How Did Kush Culture Develop

Many of the peoples of West Africa are able to trace their origins back to the Nile River Valley. Egypt, during mid 600 BCE, though during this time it may have been known by the “Gift of the Nile,” was only a very minor portion of the vast Nile Valley culture. However, in the late 600 BCE the Assyrians conquered Egypt. Around 671 BCE, the Assyrians were able to run the Kushites out of Egypt with great superior weaponry. With this weaponry they were able to conquer and rule Egypt all to themselves. The Assyrians used iron weapons, which were harder and more powerful than the bronze weapons that the Kushites used. These African rulers and many of their inhabitants migrated to and over a short period of time assimilated into the kingdom of Kush.

They had fallen under the persistent attacks of nomads from southern and eastern lands. Not to mention the steadily emerging Axum Kingdom in Ethiopia that challenged the Kush Kingdom and eventually contributed to its demise. After a thousand years, by 2000 BCE, Nubia gradually evolved, it became larger and more powerful than ever. Nubia became known as the Kingdom of Kush. The people of this kingdom traded ivory and other treasures from southern Africa with the peoples who lived further north. Around 1500 BCE Egyptian leaders sent armies that would overpower Kush. For nearly 500 years, Kush would be controlled by the Egyptians. The Kush people were forced to pay the Pharaoh a tribute. Eventually, however, around 1000 BCE Kush gained enough power to turn the tables on Egypt. The Kush people had gained their freedom from the Egyptians. In 724 BCE, a very large and well trained Kushite army was able to rise and invade Egypt. They gained control over

But, when the Roman Empire pulled out of northern Nubia in 272, they invited the Nobatae to fill in power. Another important element is the Blemmyes. They were desert warriors who threatened the Roman possessions and thus contributed to the Roman withdrawal to more defensible borders. In the end of the fourth century ACE they managed to control a part of the Nile valley around Kalabsha in Lower Nubia.

Areas that had once been controlled by Meroe had formed new states by the sixth century. It is safe to assume that the Nobatae evolved into the state of Nobatia. The Beja may have been expelled back into the desert, around 450 ACE, by the Nubian kings. These new states of Nubia inherited much from Kush, but were also quite different. They spoke Old Nubian and wrote in a modified version of the Coptic alphabet; Meroitic and its script seemed to disappear completely. In the seventh century, a trade-treaty between local rulers and the new Muslim rulers of Egypt enabled commerce to flourish for several hundred