Maghreb Amazigh Seminar - Session 4
Protohistory and the Berberisation of Africa
and the Canary Islands:
languages, identities, materialities

Project coordinators Karima Dirèche - TELEMMe Malika Assam - IREMAM Aude Signoles - Mesopholis 

Speakers: Jorge Onrubia PintadoProfessor at the Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha, Director of the Laboratorio de Arqueología, Patrimonio y Tecnologías
Emerging (IDR).
Discussant : Jean-Pierre Bracco, PU Lampea- AMU

Protohistory and Berberisation in North Africa and the Canary Islands: languages, identities and materials

Etymologically speaking, the term "Protohistory" could be equated with "early" or "primitive" history. But its use within historical disciplines is problematic in both chronological and socio-cultural terms. At present, the term Protohistory designates a polysemic and labile historical category that
applies to periods and societies with vague and fluctuating temporal boundaries and cultural specificities. However, there are two main uses
each with its own conceptual framework and disciplinary practice.
On the one hand, there is an evolutionary and chronometric use which has its origins in
of a universalist conception, largely inspired by diffusionism and the reference points of
chronological data long provided by Near Eastern history and archaeology. This
vision sees Protohistory as a stage in the history of mankind
characterised by the establishment of social differentiation processes, which can therefore
began in the Neolithic period, but essentially extended from the discovery of metallurgy
to the invention of writing. The second usage is based on a rather relativistic conception
and "methodologist". He considers that the field of Protohistory is linked above all to the
the nature of the documentation available, in particular the existence of testimonials
indirect textual evidence to complement archaeological observations. These
can either come from other contemporary peoples, or correspond to stories,
based on writings or oral traditions that clearly postdate the period in question.
bear witness.

As far as the Maghreb and Sahara are concerned, under the aegis of Gabriel Camps in particular,
the undisputed master of protohistoric studies in the region, Protohistory ended up
to become, to borrow his words literally, "the science of Berber origins".
It is therefore easy to see the extent to which the construction process
of North African Protohistory has contributed, and continues to contribute, in turn to
a real ethnogenesis: the 'Berberisation' of the populations that it sets out to
(re)present and historicise. But contrary to the anhistorical vision of a history
history that Camps' historiographical project could wrongly lead us to suppose, the
North African Protohistory, on the other hand, is presented as a historical scenario.
dynamic and multiform, with high socio-cultural and spatio-temporal variability.
Beyond the undeniable endogenous dynamics, this variability is related to
the specificity, in terms of autochthony and acculturation, of the different processes of
inter-ethnic and cultural contact that characterise this period over the long term.
Firstly, the influence of Pharaonic Egypt on present-day Libya and the Eastern Sahara and
the Italian and Iberian peninsulas, and the islands off their coasts, on
the North African territories opposite them during the Chalcolithic and Bronze Ages
Europeans. Then came the Phoenician and Greek colonisation, followed by the Romans, of the whole region.
the Mediterranean Tell coastline and part of the Atlantic coast of modern-day Morocco. It is
it should be noted that, in all likelihood, one of the consequences of this penetration
the settlement of the Canary Islands.
In the current state of research, it is still not easy to establish the role played by these
historical scenarios of "contagion" and cultural change, which are still in progress.
double meaning, in the introduction and dissemination of a whole range of material elements
traditionally used to characterise North African Protohistory: metallurgy of the
copper, bronze and iron, harnessed and mounted horses, Libyan-Berber writings, dromedaries...
Nor to determine their relative contribution to local differentiation processes
and social stratification which, at this very moment, are leading to the emergence of
chieftaincies or even true indigenous states.
On the basis of the data provided by archaeology, but without forgetting the contributions of
textual sources, historical linguistics and biological anthropology, this
presentation aims to provide an overview of the state of the art in the Protohistory of Africa.
and the Canary Islands. The focus will be on the issue of reconstruction
and its relationship with ethnic identities.
Presentation of the Maghreb Amazigh research project: https://somum.hypotheses.org/1037
Website of the Maghreb Amazigh research project: https://magamazigh.hypotheses.org/