Peter Robertshaw

Environmental change and political-economic upheaval in precolonial western Uganda:

This paper reassesses available evidence for environmental and cultural changes in western Uganda since 1000 bc. The period of study includes the introduction of iron working in the region, as well as the transition to nucleated settlement patterns and the apparent decline of these settlements, prior to the colonial period. Several oscillations in climate conditions, from relatively dry to relatively wet, are recorded by palaeo-climate data. Some of these can be linked to variations in vegetation cover, apparent in pollen records from a number of locations. There is a difficulty in establishing cause–effect relationships here, because human impact can have a similar impact on moist forests to increases in climatic aridity. However, there are three cases where the explication of changes in climate, vegetation and the level of human impact are possible. The first occurred towards the end of the first millennium ad and coincided with the beginning of the Later Iron Age. This was a period of major changes in cultural relationships and settlement pattern, during which variations in environmental conditions may have influenced rather than forced a process of political centralization. Increased climatic aridity and problems of soil exhaustion may have driven a subsequent change in the pattern of settlement, towards the beginning of the ad 1500s. Agricultural shortfalls and consequent problems of food insecurity among large, sedentary populations, towards the end of a relatively dry period during the late ad 1600s and early 1700s, may explain the decline of nucleated settlements.

Famine, climate and crisis in Western Uganda

That human societies must adapt to crises arising from climate variability is self-evident. Yet the nature of that adaptation is often understood either within a geographically extensive framework or within the narrow confines of environmental determinism. Some of the contributors to Chronology, Migration and Drought in Interlacustrine Africa (Webster 1979a) utilise both approaches in linking references to drought and famine in oral histories from across the Interlacustrine region of inter-tropical Africa. The historian James McCann has recently criticised this volume for its “embarrassingly uncritical use of oral sources

Chemical Analysis of Ancient African Glass Beads: A Very Preliminary Report

We report the preliminary results of chemical analysis by laser ablation-inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry of 156 glass beads from sites in southern Africa. Almost all of these beads can be grouped in two chemical types based on oxide compositions and glass recipes. Glasses of these types were manufactured in south and/or southeast Asia. These are the first results of a project that will analyse about 1000 beads from African archaeological sites.

CHEMICAL ANALYSIS OF GLASS BEADS FROM MADAGASCAR

Chemical analysis of 31 glass beads from the sites of Mahilaka and Sandrakatsy in Madagascar, which date to approximately the 9 th to 15 th centuries CE, reveals the presence of two main types of glass: mineral- soda glasses and plant-ash glasses. Most of these glasses were probably made in South Asia.

Prehistory in the Upper Nile Basin

The results of recent archaeological research in the Upper Nile basin are summarized and placed within the context of the anthropological-historical debate concerning the origins of the Nuer, Dinka and Atuot as distinct ethnic groupings. The archaeological evidence demonstrates a considerable antiquity for cattle-keeping in the region, the existence of what appears to be a very widespread cultural tradition in the late first millennium a.d. characterized by a distinctive form of burial, and a hiatus in settlement in the area east of Rumbek early in the present millennium, possibly around the time when humped cattle were introduced further north. The implications of these data for the explanation of the origins of the Luo migrations are discussed.

Zanzibar and Indian Ocean trade in the first millennium CE: the glass bead evidence

Recent archaeological excavations at the seventh- to tenth-century CE sites of Unguja Ukuu and Fukuchani on Zanzibar Island have produced large numbers of glass beads that shed new light on the island’s early interactions with the wider Indian Ocean world. A selected sample of the beads recovered was analyzed by laser ablation-inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS) to determine the origins of the glass used to make the beads and potential trade relationships are considered. The data show that two major glass types can be identified: mineral-soda glass, m-Na-Al, produced in Sri Lanka (and possibly South India) and plant ash soda glass. The latter comprises three subtypes: two with low alumina concentrations and different quantities of lime (here designated v-Na-Ca subtypes A and B) and one with high alumina (designated v-Na-Al). The v-Na-Ca subtype A beads are chemically similar to Sasanian type 1 glass as well as Zhizo beads found in southern Africa, while v-Na-Ca subtype B compares reasonably well with glasses from Syria and the Levant. While the mineral-soda beads were made in South Asia, it appears likely that at least some of the plant ash beads were made in South or Southeast Asia from imported raw and/or scrap Middle Eastern glass. In contrast, during this period, all beads imported into southern Africa were made of Middle Eastern glass from east of the Euphrates (v-Na-Ca subtype A) and appear to have arrived on ships from Oman and the Persian Gulf. These data suggest that the two sections of the African coast were engaged in different Indian Ocean trade circuits.

The last 200,000 years (or thereabouts) in Eastern Africa: Recent archaeological research

Research in Eastern Africa is hampered by a variety of logistical constraints common in underdeveloped and politically fragmented regions. The later Middle and early Upper Pleistocene are attracting attention in the debate over the origins of anatomically modern humans. There has also been considerable field research and discussion of the development of specialized pastoralism. Archaeology, history and several other disciplines have combined to study the development of social complexity in the Great Lakes region and along the Swahili coast, the Aksumite civilization and African agricultural systems. Finally, the rise of a cadre of indigenous archaeologists is fostering debate over what constitutes explanation and over the relevance of the discipline within Africa.

African Historical Archaeology(ies): Past, Present and A Possible Future

Assembled in this volume, African Historical Archaeologies , are an exciting set of papers that encompas s a remarkably wide range of topics , methods, periods and regions of the African past. From the symbolism of decorated monoliths in Nigeria (Ray, Chapter 7) to indigenous recollections of war with a colonial government in South Africa (van Schalkwyk and Smith , Chapter 12), from the origins of the African diaspora (Kelly , Chapter 8) to Swahili history on Pemba Island (Laviolette, Chapter 5), from faunal analysis in Botswana (Reid, Chapter 11) to landscape archaeology in Kenya (Helm, Chapter 3), and from the second millennium BC in Nubia (Edwards, Chapter 2) to the moment of colonial encounter in Tanzania (Fleisher, Chapter 4), Zimbabwe (Pikirayi, Chapter 9) and southern Africa (Lane, Chapter 10), and from the city of Gao in Mali (Insoll, Chapter 6) to the South African industrial revolution at the close of the nineteenth century (Behrens, Chapter 13), there is something in this volume for all tastes . While the reader can pick and choose favourites, all the while revelling in the marvellous diversity of cultural and historical expression that exists in sub-Saharan Africa, it seems reasonable to ponder the nature of the beast that is African historical archaeology, albeit transformed by a plural ending.

Petrographic and Physico-Chemical Studies of Early Pottery From South-Western Kenya

Abstract The research of Dr. Robertshaw, the Institutes Assistant Director, on pre-Iron-Age sites and their pottery in the Loita-Mara region has already figured in Azania. In 1983 the fortunate presence in Nairobi of Jean Langdon (who has been working with the National Museums of Canada in Ottawa) led to the collaborative analytical work described here on locating sources of potting clay and by extension the provenances of archaeological pots. Although the main conclusions are not surprising, in that they confirm our expectations of local rather than distant places of manufacture, it is instructive nevertheless to see both the methods and the conclusions demonstrated. The interest of the article therefore will not be confined to this one region of Kenya. Moreover, for students of the pottery sequence of the high East African grasslands, especially enlightening is the observation about the role of mica temper in the ‘plain’ Elmenteitan pottery, being in effect a decorative device appreciated by its makers...

Archaeology in Eastern Africa: Recent Developments and More Dates

Obsidian hydration dating has been successfully applied to East African archaeological sites. Chemical sourcing of obsidian artefacts has documented long-distance movement of obsidian from the Central Rift valley. A date in the ninth or eighth century b.c. has been obtained for iron objects in the Er Renk District of the Southern Sudan. Tentative culture-historical sequences are available from excavations around the Sudd and in the Lake Besaka region of Ethiopia. Archaeological research has begun in the interior of Somalia. In northern Kenya, claims that Namoratunga II is an archaeo-astronomical site have been challenged. Excavations at Mumba-Hohle and Nasera have shed new light on the transition from the Middle to Later Stone Age in northern Tanzania perhaps 20,000 to 30,000 years ago. Knowledge of the Elmenteitan Tradition has been considerably advanced by excavations in south-western Kenya. Iron-smelting furnaces with finger-decorated bricks have been discovered in south-eastern Kenya, though not yet dated. New dates falling in the last few centuries have caused first millennium a.d. dates obtained previously for Engaruka to be rejected. Excavations at several sites on the East African coast indicate that the beginnings of coastal occupation from the Lamu archipelago to Mozambique fall in the ninth century a.d. In Malawi the Shire Highlands seem to have been settled around the tenth century a.d. Investigations of large smelting-furnaces in central Malawi indicate that they were used as concentrators of poor-quality iron ore. Excavations in rock-shelters on the southern edge of the Copperbelt have produced a culture-historical sequence spanning the last 18,000 years. The western stream of the Early Iron Age was established in the Upper Zambezi valley by about the mid fifth century a.d.