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1.12 - The Archaeology of the Central African Rainforest: Its Current State

from II. - Africa

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 August 2014

By
Manfred K. H. Eggert
Edited by
Colin Renfrew  and
Paul Bahn
Manfred K. H. Eggert
Affiliation:
Universität Tübingen
Colin Renfrew
Affiliation:
University of Cambridge
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Summary

Setting the Stage

It is the aim of this chapter to present an up-to-date review of the archaeology of the equatorial rainforest. Whenever necessary, it will reach beyond the forest to consider phenomena that might have been connected with its internal settlement history. Insofar as general stimuli and processes of a natural or cultural order are important to the settling of the forest by pottery-producing and farming people, we will even have to adopt a perspective that goes beyond Central Africa.

Although “Central Africa” represents primarily a geographical term, its current usage is fundamentally marked by political considerations even if there is no common understanding. For our purposes, the term comprises the following states, listed in clockwise order: Cameroon, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC, or Congo-Kinshasa, formerly Zaïre), the northern part of Angola, the Republic of Congo (Congo-Brazzaville), Gabon and Equatorial Guinea. In this conception, Central Africa covers the area between approximately latitude 11°N to 12°N and longitude 8° to 27°E. Other archaeologists, such as P. de Maret (2005), add the southern part of Chad as well as Rwanda and Burundi.

Topography, Climate and Vegetation

In some sense, Central Africa can be thought of as being grouped around the Congo Basin, which represents the largest depression of the continent. However, “depression” is a relative term, since it implies only that it is low lying in comparison to its surroundings. Thus, the Congo Basin shows an average height of about 400 m above sea level. Its inner plains, formed by ongoing accumulation and erosion during the Pliocene, Pleistocene and Holocene, are characterised by a gentle relief of roughly 20 to 40 m. Rivers, lakes and creeks as well as swamps and seasonally induced inundation zones are ubiquitous in such a way that the topography alternates between accompanying zones of low-lying land and more elevated surfaces.

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The Cambridge World Prehistory , pp. 183 - 203
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2014

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