OF the culture-propagating rivers of Africa one need only mention the Nile
to be aware that this geographical body is, notwithstanding, a tremendous historical
body. This, however, is not just true of Ancient Egypt alone, or of that period during
which Africa has been in historical contact with Europe. It is true of all African culture;
it too has its history. There is though, in comparison with areas whose history is famil-
iar to us, the one weighty difference that here we lack the most important evidence of
historical consciousness -- writing. The achievement of a people such as the Bakuba of
the Southern Congo in tracing the genealogy of their kings for many hundreds of years
is a most rare exception. Africa too is historic ground, although, despite the fact that
specialists have long since realized this, it has scarcely penetrated the consciousness of
people at large, for whom the continent has simply remained at a 'primitive' stage of
human development. Today the historical profundity of Africa fascinates us in ever-
increasing measure and tempts us, now that we have explored the 'Dark Continent' in
space, to light it up in time, right back to the earliest beginnings. More and more we
are coming to recognize that the ethnological data which the country presents to us
today must not merely be accepted as such, but that in them other, historical forms are
handed down. These forms are, however, infinitely difficult to isolate in the absence of
any written documents, and they therefore only too often become the subject of the
most extravagant phantasy and speculation. As far as art is concerned, this historical
aspect means that we have to take the present-day forms as historically developed ones.
At the same time it brings the art of the older African past within the sphere of our in-
terest, if only in a secondary degree as it has survived only in rare exceptions. Mean-
while archaeological investigation of African ground is bringing to light not merely
new facts but, increasingly, splendid works of art.

We must not however be too hasty. We have only reached the stage of putting one
tiny piece of the mosaic alongside another; it would today be premature to try to sketch
a composite African history and to range within it the artistic evidence. What we pri-
marily lack is the support of a clear and coherent chronology. In our own history we
are accustomed to demand dates, but this demand cannot yet be satisfied in Africa; in-
deed even if we now and again possess a positive date it hangs as it were in the air, as it
has no connexion with other dates of African history or with undatable events or

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