658 TRANSACTIONS OP SECTION H., 



was the stream of northern civilisation which penetrated Black Africa by way 

 of the Nile valley. But even this civilisation did not come with a steady flow ; 

 when Egypt prospered under the early Ptolemies Meroe prospered ; as Egypt 

 decayed Meroe fell into the wretched condition recorded by Nero's officers ; and 

 even before this Candace could assert that neither the name nor condition of 

 Ceesar was known to her. ( 24, Bk. xvii. chap. 1.) As northern influence lessened, 

 and the power of Meroe decayed, the black element would preponderate more 

 and more, so that the travellers who visited Ethiopia told a story of barbarism 

 and utter stagnation. The mode of life of the Ethiopians was wretched, they 

 were for the most part naked wanderers, moving from place to place with their 

 flocks. Even in the cities along the river banks the houses were as often made 

 of wattle and wood as of bricks. Although they had grain from which they 

 prepared beer, they had no fruits or oil, using butter and fat instead, and lived 

 upon roots and the flesh and blood of animals; milk and cheese. (24, Bk. xvii. 

 chap. 2.) Beyond the immediate neighbourhood of the river was a region of 

 savagery, with inhabitants for the most part known by mere nicknames, root- 

 eaters, fish-eaters and so forth. But even in the earlier and better days of Meroe 

 there is evidence that suggests the presence of much black blood in the royal 

 family. In a stele from Napata, now in the Louvre, the mother, wife and sister 

 of King Aspelut (about 825 B.C.) are represented as distinctly steatopygous, 

 while the representations of Queen Amen-Tarit at Meroe some three centuries 

 later are frankly Negroid. Moreover, even while a king exerted real authority 

 at Meroe it would be entirely consonant v/ith African politics and African 

 customs for vassal ' kingdoms ' to arise at the extremes of the state. So, when 

 it is recorded on the authority of Eratosthenes, that in the third century B.C. 

 the Sembritffi who occupied an island south of Meroe were ruled by a ' queen ' 

 but recognised the suzerainty of Meroe (24, Bk. xvii. chap. 1), we may think of 

 the petty chieftains of the eighteenth century who were the true rulers of the 

 country from Dongola to Sennar, though every sultan of Sennar claimed sovereign 

 rights. There may have been many such ' states ' ruled by women, just as at 

 the present day in the Nuba hills the highest authority passes in the female 

 line, and may be exerted by a woman. 



Meroe seems to have been destroyed before the introduction of Christianity. 

 Nevertheless, two if not three culture phases can be traced in its history. There 

 was first a period of Egyptian influence under King Aspelut and his successors, 

 then came an influx of Greek ideas, a phase which Professor Garstang would 

 date from about the third century B.C. This is the period to which most of the 

 monuments now visible belong, and it was succeeded by the period of Roman 

 dominance. At Soba, on the Blue Nile a few miles above Khartum, Lepsius 

 collected the cartouches of a number of kings and queens of Meroe ; this site, 

 the capital of the Christian kingdom of 'Alwah, was certainly inhabited through 

 inediteval times, and may not have been fully deserted till three or four hundred 

 years ago. No doubt northern influence diminished progressively, especfally 

 after the conquest of Egypt by the Arabs, when the rivalry between 

 Christianity and Islam which culminated in the Crusades must have had the 

 effect of closing Upper Nubia and the countries beyond to Mediterranean in- 

 fluence. Nevertheless, trade objects continued to come through, though there 

 is nothing to show whether these travelled up the Nile or across the Eastern 

 Desert from the thriving Mohammedan trading ports which, as Crowfoot has 

 shown, were established there previous to the thirteenth century.^ (4, 542.) 



° There is a particular form of bead made of chalcedonic agate, numerous 

 examples of which have been dug up in the neighbourhood of Khartum. A 

 large niunber of similar beads are said to have been found in Somersetshire a 

 few years ago, but archseologists tell me that there is no sufficient warrant for 

 their origin. But a chain of these beads found at Erding in Upper Bavaria and 

 now in the Munich Museum (K. IV. 1924 in Room 2, Case 4) dates them, at least 

 approximately, to the early mediseval period, Merovingian or earlier. More- 

 over, three large chevron beads of the usual type were said to have been removed 

 from the body of an ' Arab ' who fell at Omdurman, and I see no reason to 

 doubt the truth of the statement. What I have said concerning the Ethiopia of 

 Strabo closely follows the argument set forth by Crowfoot in The Island of 

 Meroe, published by the Egypt Exploration Fund. 



