religion, there were many purposes, including marking sa-
cred ground or altars and indicating places for worshipping
the sun. Many Africans believed the sun to be sacred, and
archaeologists have found evidence that a profound interest
in the sun dates back several thousand years.
As in other parts of the world, management of light
probably began with campfi res. In modern times the San of
sout hern Af rica centered ma ny of t heir act iv it ies on a fi re that
provided a central gathering place in their communities. In
Saharan Africa there was a mix of ethnic groups for thou-
sands of years, as their rock paintings make clear. For regions
where diff erent cultures mixed, the area around a campfi re
became a gathering place for people to share information and
stories. Th us, the fi re’s light in the dark not only helped peo-
ple to see but also drew them together.
When the Sahara was a fertile land, it was populated fi rst
by hunter-gatherers (perhaps 27,500–5095 b.c.e.) and then
herders of cattle and sheep. Th ey used torches of wood to light
their way at night. Th e exact mechanisms of the torches have
yet to be defi ned, but these early peoples probably just ignited
sticks of wood at one end and then let them burn down. How-
ever, the ancient Saharans had at hand what they needed to
make more sophisticated torches, such as sticks wrapped at
one end with grass or cloth soaked in animal fat. Whether
the Saharans used torches in their religious ceremonies is un-
certain.
Th e history of ancient Africa is very incomplete, but here
and there archaeology off ers hints at how ancient Africans
dealt with illumination. Th e management of light seems to
have been very important for them by the time they begin to
show up in ancient histories. Th eir homes show that sunlight
was oft en an enemy. Whether the homes were woven huts, grass
and wood huts, houses of clay, or houses of stone, throughout
central and northern Africa, from west to east, houses tended
not to have windows. Th ey did not even have openings in their
roofs to let out smoke from hearths. A single door was oft en
the only source of outside light, perhaps because the sun can
be harsh in Africa, and keeping cool inside one’s home may
have been more important than having light.
During the Meroitic Period (ca. 590 b.c.e.–ca. 350 c.e.),
the Kushites (ca. 900 b.c.e.–ca. 350 c.e.) of eastern Africa
south of Egypt developed a way of managing sunlight that
would be duplicated in later cultures in West Africa. City
dwellers built homes that consisted of a walled enclosure with
rooms at its corners. A single door opened into the enclosure,
giving the homeowners the privacy of a home, but the en-
closure was open to the sun. Th e rooms had single doorways
into the enclosure, and they were otherwise without open-
ings. Th ose who lived in the house could have the benefi ts of
sunlight for their daily activities but could retreat into cooler
rooms when they wished to escape the heat.
Th e Bantu-speaking peoples of the third century c.e.
seem to have used torches to light their villages at night.
Some of their ancient altars consisted of a large uncut stone
on which a statue or mystical symbol rested. To the sides of
these altars were torches, perhaps just to frame the altar in
light. Th e torches may also have had a ritual purpose, now
unknown. Th e Kushites were heavily infl uenced by the Egyp-
tians, and they adopted Egyptian lighting techniques for
their own homes, temples, and civic buildings. As early as the
2600s b.c.e. Egyptians were using indirect sunlight to illumi-
nate interiors of underground tombs. An aperture was cut at
an angle through the roof and ceiling so that direct sunlight
did not fall into the passage below but a haze of light did. Th is
construction may have been used in Kushite temple passages,
keeping some of the heat of the sun outside while enabling
sunlight to play on bright, glistening interior decorations of
precious metals, creating a display of sparkling art.
Th e Egyptians are oft en credited with inventing the oil
lamp. Th is method of lighting quickly became known to the
peoples in touch with Egypt, called “Libyans” to the west of
Egypt and “Nubians” to the south of Egypt, where the king-
dom of Kush eventually arose. Archaeology has yet to reveal
how extensive the use of oil lamps was in Kush, but it was
probably widespread. Th e simplest oil lamps, shallow bowls
made of clay with impressed lips for holding wicks of cotton,
could have been used by even ordinary Kushite farmers. In
Kushite cities there may have been stands of metal to hold
them or niches in the walls of stone buildings. Th ey prob-
ably did not entirely supplant torches, because torches made
a dramatic image when arrayed in a large assembly hall or
along an otherwise dark passage leading into the depths of a
large temple.
An example of Kushites’ managing light is the Sun Tem-
ple outside the city of Meroë, once the capital city of Kush.
Th e temple is in a hollow in the ground but is raised above the
ground at the bottom of the hollow, perhaps to accumulate
rainwater, which was used to water a grassy lawn around the
temple. Th e fl oor of the temple was yellow, and its walls were
blue. Its sanctuary was surrounded by columns. On the back
wall, facing the entrance, was a golden circle representing the
sun. It would have dazzled people, with the refl ected sunlight
seeming to thrust out of the earth, while the temple seemed
to fl oat on yellow light.
By the time Kush fell out of history around 350 c.e., an-
other ancient kingdom, Axum (ca. 500 b.c.e.–ca. 950 c.e.),
was on the rise. Th e Axumites were a cosmopolitan people
who were constantly visited by traders from Europe, the
Near East, and southern and eastern Asia. Th ey built houses
with columns similar to those used in India’s architecture.
Short awnings of stone or wood extended over the columns,
and behind them were windows, oft en arched at their tops.
Th ese windows had latticework shutters that would allow
some light into the rooms beyond but that would keep the
rooms somewhat shadowy. It is possible that the shutters were
carved so that decorative patterns would fall on the fl oor as
sunlight passed through. Th e windows probably had panes
of glass. Glass windows inspired an explosion of creativity
when Axumites converted to Christianity in the mid-fourth
century c.e. Techniques for making colored glass were prob-584 illumination: Africa