Ancient History
History
African Mythology: The Darassa and the Shift of Power
A Darassa origin myth recounts how women held sole dominion in the early days—as rulers, officials, and elite—while men performed domestic labor. The narrative traces the transfer of power to men through political conspiracy: a male rebel's wife kills him at the queen's command, then the reorganized men engineer the queen's death and eliminate her heir, establishing male rule as permanent law.
African Queens #5: Dihya
Kahina Dihya was a Berber warrior queen who led indigenous resistance to the Arab Islamic conquest of the Maghreb in the late seventh century. She achieved a stunning military victory against General Hassan Nu'Man in 698, but ultimately fell to his returning forces after a scorched-earth strategy fractured her coalition.
African Queens #3: Pokou Awura
This essay traces the legendary journey of Queen Pokou, an 18th-century Asante noblewoman who refused to join her uncle Osei Tutu I's confederacy and led her people westward into what is now Ivory Coast. According to oral tradition, she sacrificed her own son at the Komoe River to secure safe passage, an act that gave rise to the Baoule people, who remain the largest ethnic group in modern Ivory Coast.
African Queens #2: Yaa Asantewaa
A portrait of Yaa Asantewaa, the Asante queen mother who in 1900 publicly called her people to armed resistance against British colonial demands—including the seizure of the sacred Golden Stool. Her defiant speech galvanized the Asante Kingdom into a rebellion that, though ultimately quelled by superior British force, preserved Asante sovereignty and cultural independence in ways that outlasted formal colonialism itself.
African Queens #5: Dihya
This essay traces the life and legacy of Kahina Dihya, a seventh-century Berber warrior queen who led indigenous resistance against Arab Islamic conquest in North Africa. From her celebrated victory at the Battle of the Camels in 698 to her death five years later, Dihya commanded the Berber tribes and challenged one of history's great imperial expansions.