I made 2 videos about Africa and that video gets A LOT of racist comments from people who think that Africa had nothing going on in this period, except people living in tents or caves. It's very nice to see a video which covers topics like this; one of the least taught periods of one of the least taught continents.
@Stratos I how much research have you actually done? I'm not asking this to insult you, i'm just genuinely curious. Because even a decent amount of research into pre-colonial african architecture reveals structures that cannot be labeled just simply as "large huts". Infact just simply googling "pre colonial African architecture" is enough to get these results. Not to mention that they didn't have the same architecture achievements and styles from 12000 years ago. Cause like with all places, techniques and aesthetic sensibilities changed over time. So honestly, how much research did you do? because everything you said was false.
It’s so hilarious to see people literally be ANGRY that “subsaharan” Africans had lives, civilization, travel, trade routes, and political intrigue before Europeans arrived.
Also people love to generalize when it comes to Africa. They speak of "sub-Saharan Africa" like it's a single homogeneous place. So-called sub-Saharan Africa has more genetic diversity than all of Europe and the Americas combined. There are over 1000 languages spoken, There are over 900 ethnic groups etc.. The Khoi San are very genetically and visually different from the Nillotes, who are genetically and visually different from the bantu, who are visually and genetically different from the pygmies, who are genetically and visually different from the Cushites etc. The average African you will see in South Sudan will look VERY different from the average African you will see in South Africa. Botswana is as far from Nigeria as Ireland is from Kazakhstan etc. Falling into generalizations for such a huge and diverse area is being very shallow.
I think it's funny that people need to identify with them. My ancestors were called Barbarians, vandals, savages... Probably why Germans wanted to identify with Aryans. I can see the same thing happening to black Americans. When you teach someone to be disenfranchised then provide them with.... something.
Exactly! I’ve noticed these new channels always make the same MISTAKE either willingly or unwillingly. For example, the Slave Trade associated with European colonials, they call it “Atlantic Slave Trade” which whitewashes any ethnicity or religion. However, when it comes to the Indian Slave Trade, they call either the Arab Slave Trade or the “Islamic Slave Trade” which emphasizes an ethnic or religion. This type of hypocrisy is why western historian and UA-camrs who don’t see it or refuse to it become a JOKE!
Are there good series like this made by youtubers from Africa? My youtube suggestions almost exclusively suggest European/American history channels. It would be interesting to watch this content from a different perspective.
The biggest challenge about presenting Africa to the world is overcoming the entrenched myth that Africans are a people. A simple monolithic block of people called Africans. Ha ha ha. No. We are the African peopleS. Emphasis on the S. Plural. The continent has more human diversity than the rest of the world combined. In terms of language culture skin colors etc etc. I am from Ghana and apart from skin tone I have nothing in common with say a Somali or Botswana or Ethiopian. The only famous person I have seen address this nuance and present the specific context of certain issues is the late Fidel Castro. Even though I don't like communism I give Mr Castro credit for correctly presenting the correct context and nuance of specific issues on the continent and not using the broad brush "Africans" approach that still pertains to this day. .
It is always amazing how so many use broad strokes for a continent of diverse people. Not just Africa which many do not understand just how HUGE it is is but Europe and Asia as well. I have friends who wear their wokeness on their sleeves but then conflate Asian cultures, umm no that is Chinese and that is Japanese. Africa has SOOOO many different cultures. I was reading of just the diversity say in Nigeria is staggering. I was referring to all peoples but took some heat when I said that one of the worst things of appropriation is when someone claims another culture as their own just because the skin color is similar. I think it was the BBC but they have this documentary on 5 ancient kingdoms in the Sub Sahara Africa. I thought it was really good because it is something you normally do not see and all of these were far from each other as well.
@@DevinMacGregor you have read wide.thank you. The cultural appropriation argument is an another silly example of the ignorance of wokeness. It would mean a Thai is prohibited from wearing a kimono. Or a Nigerian is prohibited from wearing kente which is native to southern Ghana. Or a Zimbabwean is prohibited from wearing the boubou which is native to Senegal. Its just silly and ignorant. They even forgot that under Wokeism then dark skinned people should not be wearing suits shirts or coats because those came from cultures elsewhere .
@@kwakuba9167 I love when it gets shifted to food such as I can not say if a food was good or not that did not come directly from my culture. Yet I live in a multicultural society. I am thinking, but food is not genetic. I have a work friend who we would go to lunch periodically and she completely bought into this such as I could not tell her if a burrito was good or not because I am white and she is Mexican even though I grew up in Southern California eating burritos, tacos etc. Not to mention a burrito is what we call Tex Mex and it has only been in the last several decades the bulk of Mexico even knows what one is. It was not a part of Mexican cuisine. It is like certain foods here that you find in Chinese restaurants did not come from China and are not a part of traditional Chinese cuisine. So then I asked her so how can you tell me what a good Sushi place is because last I checked you are not Japanese. She had nothing to say after that. She loves sushi bars btw. It is just silly. If you want to know how to make a schnitzel I will tell you and I will trust you and your taste buds. All of this comes out of a hyper sense of identity.
Good work. I've notice there is a trend of channels interested in African history or aspects of it, and so far it's a positive change to the usual imagery of poverty, starvation, and corruption that we are constantly fed about in regards to Africa.
Same here, history channels are starting to diverge from the euro-centric viewpoint (which is still my favorite area of history) and done videos on India, SE Asia, Africa, S. America, and the central Asian/Iranian area of influence that is just as rich. For example the Khazar Khaganate converted to Judaism....a nomadic horse archer culture actively embraced Judaism! Doesn't that just blow your mind! That and the Indo-European descendants living in the Gobi desert that were wiped out by the Medieval Chinese empire, (the Tar-somethings) history is full of amazing one-off irregularities like this and I love it! Like for example the Tai-Ping rebellion was started by a Chinese man claiming to be Jesus' brother which caused the deaths of up to 10million!!!
@@ericcloud1023I haven't heard of the indo Europeans in the Gobi, are you referring to the Tocharians. They were a group of indo Europeans in the Tarim basin, but they eventually assimilated into the ugygurs.
@@DeadGivaway alot of pre-colonial african history that non-academics have access too is either eurocentric or afrocentric. The others refusing to see any progress in africa for thousands of years, the others somehow attributing anything good in the world with africa somehow or treating it like some sort of paradise.
History is not simply what is told in class, but the culmination of millions of day to day choices made by billions of people throughout their lives. This video just goes to show that it is so much more complex then students are lead to believe
There has to be a desire for truth in order to know true history. The “primitive” narrative of Africa suits Europeans. Most of them would be mortified to know the real reason behind the renaissance. They need to read the “Memoirs of the Secret Services of John Mackey”, and study the history of the Moors in Europe. I think they’d die of heart attacks because it’s contrary to their beliefs. I know the creator tells us not to wish for his judgement day, because none of us really knows where we stand but it will be great to see the smiles wiped off these racist fools faces. Jeremiah 16:19 O Lord, my strength, and my fortress, and my refuge in the day of affliction, the Gentiles shall come unto thee from the ends of the earth, and shall say, Surely our fathers have inherited lies, vanity, and things wherein there is no profit. We are living through some very trying times, and only those with discernment can see scripture unfolding, and prophecy being fulfilled right before our very eyes. Black people remain proud that you were created in the image of the Creator and we have all seen the following: Ecclesiastes 10:7 I have seen servants upon horses, and princes walking as servants upon the earth.
@@jaijai5250 Loincloths, Spears, Absence of written-language system until contact with Islam, Shamanism, Albinism understood as a tribal curse even in the modern era, Sleeping Sickness, Ebola, HIV, Sickle Cell Anemia, Malaria........that's what you had and still have. THE APPROPRIATION OF NORTH AFRICAN HISTORY (Berbers, Arabs, Moors, Tuaregs) is about your biggest historical accomplishment. What is comical about these uploads is the all-too-patent desperation at trying to compensate for the glaring absence of any notable achievements when compared to Europe, China, India, Israel, The Golden Age of Islam. To be sure, the Golden Mongol Horde under Ghengis Khan was more interesting and important than the entire history of Sub-Saharan Africa combined. By the way, leave the Egyptian pyramids alone. TAKE A GOOD LOOK AT THE FEATURES OF EGYPTIANS TODAY: THATS WHAT THE PEOPLE WHO ACTUALLY CONSTRUCTED THEM LOOK LIKE. AND COME UP WITH SOMETHING THAT IS TRULY YOURS WITHOUT CITING THE SPIRITUAL MUSINGS OF A WANDERING SEMITIC PEOPLE WHO ACTUALLY DID GO ON TO CONTRIBUTE TO THE MODERN WORLD. CULTURAL ENVY IS ALL YOU WILL EVER HAVE.
I appreciate your work on this series, I'm going to watch them all! I never imagined I'd ever see unbiased content on African history on UA-cam, nor did I think it'd be suggested to me by the algorithm ... awesome
Nice video, though I think Benin Empire deserved a mention, if only for the fact that its capital, Benin was one of the largest cities of its time (worldwide) and a wonder of city planning, divided into self sufficient districts, with sewerage and street lights. The plan itself was based upon mathematical principles in a fractal-like divisions.
Never heard of Edo the capital city of the once empire of Benin. Thought, the Aztec capital city of Tenochtitlán (modern day Mexico city) was the wonder of the world back then.
@@ab9840 As someone whose parents come from Edo State and have Benin ancestry, I'm still really happy to see folks express interest in learning about our history!
@@512TheWolf512 you’d be surprised how many don’t know that there were civilizations outside of Egypt in Africa. A lot of people believe it was just a bunch of tribal mudhuts. Nothing complex
What a joke, Egypt Morocco etc are not really Africans they are Arabs. The Africans hadn't invented a written language, the wheel or a two story fucking Building what a joke.
No mention of the Asante Empire? Asante was the most powerful empire in West Africa during the 19th century. It was the only West African kingdom to defeat a major European power on more than one occasion. Asante fought the British for a century. You even had a depiction of an Asante soldier during your section on Oyo.
I feel like unfortunately an online discourse we never really give much credit or respect to actual African History either treat it as something unimportant or as one big tragedy with nothing good to it due to European interaction. I appreciate this video making a legitimate attempt to show what happened in a period and region which doesn't get the coverage it deserves
It’s like if we just cut out the 1600-1900 for Europeans and just say their history is 3BC-1400AD lotta goofy ass mfers. There’s a reason anywhere we touch down in big numbers whether it’s the slave trade in Americas or immigration to Europe sub Saharan Africans have a big impact on the culture especially the music we’re the oldest demographic of people on this planet and will likely be the last
It's half the european propaganda aspect of the "white mans burden" which heavily influenced this view, and also the idiotic discourss in america doesn't help the situation where even african americans argues that everything in Africa was purely black or darkskinned. The debate is so dumbed down it's like people put in their own personal views in history when in the end who gives a shit if north africans look different, so does south-africans, and eastern africans and western africans. They'd still all be africans is what people seem to ignore.
@Stratos I 1. Sumer was never an empire, the first empire was the Akkadian empire. 2. Yes, Sumer was located in the region that became Iraq, but that doesn't make their inhabitants Iraqis.
I really, really enjoy history in a very broad sense (broad meaning I am interested in a lot of different time periods in a lot of different places) and seeing videos on seemingly barely touched subjects like this is absolutely wonderful. I’m a pretty busy person so I love listening to documentary videos like this while I do other work or run errands, and so I don’t get to read as much as I’d like to so videos like this absolutely make my day when I find them. Really quenches my thirst for knowledge that’s seemingly very difficult to find and in a way I can easily manage while going about my busy schedule. Thank you!
" Yoruba dynasty" displaced the Portuguese in the East coast of Africa--NO NO NO! the proliferation of this "internet historians" is to deliberately sow confusion through disambiguation of false facts..... Stay focused on the 800+ years of the Moors, Africans and Muslims in the Iberian peninsula....
Small correction : at 6:19 the rulers of Oman are named the "Yoruba dynasty" They were the Y'arubid Dynasty or the Yaruba. The Yoruba are a significant ethnic group in Nigeria.
Great video Jabzy. Pre-colonial africa and the many kingdoms there are rarely covered, especially on youtube. Thanks for providing such a valuable video.
@Danny Tallmage Im from Kenya and im part pf the Luhya ethnic group, we have texts and so many writings dating back to the bantu expansion in kenya. Our history is hidden, because all Africans know that the Europeans tried to erase it and they still try to today. Its easier to learn about africa if you’re there
@Danny Tallmage ur world is so tiny u know nothing outside, Luhya text existed thousands of years ago, we had a writing system similar to the one in Mali. If google is ur only source then maybe go outside
This is really amazing and we need more people doing in depth documentaries like this. Thank you Jabzy. This is also possibly the topic I most want to learn more about. Great job!
This is just so interesting! Thanks for providing such a balanced overview. I really appreciate how you added enough detail while still keeping it brief. And also how you avoided a lot of modern political traps and just focused on the facts. It was just very thoroughly interesting.
Brilliant. I’m ashamed to say that most of my knowledge about early African kingdoms comes from playing EU4 😂 I also had no idea Tangier was in English hands for a time. Great video - subscribed.
EU4 and learning about history can go together -- nothing to be ashamed of. On the contrary -- the game is so complex -- only hard core history fans can truly enjoy it
Ck3 led me to a multiday rabbit hole.learning about the Oyo Empire. The spark to drive a search for knowledge matters little, so long as learning is pursued.
@@mikeld2067 More of multiple Empires competing against each other; the Empires of Europe/Asia weren't so different with their killings. Just shows how close together we all are
@@matthewgardner5364 Yeah agreed, I feel like this is not only an interesting overview of African history, but it's very humanizing in a way that a lot of modern talks involving race are not. I feel like it's all heavily, heavily coloured by the history of African slaves in the US, and people from all sides of the topic take those issues and project them onto every part of African history, and it's so inaccurate. Of course Africans had their own kingdoms, cultures, economies, trade relations, etc and very complex relationships with people all over the world - just like people from other continents did. Real history is so much more fascinating than the oversimplified, politicised versions.
@@aerialpunk Such a refined way to explain it lol. I concur dude this video based. Like this kinda history right here with its good and bad right and wrong; is my cup of tea. If history was taught like this in the classes and beyond more people would find it interesting. The winners in history can be so biased and leave things out or exaggerate things that were not meant to be so this video speaking from all sides is truly a gift.
@@matthewgardner5364 Thanks haha. And yeah I agree, watching this made me really feel how narrow the stuff we learn about in history classes is. I remember back when I was in high school, I felt like we spent every year learning the same things about WW2... Funnily enough, half my family is from Poland, and as I'm learning more about that sides history I realise that even with all that education, I actually knew very little about how the war affected the Polish. And that's in a continent we actually learn something about, nevermind places like Africa where you're lucky if they skim over any part of it besides the colonial slave trade. There's a whole world of history out there! And it's all so interesting. It'd be amazing if people would get a class where they just learn about the broad strokes of history in a balanced, unbiased way like this. It'd be interesting and broaden our knowledge a lot.
@The French Kiwi...It's underrated and overlooked because the West did that on purpose. It goes against the centuries of propaganda to paint Africans as one big monolith entity yet the continent is bigger then Europe with more civilizations then one can count on its fingers. The Akan civilization of modern day Ghana and Ivory Coast where a pain in the ass for the British and French with the many wars and victories of the Akan empire.....you really think the French and British in those days would teach how they lost from one of the most powerful and sophisticated African civilization ? No bro. I am not even African but Asian but i learned this later on in University and did my own research. Africa is has a untapped history that fears the west deep down, the west dont know much about Africa and the genesis of African civlizations and empires ..so what you dont know you fear.
@@dylandylantoriyama5370 they’ve had 0 influence on the world except things like you just listed yourself, being a pain in everyone’s ass. They’ve directly contributed nothing to the modern world, so who cares. Keyword directly. I’m sure you’re gonna go on some cringe rant about their past influences.
@@eldoplo1155 What you just wrote makes no sense the world wouldn’t be where it’s at now if it weren’t for the colonisation of africa. Even today Europeans are still scrambling for Africa.
Thank you for these videos. I love learning about history, especially the many people and civilizations that weren't discussed during my "classical education".
The Rwanda kingdom didnt start in the late 1600s as mentioned but rather in 11th to 12th centuries, what happened in the 1600s was a rebirth of the defeated kingdom by Ruganzu Ndori after a generation of non existence.
Attaching the Malagasy to the Maori isn't really that accurate - they're distant and divergent branches. It'd be more appropriate to compare Malays or Indonesian groups, at least linguistically.
Awesome video! A lot of historical works, however, maintain that European trading initiatives in Guinea and West central Africa were not examples of colonization, not for lack of effort on part of Europe (The Papal Bulls outlining the ethos), but due to the fact that African armies and tropical diseases prevented any effective colonization until the late 19th century. Thus, European factories, forts, and lodges were often merely just that, trade centers, not colonies (practically no women were brought there for example). These were Trade centers that paid rents to powerful states. Colonial society arguably did not extend outside of the walls of the relatively small fortresses on the coasts . African power in the Atlantic age was real. This is not to say that the factories and forts were not powerful and did not impose this power, but African power matched it and each side sought to engage in commerce, which gave way to traditions of negotiation. And just a side note, had the merchant elite of Asante chose war instead of indirect colonial rule during the 19th century, the British would have been compelled to face off against hundreds of thousands of riflemen. Although there was conflict between the British and Asante, internal divisions prevented Asante from fully exerting itself against the Europeans. Many Gold Coast elites actually preferred what we call colonialism in efforts to modernize and industrialize, but of course the British were more interested in exploitation. But negotiation still occurred, which is likely why Ghana is where it is today! After roughly half a century of colonialism, Ghanaian elites were ready to challenge the British for independence, which they gained in 1957, being the first Black African nation to do so. Technically the region was never conquered per se, even in the Ages of Mali and Songhai, Sudanic cavalries could not overcome the forest societies of the Gold Coast, so negotiation gave way to a flourishing Gold trade. Not tryna hate lol ! I really enjoyed watching this, we need more stuff like this, and the imagery is really cool!
You are acting as if colonisation and subjugation ended after countries gained independence. You also ignore that much of colonisation wa specifically predicated on divide and conquer. Identify divisions in society, exploit those divisions to your side. Guess what, we are still doing this by bribing the ‘elites’ as you put it and subverting democracy to ensure our businesses operate without bother. It never stopped.
I've been looking for something like this for years, it's hard to get an idea of Africa brofore the scramble, between the vast distances, jostle environment, lack of records from the various tribal peoples, and a gerneral disinterest by historians of the time made it hard to find info by an amateur like myself. I really can't wait for the next installment
@@bobcostas6272 Yet again another ignorant and stupid statement. There's loads of written history from the ancient Mali empire and the Ethiopian (the various versions over time) empire. Besides issues around the language being indiscernible, there is enough history to cover and yet somehow when people do decide to cover Africa, it is only around slavery. Nobody has to cover anything but if you choose only one part of history, you have to be called out. But then, there're a**holes like you talking crap under every UA-cam video which attempts to say anything other than the nonsense they want to believe.
Love your new style of videos you have been making in the past year (being the longer format), it really allows you to go into detail in the nuanced, unbiased way that you tend to explain history. Still seem short but history is so dense that there is always things that are gonna be left behind.
Jazzy, Sandrhoman and Pike and Shot Channel are the best early modern UA-cam history documentarians. Some good up and comers I recommend include “From Nothing”
Ok, this makes sense... The Yarubid dynasty (Arabic: أسرة آل يعرب) (also the Yaruba or Ya'arubi) were rulers of Oman between 1624 and 1742, holding the title of Imam. They expelled the Portuguese from coastal strongholds in Muscat and united the country. They improved agriculture, expanded trade and built up Oman into a major maritime power. Their forces expelled the Portuguese from East Africa north of Mozambique and established long-lasting settlements on Zanzibar, Mombasa and other parts of the coast. The dynasty lost power during a succession struggle that started in 1712 and fell after a prolonged period of civil war.
Nice video. Small correction though, the norman "kingdom of africa" is more likely to be referring to the Roman province of Africa (which was mostly land in current tunisia), as opposed to saying they were the kings of the entire african continent.
That isnt a correction. Your literally just stating your interpretation of what the Normans meant when they stated they were " Kings of Africa". Even though that is just speculation.
@@abdurrahmanqureshi3030 nah what he said was right, africa at the time didn't have the same meaning as today, Africa was the old name of Tunisia with eastern Algeria and western Libya
Truly impressive summary/introduction to an enormous and complicated topic! BTW speaking of weird attempts of colonisation in Madagascar, there was certain Hungarian-Slovak-kinda-Polish nobleman Maurice Benyovszky (also spelt Beňovský or Beniowski), who after fighting in the Polish Bar Confederation against Russia, then being imprisoned all the way in Kamchatka and escaping, ended up having adventures in Madagascar, even trying to become a ruler of a part of the island. His story would be quite the material for a video of its own, especially as apparently a considerable amount of exaggerations and fiction got entangled with the facts in it.
After you mentioned Muhammad Ali in Egypt I was hoping that you would go a bit deeper on the Egyptian-Ottoman War and the Oriental Crisis. Maybe in the next video?
Wait until you hear about their losses. Like naval battles with poison arrows or when Congo forced them to return a thousand people who were kidnapped and sent to Brazil.
The situation in Sudan was much more dramatic than this, the early 1700s marked the end of a long chaos of infighting in the country that lasted probably for more than 500 years, and saw prosperity that wasn't seen on this land since the emperial days of Kosh. everything was free and if you wanted to go to Hajj or get educated abroad the state would pay the entire costs, this also attracted migrants from west and north Africa. however in the early 1800s the Turks barged in in the name of "Caliphate", and the Sudanese people being fairly religious have fallen to this, starting the most humiliating and impoverishing eras in the nations long history, Ottoman/Turk soliders would plunder at will from farmers and herders, until the Mahdist Revolution broke out.
@@bozkurt7612 The Egyptians were the "slaves" of the Turks as Mohammad Ali has said. Egyptians are just puppets of anyone who rule their land British/French/Ottomans etc.
As an African from Ghana I know there is kingdoms b4 the scramble of africa but this video give me more insight of how a lot of things happen. Thanks for sharing
he didn't say it was. He said it was a time of clashes between lords and the emperor had no real power which, in turn, led to ethnic clashes. ie. society broke down, so tensions between the ethnic groups festered with no intervening or mediating power.
Yes it was different kings who wanted to be the king of kings.. or rule the entire empire .. From tigray and different parts of amhara.. ertrea? Not sure ... after oromo expanded and mixed they also played a role (jima kings n others) ? And king tewdros from gondor is the one that tried to unify this disintegrated small kingdoms .. as he fails n lost from his wars with the Britain (as he asked them to modernise ethiopia n they refuse)king yohannis win the egypt war but later lost wars with the mahdist in sudan then king minilik was successful unifying ethiopia at the same time defending ethiopia from italy colonials and later BY MODERNISING ethiopia
I’m curious if they teach about the Barbary Slave Trade in Algeria? (Between ~1500-1750, North Africans enslaved between 1-1.25 million Europeans through slave raids/piracy. A huge reason why France invaded Algeria in 1830 is because the Algerian government refused to stop enslaving French civilians). I’m just wondering if that is ever taught, or anything like that? Hello from America, I would love to visit the Maghreb one day ☺️
@@ghassencsetwow That is so surprising to me. Why would they not teach you your history? So in Algeria, they teach that Europeans/Americans did colonialism, slavery, etc. but not Arabs?
@@advendale9119 they don't teach about slavery at all w unlike sub Saharan Africa we weren't enslaved by Europeans they teach more about the recent colonialism.
@@tobilobaokorodudu9594 he did a really good job overall, but it is quite Euro-centric. Before the Crimean war Africa was not a viable place to "take over" . Then came the Maxim gun, quinine, and civil disruption in different empires at different times. Much of the western and eastern parts of the content were being depopulated for over 2 centuries and it caused economic stagnation and civil regression.
this is one of my favorite videos of yours, i saw it twice. i wish we could spread more knowledge about the history of Africa kingdoms. "We wuz kangs" meme is racist trash but black Americans praise wrong ancestors(Egypt) while there was many great important empires they can be proud of
@roger barron uhh the early historians were racists lol especially in the US. Thats why most people out side of africa dont know shit about it but cry ig
Morocco is a rare example of a empire that later became a kingdom, whos people never gave up and kept believing in their Leader and kept fighting for their territories and against colonialism
YOO HYPE I've been trying to learn about this stuff for a while but I can never get myself to sit down and skim through a textbook - thanks for helping me and a lot of others out!
Nice video. I didn't know the Dahomey Amazons had a dark side :( Also, powerful Somali Kingdoms (most notably Geledi) existed in the Horn of Africa until the Scramble for Africa.
I have no idea why history of africa is so overlooked. It's a crossroads between indigenous Africa, Europe and Asia and has so many interesting stories. Instead we get weird propaganda like Woman King or we have afrocentrists appropriating ancient Egypt. C'mon the actual history is so much more interesting.
@NEVERmoreLenoreEVER All of it was black until the Asiatics moved in. The oldest lamentations of Egypt have Egyptians angry that Asiatics and Libyans we're all over Egypt and in positions of power and they wanted a king from Nubia to save them. Ancient Egypt was black
Very great and descriptive video of pre-colonial africa. People are so bigoted and hateful that they forget Africans are human too therefore they also had history
19:27 the history of Genoese Tabarkans doesn't end here: around the 1700s, coral trade was declining, and the island was occupied by the Bey of Tunis. However Charles Emmanuel III, king of Sardinia, ransomed some of the Tabarkan Ligurians to settle them in the island of St. Peter and the island of St. Antioch, both in a minor archipelago off the Western coast of Sardinia (though some already migrated there). The name of their first city, Carloforte (or Fort of Charles), was chosen in his honor. To this day, around 15.000 people still speak Tabarkan Ligurian there.
I'm Tunisian and I didn't know about that, thank you for sharing this information. Also that explains the distinctly european archtectural style of the villages and towns in that region of the country.
I'm from Ghana...if you're to have a conversation with an ordinary person concerning some of our past civilisations they won't even believe such a history...In Ghana we look down on ourselves and think white people are the ones with all the knowledge...
That is one of the many reasons blacks have always performed disastrously in all categories except running. Stop making excuses and ask yourself why my people cannot do anything right?
@@theActive_guitarist No one person or group of people ever had, has now, or ever will have all the knowledge there is to have, even if you expand the size of that group to everyone alive. Even a toddler can teach us something. 🙂
After taking a look through the comment replies and comments it's astonishing to see how many people just hate the idea of Africans being themselves before colonisation 😬like he didn't even say anything bad about Europe but people still mad. for what?????if you hate the idea of Africans thriving on their own just go to a different video?? ignore us and let us enjoy ourselves
the Africans were supposed to crush the colonials on their coasts. they failed to do that but the fact that they fought them for a century before finally accepting subjugation is very impressive. unfortunately not enough.
@@FazeParticles Your comment didn't even respond to my comment it just validated my point further. Do you even know the colonial conflicts? Europeans were fighting across the world (started in African and eventually ended in Africa) for conquering of territories for 350 years (starting 15th century) before the Berlin conference (late 1800s). For those 100s of years everyone was on the same level militarily and the Africans had the home and number and environment advantage that's why we won 75% of the conflicts overall in those years (enough to stop European progression for the most part but not enough to stop them from keep on coming back). They only ever lost to Europeans when the internal conflict of that particular area crushed themselves internally making way for Europeans to come in. The only reason Europeans eventually won was because of the making of the first ever machine gun. that's it. without it you still would have kept losing and eventually giving up. And we did not "finally accepting subjugation" they still fought while subjugated and won eventually.
Very good video. I consider myself an average informed and educated Portuguese. I did knew a little, but 80% of the information was very much new for me. For that, I'm grateful. Thanks. And waiting for more.
Super impressively & accurately done! Only AmaXhosa are factually Bantu - the word simply means "people" or many persons, singular Muntu ... it's a linguistic classification referring to a multitude of ethnicities who regardless of distances share a certain amount of similar words & customs which go back to a proto group, like Celts - the illustration at 5:20 is a Ndebele not a Shona - and all Bantu are mixed with whoever who was already in the regions they settled ...
Great production overall, definitely clean, BUT….a little too disjointed for me to get as much out of this as I could have. Might I suggest following the timeline chronologically, rather than, well, randomly?
How the heck did Polynesians end up on Madagascar! We never learned about that at school in New Zealand. Thank you for sparking a new topic for me to learn about 🙏
Nice video I appreciate it but can you make a video about the Benin empire pls. They have very cool architecture, art and have badass looking armors(they look like African samurais in my opinion).
Theres like 5 surviving ivory carvings that are pretty rudimentary. No surving buildings to speak of because of the materials used. Only thing that has survived architectural wise is an earthworks mound (pile of dirt). No surviving armors. They never "defeated" any European power. The only thing I could find was an envoy of 8 basically unarmed British diplomats were murdered outside the capital so later a British expeditionary force was sent back to sack the city. I wouldn't even consider this an empire or kingdom really, they had 4 recorded kings and queens over their supposed 500 year existence. So yeah.
@@animuslite8809 There is no existing building of Benin architecture today because the British destroyed everything. The people of Benin built large domes and towers, decorated with snakes and a bird on the top which is made out of brass.
@@animuslite8809 "There's like 5 surviving ivory carvings" Don't you know about the Benin Bronzes??? The Benin Bronzes changed the view how Europeans looked at African art.
15:58 to 16:09 you repeat yourself on the line: And this in turn opened up their path to taking coastal libya algeria and tunisia. Other than that, really great video can't wait for the other parts.
@@LEFT4BASS Hence why he said “SORT OF” not precisely. The whole point is just like you Mormons, they made up a fictional story of Jesus to insert him into their geographical/cultural context because they like american mormons think they’re the main character loool
Corrections - The Omani Ruling Family was the Yaruba Dynasty, not the Yoruba. Sometimes I say 17th Century but the timeline says 1700s. This is Part 1 of 5 on the Scramble for Africa (obviously this is just setting the scene). Thanks to the Patreons for voting and, if you'd like, I could always do with a little support in making these longer series and survival guides - www.patreon.com/jabzy
Add to the corrections that you confused Madeira with Canary Islands, Madeira is further North, almost equidistant from both Portugal and Morocco (but was uninhabited when Portugal claimed it). It is also much smaller than the Canarias, and was the first ever slave plantation colony, after the woodlands it give it the name were destroyed by intentional massive fires in order to plant sugarcane. Granted that Portugal was also involved in the conquest of Canary Islands but soon it was claimed by Castile instead, leading to some rivalry between the two Iberian powers in the region that would only be solved by the Tordesillas Treaty.
Also Morocco didn’t really single-handedly defeat Songhai. They captured and looted a few cities like Timbuktu which wasn’t even the capital but them were forced to retreat due to uprisings from the people.
African history is either told from either a Eurocentric view or a Afrocentric view, props to you for being the most objective guy on UA-cam on this matter. 🗿
‘Eurocentric’ is usually the part that’s make them look cool and make Africans look like they never had foundation, civilizations and were always farmers and gatherers
As a black person, I’ve always heard the word Bantu in reference to the Bantu knot hair style. Good to finally find out where I assume this style came from.
@@bobcostas6272 😂 u gotta believe what u want to believe. This mental frame that Africans don’t have history is outdated. U need to update urself coz u are just embarrassing urself🤷🏽♂️
I like videos like these because they showcase my favourite part about historical perspectives: how events are so tightly interwoven with their spatial and temporal context that any newcomers (like the colonizers) were totally out of their depth when it came to making sense of the political maneuverings going on around them. When Caeser campaigned in Gaul he was always losing and gaining allies out of nowhere as his legions moved around the region. He writes in his histories like he’s in control of the situation but then you step back and realize he gets ambushed way too often to be by chance and he gets saved at the most unlikeliest of times (like during the vercingetorix battles) for him to be less of a mastermind and more of a chaotic element being vyed for by different sides
![Kingdom of Kush - History Of Africa with Zeinab Badawi [Episode 4]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/CwaP1kyAqqo/mqdefault.jpg)
I made 2 videos about Africa and that video gets A LOT of racist comments from people who think that Africa had nothing going on in this period, except people living in tents or caves. It's very nice to see a video which covers topics like this; one of the least taught periods of one of the least taught continents.
@Stratos I lol
@Stratos I how much research have you actually done? I'm not asking this to insult you, i'm just genuinely curious. Because even a decent amount of research into pre-colonial african architecture reveals structures that cannot be labeled just simply as "large huts". Infact just simply googling "pre colonial African architecture" is enough to get these results.
Not to mention that they didn't have the same architecture achievements and styles from 12000 years ago. Cause like with all places, techniques and aesthetic sensibilities changed over time. So honestly, how much research did you do? because everything you said was false.
@Stratos I yes that's racist black people aren't dum as you think 🤔
Racists will always come and do their keyboard warrior shenanigans.
@Stratos I All measures like what exactly give a few examples with evidence.
It’s so hilarious to see people literally be ANGRY that “subsaharan” Africans had lives, civilization, travel, trade routes, and political intrigue before Europeans arrived.
There's a word I like when referring to their behavior: cope.
Also people love to generalize when it comes to Africa. They speak of "sub-Saharan Africa" like it's a single homogeneous place. So-called sub-Saharan Africa has more genetic diversity than all of Europe and the Americas combined.
There are over 1000 languages spoken, There are over 900 ethnic groups etc.. The Khoi San are very genetically and visually different from the Nillotes, who are genetically and visually different from the bantu, who are visually and genetically different from the pygmies, who are genetically and visually different from the Cushites etc.
The average African you will see in South Sudan will look VERY different from the average African you will see in South Africa. Botswana is as far from Nigeria as Ireland is from Kazakhstan etc. Falling into generalizations for such a huge and diverse area is being very shallow.
I think it's funny that people need to identify with them.
My ancestors were called Barbarians, vandals, savages...
Probably why Germans wanted to identify with Aryans.
I can see the same thing happening to black Americans.
When you teach someone to be disenfranchised then provide them with.... something.
Right????
Exactly! I’ve noticed these new channels always make the same MISTAKE either willingly or unwillingly. For example, the Slave Trade associated with European colonials, they call it “Atlantic Slave Trade” which whitewashes any ethnicity or religion. However, when it comes to the Indian Slave Trade, they call either the Arab Slave Trade or the “Islamic Slave Trade” which emphasizes an ethnic or religion. This type of hypocrisy is why western historian and UA-camrs who don’t see it or refuse to it become a JOKE!
I'm from Kenya in East Africa. I really enjoy watching these African history documentaries every evening after work.
Dude look up Mansa Musa or the Kush kingdoms, yall dont teach your own history in school?
Are there good series like this made by youtubers from Africa? My youtube suggestions almost exclusively suggest European/American history channels. It would be interesting to watch this content from a different perspective.
@@JasonRobards2 1. Hometeam history
2. From Nothing
@@Niani23455 thanks!
Nice to see another history nerd
The biggest challenge about presenting Africa to the world is overcoming the entrenched myth that Africans are a people. A simple monolithic block of people called Africans. Ha ha ha. No. We are the African peopleS. Emphasis on the S. Plural. The continent has more human diversity than the rest of the world combined. In terms of language culture skin colors etc etc. I am from Ghana and apart from skin tone I have nothing in common with say a Somali or Botswana or Ethiopian. The only famous person I have seen address this nuance and present the specific context of certain issues is the late Fidel Castro. Even though I don't like communism I give Mr Castro credit for correctly presenting the correct context and nuance of specific issues on the continent and not using the broad brush "Africans" approach that still pertains to this day. .
It is always amazing how so many use broad strokes for a continent of diverse people. Not just Africa which many do not understand just how HUGE it is is but Europe and Asia as well. I have friends who wear their wokeness on their sleeves but then conflate Asian cultures, umm no that is Chinese and that is Japanese.
Africa has SOOOO many different cultures. I was reading of just the diversity say in Nigeria is staggering. I was referring to all peoples but took some heat when I said that one of the worst things of appropriation is when someone claims another culture as their own just because the skin color is similar.
I think it was the BBC but they have this documentary on 5 ancient kingdoms in the Sub Sahara Africa. I thought it was really good because it is something you normally do not see and all of these were far from each other as well.
@@DevinMacGregor you have read wide.thank you. The cultural appropriation argument is an another silly example of the ignorance of wokeness. It would mean a Thai is prohibited from wearing a kimono. Or a Nigerian is prohibited from wearing kente which is native to southern Ghana. Or a Zimbabwean is prohibited from wearing the boubou which is native to Senegal. Its just silly and ignorant.
They even forgot that under Wokeism then dark skinned people should not be wearing suits shirts or coats because those came from cultures elsewhere .
@@kwakuba9167 I love when it gets shifted to food such as I can not say if a food was good or not that did not come directly from my culture. Yet I live in a multicultural society.
I am thinking, but food is not genetic. I have a work friend who we would go to lunch periodically and she completely bought into this such as I could not tell her if a burrito was good or not because I am white and she is Mexican even though I grew up in Southern California eating burritos, tacos etc. Not to mention a burrito is what we call Tex Mex and it has only been in the last several decades the bulk of Mexico even knows what one is. It was not a part of Mexican cuisine. It is like certain foods here that you find in Chinese restaurants did not come from China and are not a part of traditional Chinese cuisine.
So then I asked her so how can you tell me what a good Sushi place is because last I checked you are not Japanese. She had nothing to say after that. She loves sushi bars btw.
It is just silly. If you want to know how to make a schnitzel I will tell you and I will trust you and your taste buds.
All of this comes out of a hyper sense of identity.
You have nothing in common with me and I am African American within 3% Ghana blood
All 🩸 from the same creator different cultures
Good work. I've notice there is a trend of channels interested in African history or aspects of it, and so far it's a positive change to the usual imagery of poverty, starvation, and corruption that we are constantly fed about in regards to Africa.
Agreed, most people seem to only demonize or patronize that continent, both groups just love to oversimplify everything to
@@christianweibrecht6555 You summed it up better than I could.
Same here, history channels are starting to diverge from the euro-centric viewpoint (which is still my favorite area of history) and done videos on India, SE Asia, Africa, S. America, and the central Asian/Iranian area of influence that is just as rich. For example the Khazar Khaganate converted to Judaism....a nomadic horse archer culture actively embraced Judaism! Doesn't that just blow your mind! That and the Indo-European descendants living in the Gobi desert that were wiped out by the Medieval Chinese empire, (the Tar-somethings) history is full of amazing one-off irregularities like this and I love it! Like for example the Tai-Ping rebellion was started by a Chinese man claiming to be Jesus' brother which caused the deaths of up to 10million!!!
They wanted to keep Africans poor as long as possible that's why.
@@ericcloud1023I haven't heard of the indo Europeans in the Gobi, are you referring to the Tocharians. They were a group of indo Europeans in the Tarim basin, but they eventually assimilated into the ugygurs.
Well done! It's rare to see African history talked about in an objective factual way!
what are you watching ?
@@DeadGivaway alot of pre-colonial african history that non-academics have access too is either eurocentric or afrocentric. The others refusing to see any progress in africa for thousands of years, the others somehow attributing anything good in the world with africa somehow or treating it like some sort of paradise.
Hahahahahahahaha
@@konradvonschnitzeldorf6506 hahahahahahah ok simp
@Kyjohc literally never made a road
History is not simply what is told in class, but the culmination of millions of day to day choices made by billions of people throughout their lives. This video just goes to show that it is so much more complex then students are lead to believe
@roger barron i mean, you're wrong. But you're entitled to your opinion.
@roger barron
😂😂😂
There has to be a desire for truth in order to know true history. The “primitive” narrative of Africa suits Europeans. Most of them would be mortified to know the real reason behind the renaissance. They need to read the “Memoirs of the Secret Services of John Mackey”, and study the history of the Moors in Europe. I think they’d die of heart attacks because it’s contrary to their beliefs.
I know the creator tells us not to wish for his judgement day, because none of us really knows where we stand but it will be great to see the smiles wiped off these racist fools faces.
Jeremiah 16:19
O Lord, my strength, and my fortress, and my refuge in the day of affliction, the Gentiles shall come unto thee from the ends of the earth, and shall say, Surely our fathers have inherited lies, vanity, and things wherein there is no profit.
We are living through some very trying times, and only those with discernment can see scripture unfolding, and prophecy being fulfilled right before our very eyes.
Black people remain proud that you were created in the image of the Creator and we have all seen the following:
Ecclesiastes 10:7
I have seen servants upon horses, and princes walking as servants upon the earth.
You just now learned that?????? You missed out on Tolstoys 'War and Peace'. Then again, I doubt you read much, if at all.
@@jaijai5250 Loincloths, Spears, Absence of written-language system until contact with Islam, Shamanism, Albinism understood as a tribal curse even in the modern era, Sleeping Sickness, Ebola, HIV, Sickle Cell Anemia, Malaria........that's what you had and still have. THE APPROPRIATION OF NORTH AFRICAN HISTORY (Berbers, Arabs, Moors, Tuaregs) is about your biggest historical accomplishment. What is comical about these uploads is the all-too-patent desperation at trying to compensate for the glaring absence of any notable achievements when compared to Europe, China, India, Israel, The Golden Age of Islam. To be sure, the Golden Mongol Horde under Ghengis Khan was more interesting and important than the entire history of Sub-Saharan Africa combined. By the way, leave the Egyptian pyramids alone. TAKE A GOOD LOOK AT THE FEATURES OF EGYPTIANS TODAY: THATS WHAT THE PEOPLE WHO ACTUALLY CONSTRUCTED THEM LOOK LIKE. AND COME UP WITH SOMETHING THAT IS TRULY YOURS WITHOUT CITING THE SPIRITUAL MUSINGS OF A WANDERING SEMITIC PEOPLE WHO ACTUALLY DID GO ON TO CONTRIBUTE TO THE MODERN WORLD. CULTURAL ENVY IS ALL YOU WILL EVER HAVE.
I appreciate your work on this series, I'm going to watch them all! I never imagined I'd ever see unbiased content on African history on UA-cam, nor did I think it'd be suggested to me by the algorithm ... awesome
Nice video, though I think Benin Empire deserved a mention, if only for the fact that its capital, Benin was one of the largest cities of its time (worldwide) and a wonder of city planning, divided into self sufficient districts, with sewerage and street lights. The plan itself was based upon mathematical principles in a fractal-like divisions.
Will be mentioned a couple times throughout the series
@@JabzyJoe
Never heard of Edo the capital city of the once empire of Benin. Thought, the Aztec capital city of Tenochtitlán (modern day Mexico city) was the wonder of the world back then.
@@ab9840 Look at that! You learn something new everyday!
@@ab9840 As someone whose parents come from Edo State and have Benin ancestry, I'm still really happy to see folks express interest in learning about our history!
Thank you for bringing light to the fact that there was history and cultural exchange before the scramble
I was waiting for this day to come.... and it came!
It's common knowledge though.
@@512TheWolf512 you’d be surprised how many don’t know that there were civilizations outside of Egypt in Africa. A lot of people believe it was just a bunch of tribal mudhuts. Nothing complex
What a joke, Egypt Morocco etc are not really Africans they are Arabs.
The Africans hadn't invented a written language, the wheel or a two story fucking Building what a joke.
@@Yawnymcsnore your first sentence is correct, the second is incorrect
Love to all my African brothers from Tunisia 🌹🇹🇳
Love you too, from New Jersey, America
🇹🇳🤍🇩🇿
No mention of the Asante Empire? Asante was the most powerful empire in West Africa during the 19th century. It was the only West African kingdom to defeat a major European power on more than one occasion. Asante fought the British for a century. You even had a depiction of an Asante soldier during your section on Oyo.
We all fought, my country was the first one to be bombed because they couldn't fight us on land or sea, im somali
@Wolfgang Rotz When did he say Black you turd ? The man clearly said he was Somali......
@@michiga5220 ahh yes the great Somalian military lol
@@Originalchili of course what could be any better!
@Wolfgang Rotz you sound confused for no reason
I feel like unfortunately an online discourse we never really give much credit or respect to actual African History either treat it as something unimportant or as one big tragedy with nothing good to it due to European interaction. I appreciate this video making a legitimate attempt to show what happened in a period and region which doesn't get the coverage it deserves
It’s like if we just cut out the 1600-1900 for Europeans and just say their history is 3BC-1400AD lotta goofy ass mfers. There’s a reason anywhere we touch down in big numbers whether it’s the slave trade in Americas or immigration to Europe sub Saharan Africans have a big impact on the culture especially the music we’re the oldest demographic of people on this planet and will likely be the last
It's half the european propaganda aspect of the "white mans burden" which heavily influenced this view, and also the idiotic discourss in america doesn't help the situation where even african americans argues that everything in Africa was purely black or darkskinned.
The debate is so dumbed down it's like people put in their own personal views in history when in the end who gives a shit if north africans look different, so does south-africans, and eastern africans and western africans. They'd still all be africans is what people seem to ignore.
@Stratos I Sumerians were never called Iraqis.
@Stratos I 1. Sumer was never an empire, the first empire was the Akkadian empire.
2. Yes, Sumer was located in the region that became Iraq, but that doesn't make their inhabitants Iraqis.
@Stratos I Whatever you say man. Never heard any Archaeologist say that Sumer was an empire.
I would love to see more African history or discussion about conflict in Africa today
Everyone knows most conflicts in developing countries including the Middle East has the hand prints of Western Countries
I really, really enjoy history in a very broad sense (broad meaning I am interested in a lot of different time periods in a lot of different places) and seeing videos on seemingly barely touched subjects like this is absolutely wonderful. I’m a pretty busy person so I love listening to documentary videos like this while I do other work or run errands, and so I don’t get to read as much as I’d like to so videos like this absolutely make my day when I find them. Really quenches my thirst for knowledge that’s seemingly very difficult to find and in a way I can easily manage while going about my busy schedule. Thank you!
" Yoruba dynasty" displaced the Portuguese in the East coast of Africa--NO NO NO! the proliferation of this "internet historians" is to deliberately sow confusion through disambiguation of false facts.....
Stay focused on the 800+ years of the Moors, Africans and Muslims in the Iberian peninsula....
Small correction : at 6:19 the rulers of Oman are named the "Yoruba dynasty" They were the Y'arubid Dynasty or the Yaruba. The Yoruba are a significant ethnic group in Nigeria.
yeah, but they're not the same
@@drose6437 That's his point
@DRose There is a 'not' missing
Great video Jabzy. Pre-colonial africa and the many kingdoms there are rarely covered, especially on youtube. Thanks for providing such a valuable video.
To be fair it’s hard to cover society’s which didn’t record their history
@@ArturMorgan7491 a lot of these societies recorded their history though? But what do expect from Adolf Hitler...
@@ArturMorgan7491 Fucking finally. At least you get it, people act like its a race thing but NO PEOPLE the societies just didnt document much.
@Danny Tallmage Im from Kenya and im part pf the Luhya ethnic group, we have texts and so many writings dating back to the bantu expansion in kenya. Our history is hidden, because all Africans know that the Europeans tried to erase it and they still try to today. Its easier to learn about africa if you’re there
@Danny Tallmage ur world is so tiny u know nothing outside, Luhya text existed thousands of years ago, we had a writing system similar to the one in Mali. If google is ur only source then maybe go outside
Every sixty seconds in Africa a minute passes.
wow :(
such a tragedy
Together we can stop this
Woah so deep bruh
Astounding knowledge
This is really amazing and we need more people doing in depth documentaries like this. Thank you Jabzy. This is also possibly the topic I most want to learn more about. Great job!
It's so hard to find videos about African history that can whittle down the huge amount of info!
This is just so interesting! Thanks for providing such a balanced overview. I really appreciate how you added enough detail while still keeping it brief. And also how you avoided a lot of modern political traps and just focused on the facts. It was just very thoroughly interesting.
Sounds like you're trying to find said political traps...
Brilliant. I’m ashamed to say that most of my knowledge about early African kingdoms comes from playing EU4 😂
I also had no idea Tangier was in English hands for a time. Great video - subscribed.
That's what internet for just look for it.
EU4 and learning about history can go together -- nothing to be ashamed of. On the contrary -- the game is so complex -- only hard core history fans can truly enjoy it
Ck3 led me to a multiday rabbit hole.learning about the Oyo Empire. The spark to drive a search for knowledge matters little, so long as learning is pursued.
Another nice series Jabzy! btw I saw you in r/mongolia last week asking for help for a Basic Politics video. How is that? Any news about it?
Afraid not - I'm getting next to no biters on any country.
@@JabzyJoe That sucks man :/
Great work. Thank you for the high level overview of the side of African history that doesn’t get much coverage.
THIS is the sort of video you want Boosted for Black History Month.
Multiple tribes killing eachother is about all they can do lmao
@@mikeld2067 More of multiple Empires competing against each other; the Empires of Europe/Asia weren't so different with their killings. Just shows how close together we all are
@@matthewgardner5364 Yeah agreed, I feel like this is not only an interesting overview of African history, but it's very humanizing in a way that a lot of modern talks involving race are not. I feel like it's all heavily, heavily coloured by the history of African slaves in the US, and people from all sides of the topic take those issues and project them onto every part of African history, and it's so inaccurate. Of course Africans had their own kingdoms, cultures, economies, trade relations, etc and very complex relationships with people all over the world - just like people from other continents did. Real history is so much more fascinating than the oversimplified, politicised versions.
@@aerialpunk Such a refined way to explain it lol. I concur dude this video based. Like this kinda history right here with its good and bad right and wrong; is my cup of tea. If history was taught like this in the classes and beyond more people would find it interesting. The winners in history can be so biased and leave things out or exaggerate things that were not meant to be so this video speaking from all sides is truly a gift.
@@matthewgardner5364 Thanks haha. And yeah I agree, watching this made me really feel how narrow the stuff we learn about in history classes is. I remember back when I was in high school, I felt like we spent every year learning the same things about WW2... Funnily enough, half my family is from Poland, and as I'm learning more about that sides history I realise that even with all that education, I actually knew very little about how the war affected the Polish. And that's in a continent we actually learn something about, nevermind places like Africa where you're lucky if they skim over any part of it besides the colonial slave trade. There's a whole world of history out there! And it's all so interesting. It'd be amazing if people would get a class where they just learn about the broad strokes of history in a balanced, unbiased way like this. It'd be interesting and broaden our knowledge a lot.
Great content!
A small error though… “17th century” should refer to the 1600s.
The same error crept into mention of the 18th century.
There's a persistent off-by-one error in the enumeration of centuries.
LOOK WHO YOU'RE MENTIONING THAT TO.
@@erikawhelan4673 it would be easier if 0-99 was referred to as the 0th century or something like that
@@mpforeverunlimited You mean 1-100?
I love videos like this that go in depth on the subjects generally neglected by history
An amazing video! We need more content like this, even if it's condensed, because African history is still sadly underrated and overlooked.
@The French Kiwi...It's underrated and overlooked because the West did that on purpose. It goes against the centuries of propaganda to paint Africans as one big monolith entity yet the continent is bigger then Europe with more civilizations then one can count on its fingers. The Akan civilization of modern day Ghana and Ivory Coast where a pain in the ass for the British and French with the many wars and victories of the Akan empire.....you really think the French and British in those days would teach how they lost from one of the most powerful and sophisticated African civilization ? No bro. I am not even African but Asian but i learned this later on in University and did my own research. Africa is has a untapped history that fears the west deep down, the west dont know much about Africa and the genesis of African civlizations and empires ..so what you dont know you fear.
@@dylandylantoriyama5370 this has nothing to do with the west. No one cares anywhere. There’s an entire planet and they also don’t care.
@@dylandylantoriyama5370 they’ve had 0 influence on the world except things like you just listed yourself, being a pain in everyone’s ass. They’ve directly contributed nothing to the modern world, so who cares. Keyword directly. I’m sure you’re gonna go on some cringe rant about their past influences.
@@eldoplo1155 What you just wrote makes no sense the world wouldn’t be where it’s at now if it weren’t for the colonisation of africa. Even today Europeans are still scrambling for Africa.
That’s was fine on purpose they even burned many of libraries and now the average African doesn’t know anything about thier own tribe
Thank you for these videos. I love learning about history, especially the many people and civilizations that weren't discussed during my "classical education".
The Rwanda kingdom didnt start in the late 1600s as mentioned but rather in 11th to 12th centuries, what happened in the 1600s was a rebirth of the defeated kingdom by Ruganzu Ndori after a generation of non existence.
Also, where the hell did he get the idea that Mormons thought Jesus was born in the United States?
@@scottanos9981 It is a bit of a simplification and they naturally don't have the same mythology but I think it's a good analogy.
You're doing incredible work highlighting history that's often overlooked!
😂😂😂
I love finding new channels like this. Thank you so much for taking the time to not only research but compile everything.
Disney: "Endgame is the most ambitious crossover event in history"
Africa: "hold my beer"
Attaching the Malagasy to the Maori isn't really that accurate - they're distant and divergent branches. It'd be more appropriate to compare Malays or Indonesian groups, at least linguistically.
He probably got his source from Wikipedia
Plus there were Bantu populations of free Swahili town settlements who populated parts of the North he missed out that bit.
good point
They all descend from populations originating in what's now Taiwan.
That is indeed a stretch. Genetic similarities Maoris might possess if any would be with their closest neighbours in the Malay archipelago.
6:15 The Sultan of Oman lives in Zanzibar now. That's just where he lives.
Ty so much Jabzy for covering this subject. It is such an overlooked part of history, but should never be forgotten. Amazing video as always :)
The animation and sound are perfectly pitched.
This is one steady stream of facts that ranged throughout the continent.
Awesome video! A lot of historical works, however, maintain that European trading initiatives in Guinea and West central Africa were not examples of colonization, not for lack of effort on part of Europe (The Papal Bulls outlining the ethos), but due to the fact that African armies and tropical diseases prevented any effective colonization until the late 19th century. Thus, European factories, forts, and lodges were often merely just that, trade centers, not colonies (practically no women were brought there for example). These were Trade centers that paid rents to powerful states. Colonial society arguably did not extend outside of the walls of the relatively small fortresses on the coasts . African power in the Atlantic age was real. This is not to say that the factories and forts were not powerful and did not impose this power, but African power matched it and each side sought to engage in commerce, which gave way to traditions of negotiation.
And just a side note, had the merchant elite of Asante chose war instead of indirect colonial rule during the 19th century, the British would have been compelled to face off against hundreds of thousands of riflemen. Although there was conflict between the British and Asante, internal divisions prevented Asante from fully exerting itself against the Europeans. Many Gold Coast elites actually preferred what we call colonialism in efforts to modernize and industrialize, but of course the British were more interested in exploitation. But negotiation still occurred, which is likely why Ghana is where it is today! After roughly half a century of colonialism, Ghanaian elites were ready to challenge the British for independence, which they gained in 1957, being the first Black African nation to do so. Technically the region was never conquered per se, even in the Ages of Mali and Songhai, Sudanic cavalries could not overcome the forest societies of the Gold Coast, so negotiation gave way to a flourishing Gold trade. Not tryna hate lol ! I really enjoyed watching this, we need more stuff like this, and the imagery is really cool!
i bet we´ve been preventing you from learning to read with the 60% illiteracy rate in africa, right?
You are acting as if colonisation and subjugation ended after countries gained independence. You also ignore that much of colonisation wa specifically predicated on divide and conquer. Identify divisions in society, exploit those divisions to your side. Guess what, we are still doing this by bribing the ‘elites’ as you put it and subverting democracy to ensure our businesses operate without bother. It never stopped.
I've been looking for something like this for years, it's hard to get an idea of Africa brofore the scramble, between the vast distances, jostle environment, lack of records from the various tribal peoples, and a gerneral disinterest by historians of the time made it hard to find info by an amateur like myself. I really can't wait for the next installment
Try watching HomeTeam History videos. They have very good videos on precolonial Africa. Tell your friends lol.
There's always books!
“We couldnt write our own history down so this is later people’s faults!”
Simps in a nutshellz
@@bobcostas6272 exactly, hes too busy KANGING to think about that tho
@@bobcostas6272 Yet again another ignorant and stupid statement. There's loads of written history from the ancient Mali empire and the Ethiopian (the various versions over time) empire. Besides issues around the language being indiscernible, there is enough history to cover and yet somehow when people do decide to cover Africa, it is only around slavery. Nobody has to cover anything but if you choose only one part of history, you have to be called out. But then, there're a**holes like you talking crap under every UA-cam video which attempts to say anything other than the nonsense they want to believe.
Excellent concise history. Really makes me want to do a deep dive into some of these African kingdoms and nation states.
Good luck you will find they are mostly made up fairy tales.
Love your new style of videos you have been making in the past year (being the longer format), it really allows you to go into detail in the nuanced, unbiased way that you tend to explain history. Still seem short but history is so dense that there is always things that are gonna be left behind.
Jazzy, Sandrhoman and Pike and Shot Channel are the best early modern UA-cam history documentarians. Some good up and comers I recommend include “From Nothing”
Thanks, I didn’t know about Pike & Shot channel
Thank you so much for covering this topic in as much detail as you did. Please keep up with such great content 😍
Ok, this makes sense...
The Yarubid dynasty (Arabic: أسرة آل يعرب) (also the Yaruba or Ya'arubi) were rulers of Oman between 1624 and 1742, holding the title of Imam. They expelled the Portuguese from coastal strongholds in Muscat and united the country. They improved agriculture, expanded trade and built up Oman into a major maritime power. Their forces expelled the Portuguese from East Africa north of Mozambique and established long-lasting settlements on Zanzibar, Mombasa and other parts of the coast. The dynasty lost power during a succession struggle that started in 1712 and fell after a prolonged period of civil war.
One of the most informative videos I have ever seen on the subject. I have learned many details I was unaware of. Keep up the great work!
Excited to hear what you've compiled!
Amazing video, I can’t wait for the whole series. Wonder if the Roman, Chinese or Tamil traders from Somalia to modern Mozambique will get a mention.
Proud to be Bantu, Shona . My totem and word of mouth family history checks out with your research. Love your channel.❤🇿🇼
hi that’s really interesting how it matches id like to know more!
@@Badbadgoodkid sure any time .
Without correcting him when he said Mutapa State was from Mozambique
@@mrnicewatch8877 we’re Gods true chosen ppl
@@Monke_boi13 we're all god's people
Sorting by newest, wish me luck.
It's always a wild ride😂
Nice video. Small correction though, the norman "kingdom of africa" is more likely to be referring to the Roman province of Africa (which was mostly land in current tunisia), as opposed to saying they were the kings of the entire african continent.
That isnt a correction. Your literally just stating your interpretation of what the Normans meant when they stated they were " Kings of Africa". Even though that is just speculation.
@@abdurrahmanqureshi3030 nah what he said was right, africa at the time didn't have the same meaning as today, Africa was the old name of Tunisia with eastern Algeria and western Libya
@@abdurrahmanqureshi3030 hahaha
Truly impressive summary/introduction to an enormous and complicated topic!
BTW speaking of weird attempts of colonisation in Madagascar, there was certain Hungarian-Slovak-kinda-Polish nobleman Maurice Benyovszky (also spelt Beňovský or Beniowski), who after fighting in the Polish Bar Confederation against Russia, then being imprisoned all the way in Kamchatka and escaping, ended up having adventures in Madagascar, even trying to become a ruler of a part of the island. His story would be quite the material for a video of its own, especially as apparently a considerable amount of exaggerations and fiction got entangled with the facts in it.
I will NEVER believe the first habitants of madagascar are from around india and not bantu or from africa ?
I've literally never been taught any of this in school .
Thank you, Jabzy
Cos it doesn't feed the narrative. It requires research beyond the classroom
Because all of this contributed literally zero to history (except the Boers). It's simply irrelevant
Glad to hear the Fulani get some recognition in African History
After you mentioned Muhammad Ali in Egypt I was hoping that you would go a bit deeper on the Egyptian-Ottoman War and the Oriental Crisis. Maybe in the next video?
This.
Not even 10 minutes in the video and the Portuguese are taking wins
The portuguese are my favorite Iberians.
@@exaggeratedswaggerofablackteen I prefer the Spanish
Wait until you hear about their losses. Like naval battles with poison arrows or when Congo forced them to return a thousand people who were kidnapped and sent to Brazil.
@@ushikiii You mean Castilians. Spanish is copyright infringement.
@@andysawyer647 Hey, if you want losses I will give you two: Mamora (1515) and Alcácer Quibir (1578). Have fun.
The situation in Sudan was much more dramatic than this, the early 1700s marked the end of a long chaos of infighting in the country that lasted probably for more than 500 years, and saw prosperity that wasn't seen on this land since the emperial days of Kosh. everything was free and if you wanted to go to Hajj or get educated abroad the state would pay the entire costs, this also attracted migrants from west and north Africa.
however in the early 1800s the Turks barged in in the name of "Caliphate", and the Sudanese people being fairly religious have fallen to this, starting the most humiliating and impoverishing eras in the nations long history, Ottoman/Turk soliders would plunder at will from farmers and herders, until the Mahdist Revolution broke out.
That was the Egyptians not the Turks.
@@bozkurt7612 The Egyptians were the "slaves" of the Turks as Mohammad Ali has said. Egyptians are just puppets of anyone who rule their land British/French/Ottomans etc.
@@semregob3363 lol
@@semregob3363 the armies that Mohamed Ali used to conqueror the region were not even egyptian
@@MohamedRamadan-qi4hl what were they?
As an African from Ghana I know there is kingdoms b4 the scramble of africa but this video give me more insight of how a lot of things happen. Thanks for sharing
Age of warring princes wasn’t an ethnic war it was between princes from different branches of the Solomonic dynasty
You can even think of it as a Sengoku-esque period in Ethiopia.
he didn't say it was. He said it was a time of clashes between lords and the emperor had no real power which, in turn, led to ethnic clashes. ie. society broke down, so tensions between the ethnic groups festered with no intervening or mediating power.
Yes it was different kings who wanted to be the king of kings.. or rule the entire empire ..
From tigray and different parts of amhara.. ertrea? Not sure ... after oromo expanded and mixed they also played a role (jima kings n others) ?
And king tewdros from gondor is the one that tried to unify this disintegrated small kingdoms .. as he fails n lost from his wars with the Britain (as he asked them to modernise ethiopia n they refuse)king yohannis win the egypt war but later lost wars with the mahdist in sudan
then king minilik was successful unifying ethiopia at the same time defending ethiopia from italy colonials and later BY MODERNISING ethiopia
As an Ethiopian most Ethiopian sees it as a ethnic war and it’s the cause of all of Ethiopia’s problems to this day
Such an under represented period in history. I never really learned what happened during this period until after I graduated university.
It’s almost as if it never existed
im from Algeria and theres so much information about us that 95% of algerians doesnt even know, great work.
I’m curious if they teach about the Barbary Slave Trade in Algeria? (Between ~1500-1750, North Africans enslaved between 1-1.25 million Europeans through slave raids/piracy. A huge reason why France invaded Algeria in 1830 is because the Algerian government refused to stop enslaving French civilians). I’m just wondering if that is ever taught, or anything like that? Hello from America, I would love to visit the Maghreb one day ☺️
@@advendale9119 they don't even teach us about the trans saharan slave trade which was much much more massive and cruel let alone barbary one .
@@ghassencsetwow That is so surprising to me. Why would they not teach you your history? So in Algeria, they teach that Europeans/Americans did colonialism, slavery, etc. but not Arabs?
@@advendale9119 they don't teach about slavery at all w unlike sub Saharan Africa we weren't enslaved by Europeans they teach more about the recent colonialism.
@@advendale9119 yup
This video was very interesting to watch; are the sources you used somewhere I could access? I'd love to delve deeper into these places.
The Mutapa empire was not in Mozambique its had territories covering parts of Mozambique but the kingdom was still in Zimbabwe.
@@Kemetyu-Centered36 Wtf!!!! I've watched the whole video about thrice now and nowhere did i get even just an inkling of intentional bias
@@tobilobaokorodudu9594 he did a really good job overall, but it is quite Euro-centric. Before the Crimean war Africa was not a viable place to "take over" . Then came the Maxim gun, quinine, and civil disruption in different empires at different times. Much of the western and eastern parts of the content were being depopulated for over 2 centuries and it caused economic stagnation and civil regression.
@@Kemetyu-Centered36 no
@@andysawyer647 i don't agree
Always enjoy seeing your comments. You should make videos
High quality content! Great job 🔥
Africa is very underrated
this is one of my favorite videos of yours, i saw it twice.
i wish we could spread more knowledge about the history of Africa kingdoms.
"We wuz kangs" meme is racist trash but black Americans praise wrong ancestors(Egypt)
while there was many great important empires they can be proud of
@roger barron Name the actual historians you've got your history from which contradicts anything in the video above.
@roger barron uhh the early historians were racists lol especially in the US. Thats why most people out side of africa dont know shit about it but cry ig
Exactly.
@@joanthemad5894 everyone has some racial biases even if not conscious of them.
Awesome video. Can you list your sources? I would be really interested to read them too.
Morocco is a rare example of a empire that later became a kingdom, whos people never gave up and kept believing in their Leader and kept fighting for their territories and against colonialism
@NEVERmoreLenoreEVERnope only Moroccans
This was so fascinating thank you very much for this video
YOO HYPE I've been trying to learn about this stuff for a while but I can never get myself to sit down and skim through a textbook - thanks for helping me and a lot of others out!
Right I've got like 3 textbooks I haven't touched yet. 😭
Nice video. I didn't know the Dahomey Amazons had a dark side :(
Also, powerful Somali Kingdoms (most notably Geledi) existed in the Horn of Africa until the Scramble for Africa.
I have no idea why history of africa is so overlooked. It's a crossroads between indigenous Africa, Europe and Asia and has so many interesting stories. Instead we get weird propaganda like Woman King or we have afrocentrists appropriating ancient Egypt. C'mon the actual history is so much more interesting.
Egypt was black, no one is appropriating anything except Arabs.
@NEVERmoreLenoreEVER All of it was black until the Asiatics moved in. The oldest lamentations of Egypt have Egyptians angry that Asiatics and Libyans we're all over Egypt and in positions of power and they wanted a king from Nubia to save them.
Ancient Egypt was black
Finally someone with actual interest in african history 😊😊
Glad to see everyone is educated now.
Very great and descriptive video of pre-colonial africa. People are so bigoted and hateful that they forget Africans are human too therefore they also had history
amazing video, opened my eyes on so many things I never knew about.
19:27 the history of Genoese Tabarkans doesn't end here: around the 1700s, coral trade was declining, and the island was occupied by the Bey of Tunis. However Charles Emmanuel III, king of Sardinia, ransomed some of the Tabarkan Ligurians to settle them in the island of St. Peter and the island of St. Antioch, both in a minor archipelago off the Western coast of Sardinia (though some already migrated there). The name of their first city, Carloforte (or Fort of Charles), was chosen in his honor. To this day, around 15.000 people still speak Tabarkan Ligurian there.
I'm Tunisian and I didn't know about that, thank you for sharing this information. Also that explains the distinctly european archtectural style of the villages and towns in that region of the country.
As an African, it makes me sad to think about what we could've had and been as a people if circumstances were different.
You would be like this
ua-cam.com/video/tnRtBg2wxow/v-deo.html
I'm from Ghana...if you're to have a conversation with an ordinary person concerning some of our past civilisations they won't even believe such a history...In Ghana we look down on ourselves and think white people are the ones with all the knowledge...
😔
That is one of the many reasons blacks have always performed disastrously in all categories except running. Stop making excuses and ask yourself why my people cannot do anything right?
@@theActive_guitarist No one person or group of people ever had, has now, or ever will have all the knowledge there is to have, even if you expand the size of that group to everyone alive.
Even a toddler can teach us something. 🙂
this by far the best history so far of Africa! so transparent and straight forward! looking forward to a part 2
This was a treat. Great details. Thanks.
After taking a look through the comment replies and comments it's astonishing to see how many people just hate the idea of Africans being themselves before colonisation 😬like he didn't even say anything bad about Europe but people still mad. for what?????if you hate the idea of Africans thriving on their own just go to a different video?? ignore us and let us enjoy ourselves
Cause they're ignorant and can't except the truth
the Africans were supposed to crush the colonials on their coasts. they failed to do that but the fact that they fought them for a century before finally accepting subjugation is very impressive. unfortunately not enough.
@@FazeParticles Your comment didn't even respond to my comment it just validated my point further. Do you even know the colonial conflicts? Europeans were fighting across the world (started in African and eventually ended in Africa) for conquering of territories for 350 years (starting 15th century) before the Berlin conference (late 1800s). For those 100s of years everyone was on the same level militarily and the Africans had the home and number and environment advantage that's why we won 75% of the conflicts overall in those years (enough to stop European progression for the most part but not enough to stop them from keep on coming back). They only ever lost to Europeans when the internal conflict of that particular area crushed themselves internally making way for Europeans to come in. The only reason Europeans eventually won was because of the making of the first ever machine gun. that's it. without it you still would have kept losing and eventually giving up. And we did not "finally accepting subjugation" they still fought while subjugated and won eventually.
Very good video. I consider myself an average informed and educated Portuguese. I did knew a little, but 80% of the information was very much new for me. For that, I'm grateful. Thanks. And waiting for more.
Thanks for covering this topic I noticed before recently I had hard time finding videos on Africa before slavery
Super impressively & accurately done! Only AmaXhosa are factually Bantu - the word simply means "people" or many persons, singular Muntu ... it's a linguistic classification referring to a multitude of ethnicities who regardless of distances share a certain amount of similar words & customs which go back to a proto group, like Celts - the illustration at 5:20 is a Ndebele not a Shona - and all Bantu are mixed with whoever who was already in the regions they settled ...
It's a language family. Like Indo European, Afroasiatic and Niger Congo for example.
This us not accurately done! As usual, very eurocentric.
@@admirekashiri9879 bantu languages are niger congo languages
@@thisvidsonly.7601 they aren't the same language family there is a link yes bit they aren't the same.
Great production overall, definitely clean, BUT….a little too disjointed for me to get as much out of this as I could have. Might I suggest following the timeline chronologically, rather than, well, randomly?
How the heck did Polynesians end up on Madagascar! We never learned about that at school in New Zealand. Thank you for sparking a new topic for me to learn about 🙏
The same way they ended up in Hawaii. With some of the best navigators ever.
They didn’t it was malay people
You deliver excellent content to your audience. All of your effort put into creating this video is much appreciated. I'm truly grateful for your help!
We appreciate your research and insight ✊🏽
Fascinating content!
Nice video I appreciate it but can you make a video about the Benin empire pls. They have very cool architecture, art and have badass looking armors(they look like African samurais in my opinion).
Please share me a link
Theres like 5 surviving ivory carvings that are pretty rudimentary. No surving buildings to speak of because of the materials used. Only thing that has survived architectural wise is an earthworks mound (pile of dirt). No surviving armors. They never "defeated" any European power. The only thing I could find was an envoy of 8 basically unarmed British diplomats were murdered outside the capital so later a British expeditionary force was sent back to sack the city. I wouldn't even consider this an empire or kingdom really, they had 4 recorded kings and queens over their supposed 500 year existence. So yeah.
@@tristanjohnson4159 When I share a link youtube will delete it for some reason
@@animuslite8809 There is no existing building of Benin architecture today because the British destroyed everything. The people of Benin built large domes and towers, decorated with snakes and a bird on the top which is made out of brass.
@@animuslite8809 "There's like 5 surviving ivory carvings" Don't you know about the Benin Bronzes??? The Benin Bronzes changed the view how Europeans looked at African art.
Been looking for a documentary like this for so many years. Thankyou so much.
15:58 to 16:09 you repeat yourself on the line: And this in turn opened up their path to taking coastal libya algeria and tunisia.
Other than that, really great video can't wait for the other parts.
4:48 “ Sort of like an African version of Mormonism “ LOOOL GOLD
It’s really not accurate though. We believe Jesus visited the Americas, not that he was born or originated from here
My SIDES this "historian" sucks!
@@LEFT4BASS Hence why he said “SORT OF” not precisely.
The whole point is just like you Mormons, they made up a fictional story of Jesus to insert him into their geographical/cultural context because they like american mormons think they’re the main character loool
@@scottanos9981 Cry harder
@@LEFT4BASS 😂🤣
Corrections - The Omani Ruling Family was the Yaruba Dynasty, not the Yoruba. Sometimes I say 17th Century but the timeline says 1700s.
This is Part 1 of 5 on the Scramble for Africa (obviously this is just setting the scene). Thanks to the Patreons for voting and, if you'd like, I could always do with a little support in making these longer series and survival guides - www.patreon.com/jabzy
can you do more on the congo kingdom?
A video on Mughal-maratha war?
Add to the corrections that you confused Madeira with Canary Islands, Madeira is further North, almost equidistant from both Portugal and Morocco (but was uninhabited when Portugal claimed it). It is also much smaller than the Canarias, and was the first ever slave plantation colony, after the woodlands it give it the name were destroyed by intentional massive fires in order to plant sugarcane.
Granted that Portugal was also involved in the conquest of Canary Islands but soon it was claimed by Castile instead, leading to some rivalry between the two Iberian powers in the region that would only be solved by the Tordesillas Treaty.
Also Morocco didn’t really single-handedly defeat Songhai. They captured and looted a few cities like Timbuktu which wasn’t even the capital but them were forced to retreat due to uprisings from the people.
The Zanj revolt is actually have said to be a revolt of the peasants along with free and enslaved Africansz
Beautiful video man, i love the music and the way you speak so calming:)
This is great! a lot of things normally left undiscussed in much of internet discourse
African history is either told from either a Eurocentric view or a Afrocentric view, props to you for being the most objective guy on UA-cam on this matter. 🗿
'Afrocentrism' is usually just the truth
‘Eurocentric’ is usually the part that’s make them look cool and make Africans look like they never had foundation, civilizations and were always farmers and gatherers
As a black person, I’ve always heard the word Bantu in reference to the Bantu knot hair style. Good to finally find out where I assume this style came from.
As a Bantu speaker I died at the way you pronounced Xhosa 🤣 Love the content though
Interestingly so accurate. Enjoyed every second of the video👍🏼
Lol hows it feel to pretend arabs are african so you can claim their accomplishments
@@bobcostas6272 😂 u gotta believe what u want to believe. This mental frame that Africans don’t have history is outdated. U need to update urself coz u are just embarrassing urself🤷🏽♂️
@@hasanitto Lmao
Wow Jazby has been playing Rise Of Nations on Roblox
the slave trade did NOT lead to the rise of the Oyo empire, (which happened around 1300 ad) in actual fact it led to the fall of the Oyo empire
I like videos like these because they showcase my favourite part about historical perspectives: how events are so tightly interwoven with their spatial and temporal context that any newcomers (like the colonizers) were totally out of their depth when it came to making sense of the political maneuverings going on around them.
When Caeser campaigned in Gaul he was always losing and gaining allies out of nowhere as his legions moved around the region. He writes in his histories like he’s in control of the situation but then you step back and realize he gets ambushed way too often to be by chance and he gets saved at the most unlikeliest of times (like during the vercingetorix battles) for him to be less of a mastermind and more of a chaotic element being vyed for by different sides