AFRICAN KINGDOM, MEROE, ONE OF THE FIRST TO HAVE ELECTIONS

Quote:
"One of the peculiar features of the Meroitic political system was the choice of a new sovereign by election. Classical authors from Herodotus, fifth century BCE, and Diodorus of Sicily, first century BCE express their surprise about this usage, so different from the other ancient kingdoms." from General History of Africa: Abridged Edition  Vol. II page 172

http://www.dignubia.org/maps/timeline/bce-0330c.htm

Background:
Meroe seems to have been a flourishing town at least as early as the eighth century BC. It was situated at the junction of several main river and caravan routes, connecting central Africa, via the Blue and White Niles, with Egypt, and the Upper Nile region itself with Kordofan, the Red Sea and the Ethiopian highlands. Since it lay within the rainbelt, the land about it was seasonally more productive than the region of Napata, and it was thus a somewhat more pleasant place to live. By the third century BC it was only one of several large towns that had arisen in the same region. Bounded to the west by the Nile, the north by the River Atbara and to the south by the Blue Nile, this area, now known as the Butana, was the heartland of the later Kushite kingdom, and came to be known in classical literature as 'the Island of Meroe.' From Nubia Museum http://www.numibia.net/nubia/meroe.htm

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GABBY DOUGLASS - FIRST PLACE AT OLYMPICS TRIAL

Gabby Douglas website:  http://gabrielledouglas.com/

From:

http://espn.go.com/olympics/gymnastics/story/_/id/8121407/2012-olympic-games-gabby-douglas-clinches-gymnastics-spot

Long called an underdog, Gabby Douglas likes her new label a whole lot more.

Olympian.

The 16-year-old with the spectacular uneven bars routine and personality to spare beat Jordyn Wieber for the first time Sunday night, winning the Olympic trials and the lone guaranteed spot for the London Games.

"Everyone was telling me you have this great potential and you can be on top," Douglas said. "I didn't believe that, but everyone was just telling me to believe in myself. I did and I'm kind of up on top and it's amazing."

QUAKERS FIRST WHITES TO TAKE A STAND AGAINST SLAVERY

From Swarthmore and Haverford College library: Quakers & Slavery

http://trilogy.brynmawr.edu/speccoll/quakersandslavery/

"The Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) was the first corporate body in Britain and North America to fully condemn slavery as both ethically and religiously wrong in all circumstances. It is in Quaker records that we have some of the earliest manifestations of anti-slavery sentiment, dating from the 1600s. After the 1750s, Quakers actively engaged in attempting to sway public opinion in Britain and America against the slave trade and slavery in general. At the same time, Quakers became actively involved in the economic, educational and political well being of the formerly enslaved.

The earliest anti-slavery organizations in America and Britain consisted primarily of members of the Society of Friends. Thus much of the record of the development of anti-slavery thought and actions is embedded in Quaker-produced records and documents. Friends Historical Library at Swarthmore College and the Quaker Collection at Haverford College are jointly the custodians of Quaker meeting records of the Mid-Atlantic region, including Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, New York and Vermont and these records illuminate the origins of the anti-slavery movement as well as the continued Quaker involvement, often behind the scenes, in the leadership and direction of the abolitionist movement from the 1770s to the abolition of slavery in the United States in 1865, and beyond."

Black Heritage Now--President Obama

From the New Your Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/29/us/health-care-ruling-may-secure-obamas-place-in-history.html?_r=1&hp

"For Barack Obama, who staked his presidency on a once-in-a-generation reshaping of the social welfare system, theSupreme Court’s health care ruling is not just political vindication. It is a personal reprieve, leaving intact his hopes of joining the ranks of Franklin D. Roosevelt, Lyndon B. Johnson and Ronald Reagan as presidents who fundamentally altered the course of the country."

INVENTION OF WRITING AND ITS IMPORTANCE TODAY

THOTH - EGYPTIAN GOD OF WISDOM AND WRITING 

We rarely think about the fact that writing is a powerful tool; therefore, we take writing for granted. Reams of Black heritage have been lost because records have been destroyed, or accomplishments weren't ascribed to the right people, or the history was not written down. Although we are constantly writing texts or things for work, we seldom write down what is truly important. We rarely write about what we create. We don't write down our thoughts about life, philosophy, or our hopes and dreams.  We don't write our autobiographies. In short, we leave nothing for posterity. Please do not take the gift of writing for granted.

Videos about Origin of Writing in Africa:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUGc2W06rgo Origin of writing in Africa part 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bpsIFT4uJo Origin of writing in Africa part 2


More traditional explanation of the origin of writing.

There is not a unique origin of writing; it was independently born in different parts of the world. It seems the first people who wrote were the Sumerians and the Egyptians around 3500-3200 BC. It is not clear which of those two peoples invented writing first, although it seems the Egyptian writing had some Sumerian influence and not vice versa. They were peoples who had known agriculture for some millennia and who felt the need for a system of notation for agricultural products. Usually, sovereigns imposed taxes on their own subjects as agricultural products. They used these resources in order to pay for the construction of palaces and temples, to maintain the army, the court officials, the court, etc. Also in the trade exchanges people felt the need to be allowed to annotate goods. The same is valid for the offers which were brought to the temples. The invention of writing closely followed many other innovations typical of the Neolithic age, such as the construction of cities, the use of bronze, the invention of the wheel, the potter's wheel and the loom for weaving. In this period, agriculture and breeding spread and it was always more important to be able to indicate goods and persons in account documents and in commercial transactions. FROM http://www.funsci.com/fun3_en/writing/writing.htm

FIRST SLAVE REVOLT IN COLONIES

There are many kinds of revolt. One lesson we can take from American slave revolts is that no matter how dire the situation and no matter how high the cost, freedom is worth fighting for. On September 13, 1663, the first recorded major conspiracy of persons in servitude in colonial America occurred in Gloucester County, Virginia. White and Black slaves tried to escape from their masters. However, the plot was betrayed.

The other lesson: WHEN YOU ARE TRYING TO SECURE FREEDOM, TRUST WITH SUSPICION!


A Wikipedia history of slave revolts:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slave_rebellion

A PBS timeline of slave revolts and a movie about Nat Turner:
http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/natturner/slave_rebellions.html

From a pdf. essay on slave revolts by Dr. Sujan Dass at www.TwoHorizonsPress:
http://supremedesignonline.com/2012/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/blackrebellionexcerpts.pdf

"A cursory glance of our traditional history curriculum suggests that slave revolts, like the one led by Nat Turner, were few and far in between. Further, the uprisings themselves are typically thought of as disorganized clashes between angry slaves and local whites in the South. Instead, the historical record reveals that uprisings, and revolt plots were common and widespread, that it was often free Blacks and those enslaved under the least repressive conditions that led insurrections, that these insurrections were often highly organized and required months of planning and thousands of committed participants, and that enslaved Africans and their descendants rebelled against captivity from its very onset." 

KARMAH AND KUSH

"Before the late 1970's scholars saw Karmah and Kush as little more than Egyptian colonial outposts. Racists beliefs that Black Africans were incapable of establishing advanced cultures and civilizations contributed to the misconception. Modern archaeologists have restored Karmah and Kush to their proper places among great cultures in world history. Although they borrowed from Egyptian culture, they were indigenous Black African societies  comparable to Egypt in importance, power, material wealth, and cultural development. The civilizations of Karmah and Kush occupied the Nile Valley between present-day Khartoum (in Sudan) and Aswan (in Egypt)."

from Africana: The Concise Desk Reference