Despite suffering through slavery, oppression, mismanagement and
a host of other vices, Africa is a continent that has fought to remain strong,
admirable and formidable amidst suffering and oppression. One of such admirable
aspects of Africa is its achievement in significant areas of life and work that
many might not even be aware of. here are 4 great achievements of ancient Africans
most people don't know.
Mathematical Achievements
Many modern high-school level concepts in mathematics were first
developed in Africa. More than 35,000 years ago, Egyptians scripted textbooks
that included basic mathematical concepts like division and multiplication of
fractions and geometric formulas to calculate the area and volume of shapes.
The ancient Egyptians were the ones who considered a circle to be 360 degrees
and estimated pie at 3.16. They also calculated distances and angles, solved
algebraic equations and carried out mathematically based predictions on the
size of the floods of the Nile. In addition, eight thousand years ago, the
people in present-day Zaire developed their own numeration system, as did the
Yorubas in present-day Nigeria. The Yoruba numeration system was based on units
of 20 (instead of 10), and scholars have lauded this because it required an
impressive amount of abstract reasoning and subtraction to identify different
numbers.
Architecture and Engineering
Many ancient African societies built sophisticated environments.
The Egyptians pyramids are very good examples of the engineering feats of
ancient African societies. Later in the 12th century, in the far south, there
were hundreds of great and architecturally brilliant cities built in Mozambique
and Zimbabwe. Massive stone complexes were the hub of these cities, and one
even included a 250-meter-long, 15,000-ton curved granite wall. The cities had
huge castle-like compounds with numerous rooms for specific tasks like
iron-smithing. In the 13th century, the Mali empire was another African society
that boasted of impressive cities, including Timbuktu, with grand palaces,
mosques and universities.
Metallurgy and Tools
Some ancient African societies were responsible for a good
number of the advances in metallurgy and tool making. Advances in Tanzania,
Rwanda and Uganda between 1,500 and 2,000 years ago were believed to have
surpassed those of the Europeans, and were astonishing to the Europeans when
they learned of them. For example, Ancient Tanzanian furnaces could reach 1,800°C,
which was 200 to 400°C warmer than those of the Romans.
Astronomical Achievements
It is believed that several ancient African cultures birthed
discoveries in astronomy. Some of these discoveries are foundations on which
the field of astronomy still relies on for footing, while some others were so
advanced that their mode of discovery has still not been understood. Egyptians
were responsible for a good number of these discoveries and they charted the
movement of the sun, constellations and the cycles of the moon. They are
believed to have divided the year into 12 parts and developed a yearlong
calendar system containing 365 and a quarter days. They made their clocks with
moving water and used sundial-like clocks.
Additionally, the Dogon people of Mali also garnered a wealth of
detailed astronomical observations, with discoveries so advances that some
modern day scholars actually refuse to credit them with the discoveries. They
credit their discoveries instead to space aliens or unknown Europeans travelers.
The Dogon people are believed to have known about Saturn's rings, Jupiter's
moons, the spiral structure of the Milky Way and the orbit of the Sirius star
system. Hundreds of years ago, they plotted orbits in this system accurately
through the year 1990. They knew this system contained a primary star and a
secondary star (now called Sirius B) of immense density and not visible to the
naked eye.
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