1 101 x Egypt @ Villages established in Egypt's Western Desert before 6000 BC had large pits to store local grain, including sorghum, which may have been cultivated. By 5000 BC, wheat and barley, probably introduced from West Asia, were being grown in the adjacent Nile Valley. Egypt owed its prosperity to the annual inundation (flooding) of the Nile which made cultivation easy.
# Egypt
2 101 x Nubia and the Sudan @ Cultivation of wheat and barley, introduced, along with cattle, goats and sheep, from West Asia, spread from Egypt into Nubia, Ethiopia and Sudan along with the use of the plough. These areas also cultivated sorghum and other millets domesticated further west in the Sahara, and other crops from further south, including oil palm nuts.
# Nubia and Sudan, Meroitic engraving with sorghum
3 101 x Ethiopia @ Southern Ethiopia was home to a number of crops that never spread elsewhere, including ensete, the 'false banana' whose stem and roots were eaten, noog, an oil-bearing plant, and tef, a small but extremely nutritious grain crop. Finger millet, later widely cultivated, may also have been domesticated locally in Ethiopia. Northern Ethiopia grew crops introduced from Egypt.
# Ethiopia
4 102 X The Sahara and West Africa@ The area stretching from West Africa through the Sahara into Sudan was the home of a number of African grain species, which were domesticated here, perhaps as a response to increasing aridity in the Sahara, once fertile grasslands. These plants included sorghum, several other millets and probably rice. Domestic cattle were being herded here before 6000 BC.
# Sahara and West Africa, Sahara cattle
5 101 x Tropical Africa @ Africa's savannahs and forests were home to a diverse range of tubers and tree crops. Oil palm nuts were being grown in the Sudan, outside their native range, by 4400 BC, showing that they had already cultivated in their homeland at an earlier date. Particularly important were yams, the cultivation of which is hard to demonstrate from archaeology.
# Tropical Africa, Oil palm and yam
6 101 x Madagascar @ According to the 'Periplus', a 1st century AD sailing manual, the East African coast was involved in trade across the Indian Ocean. In later centuries, Indonesian colonists established themselves on Madagascar, to which they introduced South-East Asian crops such as sugarcane, bananas, coconut and papaya, which were eventually widely adopted through Africa.
# Madagascar, One or two of these especially banana
8 101 x Horses @ The Hyksos invaders from the Levant who ruled Egypt during the 17th century BC may have brought in horses, though evidence at Buhen suggests horses were already present by 1800 BC. They were used by royalty and the most important elite to pull their light chariots. The Nubian royal burials contained rows of buried chariot horses.
# Horse
9 101 x Pigs @ By 5000 BC, pigs were being kept alongside sheep, goat and cattle in Egypt; they were probably locally domesticated in the Nile Delta. The pig was not a popular subject in Egyptian art, but numerous pig bones in the town of Amarna indicate that pork was a popular food for the less well-to-do.
# Pig
10 101 x The ass @ The donkey was domesticated from the wild ass in Egypt or the Sudan. It was important to the ancient Egyptians as a beast of burden for the farmer, carrying goods and people. It was also later used as a pack animal by the Berber people of North Africa in their trade across the Sahara.
# Ass
11 101 x Cattle @ Cattle may have been domesticated around 6000 BC in the Sahara, although they were certainly also introduced from West Asia. As the Sahara progressively dried up, herders sought new pastures further south, finally reaching the far south after AD 1000. Rock art in the Sahara provides an invaluable insight into early cattle herding practices, which included milking.
# Cattle
12 101 x Goats @ No native species existed in Africa which could have given rise to domestic goat so it seems it was introduced from West Asia. Domestic goats were being herded, together with sheep, in North Africa and the Nile Valley before 5000 BC. They later spread widely in sub-Saharan Africa.
# Goat
13 101 x Sheep @ The native African Barbary sheep was not ancestral to the domestic sheep of Africa, which was introduced from West Asia. Domestic sheep and goat were being kept in North Africa and the Nile Valley before 5000 BC, and were later introduced widely in sub-Saharan Africa. The fat-tailed breed were particularly useful, providing valuable dietary fat.
# Sheep
14 101 x Unusual animals @ Rock art from the Sahara shows tethered giraffes around 6000 BC; giraffes were also kept by the Egyptians several thousand years later. Egyptian relief carvings of the Old Kingdom, c 3000-2200 BC, depict a number of unusual animals being led and therefore presumably tame: these include hyaena, ostrich, antelope, monkey and leopard.
# Unusual animals
15 101 x Camels @ Camels, probably native to Arabia, were known in Egypt from ancient times, for example in a burial around 3000 BC, and were introduced to Egyptian Nubia by 800 BC. The introduction of domestic camel to North Africa was of major significance for developing cross-Sahara trade routes.
# Camel
16 101 x Cats @ Cats, descended from a North African wild species, seem likely to have attached themselves to humans when farming was well enough established to require large grain storage facilities that attracted rats and mice. The Egyptian goddess Bastet is represented as a cat, and a number of cat mummies are known.
# Cat
17 101 x Ducks and geese @ Ducks, geese and other birds were a popular source of food in many parts of the continent and in Egypt were reared for the table. Wall paintings and reliefs depict geese being force-fed to fatten them up, while other show vivid wild fowling scenes in the marshes, a popular sport of royalty and nobility.
# Ducks and geese
18 101 x Guineafowl @ Known from preDynastic times in Egypt the guineafowl was taken from Africa to Europe by the Romans and rediscovered by the Portuguese explorers of Africa in the 16th century AD.
# Guineafowl
19 101 x Wheat @ Wheat was introduced to Egypt around 5000 BC from West Asia where it had long been cultivated. It became established as the main staple in the north - along the Mediterranean coast and as far south as the Ethiopian highlands. The Egyptians used it to brew beer.
# Wheat
20 101 x Sorghum @ Although evidence is very limited, it is probable that sorghum (Guinea corn) was cultivated in the Sahara well before 5000 BC. It became an important crop throughout the northern part of Africa, grown in areas like West Africa and the Sudan as a major staple. In the early centuries AD it was introduced to other regions.
# Sorghum
21 101 x Barley @ Though most probably introduced from West Asia, it is possible that local wild barley was also domesticated in the Sahara. It became an important crop particularly in Egypt where it was made into bread. It was also grown in the Ethiopian highlands and in coastal North Africa.
# Barley
22 101 x African rice @ Native to West Africa, African rice may have been cultivated here when Saharan dwellers began to move southward from their progressively less hospitable environment. The earliest evidence for cultivated rice is from the major site of Jenne-jeno in the Niger delta, in the 1st century AD, though almost certainly cultivation began much earlier.
# African rice
23 101 x Millets @ Bulrush millet (Pennisetum) was probably domesticated in the Sahara region by 6000 BC; around 4000, finger millet was also being cultivated here. Yet another millet, panicum, was grown along with finger millet in the Sudan at a similar date. By the early centuries AD bulrush and finger millet had been introduced to southern Africa by the spreading Bantu people.
# Millets
24 101 x Pulses @ A wide range of pulses, including beans, chickpeas, lentils and green beans, were the staple fare of the ancient Egyptian peasant, along with cereals. Cowpea, groundnuts and other pulses were also among the plants cultivated by early farmers spreading through the rest of the continent.
# Pulses
25 101 x Tubers @ Yams are a staple crop in Africa and are likely to have been so for thousands of years, but this is difficult to establish since they, and other tubers, do not usually leave any archaeological traces. Yams are native to the forest fringes of West Africa.
# Tubers
26 101 x Fruits and vegetables @ Grapes were cultivated by the Egyptians who ate them as raisins and made them into wine. Jars of wine are among the objects recovered from many tombs: these are often labelled with details of the vintage. The Egyptians also grew vegetables, such as leeks, onions and lettuces; garlic, thought to ward off disease, was very popular.
# Grapes
27 101 x Treecrops @ Nuts from the oil palm, an important source of protein and oil, have been found in West Africa around 3000 BC and by about 4400 BC in the Nile Valley. The versatile date palm was also an important treecrop, cultivated in Egypt. Other palm fruits were also grown, as were plums, carobs (locust beans) and walnuts.
