The emergence of a food-producing economy in the Sahara

The prestige of Pharaonic Egypt has long been such that its aura has been projected backwards onto earlier periods. Indeed, it was until recently considered inconceivable that Africa's so-called ‘Neolithic Revolution’ could have started anywhere other than in the valley of the Nile. Earlier predynastic villages — especially the Fayum (see Wetterstrom, Ch. 10, this volume) — were long seen as the first stars from which the light of civilization had radiated throughout the whole of Africa. The discovery of the Khartoum Mesolithic (Arkell 1949) extended this theme to the Sudan: henceforth the ‘Sudanese crucible’ (creuset) was lyrically celebrated as the origin of the innovations which were allegedly exported to the vast Sahara area.