Thursday, February 12, 2009

History - Egyptology - Archaeology - Race and its Unimportance to me

I wouldn't class myself as being particularly naïve but I've been a bit shocked whilst researching online at the lack of basic human decency and the attempts to 'claim' history for either one side, or the other, of the race debate.

When I dedicated my sites to Amenirdis I, I did so knowing that she was black - an ancient Kushite Princess with an enormous level of power politically and religiously. The fact that Amenirdis was black is irrelevant to me. What is so important is the amazing woman that she was - her lineage and her history, however confusing that may be at times for someone in the twenty-first Century trying to piece together her history.

By default, I found myself embroiled in an online conversation recently regarding race, black supremacy & white supremacy. It very quickly became obvious to me that supremacists of either 'variety', especially where ancient Egyptian history was concerned, were both as bad as each other.
I don't wish to have my view of history tainted by the likes of either 'type' of supremacist not least because their attitudes to history and its facts (however vague at times) appear to be claimed by one 'side' or the other as trophies of some description. Ridiculous.

To those supremacists, of either 'type', I would suggest that you put away your personal agendas and look at ancient Egypt for exactly what it was - a wealth of wonderful and diverse peoples of varying different skin colours who all added to the magnificence of Upper and Lower Egypt.

I live in Luxor - within its wonderful modern-day diverse culture and I see the 'modern Egyptians' struggling with race, colour and religious differences, just as the ancient Egyptians did - some things don't change :-(

Whilst I do not wear rose-tinted spectacles regarding the wars, the invasions and the barbaric cruelty of some periods of ancient history (no more obvious than in the present day!), I would like to think that I have a fairly balanced view of the 'colour issue'. For me that issue is irrelevant when trying to gain an insight in to the way that people of ancient Egypt lived, ruled, loved and died. History has no colour and to suggest otherwise is, to me, preposterous.


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http://queen.amenardis.net/?p=139
http://amenirdis.wordpress.com/2009/02/12/history-egyptology-archaeology-race-and-its-unimportance-to-me/
http://amunirdis.blogspot.com/2009/02/history-egyptology-archaeology-race-and.html