africa is the world's second-largest and second-most-populous continent.
At about 30.2 million km² (11.7 million sq mi) including adjacent islands, it
covers six percent of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4 percent of
the total land area. With 1.0 billion people (as of 2009, see table), it accounts for about 15% 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 archipelagoes. It has 54 fully recognized sovereign states ("countries"), 9 territories and two de facto independent states with limited or no recognition.Africa's name is derived from an ancient area in modern day Tunisia known as Ifriqiya or sunny place, in Tamazight. Algeria is the largest African country by area, and Nigeria is the largest by population. Africa, particularly central Eastern Africa, is widely accepted as the origin of humans and the Hominidae clade (great
apes), as evidenced by the discovery of the earliest hominids and their ancestors, as wel 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. Africa straddles the equator and encompasses numerous climate areas; it is the only continent to stretch from the noEtymology Afri was a Latin name used to refer to the Carthaginians, who dwelt in North
Africa in modern-day Tunisia. This name seems to have originally
referred to a native Libyan tribe; however, see Terence#Biography for discussion. The name is usually connected with Phoenician afar, "dust", but a 1981 hypothesis has asserted that it stems from the Berber ifri (plural ifran) "cave", in reference to cave dwellers. The same word 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. Under Roman rule, Carthage became the capital of Africa Province, which also included the coastal part of modern Libya. 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, modern-day Tunisia, also preserved a form of the name According to the ancient 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":
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.[citation needed] However, the warming and drying climate meant that by 5000 BC, the Sahara region was
becoming increasingly dry and hostile. 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 already domesticated in North Africa. 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. In the year 4000 BC, the climate of the Sahara started to become drier at an exceedingly fast pace. 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 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, 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. At about 3300 BC, the historical record opens in Northern Africa with the rise of literacy in the Pharaonic civilization of Ancient Egypt. 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.
Egyptian influence reached deep into modern-day Libya, north to Crete and
,[citation needed] and south to the kingdoms of Aksum[citation needed] and Nubia.[citation needed An independent center of civilization with trading links to Phoenicia was established by Phoenicians from Tyre on the north-west African coast at Carthage
european exploration of Africa began with Ancient Greeks and Romans. 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. 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. Christianity spread across these areas at an early date, from Judaea via Egypt and beyond the borders of the Roman world into Nubia;[citation needed] by AD 340 at the latest, it had become the state religion of the Aksumite Empire thanks to Syro-Greek missionaries who arrived by way of the red Sea. 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 center 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.
At about 30.2 million km² (11.7 million sq mi) including adjacent islands, it
covers six percent of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4 percent of
the total land area. With 1.0 billion people (as of 2009, see table), it accounts for about 15% 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 archipelagoes. It has 54 fully recognized sovereign states ("countries"), 9 territories and two de facto independent states with limited or no recognition.Africa's name is derived from an ancient area in modern day Tunisia known as Ifriqiya or sunny place, in Tamazight. Algeria is the largest African country by area, and Nigeria is the largest by population. Africa, particularly central Eastern Africa, is widely accepted as the origin of humans and the Hominidae clade (great
apes), as evidenced by the discovery of the earliest hominids and their ancestors, as wel 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. Africa straddles the equator and encompasses numerous climate areas; it is the only continent to stretch from the noEtymology Afri was a Latin name used to refer to the Carthaginians, who dwelt in North
Africa in modern-day Tunisia. This name seems to have originally
referred to a native Libyan tribe; however, see Terence#Biography for discussion. The name is usually connected with Phoenician afar, "dust", but a 1981 hypothesis has asserted that it stems from the Berber ifri (plural ifran) "cave", in reference to cave dwellers. The same word 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. Under Roman rule, Carthage became the capital of Africa Province, which also included the coastal part of modern Libya. 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, modern-day Tunisia, also preserved a form of the name According to the ancient 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 Etymologiae XIV.5.2. suggests the Latin aprica "sunny".
- Leo
Africanus (1488–1554) proposed the Greek aphrike (Αφρική),
"without cold". Africanus suggested that the Greek phrike (φρίκη, "cold
and horror"), combined with the privative prefix "a-", indicated a land free of cold and
horror. - Another theory is that the word aphrikè comes from aphròs,
'foam' and Aphrikè, 'land of foam', meaning the land of the big
waves (like Attica, from the word aktè, Aktikè
meaning land of the coasts).[citation needed] - Massey, in 1881, states that Africa is derived from the Egyptian
af-rui-ka, "to turn toward the opening of the Ka." The Ka is the energetic double of every person and
"opening of the Ka" refers to a womb or birthplace. Africa would be, for the
Egyptians, "the birthplace." - Yet another hypothesis was proposed by Michèle Fruyt in Revue de
Philologie 50, 1976: 221–238, linking the Latin word with africus
"south wind", which would be of Umbrian origin and mean originally "rainy
wind".
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.[citation needed] However, the warming and drying climate meant that by 5000 BC, the Sahara region was
becoming increasingly dry and hostile. 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 already domesticated in North Africa. 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. In the year 4000 BC, the climate of the Sahara started to become drier at an exceedingly fast pace. 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 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, 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. At about 3300 BC, the historical record opens in Northern Africa with the rise of literacy in the Pharaonic civilization of Ancient Egypt. 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.
Egyptian influence reached deep into modern-day Libya, north to Crete and
,[citation needed] and south to the kingdoms of Aksum[citation needed] and Nubia.[citation needed An independent center of civilization with trading links to Phoenicia was established by Phoenicians from Tyre on the north-west African coast at Carthage
european exploration of Africa began with Ancient Greeks and Romans. 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. 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. Christianity spread across these areas at an early date, from Judaea via Egypt and beyond the borders of the Roman world into Nubia;[citation needed] by AD 340 at the latest, it had become the state religion of the Aksumite Empire thanks to Syro-Greek missionaries who arrived by way of the red Sea. 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 center 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.