Ancient African Civilizations

Catalog description

This class introduces the civilizations of the ancient Nile Valley, Egypt, Nubia, and Ethiopia. It also provides an introduction to the transformation and survival of those civilizations into the medieval and modern worlds. Lectures will cover the social and political history of Pharaonic Egypt; the transformations of Egypt under Greco-Roman rule; the emergence of independent Nubia; the birth of a centralized and literate society in the Ethiopian highlands; the Christianization of Egypt, Nubia, and Ethiopia; the survival of Nubia and Ethiopia as independent medieval powers; and the historical memory of modern Copts, Nubians, and Ethiopians.