UNESCO Ancient Civilizations of Africa (Editor G. Mokhtar)

Ancient Civilizations of Africa
of wheeled vehicles abound in the Sahara. Systematic inventories have
even made it possible to give a cartographic reconstruction of trans-
Saharan wagon routes. 39 Though we must not let ourselves be too dazzled
by such clues, we must recognize that apart from the western route, parallel
to the Atlantic coast line, which does not play an active part in our classical
sources, the path of several ancient journeys attested by texts or by
archaeological material turn out to coincide with these famous protohistorical
routes. It should be added that any Saharan itinerary used by
horses, whether in harness or no, required either a system of wateringplaces,
which we know the Garamantes had, or else the transport of a
large store of provisions.
As for the camel - more exactly, the one-humped dromedary originating
in the Near East - it appears in Saharan Africa only belatedly. This event
has been discussed ad infinitum.* 0 On the continent itself, in fact, the camel
was a late arrival. It is not found in Egypt until the Persian and hellenistic
periods (fifth and fourth centuries before our era) and it is a likely supposition
that it spread to the Sahara from the lower Nile valley. The event
seems very hard to date. All we have to go on are Libyco-Berber Saharan
rock drawings which are of little use for accurate chronology and a large
number of inscriptions and sculptures from Roman North Africa, all
apparently subsequent to the second century of our era. On the other hand,
a graphic monument of Ostia, the port of Rome, dating from the last thirty
years of the first century of our era, shows the elephant and the camel
in use in games in the arena. In —46 Caesar had already captured in
Africa twenty-two camels of the Numidian King Juba I, whose states
extended to the Saharan frontiers. Perhaps they were still rare animals.
But if 150 years later the ones imported to Rome were really African,
camels, since they were not yet common in Maghreb territory, must
already have been living in the Sahara in considerable numbers and been
obtained there for the games.
Let me note in passing the symbolic presence of camels on the well-
39. General bibliography in R. Mauny, 1970, pp. 61-5; Add. H. Lhote, 1970, pp. 83-5.
These drawings are not sufficiently clear and detailed or sufficiently homogeneous for any
sure conclusions to be based on them. The only definite point to emerge is the Garamantic
style of the horse-drawn chariots, found only in the Fezzan and in Tassili n'Ajjar. These
seem, moreover, to be only parade vehicles, made of wood and leather and, according to
Spruytte's reconstitution, weighing not more than about 30 kilogrammes — unsuited, therefore,
for the transport of merchandise (G. Camps, i974d, pp. 260-1 and J. Spruytte, 1977).
I am not convinced that the style of these Garamantic chariots is due to the influence of
Cretan invaders who got lost in the Libyan desert some time about the end of the second
millennium before our era. The routes themselves are problematical: they were probably
nothing more than general directions, and quite aside from the wild theories about Romans
on chariots reaching the Niger (H. Lhote, 1970), some writers have even disputed their
existence altogether: R. Cornevin, p. 453, after P. Huard; G. Camps, i974d, pp. 346-7.
40. C. Courtois, 1955, pp. 98-101; K. Schauenburg, pp. 59-94; E. Demougeot, pp.
209-47; H. Lhote, 1967, pp. 57-89; J. Kolendo, pp. 287-98.
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