to the head of a Semite. This is also the case with
Ramses II, Hatshepsut, Thotmes III, Tutankhamen, etc. They were definitely
a race-aware, etnnocentric people, but not in the same manner that we are
today.

I also recall a mural showing the four races of man in relations to Ausar
(Osiris). Closest to him are the racially-mixed Egyptians, followed by
Black Africans, then asians, and last, and apparently least, the blond,
blue-eyed European. In my opinion, this is a statement of cultural
advancement, not racism, as each figure in the mural accurately reflects
the state of devlopment/advancement of each of those groups of people at
the time. It is unfortunate that this mural has been interpreted through
biased, 20th century eyes by Western "scholars" who, ironically, use it to
imply that the Egyptians distanced themselves from other Blacks, yet
somehow neglect to mention the VERY insignificant stature of the European
in the group.

RE: Katherine
>> Rather, it was that the black Africans were one part of **many groups**
in the area of the Nile Valley...

What "many groups?" I am aware of only three: Blacks, asiatics, and mixed
breeds. How broad an area are you defining?

>> In other words, there was no *ruling class/race/group*, but a
**blending** of all cultures/peoples into what we know now as Egypt of the
ancient times.

Again, this blending was purely physical. The culture, demeanor, manner of
thought, perception and expression of ancient Egypt is African to the core,
regardless of outward appearances.

RE: Katherine
>> Even Williams, when presenting the burner and his *theory* of the
>> reconstruction, did NOT assert that it indicated that the Egyptian
civilization
*flowed from the South*, but that the **interaction** beteen Egypt and
Nubia was of a longer term than had been previously imagined.

Hmmmm.... Consider this:

"Africa in History" by Basil Davidson. (1992 Collier Books, $14.95)

"As for the Egyptians themselves, the Greek historians of those times - of
the last four or five centuries B.C. - accepted what the Egyptians had told
them: THAT THE EGYPTIANS WERE COLONISTS (i.e., immigrants) sent out by the
Ethiopians', meaning by 'Ethiopians' not the peoples of geographical
Ethiopia we know today but, generally, the inhabitants of inner Africa
south of Egypt" (Nubia). "And why would the 'Ethiopians' have done this?
Because 'what is now Egypt, our historians maintain, was not land but sea
.... Afterwards, as the Nile during times of its inundation, carried down
the mud from Ethiopia (i.e., from inner Africa), land was gradually built
up from the deposit.' The racist ideologues of nineteenth-cenury
history-writers simply ignored all this. Yet, what Diodorus wrote in 50 BC
remains astonishingly close to what scientific research has now confirmed"

THE NEW YORK TIMES, March 1, 1979 published an article, "Ancient Nubian
Artifacts", in which the writer, Boyce Rensbereger, states: "Evidence of
the oldest recognizable monarchy in HUMAN HISTORY, preceding the rise of
the earliest Egyptian kings by several generations, has been discovered in
artifacts from ancient Nubia in Africa... The various symbols of Nubian
royalty that have been found are the same as those associated, in LATER
TIMES, with Egyptian kings. The new findings suggest that the ancient
Nubians may have reached this stage of political development as long as
3300 B.C., several generations before the earliest documented Egyptian
king."

ARCHAEOLOGY MAGAZINE, Sept-Oct 1980. Professor Bruce Williams of Chicago
University writes on what he termed "The Lost Pharaohs of Nubia." He
states: "A newly discovered ancient kingdom precedes the earliest known
monarchy. The place is ancient Nubia at Qustul, where the investigation of
archeological materials recovered during the great 1960's rescue effort has
recently unveiled a birthplace of "Pharaonic civilization several
generations before the rise of the first historic Egyptian dynasty."

Sir E. A. Wallis Budge, keeper of Egyptian and Assyrian Antiquities for the
British Museum supports this when he states in his book "EGYPT" that:
"There are many things in the manners and customs and religions of the
historic Egyptians .. that suggest that the original home of their
ancestors was a country in the neighborhood of Uganda and Punt
(Kenya/Tanzania)." "The historic native of Egypt, both in the old and new
stone ages, was African."

Thanks for taking the time to read my comments ;-)

Eric Silver