What follows is my
response to a Somali friend who asked me about various aspects of the colonial
distortion of African History with focus on the Horn Region, the historical
background of the ethnic and culture divide between Semitic Abyssinia and
Cushitic Ethiopia, and the ensuing benefits for the colonial powers France,
England and America. The unprecedented affair of historical name usurpation by
Abyssinia ('Ethiopia' is the historical name of Sudan – not of Abyssinia)
brings into the picture Sudan, Africa's greatest land and possible
anti-colonial locomotive, which was continually, systematically and efficiently
targeted by the colonial powers with the evil theories of Pan-Arabism and
Islamism.
----- Answer to a
Somali friend about Colonial Distortion of African History ------
Dear Mohamed,
Thank you for your
questions and apologies for my late response!
I don't know to what
exactly you are referring by mentioning the "Amhara distortion of
Ethiopia's and Horn of Africa region's History". This sentence is not
clear and perhaps you misunderstood parts of an article of mine.
The Amhara and Tigray
Abyssinians did not "distort" any region's or country's History. They
simply had their own version of world view, their own eschatology, their
historical tradition, which was a forgery of course, and their expansionist
plans. That's one point.
A totally different
point is the Western falsification of the World History, which started in parts
of Western Europe as early as 1500, and after being tyrannically and
deceitfully imposed there, it was 'exported' worldwide by means of colonization,
modernization and globalization.
These two issues were
two initially unrelated developments that one needs to first study per se
(independently); only at a later stage the two developments converged. The point
of conversion was surely the period from the middle of the 19th c. to the
middle of the 20th c. when the Amhara and Tigray Abyssinian rulers adjusted
their visions and world views to the Western historical forgery and established
a link with the Western plans for globalization, however managing to keep their
tyranny far and almost cut off (if possible intact) from the rest of the world,
because they did not agree with various elements of the Westernization process.
By this, I mean that the world-known situation of underdevelopment that still
characterizes Abyssinia (Fake Ethiopia) today was a very conscious decision of
the Abyssinian rulers (be they monarchical, Third World communist or
pseudo-republican) of the country over the past 70-140 years.
I. Abyssinia
re-baptized as 'Ethiopia': a French colonial concept and decision
However, it was not an
Abyssinian decision to re-baptize the country as "Ethiopia"; this was
a Western plan that Haile Selassie only followed and implemented locally. Your
question reminds me of the telephone call of an Australia-based Oromo friend of
mine back in April 2007.
This long telephone
call resulted in an article that I then published under the title "Ethiopia:
a Panacea for Tyrants, a Stiletto in Colonial Hands" (27th April 2007) in
AfroArticles, Buzzle and American Chronicle; that article was extensively
republished at the time, but I think that by now it is not anymore available
online. So, I promise you now that I will do my best to re-upload it within the
next few days.
In that article, I
expanded on this issue; it was my former professor of Egyptology in Paris (from
1978 until 1981), Jean Leclant (1920-2011 / read his curriculum in brief here: https://journals.openedition.org/lettre-cdf/2729?lang=en),
who convinced his personal friend Haile Selassie to officially rename
"Abyssinia" as "Ethiopia".
When events of such
importance take place, one has to automatically understand that they don't
reflect the innovative ideas of a young Egyptologist (who was also fluent in
Ge'ez), but constituted deep colonial state machinations and evil conspiracies.
It may sound strange to
you, but the real reason of re-baptizing Abyssinia with the historical name
that describes Sudan (something that was well-known to Leclant) has more to do
with Sudan itself, and less with Abyssinia.
Basically, it has to do
with the general and vast falsehood that colonial diplomats, Orientalist
academics, and statesmen diffuse and impose worldwide as "World
History"; it is only a small piece in an entire mosaic.
When Leclant was
assigned the task (following earlier diplomatic contacts between the French
ambassador and Haile Selassie) to set up the Service of Antiquities in
Abyssinia (: Fake Ethiopia), another French scholar, Jean Vercoutter
(1911-2000, so 9 years older than Leclant) was tasked (following earlier
agreements between the French and the English diplomats at Khartoum) to
establish the Service of Antiquities in Sudan (when that country became
independent).
II.
Sudan, the only true Ethiopia: the ultimate target of the criminal colonial
Orientalists in the middle 1950s
What the French
colonials (who are the main standard bearers of the worldwide colonial
historiography and of all the ensuing fallacies and distortions) wanted to
achieve was this: they wanted to disconnect Sudan from
- its own past and
5000-year old heritage,
- its diverse and
multifaceted historical tradition,
- its true national
name,
- its African cultural
identity, and – above all –
- the enormous
perspectives that the historical reality de facto offers to Sudan at the academic,
educational, intellectual, cultural, political, regional and international
levels.
In other words, they
wanted to prevent Africa's largest country from rising to political, economic,
academic, intellectual and geostrategic supremacy, which would be very easy,
following a proper nation-building effort, which would involve a genuine,
historical name for the country and a real, clear linguistic-cultural identity.
Sudan is the only
country that has historical right to the name of Ethiopia. And Leclant knew
this very well because his thesis concerned the historical period of the 8th
and the 7th c. BCE, when first Upper (: Southern) Egypt and then Lower (:
Northern) Egypt were under Cushitic / Ethiopian, i.e. Sudanese control. This
development occurred because the Egyptian priesthood of Amun at Thebes (Luxor)
wanted to use the Napata (today's Karima)-based Kings of Cush (Kas in Ancient
Egyptian Hieroglyphics) in its clash with the Heliopolitan priesthood of Ra,
which was based in the area of today's Cairo and supported by Berber princes of
the African North-Northwest (spanning across the area of today's NW Egypt,
Libya and the African Atlas).
The Egyptian
Hieroglyphic term 'Kas' (also used among the Cushites of Ancient Sudan –
Ethiopia for their own land, country and kingdom) was translated as Mat Kusi in
Assyrian-Babylonian and as Cush in Ancient Hebrew; it was the equivalent of the
Ancient Greek term 'Ethiopia', and we know this not only because there are
Ancient Greek historical references to the state immediately south of Egypt as
'Ethiopia', but also because in the Septuagint Ancient Greek translation (3rd
c. BCE) of the Hebrew Bible the terms 'Cush' and 'Ethiopia' are used in Ancient
Greek interchangeably.
Jebel Barkal (the holy mountain of Amun of Napata, venerated by the Ancient Cushites-Ethiopians of Sudan and by the Ancient Hamites of Kemet-Egypt) at the outskirts of Napata (today’s Karima) and the pyramids of the Cushitic Qore (: Kings) of the 8th-5th c. BCE (first two pictures); El Kurru pyramids near Karima (third picture); Nuri pyramids on the other bank of the Nile, opposite Karima and near Marawi (fourth picture)
At this point, it is
important to add that first, the territory of Ancient Cush with either Napata
or Meroe as capital never encompassed lands of Abyssinia, and second, there was
never a significant state located in the area of Abyssinia before Axum; and
Axum rose to power only in the 4th c. CE.
Now, you may ask me
what would be the result of a right nation building process carried out in
Sudan in the late 1950s and the 1960s. This would be astonishing, but few
people can now comprehend what great developments for the entire African
continent the evil colonial fallacy of the French managed to avert.
Meroe and its pyramids represent a later phase of Ancient Sudanese, i.e. Ethiopian – Cushitic Civilization (4th c. BCE – 4th c. CE), which is totally unrelated to Abyssinia (today’s Fake Ethiopia)
III.
What would happen if Sudan did not fall victim of Pan-Arabism, Nasserism and
Islamism?
First, the Sudan would
not be plunged in the Arab Nationalist (or Pan-Arabic) fallacy that absorbed
all the resources of the victimized countries, which accepted this colonial
Orientalist distortion and, after losing their true national identities, were
plunged into disastrous wars, civil strives, severe oppression, genocides (like
Darfur), and choleric processes of linguistic Arabization and pseudo-religious
Islamization.
There is not even one
drop of Arab blood in any Sudanese citizen's veins. The country accepted Islam
at a later age and without any sort of invasion. This is also true for Upper
Egypt; Sohag, Qena, Luxor and Aswan do not have an Islamic past that exceeds
1100 years. Iberia and North India, Central Asia and Sicily were under Islamic
rule, Constantinople was attacked by Islamic armies, but Luxor and Aswan were
calm and pious Christian cities of the Kingdom of Nobatia that had capital at
Faras, near Abu Simbel.
The fallacious Arab
identity of a genuinely non-Arab country like Sudan alienated the quasi-totality
of the African nations gathered within the colonial structure under a fake name
and a monstrous identity. All these ancient and noble African nations did not
need to either learn the fabricated, fake modern pseudo-language that is called
'Modern Arabic' or to become Muslim.
There were already
enough Muslims in the Sudan, from the Furis (of Darfur) to the Nubians to the Beja
to the Berta; modern Sudan's most illustrious anti-colonial exploits and heroic
battles were undertaken by Muslims. First Sudan and the noble leader of
Muhammad Ahmad the Mahdi stood against the Anglo-French colonial cholera and
died fighting to avert Africa's colonization. Quranic Arabic was their
religious language and it was wonderful like that. These Muslims did not have
major clashes with the non-Muslims of various adjacent regions. Only within the
abnormal and inhuman frame of the vicious, Satanic colonial rule, all African
nations were oppressed and all Africans started fighting against one another.
Axum, the capital of Ancient Abyssinia during pre-Christian and Christian (4th – 7th c. CE); Abyssinians spoke and wrote Ge’ez, which remains until today the religious language of the Modern Abyssinians, i.e. the Amhara and Tigray. Abyssinians are Yemenites who crossed the Red Sea and settled in Africa as late as the 2nd half of the 1st millennium BCE. The famous stelae of Axum testify to Axum’s pre-Christian civilization and date back to the first centuries of the Christian Era.
IV.
What a true nation-building would mean for Sudan, rightfully named 'Ethiopia'
With Ethiopia as
national name, Sudan would give all its citizens the true portion of historical
heritage and antiquity that belongs to them and they would all find elements of
their culture, spirituality, faith and world view in the Ancient Cushitic and
Meroitic past. Learning that Napata (today's Karima) was already a holy place
for the Ancient Egyptians, all Modern Sudanese would grasp an idea of the
greatness of their land and of the splendor of the past that belongs to them –
and not to the colonial gangsters who appear under the evil masks of
Orientalists, archaeologists, epigraphists, Africanists, linguists,
ethnographers, philologists and historians, only to
- minimize the African
past,
- conceal its
cataclysmic impact on the formation of civilization on European soil, and - subordinate
it to the racist fallacy of Hellenism, Greco-Roman civilization, and
Euro-barbarianism.
With Ethiopia as
national name, all Modern Sudanese would become proud of their civilization and
of its radiation. In striking contrast with the colonially corrupt, idiotic and
worthless Modern Egyptians, who have been stupidly selling their own antiquities
for 222 years, Modern Sudanese would undertake the research of their past, the
exploration of their antiquities, the decipherment of their ancient writing
systems, and the reassessment of their diachronic role in World History at a
national, sovereign level, finding the true, non-colonial partners for these
purposes.
Second, because of the
absence of the above, a true nation-building effort would take place and, as a
consequence, today's Sudanese would be all fully conscious of
a- their Cushitic –
Ethiopian historical and cultural heritage
b- their Ancient
History, as it is recorded in Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics and in Meroitic
hieroglyphic and cursive writing systems
c- their ethnic,
national, cultural, historical and spiritual interconnection with the Oromos
and the other subjugated Cushitic nations of Abyssinia
d- their Christian
Nobatian, Makurian and Alodian History, as it is recorded in Coptic, Old Nubian
and Makurian writing systems
e- their Islamic
African History that is totally unrelated to Arab presence
f- their pro-eminent
role across the trade routes of the Antiquity and the Islamic Ages, when the
Historical Ethiopia (i.e. Sudan) linked
- Egypt with Sahara and
the Western African world,
- the Mediterranean
world with the Horn of Africa region, and
- almost all the
African Muslims with the three cities of Islamic Pilgrimage, namely Mecca,
Madina and Al Quds ash Sherif (Jerusalem).
V. Regional
and international consequences of a true nation-building in Sudan, rightfully
named 'Ethiopia'
Third, because of the
above, Sudan would
a- help dissolve the
criminal colonial state of Abyssinia, by incorporating Oromia into
Sudan-Ethiopia and by making Afaan Oromo the official language of the new, magnificent African super-state
b- help form numerous
independent nations on parts of Sudan's soil, namely among the Bejas in the
East, in Darfur, in Kordofan, and in the South – when the Westerners were not
there to fuel rebellion against Pan-Arabist Khartoum that they (: the Western
colonials) fabricated in the first place
c- help establish
numerous independent nations on parts of the criminal colonial state of
Abyssinia, namely Afar, Ogaden, Sidama, Hadiya, Kaffa, Kambata, Shekacho, Wolayita,
Agaw, Nuer, Anuak, Berta, etc. whereby every nation would have their own language
as official
d- help dissolve the
filthy colonial fabrication of Djibouti, a pseudo-state created by the
criminal, murderous gangsters of France, and in the process help Afar nation
pull together all parts of their nation and Isa tribe merge with the other
Somalis
e- strike an alliance
with the Eastern Cushitic nation of Somalia in order to impose a genuine,
anti-colonial, African Order across Africa, which would bring forth the
dissolution of fake colonial states whereby many different historical nations
are oppressed by the filthy nation or tribe that had previously been the
lackeys of their colonial masters, like the Kikuyu in Kenya
f- launch an African
educational, academic system in total refutation of the Western Orientalism,
Hellenism, 'Greco-Roman Civilization' and fake Africanism, and in total
rejection of the racist, Eurocentric version of World History,
- by highlighting the
superiority of Ancient African civilizations (Egyptian, Cushitic-Meroitic,
Carthaginian-Berber) over Ancient Greece and Rome,
- by establishing the
correct links between the Ancient African civilizations and the Ancient
Oriental civilizations (Sumerian, Assyrian-Babylonian, Hurrian,
Hittite-Anatolian, Canaanite-Phoenician, and Iranian),
- by meticulously
examining and widely publicizing the multifaceted, overwhelming African
cultural, religious, spiritual, artistic, literary and linguistic impact on Ancient
and Medieval Europe
Black Egyptian high priests were initiating White Romans into the mysteries of the Ancient Egyptian divine concept of Isis (Aset in Egyptian Hieroglyphics); hundreds of temples of Isis (Iseum – Isea in Latin) have been excavated across Europe but this evidence of absolute African Egyptian impact on European civilization remains hidden to Europeans and others – in order not to function as a rejection of the still prevalent, racist pseudo-historical model of ‘Hellenism’ and Greco-Roman civilization’. Iseum Campense, Rome
g- promote a system of
cultural, academic, educational and intellectual interconnection among all
African nations, imposing
- the immediate
obliteration of the colonial languages, English and French, across the
continent,
- the prohibition of
these two languages from the primary, secondary and tertiary education of all
African states, and
- their replacement by
a system of all-African multilingualism, involving the major African languages,
h- destroy all fake
pseudo-states that the colonial powers, France, England and America, produced
over the past 222 years on African soil, notably Fake Egypt, Fake Morocco, etc.
and help generate genuinely African nations instead.
What I am saying with
the aforementioned brief diagram is that a non-Arab, non-colonial, genuinely
African Sudan, named Ethiopia, in the middle 1950s should act as if having
fully understood, assessed and capitalized on the historical conclusions of
scholars like Martin Bernal (author of the venerated "Black Athena: The
Afroasiatic Roots of Classical Civilization", in three volumes: 1987,
1991, 2006) and Edward Said (author of the highly respected
"Orientalism", 1978). This aphorism of mine may sound as preposterous
because these great opuses were published more than 20 or 30 years after Sudan
proclaimed its independence.
However, all the
constituent elements, the textual and archaeological evidence, which led the
aforementioned scholars to their groundbreaking publications, were there
already in 1956. As a matter of fact, all that an African scholar needed to do
was
- study the historical
sources and the archaeological material record
- identify the
discrepancies between historical sources and colonial bibliography
- list a vast number of
topics commonly shared among colonial scholars but hidden from the Western and
worldwide public (readership)
- analyze the reasons
of the unrepresentative selection of historical sources for educational –
intellectual – cultural purposes, as carried out by colonial scholars
- examine the above
through the question 'qui bono' and accurately specify the colonial intentions,
and
- conclude about a) the
racist, criminal, and inhuman motives of the colonial pseudo-academia and b)
the ensuing benefit for the colonial powers and their false historical version.
VI.
Anti-colonial struggle means total rejection of the colonial fallacy still
diffused worldwide as 'Word History'
A non-colonial,
non-Arab Sudan, officially named Ethiopia, would of course demolish fundamental
colonial myths and highlight concealed facts that constitute basic elements of
today's Western version of World History. The topic is as vast as an entire encyclopedia,
but I will herewith offer few examples pertaining to Africa and the surrounding
seas.
a- there is no such
country as "Egypt" and there is no such thing as "Egyptian
Civilization". The country's real historical name is Kemet, which means
the 'Black Land' or 'the Land of Black People', and this is due to the fact
that the Ancient Egyptians were both, dark brown and black. So, there was
Kemetic or Kemetian Civilization. Today, a liberated, non-colonial country at
the northeastern corner of the Black Continent must be called Kemet – not Egypt
– at the international level. Egyptian politicians and statesmen accepting to
name their country 'Egypt' at the international level are born slaves and
constitute a most disreputable clique alien to the great history of that land.
b- the name 'Egypt',
used by Egyptians, constitutes a colonial relic of the filthiest and most racist
contents. The word originates from the Ancient Greek word Aigyptos, which is
the Hellenization of the Ancient Egyptian term 'Hwt Ka Ptah', i.e. 'the
enclosure of the soul of Ptah'; Ptah was a marginal deity in Ancient Egypt, and
the Ancient Egyptians would never accept to name their country after that deity
of the polytheistic priesthood of Memphis. This is the first point against the
use of the term. The second point is related to the fact that European and North
American colonials view the use of this term as resulting from their cultural,
political, academic and intellectual supremacy over colonized (since 1798)
Modern 'Egypt'.
c- Modern Egypt cannot
be called "Egypt" at the international level for one extra, totally
different, reason; the use of this name, which is totally alien and unknown to
today's average Egyptians, consists in an unprecedented colonial denigration
and vulgar deprecation of the modern nation, which uses the name Masr to denote
their identity. Assyrian-Babylonian of origin (Musur and Mat Masri, lit. 'land
of Egypt'), this name was diffused among Aramaeans and Hebrews, before being
adopted among Arabs.
And notice the
difference, if you please: the authorities of Myanmar managed to impose at the
international level respect for their country's name, which is the
aforementioned, officially accepted, name and not the filthy, colonial parody
of Burma that the English colonials used since the early colonial days. But the
idiotic, colonial, Pan-Arabist rulers of Kemet / Masr from Nasser to Mubarak to
Morsi never raised such a subject in an effort to always remain disgustingly
servile and docile enough to please their colonial masters – the Satanic
gangsters of France, England and America.
d- there is no such expanse
of sea as "the Indian Ocean"; this is a fake term introduced by the
English, Dutch, Portuguese and French colonials as late as the 16th c. In the
Antiquity, the most commonly used term was "Red Sea" (in Ancient
Greek: 'Erythra Thalassa'); during the Roman and Arsacid / Sassanid times, this
term denoted the seas that we call today 'Persian Gulf', 'Red Sea' and 'Indian
Ocean'. When Agatharchides writes in the 2nd c. BCE his treatise on the Red Sea
(Geographi Graeci Minores), in the part of his work in which he describes the
natural phenomenon due to which the sea was called 'red', he narrates an event
happening in today's coast of Hadhramaut or Mahra in SE Yemen.
e- if one wants to name
the entire Afro-Asiatic expanse of sea after the national name of the first
seafarers and navigators who, after studying the meteorological conditions, the
winds and the oceanographic data of that sea, sailed across the ocean from the
Horn of Africa region to today's coast of Malabar, then one has to call the sea
"Yemenite Ocean". First, the Qataban Yemenites, with capital at
Timna, established safe navigation from the Gulf of Aden to the Malabar coast
where they established commercial relations with the local Dravidian (not
Indian, not Indo-European) kingdoms as early as the middle of the first
millennium BCE.
Qataban Yemenite
thalassocracy across the Yemenite Ocean lasted many centuries and was matched
with an early colonization of the East African coast where the Qatabanis
intermingled with the local Ancient Somalis of the coast of Azania (from the
Horn of Africa down to today's Daressalaam in Tanzania). Qatabani supremacy was
terminated when the Himyarite Yemenites and the Sabaean Yemenites made an
alliance to vanquish Qataban and accumulate in their palaces the mythical
treasures that used to be garnered at Timna. This happened ca. 115 BCE.
The Himyar – Sheba
alliance was not as experienced as the Qatabanis seafarers; their heavy taxes
were a problem for the last Ptolemies who were easy partners. After Octavian
invaded Kemet (Egypt) and annexed the land of the Nile to the Roman Empire (30
BCE), the Romans proved to be difficult partners and in the year 25 BCE, Aelius
Gallus, prefect of Egypt, undertook a maritime expedition against Yemen, which
also involved several land expeditions. At the end, after many collateral damages,
the Romans managed to destroy the main Yemenite port of call at Aden and thus
force the Yemenites to cooperate with Rome and reduce the customs.
Yemenite thalassocracy
across the Yemenite Ocean continued, evidently coordinated with the Roman
imperial establishments at Egypt and Leuke Kome (NW coast of today's Saudi
Arabia), and it is well documented in historical texts like the Periplus of the
Red (Erythraean) Sea, which was written by an Alexandrian Egyptian captain and
merchant who traveled across the coastal regions from Suez to China at the
times of the Roman Emperor Nero (so in the middle of the 1st c. CE). The same
text describes the continuation of the Himyar-Sabaean colonization of Azania
and prevalence across the seas. There have truly been found Roman coins in
different archaeological sites across the Malabar coast where the kingdoms of
Damirica, Nelkyndis, Cerobothra (Chera) and Pandya were located according to
the Periplus of the Red (Erythraean) Sea.
But Yemenite traders
and sailors used these coins while sailing across the Yemenite Ocean; and these
kingdoms were all Dravidian – not Indian. And the Dravidians never demonstrated
navigational skills, which is one more reason for which we cannot call this sea
'Indian Ocean', pretty much like we cannot call 'India' the cemetery of South
Asiatic nations that the English colonials prepared for more than 100 years
during their calamitous colonial presence there. 'India' is only the land
around the Indus River, and this concerns only a minor part of the state which
is nowadays fallaciously called with this name.
At the beginning of my
response, I mentioned the Amhara and Tigray Abyssinian world view, eschatology,
and historical tradition. This relates to their famous historical book Kebra
Negast, which was written in Ge'ez, their religious language down to our days. First
written in Coptic, then translated to Arabic (early 13th c.), and last rendered
in Ge'ez at the beginning of the 14th c., Kebra Negast is a historical forgery
prepared by Amhara debteras (monks) only to justify their false pretensions to
ancestry and to royalty and to prepare the ground for expansionism of
apocalyptic and eschatological contents.
The disappearance of
Islam, the common borders between Abyssinia and a Zionist state in the area of
Palestine, the fallacious and unhistorical theory of Axum being the 'New Zion',
and the fabrication of Menelik, nonexistent son of Solomon (Suleyman) and
'Makeda', the fake queen of Sheba (that kingdom was located only in Yemen, not
in Africa), do not bode well with the future of Africa but are all some of the
targets of the real authors of this forgery. All later Amhara and Tigray 'prophecies'
about their expansion are repetitions of earlier material included in Kebra
Negast. Somali, Sudanese and Egyptian (not to mention more) scholars are
idiotic enough not to learn Ge'ez, not to study Kebra Negast and not to
highlight the fallacious nature of the book that prepares the Amhara and Tigray
Abyssinians as followers or conscious slaves of the Antichrist (Masih
al-Dajjal). But this is a totally different subject, as I already said.
Best regards,
Shamsaddin
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