Ancient African Religions

A History

Inbunden, Engelska, 2024

AvRobert M. Baum

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Scholars have sometimes maintained that the study of the history of African religions is an impossible endeavor. Some have contended that African religions do not have a history unto themselves, apart from their interaction with the newer religious traditions of Islam and Christianity. Others concede that such a history exists, but believe the source materials are insufficient to reconstruct such a history. This book speaks directly to these critics. The history of African religions becomes in many ways like a pentathlon, expecting the scholar who conducts such research to work with written texts, to learn African languages, to live within a community where these religious traditions are practiced, to study material culture, both sacred and mundane, and a variety of archaeological sources from tree rings to stone circles and gravesites. By relying on the existing corpus of written texts, oral traditions, linguistic analyses, descriptions based on participant observation, and various types of archaeology, Robert M. Baum demonstrates that African religious history is nearly as old as humanity itself. Baum has spent his entire academic career focused on the historical study of African religious traditions, as far back as accessible sources will permit. This volume traces the history of African religions beginning with early hominids and their ritual and burial sites through ancient Egypt, North and Northeast Africa, and Africa south of the Sahara from the Fourth Millennium BCE to the birth of Islam in the Seventh Century.

Produktinformation

Utgivningsdatum2024-12-23
Mått156 x 235 x 23 mm
Vikt576 g
FormatInbunden
SpråkEngelska
Antal sidor314
FörlagOUP USA
ISBN9780197747070

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Robert M. Baum chairs the Department of African and African American Studies and is a professor in that department and the Department of Religion at Dartmouth College. He is the author of two other books, the award-winning Shrines of the Slave Trade: Diola Religon and Society in Precolonial Senegambia and West Africa's Women of God: Alinesitoue and the Diola Prophetic Tradition. He served as Executive Editor of the Journal of Religion in Africa for six years.

Chapter 1: Introduction Chapter 2: Before Adam and Eve: African Religions from the Dawn of Humanity to the Neolithic Revolution Chapter 3: A Religious History of Ancient Egypt: From Unification to the Reforms of Akhenaten1 Chapter 4: Not out of Egypt: Africa from 3200 to 1200 bce Chapter 5: Egypt and the Nile Valley before the Roman Occupation Chapter 6: Beyond the Nile Basin: African Religious History from 1300 bce to the Dawn of the Common Era Chapter 7: Egyptian Religious Traditions under Foreign Domination: From the Roman Conquest to the Arab Conquest Chapter 8: North and Northeast Africa in the Age of Roman and Byzantine Domination: From the First Century bce to the Lesser Hijra Chapter 9: The Sahara and the South: African Religious History from the Beginnings of the Common Era to the First Hijra Chapter 10: Conclusion

This ambitious, continent-wide investigation into African religious history from the beginning of time is written in an accessible and engaging manner and can be enjoyed by the novice and expert alike. Baum's dataset and methodology are remarkable. He draws on a treasure-trove of sources-archaeological, linguistic, and oral, tree rings, grave sites, rock art, rituals--to put to rest cynical views about the persistence of indigenous African religions following the institution of 'a hegemonic Christian tradition.' Ancient African Religions is the first of its kind.