Disease and Africa

So about 13.000 BP whe have a great civilazation growing on the fertile plains between OTL's Greater Sunda Islands,
With Small cities and towns in the Highlands of Sumatra, Java, Borneo.
It has crossed the Banda Sea into the plains of the Arafura Sea. But has yet to push into the highlands of New Guinea or Australia.
It has trading cities established along the China coast, and around the Indian ocean

Then just by chance a Meteor [Arizona Crater, or that Australian Crater size] hits the Banda sea, causing a major tsunami.
as they start to rebuild, the rising waters from the end of the ice age force an abandonment,
On the Arafura Plains the survivors flee into the highlands giving rise to the legends of the Dreamtime, as they regress into the Stone Age.
From the Java plains survivors flee into the Sumatra and Java highlands,
Longer settled they don't regress as far, and within several thousands years will be the pre Hindu civilizations of OTL.
Some end in the Indus plain, where they are pushed north into the Valley forming the Indus Civilization, that so puzzles modern archaeologists due to having no known precessor.

One group takes ship, along with with it's goods and Animals and flees to southeast Africa.
There they trek inland, With legends of terrible things coming from the sea, they will stay away from the Shoreline.

Here isolated from Europe and Asia they will have civilization rise and splinter and rise again.
 
South Africa and Rhodesia should be largely safe. The Kilimanjaro and Mount Kenya areas of East Central Africa should be OK as well, as are Zanzibar and Pemba. The horn is fine, but not too prosperous. Yemen and the Arabian coast have a lot of potential.

It's hard to say what the range of disease and sleeping sickness were 11,000 years ago - I suppose it was smaller due to the lack of people and their livestock and the cooler climate.

There is some plausibility problem with an empire stretching all the way to the cape - check out a map of monsoon patterns and you can see this empire would have a very difficult time communicating with anything south of the Comoros. This was a very strong barrier in OTL. An empire encompassing South Africa as well as the more northerly territories you mentioned seems unlikely, so you would need to really think about how it's possible.

http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/islands_oceans_poles/dhow_76.jpg

As far as disease goes, there are ways around it, but it would mean a slave civilization, as that was the only way to transport stuff through regions infested with sleeping sickness.



Another theme related to a book I am trying to write (fiction AH).

Say about 11000 years ago a civilisation on the Sunda Plain (now under water - north of Java) was destroyed and a group of survivors sailed westward via the Indian and Arabian coasts and down the east coast of Africa to settle approximately where Great Zimbabwe existed in real history. The survivors founded a new replacement civilisation which grew annd spread along the entire length of east Africa (from cape to cape) and then along the southern and eastern coasts of Arabia. This would be a 3000 year period before further expansion that I don't have to go into at this point.

They would have come from the equatorial region (post glacial) to roughly equivalent latitudes.

Would they have been more resistent to disease than Europeans?

Just how restricting was the tsetse fly for cattle farming / horse breeding, etc and thus on growth and spread of such a civilisation?

I assume that South Africa would be relavtively safe. I understand that Zimbabwe / Zambia / Tanzania / Kenya (to use current names) are more favourable to agriculture and growth than say Mozambique and certainly the Congo rainforest area. Is this true?

Just as background I have read the following books:
- Plagues and Peoples (William McNeill)
- Africa in History (Basil Davidson).

Neither provide sufficient information to come to a satisfactory conclusion.

Anyone got any ideas, especially people with detailed knowledge of the tsetse fly and other diseases that have plagued African development. Also local knowledge of the areas mentioned.
 
So about 13.000 BP whe have a great civilazation growing on the fertile plains between OTL's Greater Sunda Islands,
With Small cities and towns in the Highlands of Sumatra, Java, Borneo.
It has crossed the Banda Sea into the plains of the Arafura Sea. But has yet to push into the highlands of New Guinea or Australia.
It has trading cities established along the China coast, and around the Indian ocean

Then just by chance a Meteor [Arizona Crater, or that Australian Crater size] hits the Banda sea, causing a major tsunami.
as they start to rebuild, the rising waters from the end of the ice age force an abandonment,
On the Arafura Plains the survivors flee into the highlands giving rise to the legends of the Dreamtime, as they regress into the Stone Age.
From the Java plains survivors flee into the Sumatra and Java highlands,
Longer settled they don't regress as far, and within several thousands years will be the pre Hindu civilizations of OTL.
Some end in the Indus plain, where they are pushed north into the Valley forming the Indus Civilization, that so puzzles modern archaeologists due to having no known precessor.

One group takes ship, along with with it's goods and Animals and flees to southeast Africa.
There they trek inland, With legends of terrible things coming from the sea, they will stay away from the Shoreline.

Here isolated from Europe and Asia they will have civilization rise and splinter and rise again.

I think I've missed something in what you posted. It seemed to parallel my proposed AH. If there was a point to your post - no offense intended - I am afraid I didn't get it. :confused: Perhaps its the Asperger in me!
 
South Africa and Rhodesia should be largely safe. The Kilimanjaro and Mount Kenya areas of East Central Africa should be OK as well, as are Zanzibar and Pemba. The horn is fine, but not too prosperous. Yemen and the Arabian coast have a lot of potential.

It's hard to say what the range of disease and sleeping sickness were 11,000 years ago - I suppose it was smaller due to the lack of people and their livestock and the cooler climate.

There is some plausibility problem with an empire stretching all the way to the cape - check out a map of monsoon patterns and you can see this empire would have a very difficult time communicating with anything south of the Comoros. This was a very strong barrier in OTL. An empire encompassing South Africa as well as the more northerly territories you mentioned seems unlikely, so you would need to really think about how it's possible.

http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/islands_oceans_poles/dhow_76.jpg

As far as disease goes, there are ways around it, but it would mean a slave civilization, as that was the only way to transport stuff through regions infested with sleeping sickness.


I don't see a problem moving to the Cape of Good Hope over land. Once settled in the cape provinces ships could be built at the cape or west coast and sailed / rowed (galleys maybe or early galleons or something similar to Viking ships) could then travel along the African coast to the Med. I time this about 3 - 3500 years after first settlement which means they found Carthage in the couple of hundred years before 6000BCE and Byblos at the historical time of 6000BCE. This together with occupation of Iberia form the extent of expansion up to Roman times. Romans take Iberia but fought to a standstill at sea (ie do not capture North Africa west of Eygpt or perhaps Cyrenica.

The overland move north west wards would be from about 6000BCE onwards in a reverse of the historical Bantu movement south east. Inland expansion from the Atlantic coast (equivalent to the future historical Old Ghana) and Med coast to the 'wet phase' Sahara (ie mainly savanah / grasslands for the few thousand years that this was relatively attractive for settlement).

In ship design I have assumed at the very least an early dhow or equivalent to the skin boats of the Celts (eg as replica Brendan) or perhaps an early Caravel. Certainly at Roman times they would have Caravel type ship that can out maneouvre Galleys / Trimeremes, etc.
 
Well yes if a civilization just happened to base its self on land that is going to be Atlansised then there would not be much left. However you then need to explain why the people did not expand and spread (as the Han did) until they are where they would survive the cataclysm and how they achieved such a high technological level without contact with other civilizations or barbarians who would copy them.
On the Arafura Plains the survivors flee into the highlands giving rise to the legends of the Dreamtime, as they regress into the Stone Age.
From the Java plains survivors flee into the Sumatra and Java highlands,
Longer settled they don't regress as far, and within several thousands years will be the pre Hindu civilizations of OTL.
Some end in the Indus plain, where they are pushed north into the Valley forming the Indus Civilization, that so puzzles modern archaeologists due to having no known predecessor.
If there was a point to your post - no offense intended - I am afraid I didn't get it.
just showing what could have happened to the other remnants,
 
just showing what could have happened to the other remnants,

OK
I guess I have passed over a number of aspects in order to 'get on with the AH scenario'.
Taking Eden in the East there are many different peoples around the central Sunda Plain area. I have assumed there was an uneasy relationship between X and these. After the catastrophy there would be a dispersal and a (total) dilution of the X population which would not be obvious today. The only real survivors would be in Africa and other occupied territories.

Another reason for choosing Africa is that it is relatively speaking a blank sheet on which to write without disturbing the European, Asian and North American histories too much.
 

Glen

Moderator
OK
I guess I have passed over a number of aspects in order to 'get on with the AH scenario'.
Taking Eden in the East there are many different peoples around the central Sunda Plain area. I have assumed there was an uneasy relationship between X and these. After the catastrophy there would be a dispersal and a (total) dilution of the X population which would not be obvious today. The only real survivors would be in Africa and other occupied territories.

Another reason for choosing Africa is that it is relatively speaking a blank sheet on which to write without disturbing the European, Asian and North American histories too much.

Blank sheet? Blank sheet?? What DO you know of Africa?:eek:
 
Blank sheet? Blank sheet?? What DO you know of Africa?:eek:

I'm referring to a time period between 11200 and approximately 2500 years ago. If you look at one of my earlier posts you will have seen that I have read one complete book only on the history of Africa. I have many other books of useful reference.

True I have no personal experience of today but that is not what I am asking about here.

Yes I know there were loose groupings of humans but not on an organised scale of Egypt, Sumeria, etc.
 
I've also been thinking about what you have all said.
What if the expansion took longer and was less expansive?
Say from 11200 BP to about 2500BP the population spread mainly by land from Cape of Good Hope to tip of Somalia but no further northwestwards than the edge of the Congo rainforest, but also expanded into Arabia. What if the expansion overseas was limited to Ceylon and Malacca until say 1000 - 500 BP and then reached around the World.
Would this be more reasonable?
 
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