#pre saharan

[philophilophilophilo]

[a-minke-whales-tale]

Delusion, Clinical Zoanthropy

I am a clinical zoanthrope. I have schizophrenia. If you have read my posts or blog before this should be no surprise as I am quite open about it. These labels that have been put on me affect nearly every aspect of my life, and greatly affect how I interact with the community. There is often a lot of discussion surrounding ideas of physical identity, delusion and if these things should be acceptable within the community or how to handle these topics.

Length: 3676 words

TW: delusions, reality checking, mentions of medical abuse

The year before last, I had spent quite a bit of time working with another academic to construct a historical materialist analysis of therianthropy. Historical materialism for people who are not familiar is a method of analysing history through the lens of production and class society. In particular, given the apparent wealth of historical therianthropy among “primitive” society, and the narrow niche of modern therianthropy, as well as my own treatment at the hands of the medical system, I wished to understand the origins of the oppression of therianthropic identity. I have to date not completed the project for a number of reasons - limited available literature regarding the transition from pre-class society to slave society particularly regarding religious and spiritual beliefs, personal health and time, and forcing myself to create a complex system of double bookkeeping and analysing my experiences through a materialist lens essentially constantly and forcibly reality checking myself constantly was very taxing.

Although I did not get to the state to write and publish the paper, I did learn a fair bit, and I think the most important concept within this discussion is the concept of delusion and how we define it. There is a common vulgar definition of delusion as believing anything that is not real or not backed by scientific consensus. But then there are many things people believe which is not backed by scientific consensus. While certainly there are people who would say that anyone who believes in ghosts or the Christian God are delusional, nearly half of the people in my country believe in God, however we lack any materialist evidence at this point for such a thing. The state of being identified by others as delusional comes with some pretty serious consequences, it should be noted though that these consequences are not applied to people who believe in God. Similarly, there are times when scientific consensus is simply wrong. Is the man who rejects the inherent inferiority of the [Sub-saharan Afrikan] race because of their skull shape and “thick skin” delusional? We today would collectively say no. For a man in the early 19th century, this would have been scientific consensus even if now we should find such a thought abhorrent. Was he then delusional? (Though some people did try to justify slaves escaping as a mental health condition Drapetomania, and historical terms like madness are often connected to modern terms like delusion and psychosis). I think often modern humans can create an almost religion out of science and progress and belief in their own rationalism - that not only is there absolute objective truth, but they can and do know it all in this particular moment, and that the society they exist within does not effect an impact on their view.

It is important to understand that delusion has a fairly specific definition and caveat when talking in a medical definition. That important caveat is that the belief conflicts, or is not standard, within their culture or subculture. Not only that, the belief must be very fixed and firmly set which does not respond/change to the presence of outside evidence. This cultural context is an important factor in the diagnostic criteria for delusions, as well as dissociative disorders like OSDD and DID (it may well be important for other conditions diagnostic criteria as well though I lack experience to speak on that topic).

Delusions -are- very much socially defined. I make the joke often that a rich man hears the voice of God he runs for office, I hear the voice of a spirit and need to be on antipsychotics. There are a number of examples namely in SEA where the experience of transforming into another animal would be considered entirely within the range of normal possibility (though notably with tigers primarily). There are also cultures and practices in which physical transformation is not considered delusion but a normal part of ritual notably among the Xan peoples. Among some Siberian cultures as part of hunting some will take essentially the mind of a wolf. In South Asia there are also recorded practices in which a person’s soul is bonded to and moved to an animal’s body in the night. Most people those reading this might encounter day to day would think these are surely delusions, but for those people, it is just a normal part of life and culture.

Most people here would collectively agree that therianthropy is not a delusion, however from outside the community many easily could argue it. You -are- human, you can look at your body and it and see that it -is- human. If you argue for past lives, there exists no evidence supporting that and no evidence supporting the existence of spirit or plausible explanation beyond hallucination despite many attempts to measure their existence. Nor do you have the instincts of that animal because you are clearly a human, and any "instincts" you might have are phantoms of the mind or attaching to a certain animal as a way to manage your life. However neither of these explanations would be acceptable nor would they convince you that you are wholly and entirely human.

Similarly with transgender identity, people here would collectively agree that is not a delusion. But 60 years ago? Or among transphobes? You are experiencing a delusion. You are obviously a wo/man, and no amount of hormones, [presentation], or [surgery] will change that. We would all collectively say fuck that shit, but you know who agrees under certain circumstances? WPATH in their Standards of Care directly notes among certain conditions of transgender identity as delusion (or at least in their old SOC before informed consent became common). It is common for people with schizo-spectrum disorders and higher level structural dissociative disorders to be denied care, or to face significant pushback. But this can also be true for all sorts of other “less serious” conditions such as austime, adhd, depression etc. This is something I have faced, and who knows how many others have faced it as well.

But what a delusion is very much defined by perspective and culture. It is easy when sitting on the "non-delusional" side of a cultural belief, to believe the order of things is logical. However, when I must construct materialist explanations of experiences, a task for which I am forced as part of double bookkeeping, the differences between my "delusional" experiences, and others "nondelusional" experiences especially in regards to therianthropy is one of degree, not of kind. Do not make the mistake to think that in other scenarios, other cultures, your experiences may be seen as delusions, and in other places, mine as natural and grounded in reality.

My experience as a clinical zoanthrope has left me often feeling quite divorced from the community, that I am separate, unwelcome, or an interloper in what is supposed to be my own community. I have been in the community for a while, but only at certain points felt comfortable to really call myself therian, a feeling which is again waning. There is a strong push constantly against physical identity. Even the most (in)famous phrase in wider culture about therians is the “on all levels except physical I am a wolf”. However this pushback against physical identities, especially from the concerns over P-shifter cults and abuses, created an environment that for me to be tolerated, I would have to constantly “show insight” or really reality check myself, and ensure all the others there knew that I knew my experience was not real and was not like their experiences were (that theirs were real and different). I still often have to do the dance describing my experiences, and even in the terms I use for myself as a clinical zoanthrope is indirectly that same dance.

The therian community often prides itself on how accepting it is. Though to be honest, I really have to question if this is the case. I have always felt unwelcome by the broader community. But so have very many others. It always strikes me that whenever I really share my experiences, how many others really relate to that feeling of not feeling wholly secure or belonging within the community. My orca friend, Ike, has talked quite a lot how they simply did not join the community for so long for feeling unwelcome. Sharing my experiences on a discord server a few weeks ago I learned another member was also a zoanthrope but had never shared it for fear of ostracization. A number of others expressed sentiments of feeling not total included, some for shift strengths, some for things like sexuality, theriomythics often get excluded, etc. Heck, by some accounts even the transition to the term Therian away from Were was an effort to include more people besides just shapeshifters.

Really when you think about it, it is not surprising so many people feel excluded in various ways. Therians have all these lines that you have to sit inside of and not cross to be acceptable to the community. But when you try to actually measure those lines many are not only extremely blurry, but vary person to person. Indeed my own experience is that there are people that do accept me, even if the wider community does not, and that is really the only reason I stayed.

The community has historically for instance a pretty hard stance on delusion and hallucination. The question though is, when does a shift move from being a socially acceptable phantom shift, to an unacceptable hallucination. For me in particular, my sensation of shift goes through a fairly long process of getting more and more intense, but it is also really a quite smooth process. It is like following a colour line, when does ‘blue’ truly begin? The first sensation is often a slight tickling, and very light phantom touch that you can sort of see through the feeling on your body. Beyond that the sensation gets more intense and becomes bothered from having things push against or intersect it. Further it begins to have not only form but colour and texture, but still if I look at the limb I cannot see it, I still see a human limb, though I do not expect it. Further the visual appearance comes in more and more until eventually my human parts are gone, transformed into animal parts I can see and I can touch. When we write it out like this it is pretty separately defined, but in the process this occurs for me, it is very smooth.

After enough quantitative change, there is a qualitative change, but where and when that occurs is hard to say. I think the first two experiences are very common among therians. I think the third experience is also fairly common but that starts to get more and more into the blurry lines, and if you cannot see where that line is you are likely to downplay your own experiences for fear if you say too much, you will be excised or ostracised from the community. But this fear also has the doubly cruel aspect that you can never really know where that line is because many people downplay their experiences to make them palatable, and so though many others might share in these experiences, people simply do not speak of them because they only see either extreme being shared, the particularly minor shifts being accepted, or the extreme shifts being sorted into delusions. I think it creates a false binary from a spectrum of experiences.

So many of these blurry lines exist though. What age can you be taken seriously? What platform do you use? How many kintypes is too many? Theriotypes being too common? Theriotypes being too rare? Are paleotherians acceptable? Are theriomythics acceptable? Can a dragon be a therian? Can an otherlinker or copinglinker have their identity so long it becomes therian? Are beastly animals from fictional settings acceptable or should they be with fictionkind? What sort of sexual and romantic expression is allowable? Is transspecies an acceptable identity? Some of these are blurry, some of them are clear, but they all wiggle around in different ways of some people will find them acceptable and some not. This leads to people self-censoring to the safe answers that they know are acceptable and prevents them really exploring their own identities, but also these questions within the community as it learns and grows and becomes more inclusive. In a certain irony, therianthropes as a community, are actually quite demanding in their conformity while preaching of their acceptance.

There has been a significant push in recent years to give greater levels of inclusion to therians with both delusional identities and physical identities. People are generally more accepting of zoanthropes and at points I have felt comfortable even to call myself therian and not just a member of the community. But there are also a number of additional terms, namely endel and holothere, which cover these experiences. However, something I note often when people talk why I as a clinical zoanthrope can be acceptable, while P-shifters and at times holotheres cannot, still comes down to that I acknowledge my experience as delusion. When I read the experiences of at least some p-shifters and holotheres, often the difference really is not so great, I often see their experiences mimicking or mirroring my own. I do use the word clinical zoanthropy, which on some level does indicate an understanding I know that at least others see my experiences as not real. This is a pretty common feeling among zoanthropes, we use this word, we know the humans think our experiences are not real, but they are incredibly real to us.

The question then is what should be done with us? There is a lot of comment that allowing us in the community to share our experiences or not reality checking people is encouraging delusion. People also say that delusions are harmful and that we should seek medical help. There are quite a few people who even wish to excise or isolate those who are anti-psychiatry and anti-recovery from the community.

If I am forced to analyse my experiences through a materialist and distant lens, it is quite clear my experiences are heavily rooted in delusion. I am a scientist, and there is no means under current knowledge to explain what I experience except hallucination - still I believe it fully. My knowing this is the only logical explanation does not lead me to believe it, to truly believe it inside. I mentioned before I had to give up on projects I did really enjoy because forcing myself to continuously deny my experiences and continuously reality check myself, brought to me very much distress. There are times I have wanted to be reality checked, but for vast part that is the remainder it is really distressing. It is distressing to be told a core part of your identity is not real, to be told the you that exists isn’t the real you, and sometimes see people mourning the “sane you”. Individuals in the community are not going to solve my “delusion” by reality checking myself or others.

Nor will them blocking me from the community or ensuring I do the dance for them encourage my “delusions” away. Delusions are heavily fixed experiences, and though you can encourage them in certain ways (think the example of people making “in your walls” jokes at schizophrenics), us talking about and sharing our experiences with each other and in our own community helps us feel understood and a sense of belonging. There are so few of us to start with, and the community closest to us either often disallows us, or makes us sit at the edge never really able to join. All banning us does is further isolate us, and for many delusions reinforces that we will never be acceptable or tolerable to others and it is best we are alone so we don’t hurt others with our presence.

I cannot speak on every person’s delusions, but I can speak on my own. For the question of if delusions are harmful, I think it often asks the wrong question. Who is it harmful to? Under what framework? Who thinks it is harmful? What does the patient want? I think one could say that my delusions of turning into a whale do harm me. I have trouble to interact with humans, I cannot work a full time job, I struggle in relationships, many nights I lay on the couch stuck for hours simply unable to move. These are all pretty negative things no? But it fails to ask why are these things harmful? A doctor looks through a very human framework and sees that I cannot do the human things and sees that I must have a poor quality of life and these delusions need to be addressed. But I am a whale and it is a core part of me, these things can be distressing, but whales cannot interact with humans the same way two humans would, work a full time job, have relationships with humans, and if you stuck them on a couch they would also not be able to move. This all is distressing and perhaps harmful, but then what other option is there? What the humans offer to me as solution is far worse.

I am anti-recovery, at least for myself. I think it is important to ask what does recovery look like? For me recovery would be to return to the water where I belong. But the humans would certainly say otherwise. For them recovery would look like fitting into and functioning within human society - having a job, a house, a car, a husband, kids, going on holiday, etc. I am not a human and I do not wish to be a human and live among them. However what is worse is how the humans would go about fixing that. I have been locked in hospitals, I have been strapped down, I have been sedated, I have been put on horrible meds that destroyed things I cared about and have often left me a shell of a person (there is a reason they were marketed as a chemical lobotomy). Some things I have gotten better in over time, and I can hold a job for the moment, even quite technical and difficult jobs.

However, the damage done to me from the humans was severe. Although I can talk about being a whale as delusion, the why is really far more impactful and distressing in my life. I was taken from the water, turned human, and am a useful thing for the humans. This understanding of myself as merely a tool and something the humans can do whatever they want with me is the real distressing aspect of my life. For me, the ‘help’ I received at the hospital only strengthened and set this delusion in so much firmer. I can look back at certain experiences, I can see the humans don’t have the technology to do what they did to me, but then I also have those years in the hospital, those years where everything was very apparent and clear and something that others can confirm and it seems to only further make plausible the experiences of the past, and those in the present the fear for what the humans will do to me. I know that I am deteriorating, I am struggling more and more, but nothing the humans offer me will make things better, they will only hurt me more, and if I ask for help, and reject it, they will only see it as proof I need the help more and force it onto me, which will only further reinforce that delusion.

If someone wishes to see a doctor and talk about therian things, I do often warn them of caution for what happened to myself and I do not want others hurt that way. I also urge them to think about what they want as the outcome from that discussion or what they hope will happen. A lot of mentally ill people have been hurt by doctors who thought they knew best, and once something is said, it cannot be undone. However, in the end they are free to decide what they will, and are free to navigate the medical system if they think it will benefit them.

For myself, I struggle to believe that doctors would really help me and instead work to help myself and my cetacean friends so that maybe someday we could swim again and swim forever. That we can fix ourselves and heal. That in time the deep scars across our bodies might start to fade and look like the scars of other captive cetaceans. That instead of surviving merely trying to please the humans to not be hurt, that we might actually -live- and have the life we were denied.

We are still people with agency, agency to choose our own path, to choose what brings us joy, to decide what we want from life, and from our healthcare. Or at least we should be granted that agency. We should not be excluded from the community or forced to dance around our experiences as not real for the comfort of others who happen to lie on the other side of the sane-delusional line, afterall the positioning of that line is very arbitrary and could easily swing to find yourself on my side of that line.

~ Kala

[psychotrenny]

There's a lot to be said about Zambia's relationship with South Africa, especially during the Apartheid era. A nation with legal political independence, like much of "post-colonial" Sub-Saharan Africa the deep rooted structures of Colonialism and ongoing pressure of Imperialism have kept it economically dependent on the Imperial Core. Like much of Southern Africa, South Africa specifically is a major locus of that dependence. Indeed, the primary focus of South Africa's foreign policy towards its immediate neighbours, the "Frontline States" in the struggle against Apartheid, was to keep things that way using the most suitable combination of soft and hard power that South Africa had at its disposal.

Now Zambia got off lightly in terms of the military threat it faced, suffering no major South-African proxy wars and relatively few commando raids against the personnel and offices of anti-apartheid resistance that had set up on Zambian soil. The Apartheid regime saw Kenneth Kaunda, the Zambian head of state from 1964 (the year of Zambian political independence) to 1991 (by which time Apartheid was beginning to be dismantled), as a relative moderate due his anti-communist sentiments. Despite Kaunda's outspoken opposition to the Apartheid system, he maintained strong economic ties with South Africa. Zambia's copper mines had their ownership nationalised but were still managed and operated by the same companies, to the point that the pre-independence culture of racism remained alive and well decades later and many Zambian engineers left the mining industry for the private sector as soon as they could due to the discrimination they faced from their mostly white (often South African) managers. A similar arrangement existed for Emerald mines, an industry that only began development in the 1970s and remained in its infancy until the 1990s, remained largely in private hands.

Yet at the same time Zambia was still an independent African nation. On top of verbally denouncing Apartheid to the international community, Kaunda's regime offered material assistance and free access to the anti-colonial resistance movements that toppled the Portuguese Empire and Rhodesia while destabilising South African apartheid to the point of dissolution. Despite the burden of exploitation the masses faced from both foreign imperialists and their local collaborators, conditions for the black majority of Zambia were significantly less vicious than for those living under Apartheid in South Africa and Namibia. Relations between Zambia and South Africa were messy, complex and often contradictory but they were like this because Zambia was very much its own nation. While the shadow of Apartheid is something that must always be taken into account while discussing Zambia in this period, especially in the context of South African investment, this country was much more than an extension of South Africa. You can't talk about it like it's some glorified Bantustan

And yet for most people none of that matters. All Southern Africa is the same to them; who gives a shit about the actual history of struggle? The whole "Elon Musk's dad own a South African emerald mine" is incredibly stupid because it's a severely misleading distortion of the facts that only gets passed around due to widespread attitudes of chauvinistic ignorance towards Africa. Now Errol Musk's statements about his involvement in the Southern African emerald trade are inconsistent; at times he claims to have owned a stake in an emerald mine while at others he claims to have merely traded in the gems. But either way, the gems in question are Zambian and not South African and that's a distinction that matters.

Additionally, the spread of this rumour comes from a grossly oversimplified view of Imperialist exploitation in Africa. While the mining industry is an important vector by which wealth is extracted from the continent, it is far from the only one. Errol Musk did not make his fortune from emeralds; he was an electrical engineer who went own to invest in a wide assortment of businesses from auto parts stores to tourist lodges. A beneficiary of Apartheid for sure, operating in an economic system made possible only through the brutal exploitation of millions of Africans, but in a much more sophisticated way than the cartoonish caricature of a mine overseer a lot of people seem to have in mind.

The point must also be made that most mining in Africa takes the form of modern industrial enterprises operated by voluntary workers who, while still incredibly exploited in terms of the value they produce compared to what they receive, tend to be relatively well paid by local standards. Even in apartheid South Africa and Namibia itself, mining jobs were considered among the most desirable work an African could get. The image of slaves held at gunpoint to dig with shovels, distorted half memories of Sierra Leonean diamonds and Congolese Coltan, do not represent the reality of Imperialism in most of the continent.

The whole "Musk Emerald Mine" discourse is an all around outstanding example of ignorance, made even more egregious by the ostensible "progressive" beliefs of those who engage in it. "Leftists" who care little for what's actually happening to the people of the Imperial Periphery, who see the suffering of Africans as little more than a cheap way to mock an individual they don't like. Maybe it would pay to open a book or two before you open your mouth. Or at least look at a world map and see the funny solid line that exists between "South Africa" and "Zambia"

[moneeb0930]

AFRICA, a continent rich in history and culture, was a diverse and vibrant place 100 years before the colonial era began. The period prior to European colonization of Africa was characterized by the existence of powerful and sophisticated civilizations, trade networks, and diverse societies. During this time, Africa was home to thriving kingdoms and empires, such as the Kingdom of Ghana, the Mali Empire, the Benin Empire,and the Great Zimbabwe Empire.

One of the remarkable aspects of Africa before colonialism was the economic prosperity and trade networks that existed across the continent. The Trans-Saharan trade routes connected the North African coast with the interior of the continent, facilitating the exchange of goods, ideas, and cultures. The trade in gold, salt, ivory, and other resources contributed to the wealth of African societies and enabled the development of urban centers and marketplaces.

In addition to trade, agriculture played a significant role in the pre-colonial African societies. Many regions practiced advanced farming techniques, growing crops such as grains, yams, and millet. Livestock farming was also a common practice, with cattle, sheep, and goats being raised for food, milk, and trade. The agricultural surplus generated by these practices supported the growth of populations and the development of complex societies.

Socially and culturally, pre-colonial Africa was characterized by a rich tapestry of traditions, languages, and belief systems. The continent was home to a diverse array of ethnic groups, each with its own customs, art forms, and social structures. Oral traditions, storytelling, and music played a vital role in communicating histories and values within African societies. Religious practices were also diverse, ranging from indigenous animist beliefs to Islam and Christianity, which were introduced through trade and migration.

The political landscape of Africa before colonialism was marked by the presence of powerful kingdoms and empires that governed vast territories. These political entities were often organized hierarchically, with rulers holding significant authority over their subjects. The Kingdom of Ghana, for example, controlled trade routes and amassed wealth through taxation and tribute. The Mali Empire under Mansa Musa was renowned for its wealth, power, and intellectual pursuits.

In conclusion, Africa 100 years before colonialism was a continent teeming with cultural diversity, economic prosperity, and political sophistication. The continent's vibrant civilizations and societies thrived through trade, agriculture, and social structures that sustained their way of life. The legacy of pre-colonial Africa continues to influence the continent's present-day cultures, identities, and aspirations, reminding us of the resilience and vitality of Africa's past.

📸 A lady from today Ghana 🇬🇭 adorned in gold jewelry #africa

[deadboydetectives-confessions]

Kind of inspired by the "fandom has bad taste in music" anon and the more recent "for fandom enrichment let's argue about character's tastes" anon, going to do some hardcore projecting based on my own musical tastes:

Charles' current musical obsession is Saharan desert blues. He also fucks with some French hip-hop on the side. He generally winds up listening to a lot of music that isn't from the UK -- he kind of searches out interesting scenes on a global scale. Edwin doesn't really connect with most of what Charles listens to, but he and Charles both agree on Angelique Kidjo, so she's one of their go-tos as background music in the office.

Aside from Kidjo, Edwin is generally fond of instrumental pieces, as lyrics are distracting when he is working. He's realized that while modern cinema like "Star Wars" or "Lord of the Rings" are not to his taste, he does enjoy their musical scores so pre-show he mostly listened to film soundtracks. Both Charles and Edwin share a particular fondness for music from the James Bond films of any era. Later, Niko shows Edwin Spirited Away & Edwin falls in love with Joe Hirashi's music.

Post-gay awakening, however, Edwin embarks on a quest to understand queer culture of the last hundred or so years. He finds doesn't really like most musical theater music, though he half-heartedly defends Sondheim to Charles. He likes opera marginally more as an audience member (Charles hates it), but he doesn't care to listen to opera music outside of watching a show. He dutifully listens to various women over the years who have been important to gay culture like Judy Garland. He find it intellectually stimulating from a historical perspective and he appreciates the artistic qualties & merits, but none of it is music he feels the need to casually listen to.

Charles off-handedly mentions to Edwin that he could look into queer male musicians and this is a winning suggestion: Marc Bolan, Freddie Mercury -- Edwin is enthralled. They watch Velvet Goldmine doing a movie night with the girls. "Pretty good, innit?" was Charles' reaction, but Edwin was left breathless. He is currently enamoured with glam rock & generally on the lookout for queer male rockers (and if many of them remind him somewhat of Charles, well).

Crystal listens to a lot of Erykah Badu, who to everyone's surprise Edwin winds up liking more than Charles. She's the most likely of all of them to listen to and recognize whatever is on the radio.

Niko loves metal. She got into it through Japanese metal, but now she's more likely to listen to The Hu or Bloodywood. She does appreciate English-language metal, but she finds it more of a curiosity. She also listens to a fair amount of rap and knows about all of the beefs between rappers, stuff that even Crystal has a hard time following.

Jenny, to everyone's surprise, likes folk music and older country: Simon & Garfunkel, Neil Young, Patsy Cline, Johnny Cash. She introduces Edwin to Lavender Country (he finds it intellectually interesting through his blushes as some of the more vulgar lyrics, but ultimately not his style) and Orville Peck (he loves). This leads Edwin to discovering Lil Nas X's Old Town Road and all the remixes, which he loves so much and Charles has to ban him from playing them in the office.

.

[talonabraxas]

8.8 Lion's Gate 'Zurvan Akarana' Talon Abraxas

God as ‘Time’ in the Ancient World

Once Krishna-Vishnu as Lord Nara-Hari / KALAH / TIME was worshiped as the Supreme Lord World-wide. He was the Deliverer of the Jews and Mixed-Multitude in their Biblical Exodus from slavery in Egypt. KRISHNA- VISHNU NARA-HARI Leontocephalos Lion-Headed TIME / KALAH of the Bhagavad-Gita, as the Biblical YAHU-TZABAOTH and Zeus-Jupiter Chronos-Saturus, Egyptian HERU-AUSU-Ammon-RA, Kushite Apademak, Shaivite and Buddhist Kalah-Bairab, Mithraic Zervan, etc. HE, ARYEH / HARYAH is the “Lion of Judah”, NARA-HARI, the Biblical Exodus Deliverer and Protector of the Jews.

Some Scholars of Zurvanism and Comparative Religions are well acquainted with the Form of the Supreme God as Leontopcephalos (Lion Headed) Time, surrounded by His Alter-Form or Expansion as the Ouroboros Serpent of Infinity. What they do not realize is that this Form of the Supreme Lord is both the Jews’ and Christians’ ARI-YAHU or ARI-EL YAHU-TZABAOTH (Lion-Headed Time) ‘Lord of Hosts’ of the Exodus Story, AND Krishna-Vishnu’s Central Bhagavad-gita Theophany as Narasimha KALAH / TIME, surrounded by His Alter-Form, Eternity as An-anta Un-Ending Sesha (Remainer) Naga (Biblical NACHASH).

To the ancient Africans, He was the Lion Headed AMUN (Zeus-Jupiter Chronos-Saturnus) the Supreme Lord of Egypt, Meroe and Sub Saharan Africa.

To the ancient Persians He was the Supreme Lord Zurvan.

To the ancient pre-Buddhist Tibetans He was the Lion-Headed Protector ZA.

To the ancient Eurpeans He was Zeus Chronos and Jupiter Saturnus etc.

To the Shaivites and Mahayana Buddhists He was/is the Wrathful Time-wheel Devouring Form of Kalah Bairava / Bairab Mahadeva (Shiva)

Shaivites identify the Central Theophany of KALAH in the Gita with Siva, because KALAH is one of Siva’s Names and Forms.

The Island Civilizations of Austro-Indonesia and the Pacific also worship the Lord as Lion-Headed Time. His New Year Lion Dance Blessing Festivals can still be seen there.

In the Western Hemisphere the Lion Headed JAG-WERE GOD of the earliest OLMECS ruled the TIME WHEEL of all of the subsequent Amer-Indian Civilizations.

Among the Names and Forms of Hari (Krishna) or Vasudeva (Vishnu) as the Man-Lion Nara Hari (Nara-Simha) are the Names and Forms of Kalah-Shiva!!! In Gita Jayanti and Buddhist New Year’s Festivals throughout the East, the All-devouring Universal Revelation / Theophany of the Supreme Lord as TIME / KALAH (BAIRAVA) is represented in a MAN-LION FORM. Thus Sacred Traditions from around the World, which are thousands of years old, confirm that ancient humanity worshiped the Supreme Lord in His Gita-related Revelation as Lion-Headed Time, with His Alter-Form of the Sarpa / Serpentine Anantadeva as Un-Ending Eternity.

Article by Bhakti Ananda Goswami:

[sarah-ankh]

what's your favorite ancient civilization

Damn. That's a tough question.

There are things I love about all of them, but there are so many that we know so painfully little about.

Like the Hittite empire prior to the bronze age collapse. It was long believed to be a biblical myth before we found separate contemporary evidence of it.

Same for Troy. We used to think it was just a myth, but now we know the story is at least partially true and a place called Illium really did exist.

Mycenaean Greece is shrouded in mystery compared to it's classical counterpart. Then there's Minoan Crete.

Linear A and B, one of which remains a mystery.

Then there's the Indus river valley civilization of which we know absolutely nothing other than it existed.

Ancient India is something I really need to look into more.

And as a whole there isn't nearly enough research into the many, many ancient civilisations of sub-saharan Africa that must have existed but have been erased by imperial colonialism.

Of the pre-classical era Mediterranean, the best documented is probable ancient Egypt, but there are still entire swathes of its history that we are making educated guesses about, and the whole thing has become entangled with religious and political ideologies and popculture simplifications.

It's impossible to truly know about a culture over such a span of time, because every study of history is invariably coloured with the contemporary biases of the historian, so that everything becomes viewed through a stained glass mosaic.

[justforbooks]

This is a book for readers of second world war history who like the Boy’s Own version of the conflict. The cast of characters could have stepped straight from a comic strip story. Yet the men of the SAS were real flesh and blood, “rogue heroes” as the title suggests. The organisation now famous for its derring-do, and as famously secretive, has opened its archive to the historian and journalist Ben Macintyre, so that he can produce the first authorised history of what the SAS did in the war.

Macintyre has made the most of the opportunity. The history needs scarcely any embellishment, though he tells it with flair: the simple facts of SAS activity make the “ripping yarns” of comic book heroes pale by comparison. The organisation was the brainchild of two officers posted to the war in Egypt, David Stirling and John “Jock” Lewes. Stirling was an awkward soldier, hostile to spit-and-polish and authority, charming, fun-loving and irreverent (“layer upon layer of fossilised shit” was how he described military bureaucracy). Bored by life in Cairo, he discussed with the ascetic, hard-working, serious-minded Lewes, his complete opposite in personality, the possibility of creating a unit of awkward men like himself, who wanted action, few rules and adventure in small hit-and-run assaults behind enemy lines. Astonishingly, Stirling persuaded the high command in Cairo that he could achieve something significant at low cost in men and materials. The chief of British deception in the desert war, Dudley Clarke, gave the unit its name. Already fooling the Italians with a bogus parachute unit, the First Special Air Service Brigade, he lent the name to Stirling, and the organisation has borne it ever since.

Macintyre uses the SAS war diary as the backbone of his narrative, and is candid about failure as well as the hard-earned successes. The SAS was an irregular unit, its members drawn from an extraordinary range of backgrounds �� a spectacles salesman, a textile merchant, a tomato farmer, amateur boxer, and so on – with a range of motives to match. Some wanted excitement, some liked killing and made no pretence about it, some were escaping from their past, some were too eccentric for the ranks; all had to be fit, alert, crafty, ruthless if required and dedicated to the mission. Stirling was also aware that his outfit did not meet with approval in conventional military circles, which saw war as face-to-face, not behind the back. Churchill liked the force, and would no doubt have joined it had it existed in his youth. But through the campaign in North Africa, then Italy and Germany, the SAS had always to prove itself, in order to stave off disbandment.

The new unit nevertheless made a disastrous start and indeed had mixed fortunes throughout the war. The first operation, code-named “Squatter”, carried out while the handful of volunteers were still feeling their way, could not have gone more wrong. Poorly trained as paratroopers, the group nevertheless flew off into a desert storm trying to land at pre-planned dropping zones well to the rear of the enemy. They landed in the worst places, faced a Saharan downpour of biblical proportions, lost some of the troop to injury as they hit the ground, and were then unable to retrieve the parachuted supplies. With explosives so soaked they were worthless, uncertain about their whereabouts, short of food and water, the remnants of the original units made their way back to Egypt. Out of 55 men, 34 were killed, injured, captured or missing without a single achievement.

Macintyre makes the point that this was by no means the end of a madcap idea. Stirling recruited the Long Range Desert Group to take the SAS teams by Jeep or truck rather than risk any further parachute drops, and the second set of raids in December 1941 resulted in the destruction or disabling of 60 enemy aircraft. But Operation Bigamy, a series of raids against Benghazi shortly before the battle of El Alamein, was another disaster. It featured one of the most bizarre figures to emerge from the story: a Belgian textile merchant, Robert Melot. Fluent in Arabic, keen to get at the Germans, he volunteered for the SAS aged 47 as an intelligence officer. He used his range of Libyan contacts to glean information needed for the raids, but in this case Melot miscalculated. An Arab double agent alerted the Germans and Italians and the raids were a disaster. Once again a forlorn, bearded, hungry and damaged band straggled back to Cairo. Melot carried on his SAS career regardless, and died not from his many scrapes in battle, but from a Jeep accident on his way to a party in Brussels late in 1944.

The SAS came of age in the campaign in Italy, where it was used as a more conventional raiding party, the Special Raiding Service, under the command of Paddy Mayne following Stirling’s capture in Tunisia in late 1942. The Italian campaign was a particularly grisly one, and the SRS (with its core of SAS men) found collaboration with the partisans and rivalry with the Special Operations Executive (SOE) a challenge (unlike the SAS, the SOE always linked up with local resistance). Macintyre spares none of the details; the SAS fought a dirty war against an enemy they regarded as every bit as dirty. Prisoners were rare, but in return Hitler condemned irregular commando units to death if they were caught. Not all were killed by any means, but many were, just as the Germans killed all the other irregular, partisan forces ranged against them.

In October 1945 the army wound up the SAS and it continued to exist by subterfuge, a unit of war crimes investigators searching for evidence across Europe that SAS members had been murdered. In 1947, to meet the many crises of empire, the SAS was revived. What it did then and since can be guessed at, but until the postwar unit diaries are revealed, like the wartime diary used by Macintyre, the exact details will not be known.

What in the end did the SAS achieve in the war? Macintyre does not really say, leaving the narrative to speak for itself. It did not, as some of the book’s publicity has suggested, turn the tide of war. Its overall accomplishment, set beside those of the Commandos, or the SOE, the Chindits or other partisan groups, was strategically modest, whatever its tactical successes. But the SAS did bring to life the plucky, maverick, individualist hero of the comic strip, a very British way of making war. SAS: Rogue Heroes is a great read of wartime adventuring, in a long, grim war of attrition where adventure was hard to find.

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at Just for Books…?

[dustedmagazine]

Listening Post: Mdou Moctar

Mdou Moctar is, without question, one of the pre-eminent rock guitarists of our time, as much a master of heavy, hazy grooves as of double-tapped Van Halen-esque shreddery. His music is steeped in a very specific desert blues aesthetic, the swaying, side-to-side rhythms that evoke camel caravans, the keening call and response that suggests lonely attempts at communion in remote campsites, the hard-bashed but intricate percussion, the silky multi-colored tunics that the band sports onstage. And yet, it’s universal in the same amp fried lineage as Jimi Hendrix, Jimmy Page, Jeff Beck, Eddie Hazel and, oh right, Eddie van Halen.

Dusted has been enamored of Mdou Moctar for quite some time, beginning with Patrick Masterson’s highly entertaining review of the Akounak Tedalat Taha Tazoughai OST in 2015—the music for a remake of Prince’s Purple Rain in the Tamashek language— on Sahel Sounds.Masterson observed, “The idea of a Tuareg Purple Rain would have been unthinkable in 1984, not least of all because —and I cannot stress enough how funny I find this — there is no Tamashek word for ‘purple.’ Yet, 31 years later, here we are — the magic of a smaller world has helped bring an academic outsider’s joke to life. The punchline, of course, is that it’s as good as advertised.”

We collectively fell for Ilana (The Creator) and its out-of-hand shredding in 2019.Isaac Olsen noted, “If you still have a punk-induced allergy to flashy guitar solos, be warned; there’s not a track on Ilana where Moctar doesn’t take every available opportunity to — no other word for it — shred. Fortunately, Moctar earns the right to play his ass off by recruiting a band whose hungry energy matches and spurs on his own and by, for the first time, writing a whole album of tunes worthy of his chops.” The record brought a normally fractious Dusted roster to unity and dominated the 2019 Mid-Year feature.

Two years later, Afrique Victime won praise for its less showy, more groovy vibe. Said Jennifer Kelly in her review, “While he’s been one of rock music’s best guitarists for a while, the larger platform takes him out of the niche desert blues category and into the broader multinational arena. He might be excused for capitalizing by leaning into the rock elements of his sound, but instead, he’s putting forward the droning, mystic, call-and-response twilight magic of northwest African guitar music.”

And so we come to Funeral for Justice, another scorcher. The new record is as sharp and impassioned as any Moctar and his band have done so far, and it is inflamed with political energy. It comes after a period of exile after civil war in Niger. It calls out the injustices of colonialism, economic inequality and exploitation in cuts including the title track, “Oh France” and “Modern Slaves.” It cooks on the strength of a band that has never sounded better or more locked in, and it has one or two guitar solos, too.

Intro by Jennifer Kelly

Jennifer Kelly: How are you all liking the new Mdou Moctar? I’m feeling like it’s the best thing he’s ever done, not different exactly but more intense and volcanic. Definitely turned up to 11. 

Bill Meyer: My first reaction is that while Funeral For Justice definitely foregrounds the shredding, I miss the layered sound of Afrique Victime. But I’m tickled to hear the increased prominence of electronic percussion and autotune. It’s kind of a roots move, given that the first time a lot of people heard him was on a tune originally identified only as “Autotune,” which appeared on the Sahel Sounds compilation, Music From Saharan Cellphones. 

Tim Clarke: I saw Mdou Moctar live last year at a music festival, and it was very loud and thrilling. This is the first time I've listened to a full album. It makes me realize how little I'm drawn to fast guitar playing! And the band's trademark "cantering" rhythm feels like a bit of a musical rut. But when they explore outside these parameters, things get more interesting, especially when they play around with a mix of recording fidelities at the start of second track, "Imouhar." I also like the fact the record is concise and well-paced. Definitely piqued my interest to hear more of what the band can do. 

Christian Carey: The combination of desert blues and intense rock solos is amazing - and fairly singular. The group vocals create an appealing contrast to Mdou's shredding. 

I'm not sure that he can raise the intensity level any higher than this — turned up to 12?

Jennifer Kelly: I'm so glad you guys picked up on this. Lots to think about.

First regarding Bill's comment about a "rootsier" sound, it's complicated isn't it?

We look to third world artists for authenticity, which in its most reductive form means less electrification, fewer electronics, etc. But as Bill points out, Mdou's early stuff was heavily autotuned, as for instance here:

And a lot of the Sahel Sounds’ (and thanks, Bill, for making sure we gave them credit for being first with this stuff) cellphone compilations have a very slick, disco-electronic vibe. And that's music largely produced for African audiences without much consideration of a global audience. So which is authentic?

Also, my understanding, Tim, is that the rhythm is based on the way camels walk and a nod to West Africa's nomadic culture and heritage? You hear the same beat in Tinawarin's stuff.

Tim Clarke: I can definitely hear the camel's gait in the cantering rhythm section, that slightly awkward, loping feel. It's certainly unique.

Bryon Hayes: The almost hard rock riff in the intro of the title track originally confused me (did I put the right album on?), but I found it really powerful upon further spins of the album, especially how it segues into the cantering rhythm. Also, the roar as the lower fidelity section of “Imouhar” transitions to a higher fidelity is downright mind-melting! He’s experimenting with song form, and it really works.

Michael Rosenstein: As much as I've liked Mdou Moctar's music, I have to admit that this one is starting to lose me a bit. But that has way more to do with my musical proclivities than it does to the music at hand. What originally drew me to Moctar's music was the rawness of it; that uneasy balance of "shredding" that others have mentioned with a trance-like, cyclical flow. That was really foregrounded in his early albums like Afelan or Anar both of which were released a decade ago. This new one sounds, to my ears, much more heavily produced and fussed over. I admit, though, that I'm really uneasy with my assessment in that, as much as I hope I'm not, I fear I am just bringing my old, white, privileged judgement to bear. Is this just me judging that the music is no longer "authentic" enough? Or is it just that he is embracing the rock leanings inherent to his music and that just resonates less with me?

I do find it curious that, as far as I can tell, none of Moctar's music on Sahel Sounds is available anymore (including the one track on Music from Saharan Cellphones: Volume 2 referenced by Bill.) I have no idea if that is by his choice, by contractual obligations with Matador, or by the choice of the Sahel Sounds folks.

Jennifer Kelly: I noticed that those records were missing, too, when I looked for the Sahel Sounds records to hear the autotune. I wonder what happened?

Some of the songs are still very trance-y..."Imouhar," for example, especially at the beginning (it gets loud later), "Takoba" all the way through. The production seems about the same as on Afrique Victime to me, clean but not overly so. (Though, I will admit that I probably like the rock stuff more than Michael does.)

We haven't really talked about the political backdrop to this record, have we? The fact that Civil War in Niger has left them stranded in the States since 2023. I don't speak Tamshek but it seems that a lot of the songs with English titles are about politics and colonialism, which may affect the way they play and present the material, yes? It's different from writing songs about village life or falling in love with the local beauty.

Ian Mathers: I'll admit, there's at least a part of me that wishes this whole record was just unabashedly Going For It as hard as the opening title track does. Not that I don't like the relatively more restrained material; I'm not terribly knowledgeable about African music in general but "Takoba" reminds me of one of the few records from the continent I do very much know and love, the one Ali Farka Toure did with Ry Cooder (Talking Timbuktu) that my dad played all the time when I was in high school. Toure was from Mali, which at least shares a border with Niger, so hopefully I'm not being too ignorant hearing similarities in some of the guitar playing there. The more monomaniacally the band gets cooking here, generally, the more I like it (I really like "Sousoume Tamacheq," for example). I think I probably like it a little more than (the also excellent!) Afrique Victime, although I think for similar but opposite reasons to Michael, that it's just more to my taste and not necessarily a better record.

I'd also love to see a full set of lyrics/translations, and everything I've read about the sociopolitical context of the band and this music has been fascinating, but mostly right I'm just appreciating and enjoying this record in a similar way to, say, Oneida's "Sheets of Easter" or that U SCO record I picked for our 2023 Slept On round up.

Tim Clarke: Further to what you're saying about enjoying the "everything on 11" aspect of Moctar's sound, I can't help wondering what the band would sound like recorded by Steve Albini. That I'd like to hear!

Ian Mathers: Oh, good point; maybe because we talked about African Head Charge a while back I'm now also wondering what Adrian Sherwood would make of them.

Bill Meyer: I don’t think you’re too far off the mark in seeing a similarity between Moctar’s and Ali Farka Toure’s music, Ian. Toure worked with the languages and styles of several ethnic groups from the Malian interior, soI’m sure he would have been acquainted with the precedents for what Moctar does. Moctar is from subsequent generation, so his music is more in touch with what has been popular in the Sahel in this century. But another thing they both have in common is that they’ve been worked a lot on non-African stages, gotten hold of gear that isn’t particularly available back home, and undergone a personal course of development on a world stage. 

Their politics are different, though. I think Toure was the mayor (or something similar) of his town. He was pretty invested in fostering the stability of the existing Malian state, thus all the songs in different languages that encouraged people to get along. He was the big man in town who responsibly leveraged his popularity as a musician to obtain resources for his community. Your CD purchases generated income for Niafunke’s farming community. Moctar, on the other hand, was just another guy on the street, albeit an artistically ambitious one, until musical opportunities permitted him to tour and make records outside of Niger. His stance, as far as I can grasp it, is critical of African leaders who don’t look out for their people, and even more critical of the foreign powers that have run roughshod over his country (mostly France and the US). 

Matador came through with the lyrics.

[Here are some excerpts.]

“ FUNERAL FOR JUSTICE”

Dear African leaders, hear my burning question

Why does your ear only heed France and America? 

They misled you into giving up your lands

They delightfully watch you in your fraternal feud

They possess the power to help out but chose not to

Why is that? When your rights are trodden upon

 Why is that? When your rights are trodden upon

“ MODERN SLAVES”

Oh world, why be so selective about human beings? 

Oh world, why be so selective about human beings? 

My people are crying while you laugh

My people are crying while you laugh

All you do is watch

All you do is watch

Oh world, why be so selective about counrties?

Oh world, why be so selective about counrties? 

Yours are well built while ours are being destroyed

Yours are well built while ours are being destroyed.

Jennifer Kelly: Wow, that is fiery stuff. 

Ian Mathers: I can also see in the translated lyrics even more of a connection between the two countries, with Tamasheq described as "A helpless orphan abandoned by 3 countries / Mali-Niger, Niger-Mali and Algeria as the third." Interesting to note the gap between Toure and Moctar's respective places in society (at least right now, for Moctar). I didn't specifically think of reggae when I was reading the lyrics, Bill, but once you point it out there does seem to be a number of shared themes, maybe even some metaphors and imagery, there.

[inspofromancientworld]

The Neolithic began at different times, depending on how and when the warming of the Holocene made agriculture viable. While there is some evidence of humans deliberately planting seeds prior to the beginning of the First Agricultural Revolution (another name for the Neolithic), it wasn't until the Holocene that it was practical to shift from a hunter-gatherer type society to a settled agrarian one. Not all people chose to settle, though, such as those in Sub-Sahara Africa and Australia, and there is evidence of people moving between settled and nomadic life styles, depending on local climate. This was the beginning of the type of society that we're more familiar with.[image text] [slide 1] Neolithic about 10,000 BCE to 2000 BCE

Key features: farming, animal domestication, settlements (also known as the Neolithic Revolution or the First Agricultural Revolution

Lasted through the Protodynastic period in Egypt (about 3150 BCE) and the rise of the pre-Shang Erlitou culture in China (about 2000 BCE)

The climate changes of the Younger Dryas cold climate changed to the warmer Holocene

Happened in many places at once, leading to local varieties of plants and animals

Crops in the Levant and Fertile Crescent included wheat, lentils, peas, chickpeas, and flax. In much of Asia, the predominant crop was rice. In the New world, maize and potatoes were the predominant crops.

Animals that were domesticated include dogs, sheep, goats, cattle, and pigs

[slide 2]

Pottery became much more common as people started living in settlements, appearing at different times in each area, often with distinct patterns and decorations being used in an area

Goblekli Tepe build around 9500 BCE - may be the oldest human built center of worship used by nomadic peoples

Remains of figs in Jericho (Tell es-Sultan) dated 9400 BCE- oldest evidence of human cultivated food as figs couldn't be pollinated by insects, but reproduced via cuttings

In Sub-Saharan Africa, development tended toward pastoralism, following herds, rather than settlements.

Crop domestication occurred by 4500 BCE (the Formative Stage) in Mesoamerica, possibly starting as early as 11,000-10,000 BCE (the Archaic Era)

In Australia, a hunter-gatherer lifestyle largely continued until the arrival of the Europeans in 1788 CE, though there is evidence for 'fire farming,' deliberately setting fires to clear underbrush, to open forests for the growth of grasslands, to encourage plants to produce a green flush, to attract and to drive game for hunting

[end image text]

[reasoningdaily]

Ancient Black Egyptians? They were African? Were they? This was a topic that was raised and discussed. It is true that other studies have been carried out which suggest the opposite. But the answer is there if you look closely at the enormous array.

Here are the facts that prove ancient Egyptians were Black and Africans.

Ancient Egyptians referred to their homeland as Kmt (conventionally pronounced as Kemet). According to Diop, the Egyptians referred to themselves as “Black” people or kmt, and km was the etymological root of other words, such as Kam or Ham, which refer to Black people.

Senegalese scholar Dr. Cheikh Anta Diop (1923-1986)’s role in life was to challenge Eurocentric and Arab-centric perceptions of pre-colonial African society. He set out to prove definitively that Egypt’s ancient civilization had its origins in Black Africa. At the Museum of Man in Paris, he performed melanin checks on Egyptian mummies and concluded that all the ancient Egyptians were among the Black races.

Egyptian pharaoh Tutankhamen and family analysis by DNATribes recently found that sub-Saharan Africans, especially those from Southern Africa and the Great Lakes region, are the closest living relatives of the mummies, Face2Face Africa documented.

Scouring the past of Egypt and ancient Egyptians, some ancient Greek historians said that the skin of ancient Egyptians was “melanchroes,” that is, black or dark-skinned. The ancient Egyptians were also identified by early Latin eyewitnesses as “black-skinned.”

Scholars Agree Some of the world’s most esteemed scholars have speculated that Egyptians were Black Africans. Some modern researchers, like W. E. B. Du Bois accepted the theory that Ancient Egyptian society was mostly black Face2Face Africa documented.

In addition to Dr. Diop’s research, in its geographic DNA study, National Geographic recorded that 68 percent of present-day Egyptians are ethnically North African, with foreign invasions having little influence on the genetics of most modern Egyptians.

Some of the most famous ancient Egyptians have been identified as black. For example, Queen Ahmose-Nefertari is most often identified as a woman of color. “According to Sigrid Hodel-Hoenes, the author of “Life and Death in Ancient Egypt,” the Queen’s black skin color is derived from her role, as black is the color of both the fertile earth and the netherworld and death.”

“The term is a collective noun which thus described the whole people of Pharaonic Egypt as a Black person,” according to Diop.

Reading Bones Most of the skeletons and skulls of ancient Egyptians had characteristics similar to those of modern Black Nubians and other people of the Upper Nile and East Africa, showing they were Black and African, according to study by scientist Diop.

The Blood Group Tell Us Also, blood type is evidence, according to Diop. He discovered that even after hundreds of years of intermixing with foreign invaders, the blood type of modern Egyptians is the same group B as West Africa populations on the Atlantic seaboard and not the white race’s A2 characteristic prior to any crossbreeding,’  The Atlanta Star reported.

Mother Tongue Evidence  Also, blood group is evidence, according to Diop. He discovered that even after centuries of intermarrying with foreign invaders, the blood type of modern Egyptians is the same group B as West Africa tribes on the Atlantic seaboard and not the white race’s A2 characteristic prior to any crossbreeding.

“The Atlanta Star reported that Diop clearly indicates that ancient Egyptian, modern Egyptian Coptic, and Wolof are related, with the latter two having their origins in the former.

Diop wrote in the “General History of Africa”: “The relationship between ancient Egyptian and African languages is not a fictional fact, but a demonstrable fact that it is impossible to put aside for scholarship.”

[paramedicabroad]

Ksar of Ait-Ben-Haddou

The Ksar of Ait-Ben-Haddou stands proudly on a hill along the Ounila River, a striking sight with its terracotta-colored walls blending harmoniously with the surrounding desert landscape. The word "ksar" refers to a group of earthen buildings enclosed within defensive walls, and Ait-Ben-Haddou is the most famous and best-preserved example of this ancient form of settlement in southern Morocco.

In 1987, the Ksar of Ait-Ben-Haddou was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage site, acknowledging its cultural and historical importance, as well as its extraordinary earthen architecture. The site is a testament to Morocco’s ancient trade routes, traditional construction methods, and the resilience of its desert communities. The ksar continues to be a source of inspiration and fascination for travelers and historians alike.

This UNESCO World Heritage site has been around for centuries—since the 11th century, to be exact. It served as a crucial stop on the ancient trans-Saharan trade route, where merchants would rest, trade, and shelter from the harsh desert conditions as they traveled between Marrakesh and the Sahara, bringing goods such as salt, gold, and ivory.

The architecture of Ait-Ben-Haddou is a stunning example of pre-Saharan construction, using a mixture of clay, straw, and wood. Its mud-brick towers, intricately decorated facades, and narrow, winding streets give the ksar a unique, fortress-like appearance. Walking through its ancient alleyways feels like stepping back in time, with every turn offering a glimpse of Morocco's rich past.

Ait-Ben-Haddou’s otherworldly charm hasn’t gone unnoticed by Hollywood. Over the years, it has been featured in numerous blockbuster films and TV shows. From "Gladiator" to "Game of Thrones", this ksar has doubled as ancient cities and far-off fantasy lands. As you wander through its dusty streets, it’s easy to see why directors are drawn to its timeless beauty.

At the top of the ksar, you’ll find the granary, which offers breathtaking views of the surrounding desert and the nearby Atlas Mountains. This climb is well worth the effort, especially at sunset, when the red hues of the buildings and landscape glow under the setting sun. It’s one of those moments that will leave you speechless, feeling as though you’re on the edge of the world.

While many of the families that once lived within the ksar have since moved to more modern homes across the river, a few still remain, keeping the traditions and history of the ksar alive. As you explore the narrow streets and shaded courtyards, you might come across local artisans selling their handmade crafts or invite you to visit one of the small shops housed in the ksar's ancient walls.

Visiting Ait-Ben-Haddou is like discovering a hidden treasure in the middle of the desert. It’s about a four-hour drive from Marrakesh, making it a perfect day trip if you’re exploring the Atlas Mountains or heading toward the Sahara. The ksar’s location on the edge of the desert only adds to its mystique, offering visitors a chance to see a different side of Morocco—one that’s steeped in history and tradition.🏛️⛰️🇲🇦

[angelkarafilli]

Yeha Temple, Temple of the Moon,Ethiopia

Discovered in the town of Yeha in the Mehakelegnaw Zone of the northern Tigray region, the stone tower is built in a Sabean-style, common across much of sub-saharan Africa. 

Towering over the small town, which is considered by many to be the pre-aksumite capital of the country, the temple of the moon was built in honour of the god Almougah, and dates back to around 700 BC to the reign of D’mt.

Stone carved inscriptions found across the site detail grand tales of Almougah’s glory and their power to cast out the harsh unrelenting sun.

More on:https://www.brilliant-ethiopia.com/yeha-temple

[moneeb0930]

ORIGINS OF HAPI (NILE) VALLEY CIVILIZATION

The progenitors of the Nile Valley civilization were Nilo-Saharan peoples who migrated to the Hapi (Nile) Valley from the Green Sahara, Nubia and Northeast Africa. The cattle cults of Het-Heru (Hathor), spiritual beliefs, iconography and cultural motifs associated with the old Kingdom can be traced to these regions prior to the unification of the two lands. The science of mummification began in Libya with the 5600 year old Tashwinat Mummy, known as the “Black Mummy of the Green Sahara''. The Black Mummy predates the oldest Kemetic mummy by over 1000 years. Astronomy and the study of the procession of the equinox began in South Africa at the site of the Adams Calendar Stone Circle and continued at the Napta Playa Stone circle located in modern day Sudan. This 7000 year old ceremonial center dried out around 3400 BC and they transferred their knowledge into the Nile Valley. The earliest images of Pharaonic Kingship were found in Nubia at the site of Qustul were the oldest depiction of Pharaonic Kingship is shown on the Qustul incense Burner. The original populations of the Nile Valley were no different than modern Sudanese, Ethiopian, Eritrean and Somali populations of today with a mixture of western Eurasians via the Levant whom for the most part settled in the Delta region. The cultural overlap of Kush and Kemet existed from the very dawn of Hapi Valley civilization and the cultural fusion was expressed in the customs and spiritual beliefs of its early inhabitants. These ancient traditions are continually practiced in Africa to this day.

Below are the results from a genome project conducted by Dr. Shomarka Keita, a Research Affiliate and Biological Anthropologist in the Department of Anthropology at the Smithsonian Institution and Dr. A. J. Boyce, who works at the Institute of Biological Anthropology and St. John's College

Oxford University.

PROJECT MUSE

Genetics, Egypt, and History: Interpreting Geographical Patterns of Y Chromosome Variation

IV, XI, V=Nilotic African

VII, VIII=Near Eastern

235 S.O.Y. Keita and A. J. Boyce

Early speakers of Nilosaharan and Afroasiatic apparently interacted based on the evidence of loan words (Ehret, personal communication). Nilosaharan’s current range is roughly congruent with the so-called Saharo-Sudanese or Aqualithic culture associated with the less arid period (Wendorf and Schild 1980), and therefore cannot be seen as intrusive. Its speakers are found from the Nile to the Niger rivers in the Sahara and Sahel, and south into Kenya. The eastern Sahara was likely a micro-evolutionary processor and pump of populations, who may have developed various specific sociocultural (and linguistic) identities, but were genealogically “mixed” in terms of origins.

These identities may have further crystallized on the Nile, or fused with those of resident populations that were already differentiated. The genetic profile of the Nile Valley via the fusion of the Saharans and the indigenous peoples were likely established in the main, long before the Middle Kingdom. Post-neolithic/predynastic population growth, as based on extrapolations from settlement patterns (Butzer 1976) would have led to relative genetic stability. The population of Egypt at the end of the pre-dynastic is estimated to have been greater than 800,000, but was not evenly distributed along the valley corridor, being most concentrated in locales of important settlements (Butzer 1976). Nubia, as noted, was less densely populated.

Interactions between Nubia and Egypt (and the Sahara as well) occurred in the period between 4000 and 3000 BCE (the predynastic). There is evidence for sharing of some cultural traits between Sudan and Egypt in the neolithic (Kroeper 1996). Some items of “material” culture were also shared in the phase called Naqada I between the Nubian A-Group and upper Egypt (~3900-3650 BCE). There is good evidence for a zone of cultural overlap versus an absolute boundary (Wilkinson 1999 after Hoffman 1982, and citing evidence from Needler 1984 and Adams 1996). Hoffman (1982) noted cattle burials in Hierakonpolis, the most important of predynastic upper Egyptian cities in the later predynastic. This custom might reflect Nubian cultural impact, a common cultural background, or the presence of Nubians.

Whatever the case, there was some cultural and economic bases for all levels of social intercourse, as well as geographical proximity. There was some shared iconography in the kingdoms that emerged in Nubia and upper Egypt around 3300 BCE (Williams 1986). Although disputed, there is evidence that Nubia may have even militarily engaged upper Egypt before Dynasty I, and contributed leadership in the unification of Egypt (Williams 1986). The point of reviewing these data is to illustrate that the evidence suggests a basis for social interaction, and gene exchange.

236 S.O.Y. Keita and A. J. Boyce

There is a caveat for lower Egypt. If neolithic/predynastic northern Egyptian populations were characterized at one time by higher frequencies of VII and VIII (from Near Eastern migration), then immigration from Saharan sources could have brought more V and XI (Nilo-Saharan) in the later northern neolithic. It should further be noted that the ancient Egyptians interpreted their unifying king, Narmer (either the last of Dynasty 0, or the first of Dynasty I), as having been upper Egyptian and moving from south to north with victorious armies (Gardiner 1961, Wilkinson 1999). However, this may only be the heraldic “fixation” of an achieved politi- cal and cultural status quo (Hassan 1988), with little or no actual troup/population movements. Nevertheless, it is upper Egyptian (predy- nastic) culture that comes to dominate the country and emerges as the basis of dynastic civilization. Northern graves over the latter part of the predynastic do become like those in the south (see Bard 1994); some migration to the north may have occurred—of people as well as ideas.

238-239 S.O.Y. Keita and A. J. Boyce

After the early late pleistocene/holocene establishment of Afroasiatic-speaking populations in the Nile valley and Sahara, who can be inferred to have been predominantly, but not only V (and XI), and of Nilosaharan folk in Nubia, Sudan, and Sahara (mainly XI and IV?), mid- holocene climatic-driven migrations led to a major settlement of the valley in upper Egypt and Nubia, but less so in lower Egypt, by diverse Saharans having haplotypes IV, XI, and V in proportions that would significantly influence the Nile valley-dwelling populations.

These mid-Holocene Saharans are postulated to have been part of a process that led to a diverse but connected metapopulation. These peoples fused with the indigenous valley peoples, as did Near Easterners with VII and VIII, but perhaps also some V. With population growth the genetic profiles would become stabilized. Nubian and upper Egyptian proximity and on some level, shared culture, Nubia’s possible participation in Egyptian state-building, and later partial political absorption in Dynasty I, would have reinforced biological overlap (and been further “stabilized” by ongoing population growth).

Source:

https://muse.jhu.edu/article/187884

HEAD to HEAD: Ancient Egypt Reconstructions COMPARED (Bas Uterwijk vs TKM): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8iN6EFVTbQ&t=35s

Visit A Virtual Museum:

https://www.knowthyselfinstitute.com/museum

"I have not spoken angrily or arrogantly. I have not cursed anyone in thought, word or deeds." ~35th & 36th Principals of Ma'at

[tobacconist]

TOO MANY FUCKING ACRONYMS

THERE ARE TOO MANY ACRONYMS IN THE WORLD

STOP IT. ITS GONE TOO FAR

Sub-Saharan Africa? Safe Schools Alliance, a British advocacy group? SSA Global Technologies, American software company acquired by Infor Global Solutions? Shan State Army, a former insurgent group in Burma? Slovak Society of Actuaries (Slovak: Slovenská spoločnosť aktuárov), professional association in Slovakia? Soaring Society of America, American sporting society founded in 1932? Society of Scottish Artists, artists society founded in 1891? Swedish Society of Radio Amateurs, an amateur radio organization? Singapore Scout Association, youth movement founded 1910? Seismological Society of America, international scientific society founded 1906? Scottish Socialist Alliance, a coalition of left-wing bodies, fore-runner to the Scottish Socialist Party? Shipconstructors' and Shipwrights' Association, a former British trade union? Sainsbury's Staff Association, of Sainsbury's, UK? Sudan Studies Association, US professional association? Society for the Study of Addiction, UK learned society with charitable status? Steamship Authority, a Massachusetts ferry service and regulatory body? School of Saint Anthony, Quezon City, Philippines? Secular Student Alliance, US? Shady Side Academy, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, US? Social Security Administration of the US government? Social Security Agency (Northern Ireland)? State Security Agency (South Africa), the South African intelligence service? Selective Service Act of 1917, an American piece of legislation signed by President Woodrow Wilson during WWI that established nationwide conscription? Software Security Assurance? Serial Storage Architecture? Singular Spectrum Analysis? Stationary Subspace Analysis? Static single-assignment form, a property of intermediate representations used in compilers? Stochastic Simulation Algorithm? Strong subadditivity of quantum entropy? SubStation Alpha and .ssa file format, a video subtitle editor? Super systolic array? Start of Selected Area, a control character in the C1 control code set? Solid State Array, in flash data storage using solid-state drives? Semantic structure analysis? Single-strand annealing in homologous recombination? Specific surface area, a property of solids? Side-side-angle in geometry for solving triangles? Senile systemic amyloidosis? Sessile serrated adenoma, a type of pre-malignant intestinal polyp? Special somatic afferent? Anti-SSA/Ro autoantibodies? Sulfosalicylic acid? SSA, Grand Cross of the Order of the Star of South Africa? Deputado Luís Eduardo Magalhães International Airport, IATA Airport code? Same sex attraction? Safe Sex Always? Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, the Government of India's Education for All programme? Self-sampling assumption? Shared services agreement? Slippery slope argument, a rhetorical device (and often a fallacy)? ESA Space Situational Awareness Programme? Special services area or business improvement district? Special Service Agreement between the UN and a contractor? Supervisory Special Agent? Serious Sam Advance, a 2004 video game?

WHICH OF THESE ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT????????