By Runoko Rashidi
Dedicated to Dr. Yosef A. A. Ben-Jochannan
Part 1
Ancient Africa produced many dazzling civilizations and although it was Africa's Upper Nile Valley--the highly regarded Ethiopia ("land of the burnt-faced people"), that gave birth to the world's oldest monarchy of which we are informed (Ta-Seti), it is in pharaonic Kmt (ancient Egypt), the greatest nation of antiquity and Ethiopia's most celebrated offspring, that the tremendous volume of historical inquiry has been made. When we examine the Kemetic civilization of Africa's Nile Valley, we examine perhaps the proudest and loftiest accomplishment in the whole of human annals.
It should be stated early on that from the very beginning of the predynastic Period to the first Kemetic Dynasty and through the mass of her Dynastic Period African people endowed with dark complexions, full lips, broad noses and tightly-curled hair were overwhelmingly dominant in both the general population and the royal families. The efforts of numerous scholars including Cheikh Anta Diop, Chancellor Williams, Theophile Obenga, Yosef ben-Jochannan, Asa Hilliard, Jacob Carruthers, Charles Finch and many others have demonstrated this beyond sane rebuttal. We need not review the evidence here. This has already been done thoroughly and conclusively and a comprehensive bibliography will be presented at the end of this series. This essay is intended merely as a brief synopsis of Kmt's royal dynasties.
By the latter portion of the fourth millennium B.C.E., the forces of the Black Land of Upper Kmt, probably during the reign of Narmer (the historical king often equated with the legendary Menes), had completed the titanic task of coupling Upper Kmt in the South (the borders of which extended from the vicinity of the first cataract to near the apex of the Kemetic Delta), with Lower Kmt in the North (essentially the Delta) into a single unified state. Although the history of the struggle for the unification of the Two Lands is lacking in many details, it is highly significant that Narmer, the first sovereign lord of Dynastic Kmt, came from the South. The orientation of Dynastic Kmt was always towards inner Africa. During Dynastic Kmt's times of deepest crisis renewal always came from the South.
Following Narmer, other important royal personages of the Early Dynastic Period include: Hor-Aha (perhaps Narmer's son), under whom major temples were erected and dedicated to the Neters Ptah and Neit; Djer, who occupied the throne of Kmt for 47 years and celebrated far into Kemetic history as a superb physician; Mer-neit, who may have been Dynastic Kmt's first female monarch; Den, who conducted experiments with stone as a building material; and the last king of Dynasty II, Khaesekhemui, another Southerner who strove aggressively to irrevocably cement the foundations of a strong centralized Kemetic state.
Copyright © 1998 Runoko Rashidi. All rights reserved.