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Ecological Perspectives on Mande Population Movements, Commercial Networks, and Settlement Patterns from the Atlantic Wet Phase (ca. 5500-2500 B.C.) to the Present*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 May 2014

George E. Brooks
George E. Brooks*
Affiliation:
Indiana University
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Extract

In this paper I discuss known and probable migrations and areas of settlement of proto-Mande and Mande-speaking groups during eight climate periods spanning the past eight millennia. Recent scholarship concerning west African climate patterns in past times has made feasible provisional periodizations of west African history that are independent of European-derived chronologies. Concomitantly, these historical periodizations offer provocative insights regarding such long-term processes as human migrations and settlement patterns; the diffusion of cultigens and domestic animals; the development of long- distance trade routes; and the use of horse cavalry in warfare.

The provisional historical schema comprising eight climate periods and Map 1 depicting ecological zones are principally derived from the pioneering studies of Sharon E. Nicholson and of Susan and Roderick McIntosh, and from the analyses I have presented elsewhere: (1) The Atlantic Wet Phase which extended from ca. 5500 to ca. 2500 B.C., was succeeded by (2) a two-and-a-half millennia-long period of desiccation. (3) There was a six centuries-long transiton period between ca. 300 B.C. and ca. 300 A.D., during the latter part of which ecological conditions improved sufficiently to permit the development of intra- and trans- Saharan commerce. (4) Four centuries of moderate rainfall ca. 300-ca. 700, and (5) four centuries of abundant rainfall ca. 700-ca. 1100, were followed by (6) a four centuries long dry period extending from ca. 1100 to ca. 1500. (7) A brief wet period, ca. 1500-ca. 1630, preceded (8) a two centuries-long dry period lasting until ca. 1860.

Type
Research Article
Information
History in Africa , Volume 16 , 1989 , pp. 23 - 40
Copyright
Copyright © African Studies Association 1989

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Footnotes

*

An earlier version of this paper was presented at the African Studies Association meeting convened in Denver, 20-22 November 1987. I am indebted to C. S. Bird, M. G. Kendall, and P. R. McNaughton for many informative discussions over the years. E. C. Rivron contributed to numerous improvements in analysis and presentation.

References

NOTES

1. Nicholson, Sharon E., “The Methodology of Historical Climate Reconstruction and its Application to Africa,” JAH, 20, 1 (1979), 31–49CrossRefGoogle Scholar; McIntosh, Susan Keech and McIntosh, Roderick J., “West African Prehistory,” American Scientist, 69, (1981), 602–13Google Scholar; Brooks, George E., Western Africa to ca. 1860 A.D.: A Provisional Historical Schema Based on Climate Periods (Bloomington, 1985)Google Scholar; idem., “A Provisional Historical Schema for Western Africa Based on Seven Climate Periods (ca. 9000 B.C. to the 19th Century),” Cahiers d'Etudes Africaines, 101-02 (1986), 43–62.

2. Greenberg, Joseph C., The Languages of Africa (Bloomington, 1963)Google Scholar; Bird, Charles S., “The Development of Mandekan (Manding); A Study of the Role of Extra-Linguistic Factors in Linguistic Change” in Dalby, David, ed., Language and History in Africa (New York, 1970), 146–59Google Scholar; idem., The Dialects of Mandekan (Bloomington, 1982).

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18. Ibid., 154-55.

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