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Archaeological Discoveries on the Blue Nile

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2015

F. Addison
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Abstract

In a recent article in this journal Mr O. G. S. Crawford referred to the people of the Sudan as a people without a history, and he drew attention to the possibilities of filling some of the lacunae in their history by the excavation of sites south of Khartoum especially along the White Nile. It is, of course, true, as the responsible authorities are well aware, that a good deal of exploration remains to be done in the Sudan and awaits only the necessary funds. It is probable, also, that many ancient village sites in the area between the Blue and White Niles now lie beneath the cotton fields of the Gezira Irrigation Scheme. It is therefore the more unfortunate that some archaeological discoveries which have been made have either been inadequately published or their publication has been inordinately delayed.

In this latter respect archaeology has been singularly unfortunate in the district round Sennar, on the Blue Nile, a region which appears to have been important throughout the history of the Sudan. It is doubtful if the Egyptians of the Old Kingdom penetrated as far south as this, though their descendants may have done so in New Kingdom times ; but the area was certainly a centre of civilization in the heyday of the Meroitic kingdom, about the beginning of the Christian era, and, nearer our own times, it was the headquarters of the powerful Fung kings of the 16th to 18th centuries.

Type
Research Article
Information
Antiquity , Volume 24 , Issue 93 , March 1950 , pp. 12 - 24
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd 1950

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References

1 ANTIQUITY, vol. XXII, no. 85, March 1948.

2 Three Burials in Sennar District, by A. J. Arkell. S.N. & R., XVII, 1934, p. 103.

3 Antiquities at Sennar, by F. Addison. S.N. & R., XVIII, 1935, p. 288.

4 Buhen, by C. L. Woolley and D. Randall Maclver. (The Eckley B. Coxe Junior Expedition to Nubia, vol. VIII).

5 Oxford Excavations in Nubia, by F. Ll. Griffith. Annals of Archaeology and Anthropology (Liverpool), vol. XI.

6 Excavations at Gammai, by Oric Bates and Dows Dunham. {Harvard African Studies, vol. VIII), p. 41 and pl. LXII, 27.

7 loc. cit., pl. XLII.

8 Karanog, The Romano-Nubian Cemetery, by C. L. Woolley and D. Randall Maclver. (The Eckley B. Coxe Junior Expedition to Nubia, vol. IV), pl. 102.

9 Jebel Moya, by F. Addison (The Wellcome Excavations in the Sudan), pls. CXI, CXIII. A discussion of this type of pot is given on p. 220.

10 loc. cit.

11 Annals of Archaeology and Anthropology, vol. XI, pls. LXII, LXIII, LXX.

12 Vol. XVII, 1934, p. 103.

13 Abu Geili, by O. G. S. Crawford and F. Addison (The Wellcome Excavations in the Sudan), pls. XIII, XIV.

14 Abu Gali, pl. LA.

15 ibid, pl. LB.

16 The area in the angle between the Blue and White Niles.