ADSactly History : Lost Science Of Ancient Africa [Part 1]

Africa contributed immensely to the origin and development of various science disciplines - this is substantiated by the fact that the Ancient Africa was the birthplace of modern human species from the ancestral hominid species. By inference; Africa is the ancestral home of mankind. However, because of the influence of the wider world and partly due to colonialism and colonial education, Africa has been denied of many contributions that should be credited to her, both in the field of science and whatnot. It is quite disheartening that Africa is always referred to as "Dark Continent", but here we'll bring to light some science disciplines that flourished in Africa in the pre-colonial era.

_{[Pre-colonial Africa. Image from Wikimedia Commons. Author: Brown, Robert. Public Domain]}

During the ancient times (the pre-colonial era), the development of science on the African continent was majorly characterized by slow adoption and slow proliferation of new scientific discoveries. However, with all these slow adoption rate, many ancient scientific discoveries can be traced to the continent of Africa. Let's look at some of them.

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Advanced Metallurgy

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Metallurgy; like we all know; is the science that deals with the extraction, purification and alloying of metallic elements, but have you taken time to research about history as it relates to metallurgy? Between the 1st and 5th century AD, according to archeological reviews, it has been inferred that the people of ancient Tanzania (west of Victoria lake) created tools made of carbon steel. Impressive right? Okay hold on!! Steel is a metallic alloy comprising of iron and carbon - but the amazing part of it is the fact that the process used to create this alloy was way advanced for such era.

According to Professor Peter Schmidt (professor of history and anthropology), he stated that the process of producing steel using blast furnace wasn't seen in Europe till around 14th century _[ref], but the Haya tribe (in the ancient Tanzanian region) mastered the act quite earlier than can be explained.

The history of the Haya tribe is one that fascinates even history scholars. According to oral tradition (which is a very valid source of history), the Haya people believed that their ancestral king brought the technology of steel making to their tribe from "heaven" and they also believed that the king made an iron pillar (steel) which he used to return back to "heaven". Well, whether the legend is true or not, you'd be surprised to know that the furnace which they used to produced steel has the technology which is comparable to the present day blast furnace - what an ancient ingenuity.

_{[Prototype of Haya furnace. Image Source. Credited to Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel]}

This technology, though originated in Haya, but it spread to other parts of Africa and flourished extensively during the iron age in the continent of Africa. Asides metallurgy, what other field of science has its root in Africa?

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Medical Sciences

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A lot of African history has been lost due to the fact that there were poor records during the pre-colonial era and the source of history that was predominant at the ancient time was "oral tradition". African medicine is one of the lost sciences of Africa and that is why many have attributed medicine to western science. Even at that, some western medical practices are now incorporating elements of African medicine like herbal treatment, placebo et al.

One major area of medicine that flourished during the ancient times long before the introduction of surgical interventions was the area of orthopaedics. You will agree with me that traditional bone setting is not uncommon, particularly in parts of Sub-Saharan Africa - even till this present time, it has remained a very potent way of treating broken bones and other orthopaedic problems. As a matter of fact, while growing up as a kid _{(@samminator speaking here)}, my local community (eastern part of Nigeria) had a particular kindred well known for bone setting and almost all cases of fractures were referred to the family, and they had a high success rate as comparable to conventional hospitals - or even more.

Judging from the adoption of the Traditional bone Setting (TBS), you will not be wrong to infer that is has remained among the very few ancient medical practices that has survived till this present time and still flourishing

Many methods are employed by traditional bone setters (particularly in parts of eastern Nigerian that I have witnessed) - For fractures of the long bones (femur, humerus et al), bamboo sticks or carved splints are usually placed on the affected part and secured with a piece of cloth or bandage. The purpose of the splint is to immobilize the affected area for few days, after which the bandage will be loosened and the site massaged a little. The bandage will be placed back and the process will be repeated after few days or weeks (as the case may be). Surprisingly, all the cases I witnessed were successful and the patients regained the used of the affected parts.

Even though there is no much formal education on TBS, the act of bone setting is usually based on skills acquired through oral tradition. This does not also rule off the fact that there could be potential risks associated with such practices (like the risk of complications). This is the reason it has been advocated that there should be some organized programs to formally educate traditional bone setters to improve their skills and performance _[ref].

Apart from the field of orthopedics, Africa is also home to many medicinal herbs and the knowledge of these herbs and the uses flourished during the ancient times, even though some elements of spirituality were incorporated into it. On the overall, the ancient African subregions were well known for medicine. We'll look at other lost sciences in the next part.

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References: Ref1, Ref2, Ref3, Ref4