Historical Dictionary of Ancient and Medieval Nubia


Book Description

The Historical Dictionary of Ancient and Medieval Nubia covers the period from the Paleolithic, all the periods of ancient Nubia (Predynastic, Kerma, Dynasty XXV, Napatan, Meroitic, Post-Meroitic) and to the end of medieval Christianity in Nubia (Sudan). This resource focuses on Nubian history through a Nubian perspective, rather than on the more common Egypto-centrism perspective, and the coverage is based on the latest and best archaeological and epigraphic evidence. Newly created maps of the general area and its specific regions and place names and a photospread showing important related features of the region are included. A detailed chronology provides a timeline of historical events, and an introductory narrative shapes the overall history and leads to the main body of the work in the form of a cross-referenced dictionary. The descriptive entries cover the main features of the region in the various periods that are key not only to Nubian events, but also to the important interactions they had with Egypt to the north. Nine appendices and an extensive bibliography conclude this work. Lobban has been teaching Nubian studies in undergraduate classrooms for thirty years, and this book is a product of his hands-on experiences as well as extensive anthropological fieldwork and travel in Sudanese and Egyptian Nubia.




Handbook of Ancient Nubia


Book Description

Numerous research projects have studied the Nubian cultures of Sudan and Egypt over the last thirty years, leading to significant new insights. The contributions to this handbook illuminate our current understanding of the cultural history of this fascinating region, including its interconnections to the natural world.




Studien Zum Antiken Sudan


Book Description




The Languages and Linguistics of Africa


Book Description

This innovative handbook takes a fresh look at the currently underestimated linguistic diversity of Africa, the continent with the largest number of languages in the world. It covers the major domains of linguistics, offering both a representative picture of Africa’s linguistic landscape as well as new and at times unconventional perspectives. The focus is not so much on exhaustiveness as on the fruitful relationship between African and general linguistics and the contributions the two domains can make to each other. This volume is thus intended for readers with a specific interest in African languages and also for students and scholars within the greater discipline of linguistics.




Public Documents from Sinnar


Book Description

This selection of Arabic and English translations illuminates the changes of eighteenth-century government in the northern Nile Valley of Sudan, and provides reliable chronological points of reference for the history of the region. The documents offered in this volume, including charter grants of land and privilege, administrative letters, judicial rulings, and other official government records, date form 1702 to 1820. This period marks the apogee of the wealth, power, and geographical extent of the realm of the Funji kings of Sinnar who reigned over much of the Sudan from about 1500 until the Turkish colonial conquest of 1821. These records document with concrete precision and eloquence the dissolution of the agrarian social order of an old African kingdom under the corroding influence of intrusive Mediterranean commercial practices and culture. They reveal the Sudan's legacy of a traditionally weak government vulnerable to manipulation or conquest by foreign powers and a divided and impoverished society dominated by a minority of urban interests.




Nubians and the Nubian Language in Contemporary Egypt


Book Description

The displacement of the Egyptian Nubians from their ancient lands and their resettlement deeper in the land of Egypt in 1964 had an impact on Nubian culture and the Nubian language. Contemporary Egyptian Nubian consists of two dialects, Fadicca and Matoki. After the resettlement of Nubians, the interactions between speakers of the two Nubian dialects and speakers of Arabic increased. Nubian, an East Sudanic language, came into contact with a dominant Semitic language, Arabic. How has this increased contact affected the Nubian language in Egypt? The aim of this work is to examine from the perspective of a 'language-contact situation' the impact of the resettlement on the future of the Nubian language. The comparative data on the Nubian situation will add an important contribution to our fund of knowledge on processes of language contact. This is the first sociolinguistic study of the Nubian language from such a perspective.




Dotawo: A Journal of Nubian Studies 6: Miscellanea Nubiana


Book Description

Dotawo: A Journal of Nubian Studies offers a platform in which the old meets the new, in which archaeological, papyrological, and philological research into Meroitic, Old Nubian, Coptic, Greek, and Arabic sources confront current investigations in modern anthropology and ethnography, Nilo-Saharan linguistics, and the critical and theoretical approaches of postcolonial and African studies. Dotawo gives a common home to the past, present, and future of one of the richest areas of research in African studies. It offers a crossroads where papyrus can meet the internet, scribes meet critical thinkers, and the promises of growing nations meet the accomplishments of older kingdoms.Bringing together a collection of articles that were first presented as papers at the International Medieval Congress at the University of Leeds in 2016 and additional articles, the sixth volume of Dotawo showcases a diverse richness of topics concerning Nubia. The articles within this volume attest to the cultural, linguistic, geographic, and demographic diversity witnessed throughout Nubian history nationally and internationally amongst its neighbours, both near and far.




A History of African Linguistics


Book Description

The first global history of African linguistics as an emerging autonomous academic discipline, covering Africa, the Americas, Asia, Australia, and Europe.




The Meroitic Language and Writing System


Book Description

This book provides an introduction to the Meroitic language and writing system, which was used between circa 300 BC and 400 AD in the kingdom of Meroe, located in what is now Sudan and Egyptian Nubia. This book details advances in the understanding of Meroitic, a language that until recently was considered untranslatable. In addition to providing a full history of the script and an analysis of the phonology, grammar, and linguistic affiliation of the language it features: linguistic analyses for those working on Nilo-Saharan comparative linguistics, paleographic tables useful to archeologists for dating purposes, and an overview of texts that can be translated or understood by way of analogy for those working on Nubian religion, history, and archaeology.