Customer Reviews

The Kingdom of Kush: The Napatan and Meroitic Empires

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This is a beautiful and captivating book. It differs completely from other books about the black Pharaohs, which are often ideological and controversial. This book provides proof, with photos from archeological sites. It informs us about life in the cities and in the countryside and about ancient black religions. Kush was not Egypt, but it ruled Egypt for a period of time. The book is also affordable, which I greatly appreciated.

I have rarely read a more disappointing book than The Kingdom of Kush by Derek Welsby. Badly organized with no continuity, I assume the publisher's editorial staff was on vacation when this one came through. The book is the literary equivalent of the 50 yard dash for people with no sense of direction. Hummingbirds spend more time in one place than Mr. Welsby spent with any one facet of his book. Unless you happen to be a scholar specializing in the Kingdom, you will be quickly lost as the author zigs and zags through myriad arcane tidbits that are probably significant to someone. There is no effort to establish a context, set out a chronology, or discuss the historical significance of the topic in general terms that an intelligent, but unschooled lay person could understand. Perhaps the target audience was the six other experts fluent in this field; for the rest of us, the book is a useless garble of facts and pontifications. Equal criticism goes to the History Book of the Month Club who marketed the book with no indication that you needed a PhD in the topic to follow the book. The bio describes Mr. Welsby as an assistant keeper and field archealogist. While it appears that he is indeed quite knowledgeable in the field of Kushite history, I would recommend that he stick with his day job or get real editors.

This is a beautiful and captivating book. It differs completely from other books about the black Pharaohs, which are often ideological and controversial. This book provides proof, with photos from archeological sites. It informs us about life in the cities and in the countryside and about ancient black religions. Kush was not Egypt, but it ruled Egypt for a period of time. The book is also affordable, which I greatly appreciated.

Author Derek Welsby spares every effort to clarify Kushite history. Here's an emblematic sentence: "El Kurru should perhaps be considered as a candidate for the location of Krtn with its royal palace." Is it possible to cram more conditionals into a single sentence? The text is filled with clauses such as "of which we are largely ignorant", "we have no way of knowing", and "no indisputable evidence exists".

Admittedly, this may indeed reflect the true state of affairs of our knowledge, or lack thereof, of the Kingdom of Kush. But to me the faults in the writing extend beyond failing to clarify an ambiguous situation or hesitancy in choosing between alternative explanations. Place-names are frequently introduced without explaining whether they are ancient or modern names. The relevant geography is treated as if the reader is already an expert in the Nile's meanderings. References are brief and seldom help in evaluating a citation's specific interpretation. Succeeding paragraphs do not often link together. Sentences are often opaque, doggedly refusing to surrender their meaning ever after repeated readings.

And where the history of Kush touches on an event that may already be known to many readers - that being the Kushite intervention against Assyria in its assault on Jerusalem in 701 BC, as ambiguously recounted in the Old Testament -- Welsby fails to treat it with the rigor the episode deserves. He fails to recognize both that 1) the accounts in Kings I and II are superficially inconsistent and 2) resolving the discrepancy shows that the Kushites in fact saved the kingdom of Judah from certain destruction at a crucial moment in its history. (An absorbing and fully convincing exegesis is provided by Henry Aubin in "The Rescue of Jerusalem".)

The photographs - many in color - are extensive, stunning and provide an eloquence the writing lacks. The best that can be said of the diagrams, including a few meagerly drawn maps, is that they are no worse than the text.

Interesting book, but tried to use European fantasies of being African, indigenous (Egyptian)or Black (the modern European term for African). However it does have some very good information. When you get pass the imperial European denial. You can find some good information in this book. Ancient Nubians and the other ancient Africans, the Kamites (their real name)called Egyptians thousands of years later by the Greeks.