Predynastic warfare – No eden: violence and warfare in the Nile Valley

As is the case around the world, archaeological evidence has been discovered in Egypt and northern Sudan revealing that its diverse prehistoric communities did not always live side-by-side in equitable harmony, and that violence and ‘warfare’ were a regrettable reality of life. (Some scholars are of the opinion that ‘true’ warfare emerged only with the formation of states and their professional armies, and prefer instead to talk of ‘lethal intergroup violence’ or the like). The earliest evidence we have that it was not all sweetness and light between these communities was unearthed at Wadi Kubbaniya (the largest wadi in the Western Desert), which lies about ten miles north of Aswan.

Wadi Kubbaniya Man

Between 1978 and 1983, the famous American archaeologist Fred Wendorf (a hugely important figure in Egyptian prehistoric research) and his colleagues of the Combined Prehistoric Expedition (CEP) undertook a series of important archaeological investigations at Wadi Kubbaniya. They discovered that, about 18,000 years ago, the lower reaches of the wadi were flooded by the Nile inundation, creating a temporary lake and a favourable environment for Late Palaeolithic hunter-gatherers (or ‘foragers/hunter-fisher-gatherers’). The area was rich in food resources, particularly fish (at one of the wadi’s hunter-gatherer sites, about 13,000 catfish bones were found). Also available on the Late Palaeolithic menu at Wadi Kubbaniya were many edible plants, including camomile and nut-grass tubers, and wild animals such as hartebeest and wild cattle.

The most notable discovery made by the CEP archaeologists at Wadi Kubbaniya, however, was the skeleton of a young man (around 20-25 years of age), who, it seems, had not only been killed by an armed aggressor, but had also been involved in at least one previous violent encounter. As detailed in the American National Academy of Sciences tribute to Fred Wendorf: