Africa > Nubians

Nubians

This specific picture of Nubia and the Nubians arose from the structure and function of the Nubian society and its adaptation to the environment along the shores of the Nile.

One cannot associate violence with this land and people. Nor were the more subtle patterns of factionalism and hostility so evident here as they sometimes are in village life elsewhere.

The fundamental impression of the nonviolent peaceful quality of Nubian life can only be explained or made plausible if we understand what is called the Nubian polity. Polity in this sense, involves economy and ecology, as well as the kinship organization, and the values and attitudes associated with these basic conditions of every-day life.

This necessity also influenced social relationships and interactions because shares in property could not be sold but were bequeathed. Therefore, it would be in the interest of an owner of part of a waterwheel and consequently to a share of the crops irrigated by it, to acquire part of the land irrigated by the waterwheel. He would try to achieve this by marrying off his son to the daughter of the landowner; thus, the bride would bring a share of the land to the bridegroom's family.

Since the Old Kingdom, texts tell us that in the Egyptian army, the Nubians were fighting side by side with the Egyptians. In the Middle Kindom, we find the Nubians represented in military formation, as seen here on this model, a replica of a wooden one found in a tomb of Asyut, and now on display in the Cairo Museum – 11th dynasty.