All about Africa

Africa is the world's second largest and second most-populous continent (the first being Asia in both categories). At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of its total land area. [2] With 1.2 billion[1] people as of 2016, it accounts for about 16% of the world's human population . The continent is surrounded by the
Mediterranean Sea to the north, both the Suez Canal and the Red Sea along the Sinai Peninsula to the northeast, the Indian Ocean to the southeast and the Atlantic Ocean to the west. The continent includes Madagascar and various archipelagos . It contains 54 fully recognised sovereign states (countries ), nine
territories and two de facto independent states with limited or no recognition . [3] The majority of the continent and its countries are in the
Northern Hemisphere , with a substantial portion and number of countries in the Southern Hemisphere.
Africa's average population is the youngest amongst all the continents; [4][5] the median age in 2012 was 19.7, when the worldwide median age was 30.4. [6] Algeria is Africa's largest country by area, and Nigeria is its largest by population. Africa, particularly central
Eastern Africa, is widely accepted as the place of origin of humans and the Hominidae clade (great apes ), as evidenced by the discovery of the earliest hominids and their ancestors, as well as later ones that have been dated to around seven million years ago, including
Sahelanthropus tchadensis, Australopithecus africanus , A. afarensis , Homo erectus , H. habilis and H. ergaster —with the earliest Homo sapiens (modern human) found in Ethiopia being dated to circa 200,000 years ago. [7] Africa straddles the equator and encompasses numerous climate areas; it is the only continent to stretch from the northern temperate to southern temperate zones. [8]
Africa hosts a large diversity of ethnicities , cultures and languages. In the late 19th century European countries colonised almost all of Africa; most present states in Africa originated from a process of decolonisation in the 20th century. African nations cooperate through the establishment of the African Union , which is headquartered in Addis Ababa.
Etymology
Statue representing Africa at Palazzo Ferreria, in
Valletta, Malta
Afri was a Latin name used to refer to the inhabitants of Africa, which in its widest sense referred to all lands south of the Mediterranean (Ancient Libya ).[9][10] This name seems to have originally referred to a native Libyan tribe; see Terence for discussion. The name is usually connected with Hebrew or Phoenician
ʿafar 'dust', but a 1981 hypothesis [11] has asserted that it stems from the Berber ifri (plural ifran ) "cave", in reference to cave dwellers. [12] The same word [12] may be found in the name of the Banu Ifran from Algeria and
Tripolitania , a Berber tribe originally from
Yafran (also known as Ifrane ) in northwestern Libya. [13]
Under Roman rule, Carthage became the capital of the province of Africa Proconsularis , which also included the coastal part of modern
Libya .[14] The Latin suffix -ica can sometimes be used to denote a land (e.g., in Celtica from
Celtae , as used by Julius Caesar). The later Muslim kingdom of Ifriqiya, located in modern-day Tunisia, also preserved a form of the name.
According to the Romans, Africa lay to the west of Egypt, while "Asia" was used to refer to
Anatolia and lands to the east. A definite line was drawn between the two continents by the geographer Ptolemy (85–165 AD), indicating
Alexandria along the Prime Meridian and making the isthmus of Suez and the Red Sea the boundary between Asia and Africa. As Europeans came to understand the real extent of the continent, the idea of "Africa" expanded with their knowledge.
Other etymological hypotheses have been postulated for the ancient name "Africa":
The 1st-century Jewish historian Flavius Josephus (Ant. 1.15 ) asserted that it was named for Epher , grandson of Abraham according to Gen. 25:4, whose descendants, he claimed, had invaded Libya.
Isidore of Seville in his 7th-century
Etymologiae XIV.5.2. suggests "Africa comes from the Latin aprica , meaning "sunny".
Massey, in 1881, stated that Africa is derived from the Egyptian af-rui-ka , meaning "to turn toward the opening of the Ka." The Ka is the energetic double of every person and the "opening of the Ka" refers to a womb or birthplace. Africa would be, for the Egyptians, "the birthplace." [15]
Michèle Fruyt in 1976 proposed [16] linking the Latin word with africus "south wind", which would be of Umbrian origin and mean originally "rainy wind".
Robert R. Stieglitz of Rutgers University in 1984 proposed: "The name Africa, derived from the Latin *Aphir-ic-a, is cognate to Hebrew Ophir ." [17]
History
Main article: History of Africa
Further information: History of North Africa,
History of West Africa, History of Central Africa, History of East Africa, and History of Southern Africa
Prehistory
Main article: Recent African origin of modern humans
Lucy , an Australopithecus afarensis skeleton discovered 24 November 1974 in the Awash Valley of Ethiopia 's Afar Depression
Africa is considered by most
paleoanthropologists to be the oldest inhabited territory on Earth , with the human species originating from the continent.[18][19] During the mid-20th century, anthropologists discovered many fossils and evidence of human occupation perhaps as early as 7 million years ago (BP=before present). Fossil remains of several species of early apelike humans thought to have evolved into modern man, such as Australopithecus afarensis (radiometrically dated to approximately 3.9–3.0 million years BP,[20] Paranthropus boisei (c. 2.3–1.4 million years BP)[21] and Homo ergaster (c. 1.9 million–600,000 years BP) have been discovered. [2]
After the evolution of Homo sapiens sapiens approximately 150,000 to 100,000 years BP in Africa, the continent was mainly populated by groups of hunter-gatherers .[22][23][24] These first modern humans left Africa and populated the rest of the globe during the Out of Africa II migration dated to approximately 50,000 years BP, exiting the continent either across Bab-el-Mandeb over the Red Sea ,[25][26] the Strait of Gibraltar in Morocco, [27] or the Isthmus of Suez in Egypt. [28]
Other migrations of modern humans within the African continent have been dated to that time, with evidence of early human settlement found in Southern Africa, Southeast Africa, North Africa, and the Sahara. [29]
The size of the Sahara has historically been extremely variable, with its area rapidly fluctuating and at times disappearing depending on global climatic conditions. [30] At the end of the Ice ages , estimated to have been around 10,500 BC, the Sahara had again become a green fertile valley, and its African populations returned from the interior and coastal highlands in Sub-Saharan Africa, with
rock art paintings depicting a fertile Sahara and large populations discovered in Tassili n'Ajjer dating back perhaps 10 millennia. [31] However, the warming and drying climate meant that by 5000 BC, the Sahara region was becoming increasingly dry and hostile. Around 3500 BC, due to a tilt in the earth's orbit, the Sahara experienced a period of rapid desertification. [32] The population trekked out of the Sahara region towards the Nile Valley below the Second Cataract where they made permanent or semi-permanent settlements. A major climatic recession occurred, lessening the heavy and persistent rains in Central and
Eastern Africa. Since this time, dry conditions have prevailed in Eastern Africa and, increasingly during the last 200 years, in
Ethiopia .
The domestication of cattle in Africa preceded
agriculture and seems to have existed alongside hunter-gatherer cultures. It is speculated that by 6000 BC, cattle were domesticated in North Africa. [33] In the Sahara-Nile complex, people domesticated many animals, including the donkey and a small screw-horned goat which was common from
Algeria to Nubia .
Around 4000 BC, the Saharan climate started to become drier at an exceedingly fast pace. [34] This climate change caused lakes and rivers to shrink significantly and caused increasing
desertification . This, in turn, decreased the amount of land conducive to settlements and helped to cause migrations of farming communities to the more tropical climate of
West Africa. [34]
By the first millennium BC, ironworking had been introduced in Northern Africa and quickly spread across the Sahara into the northern parts of sub-Saharan Africa,[35] and by 500 BC, metalworking began to become commonplace in West Africa. Ironworking was fully established by roughly 500 BC in many areas of East and West Africa, although other regions didn't begin ironworking until the early centuries AD. Copper objects from Egypt, North Africa, Nubia, and Ethiopia dating from around 500 BC have been excavated in West Africa, suggesting that Trans-Saharan trade networks had been established by this date. [34]
Early civilizations
Main article: Ancient African history
Colossal statues of Ramesses II at Abu Simbel , Egypt, date from around 1400 BC.
At about 3300 BC, the historical record opens in Northern Africa with the rise of literacy in the
Pharaonic civilization of Ancient Egypt. [36] One of the world's earliest and longest-lasting civilizations, the Egyptian state continued, with varying levels of influence over other areas, until 343 BC. [37][38] Egyptian influence reached deep into modern-day Libya and Nubia , and, according to Martin Bernal, as far north as Crete. [39]
An independent centre of civilization with trading links to Phoenicia was established by
Phoenicians from Tyre on the north-west African coast at Carthage . [40][41][42]
European exploration of Africa began with
Ancient Greeks and Romans . [citation needed] In 332 BC, Alexander the Great was welcomed as a liberator in Persian-occupied Egypt. He founded Alexandria in Egypt, which would become the prosperous capital of the Ptolemaic dynasty after his death. [43]
Following the conquest of North Africa's Mediterranean coastline by the Roman Empire, the area was integrated economically and culturally into the Roman system. Roman settlement occurred in modern Tunisia and elsewhere along the coast. The first Roman emperor native to North Africa was Septimius Severus , born in Leptis Magna in present-day Libya—his mother was Italian Roman and his father was Punic .[44]
Christianity spread across these areas at an early date, from Judaea via Egypt and beyond the borders of the Roman world into Nubia; [45] by AD 340 at the latest, it had become the state religion of the Aksumite Empire. Syro-Greek missionaries , who arrived by way of the Red Sea, were responsible for this theological development. [46]
In the early 7th century, the newly formed Arabian Islamic Caliphate expanded into Egypt, and then into North Africa. In a short while, the local Berber elite had been integrated into Muslim Arab tribes. When the Umayyad capital Damascus fell in the 8th century, the Islamic centre of the Mediterranean shifted from Syria to Qayrawan in North Africa. Islamic North Africa had become diverse, and a hub for mystics, scholars, jurists, and philosophers. During the above-mentioned period, Islam spread to sub-Saharan Africa, mainly through trade routes and migration.