Ancient Kush was one of the earliest and longest-lived empires in Africa, rivalled only by Egypt. We think of Kush in terms of its relationship to Egypt of the pharaohs, but in fact Kush remained in power long after the last Egyptian pharaoh, and indeed was a rival and trade partner of ancient Rome after the Roman conquest of Egypt in 31 BCE.
The initial contact with Rome resulted in a series of skirmishes in which the Kushite army was led in battle by a ruling queen or kandaka, who one Roman source described as “a masculine sort of woman who was blind in one eye”. The kandakas were part of a long line of powerful Kushite royal women, and they remain important symbols even in Muslim Sudan today.
This talk describes the long relationship between Kush and the Roman world, including espionage, conflict, and a long a rich trade and gift exchange.
Martha Sharp Joukowsky Lectureships
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