The Negro in the South / His Economic Progress in Relation to his Moral and Religious Development

n southern Asia primitive human beings began to differentiate in two directions. Toward the south appeared the primitive Negro, long-headed and with flattened hair

two types or, as some prefer to think, by the direct prolongation of the original primitive man, a third intermediate type of human being appeared with hair and cranial measuremen

many human beings have believed them in the past. The biblical story of Shem, Ham, and Japheth retains the

able now that from the primitive Negroid stock evolved in Asia the Semites either by local variation or intermingling with other stocks; later there developed the Mediterranean race, with Negroid characteristics, and the modern Negroes. The blue-eyed, light-haired Germanic people may have arisen as a modern variation of the mixed peoples produced by the mingling of Asiatic

ient statues of Indian divinities show the Negro type with black face and close-curled hair, and early Babylonian culture was Negroid. In Arabia the Negroes may have divided, and one stream perhaps wandered into Europe by way of Syria. Traces of these Negroes are manifest not o

yellow, and his skull was sometimes round like the Mongolian. He entered Africa not less than fifty thousand years ago an

lighter and straighter haired than the primitive Negroes. From this Mediterranean race was developed the modern inhabitants of the shores of the

t mulatto character. The primitive Negro stock was "mulatto" in the sense of being not widely differentiated from the dark, original Australoid stock. As the earlier yellow Negro dev

ering these types as transitions between absolute Caucasians and absolute Negroes. No such absolute type ever existed on either side. Both were slowly differentiated from a common ancestry and continually remingled their blood while the differentiating wa

n and so much is still in dispute. Yet, by avoiding the real controversies and being unafraid of

l, black Nilotic Negro in the eastern Sudan. In the earliest times we find the Negroes in the valley of the Nile, pressing downward from the interior. Here they ming

ing backward met Egyptian, Ethiopian, and even European and Asiatic influences about Lake Chad. To the southeast, nearer the primitive seats of the earliest African immigr

y settled into a great southeastward migration. Calling themselves proudly La Bantu (The People), they grew by agglomeration into a warlike

ulatto Egypt black Africa was always in closest touch, so much so that to some all evidence of Negro uplift seem Egyptian in origin. The truth is, rathe

Rome. In some of the North African kingdoms the infiltration of Negro blood was very large and kings like Massinissa and Jugurtha were Negroid. By way of the Atlantic the Carthaginians reached the African west coast. Greek and Roman influences came through the desert, and the Byzantine Empire a

und an already existent culture and came, not a conqueror, but as an adapter and inspirer. Civilization received new impetus and a wave of Mohammedanism swept eastward, erecting the great kingdoms of Melle, the Song

black slaves should have poured into Egypt, because the chief line of Egyptian conquest and defense lay toward the heart of Africa. Moreover, the Egyptians, themselves of Negro descent, had not only Negro slaves but Negroes among their highest nobility and even among their Pharaohs. Mohammedan conquerors enslaved peoples of all colors in Europe, Asia, and Africa, but eventually their empire centered in Asia and Africa a

racteristic? This does not seem a fair conclusion. In four great centers state building began in Africa. In Ethiopia several large states were built up, but they tottered before the onslaughts of Egypt, Persia, Rome, and Byzantium, on the one hand, and finally fell before the turbulent Bantu war

ard the Congo valley was probably a prime cause of the original Bantu movements to the southeast. Toward the north and northeast, on the other hand, these city-states

g: first, the fierce resistance of the heathen south made war continuous and slaves one of the articles of systematic commerce. Secondly, the highways of legitimate African com

it to an enormous degree, until their demand, added to the demand of the Mohammedan in Africa and Asia, made human beings the highest priced article of commerce in Africa. Under such circumstances there could be but one end: the virtual uprooting of ancient African culture, leaving only misty reminders of the ruin in the customs

TNO

lack), the native name of Egypt. In the origina

interest. It is sufficient to remember that for several centuries leaders of the Christian Church gravely defended Negro slavery and oppression as the