Black Genesis by Robert Bauval Read Free Book Online Page A

behind his right ear then take a sight to a star to the south in that line. He would march for perhaps five minutes with his eye riveted on this star, then turn and make a new observation of the polestar; for, of course, the star to the south was constantly progressing westward. He would then select a new star for guidance and
continue. 4
    It took an overnight trek to reach the western flank of the lost oasis of Jebel Uwainat. There, he was confronted by a huge rocky massif sprouting out of the flat desert like a giant iceberg: “The range in that vicinity rose in a sheer cliff from the desert floor. Heaped against it were masses of boulders, which through the ages had been worn smooth by the grinding, polishing action of wind and sand. It was as if here were piled the arsenals of Stone-Age giants whose weapons had been gargantuan
slings.” 5
    At Jebel Uwainat, Hassanein “found ample supplies of water in the deep-shaded recesses of the
cliffs.” 6 Usually, in these parts of the remote desert, water is found in very deep underground aquifers that are often far too deep to be reached by simply digging wells. Here at Jebel Uwainat, however, the water was at the surface, coming from the occasional rain that trickled down the rocks and collected in natural pools. Hassanein found four such pools (called
uwyun,
literally “eyes” in Arabic, and hence the name Uwainat, meaning “many eyes”), which had water that was “cool and of good
quality.” 7 In the days that followed, Hassanein and his men circumnavigated the outer rim of the Uwainat massif, and at night, they camped in the dry wadis (valleys) and always assumed that they were completely alone in this strange wilderness. One morning, however, as Hassanein woke up, standing before him was a young Black woman holding a bowl of milk in offering. She was slender and very beautiful, and Hassanein at first thought he was having a dream. The woman spoke a strange language, which Hassanein’s guide recognized as being of the Tebu people, pastoral nomads known to have once roamed this part of the Sahara. The young woman offered to take them to the king of Uwainat. He turned out to be a Black man called Herri who claimed to rule over some one hundred and fifty Tebu who lived there. King Herri spoke of mysterious rock carvings of animals and men not known in this part of the Sahara, and Hassanein was taken to see them.
    The animals are rudely drawn, but not, unskillfully carved. There are lions, giraffes, ostriches, and all kinds of gazelles, but no camels. The carvings are from a half to a quarter of an inch deep and the edges of the lines in some instances are considerably weathered. “Who made these?” I asked Malakheni, the Tebu. He expressed the belief that they were the work of the
jinn
[demons]. “For,” he added, “what man can do these things now?” What man among the present inhabitants, indeed! Here is a puzzle, which must be left to the research of archeologists. Suffice it to say that there are no giraffes in this part of Africa now, nor do they live in any similar desert country anywhere. Perhaps even more significant is the absence of camels from the drawings. If they had been native to the region at the time that the carvings were made, surely this most important beast of the desert would have been pictured. But the camel came to Africa from Asia not later [than] 500 BCE. Can these carvings antedate that event? Or has the character of this country undergone such astonishing modification to have converted into desert a fertile region in which the giraffe roamed, and the camel was not a familiar burden-bearer? With the inspection of these rock carvings, my hasty exploration of Uwainat was
concluded. 8

    Figure 2.1. The tebu of the Sahara photographed by Ahmed Hassanein, 1923. Courtesy of SaharaSafaris.org/hassaneinbey.

    Figure 2.2. King Herri of Unwainat photographed by Ahmed Hassanein, 1923. Courtesy