Their Negro-ness could not be explained away nor, in most cases, their African cultural origin. Some believe that Blacks were already in America and have more Native American ancestry than African. [22], In 1981, They Came Before Columbus received the "Clarence L. Holte Literary Prize". These Black Indians, now mistaken as African Americans, were shipped back to America and classified as African Slaves. This part of our history is what the school systems fail to mention in history programs. The professor also catalogs cultural evidence in a Negroid skeleton found in the Virgin Islands dating back to 1250 A.D. and the finding of African cotton in the Americas. Van Sertima answers that Africans were indeed sailors, that a division of Negro sea captains and mariners is reported to have been in the Egyptian navy of the 19th dynasty and the East Africans sailed between their countries and China in the 13th century. The two likely were not even alive at the same time period. If there were an African presence in the Americas, he asked, "why do we not find more African stylistic artifacts?". [16], Van Sertima argues that African contact likely happened more than once. Maize has African origins. There is far more to Black history than the slave trade alright. Anthropologists, archaeologists, historians and linguists alike have debunked much of the evidence that Menzies used to support his notion, which has come to be called the 1421 theory. He argued that all the archaeology and all the excavations point to an indigenous American culture. ", Van Sertima said he didn't travel much to research the book. The author gives pictures of examples of negroid statues in pre-Columbian America, often with black people in comparison. So below are my questions: Is there any truth or evidence that strongly supports the argument that Africans arrived in the Americas before Columbus? I may hear about anything from the cultural revolution, to ancient Chinese dynasties, to Genghis Kan. After divorcing his first wife, Sertima remarried in 1984, to Jacqueline L. Patten, who had two daughters. Highlighted Ogham found on the Isle of Man - Credit: ViewTeam (Author provided) I am not suggesting that no African people were in the Americas before Columbus. History, as taught in the Western and Western-dominated world, gives the impression that the first Africans to reach the Americas were brought as slaves, in shackles on slaves-ships. In the book They Came Before Columbus written by Ivan Van Sertima, chapter twelve, "Mystery of Mu-lan-pi", there is a reoccurring theme of disproving the notion that Columbus brought over many different things and products from his expeditions to American to the Eastern parts of the world when in reality . Moreover, how would he have known? Unfortunately, the scholarship that he has inspired has tended to be of a worse quality than Van Sertimas was. They noted that no "genuine African artifact had been found in a controlled archaeological excavation in the New World." He was a . However, Afrocentrists then make the claim that the natives of Mesoamerica regarded them as gods, and so they sculpted these statues in order to honor them (sounds like Ancient Aliens, to me). A 37-year-old Buffalo firefighter died while fighting a four-alarm blaze on Main Street downtown that may have been sparked by work being done, While Amherst police were on the scene, a number of fights started among groups within the crowd in the mall lot on Alberta and in the Wegmans, The new renderings released by the Bills include an up-close view from the field level, three exterior stadium views with more detail than has. The mapmaker, Martin Waldseemller, named the New World "America," after the Italian Amerigo Vespucci, who had explored the coastline of South America and was the first to realize that it was a . In a Medaille College debate moderated by Jesse E. Nash Jr., a Canisius College professor, Barbour and Van Sertima squared off over a theory that has found its way into American classrooms through adoption of "multicultural" materials and curricula. In They Came Before Columbus,we see clearly the unmistakable face and handprint of black Africans in pre-Columbian America, and their overwhelming impact on the civilizations they encountered. Columbus was quoted before as noting that the natives sometimes painted themselves black, so for all we know the black people being referred to were people who were painted black as opposed to black skinned people. The spears, he claimed, were identical to weapons from African Guinea. Laster that year he returned to this country to teach at Rutgers. Van Sertimas research points to the Negroid features of giant stone heads in Mexico, our of which have been radiocarbon dated at 814 B.C. [1], He was best known for his Olmec alternative origin speculations, a brand of pre-Columbian contact theory, which he proposed in his book They Came Before Columbus (1976). [5] They further noted that in the 1980s, Van Sertima had changed his timeline of African influence, suggesting that Africans made their way to the New World in the 10th century B.C., to account for more recent independent scholarship in the dating of Olmec culture. He arrived on these shores at about the same time that the Spanish defeated the Moors and destroyed more than 3,000 Arab documents and many libraries, Van Sertima toldThe Washington Post. All Rights Reserved. "They couldn't be slave blacks," he said. Ivan Van Sertima's They Came Before Columbus is the first monographic treatment of this problem since Leo Wiener's Africa and the Discovery ofAmerica (3 vols., Philadelphia, 1920-1922), although M. D. W. Jeffreys has littered the intervening fifty years with articles on various aspects of it, often drawing heated responses Critics in anthropology and archaeology have stated that They Came Before Columbus portrays Native Mesoamerican peoples as inferior and incapable of developing highly sophisticated civilizations, cultures, and technologies without the influence of Africans arriving by boat as gods in their eyes, as Van Sertima puts it. Zinn perpetuates Koning's smears. Genome-wide ancestry estimates of African Americans show average proportions of73.2% African, 24.0% European, and 0.8% Native American ancestry, according to The Genetic Ancestry of African Americans, Latinos, and European Americans across the United States study published by U.S. National Library of MedicineNational Institutes of Health. "Human beings in any population have a great deal of variation," pointed out Barbour, whose methodical approach contrasted sharply with Van Sertima's more theatrical arguments. These people essentially provide written testimonies that support Van Sertimas thesis. The journal required that reprints must include the entire article and would have had to include the original authors' response (written but not published) to his response. Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email. Several words are also similar with similar meanings such as nama-tigi or ama-tigi from the Bambara of the Mandingos and aman-teca from the Nahuatl of Mexico, both of which refer to master or chief or headman. Van Sertima presents an argument for the transformation of the word banana with African origins. Ancient Egypt is regarded as one of the greatest earliest civilizations that has captured the attention and imagination of historians and laypeople alike for years. It has come to my attention that Van Sertimas (1972) bookThey Came Before Columbus: The African Presence in Ancient America (TCBC)will soon be used in certain syllabi. So, Van Sertima had his conclusion in mind first, and looked for evidence for itmeaning he was telling just-so stories. In this book, the author presents evidence and arguments for the existence of black Africans in America before the arrival of Columbus and the beginning of the Atlantic Slave Trade in 1492. 6 Pages. She also planned to publish a book of his poetry.[25]. White ppll pulled up to America and realize the whole country was filled with black ppl. Review of They Came Before Columbus by Dr. Ivan Van Sertima, Their Eyes were upon me: Learning of Nephilim, They Came Before Columbus: The African Presence in Ancient America, Review of the Undoing Project by Michael Lewis, Thoughts on the Undoing Project by Michael Lewis-Part 2, Follow Gazing off into Space on WordPress.com. Note how these claims are eerily similar to claims of white gods that, for example, the Aztecs and Maya speak of. {{start_at_rate}} {{format_dollars}} {{start_price}} {{format_cents}} {{term}}, {{promotional_format_dollars}}{{promotional_price}}{{promotional_format_cents}} {{term}}, Sabres place Alex Tuch on injured reserve; top-line winger's status is uncertain, Paula's Donuts to move Clarence store that faced backlash for tax breaks to Amherst, Nebraska cheerleader competes by herself at state competition, but crowd doesn't let her feel alone, Chad Hall's departure from Buffalo Bills to Jaguars remains a bit of a mystery. I found an audio version of this book on YouTube. Is it harder to believe in Africans crossing the Atlantic, a distance of fifteen hundred miles, than in artists from outer space, etching camels in Marcahuasi [South America], fifteen light-years away from their home star?. Change), You are commenting using your Facebook account. In this book, Ivan Van Sertima explores his theory that Africans made landfall and had significant influence on the native peoples of Mesoamerica, primarily the Olmec civilization. These discs were placed above entrances of inner chambers of temples in Egypt and above temple door lintels in pre-Columbian America. The others are unidentified. "[20][n 2], In 1981 Dean R. Snow, a professor of anthropology, wrote that Van Sertima "uses the now familiar technique of stringing together bits of carefully selected evidence, each surgically removed from the context that would give it a rational explanation". In his book, "They Came Before Columbus," Van Sertima, a Rutgers professor, says that African influences can be found in an array of cultural similarities between Africa and the ancient Americas - pyramid construction, the use of boat litters, the parasol, the plumed serpent motif, bronze-casting techniques. Mansa Musa never sailed to America. Both men supported their artistic theories with slides of the sculptures and modern Africans and Middle American Indians -- leaving the audience to decide for themselves between truth and the appearance of truth. For example, Van Sertimas claims that the Olmec heads are Negroid due to the broad flat noses runs into a major problem: nose shape is dictated by climate; the climate of Mesoamerica and Africa is similar; the function of nose shape is to moisten air before it goes into the lungs; therefore, since climate is dictated by nose shape and the climate of Mesoamerica and Africa is similar, then they have similar-shaped noses due to the climate they lived in. Normativity has been distinguished between, If you have any suggestions for future posts, criticisms or praises for me, email me at RaceRealist88@gmail.com. It was with the coming of Columbus that the twilight of the red and black races began. [5] Instead, Van Sertima replied to his critics in "his" journal volume published as Early America Revisited (1998). Also, some other West African countries had been known to both fish by boat and sail. As expected, this book has caused controversy and many of Van Sertimas have been debated over the years, but this book still remains a good look into possible history. Columbus actually said in the journal of his second voyage when he was in Haiti, then known as Espanola, Native Americans came to him and told him that Black people had come in large boats from the south and southeast trading in gold-tipped metal spears. He never returned, though some (including Van Sertima) argued that he arrived in the Americas. No, since they are only telling just-so stories. It provides further evidence that all great civilizations and races are heavily indebted to one another and that no race has a monopoly on enterprise and inventive genius. Van Sertima uses written, archaeological, and cultural evidence to support his thesis. Recently, I've been handed a book called "They Came before Columbus" by Ivan Sertima, which asserts that Africans had discovered and traded with the native people of the Americas long before Columbus arrived. Van Sertima believed that Mali seafarers sailed across the Atlantic and landed in Mesoamerica. Mike Harrington: His team looks good, even without Alex Tuch. When evidence came out refuting Van Sertimas storytelling, he concocted an ad hoc hypothesis to save his hypothesis from immunization. Sidenote: I enjoyed the story of Mali in Chapter 3. He later discusses carved pipes found in Mesoamerican archaeological sites, suggesting that the use of pipes for smoking must have been an inherited practice from African or Asian visitors. [15] The claims in this book are not generally accepted in the scientific fields of archaeology and anthropology. Phil Valentine is even more confused. There are Egyptian-like pyramids in the Americas and mummified persons similar to those in Egypt. But early African contact, by free peoples, is being viewed in school curriculum development as a source of pride for a large segment of the modern school population, to counter what Van Sertima termed "disrespect for the Africans" who had built early civilizations and empires in their own homelands long before European contact. They also claim slave ships are a myth. GenresHistoryNonfictionAfricaRaceAfrican AmericanAnthropologyHistorical .more 284 pages, Paperback First published January 1, 1976 Book details & editions No, these grown adults SERIOUSLY believe that there were Indians(that look like modern-day B Americans) that were here before Native Americans. Van Sertimas main evidence for his claims regarding a pre-Colombian contact between ancient Africans (Nubians) and Olmecs rests on the supposed similarities between Negroid facial features and the colossal Olmec heads. I can only assume that Van Sertima is largely responsible for this line of thinking which was largely debunked then and is especially debunked today . One could do worse. The Book Review received about 70 letters, the most reader reaction it's had on an issue since the reviewer attacked Robert Frost several yeas ago. He researched the book at the British Museum, and in libraries at Princeton, London University and Douglas College, and the corresponded with scholars all over the world. Neither Columbus nor de Las Casas wrote anything about African spears. In doing so, he also attempts to combat the perceived inferiority of black Africans due to their perceived lack of technological or cultural advancements prior to colonialism in Africa. [5], Van Sertima completed his master's degree at Rutgers in 1977. here is no question but that the book is landmark." John A- Wi am. I was a friend of de Montellanos and many years ago we used to debunk Afrocentrists aka Afronuts on several forums (he posted as Quetzalcoatl on Egyptsearch), but he died I think in 2016. Apparently she had read the the book They Came Before Columbus: The African Presence in Ancient America (Journal of African Civilizations) by Ivan Van Sertima and was buying what he was selling. Despite this, there were however, agreed upon black kings of the 25th dynasty such as Taharqa. You have permission to edit this article. . What would the point of shipping Black Indians to Europe then to Africa and then back to America again be? (Van Sertima, 1972: xiv; They Came Before Colombus). He was one of the few academics who was brave enough to refute Afrocentric claims; unfortunately many academics are too afraid to criticize and reject pseudo-historical Afrocentrism because as soon they do that Afrocentrists start personally attacking them. 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