African Asiatic Studies Project

The Mande-Soninke-Songhai (Zaghai - or early Beriberi/“Berbers”) relationship to ancient Judaism is one of the fascinating topics in the subject Afroasiatic civilization. Remember Berber is the ancient name for those that came to be called Djana, Ignawan and Niger, Nigritae or Negro in Europe. The Dogon are an old group of the Mande or Malinke stock that may have been derived from two groups called Sao and the Soninke. The latter as shown in the posts below and on the blogspot were the same people as Wakore or Wa n'gara, Garawa or Djerma Songhai - an originally Zaghai or Zaghawa population of the Beriberi. The writer of the Sirius Mystery thus had correctly tried to link them to the Garamantes (Jerma, Garama). One author who wrote a book called, The Science of the Dogon, has noticed a connection between the mythological concept of the primordial Word found in both Dogon and Jewish religion for example. The Dogon - like numerous African tribes - and Judaism share the circumcision ritual, and its meanings in Dogon culture explains its significance in the ancient Middle East. Would you believe there is a connection between circumcision and the star Sirius? Certain details of the prayer shawls of the Dogon (See below) and those of western Jewish people are the same according to this same author. Hmmm…how did that happen?! The author says he was “interested in the parallels between Dogon rituals and those of modern day Judaism because the Dogon religion includes enticing explanations of the practice of circumcision and the celebration of the jubilee year.“ In fact the author claims the Dogon preserve the same calendar. He also sees a connection between the priests of the Dogon called Hogun and that of the Kohan or Kahin of the early Judaeans, although that connection has yet to be truly proven. There are also links that the author notes in his other books between the Dogon and ancient Egyptian culture, the Sumerians and even Gobekli Tepe and neolithic Scotland. As mentioned previously the Dogon venerate Amma and also Nummo which appears etymologically related to both the name of the watery consciousness of Nu (Noah) and the Khnoum of ancient Khamit. The Nummo are called amphibious and fish-like beings, not dissimilar to Uah or "Oannes” of Sumeria. But what is important to remember is that as Marcel Griaule stated they preserve a philosophical mystery system found in societies across Africa, not just among the Dogon. It is likely that the Dogon like other groups of Mande stem from both the Soninke who were gold miners, traders, smiths and Yehudim and the aboriginal Sao populations. There is African tradition however that says the Sao or So were themselves descendants of the Ad that came and established themselves in the Lake Chad region at a very remote period in time. ; )

I really find myself struck by how white the narrative of art history is. I graduated with a degree in art, took 5 art history classes, and never heard about this. Yes, please. Disrupt the narrative.

Art history is really white washed especially when you look at the different art movements like Cubism. I think it also has something to do with where you study art/art history because I remembered I wanted to do art history for my undergraduate degree but couldn’t because of reasons and I knew that hardly any universities looked at the African continent but some did like University of London: School of Oriental and African Studies and if I did do arr history and has gone to SOAS I probably would have learnt this. It’s not like this isn’t being taught, the problem is that not enough institutions are teaching it. There are so many problems in the art world, don’t even know where to begin. There are resources out their if you look but I wouldn’t recommend blogs like medievalpoc because they’re a white person who pretended to be non white and is antisemitic and anti-romani they also don’t understand the fact that people living in the African and Asian continent are not poc because its a western racial construct which shouldn’t be applied to them and its a modern one so labelling them poc would make no sense (they need to stop applying modern constructs to non modern people) you can find a post with receipts if you check the tag. Anways, I also think if its something you specialised in then you would have known about it and understood it, if you’re focus is on particular types of art movements like Tonalism or Realism then you probably wouldn’t have come across it. But I do think things like this need to be taught in intro classes because it’s pretty damn lazy and wrong to ignore the impact colonialism (and different African arts and in this case Congolese arts) had on art in Europe