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Archaeological Research in West Africa*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2015

A. J. Arkell*
Affiliation:
Archaeology and Anthropology, Anglo-Egyptian Sudan

Extract

The pilgrimage to Mecca made on foot across Africa from west to east between the desert and the tropical forest keeps many West Africans in close touch with the valley of the Nile. The pilgrims follow a route along which culture must from the earliest times have been spread by refugees, traders, military expeditions and the like. (In these latter days motorized convoys of West African troops and aerial reinforcements for the Middle East have followed the same route).

Over twenty years’ service in the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan (of which twelve years were spent in Darfur, where the cultural and political influence of West Africa was strong in medieval times, and is still felt today), has left me much interested in West Africa, although I have never been there.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd 1944

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References

* A memorandum submitted by request to the Commission on Higher Education in West Africa, and printed here by kind consent of the Commission and of the Sudan Government. The author adds a note explaining that it was written while on leave in Eire, away from all his notes and books of reference; he is now in the sudan and unable to see the proofs.