Asa Hilliard was a colleague and friend whom I had the pleasure of knowing since 1980. He was the inspiration and consultant for the study tours to Egypt I began conducting in 1987, and he wrote the introduction to my first book, From the Browder File, twenty years ago. The sudden passing of Dr. Hilliard in 2007 came as a shock to all those who knew and loved him and it inspired many throughout the world to establish scholarships and programs in his memory. The ASA Restoration Project is IKG’s effort to honor a great man and preserve his legacy for future generations.

What is the ASA Restoration Project?

ASA is an acronym for the Asa G. Hilliard South Asasif Restoration Project which is dedicated to the restoration of the Kushite presence in Kemet and the preservation of the legacy of Dr. Asa G. Hilliard, III.

Dr. Hilliard was an educational psychologist, historian and master teacher. Through his lectures, writings and media appearances, he introduced millions of people to Nile Valley civilization, and he personally escorted thousands on study tours to Egypt.

South Asasif is a burial ground on the west bank of Luxor, Egypt where Egyptologist Elena Pischikova discovered three Kushite tombs in 2006. The tombs are of three nobles of the 25th dynasty who lived during Kemet’s last Golden Age over 2500 years ago.

Our Mission

Our mission is to preserve the legacy of Dr. Hilliard by increasing public awareness of the Golden Ages of Kemetic history through lectures, seminars and multi-media presentations.

We will also support the work of Dr. Pischikova through fundraisers and recruiting volunteers to work on the annual excavation and conservation missions in the South Asasif region of Luxor, Egypt. This will be accomplished by the following:

1. The establishment of a non profit (501C3) foundation for handling tax deductible contributions

2. Recruiting and training volunteers to work for a minimum of two weeks in South Asasif.

All volunteers must apply for a security clearance from the Egyptian government in order to become a mission member. The mission season is from May through August and all volunteers will work six days a week (Saturday – Thursday) from 6 am until 1 pm. Mission members are eligible for discounted lodging and meals, and are allowed free access to the temples, tombs, monuments and museums throughout Egypt.

Mission members do not need to have archeological experience but must be willing and capable of working seven hour days for a minimum of two weeks. We have a specific need for artists, photographers, architects and engineers. But we are also accepting tireless, adventurous souls who are interested in restoring and creating history.

The tombs have been terribly damaged over the centuries. Each tomb has carvings that have fallen from the walls and ceilings and must be recovered from the dirt and sand, cleaned, numbered, catalogued, photographed and entered into a database. This is tedious work that will require patience and dedication. Please read Dr. Elena’s article, Nubian Tombs Discovered, below for more details on the tombs and the work required to repair and conserve them. Her article will also provide you with details on how to apply for a security clearance and specifics on where to send your tax-deductible contributions.

Goals for 2011 

The ASA Restoration Project has three primary goals for the coming year.
1. Sign up 400 people who are willing to make a tax-deductible pledge
of $10 a month for one year to support the project.

2. Recruit 40 volunteers to serve as mission members for the 2011 season
in South Asasif.

3. Establish 40 Van Sertima Cultural Circles (action oriented study groups) comprised of youth and adults who will be trained to conduct presentations in their
communities. The main subjects for study and training are the Four Golden Ages of Kemet and the ASA Restoration Project.

I invite you to be a part of the ASA Restoration Project and to share its goals with your family and friends. Joining our efforts affords you the opportunity to study and make history while also honoring the legacy of Dr. Asa Hilliard. You may make a contribution to the ASA Restoration Project or sign up to become a mission volunteer by contacting Dr. Elena Pischikova at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it You can also contact us if you would like information on establishing a Van Sertima Cultural Circle by emailing us through our website.

Your consideration and support of our efforts is greatly appreciated.

Anthony T. Browder
Director, IKG

(Note: For more information on the 25th dynasty read “Lies That Won’t Go Away.”)

_________________________

NUBIAN TOMBS DISCOVERED
By Dr. Elena Pischikova

In 2006, our mission “South Asasif Conservation Project,” re-discovered the earliest decorated Nubian tombs built in ancient Thebes (modern Luxor) at the end of the 8th century B.C. Seen by travelers of the 19th century in an already ruined condition, the tombs completely disappeared beneath the houses of the modern village, and were forgotten by scholars and visitors to the Theban necropolis. The tombs were considered as having ceased to exist, destroyed by people and nature. As Nubian art of Dynasty 25 is not the most popular and well-researched period in modern Egyptology, the tombs were completely neglected for almost two hundred years.

We made it our mission to find the lost tombs and restore all that was still possible to rescue. It proved to be a very difficult task. Since these tombs were built they were reused as workshops, living quarters, stables, and quarries. The blocks of stone from the walls and pillars were used to build houses and fences. The courts and pillared halls were filled with livestock, the vestibules used as kitchens, and the burial chambers robbed. As a result, some of the tombs’ areas collapsed, some are devoid of their original decoration, and some painting and colorful reliefs were covered with a layer of soot so thick that they looked completely black. Houses were built right on top of the tombs and collapsed areas were used as dumps.

When we started excavating three years ago, we could not be sure we would find anything. All that was left of the largest tomb in the area was a crack in the ground. For weeks we were digging with no results. Our only discoveries were pieces of burnt bedrock with no traces of hieroglyphic inscriptions or decoration. Only fifteen feet down from the surface of the desert did we find the first inscription with the titles of a dignitary. This small fragment with original ancient carving gave us hope that there was something still left in the tomb. A week later we found the first image of the owner of the tomb, the Nubian Priest Karakhamun. The face of Karakhamun displays bold Nubian features, round head with cropped hair, round full cheeks, nose broad at the nostrils, and full protruding lips. A long neck and large elegant eyes with thin pointed cosmetic lines make his features resemble those of the Nubian pharaoh Shebitqo who ruled Egypt and Nubia at the end of the eighth and beginning of the seventh century B.C.

The rest of his figure and the whole composition were rendered in the style of the Old Kingdom (2700–2200 B.C.). Karakhamun is shown with a broad shouldered torso, narrow waist, heavily muscled legs, and bare feet, seated on a bovine-legged chair with a short back and papyrus umbel behind. The legs of the throne are resting on a double pedestal. Although a priest, he is depicted without a pelt vest, in a pleated skirt and a broad collar. The precision and elegance of the carving of the figure, bold modeling on the legs, and delicate detailed carving of the eye and ear are beautifully, balanced creating an exquisite piece of art. The offering table, offering list, and rituals performed in front of Karakhamun were clearly influenced by the art of the Old Kingdom, some two thousand years earlier.

Nubian pharaohs collected and copied Old Kingdom inscriptions, re-used Old Kingdom royal names, constructed pyramids over their burials in Nubia, and ordered decoration in the style of the Old Kingdom for their tombs and temples. The revival of the ancient forms of art, architecture, and literature in the 8th-7th century B.C. was an incomparable Renaissance period in ancient Egyptian culture. The Nubians admired and preserved the traditions of ancient art and managed to turn Egyptian civilization back to its past so it would remain “true” to its roots. Nubian pharaohs, who ruled Egypt from 750-664 B.C., brought back to life the most ancient and fundamental forms of Egyptian culture. For example, the building of monumental decorated tombs in Egypt had ceased to exist for almost four centuries since the end of the New Kingdom (2200 B.C.) but came back as part of the Nubian Renaissance. The tombs of South Asasif that we discovered are the earliest Nubian tombs built on the West bank of ancient Thebes.

The exquisite quality of relief carving found in the tomb of Karakhamun demonstrates that this Nubian tomb was one of the most beautiful in the Theban necropolis, if not in all of Egypt. The hunting dog under the chair of Karakhamun is one of the most exquisite images found in the tomb. The outlines of its elegant body are carved in sunk relief with sharpness and precision. The muzzle and chest are beautifully modeled. The muscle structure of the hind leg is shown extremely powerfully, corresponding with the treatment of Karakhamun’s legs. The elongated eye is rimmed with a long cosmetic line almost reaching the collar. The collar itself is shaped as a sash wrapped three times around the neck and knotted on the back. What gives the dog a flair of stylish elegance is its exaggeratedly long slender nose, upright pointed ears, and a long tail twisted into four coils.

By the fall of 2008 we cleared debris from the east and north sections of the First Pillared Hall of the tomb of Karakhamun and found five pillars and thousands of painted relief fragments of the tomb’s magnificent relief decoration. Our major finds include an exquisite collection of faces of Karakhamun and other Nubians of his time.

One of the most impressive faces we discovered belongs to the Nubian dignitary, the Mayor of Thebes, Karabasken. It is the head of his shawabti (faience funerary figurine), with bold portrait features. What was left of the tomb of Karabasken was used by the local villages as a “summer house,” as it is always cool in its underground chambers. With its decoration chiseled off by later inhabitants, the tomb looked like an empty shell.

Patiently removing a six-feet debris layer from the entrance area we discovered an unknown image of Karabasken. Damaged, deteriorating and flaking from the moist debris covering it, the bedrock still preserved the outlines of his figure. Karabasken wanted to be presented as a priest of the Old Kingdom seated on a lion-legged chair, barefoot and dressed in a pelt vest and a short skirt.

The sophistication and self-confidence seen in the style of Nubian images in Thebes show that they were based on a thorough knowledge and understanding of the art and culture of the Old Kingdom. The Nubian pharaohs present themselves as devoted keepers of the ancient traditions of Egyptian culture, restorers of “true” Egypt, and faithful descendants of the legendary pharaohs of the Old Kingdom.

Three years of work in the Nubian tombs of the South Asasif necropolis let us prove that they not only exist but they also contain beautiful architecture, painting and relief carving comparable with the best monuments created in ancient Egypt. They also add to our understanding of Egyptian history of the late period and the role of Nubians in creating, preserving, and resurrecting Egyptian culture.

Recovering and restoring the beauty of these extremely important tombs is tremendously hard work due to their present condition, and it will take many years and thousands of dollars to restore them. We need to finish the excavation of their vestibules, courts, pillared halls and burial chambers. Every tiny stone must be examined in search of traces of the collapsed wall decoration. What is equally important is the restoration of every found fragment, which then has to be cleaned, numbered, entered into a database, and consolidated. The next step is looking for joints. We put together large sections of walls and pillars in sand boxes on the ground, to be later reinstalled in their original locations. The walls and pillars have to be rebuilt, and thousands of carved fragments of limestone must be fixed on them. Our final goal is to fully reconstruct, photograph and publish our work, so that people can visit the tombs in Egypt, and read about them in homes and schools all over the world. Their reconstruction and publication will be a major turning point in our understanding and evaluation of Nubian art and the Nubian contributions to Egyptian history.

A project of this magnitude needs the help of those who appreciate its future impact on our interpretation of Egyptian art and culture. We are asking for help, both financial and professional. Your financial contribution does not have to be substantial. Every $10-20 will help us to buy tools and conservation materials. If many people support us it will be a project run by a community devoted to finding the roots of their civilization and preserving their history for future generations. All your donations will be tax-deductible as you will address them to our non-profit organization, The ASA Restoration Project, Inc.
Please mail your checks to:
IKG  1816  12th Street , NW.

Washington, DC  20009

You may use your professional skills to help us in Egypt. We need skilled volunteers with experience in photography, computer graphics, engineering, geology, database maintenance, architecture, and other related areas. We work in Egypt from May to August and can arrange discount airfare and lodging for anyone willing to work as a mission member. It is hard work but it is extremely rewarding. In addition to uncovering and documenting ancient history, mission members are granted free access to the temples, tombs, monuments and museums throughout Egypt.

All fieldwork in Egypt requires a security clearance. Every year as a mission director I apply for security clearance for all mission members to the Supreme Council of Antiquities of Egypt. To be included on the security list you must provide me with your CV, a scan of the first page of your passport, and an additional passport photograph. The application must be submitted three months before the starting date of the season. This means that I must hear from the people who want to work on the project by January 20. If you are interested in participating in the project please contact us at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

I will be happy to lecture for interested groups of people, show images of our finds, and answer your questions.

Dr. Elena Pischikova
Director
South Asasif Conservation Project

_____________________________

Lies That Won’t Go Away
Three Falsehoods in the National Geographic “Black Pharaohs” article
By Anthony T. Browder / February, 2008


Dr. Carter G. Woodson established Negro History Week in 1926 in an effort to tell the history of a people who had consistently been written out of the “respectable commentary of human history” by some of the most revered historians and historical institutions in the United States. Woodson’s magnus opus, “The Mis-Education of the Negro” documented the deliberate falsification of black history. It is a book that is more relevant today than when it was first published in 1933.

Were Dr. Woodson alive today, and were he to read the February 2008 cover story of National Geographic, “The Black Pharaohs: Conquerors of Ancient Egypt” Woodson would realize that the history of black people is still being grossly distorted and the process of mis-education continues unabated.

To the average “mis-educated” American who saw the National Geographic magazine on the newsstand, its cover would incline them to believe that the issue was a timely tribute to the national celebration of Black History Month. Were they to read the magazine, they would be amazed to discover that, “For 75 years Nubian kings ruled over ancient Egypt, reunifying the country and building an empire.” Many would be shocked upon discovering this “chapter of history lost in the shadows,” and wonder how much more Black History there is waiting to be revealed.

But to a formerly “Mis-educated Negro,” one who discovered in 1977 that the Egyptians were black, I read the “Black Pharaohs” article and found it to be guilty of deliberate acts of omission and commission. I reached this conclusion not because I am a black radical who believes that white men are devils not to be trusted. On the contrary, my life’s experience has taught me that I should believe in someone until I have reason to believe otherwise.

I believed Harry Truman when he stated that, “There is nothing new in the world except the history you do not know.” I believed Malcolm X when he said, “History is best qualified to reward all research.” I believed my own eyes when I made my first study tour to Egypt in 1980 and saw the physical evidence of what black Africans had accomplished when they ruled Egypt thousands of years before the arrival of European and Arab invaders.

I grew to understand the power of mis-education when I realized that the true history of ancient Egypt had been withheld from me throughout my formal education and only came into my awareness when I sought it. I came to believe in Dr. Woodson’s antidote to mis-education when he stated that:
Philosophers have long conceded that every man has two educations: "that which is given to him, and the other that which he gives himself. Of the two kinds the latter is by far the more desirable. Indeed all that is most worthy in man he must work out and conquer for himself. It is that which constitutes our real and best nourishment. What we are merely taught seldom nourishes the mind like that which we teach ourselves."

In 1977, upon discovering that the ancient Egyptians were “black” Africans, I began a process of “re-education” which, since 1980, has resulted in my making 40 trips to Egypt; writing and publishing 5 books on ancient Egyptian history and culture; and lecturing on Egypt on every continent except Australia. As an autodidact, I am qualified to critique the National Geographic cover story, written by Robert Draper, and will do so by illuminating three major falsehoods in his article.

Before I begin my critique I must acknowledge that the article is well written and quite informative. It is also filled with wonderful photographs (as one would expect from National Geographic) and there are two beautiful paintings that are reminiscent of the “Great Kings and Queens of Africa” posters popularized by Budweiser many decades ago. Unfortunately, the beauty of the article dissipates when one reads it with a deeper understanding of Ancient Egyptian history and an awareness of the countless efforts that have been made to separate Egypt from Africa, and African people from the legacy of their ancestors.

Without an understanding of historiography (the history of researching and writing history) one can be easily mislead and conditioned to embrace unreasonable falsehoods as fundamental truths. History has clearly demonstrated that when falsehoods are repeated with conviction by “experts,” and popularized by the media (principally print, TV and film), an unsuspecting public will be incapable of recognizing truth when it is presented to them. When accustomed to being fed a steady diet of falsehoods this mentally malnourished population will become incapable or unwilling to consider opposing viewpoints which they have been conditioned to find impalatable.

What Dr. Woodson referred to as mis-education, social scientists now call “cognitive dissonance.” Both states of mind can be summed up in the declaration, “My mind is already made up…don’t confuse me with the facts.” These intellectually stifling states of un-consciousness can be minimized and overcome when one learns to recognize falsehoods and replace them with sound, factual data.

Thus, it is in the spirit of Dr. Woodson (and Black History Month) that I submit my assessment of the falsehoods imbedded within the National Geographic “Black History Month” cover story for your consideration.

Falsehood #1
“Piye was the first of the so-called black pharaohs—a series of Nubian kings who ruled over all of Egypt for three-quarters of a century as that country’s 25th dynasty. “

This statement is false, not because Piye wasn’t the first of a series of Nubian kings who ruled Egypt for 75 years but because Piye was not the first black pharaoh. The title of the article, “The Black Pharaohs: Conquerors of Ancient Egypt” is deceptive because it implies that “Black Pharaohs” conquered an Egypt which had previously been ruled by “non-black” Pharaohs.

Not all Egyptologists agree with the conventional interpretation of ancient Egyptian history. There is an opposing viewpoint that has long been suppressed by the establishment but is increasingly gaining acceptance within and without the discipline. This viewpoint espouses, with sound factual data, that:
• Ancient Egypt was an indigenous African civilization founded by “black” Africans who migrated northward, down the Nile, from Nubia and Ethiopia.
• The leadership of Egypt always came from the south and that the rulers responsible for founding the culture that would sustain the nation for thousands of years were “black” Africans.
• Egypt was subject to numerous foreign invasions and periods of instability, but stability was always restored by “black leaders” from the south (Upper Egypt and Nubia).
• The ancient Egyptians made no racial distinctions between themselves and the Nubians but they acknowledged and depicted distinct differences between themselves and Libyans, Asiatics, Persians, Greeks and Romans.
• When Egypt was invaded and subsequently conquered by non-Africans, the conquering armies added little of value to the country, and
• After Egypt fell to foreign domination the conquering leaders often rewrote the history of the ancient past. This is consistent with the writing of history in general, which is often written by the victor in any struggle.

It is an unfortunate reality that most of what we know about Egypt and “Black Africa” has been written by whites after centuries of discoveries, conquests and colonization. The general public is unaware that most of the names of Egyptian people, places and things are non-African. Egypt is a Greek word, as are the words pyramid, hieroglyphics and sphinx. Pharaoh is a word of Asiatic origin. Modern Egyptian cities and towns have Arabic names as a result of the Arab conquest of Egypt in 640 AD.

The indigenous name for Egypt is Kemet, a word that is translated from medu netcher (hieroglyphics) which literally means, “the city, town or country of the blacks” and not the “black soil” as traditional Egyptologists maintain. Ancient paintings and carvings of the “Kemites” depict them as virtually indistinguishable from Nubians (ancient or modern). Paleontologists have found that the blood groupings and skeletal remains of mummies have more in common with ancient and modern Africans than their European or Asian counterparts.

Some of the strongest evidence documenting the African origins of the Kemites was presented by two African Egyptologists, Drs. Cheikh Anta Diop and Theophile Obenga, at the Cairo Symposium in 1974. This gathering of over 20 international Egyptologists was sponsored by UNESCO (the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) and was held in Cairo, Egypt. One of the primary topics of discussion was the race of the ancient Egyptians. The presentations by Diop and Obenga provided 11 categories of evidence to support the thesis that the ancient Egyptians were indigenous “black” Africans. Their research showed that the language and cultural patterns of the ancient Kemites was consistent with that found in traditional societies in modern West Africa.

The general consensus reached at the Cairo Symposium was that there was no evidence that the ancient Egyptians were white and that it was peopled by people from “the Great Lakes region in inner-equatorial Africa.” Unfortunately, news of the symposium has been virtually ignored by academia and the media but its findings were chronicled by UNESCO in a 1978 publication entitled, Ancient Civilizations of Africa, Vol. II.

What accounts for this deafening silence? A report filed by an observer at the conference holds a clue. The observer wrote:
Although the preparatory working paper sent out by UNESCO gave particulars of what was desired, not all participants had prepared communications comparable with the painstakingly researched contributions of Professors Cheikh Anta Diop and Obenga. There was consequently a real lack of balance.

Dr. Diop was a Senegalese scholar who held degrees in Egyptology, physics, linguistics and anthropology. Relying on his scientific acumen, Diop developed a “melanin dosage test” which allowed him to prove, once and for all, the racial identity of the Ancient Egyptians. This relatively simple test provided the means by which one could determine the phenotype of the royal mummies by examining the melanin content present within their skin. Although Dr. Diop had proven the viability of the Melanin Dosage Test, the Egyptian government has yet to authorize its use and so the issue of the “race” of the ancient Egyptians remains unresolved.

Falsehood #2
“Only after the European powers colonized Africa in the 19th century did Western scholars pay attention to the color of the Nubians’ skin, to uncharitable effect.”

Mr. Draper cites several examples of how racism infected the research of Egyptologists. He referenced Richard Lepsius, the Prussian archaeologist who coined the phrase “Book of the Dead” and said that the Kushites “belonged to the Caucasian race;” and Harvard Egyptologist George Reisner who believed that “Nubia’s leaders, including Piye, were light-skinned Egypto-Libyans who ruled over the primitive Africans.”

Mr. Draper neglected to mention the racist opinions of James Breasted, the founder of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago and regarded as one of America’s foremost Egyptologists. In a 1935 publication entitled Ancient Times Breasted described the Egyptians as, “…members of a race of white men, who have been well called the Great White Race.” Breasted also referred to “The Negro peoples of Africa” as having no “influence on the development of earlier civilization.”

While Mr. Draper is “fair-minded” enough to acknowledge the racism of white historians of the past, he does not acknowledge the numerous examples of racist scholarship which exists today, nor does he discuss the impact of racism on generations of teachers, students and the general public. Draper would do well to read “The World and Africa” by W.E.B. Du Bois who wrote:
There can be but one explanation for this vagary of nineteenth century science. It was due to the slave trade and Negro slavery. It was due to the fact that the rise and support of capitalism called for rationalization based upon degrading and discrediting the Negroid peoples. It is especially significant that the science of Egyptology arose and flourished at the very time that the cotton kingdom reached its greatest power on the foundation of American Negro slavery.

Were Du Bois alive today he would not be too surprised to see that the science of Egyptology has matured significantly in the twenty first century but is still fundamentally racist. The June 2005 issue of National Geographic featured a cover story entitled, “The New Face of King Tut.” The cover showed the forensic reconstruction of the skull of “Tut” which depicted him as a white man. Let’s forget about the dozens of paintings and carvings of the boy king created by artists who saw him in the flesh and depicted him as a handsome black youth. Modern science has given us a more accurate image of someone who has been dead for over 3,000 years.

This new whitened image of King Tut was to accompany a national tour of his artifacts in the U.S. between 2005 and 2007. But these plans were short lived. When confronted by protesters led by Attorney LeGrand Clegg of Compton, California and members of the Association for the Study of Classical African Civilization (ASCAC), Zahi Hawass, head of Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities, and the organizers of the Tut exhibit were forced to acknowledge the racial inaccuracies of the new face of King Tut and remove it from the exhibit.

As the exhibit made its way from Los Angeles to Florida to Chicago and Philadelphia, it was met with protests from the African American community which demanded that the racial identity of the Ancient Egyptians be accurately portrayed in the exhibit. How much media attention did these protests generate? None!

One would think that as we approach the end of the first decade of the twenty first century the world would be ready to embrace the fact that Egypt is in Africa and ancient Africans were capable of creating a civilization in their own homeland without the influence of foreigners. But history reminds us that five hundred years ago, negroes were not regarded as human beings, and less than two hundred years ago the Supreme Court’s Dread Scott case declared that negroes had no rights which the U.S. was bound to acknowledge. Negroes, coloreds and blacks have certainly come a long way, but if history is any judge of future events, African Americans still have a long way to go before our history is fully acknowledged and accurately taught.

Falsehood #3
Afrocentric Egyptologists… argue that all ancient Egyptians, from King Tut to Cleopatra, were black Africans…(and that) King Tut’s own grandmother, the 18th-dynasty Queen Tiye, is claimed by some to be of Nubian heritage).

What good Mr. Draper might have accomplished in his article was undone in the above comments. It appears that he is equating the racism of white Egyptologists with the so-called “faulty” logic of Afrocentric Egyptologists. History is replete with numerous examples of whites attempting to discredit any African American or African American movement which sought freedom from the clutches of institutional racism. In the 1960’s, Dr. Martin Luther King was labeled a communist and called the “most dangerous man in America” by the FBI. Today, African American scholars are labeled “Afrocentric revisionists” and are subjected to ridicule for attempting to tell our history through our own cultural lens.

The Civil Rights Movement of the 50’s led to the enactment of Civil Rights legislation which has since benefited all women and minorities in America. The Black Power Movement of the 60’s contributed to the rise of the Black Studies Movement which lead to the expansion of Negro History Week to Black History Month in 1976.
These rights were not achieved because whites had a change of heart and suddenly decided to do the right thing. These rights were achieved after a long and protracted struggle. As Frederick Douglass said: “Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and never will.”

It is within this context that African Americans must examine the African Centered (or Afrocentric) Movement, independent of European American oversight. The African Centered Movement has one primary objective: to rescue and reconstruct the history, culture, science, philosophy, psychology, religion, literature and economics of African people (worldwide), and to view our experiences through our own eyes. But we must be fully aware that such acts of self-determination will be met with resistance by those who profit from the perpetuation of historical falsehoods masquerading as academic truths.

Mr. Draper falsely accuses “Afrocentric Egyptologists” of claiming that all Ancient Egyptians, from Tut to Cleopatra were black. Despite the claims of “Eurocentric Egyptologists,” the historical evidence (including that of the Cairo Symposium) strongly suggests that blacks ruled Kemet from Dynasties 1-12 (3150 until 1763 B.C.E.), Dynasties 18-20 (1550 until 1170 B.C.E.), Dynasty 25 (750 until 675 B.C.E), and Dynasty 30 (380 until 343 B.C.E.). Any competent historian would know that Egypt was conquered by the Greeks in 332 B.C.E. and Cleopatra VII (there were eight in total) was a descendent of Kemetic and Greek admixture and would probably have been classified as colored in the nineteenth century American south.

With the rise of the African Centered Movement in the late 1980’s, scholars such as Drs. Cheikh Anta Diop, Molefi Asante, Yosef ben Jochannan, John Henrik Clarke, John G. Jackson, Asa Hilliard, Theophile Obenga, Jacob Caruthers, Ivan van Sertima, Charles Finch and others forced Eurocentric Egyptologists to acknowledge the racist history of Egyptology. In the last two decades, mainstream Egyptologists have begun discussing the Nubian Dynasties and are slowly acknowledging the possibility that there were other black rulers of ancient Egypt.

I don’t expect Eurocentric Egyptologists to give up without a fight and, realistically, I don’t see the struggle being won in my lifetime, but the tide has turned and we are gaining ground. In their efforts to disparage African Centered scholars, Eurocentric Egyptologists are proving to enlightened minds just how desperate they are.

The last page of the “Black Pharaohs” article features a profile of the famous wooden bust of Queen Tiye, the wife of King Amenhotep III, mother of Amenhotep IV (aka Akhenaton) and the grandmother of King Tut. The picture is accompanied by a caption that asks if Queen Tiye had Nubian ancestry simply because it was, “made of wood that has darkened with age, (which) has inspired claims that she did.”

In a similar attack against the African Centered Movement that appeared in the February 4, 1990 issue of the New York Times in an article entitled, “Africa’s Claim to Egypt Grows More Insistent.” The article featured a photograph of a partial bust of Queen Tiye (with her eyes and nose removed) and a caption that read, “Sculpture believed to be the head of Queen Tiye…Revisionist historians argue that she is descendent of Black Africans.”

I find it interesting that National Geographic and the New York Times both sought to disprove “Africa’s Claim to Egypt” by using an image of Queen Tiye. I will prove them both wrong by using their own evidence to discredit them.

Amenhotep III and Queen Tiye ruled Kemet during the height of its military power during the Eighteenth Dynasty. Their descendents, Akhenaton and Tutankhaton, are two of the most controversial and well-known kings who ever lived. They were all one hundred percent African.

A frontal view of the wooden bust of Queen Tiye depicts a female who sports “60’s Afro” and ear rings with a pair of uraei (cobras) which was a symbol of rulership worn by Nubian Pharaohs during the Twenty Fifth Dynasty some 640 years later. All of the photos and paintings of Nubian kings in the article show them wearing the same symbol of rulership. Regarding Tiye’s appearance, Lestor Brooks, author of Great Civilizations of Ancient Africa, stated: “Any Sunday morning you may see her modern counterpart proudly entering America’s Negro churches across the land.”

The problem that Europeans and European Americans have accepting the historical reality that Africans living in the Nile Valley 6000 years ago created one of the most admired civilizations in history is theirs alone to grapple with. The destiny of African Americans will no longer be determined by the descendants of their former owners.

During our first 200 years in America we were forced to fight for our human rights. In the Twentieth Century we fought against the law of the land to attain our civil rights. Now, in the Twenty First Century, we are fighting for the right to determine our own consciousness. In the end, we shall be victorious.


This article is an excerpt from the forthcoming publication, Exploding the Myths Vol. II: The Rebirth of Nile Valley Civilization by Anthony T. Browder. He conducts annual study tours to Egypt and Egypt on the Potomac Field Trips of Washington, D.C. Details on these events, and Mr. Browder’s publications and speaking engagements, can be obtained at www.ikg-info.com.


Selected References

Browder, Anthony T., Exploding the Myths Vol. I: Nile Valley Contributions to Civilization,
The Institute of Karmic Guidance, 1992.

Obenga, Theophile, African Philosophy, The Pharaonic Period: 2780-330 BC, Per Ankh, 2004.

Van Sertima, Ivan, Ed., Journal of African Civilizations: Egypt Child of Africa, Transaction Publishers, 1994.


Note: A March 16, 2009 headline on the BBC News web site read, "Cleopatra's mother 'was African.'” The headline referenced an upcoming BBC documentary which stated that Cleopatra was part African based on the forensic analysis of the skull of her sister Arsinöe. An article in the Sunday Times (March 15, 2009) stated: “Evidence obtained by studying the dimensions of Arsinöe’s skull shows she had some of the characteristics of white Europeans, ancient Egyptians and black Africans, indicating that Cleopatra was probably of mixed race, too. They were daughters of Ptolemy XII by different wives.”

You can read the entire article at: www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article5908494.ece