When explaining the effect of biology and geography on the supremacy of western science, Ian Morris writes: "People in Australia, Siberia or sub-Saharan Africa stuck with hunting and gathering" (30 October, p 32). With respect to sub-Saharan Africa, this is plainly wrong. In his book The Civilizations of Africa: A history to 1800, Christopher Ehret reports that archaeological and linguistic evidence suggests agriculture, both arable and livestock-based, has been invented in Africa independently at least four times, in the regions of the Nile, Sudan and Ethiopia, perhaps as early as 10,000 BC.
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