Algeria through Ages
An event organized by CapCowork, this Saturday, January 25th
at 13h30, to tell the story of Algeria from the first beginning. The archaeologist-prehistorian M. Farid Ighilahriz, will give this presentation. He is a researcher at the National Center of prehistorical, anthropological, and historical researches (CNRPAH), he has managed the national center of archeological researches (CNRA) and the national agency of the cultural park of Ahaggar (ONPCA) previously. Lately, he is leading research works on the recent prehistory of Central Sahara.
Here is a little preview of what he has prepared for you this Saturday:
The African continent is the part of the world that gave birth to humanity and kept the earliest marks of its activity. Algeria has also participated in this cradle and was one of the birth and flourishing places of various prehistorical cultures and civilizations. Our country is one of the very first and main centers of dynamism in the human evolution process.
In Aïn Hanech there are some arranged pebbles aged 2.4 million years that present the most ancient initiatives to manufacture the first lithic tools. Around 1 million years ago, Atlanthropus mauritanicus, which we could find some human remains in Tighenif, developed a variety of new lithic tools: the hand axe and the cleaver. The use of fire is attested to be in the age of the Lower Paleolithic age by the arrangement of fireplaces within settlements. And with the advent of Homo Sapiens, around 200,000 years ago, lithic tools are mainly produced with fragments detached from a nucleus rock. The making of the peduncle, which is a fitting device, for all kinds of tools is specific to the Atterian civilization, which is distinguished by its cultural unity and its geographical area of expansion throughout North Africa, from 50,000 years ago. This period is also characterized by the beginning of dead burial practices.
The Homo Sapiens ancestor known in North Africa, from the 20th millennium is the Mechta-Afalou Man. He is the architect of the Iberomaurism civilization with a microlithic material culture corresponding to elements of reinforcement. He also invented the oldest artistic expression form including terracotta animal figurines.
The main event of the Neolithic era is the passage of human societies from an economy of predation, based on hunting and picking, to a production economy attested by the breeding of animals and the practice of agriculture, from the 9th millennium. Algeria was home to one of the first centers of pottery invention.
It was also a hotbed of rock art form of expression. This art, engraved or painted is an incredible iconography, including representations of fauna, sketches of daily life, and practical scenes of ritual reflections and thoughts. These schematic forms reflect the spectrum of a cultural expression that led to the most ancient writing system known in North Africa; Numidian, Tifinagh, or Tamazight.
Our ancestors have also developed the art of building with stone. The various funerary monuments and megalithic structures represent the beginnings of solid buildings. They were succeeded by mausoleums, such as those of the Aguellids (kings) of Numidian kingdoms from the dawn of history.
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Translation: Amira Bousdjira
Copyrights: CapCowork
