1. The Problem Homeric Greek nēpios, at first glance, does not present obvious semantic problems. LSJ [1] give as a first meaning “infant, child,” citing νήπιον, οὔ πω εἰδόθ’ ὁμοιΐου πολέμοιο [2] nēpios, who knew nothing yet of the joining of battle [3] IX 440 [4] and the frequently […]
Preface to the Edition of 1990 This study was written in 1975–76 as my doctoral dissertation. In preparing it for publication 13 years later, I made such revisions as seem to me to render the text clearer and more readable. This new edition does not, however, incorporate recent work on the […]
Bibliography Asheri, D., A. Lloyd, and A. Corcella. 2007. A Commentary on Herodotus Books I–IV. New York. Austin, M. 2008. “The Greeks in Libya” in Greek Colonisation: An Account of Greek Colonies and Other Settlements Overseas, Volume Two, ed. G. R. Tsetskhladze, 187–217. Mnemosyne, Supplementa 193. Leiden. […]
6. Isis Africa’s most influential cultural export to the Greco-Roman world was the worship of the goddess Isis. The worship of Isis became very popular with both Greeks and Romans and spread throughout the ancient Mediterranean world. Isis was assimilated to various Greek and Roman divinities and forms of religious activities (e.g. […]
5. Imperialism: Rome Rome’s involvement with Africa began with a conflict over power in Sicily. The island lay between Italy and Africa and became the catalyst for Rome’s first conflict with the North African city of Carthage, which was a growing naval power in the third century BCE. In addition to Rome’s […]
4. Imperialism: The Persians and Alexander the Great Alexander the Great was not the first foreign ruler to seize power in Egypt. From 760–656 BCE, Egypt was ruled by the twenty-fifth Dynasty and those kings came from the Kingdom of Kush in Nubia. [1] Although the Kushites imposed their rule on Egypt, […]
3. Greek Colonization Before Alexander In addition to trade and exploration, the Greeks encountered Africa through colonization. As early as 800 BCE, there were Greek settlements outside Greece. Asia Minor was the focus on the earliest Greek colonization, followed by Sicily and southern Italy. Settlements in northern Africa, beginning in the mid-seventh […]
2. Geographers and Ethnographers on Africa Interest in what lay beyond the boundaries of their own society led Greek geographers to conduct systematic explorations and produce maps. Fascination with the peoples who inhabited remote regions spawned the genre of ethnography (literally “writing about tribes”). For these geographers and ethnographers, Africa represented one […]
1. Early Greek Contact with Africa The earliest known contact between Greece and Africa occurred in the Bronze Age, during the fourteenth century BCE, when the Minoans began to trade with Egypt. The first narratives mentioning Greek contact with Africa are in the Homeric poems, which date to the eighth century BCE. […]
Introduction The Mediterranean Sea connects Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. More properly, the Mediterranean connects people in these regions who are in reasonable proximity to the coast (or have access to it via rivers) and who have the ability to travel by water. As soon as these conditions were met, cultural […]