Who were the ancient Egyptians – the arguments

 

I’m sure most of you will be familiar with claims that aliens or a mysterious ancient race actually built the pyramids, which generate a lot of vigorous debate on social media, in varying degrees of scientific illiteracy. There’s another debate on ancient Egypt that receives less attention, but one which regularly descends into vitriol and even outright racism on both sides. This concerns the true identity of those, most definitely terrestrial, ancient Egyptians who, among other great achievements, built the pyramids. 

There are two main camps in this argument: the modern Egyptian view, that sees an unbroken, historical, cultural and genetic link to these ancient ancestors and a side dominated by an Afrocentric view, that the ancient Egyptians were black Africans, whose place was later usurped by foreign invaders.

I have very dear friends in both Egypt and West Africa, who are on different sides of the argument and have expressed strong views on the subject. This has motivated me over the years to study the issue in a lot more detail than just flicking through the angry Facebook posts that typify much of the discussion. If we all agree on one thing though, it’s that whoever the ancient Egyptians were, they certainly weren’t white. So, unlike my colonial forebears I hope I can act as a neutral arbiter on the issue. 

As the only wonder of the ancient world to survive until the present day, the Pyramids still inspire awe in all those who visit. Beyond that, numerous impressive remains and countless relics are testament to a three thousand year history, unmatched anywhere in the world. It’s little surprise then that people wish to claim a piece of the action or attribute it to fanciful causes. European colonialists included those who couldn’t accept that non-whites could produce such magnificent creations, some theorising they were linked to Atlantis. Even today, the civilisation’s technical achievements are seen by many as too advanced for “primitive” people to have created, even if they find alien explanations a step too far. 

Does the Afrocentric view belong to this group, or is it credible?

After centuries of outsiders explaining Africa to the world, with the inevitable biases that entailed, Afrocentrism was an understandable response to put Africans and the black diaspora at the heart of the subject. Writers such as Cheikh Anta Diop (The African Origin of Civilization) and Chancellor Williams (The Destruction of Black Civilization) produced valuable work in changing attitudes to the understanding of African history. Whilst of course academics outside of Afrocentrism have critiques of some of its work, this essay is not a wider comment on their views. Although it’s not simply Afrocentrists making similar arguments about ancient Egypt, I am using the term for convenience as they appear to be the most vocal community.  

To some extent the question, were the ancient Egyptians African? is fairly easily resolved. It’s indisputable that the pharaonic rule, which defines the start of ancient Egypt, commonly believed to be under Narmer, grew out of the Naqada culture, in southern Egypt, around 3150BC. The Naqada culture dates to around 3900BC and was preceded by the Badarian culture. This firmly places the ancient Egyptians as indigenous to the region, which is of course in Africa. Hence the statement that the ancient Egyptians were African is factual, not a matter of opinion. In this sense, both sides can effectively agree but it doesn’t resolve who these people were culturally and genetically, which is where the arguments centre.

North Africans don’t always feel they have a lot in common with Africa south of the Sahara. For example, I’ve heard both Tunisians and Egyptians refer to Africa as that other place, not where they are. This can even manifest as racism among some. My Egyptian friends certainly have no problems seeing beauty, friendship and even love in black Africans but I’ve never heard them express much in the way of a shared African identity. They are very much,  first and foremost Egyptians. In response, sub-Saharan Africans can sometimes have similar views on their North African counterparts. Note: some, wrongly in my view, believe that the term sub-Saharan has racist connotations. I use it purely as a geographical term.

So, describing ancient Egyptians as Africans means different things to different people: either a simple geographic description or something intimately linked to identity and culture. When most of those who argue that the ancient Egyptians were African, they are more specifically saying that they were black, in the sense of being sub-Saharan Africans. If the use of the word African isn’t straight forward, using the word black is a minefield of interpretations. Whilst only an idiot would argue that the Egyptians were white, there is a space between non-white and black where the dividing line can be placed almost anywhere on the spectrum, depending on the arguments you wish to make. Far too many of the angry online exchanges I’ve seen fail to address this issue.  Although academic approaches to race and identity in history and archeology have improved markedly in recent years, it’s an ever evolving subject area, which generates much discussion over the appropriateness of terminology. 

Online, you can find arguments that Somalis or lighter skinned Ethiopians for example don’t fully qualify as black, or even African, due to the admixture of peoples from the Arabian peninsular. However, these could well be darker skinned than, say some Khoisan people of southern Africa, who are one of the most ancient people on the continent and hence more deserving of the description of black Africans than just about anyone. Whilst these kinds of arguments are a form of racism and are by no means typical among Africans, we do see similar views directed at modern Egyptians by those who deny their link to the founders of dynastic Egypt. 

The ancient Greeks sometimes used the word melanchroes to describe the Egyptians of the time.  The word can be translated as black, however they clearly differentiated Egyptians from darker Nubians and what they referred to as Ethiopians, meaning sub-Saharan Africans. Their writings compared Egyptians to North Indians as opposed to the darker south Indians. Melanchroes was also used to describe the Colchins of the Black Sea region, who,  while notably darker skinned than others in the region, could hardly be described as black in the modern sense, particularly when you apply the African rooted sense of the word. Ancient Greek use of terms for skin colour didn’t come with any of the baggage that makes the modern use complex at times. We see Afrocentrists use these Greek writings to support their arguments and although it provides some justification for use of the word black, the Greek contextual understanding of the word certainly doesn’t allow us to implicitly infer the sub-Saharan African sense. Being over 2000 years after the building of the pyramids, some would still be inclined to argue that the Egyptians had changed in this time. 

Discussions on historical whiteness and blackness tend to avoid an important piece of framing. More recent studies have shown that the widespread appearance of lighter skin was a result of the changing diet created by the appearance of farming, hence only about 10,000 years ago. A grain based diet resulting from agriculture didn’t provide sufficient vitamin D, that previous meat and fish diets provided in less sunny climates. Lighter skin evolved to gain more vitamin D by synthesis from sunlight. British racists were very upset to learn that DNA tests on the body known as Cheddar Man, found in a cave in SW England, dating to this period, proved he was in fact black. He wasn’t an anomaly, he was entirely typical of the period, even in the sunlight deprived realm of rainy England. 

Agriculture in Egypt began to appear from about 6000BC, only 3000 years before dynastic Egypt. Even if a radical transformation had occurred in this time, it would certainly have been at the dawn of lighter skin in the region. After all, it’s hardly comparable to the cloudy gloom of England. In this light, getting upset about what skin colour someone was, misses the far greater issue of shared humanity.

Genetics have opened up a whole new area of understanding on who ancient people were and opened up a whole new can of worms in the process. Too often people assume that DNA tests on ancient bodies are a slam dunk, proving their argument.  Both sides can be guilty of scientific illiteracy, failing to understand  the complexities and limitations of these studies, which are more about percentages than certainties. In any event the results need to be viewed in the context of archaeological, historical, linguistic evidence, as well as other forms of testing. 

Countless whole academic works, books and articles have put forward differing perspectives that are far too extensive to go over here.  In the simplest of terms, there’s a good case to say that DNA investigations show ancient Egyptians to be most closely related to ancient North Africans, with a significant admixture from neighbouring Middle Eastern lands, outweighing the Sub-Saharan content. However, there are notable limitations to the evidence.  The vast majority of bodies studied come from relatively late periods and the northern half of Egypt. So although there’s a reasonable case to say that the DNA evidence broadly supports the Egyptian’s case from around 1000BC in the North, it doesn’t prove anything from 3000BC in the south, where dynastic Egypt started. Given that the modern population of Egypt tends to be darker in the south, it’s justified to make the same assumption about the ancient Egyptians, even if quantifying that is impossible. One genetic study of Tutankhamun and some of his family members did suggest a significant sub-Saharan content, but more research is needed, as with the subject as a whole. 

We only have one body from the early dynastic period that’s been studied, as the hot dry conditions aren’t ideal for DNA preservation, but it creates a bit of a dilemma for both sides of the argument. Although the researchers concluded that he was probably relatively dark skinned, his genetic composition included a large portion from the Near East as well as the North African component, with very little from Sub-Saharan Africa. Obviously it would be foolish to make any wide ranging assumptions on the basis of only one body but it doesn’t provide a completely incompatible result in relation to a lot of other evidence. 

The Afrocentric argument is that invasion and migration would have altered the genetic make up of the population over this time. Others go so far as to dismiss modern Egyptians as Arabs, entirely a product of these processes. This doesn’t stand up to any scientific or historical scrutiny though.  The initial Arab invasion was an army of only 4000, over time increasing to about three times that. Given the rapid expansion of the early Islamic empire in several directions, it’s ridiculous to assume that huge numbers of Arabs decided to leave home and permanently settle in sufficient numbers around the empire in order to substantially alter the genetics of millions of people. The Gulf Arab genetic component of modern Egyptians is extremely small, showing that the change in religion didn’t bring in much new DNA. We can compare this to Turkey, which has had numerous invasions, including some of those experienced by Egypt, but modern Turks are very similar to their ancient Anatolian ancestors, despite ancient Turks bringing their language and Arabs bringing their religion. 

A successful invasion to change the ruling class of a country only requires a big enough army to beat and subdue the defending army. Much of the rural population could remain oblivious for a long time of a change at the top. The fact that the ruling religious system remained the same until the Roman period is an indication that no invading army or immigrant culture was of sufficient magnitude to overcome the indigenous one. Egyptian Coptic Christians provide a clear link to the late ancient Egyptians, with their religious texts being a direct evolution of the ancient Egyptian language and largely marrying within the religion, minimising outside influences. We can see that although Egyptian Copts are a genetically recognisable population, they are extremely similar to other modern Egyptians. At least proving continuity for almost two millenia. Studies of teeth, which reflect various human characteristics and preserve a record of diet and environment, from the neolithic to Roman times do show a continuity in the population however. Although there isn’t a complete academic consensus among linguists about the ancient Egyptian language, it is definitely in the Afro-Asiatic family: rooted in North Africa, with influences from the Near East, including Semitic languages. This adds support to the genetic evidence, sharing a similar geographic space.

A key component of the ancient Egyptian population came from what is now the Sahara Desert, but was once green and fertile for thousands of years until the pre-dynastic period. As the region dried up its people moved out, some into the Nile valley. The limited genetic evidence from the dry Sahara period suggests that it was inhabited by a distinct population, separate from Sub-Saharan Africans and closer to ancient North Africans. These North Africans go back at least 30 000 years and contain traces of populations that over a long period of time left Africa and returned, as well as a portion from the Near East. The current perception of difference between North and Sub-Saharan African populations is actually much older than the arrival of Arabs and Islam which largely define it today.  

As this movement to the Nile valley from the Sahara predates agriculture, it’s safe to describe them as black, even if we need to be cautious about exactly what that entails in terms of skin tone. As the ancient Saharans moved both east and south, this provides a likely explanation for the suggestions of various similarities between ancient Egypt and West Africa that some have proposed. 

It’s worth noting that the oldest mummies discovered come from what is now Libya, dating to at least 3300BC, hence the ancient Sahara being the most likely source for what became an iconic Egyptian tradition. Cattle played a central role in both Saharan and pre-dynastic life, demonstrating another likely cultural link. 

The cultural evidence also points in another direction though. A relic, known as the Narmer palette, immortalises the unification of upper and lower Egypt under his rule, thus denoting the beginning of dynastic Egypt. Among its images are a pair of entwined, long necked,  mythological beasts, which can also be found on other,  pre-dynastic artifacts. There is no doubt that this is a Mesopotamian image and just one of a number of pieces of archaeological evidence which prove a well defined link in the Naqada culture period. There is no contemporary Egyptian evidence in Mesopotamia and although historians don’t believe this indicates an invasion, the one way traffic implies some incoming movement of people, not just trade. African art to the south is entirely different in style, while early Egyptian and Mesopotamian art have many similarities. Egyptian and Mesopotamian art represented people in a relatively realistic sense that we very much recognise today in the West.  African art only started to adopt something similar about one thousand years ago and even then not widely. It was more concerned with representing the spirit of beings than trying to copy their physical form. 

Social media warriors are fond of posting pairs of either comparable or opposing cultural images to prove their argument about the identity of ancient Egyptians. Some of it is certainly of dubious merit but the point is that it’s very easy to provide examples that demonstrate not just links to either further south within Africa or to the Near East but to uniquely Egyptian culture. 

We see some of these artistic styles spread south into Nubian territory later in pharaonic times, which leads us to question the direction of flow determining other similarities. It’s not clear whether the similarities in jewellery, adornments and particular hairstyles for example originated to the south, or moved there from Egypt. The Afrocentric side invariably assumes they moved north into Egypt. 

As the main neighbour immediately to the south, it’s instructive to look at the Nubians, as the cultures interacted for millenia. During the early Naqada period there was a more homogeneous population but by its end a highly distinctive Egyptian culture had formed, which still retained a relatively small Nubian component in terms of the archaeological record. 

Egyptian art clearly represents Nubians as a different people, usually in black as opposed to the reddish brown more typical for Egyptians. We need to be careful with our understanding of these representations however. Colour wasn’t used simply as a portrayal of visual reality but had symbolic meaning.  Women could be represented in white or off-white and others in different colours depending on their social position. Like the later Greeks and Romans, there’s nothing to suggest that ancient Egyptians ascribed any great significance to skin colour. There are examples of the same person being portrayed in their tomb art as both Nubian and Egyptian, both black and reddish brown. Such a person was obviously Nubian by birth but attained a position of note in Egyptian society. 

Nubians are often represented as being beaten, subjugated and enslaved by Egyptians, which we know was a historical reality. Some Egyptian writings speak in very derogatory terms of them, but that didn’t prevent some playing major roles in Egyptian society. Being well known for their expertise with the bow, Nubians were often employed in the Egyptian army. They even eventually ruled Egypt as the 25th dynasty. These have been inappropriately named the black pharaohs, because it’s not a term the Egyptians would have used.  They were Kushites from the Nubian empire to the South, who returned the true Egyptian religion to reunite the divided kingdom, after a chaotic period. While describing Nubians as black isn’t necessarily problematic, that doesn’t mean their modern descendents would identify as such. Also the female genetic lineage contains a significant Caucasian component, implying that even their early ancestors weren’t entirely African. Invading armies are almost entirely male, so female chromosomes must be more representative of a much older population, more slowly altered by immigration. 

The research that provides the clearest evidence of ancient Egyptian identity is the hair. Unlike DNA, it is well preserved and we have a good selection to analyse, from the Badarians to the later dynastic period. Even the hair of the pre-dynastic Badarians was a roughly even mix of African and European type, erring towards the latter. Nubian examples are also a mixture, with those further north being 50-50 African-European, similar to the modern Nubian population in the region. For the Egyptians, the majority is clearly of European type. Most samples are dark in colour but some reddish or even blonde examples exist, again not unknown in the modern population. These conclusions have been backed up by several studies.

It’s also been found that due to the problems of lice, many people shaved their heads, some wearing wigs. Some of the hairstyles similar to dreadlocks were found to be created by adding hair and bonding it with various natural products. Wigs were made in differing styles and sometimes used wool. Hence even the depictions of African hairstyles in art work wasn’t always an indication that the person represented had African hair.

The bulk of the evidence leaves no doubt that modern Egyptians are perfectly entitled to claim an unbroken line of descent to their ancestors who founded the kingdom.  This doesn’t completely negate aspects of the Afrocentric view however. The ancient Egyptians were clearly African by definition but ought to be seen as part of the distinct North African peoples and an important part of that identity is a result of interaction outside of the continent, whether genetic or cultural. Many academics prefer to see Egyptians as a cultural identity, precisely because of the genetic variety and cultural continuity. The problem with describing them as black, in fact has little to do with their skin colour. The Tuaregs of the Sahara, Amharic of Ethiopia, Somalis and the Khoisan of southern Africa all include relatively light skinned people comparable to what at least a portion of the ancient Egyptians must have been and many modern Egyptians from the south are. The problem is when the description is used to claim a false ownership of those people, denying Egyptians their heritage of one of the world’s great civilisations. 

Maybe future research will provide greater insight into the exact nature of these people but what is needed is more about attitudes than scientific data. Whether they were darker or lighter skinned than what anyone presumes isn’t the issue. A bit more respect on both sides would be a good start. Afrocentrists need to respect Egyptians right to their heritage and Egyptians would help by accepting that they do have an African identity and have always shared much with their neighbours to the south. The new Grand Egyptian Museum in Cairo, although impressive and well worth visiting, makes no mention of the 25th dynasty and almost no references to links with elsewhere on the continent. Given that it has substantial exhibits from the Greek and Roman periods, this is a serious omission. The representation of ancient Egyptians in images needs to change.  The usual Afrocentric depictions of solely dark skinned people, with nothing in the way of North African features is unrealistic, even if some could have been similar. All too often the other side presents them as very light skinned, which even if we take the modern inhabitants of southern Egypt as a guide, isn’t realistic. All the evidence points to a varied population who may even have embraced the extremes presented by both sides and the ancient Egyptians wouldn’t have had much of a problem with that. 

I look forward to the day when someone can say, “the ancient Egyptians were black Africans”, without any insult implied or taken.