Diffusion in the Studies of the African Past: Reflections From New Archaeological Findings

Abstract

Diffusionist theories have often been invoked to explain how ancient African cultures were formed and developed. Explanations were either in terms of waves of migrations or by infiltration by people of less African origin or people alleged to have had a high culture. This article provides new evidence for a Neolithic cultural sequence on the islands and coast of East Africa. It proposes that archaeological cultural horizons such as these should be re-examined using a revised diffusionist theory. On this basis, it can be shown that the people who were smelting iron in Sub-Saharan Africa around the first century A.D. were not marauding communities of Bantu peoples with no inclination to settle and build up empires, but of people who were well settled, and had a long history of building stable settlements and trading from Neolithic times.

Late Quaternary speleogenesis and landscape evolution in a tropical carbonate island: Pango la Kuumbi (Kuumbi Cave), Zanzibar

“…It is in this entrance talus that the earliest definitive evidence for human presence in and around Kuumbi Cave was discovered by earlier researchers (Sinclair et al, 2006;Chami, 2008) and confirmed by our excavations: a dense accumulation of Achatina landsnails comingled with marine molluscs, mammalian remains, charcoal and lithics, dated to ca. 18,500-17,000 cal.…”

“…Oral tradition, as recorded by Chami (2008), hints at a lull in human use and, even, knowledge of Kuumbi Cave: reportedly, the cave was rediscovered by a couple searching for a place 'to consummate their relationship'. This tradition also records the presence of a water pool in the rear part of the cave, presumably caused by a somewhat elevated watertable.…”

“…The concept of flank margin speleogenesis and its more comprehensive derivative, the Carbonate Island Karst Model (Mylroie & Carew, 1990;Mylroie et al, 1995;2008;Mylroie & Vacher, 1999;Mylroie & Mylroie, 2007;Mylroie, 2013), have further highlighted this distinctiveness by emphasising the crucial role of carbonate dissolution in the distal, seaward part of the freshwater lens underneath carbonate islands (and, also, continental littorals). In this speleogenetic realm, discrete from those of epigenic and hypogenic speleogenesis, critical domains of carbonate dissolution (groundwater table; fresh/saltwater mixing zone) are highly responsive to relative sea level change, in turn driven by eustatic sea level change (at several timescales), and isostatic or tectonic crustal uplift or subsidence (Ginés & Ginés, 2007;Mylroie & Mylroie 2007;Fratesi, 2013;Ginés et al, 2014).…”

Reinvestigation of Kuumbi Cave, Zanzibar, reveals Later Stone Age coastal habitation, early Holocene abandonment and Iron Age reoccupation

“…led by Chami and colleagues (Chami 2006(Chami , 2007(Chami , 2009Sinclair et al 2006). In total, these researchers excavated nine trenches (Figure 3).…”

“…Previous excavations led by Felix Chami and Paul Sinclair established that Kuumbi Cave is an important site for addressing a range of key issues on the eastern African coast, including the coastal adaptations of Pleistocene hunter-gatherers, the spread of domesticated animals and Indian Ocean trade connections (Sinclair et al 2006;Chami 2007Chami , 2009. Stone artefacts over 25,000 years old have been reported from the cave (Sinclair et al 2006), providing some of the earliest dates for coastal occupation in equatorial eastern Africa.…”