inventions: Africa heft One can imagine a group of hunters who had to encircle their quarry until someone had the idea of using cord made from tree bark to make a kind of fence around the quarry; his descendants generations later would then have learned to weave cord into nets to make the process more effective Perhaps that weaving of nets gave someone the idea of a way to make clothing out of fibers or some other innovation that can only be imagined Inventiveness was fostered as people began to settle into permanent, fi xed communities with the advent of agriculture Now they were in more direct communication with one another, observing others’ techniques and tools, sharing them, and adapting them Moreover, a critical mass of people could pool their efforts to come up with an innovative solution to a problem Throughout ancient Mesopotamia, Egypt, and Mesoamerica, for example, people carried out massive public works projects that led to innovations in architecture (columns and arches), agriculture (plant breeding), irrigation (the water wheel), road building (the crowned road), sewage and drainage systems (the lead plumbing of the Romans), and the like People interested in medicine could observe the successes and failures of others, over time developing know-how in the use of medicinal plants and even surgical techniques Farmers could learn new ways of harvesting, threshing, and storing grain Others who were more interested in crafts work could learn to make use of new tools, techniques, and materials as they collaborated with others Miners could become skilled at new ways to find ores, mine them, process them, and forge metals This process continued as trade and commerce developed, bringing novel tools and materials to new regions of the world, leading to further innovation One can only imagine the excitement of a European wood carver the fi rst time he or she acquired a piece of ivory from an African elephant tusk or a jewelry maker encountering imported glass for the first time AFRICA BY MICHAEL J O’NEAL Ancient Africa was the cradle of human civilization, the home of the world’s first people, so it is no surprise that Africans were among the world’s first inventors As the earliest Africans struggled to adapt to and control their environment, they naturally learned how to modify that environment and use the resources that surrounded them to help ensure their survival and to make their lives more comfortable The word invention suggests thinking of something entirely new, the development of a tool or process that had not existed in the past and that fundamentally changes the relationship between people and their environment Among the ancient Africans, and probably ancient peoples generally, invention was probably more of a process of discovery and adaptation Over millennia people inherited the knowledge of their ancestors, but whether from necessity or from simple 593 Stone hand ax (Lower Palaeolithic, about 1.2 million years ago) from Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania, representing one of the earliest technological inventions (© The Trustees of the British Museum) curiosity they introduced innovations, refinements, and improvements to existing technology to make it work better The ancient Africans did not invent fire, for example Fire is a process of combustion that already exists in nature Rather, they discovered that fire could be put to human uses and learned to control it to keep themselves warm, cook food, weaken rock so that it could be split into pieces for use as tools, clear fields of stubble to encourage the growth of the next season’s crop, and so on Historians and archaeologists believe that the first human use of fire occurred some 1.4 million years ago in Chesowanja, near Kenya’s Lake Baringo Many African developments had to with the most basic necessities: food, shelter, and clothing Africans were the first to develop Stone Age cutting tools, and in time they learned to produce handles for those and other tools Later they developed a great variety of tools, including fishhooks, grindstones, awls, spears, and bows and arrows They were the first to domesticate crops, some 15,000 years ago, and to domesticate and graze cattle This took place in what is now the Sahara Desert but at the time—around 6000–3000 b.c.e.—was covered with grasses