North AfricaNorth Africa

North Africa:

Egypt

• Of course, one of the main countries in North Africa.

• Started off small with divided villages, but by 3100 BC, it was united under one king, the pharaoh.

• It’s the Old Kingdom pharaohs, from about 2600 BC to 2100 BC, who built the pyramids.

• The pyramids didn’t actually start out that way. There were efforts working up to them.

• The Great Pyramid was originally 480 feet tall and was the tallest manmade structure in the world for over 4,000 years.

• Its tolerances are minute and its foundation incredibly level (no corner of its 13 acre footprint is more than ½ inch higher than any other) – actually far better than what you find in almost all modern buildings.

• It’s built out of 2.4 million blocks of limestone, which had an average weight of 2.5 tons. The heaviest weighed up to 80 tons. Some blocks came from a quarry 500 miles away. It weighs almost 5.9 million tons.

• The stones were so perfectly set that you couldn’t squeeze a piece of paper in the seam (if you could see it). This was all without cement.

• And we’re not sure how they cut the stone.

North Africa has been ruled by a succession of powers from ancient to modern times.

• Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, Arabs, Ottomans, French, Italian, German, British.

• It was primarily under Roman control from around 200 BC to AD 600, when the Muslims conquered the area.

• Though it had been in the European/Christian sphere of influence, it came irrevocably under the Arab/Muslim influence and remains so to this day.

Economy

• The economy in some countries, e.g. Libya and Algeria, is heavily based on oil.

• Other locales, such as Egypt, have a more balanced economy.

Culture

Souks

• A marketplace found in many North African cities.

• All sorts of products are sold here.

Rai music

• Form of Algerian music.

• Was originally somewhat carefree, but became the music of independence and protest against French rule before 1962 and is now against fundamentalist Islam.

Early rai music from the 1930’s.

Modern rai music.