Talk:Ancient Egyptian race controversy/Archive 12

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Black Hypothesis duplication

I think a tipping point has been successfully reached. This article is supposed to be a summary of the history of the controversy, not a place to rehash the detailed POV of Diop. However the Black Hypothesis section quickly grew into a Diop-rehash. To accommodate the notability of this debunked theory, we created the Black Egyptian Hypothesis article, so that all the detail could be wallowed in over there at length without distracting this article. That worked well for a few days, but then Diop's supporters duplicated all that detail back into this section as well, which is now well and truly WP:UNDUE. The answer here is to reduce the entire Herodotus block of text down to two sentences, and to keep the detail at the main Black Egyptian Hypothesis article. Ditto the Qustul detail - it is notable and belongs at the Black Egyptian Hypothesis article, but should be mentioned here in summary rather than duplicated in detail. However for this to work the editors with the Diop-focus need to respect the policies, to put the detail in the appropriate article only, and to stop the duplication. Wdford (talk) 09:57, 6 February 2013 (UTC)

Agreed. It's a struggle to keep this article on topic. Dougweller (talk) 10:48, 6 February 2013 (UTC)

Disagreed. The Black theory section has grown because some editors have added a lengthy digression about the veracity of Herodotus into the section. In addition, some editors try to find any statement on the internet that disagrees with the text of the Black theory and add it to the black theory (as if this isn't an article about a controversy). This leads to a rebuttal and refutation, which makes the section grow. Of course, you can find statements that contradict the text of the black theory (hence the controversy), but you can find many more statements that support it.

If you want a shorter black theory section, stop trying to disprove the black theory in the black theory section and stop digressing about Herodotus in the black theory section. I propose that you make a new section that discusses Herodotus as a reliable source. I will add to that section the numerous scholars throughout history that have cited his work and corroborated his findings.

You can also shorten the article by removing the ridiculous statements by Najovits and shortening the debunked Hamitic, Asiatic, Caucasian, and Turanid hypotheses. Finally, you can remove the statement by Hawass that Egyptians are not Africans, as there is far too much evidence at this point that Egyptians were Africans.Rod (talk) 07:56, 10 February 2013 (UTC)

Fundamentally I agree that this article is too long and the reason is that it is still based heavily on trying to portray the idea that somehow the controversy started with African scholars, yet gloss over the historic racism and pseudo science of Europeans as being irrelevant and not controversial. If people want to have a NPOV article they should stop trying to portray Africans calling ancient populations in Africa black somehow controversial. It isn't. The only thing that is controversial is the fact that Europeans have been trying hard for the last 200 years to do everything to convince people around the world that certain populations in Africa could not have been black based purely on their own racist ideologies and nothing to do with scientific fact. The fact is that among population biologists who actually have the skills and science to determine phenotype and relationships among ancient populations the idea that ancient Egyptians were black like other Africans is not even a controversial concept, considering that most Africans now and historically were black and that certainly holds true for indigenous Nile Valley Africans. So the idea that the notion of this one population of Africans in ancient times was black is NOT the controversy from a scientific perspective. Big-dynamo (talk) 23:28, 10 February 2013 (UTC)

Doug, it would be nearly impossible to edit an article about such a controversial topic and not be accused of POV violations. It can be construed as pushing a POV to list all historical theories (all of them debunked) without mentioning in those sections that modern scholarship does not agree with those theories. Conversely, in the Black theory we are not allowed to just list the main points of the black theory, we must also burden the black theory section with balance. We should be consistent. If there will be balance (contradictory views) in the Black theory section, we should rewrite all of the other theories to present the other side of the story (within those sections).Rod (talk) 03:12, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

There are different types of POV violations. One is WP:UNDUE which is probably what you are are referring to. Another has to do with tone, see WP:IMPARTIAL. Another has to do with the words we use (or don't use), see the section in WP:NPOV on words to watch and Wikipedia:Words to watch. We probably all have problems with that from time to time, but I think you need to read that carefully. And finally WP:ATTRIBUTE. Dougweller (talk) 10:20, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

As I understand it, we are discussing WP:UNDUE in the Black Egyptian section. One must remember that the Black Egyptian section is refuting all former (debunked) theories. Thus, one must compare the amount of space used to describe ALL the other theories and compare that with the space used to describe the Black Theory, which refutes them all. Diop, Bernal, and others (see my additions to the talk pages on this subject) rely heavily on Ancient Greek writers to make their case. This has been a significant event in the history of the controversy (see the many rebuttals to Diop's and Bernal's works). Therefore, the Black theory's use of Ancient Greek evidence to refute ALL former theories on the race of Ancient Egyptians is not to be glossed over in this encyclopedia article on the history of the controversy.

Thanks for the links. They were helpful.Rod (talk) 19:41, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

The Black Hypothesis section is not refuting everything that went before, it is just one more theory that has itself been rejected, and deserves no more weight than any other rejected theory. The evidence in favor of the Dynastic Race theory is as strong as that for the Black Hypothesis, regardless of the personal feelings of Diop et al. Let's try to stay a bit more neutral please? (PS: The Black Hypothesis has its own article, so put the weight in there please).Wdford (talk) 07:22, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

Not true. The Dynastic theory has been refuted by modern scholarship. Serious modern scholars do not still try to maintain that the Egyptian civilization was started by outsiders. Serious scholars say that it was started by people living in Southern Egypt and Northern Nubia that had always lived there. From the Dynastic section:

"Contemporary consensus tends to suggest that Egyptian civilization was an indigenous Nile Valley development (see population history of Egypt)."

Furthermore, it is quite obvious that the Black theory refutes all other theories, as all other theories say that the Ancient Egyptians were non-Black and/or from somewhere other than the Nile Valley. The Black theory disagrees on both of those positions, which puts it at odds with every other theory. Just read the article.Rod (talk) 14:30, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

Being non-Black and being non-native to Egypt are two very different claims, and they aren't necessarily congruent. Other theories claimed they were native to the area- the Hamitic theory, the "Brown"/Mediterranean theories, and of course the modern evolutionary viewpoint. The Black theory doesn't actually necessarily claim that Egyptians were native to Egypt either.

In fact, from what we now know of human evolution, what you call "race" is just a set of adaptations to a given environment, with major factors including climate and amount/intensity of sunlight. Humans who had lived extensive periods in warm, tropical regions developed (or kept?) very dark skin, wide nostrils and tightly coiled hair- you call this black and associate it with "Africans", but in fact it also developed independently in Papua. Egypt, likewise, although in Africa as per continent boundaries drawn by humans, has the same climate and same latitude as Arabia, so, from the evolutionary point of view, naturally Egyptians should look quite similar to Arabians. --Yalens (talk) 16:45, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

We don't have to spend a lot of time on this, but you don't understand the Black theory. Diop starts his work by discussing the Out of Africa theory for modern humanity and he would consider that people in Papua look like Africans because they came from Africa and have not significantly differentiated from the original mold. Other than Bernal, the other proponents of the Black theory state explicitly in their work that Egyptians are from the Nile Valley area. It's not about what I call race. It's about what scholars called race during the beginning, middle, and end of the controversy. That's the topic of the original article and its spin offs. Most scholars writing about this subject had views on race that have been completely discredited and we're left with the only somewhat sensible racial construct (white, black, asian).Rod (talk) 22:50, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

All humans come from Africa, not just those in Papua and Africa itself. The Swede, the Mohawk and the Korean are just as "African" as the Papuan is. "Race" is nothing but a social construct developed between different human social groups that changes regularly with time and is completely subjective. The white/black/asian tripartite scheme is the typical belief of Americans, but that is a cultural, not scientific, fact. The only indisputable scientifically factual scheme is the "human race" which unites all of humanity. --Yalens (talk) 23:02, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

In any case, nothing can change the fact that the Black theory definitely is not the only one that ever argued for indigenous origins.--Yalens (talk) 23:13, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

Agreed, the Out of Africa theory states that all modern humans came from Africa and displaced any other human like beings that they found around the globe. Let's move on. This is not a forum.Rod (talk) 01:37, 13 February 2013 (UTC)

From the article:

• Asiatic theory: A.E. are from Mesopotamia. The Black theory and modern scholarship disagrees. They were indigenous to Africa.
• Hamitic theory: A.E. are Caucasians from some mysterious place else. It doesn't say in this article where they came from in the Neolithic. The Black theory and modern scholarship disagrees. They were indigenous to Africa.
• Caucasian theory: A.E. are white men. The Black theory and modern scholarship disagrees. Modern scholarship states that A.E. was founded by people from the Southern Nile Valley area. White men did not dominate the Nile Valley during any phase of the A.E. civilization (prior to the arrival of the Greeks and Romans).
• Turanid theory: A.E. are Mongols from Asia. The Black theory and modern scholarship disagrees. They were indigenous to Africa.
• Dynastic race theory: A.E. were a Mesopotamian force that imposed themselves on the local black people. The Black theory and modern scholarship disagrees. They were indigenous to Africa.
• Next we have the Black theory: It states that the A.E. were indigenous to Africa and that they would best fit into the black race using the black, white, asian racial construct that has been so popular during the period of Western history when this controversy was raging. The Black theory explicitly denies the existence of brown/Mediterranean/Hamitic/darkred races (all euphemisms for black) and states that racist scholars invented these categories in an effort to avoid putting the A.E. into the most reasonable category (black, using the broad continuum, saharo-tropical variant approach). This puts the Black theory at odds with every other theory on both points.Rod (talk) 02:02, 13 February 2013 (UTC)

The Mediterranean/Brown theory (and the modern theory) explicitly acknowledged Egyptians as native, while the Caucasian and Hamitic theories did not negate it, viewing Egypt as part of a larger West Eurasian-affiliated area. --Yalens (talk) 02:45, 13 February 2013 (UTC)

I took my bullet points above from the text of the article. It's possible that you are right about the theories, but that's not the impression that a reader would reach by reading this article. I actually don't know much about those theories, which is why I almost never edit those sections.Rod (talk) 14:10, 13 February 2013 (UTC)

That could actually be a flaw of the article's that we should fix... the problem is where to cite this. In any case, whether Egyptians were indigenous isn't really the crux of the argument, the crux was what race they were, and some theories made claims about where they came from as auxiliary, but it wasn't the point. --Yalens (talk) 16:59, 13 February 2013 (UTC)

Back then, it was actually much less common to consider x-group indigenous to wherever they were- indeed, many European peoples didn't even assume they were indigenous to Europe. Scots thought they were descended from Scythians, Poles said Sarmatians, some British peoples thought they were "Cimmerians", Basques were said to be related to Georgians, and numerous other peoples were said to be descended from Huns. They applied this assumption of invasion elsewhere too: they thought the Chinese might be descended from Sumerians (unless of course, the Hungarians were too, haha). I would guess that it might have something to do with a vague historical memory of the Age of Migrations after the Roman Empire, which caused the founding of many European states, causing later Europeans to assume that almost every people had come from somewhere other than where they currently lived, just like how their states were founded by invaders. But in any case, all of these ideas are now heavily discredited, and the modern trend is to view traditionally sedentary peoples (esp those with high population densities) as being usually indigenous (having lived in their present location for at least some large amount of time, i.e. 1000s of years), unless there's historical knowledge that prove otherwise (i.e. post-colonial/imperial populations), or a combination of linguistic and genetic evidence (i.e. such as the Malagasy of Madagascar, who speak a language related to those of Indonesia and Oceania, and have genetics that show they are partially descended from linguistically related populations far away from Africa). --Yalens (talk) 16:59, 13 February 2013 (UTC)

Just reread the Med/Brown theory which groups Nordic whites and browns from Africa into the same race, while excluding the Med. Nordic Whites from the White race. Even when talking about a subject so flimsy as race, that seems ridiculous. For all theories except Brown/Med and Caucasian, this article specifically states that the A.E. came from somewhere else (Mesopotamia, Mongol Asia, somewhere else in the Neolithic).Rod (talk) 14:18, 13 February 2013 (UTC)

Well I find the bulk of these theories ridiculous, but it really isn't about what we think, is it? By the way, anyhow, it doesn't actually group "Nordic whites" with them; instead, it doesn't consider Mediterraneans to be "white", and says that Greeks, Italians, Turks, Iranians and so on are "brown", not white. --Yalens (talk) 16:37, 13 February 2013 (UTC)

These theories weren't just "ridiculous" they were racist. They were created to try and find some way to make the ancient Egyptians anything other than black Africans, who in their world view could never have created a civilization on their own. Therefore the indigenous Nile Africans weren't simply brown Black Africans like any other Africans along the Nile, no they had to be a "special" population separate and distinct from all other population in Africa. That is purely racist and has absolutely nothing to do with any biological facts of history. These people were absolutely serious about this and their own works make it abundantly clear WHY the ancient Egyptians could not be considered black African. They were hypocrites because most of their work often contradicts itself saying on one hand that mummies looked like Ethiopians (blacks) but on the other weren't "negroes". And that is the controversy in a nutshell. White European scholars trying to make the ancient Egyptian population separate and distinct from "black Africans" using all sorts of contrived and pseudo-scientific approaches based more on their notions of racial superiority than biological fact. But of course I notice this article leaves out that important fact.Big-dynamo (talk) 19:41, 17 February 2013 (UTC)

References

Maria Gatto

I have just finished trawling through Gatto’s interesting presentation. What struck me most is that nowhere does she even HINT that the ancient Egyptians were of the same race as the Nubians. In fact, very much the opposite. Allow me to quote a small number of examples from the text:

1. “Nubia strongly influenced the Egyptian culture at its formative stage during the 5th and 4th millennia BC.” IMPLICATION – Egyptian culture was not Nubian, it was influenced by but was separate to the Nubian culture.
2. “What the archaeological work is bringing to light, though, is the irrelevance of the race-based theory, as cultural identities do not necessarily match or relate to race.” IMPLICATION – cultural similarities do not mean they were the same race.
3. “The cultural evidence found in the Nabta-Kiseiba region of the southern Western Desert is indeed part of the Nubian cultural tradition, while that from the oases region belongs to a different cultural unit. The Badarian derives the lithic technology primarily from the Oases Neolithic.” IMPLICATION – the Badari were influenced by a people other than the Nubians, so there were people other than Nubians even this far south.
4. “It is worth remembering that domesticated grains reached northern Egypt from the Levant only at the end of the 6th millennium BC and it probably took another millennium or so for them to be adopted by the Nubian population.” IMPLICATION – the Nubian population was far removed from the Egyptian population, who in turn had much interaction with the Levant.
5. “With the aim of enlarging their land availability and expanding cultural and economic relationships with northern regions, such as the oases region and the Delta (including the Fayum), the Nubians moved north towards Middle Egypt. (Pg 24)” IMPLICATION – the Nubians had relationships with “northern Egyptians” long before Nubians actually entered Middle Egypt.
6. “The relationship with the animal world seems to have followed two different trajectories in Nubia and in Egypt.” IMPLICATION – even in this “shared pastoral tradition” they were not actually so close after all.
7. “A rapid increase in social stratification occurred during the 5th and 4th millennium BC as result of the new cultural relations between the Nubian world, through Badari, and the Mediterranean world, via the Delta. Being part of this process made it possible for the Badarian culture to reach a high level of complexity.” IMPLICATION – the southerners learned cultural complexity from the northerners – they were thus not the same people, and Egypt was the "cultural ancestor" of Nubia, not the other way around.
8. “If the Egyptian Predynastic took advantage of the Nubian social development process, Nubia did the same in return. In Lower Nubia at least two polities evolved during the second half of the 4th millennium BC, namely atSayala/Naga Wadi and at Qustul. These Nubian kings (or, more precisely, chiefs) adopted the same royal iconography as that of the Egyptian kings.” IMPLICATION – the Egyptian kings were not Nubian, and the Nubian kings adopted Egyptian ways. (This made me to think also of the Qustul burner). Once again Egypt was seemingly the "cultural ancestor" of Nubia, not the other way around.
9. “With the rise of the Naqada culture Upper and Middle Egyptian society took a separate pathway from Nubia, and Nubian elements in Naqada material and beliefs became less and less visible.” IMPLICATION – by Pre-Dynastic times the social contacts were diminishing.

Then, seemingly ignoring completely all the evidence she has just presented, Gatto concludes by saying that “To sum up, Nubia is Egypt’s African ancestor.” However she then continues – “What linked Ancient Egypt to the rest of the North African cultures is this strong tie with the Nubian pastoral nomadic lifestyle.” There is no mention here of race, just this one aspect of their lifestyle, which is consistent with the evidence above. In particular it links nicely to her opening statement that Egyptian culture was influenced by (but was separate to) the Nubian culture. The inescapable conclusion then is that the “ancestorship” is merely in terms of "influencing" Egypt to adopt an "African" pastoral tradition. No other interpretation honours the wealth of evidence she has presented. It’s a pity she was so ambiguous in her “summing up” sentence – it offers a tiny straw of hope for Diop’s spiritual descendants to cling to. Wdford (talk) 20:01, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

^^^ An example of a Eurocentric editor who cannot accept what contemporary mainstream scholarship has concluded on the matter. Gatto's study is dealing with ARCHAEOLOGY, which is ONE major piece of the puzzle that is needed to indicate the bio-cultural origins of the ancient Egyptians/Nile Valley. This was NOT a piece on the "race" of the ancient Egyptians and the source is NOT cited in this main article to indicate race. This study concludes what has been consistently indicated by contemporary research for the past three decades but never bolded stated.

None the less you points are focusing on semantics and are irrelevant to article as the study is only cited to indicate what is it was FOCUSED ON which is the archaeological evidence in 4th paragraph of the modern scholarship section. I however will really like to debate you on your fallacious interpretations on her piece over on the HISTORUM forums [1]. If you PLEASE create a thread presenting this argument over there I will enter it. Asante90 (talk) 19:24, 22 January 2013 (UTC)

You seem to be quite familiar with historical debate forums [with their typical incivility and personal attacks] . That's great and all, but for the sake of us all, don't treat this talk page like one. --Yalens (talk) 22:34, 22 January 2013 (UTC)

Wdford says above: "Gatto concludes by saying that “To sum up, Nubia is Egypt’s African ancestor.” ... It’s a pity she was so ambiguous in her “summing up” sentence". Gatto's phrase is being taken as ambiguous, but putting in the word 'African' implies there are other ancestors. So perhaps she actually meant to say what she says, that a part of Egypt's heritage came from Nubia (specifically in influencing Egypt to adopt an African pastoral tradition) whilst other parts came from ... In this case her work is being misrepresented here. Aarghdvaark (talk) 19:29, 23 January 2013 (UTC)

Hello all. My main interest here is on the pre'history'/predynastic of Ancient Egypt. I must say that the interpretations of @Wdford on the Gatto 2011 study are incorrect, but understandable seeing that he may not really be abreast of the topic itself and so wouldn't really know what Gatto meant by her statements nor the context she was basing her arguments on. So I will make it as simple as possible: The Earliest Ancient Egyptian cultures particularly in the Valley (Upper and Middle Egypt- Tasian, Badarian and Early Naqada) were essentially the NORTHERMOST, YOUNGER variants of SAME CULTURE GROUP that extended all the way from regions of the 6th Cataract deep in the Sudan to Middle Egypt an most of the adjourning desert east an west of the valley. This culture group (possibly made of diverse peoples) had its origins clearly south of Egypt and came into Egypt as a fully-fetched culture during the 5th-4th Millennium BC mostly from a desiccating Eastern Saharan entering the Egyptian Nile that was at that time mostly sparsely populated. These groups are what archaeologists now call Tasians, Badarians and (Early) Naqadians. When I say they were all essentially of same Culture group, I mean they were so similar in almost every cultural trait (same settlement pattern, subsistence pattern, pottery, material cultural artifacts, burial traditions etc). This cultural Group have been called various names by various scholars ('Nubian' Group, Saharo-Nilotic Group, Pastoral Tradition of the Nile, Middle Nile Neolithic etc); they were as I said MOSTLY a DIVERSE group of TROPICAL Africans indigenous to Northeastern/Nilotic/Saharn Africa (probably mainly speaking Afrasan and Nilosaharan Languages). THIS IS THE MAINSTREAM VIEW, and the evidences an sources (I can provide tens of them if asked) is OVERWHELMING on this narrative. Let me just however give 2 other sources from Gatto to provide some context to her above study:

"The relationship between the Early A-Group,the Final Neolithic of the Western Desert, and the Badarian already came to light in the recent past(Gatto 2002). All of them are the northermost regional variants of the Nubian Group, which of course include also cultures from the south, such as the Abkan, the Neolithic of the Kadruka, and the Middle and Terminal A-Group. It is interesting to note that the aforementioned cultures are dated to two different millenia( V and IV millenium BC).Following this, and because of the strong regional variations brought to light, the necessity to change the term A-Group is here suggested again, as it already was years ago( Gatto and Tireterra 1996). In fact we are dealing with different units of the same culture group(as described by Clarke 1968), which most certainly was present in the Kerma region, as the affinities with the later Pre-Kerma Culture seem to confirm(Honneer 2004)." The Early A-Group of Upper Lower Nubia, Upper Egypt and the Surrounding Dearts by Maria Gatto, 2006 by Maria Gatto{Archaeology of Early Northeast Africa Studies in African Archaeology 9, Poznan Archaelogical Museum}pg. 232

"Any Egyptian evidence in Nubia was seen as an import or as cultural influence, while any Nubian evidence in Upper Egypt was viewed as the sporadic presence of foreign people within Egyptian territory. In the last few years, new research on the subject,particularly from a Nubian point of view, shows that interaction between the two cultures was more complex than previously thought,affecting the time, space and nature of the interaction(Gatto and Tiraterra 1996; Gatto 2000,2003a,2003b). The Aswan area was probably never a real borderline, at least not until the New Kingdom....The data recently collected and a new interpretation of the available information are beginning to bring to life a stable and long-term interaction between between Upper Egypt and Lower Nubia that has to be seen in a very different perspective. The two regions, and so their cultural entities, are not in antithesis to one another, but in the predynastic period are the expressions of the same cultural tradition, with strong regional variations,particularly in the last part of the 4th millenium BC. Some of them are clearly connected with the major cultural and political changes of Egypt." At the Origin of the Egyptian: Reconsidering the Relationship between Egypt and Nubia in the Pre- and ProtoPredynastic Period by Maria Gatto{Origin of the State Conference, Toulouse, France, Sept 5-8,2005}

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Onwo (talk • contribs) 00:43, 27 January 2013 (UTC) 

One thing I'm sure of is that the user Wdford is almost clueless on this subject or has intentionally chosen to be clueless! Mainstream view these days is that Early Dynastic population of upper Egypt were closely related to Saharan Africans. It takes just a few minutes of searching in online academic databases to realize that.

P.s. by this "subject" in the above paragraph I'm referring to Mario Gatto's works. It was just terribly misinterpreted by Wdford. (Just making sure my statement isn't ambiguous, and will not be abused) EyeTruth (talk) 16:59, 19 February 2013 (UTC)

Actually I was just reading the cold facts as presented in this particular Gatto paper, and noting that while some people interpret it to support their Black Egyptian POV, the range of "evidence" which Gatto presents does not actually support that conclusion. It's this twisting of ambiguous publications that keeps the controversy alive. Nobody denies that the Egyptians and Nubians had contact and interaction in pre-Dynastic times, and certainly there was a degree of inter-marriage and cultural exchange, but that doesn't mean they were the same race, as Gatto herself concedes. If Gatto really believes that the Upper Egyptians were closely related to Nubians, as seems to be the case from her other work cited above, then we can assume she would have done her best to "prove" as much in this paper. That being the case, the fact that her accumulated "proof" is so insubstantial, and so open to alternative interpretation, is quite revealing. Wdford (talk) 08:45, 21 February 2013 (UTC)

I see. If you knew her other works, then you would quickly see where she was going with this particular paper. So yeah, you misinterpreted her in your analysis, and her final conclusion isn't ambiguous in light of her other papers. But I now understand why you interpreted the way you did. BTW, she does a much better job to establish the connection in her other papers. Well, a whole bunch now believe upper Egyptians were closely related to the Nubians; especially in papers from within the last 15 years. Some others still believe they aren't. EyeTruth (talk) 18:52, 24 February 2013 (UTC)

Interesting. Could you elaborate on those other works and how this paper leads into those, and/or name specific works so we can check em out? AdventurousSquirrel (talk) 05:54, 14 March 2013 (UTC)

I've come across 2 of her papers that make conclusions relevant to the one made in Egypt in its African Context. I was able to recall and find one of them: Egypt and Nubia in the 5th–4th millennia BCE. IIRC, in this one she says Middle Egypt down to Nubia shared a nearly identical culture in 5th millennium BCE (Naqada I) and distinctions began to appear by Naqada III. Once I find the other one, I will notify you if you are still interested (I haven't given Egyptology much attention in well over a year now. It's kind of difficult to recollect exactly where I read what). EyeTruth (talk) 10:31, 16 March 2013 (UTC)

Mass migration

1. Ancient Egyptians were black (like Ethiopians), in fact there referred to southern Africa as there ancestral homeland, until the Asian invasions (Assyrian, Persian, Greek, Roman, Turk/Mongol, Europ.), its proven genetically.

2. Once upon a time, African tribes were as wide spread as to the Caucasus, Crete (Minoic civl.), Persia, Spain etc.. But these African people living in the Near East, admixtured over time with primitive people coming from northerly regions. This is why Near Eastern people today share some African genes. e.g. some Arabs got curly hair, while Turks have straight.

3. A recent study indicates, that the genes who cause white/pale skin color of people today, are not older than 6000 years. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.180.2.151 (talk) 02:14, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

Obviously, all of humanity was dark-skinned and had an appearance fitting their East African origins... are curly haired Germans (of which there are plenty) descended from "Africans" too, in your book?--Yalens (talk) 03:09, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

needless to say, this has nothing to do with the article topic. The "date of loss of pigmentation" after the Out of Africa migration is an interesting, and answearble, question, as opposed the nature of this topic, which is Afrocentric ideological navel-gazing. If you can cite the "recent study", do it at Skin_color#Europe (where we have the more conservative as recently within the last 20,000 years). --dab (𒁳) 14:11, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

Proposed split

Would the editor who made this suggestion please bother to justify the suggestion on the talk page? Wdford (talk) 15:46, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

Another painting showing different races in Egypt

can someone add this http://ascendingpassage.com/Abu-Simbel-Rameses-smite-Cherubini.jpg

it's from http://ascendingpassage.com/Artist-techniques-tomb-of-Seti-I.htm and it's clearly showing races with different features other than Egyptians being smitten by Ramses — Preceding unsigned comment added by 41.196.250.44 (talk) 15:07, 25 May 2013 (UTC)

Merge proposal

Our policy has been to try and contain all the anger and madness on a single page to avoid collateral damage to more developed articles. The rationale was, one crappy article is better than several.

Now there is no doubt that this is a "real" topic in the sense that it exists outside of Wikipedia. It is, of course, a topic of rather hardcore ideological racism within the "Afrocentrism" movement. If it is to be merged, it should certainly not be into the Population history of Egypt article, which is not about Afrocentrist ideology but about actual population history. At best the article could be split, put the ideological bits into Afrocentrism and whatever can be salvaged as free from ideological agendas into the population history article.

At best, we could label most Egyptology for the last several hundred years as Eurocentric racist propaganda and then it would be appropriate to label the response as "Afrocentric" ideology.Rod (talk) 21:12, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

But I would really recommend keeping this page around as a topic in its own right, and clearly mark it as a sub-topic of Afrocentrism from the very beginning. --dab (𒁳) 14:16, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

I'd generally agree with this. This article has never been good, and probably never can be good. It serves as a pretty nice dumping ground to place crackpot theories in order to keep the editors who really really want people to believe these crackpot theories have any scholarly merit from trying to edit the population history article instead. Text is here specifically because it cannot go in population history, so a merge is out of the question. But rather than clearly marking this article as being a subset of Afrocentrism, I'd say it's high time that the historically minded wikiprojects were granted a warning template to slap on the top of bad articles, reading something to the extent of "This article has been deemed by people who actually know what they're talking about to consist of clever sounding but fallacious pseudo-historical methodologically unsound bits of sophistry designed to gin up racism and nationalist sentiment."

If that sounds harsh, sorry, but I've really run out of patience with all the pseudo-historical methodologically unsound bits of sophistry that have yet to be stomped out in the seven years since I began editing. Thanatosimii (talk) 19:33, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

Agreed. A good dumping ground for crackpot theories that tried unsuccessfully to prove that Ancient Egyptians were non-Africans (e.g. white, asian, etc.).Rod (talk) 21:14, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Your frustration is understandable, but unhelpful. This article is about the history of the debate, which as you can see has been long and varied. Its true that the latest incarnation of the debate is between a handful of Afrocentrist scholars with a specific POV, vs the mainstream who fundamentally disagree with them. The material all comes from reliable sources, who know as much about the topic as can be expected considering the inherent fundamental imprecision of the subject matter, and reliable sources have the "right" to be aired fairly and without bias. It would help a lot if you could please produce some reliable sources who say categorically that these theories are all just "clever sounding but fallacious pseudo-historical methodologically unsound bits of sophistry designed to gin up racism and nationalist sentiment." That would help enormously to put the rabbit back in the hat. In the shorter term, are you perhaps aware of any policy that specifies how long a summary section should be if it has been spun off into a "main" article? Wdford (talk) 21:25, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

I am aware that the present tactic being taken with regards this article is to make it about the controversy over the race of the Egyptians, not over the race of the Egyptians itself, but 1) when I subscribed to this article years ago the title was "Race of the Ancient Egyptians," and the fringe POV Afrocentrist editing one would expect in an article so named has not been ameliorated with the name change, and 2) having an article about the controversy about X as a separate subject apart from the article on the subject of X is a bit of a cheating way to get around notability and reliable source requirements that would preclude certain positions from being expressed in article X. These arguments aren't important enough to be mentioned in population history because they're being proffered by fringe non-population-historians, but in an article about controversy about population history, these non-notable non-population-historians become notable merely by virtue of the fact that they're being controversial. As far as me finding sources arguing that positions cited on this page are methodologically unsound nationalism, the fact that they're nationalistic is self evident, and it's not the obligation of someone challenging a source to find a peer reviewed source that attacks that source. It's the obligation of the source to be defensible. Numerous parts of this article - Afrocentrist interpretations of kmt, of Herodotus, of Cleopatra, and the like - are absent from all the major histories of ancient Egypt put out by Egyptologists. If Diop's works have been peer reviewed by anyone, they certainly haven't been by anyone who counts. Thanatosimii (talk) 23:54, 4 April 2013 (UTC)

Things have changed since you subscribed to this article years ago. Population history of Egypt now has its own article, where we report the actual scientific conclusions supported by actual scientific sources. We also have an article for Afrocentrism, where that particular issue is discussed in detail, as well as a Black Egyptian Hypothesis article for the specific "evidence" of the Afrocentrists re Egypt. This does not stop the Afrocentrists from adding their POV to this article, of course, but it is managed here by limiting it to a summary along with summaries of other discredited theories, and a summary of the scientific consensus as well. Similarly at the Black Egyptian Hypothesis article we ensure that the counter-comments of the non-adherents are properly reported. Again please – do you know of any policy that specifies how short a summary linked to a main article should be? Wdford (talk) 11:43, 5 April 2013 (UTC)

The problem here are the blowhard racists and I say racists who claim that Africans are racists for calling Africans in Africa black. Seriously. And continuing to try and warp history by claiming racism in science started with African scholars. One thing I need to do is to correct the current wording of the article since it has been rearranged to protect the tender emotions of those who want to pretend that "modern scholarship" on race started with Afrocentrics. So are the 18th and 19th century white European scholars who came from societies who went out and consciously promoted white skin phenotype to the exclusion of any other phenotype as not racists and their "scholarship" on race as not MODERN? Please. People should be banned from this article for even trying to propose outlandish offensive nonsense like that. It is offensive AND racist and poisons the whole entire discussion. White Europeans CREATED the modern concept of race and along with it a world wide system of racism and all of that is MODERN. Period. It is as if one group of folks want to pretend the history of the white imperial age during the 17th, 18th and 19th and 20th century never happened at all and everything started in the MODERN world yesterday. So lynchings, slavery, white supremacy, racism, race science and all the assorted and various negative aspects of European culture and society don't exist. All of that is the reason for the debate and the controversy, not any so called racism on the part of Africans calling Africans in Africa black, which is NOT controversial and never has been. And any African has every right to be angry about those forms of blatant bias, lies and slander against Africans. Big-dynamo (talk) 14:18, 5 April 2013 (UTC)

^Can we please stay on the current topic instead of returning to the name-calling rants? --Yalens (talk) 16:42, 5 April 2013 (UTC)

It is on topic. To try and pretend that the "modern" concept of race started with African scholars in the late 19th century is pure horseradish. I call it like I see it. So all the blatantly racist books written in the 18th and 19th century by avowed self described racists of European descent don't count? So I guess Crania Aegyptiaca by Samuel Morton which starts out explicitly defining "RACE" in terms of Negro and Caucasian characteristics, doesn't constitute white racist European scholars introducing race into the study of ancient Egypt? And that is most certainly not the only one where white Europeans painstakingly and methodically laid out their arguments on what constitutes "race", how to measure it and what "races" were found in ancient Egypt. NOT ONE of these people were Africans, but to hear some folks tell it, Africans introduced the concept of "race" into the study of Egypt. Please stop introducing this nonsense POV that there is no racism in the history of the study of Egypt and that somehow it only came along with Africans calling ancient Africans black. I can produce any amount of citations and verified sources of this racism relative to European scholars in Egyptian studies, since you feel this is 'off topic'.Big-dynamo (talk) 00:43, 6 April 2013 (UTC)

I agree with big-dynamo and will routinely return to this and other articles to support an objective viewpoint of history. It is a FACT that numerous European scholars of the last several centuries were overt racists. These "scholars" distorted history to further their imperial ambitions. Their nationalist and white supremacist agenda has led to the masses being misled on Ancient Egyptian history and recently scholars have started to refute the Eurocentrist's claims. Now the apologists for the Eurocentric scholars try to distract and misdirect the layreader, while distorting the position of the opposition camp. It is a FACT that the Ancient Egyptian civilization was created by indigenous Nile Valley Africans and it is a FACT that these Nile Valley Africans were not white or asian (as those terms are understood today).Rod (talk) 21:04, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

My view on the matter of the pages is that the Black Egyptian hypothesis was getting long enough to warrant a separate page, but that the whole page about Tutankhamun's race should just be deleted as its nothing but a proxy for this one. --Yalens (talk) 16:42, 5 April 2013 (UTC)

The Race of Tut page has long since been redirected here. Has somebody created a new page? Wdford (talk) 17:24, 5 April 2013 (UTC)

Oh whoops- you did that a month and a half ago and I forgot to check... that's embarrassing xD. Sorry about that. --Yalens (talk) 17:53, 5 April 2013 (UTC)

I agree with Big-dynamo that the idea of race turned into a nasty pseudo-science in the 17th, 18th and 19th and 20th centuries. Before that it simply meant where you came from, so if someone was of the Scots race it simply meant they or their parents came from Scotland. To go back to the Ancient Egyptians, in the ancient world there was no significance attached to race, except that most cultures believed they were better than their neighbours (the Egyptians certainly believed that, as did the Romans, etc.). But is the argument about calling the Ancient Egyptians "black" that they had a black skin colour as for example the Nubians, who although thought of as a distinct and foreign people by the Ancient Egyptians had a close relationship with them and ruled as a native dynasty during the Twenty-fifth Dynasty of Egypt, or is it that they are African and therefore "black" as in the 20th and 21st century social concept? Aarghdvaark (talk) 08:54, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

Skin color is not race. No human feature constitutes race. Skin color, like other traits of the human phenotype can be observed, studied and characterized by physical characteristics. Therefore, calling someone black does not denote identifying someone's "race". It means they have a phenotytpe that can be accurately be described as "black". Therefore, it is not a "20st or 21st century concept that humans in Africa can have black skin. What is a 20th or 21st century concept is that skin color equates to race, meaning separate subspecies of human, which is quantifiably false and no longer supported by science. Likewise, the hypocrisy in all of this is that in America, you are black no matter how light your appearance based on how much African blood (ie, blood of people from Africa with dark skin) you have in you. But, IN AFRICA, these exact same people will sit up here and come up with all sorts of justifications why AFRICANS, no matter how dark, are not black even if they are on the continent of Africa. That is the controversy in a nutshell and it absolutely does go back to the pseudo science of the 18th and 19th century which tried to make up arbitrary rules in which in some cases one person can be categorized as black when it suits a certain agenda but in another case the same person or persons with similar characteristics can be NOT characterized as black when it suits another agenda. And that is the whole crux of the debate, which boils down to racists using race to justify their own subjugation of certain people based on skin color. Which is why the idea that a "black hypothesis" article is needed because somebody said that African populations IN AFRICA are black is total nonsense POV on the part of those who wish to slander African scholars as racist. Yet at the same time all the nonsensical attempts by racists to change the standard definition of black to suit their agenda concerning ancient Africans in KMT is perfectly "legit" and not seen as extreme or RACIST, even though the overwhelming evidence is that it was racist.Big-dynamo (talk) 18:13, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

This is a very nice debate to have if we're on a forum (but we're not), but we're supposed to be talking about page mergers here!--Yalens (talk) 14:21, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

Merge- seriously. This article is full of Afrocentric non-sense. Throw away the UFO theories, focus on actual science. Population history is a good destination for the good bits of info here, but everything else should be thrown away. Diop and others have really poisoned the well here. Cheers, Λuα ^{(Operibus anteire)} 21:48, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Settlement of the dispute by genetic investigation

An examination and analysis of the DNA of the remains of the ancient people would seem to be a simple and straightforward solution.

Dentine in the teeth of individuals is usually well preserved and has led to DNA analysis of Neanderthal individuals, for instance.

Such samples as would be taken would result in minimal disturbance of the deceased person's body. Fletcherbrian (talk) 18:11, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

As has just been pointed out to me, this isn't a forum. Later I hope to search for links to this idea and so perhaps resolve the dispute to some degree. Fletcherbrian (talk) 21:09, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

Here's an example for you: http://dnatribes.com/dnatribes-digest-2012-01-01.pdf It was in the article previously.Rod (talk) 21:10, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

And was removed because it isn't a reliable source (DNA Tribes has been discussed elsewhere - we need academic sources for genetics. Dougweller (talk) 09:32, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

now largely agreed that Dynastic Egyptians were indigenous to the Nile area

Why was this added twice? Particularly since we have a citation needed tag for "Recent studies suggest that the modern population is genetically consistent with an ancient Egyptian population indigenous to northeast Africa." Not that I disagree with the statement, but if we need a citation then we shouldn't be adding unsourced claims once, let alone twice. Dougweller (talk) 09:35, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

Cleopatra

I see a sentence about afro-centrist arguments for her blackness was removed - but why isn't the Newsweek cover story for September 23, 1991,"Afrocentrism: Was Cleopatra Black?" mentioned in the article? Dougweller (talk) 09:38, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

It should be. We should fix it, as its relevant to the topic.--Yalens (talk) 19:40, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

It still hasn't been added. The bias on most racial wiki articles always throws me off from reading about race subjects on here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2620:105:B00B:6808:1991:18E6:ABAD:9887 (talk) 23:02, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

Need to remove some duplication

The bit in the lead starting "Since the second half of the twentieth century" is repeated almost immediately in the article. Dougweller (talk) 19:15, 6 December 2013 (UTC)

United States culture

I think if you look at the recent history, you'll see what I was talking about. Either (a) we have the page solely referencing alleged "American" definitions or (b) an off-topic tangent comparing different definitions of blackness around the world. The first situation is bad for so many reasons: firstly it is somewhat culturally imperialistic and chauvinistic as it uses only as reference "American" cultural values (by which we mean only the United States) for Wikipedia which is an encyclopedia for the whole world. Secondly, it is a huge simplification of the concept of "blackness" in "America", which means very different things depending on the context; different speakers have many different perceptions of what it means too. And lastly, considering that the source for this "American" notion is not even "American" itself nor a work on that concept itself, its legitimacy could be called into question. The second scenario, meanwhile leads to a huge coatrack section on an already oversized article. It's better just to leave it out. --Yalens (talk) 20:35, 22 December 2013 (UTC)

Why are DNA studies in an article about the history of the controversy?

These studies clearly have their place, but not in this particular article, which is about the history of the controversy. Dougweller (talk) 22:08, 22 December 2013 (UTC)

Because much of the debate was done before genetic studies were available; leaving them out would give a seriously misleading impression of the current state of the discussion, basically ending it in the mid-1950s. These new genetic studies shed much light to the reliability and motivations of earlier arguments. Regards, Andajara120000 (talk) 22:11, 22 December 2013 (UTC)

Recent Rameses III and Amarna DNA Studies - Only Peer Reviewed Material Allowed on Wikipedia?

There seems to be some debate on inclusion of the references from DNA tribes. What is the justification that only peer-reviewed scientific information is permitted? This is regarding the below (not the references from Zawi Hawass but the additional DNA tribes reference for Amarna. I would like a conversation before sourced and referenced material below is reverted again:

"Recent DNA studies of Ancient Egyptian mummies of a New Kingdom dynasty have confirmed Sub-Saharan African origins for notable New Kingdom pharoahs from both the Rameses III (from 1186 B.C.) and Amarna (from 1353 B.C.) lineages: In December 2012, Zahi Hawass, the former Egyptian Minister of State for Antiquities Affairs and his research team released DNA studies of Rameses III (who historically is assumed to have usurped the throne and as such may not represent earlier lineages) and his son have found he carried the Sub-Saharan African Haplogroup E1b1a, and as a result clustered most closely with Africans from the African Great Lakes (335.1), Southern Africa (266.0) and Tropical West Africa (241.7) and not Europeans (1.4), Middle Easterners (14.3) or peoples from the Horn of Africa (114.0).

Earlier studies from January 2012 of the Amarna mummies had reached similar conclusions with the average affiliations of the mummies found to be Southern African (326.94), Great Lakes African (323.76) and Tropical West African (83.74) and not Middle Eastern (6.92), European (5.21) or with peoples from the Horn of Africa (14.79). As no other studies of other Ancient Egyptian mummies are available, the questions as to the genetic affiliations of other pharaohs and figures (such as Cleopatra VII, the last pharaoh of Egypt from 51 B.C. following the Greek Conquest of Egypt by Alexander the Great in 300 B.C.) is yet undetermined. " Regards,Andajara120000 (talk) 21:55, 22 December 2013 (UTC)

An earlier discussion on this was held at the reliable sources noticeboard with editors such as User:Moxy and User:Andrew Lancaster involved, see [2]. I don't things have changed since then. Dougweller (talk) 22:03, 22 December 2013 (UTC)

Fine, due to that earlier discussion I replaced the Amarna lineages reference with the peer-reviewed study it was based on: http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=185393. There should be no further problems now. Regards, 22:06, 22 December 2013 (UTC)

You put DNATribes back in as a source. There's another issue which I'll mention below.

I removed it. What are your speaking of? Andajara120000 (talk) 22:11, 22 December 2013 (UTC)

These are the two peer-reviewed studies in question; there should be no further problems: http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=185393

Hawass at al. 2012, Revisiting the harem conspiracy and death of Ramesses III: anthropological, forensic, radiological, and genetic study. BMJ2012;345doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmj.e8268 Published 17 December 2012

Sorry, I didn't see the edit where you removed DNAtribes. Thanks for your cooperation. Dougweller (talk) 10:15, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

Yes, I have also started a discussion on the Wikipedia noticeboard regarding the use of supporting sources for this issue at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard ‎ (→‎DNA Tribes Used As Supporting Source To Two Peer-Reviewed Studies). Regards, Andajara120000 (talk) 11:01, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

From what I can see here, neither of these two sources attempted to determine or conclude upon the race of the kings in question, and actually addressed a completely different issue. A non-reliable source then "interpreted" some data from these articles to support a different conclusion of their own. Is that correct, or have I perhaps missed something? Wdford (talk) 11:14, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

Have you been able to look at the Noticeboard: Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard ‎ (→‎DNA Tribes Used As Supporting Source To Two Peer-Reviewed Studies). I have started a discussion there just recently, with some explanation of what the sources are doing. Regards, Andajara120000 (talk) 11:25, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

Yes, and my question stands - those articles didn't address race, far less conclude on it, so DNA Tribes seems to be concocting an artificial conclusion. Wdford (talk) 12:10, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

I am not sure I understand. What DNA Tribes did was run the data available in the peer-reviewed studies to determine the racial affiliations. Is that what you have an issue with, their running the data in the peer-reviewed studies? I think that is exactly what is going to be discussed in Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard: the reliability of the conclusions of the source. Or am I misunderstanding what you are trying to convey? If so, many apologies.Andajara120000 (talk) 12:22, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

I responded to your point in the argument on the noticeboard- perhaps we should migrate the discussion there so there is not a lot of repeating of arguments (I am new to this so let me know if I am misunderstanding the role of the noticeboard). Regards, Andajara120000 (talk) 12:37, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

DNA Tribes has been used as a source in the following diverse Wikipedia articles:

Maghrebis Genetic history of indigenous peoples of the Americas Classification of indigenous peoples of the Americas Tunisia Asian people Regards, Andajara120000 (talk) 13:19, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

Useful. Needs to be removed from those also. Again, if something scientific like this isn't in peer reviewed sources, it doesn't belong. Dougweller (talk) 13:45, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

Reliable genetic study

As far as I'm aware, the only peer-reviewed, non-commercial genetic study on the ancient Egyptians was announced this past April in Nature magazine. The mummy in question belonged to the mtDNA/maternal Haplogroup I2: "The researchers determined that one of the mummified individuals may belong to an ancestral group, or haplogroup, called I2, believed to have originated in Western Asia. They also retrieved genetic material from the pathogens that cause malaria and toxoplasmosis, and from a range of plants that includes fir and pine — both thought to be components of embalming resins — as well as castor, linseed, olive, almond and lotus." Soupforone (talk) 12:06, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

That is great-maybe you can summarize that and add the results of that study as regards to the other pharaohs? It is good to have some mtDNA evidence and of other lineages (as Rameses III is assumed to have usurped the throne the Rameses III and Amarna studies may not be indicative of earlier lineages as the article points out):

Are you also aware of these two other peer-reviewed genetic studies (one from 2010 and one from 2012) that are referenced in the article?http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=185393

Hawass at al. 2012, Revisiting the harem conspiracy and death of Ramesses III: anthropological, forensic, radiological, and genetic study. BMJ2012;345doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmj.e8268 Published 17 December 2012

Regards, Andajara120000 (talk) 12:10, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

Okay I just saw that the study you reference is "The heads date from relatively late in ancient Egyptian history — between 806 bc and 124 ad." so that would be great in the section regarding Cleopatra VII and the genetic affiliations of later pharaohs, including after the conquest of Egypt after 300 BC--- very great find, thank you! Andajara120000 (talk) 12:14, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

I've heard of those tests, I thought they weren't finalized yet though. Wasn't Ramesses III's lineage uncertain because of shared mutations or something to that effect? Soupforone (talk) 12:18, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

Do you have any sources pointing to such an uncertainty? I don't believe I've seen any to that effect. Andajara120000 (talk) 12:23, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

See also this Nature article [3] where experts dispute the DNA testing results. Wdford (talk) 12:33, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

Okay that is a great source. Why don't we include that in the article as a disclaimer for the results? Regards, Andajara120000 (talk) 12:35, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

In my opinion (perhaps it is just my experience with things!) all these additional sources seem like great finds that can enrich the discussion on the article-they do not seem like reasons to remove the present information in the article but to add to it, as disclaimers (in the case of the Nature uncertainty article) or additional information (like the article about the mtDNA) that enriches our understanding of the Ancient DNA affiliations of Egyptians. This is great! It adds to the readers' understanding. I don't think these articles are reasons to remove any other information but to add to it. This gives the reader a full and meaty picture of the current controversy and discussion which was what was completely missing before I made my original edits---in fact I am shocked to see so many new studies coming out of the woodwork that were completely absent yesterday! So this is my view on the purpose of Wikipedia but let me know if I am misconstruing things. Regards,Andajara120000 (talk) 12:41, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

Interesting link, thanks. There still seems to be some uncertainty about the results, then. Am I missing something, or did none of the peer-reviewed links mention anything about population affinities? Is this only the DNA-Tribes company? If so, how accurate is its conclusion? It doesn't really seem consistent with the Nature findings above; but then again, that's apparently from a different time period. Soupforone (talk) 12:44, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

The Rameses III study determined genetic affinities with Sub-Saharan African populations due to E1b1a identified (Table 1), the Amarna study found the same (Figures 1 and 6). That is the crux of the discussion on the Noticeboard: DNA Tribes is simply running the data present in the peer-reviewed articles. This makes it easier for people not well-versed in science who may not be able to look at Figure 1 in the Amarna study for instance and immediately understand what the microsatellite markers represent for example. So the question is to whether that is good for a source. I honestly feel we are talking in circles but in any case. Regards, Andajara120000 (talk) 12:53, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

Wait a second--what exactly are the arguments against DNA Tribes? According to WP:BIASED even if there may be a financial bias (I think that had been the earlier argument about DNA Tribes) that is fine as long as there is a disclaimer. Or am I missing something? I posted this question on the Noticeboard but noticed here that no one has actually articulated a reason not to include the DNA Tribes articles in the first place. Regards, Andajara120000 (talk) 13:02, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

It really works the other way too. What makes DNATribes meet WP:VERIFY and WP:RS? Why would we ever use non-peer reviewed material for scientific issues such as genetics? I can think of just one - it's referenced quite a bit in scholarly books and articles (and that would be the specific article or whatever, not the company). Even a peer reviewed article might fail as a RS if it's been ignored. We know little to nothing about the quality of the people at DNATribes writing these articles. With peer review we know that at least an article has passed scholarly scrutiny. One other point. Although we can't decide at article level that a source meets RS criteria if RSN says it doesn't, we can decide what reliable sources to include. In other words you will need a WP:Consensus here to include it. That doesn't work the other way of course. You'll learn about all of our policies and guidelines as you go along, but there's a steep learning curve and after over 100,000 edits I'm still not at the top. Dougweller (talk) 13:52, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

Thank you, that is helpful to understand. I guess I am better understanding WP:Consensus now! There are some great responses coming out of the Notice Board so at least other eyes are looking at this. I am happy at least that the peer-reviewed studies are finally being referenced at all in the articles and the validity of DNA Tribes is getting a closer look by many eyes considering the importance of this issue in general. Many thanks for a respectful and constructive discussion. Regards, Andajara120000 (talk) 14:01, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

Do you have a link to Table 1 in the Ramesses III paper? The pdf seems to be closed access ->[4]. I do see, though, the data that you're referring to in the other study's Figures 1 and 6 [5]. Is there a place where the authors interpret those figures and associate them with specific ancient populations (in supplementary links, etc), or do they only collect and present the microsatellite markers alone? Soupforone (talk) 00:09, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

DRN: Ramesses and Amarna Lineages Two Peer-Reviewed Studies

What is controversial about including the following on the nearly identical DNA history of Egypt, Population history of Egypt, Black Egyptian Hypothesis and Ancient Egyptian race controversy articles. The proliferation of articles was created specifically to try the patience and time of editors unable to conduct four separate talk page conversations on the same issue. I have already engaged in multiple talk page discussions on this issue on the separate talk pages and thought consensus had been reached at least on one of the articles with the same exact editors involved in the talk page discussions on the other pages. I have submitted a DRN on including the below on all four pages as the issues and editors involved are the same: Wikipedia:Dispute resolution noticeboard#Population history of Egypt

Recent DNA studies of mummies of the Ramesses dynasty and the Armana dynasty of the New Kingdom state that these dynasties carried the Sub-Saharan African Haplogroup E1b1a.

Regards, Andajara120000 (talk) 17:45, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

Still can't figure out what - short page about climate in Egypt over the last 150,000 years has to do with DNA. Dougweller (talk) 16:32, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Or how Trombetta, Beniamino; Fulvio Cruciani, Daniele Sellitto, Rosaria Scozzari (6 January 2011). "A New Topology of the Human Y Chromosome Haplogroup E1b1 (E-P2) Revealed through the Use of Newly Characterized Binary Polymorphisms". In MacAulay, Vincent. PLoS ONE 6 (1): e16073. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0016073. PMC 3017091. PMID 21253605, which doesn't mention mummies or even Egypt, can be used as a source for "Recent DNA studies of mummies of the Ramesses dynasty and the Armana dynasty of the New Kingdom state that these dynasties carried the Sub-Saharan African Haplogroup." I am not going to check the rest, but the only ones that I think mentions mummies are the Hawass articles, and we should not cherry pick raw data. The BMJ article concludes " This study suggests that Ramesses III was murdered during the harem conspiracy by the cutting of his throat. Unknown man E is a possible candidate as Ramesses III’s son Pentawere." The JAMA one has a longer conclusion which others may read for themselves, ending "To shed light on the putative diseases and causes of death in Tutankhamun's immediate lineage, we first used molecular genetic methods to determine kinship within that lineage. Whereas some individual relationships were known from historical records, the identity of most of the mummies under investigation was still uncertain. We also searched specifically for pathologies, inherited diseases, and causes of death. For example, many scholars have hypothesized that Tutankhamun's death was attributable to an accident, such as a fall from his chariot or a kick by a horse or other animal; septicemia or fat embolism secondary to a femur fracture; murder by a blow to the back of the head; or poisoning" - we can use these studies for there conclusions but we can't start interpreting the raw data. Dougweller (talk) 16:38, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Rameses DNA Dispute Resolution Filed

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Dispute_resolution_noticeboard#DNA_history_of_Egypt

This is a response to my bringing up the issue at WP:NORN as it is WP:SYN and we should only be using the conclusions of the BMJ article (the only peer-reviewed source) which are "This study suggests that Ramesses III was murdered during the harem conspiracy by the cutting of his throat. Unknown man E is a possible candidate as Ramesses III’s son Pentawere." See my full post at NORN. The DRN filing is very unlikely to be accepted as this is already at NORN. Dougweller (talk) 16:24, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

As you filed NORN after me as the timing shows, that is an issue. But in any case, yes this closed that case due to the ArbComm but your NORN is ongoing and I welcome outside editor voices there.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:No_original_research/Noticeboard/

As Dougweller filed NORN after me as the timing shows in the diffs shows, that is an issue as you are not telling the truth:

(cur | prev) 14:05, 7 January 2014‎ Andajara120000 (talk | contribs)‎ . . (103,021 bytes) (+4,818)‎ . . (→‎DNA history of Egypt: new section) (undo) link:https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Dispute_resolution_noticeboard&diff=589602459&oldid=589591477

(cur | prev) 15:06, 7 January 2014‎ Dougweller (talk | contribs)‎ . . (82,725 bytes) (+1,018)‎ . . (→‎POV synthesis on genetics being added to several articles: use the conclusiong, which is about a possible murder, but cherry-picking genetic data is inappropriate) (undo | thank) link:https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:No_original_research/Noticeboard&diff=589609315&oldid=589606565

But in any case, yes this closed that case due to the ArbComm but your NORN is ongoing and I highly welcome outside editor voices there.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:No_original_research/Noticeboard Another editor has kindly offered a link to the full Ramesses study for those who can only see the abstract: http://www.academia.edu/2308336/Revisiting_the_harem_conspiracy_and_death_of_Ramesses_III_anthropological_forensic_radiological_and_genetic_study Regards, Andajara120000 (talk) 23:41, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Recent DNA studies of mummies of the Ramesses dynasty and the Armana dynasty of the New Kingdom state that these dynasties carried the Haplogroup E1b1a, which is common in modern Sub-Saharan African (Black People) populations.[6][7] However many experts in the DNA field dispute these conclusions, and claim instead that DNA sequencing from ancient material is unreliable and prone to contamination.[8] — Preceding unsigned comment added by 184.77.28.136 (talk) 23:36, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Problematic statements about race and biology

The article contains at least two variations of:

"Since the second half of the 20th century, anthropologists have rejected the notion of race as having any validity in the study of human biology"

"Since the second half of the 20th century, scholars have rejected the notion of race as having any validity in the study of human biology"

These claims are unfortunate and I strongly encourage that they be removed:

o The first claim may or may not be correct, but borders on being irrelevant through being made about anthropologists---not biologists. In as far as the layman might fail to see the significance of this, it is also a misleading claim. Meanwhile, the second claims gives the impression that this would be the almost certain view of scientists in general, which is patently false and highly misleading. I note in particular that biologists often have radically different views from social scientists. (Not limited to this issue.)

o The claims are both strictly speaking irrelevant to the article. The only plausible reason for their inclusion (that occurs to me on short notice) is the wish to "enlighten" readers about the irrelevance of race. Apart from the irrelevance being extremely disputable or outright wrong (in the context of biology, as opposed to e.g. the context of human rights), this is definitely not the place to preach it. Generally speaking, it must never be the job of an encyclopedia to "teach values".

o The claims are vague and given without suffient context for a proper interpretation.

o The implied statement about race vs. human biology is at best misleading, at worst disastrously wrong (depending in part on the third item and as implied in the second item). Notably, there are many very well established differences between various races that move beyond mere optics. Their relevance to e.g. society (!) may be disputed, but not their relevance to biology. (This is not the place to discuss such differences in detail. However, consider e.g. that caucasians and african-americans benefit differenctly from different medications or that some african groups have a physiology that on average allows them to build a larger muscle mass easier than most europeans. I note that related questions like how "race" should be defined, whether human races are races in the sense applied to non-human animals, what groups are sufficiently homogenous to be considered a single race, etc., are perfectly legitimate; however, they do not in anyway mitigate the problems with the cited statements.)

Due to semi-protection, I have not edited the page myself. 80.226.24.15 (talk) 22:57, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

The first statement is sourced to the American Association of Physical Anthropologists. Physical anthropology is of course a biological science. Your arguments are founded on a false premise entirely. AndyTheGrump (talk) 23:25, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

Why is this even a controversy?

I dont get why this is even a controversy? Who gives a damn if they were Negroid or Caucasoid. I bet the only reason people flipped out about it is because nobody wants to associate blacks with advanced civilizations. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.23.85.67 (talk) 04:22, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

The reason is simple: It makes one PROUD(!!) to be associated with ancient heroes and heroines of the past. In order to make little Black children proud of themselves, and show that they were superior to their white oppressors, which again brings a sense of pride and anger, the idea that civilization was STOLEN from them. It's a form of "reverse racism." Ericl (talk) 16:58, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Surely rewriting history has not been an adequate solution, or have they figured out when modern peoples dropped from the sky since now we "know" we modern peoples had no connection with any ancient peoples and could not possibly have descended from them? Til Eulenspiegel /talk/ 16:09, 17 January 2014 (UTC)

Last I checked white European scholars and people in generally cared a lot about it which is why they devoted so much time and effort trying to categorize Egyptian skulls into one of those categories you mentioned, which by the way were created by European scientists in the first place. Africans weren't doing this, neither were Asians or anyone else. All of which fits in perfectly with the fact that in the 18th, 19th and early 20th century, Europeans spent a lot of time promoting race science and theories of superiority based on race. And it is precisely during this same time period that ancient Egypt was "discovered" by Napoleon which required a lot of Europeans to come up with some way to fit this ancient culture into their racist world view. Therefore, the controversy is about whether they lied, distorted and made up science to fit the ideal of racist superiority based on skin color. And that is part of the problem with this article in that it tries to down play and ignore the historically documented facts of racism within science during this time period and then tries to turn around and slander Africans as being racist and some how controversial for calling ancient African people black.Big-dynamo (talk) 17:36, 9 March 2014 (UTC)

True and now you are trying to manipulate (though not rewrite) history to fit your own view. The fact of the matter is that you are falling into the same trap the Europeans fell into by assuming that the Egyptian cared about race at all or that race meant the same thing back then that it does now. I have never understood this controversy. The odds are Egyptian in Ancient times looked much like Egyptians in modern time, which is to say the further south you went the more Egyptian looked like Africans and the further north you went the more Egyptians looked like Middle Easterners. Egypt was and still is a melting pot, over the centuries people invaded it from both the north and the south. The Egyptian are and probably were, for all intents and purposes, multiracial. To most Americans multiracial simply means black, which is what distinguishes us from place like all of Latin America which don't view the world in black and white (pun intended). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.202.217.170 (talk) 07:04, 14 May 2014 (UTC)

Hello all, and welcome to another exciting episode of "This is Not a Forum". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.11.127.253 (talk) 19:32, 4 June 2014 (UTC)

With all due respect I was merely pointing out the fallacy of applying a modern definition of race to an ancient civilization which for all intents and purposes could have cared less about race. My issue with this entire article that I feel many more people not just myself have with this entire issue is that I find it completely irrelevant. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.238.26.73 (talk) 15:58, 5 June 2014 (UTC)

Article clean-up

There has been a bit of bloating here over the last few months. I would like to undertake a bit of a clean-up. Two issues in particular:

The sections for the Caucasian theory, the Hamitic theory and the Eurafrid brown theory, are all actually just shades of the same theory. I would like to merge these three sections into one, and clean up the duplication. Are there any objections?

Secondly, the section for Black Hypothesis has again become too long, bearing in mind that this hypothesis has its own Main Article already. I would like to trim this down to more of a summary, and leave the reader to pursue the detail at the Main Article. Are there any objections?

Wdford (talk) 12:14, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. This needs some good cleaning-up.

Cheers, Λuα ^{(Operibus anteire)} 14:05, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Ok, but read WP:SUMMARY first please. Thanks. Dougweller (talk) 21:42, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Thank you. If I understand this correctly, the summary in the main article should essentially be a copy of the lead section in the daughter article - is that correct? Wdford (talk) 22:12, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

We should also rework the history section, which as it stands currently looks rather card-stacked to give the impression that the main/only reason people thought Egyptians were anything other than "black" was because they were racist. --Yalens (talk) 23:23, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

It sure seems that way. For one thing, it's mentioned after each of the various historical hypotheses that "it is now largely agreed that Dynastic Egyptians were indigenous to the Nile area" or something to that effect. Definite overkill. Afrocentric authors like Cheikh Anta Diop and Chancellor Williams were also presented as ordinary scholars, without any qualifiers. In any event, would it be alright to include this genetic study from Nature? It contradicts the DNA-Tribes company's material that Andajara120000 linked to. The researchers observed the mtDNA Haplogroup I2 in a mummified Ancient Egyptian individual; this maternal clade is believed to have originated in Western Asia. The paper is also the only peer-reviewed, non-commercial study that explicitly mentions a haplogroup for an ancient Egyptian individual [6] -- "The researchers determined that one of the mummified individuals may belong to an ancestral group, or haplogroup, called I2, believed to have originated in Western Asia. They also retrieved genetic material from the pathogens that cause malaria and toxoplasmosis, and from a range of plants that includes fir and pine — both thought to be components of embalming resins — as well as castor, linseed, olive, almond and lotus." Soupforone (talk) 02:14, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

That's a great find, Soupforone! We should definitely include that and we can also talk about some haplogroup origin since it's in the same source and wouldn't constitute WP:SYN.

I'm also troubled by the fact that Diop et al are talked about as if they were your garden-variety, truth-seeking researchers. But what can we do that wouldn't be POV?

Cheers, Λuα ^{(Operibus anteire)} 13:54, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Cheikh Anta Diop (29 December 1923 – 7 February 1986) was a historian, anthropologist, physicist, and politician who studied the human race's origins and pre-colonial African culture. Cheikh Anta Diop University, in Dakar, Senegal, is named after him. Diop is only slandered by those pushing a POV. It is offensive that Diop is being slandered on the talk page, as if the numerous racist European scholars (that studied A.E.) of the last several hundred years are without fault.Rod (talk) 03:15, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

Thanks. It's a somewhat surprising result since that haplogroup is apparently pretty rare nowadays. Anyway, per the above, I've added the material. Please proofread it at your convenience for any errors or mistakes. Kind regards - Soupforone (talk) 03:19, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Modern genetics

Hi everyone. Does this new section really belong here, or should it be at Population history of Egypt? Bearing in mind the fraught history of DNA issues in this article, let's try to be clear and consistent please? Wdford (talk) 07:27, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

I think it at least deserves a mention (along with the E1b1a study, of course). To be honest, if someone is an interested party in this topic, they'd do the reading here, and expect some modern scholarship update. The bulk of the discussion could be at Population history of Egypt, but we shouldn't end the debate 40 years ago with Diop here. DNA is now part of the debate history, eh?

Cheers, Λuα ^{(Operibus anteire)} 12:53, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

The average interested party probably would read this page first, so that summary approach could perhaps work. Soupforone (talk) 01:46, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

From the dates indicated this could easily have been a Persian person, so its no more representative of the race of the ancient Egyptians than Rod's photos of known Nubians. We can perhaps include a paragraph in the Modern Scholarship section, that says something like "DNA testing of mummies is controversial due to the high risk of contamination, but those who claim to have performed successful tests have found DNA ranging from xxx to xyz." What do you folks think? Wdford (talk) 08:00, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

I'm still queasy on adding this stuff because I feel like it will open more ways to attract POV warfare on this page, the reason being that as it stands right now, DNA tests of Egyptian remains are in early stages and not that many individuals have been tested. I'd wait until a generally agreed picture of Ancient Egyptian DNA begins to materialize among scholars, and then we can add it to the page. But that might not be for awhile. I do see the argument for including it though, and it is legitimate in my mind, I just don't want more edit wars :( (plus people trying to add stuff from sites like DNAtribes doesn't help my view on the issue). --Yalens (talk) 18:56, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

The DNA studies section of the Population history page may perhaps be a better place for this material, as it already appears to include such genetic information on the ancient population. According to the researchers, the DNA samples were from eight Egyptian mummies. They were radiocarbon dated to a time period between the Third Intermediate and Graeco-Roman periods (806 BC–124 AD). If you click on the haplogroup page link above, it indicates that although this lineage likely originated in West Asia, it has its highest frequencies today within Africa, among other Afro-Asiatic speakers. So the lineage is probably not associated with Persians; it may instead be an indication of an older migration episode. In any event, here is the full study. Soupforone (talk) 02:51, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

If everyone feels that way, then by no means allow me to be the only impediment to moving it. The concern about future POV wars is indeed a very serious one, and I don't feel strongly enough about keeping it here to argue otherwise.

Cheers, Λuα ^{(Operibus anteire)} 02:56, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

Move it to the population page, where hopefully it will be balanced by DNA studies from a time period when Egyptians actually ruled Egypt.Rod (talk) 03:42, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

A "new" editor called Jmeyertesting has been re-adding material but also deleting stuff in a way that suggests the editor is far from new. Frankly, I do agree that unless sources link DNA to the 'race' of Egyptians, we should not be having any content about haplogroups associated with some point of origin out of Egypt, whether it be Central Africa, Asia, Norway or Mars. An individual ancestral lineage of a person tells us next to nothing about the "race of Ancient Egyptians", or even about the race of the individual Egyptian. Surely this material should only included when it has been discussed in sources in relation to the question of race. Otherwise we will get into a haplogroup war comparable to the image war, in which one person's Asian-looking DNA will be set against another person's African-looking DNA. Paul B (talk) 16:07, 17 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes, perhaps you're right. This is why I proposed to move the material to the Population history of Egypt page, where the genetic background of the ancient population is already somewhat touched on. The irony is that Andajara120000 asserted in one of his posts above that he was okay with the material. He actually encouraged me to summarize it, yet now he's removing it. So much for that. Soupforone (talk) 02:53, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

Jmeyertesting was blocked as a sock. Dougweller (talk) 11:09, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

I would like to ask the monitors of this article to be consistent. All DNA Tribes and similar genetic info was censored from the article and now that we have a genetic study mentioning Western Asia, it has been allowed to remain. Will there be any neutrality or justice on this page? The time period referenced indicates that the mummy could be a Persian, Greek, or even Roman. By the 2nd century AD the glory of Ancient Egypt was long past and it had already been a vassal to stronger empires for 500 years. The conquerors came with settlers and certainly installed someone from their own ethnic group on the throne of Egypt. I would not expect the mummy to be an Egyptian at all, but a Persian, Greek, or Roman. This study is deeply flawed and should be removed immediately or balanced with the DNA Tribes and similar info.Rod (talk) 03:22, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

What was removed was as I recall material that was original research/synthesis (ie combining two sources to make a point) and/or material not from scientific journals, eg DNA Tribes. Dougweller (talk) 10:04, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

In this section, several editors agreed to move this new DNA material to a different article. I also agree to move it and do NOT support leaving it in this article on Ancient Egypt. The time period studied makes it more applicable to an article on Persia, Greek, or Rome. Also, it gives the reader the impression that they can extrapolate the ethnicity of Ancient Egyptians to be Western Asian because of a study of mummies that lived after the old, middle, and new kingdoms. That's a lot of weight to give a study of a few mummies that could have easily been Persian, Greek, or Roman. If it is not moved to another article or balanced, I will seek redress via the appropriate wiki channels.Rod (talk) 15:47, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

Heavily contested

I agree with Dougweller's latest edit to remove the "heavily contested" language from the black hypothesis section, as that language applies to all of the theories. We should say it in all of them or none for balance.Rod (talk) 17:09, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

Dain citation

re this edit: "Though controversy over race has persisted there has been undeniable evidence that Egyptians were Black and latter on received other influences through invasions and colonization." cited to "Bruce R. Dain: A Hideous Monster Of The Mind: American race theory in the early republic, 2009. Oxford University Press. p. 59". No such statement occurs on that page, though there is a discussion of Blumenbach's views, which summarise Blumenbach's view that 1/3 of ancient Egyptians were "negro". The author of the book neither endorses nor dismisses this assertion. Paul B (talk) 18:47, 14 August 2014 (UTC)

Genetics

The section is meant for peer-reviewed studies of actual Ancient Egyptian individuals. Soupforone (talk) 23:37, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

@Soupforone:But only those discussed by sources talking about the controversy. This is not a page to argue the "race", it's an article about the controversy over the "race" of Ancient Egyptians. As it says on the top of the page, " For discussion of the scientific evidence relating to the race of the ancient Egyptians, see Population history of Egypt." Dougweller (talk) 07:08, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

Cool. Soupforone (talk) 23:15, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

El-Gebelein contracts

Perhaps of relevance here are notarized contracts from the ancient Pathyrite/El-Gebelein nome in Upper Egypt. They provide some written physical descriptions of the male and female contractors [7]. Soupforone (talk) 23:37, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

Again, they need to be discussed in sources discussing the controversy. Dougweller (talk) 07:09, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

Alright, they don't seem to be though. These notary contracts are apparently pretty obscure. Soupforone (talk) 23:15, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

Thanks. I appreciate your cooperation. Dougweller (talk) 09:00, 29 August 2014 (UTC)

Deletion of section

This section was deleted without any explanation. I see that the editor made entries on this page - see above - about things belonging here or not, but these do not explain the removal of this section. Care to explain? Thanks. Rui ''Gabriel'' Correia (talk) 01:22, 6 September 2014 (UTC)

I would assume it was deleted because this page is about the history of the controversy, not data that could pertain to it. --Yalens (talk) 15:03, 6 September 2014 (UTC)

Initially, only the material that wasn't on the Ancient Egyptians was removed. The whole section was later deleted with the explanation that this is about the actual history of the controversy [8]. So apparently even peer-reviewed studies on AE are inappropriate if they haven't been discussed in sources discussing the controversy. The rest instead goes on the population history of Egypt [9][10]. Soupforone (talk) 00:14, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

This should not be an article.

There is no race controversy at all, a fringe minority of Afrocentrists does not constitute a serious academic opposing view.

--184.144.109.135 (talk) 02:15, 22 May 2014 (UTC)

If a fringe viewpoint is notable (i.e., received coverage in multiple reliable sources) then we cover it, making sure the article indicates it is a fringe view. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 02:21, 22 May 2014 (UTC)

I agree with the first part of what you say, NeilN. It's notable as a controversy, and should be covered, even if fringe. However, in reading through the article for the first time, I did not get the impression that afrocentrism was being treated as fringe, or given due weight. If anything, it seems to lean a little more toward that position. Perhaps some balancing is in order?12.11.127.253 (talk) 19:27, 4 June 2014 (UTC)

Many of us are tired of trying. The fringe advocates tend to be single purpose editors with more time to put into just this or related articles. Dougweller (talk) 21:04, 4 June 2014 (UTC)

There's Ancient_Egyptian_race_controversy#Position_of_modern_scholarship. If you can suggest ways to improve/highlight that, please do so. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 00:34, 5 June 2014 (UTC)

Since when is the history of racism in all fields of human endeavor fringe? And are you seriously saying that the scholarship of much of the 18th, 19th and early 20th century wasn't openly and blatantly racist? That is fringe. Racism is a historical, academic and scholarly fact. It was the so-called "scholarship" of scientific racism that tried to make it seem logical and sensible, which is the problem and what this article is really about. But of course, you will always have folks trying to spin history on its head and call Africans the scientific and scholarly racists. That is not even fringe that is just out and out nonsense.Big-dynamo (talk) 07:01, 21 June 2014 (UTC)

Agreed, the other theories in this article and the sloppy scholarship of racist 18th, 19th, and early 20th century scholars is where you will find the fringe ideas, such as A.E.s are white, they came from somewhere other than Africa, etc. These are the disproven, patently false, fringe ideas that were prevalent before African scholars started printing facts.Rod (talk) 03:28, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

The "sloppy scholarship of racist 18th, 19th, and early 20th century scholars"? Does that include Flinders Petrie, and all those other writers of the era you like to quote when their sloppy "racism" supports your POV? African scholars, BTW, have had very little impact on changing views about race. Overwhelmingly, it has been the development of DNA science in Europe and the USA that has made the difference. Paul B (talk) 10:56, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

This is not a forum. I do not subscribe to the idea that because a scholar was wrong on one point that their entire work is rendered invalid. We should not use sections of their books that have been disproven, but if some other section is still relevant, why not use it?Rod (talk) 17:06, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

"This is not a forum." What an utterly irrelevant comment, since your own posting was pure-forum, wholly unrelated to any of the actual issues about content. All you and BD do is misrepresent the issue, since you confuse obsolete ideas with modern fringe ideas (in the context of contemporary scholarship). What you say is also wholly false, since "African scholars", as I said, had little significant input into changing models of ancient Egyptian history. Using bits of Petrie that you like to promote your POV is not the same as using those that are known to be true. Not all all. Paul B (talk) 17:42, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

Anything related to the article you want to discuss? Otherwise, this is a waste of my time and yours. Your opinions are just that, "your opinions."Rod (talk) 20:03, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

Speaking of Petrie, I notice that one of my references to the link between Petrie and Francis Galton and Eugenics was removed in the flurry of edits on the page. Too many attempts to down play the fact that the Europeans at the time were strongly influenced by a wide variety of social and pseudoscientific racist viewpoints. The point being these weren't simply 'honorable' scientists just looking for the truth. In fact, they were using whatever means at their disposal to alter and distort the truth to fit their agenda. The whole field of anthropology, archaeology and Egyptology were founded on race science and Eugenics. And this article tries very hard to overlook all of this and downplay it in order to make it seem that these ideas were all reasonable and level headed which is blatantly false. http://www.bloomsbury.com/us/the-archaeology-of-race-9781780934204/Big-dynamo (talk) 10:02, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

An important point is that a racist, biased point of view of many previous scholars makes the results of old scholarship questionable, but it does not make them wrong, and in particular, it does not make an opposing interpretation right. Even a racist can come to correct conclusions, either because he overcomes his prejudice based on the evidence, because the issue really is not affected by his prejudice, or because, in particular cases, reality nicely matches the prejudice. To quote Lord Peter: "You do Sugg an injustice," said Lord Peter; "if there had been any signs of Thipps's complicity in the crime, Sugg would have found them." --Stephan Schulz (talk) 12:06, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

The issue is that the 'science' of anthropology started out as search for the biological proof of white genetic superiority among the worlds' populations. This goes beyond simple opinions and reflects the fact that racism, colonization and white supremacy are based around institutional control of wealth, power and knowledge. And thus the controversy. Nobody was sitting around debating the merits of race before this because no such concept existed, even though the concept of ethnicity and nationality did exist and has always existed to some degree. And therefore, the argument today is more of a question of the legitimacy of the institutions themselves because of their racist roots as reflected in the numerous writings and opinions of those who founded those institutions. You cannot expect a tree with poisoned roots to bear good fruit. And this issue is fundamental to the whole argument as it is about power and authority over who gets to tell the story of human history. This is a crucial point even if it is not touched in this article.Big-dynamo (talk) 22:23, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

Consistent terminology

This entire article is well balanced (perhaps too balanced – see above) and so I am confused by the side-by-side use of the descriptives “Caucasoid” and “Black” in the third sentence: “These were typically identified in terms of a distinction between the Caucasoid and Black racial categories.”

Forensic and physical anthropologists generally divide the human species into 3 (or 5) major categories: Caucasoid, Negroid, and Mongoloid (sometimes plus Capoid and Australoid [Carleton S. Coon, Origin of Races, Random House, 1962, ISBN 9780394301426] who changes “Negroid” to “Congoid”). These three words are formed by employing the Greek suffix “-oid” (resembling) plus, in two cases, the use of geographic nouns (Caucasus and Mongolia), and in the third case the Spanish word for a color (“negro”, black) for the root. Coon adds consistency to terminology by his consonant use of geographic nouns (Caucasus, Mongolia, Congo, the South African Cape, and Australia) for the roots of his words.

The definition of “Negroid” is commonly understood to mean someone of sub-Saharan heritage and is synonomous in modern racial parlance with “black,” but this sentence uses, for one racial group, the forensic classification, and for the other, the name of a color. This is inconsistent: either the sentence should use two forensic classifications (“…Caucasoid and Negroid…” [or “Congoid”]), or it should use two colors (“…White and Black…”). “White” is just as messy a choice for skin color as is “Black.” For both of these “types” there are exhibited a variety of skin tones, hair textures, and morphological features, while neither approaches true white or true black, making the use of either as racial descriptives, outside of informal conversation, wholly inappropriate.

Some discussions in other fora on the net have suggested that the use of the word “Negroid” is prejudicial, and so it may be (which may inform the original writer’s choice of the word “Black” in the sentence in question); I am not trying to argue one way or the other, but granting that it may be, then for linguistic consistency’s sake the sentence should be altered to read as I have changed it. LB2Accra (talk) 08:56, 24 October 2014 (UTC)LB2Accra 24 Oct 2014

Good points but remember those terminologies are considered controversial regardless because the era when they were written and the individuals who used them most often applied them in a racist context. That is a part of the controversy of course but really that delves more into the subject of scientific racism and the history of 'race' as defined by 18th, 19th and 20th century scholars. But I would say that it is absolutely accurate if one were to be consistent, since these terms were often used as part of the historical writings of the ancient Egyptian "race".Big-dynamo (talk) 14:57, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

Races in the Bible

This isn't mention to be centric in any form and not I am African-American. Anyways, does the Bible mention anything about "Black People"? The only groups mentioned are the Hamites (North Africans and people from the Horn of Africa), Semites (People from the Arabian Peninsula), and the Japhetites (Europeans). I have heared some claim that the Hamites are the "Black People" but that doesn't make any sense since Berbers, modern Egyptian, and the people of the horn of Africa aren't "Blacks". If this were true woundt that make the ancient "blacks"? Even then none of the Hamites go further south then the Horn of Africa. The Bible divides them up as Phut(Berbers), Canaan, Cush (The Horn of Africa), Mizraim (Egyptains). The Bible also doesn't mention Asians. I just need help to make sense of this article and would greatly be thankful for the help! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 166.137.244.33 (talk) 05:56, 10 January 2015 (UTC)

The historicity of the Bible as a whole is unknown. What is more well-established is that Jesus of Nazareth and many of the Prophets were real individuals. Soupforone (talk) 00:48, 11 January 2015 (UTC)

Petrie, Dynastic Race Theory and Eugenics

Twice I have had had changes reverted by some folks who don't like the fact that there is a lot of documentation and scholarly work showing that Petrie was often motivated by Eugenics in his work on Ancient Egypt and the Near east. There are quite a few sources for this information. Not to mention that the Dynastic Race theory itself is widely available on line along with his other writings which clearly reflect a racist point of view. Now I am not one to reject constructive criticism, but when good faith edits are reverted 'just because' somebody doesn't like it or doesn't care about the facts, I have to object. So I am creating this section to discuss the problem. The subject of the article is the controversy and obviously the Dynastic Race Theory was added as it falls under the subject of race science and the opinions of various scholars on the issue. However, to omit and downplay the fact that European scholarship at the time was blatantly racist and full of overt white supremacist dogma is simply historical revisionism. If folks can't handle the facts of history then they shouldn't be editing pages about history. There is more than enough from Petries own writings to support this view and the passage I added included his own words on the matter. So suffice to say this isn't an issue of facts, as opposed to some folks clinging vainly to the lie that European scholars are somehow without bias, contradicting the history and predominance of racist theories across most forms of scholarship in this period. This view is POV and nonhistorical. Case in point, I will use Petrie's own words to illustrate:

Yet if the view becomes really grasped, that the source of every civilization has lain in race mixture, it may be that eugenics will, in some future civilization, carefully segregate fine races, and prohibit continual mixture, until they have a distinct type, which whill start a new civilization when transplanted The future progress of man may depend as much on isolation to establish a type, as on fusion of types when established.

From: The Revolutions Of Civilizations, W M Flinders Petrie, Harper, London, url=https://archive.org/details/revolutionsofciv00petruoft, page 131

This goes along with the fundamental theory of the Dynastic Race which attributes to superior outside 'caucasian' people who dominated the rest of the mixed race stock of Egypt.

It seems then that, as far as data so widely separated in time and place can be compared, there was a mixed race in North Africa and Egypt in the early prehistoric age; and that this, fused together, has persisted in Algeria with some slight improvement in general size, and especially the width of the skull from increase of brain. To get behind this mixed race is quite beyond our present data. That there was somewhat of the old paleolithic Bushman stock is very probable; and that there may have been another low type such as the Socratic Sinai Bedawy seems likely from its position. (...) To settle how far either of these results may be representative is impossible until some other large series of prehistoric skulls may be obtained in different parts of the country. So far, it might well be that the Naqada type had been mixed with a more European type at Abydos, and also lower down in the Nile valley and along the African coast.

From: Migrations, W M Flinders Petrie, Huxley Lecture for 1906, Journal of the Anthropological institute, url=https://archive.org/details/migrations00petruoft, pages 9-10.

I am open to any discussion or opinions on the issue as to why this is not relevant to the discussion, but if you cannot show me any serious reason why it isn't fundamental to this discussion, I will post my changes again and add additional citations and references as necessary to reinforce the point that this is mainstream scholarship not simply my personal opinion.Big-dynamo (talk) 20:15, 19 January 2015 (UTC)

Two problems

These are hardly new insights, but there are two core problems I have observed in this debate:

1. "Black" and "white" (which is what it boils all down to) are very subjectively delineated categories. For example, many Americans do not classify people of Middle Eastern ancestry (in general) as "fully white", or not even as white at all, but instead rather describe them as "brown", more akin to (sub-Saharan) Africans – even if not fully "black". (This can be confirmed most emphatically through the slur "sand nigger".) North Africans (such as Gaddafi) may be perceived even more decidedly as "brown people" or at least "not (quite) white". In earlier periods, Americans and Northern Europeans tended to have even more restricted views of "whiteness" and could even view Southern Europeans or Irish as less than fully white. Still today, especially Scandinavians may feel similarly, due to being used to a very narrow form of "white" appearance. White supremacists now and then may even exclude Eastern Europeans, being focused on a "Germanic" ideal of "whiteness". Conversely, blacks have a similarly wide spectrum of views on who should be described as black and who shouldn't, some of them famously declaring Obama "not black (enough)". More scientifically-sounding categories such as "Caucasian/Caucasoid" or "Negroid" are still ill-defined – some consider Australian Aborigines, Melanesians, South East Asian Negritos and even Southern Indians Negroid, others do not, still others, with a finer-grained classification system, do not even consider the San (of Southern Africa) Negroid; some consider Northern Indians, Southern Indians and even Australian Aborigines and Melanesians Caucasians/Caucasoid, others do not. Even if we had a representative sample of living, breathing native Ancient Egyptians standing right in front of us, and they had a roughly homogeneous look, chance is that we would still never come to an agreement about whether they are white or not. Kelley L. Ross suggests that the modern Copts, such as Boutros Boutros-Ghali, are indeed a reasonable model for what the Ancient Egyptians might have looked like. Is Boutros-Ghali white?
2. Evidence that can be logically interpreted in more than one way, but ideological blinders prevent the debater from seeing or acknowledging this. When we find, in modern Egypt, individuals who look Negroid, this can indeed be taken to mean that the Ancient Egyptians were originally Negroid and the Middle-Eastern-looking Egyptians immigrants; but the exactly opposite interpretation is equally possible. When, conversely, we find, in modern Egypt, individuals who look "Mediterranean", this can indeed be taken to mean that the Ancient Egyptians were originally "Mediterranean" and the Negroid-looking Egyptians immigrants; but the exactly opposite interpretation is equally possible. If Cleopatra was blond and blue-eyed (no, [http://www.amazon.com/Antique-Painting-Encaustic-Cleopatra-Discovered/dp/1491245727 seriously]), is that because she descends from the Ptolemies, immigrants from Greece/Macedonia, or it is because the Ancient Egyptians were really blue-eyed blonds (or redheads, like Ramesses II) themselves and the others are all immigrants from Nubia and the Ancient Near East? Without an open mind, you will never achieve anything but confirm only your own ideological preconceptions. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 02:10, 11 November 2014 (UTC)

That so-called "White race" is just a nationalistic name for the "European Caucasoid". In fact, There are some differences between different type of Caucasoid groups, but all of them share same origin. Even people with a same haplogroup are not from same stock, same haplogroup just determines same origin/or their ancient homeland. Western Asians, Eastern Europeans, Southern Europeans, Balkans, West Europeans, Scandinavians, and etc. are not same. So the general category "Caucasoid" or "Europid" is suitable for all of them. And many White nationalists forgot this fact: There is a kinship between them and Middle Easterns and some Central Asians. They don't like this, but it's fact. --110.135.49.153 (talk) 22:28, 12 November 2014 (UTC)

User:Florian Blaschke, IP, this is an article on the history of the debate. You two seem to want to discuss the debate, but this isn't a forum for that discussion. Dougweller (talk) 09:34, 13 November 2014 (UTC)

I was referring to the discussions above. I thought the talk page was about improving the article, and my contribution was supposed to help people understand the problem. I referred to some sources and evidence relevant to the article. Would you have expected me to edit the article directly, despite the controversial topic and my lack of experience with this subject area in Wikipedia?

By the definition of "white" the IP is using, modern Egyptians and Copts, in general, are probably not white. Using the narrowest, "Nordic"/Scandinavian-centred definition, they are clearly not. Nor were Ancient Egyptians in general, as far as I can see. But in that case, would there even be a debate? I understand this is effectively all about Afrocentrism, whose focus are people of sub-Saharan African ancestry. There's no question that Egypt, despite its close ties to (and some cultural and genetic exchange with) the Middle East, is a fully autochthonous African culture. (With close ties up the Nile as well.) What Afrocentrism does ignore or downplay is the extreme diversity within Africa in every respect, including genetic/phenotypical/"racial" diversity, which is actually a pity. This diversity is perhaps the biggest wealth of the continent, along with its natural riches, and what makes it so fascinating. I'm not aware of any evidence showing that people of sub-Saharan ancestry were ever more than a minority in Egypt – just like people of European ancestry, which there is also evidence for, without even white/Nordic supremacists trying to "claim" Ancient Egypt fully for themselves. While the Naqada culture "may also have a hint of a Sub-Saharan African component", northern Egypt shows links with the Middle East from the beginning on. The origin of Ancient Egypt's indigenous population is, as I gather from Wikipedia's own summaries, neither in sub-Saharan Africa nor in Europe or the Middle East, but in the Sahara itself. That is, well in Africa, but not where black Americans' roots are. I'm all for black Americans travelling to Africa trying to understand their roots better, which I hear can be very empowering, and if they feel that Egypt or South Africa are equally part of their roots, and feel a close kinship with their cultures, more power to them; but "blackening" Egypt (let alone Ancient Greece!) is no better than "whitening" or "whitewashing" it, and mindless copying of the thought patterns of their enemies, white supremacists. If anything, Egypt was multiracial and its heritage belongs to the whole world, literally – considering, for example, that for almost all writing system in the world can plausibly be tracked back to Egyptian writing. It's not like Egypt is Africa's only autochthonous civilisation of interest and all the rest of Africa was filled with nothing but jungle and savages; that is the colonial lie that Afrocentrism is really buying into, the pernicious racist meme it is spreading. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 21:19, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

I agree, but I'm not sure that this wouldn't be better at the Population history article talk page as it is basically about the controversy itself rather than the history of the controversy. Dougweller (talk) 10:36, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

Actually the article is about the history of racism as it applies to the study of ancient cultures and specifically Egypt. The concept of race and the use of the construct to justify domination of people and cultures is part of the legacy of the 17th through 20th century European scholarship and society world wide. To sit up here and claim that Africans originated the concept of race and used it to impose their racial views on others while ignoring and downplaying all the outright overt racist scholarship from European authors in the time period in question is historical revisionism. This controversy did not start with so-called Afrocentrics and scholars have been debating the origins of the Egyptians in terms of whether they were 'black Africans', 'mixed' or 'European Caucasoids' since the Invasion of Egypt by Napoleon and this is among European scholars. Read the writings of Petrie and many other European scholars of this era and you will see the same themes and debates including references to ancient Greeks 100 years before the word "Afrocentric" even existed. Egypt is in Africa and the origins of the ancient Egyptians lay in the South, as admitted by Petrie and most scholars on the subject, in the very areas that are currently mostly populated by black Africans near the border with Sudan. To claim that Africans as Africans cannot claim Africa as their heritage is simply racist in itself, as nobody questions a Europeans claim to any part of Europe, nor an Asians claim to any part of Asia, yet when it comes to Africa somehow Africans have to be careful about what part of Africa they can claim? This is the core of the controversy and again goes back to the time in history when European colonialism and scholarly racism was at its height, most especially in the fields of anthropology and archaeology, where in Europeans deemed anything of value as "theirs" no matter where they found it. And the reason it is a controversy is because of whether people are studying history and making decisions based on facts and evidence or ideology, where the key part of the motivation is 'race science' or 'race pride' in one way or another, versus hard science and fact. This is not new stuff and all historically documented. Big-dynamo (talk) 00:54, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 13 November 2015

The part

| Anthropologists have rejected the notion of race as having any validity in the study of human biology

the reference

| It does not reflect a consensus of all members of the AAA, as individuals vary in their approaches to the study of "race." We believe that it represents generally the contemporary thinking

1) They say "WE BELIEVE". Belief is not a valid reference. 2) How are modern biological studies relevant to the historic races classification. I would advice to remove that statement that looks placed there for political reasons. It leads to believe that this page is infected by wikipedia activists plague, and so inertly biased, anti-scientific.

95.249.59.117 (talk) 15:56, 13 November 2015 (UTC)

There is no edit request here, only vague accusations of political bias. Wikipedia is not a forum for venting your spleen. Regards, WCM_email 18:12, 13 November 2015 (UTC)

What this article is about

Doug. This article may be about the controversy. But if you were to google "what is the race of the ancient Egyptians?" Or "were the ancient Egyptians black?" This is the first page that pops up. So. It is about their race. Sorry but it is not about the controversy itself. That is just stupid and twisting the obvious. Allanana79 (talk) 18:49, 6 January 2016 (UTC)

Google can't determine what this article is about. It is about the controversy, no matter what a Google search turns up. In any case no article is going to say "Wikipedia has the answer to what is the race of the ancient Egyptians". Doug Weller talk 20:26, 6 January 2016 (UTC)

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Questionable assertion in introduction

Since the second half of the 20th century, many anthropologists have rejected the notion of race as having any validity in the study of human biology

There something is weaselly and underhand about this, and it undermines the credibility of the article - this is presented as an authoritative statement, but unjustifiably because anthropologists cannot speak with authority on the 'study of human biology'. I'm a great believer in asking anthropologists about questions of anthropology, and biologists about questions of biology - the situation can be easily remedied by referring also to the opinion of biologists on this matter, or by removing altogether any suggestion that this is a question of human biology.

--Oxford Menace (talk) 21:16, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

Can I ask you a simple question? What subject is it that you think physical anthropologists study? AndyTheGrump (talk) 21:32, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

The editor may be (incorrectly) assuming all anthropologists are cultural anthropologists. Dougweller (talk) 21:41, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

Quite likely - though I would argue that cultural anthropologists, with their understanding of the way different cultures invent 'races' for their own purposes are well-qualified to speak on the subject anyway. AndyTheGrump (talk) 21:45, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

Then it would be worth specifying 'many physical / biological anthropologists', surely? None of your counter-arguments is relevant - the piece begins by claiming to authoritatively answer a biological question with the anthropological consensus, and in the absence of any qualification many readers will be put off by this. It stands to reason that any Wikipedia entry should wear its credibility and trustworthiness on its sleeve, so that readers can rest assured that what they are reading is a valid representation of the state of knowledge about a given thing. In its current state, this statement cannot inspire such confidence in the reader, and therefore should be changed.--Oxford Menace (talk) 22:31, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

Sorry, do either of you have any answers to this problem? As it stands, the article promises to reliably guide the reader through a 'controversy', but then right at the start advances a claim that most readers would regard (rightly) as itself controversial. This cannot inspire confidence in the information that follows. The inference many readers will make is that the writers have cherry-picked the anthropological consensus on this matter because, even though not scientifically adequate for the resolution of a biological question, it backs the writers' favoured ideological position. Now even if this inference is perverse, you must change the introduction so as not to invite this perverse inference. The article announces itself as concerning a 'controversy' - the writers of the article must at least respect this contentious matter enough as to tread carefully around it. Arguing that 'cultural anthropologists, with their understanding of the way different cultures invent 'races' for their own purposes are well-qualified to speak on the subject' of biology is laughably inadequate.Oxford Menace (talk) 11:32, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

Perhaps the material in the article Race (human classification) might be helpful here? What say you read that quickly, and see if it provides a potential way forward? Wdford (talk) 17:47, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

Oh please. It's the "ideological position" that is articulated in the main article on race. If you think that is insufficiently supported by the sources you may thrash it out there. Of course even if it were proven that the differences bwtween "negroes" and "caucasians" were nothing more than skin-and-bone deep, it would not alter the fact that these terms and the visible signs of human difference that they signify would still be significant in historical and political terms to people who identify with them. Paul B (talk) 18:21, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

May want to also have a look at the single source which tells us twice that human skulls do not connect to race. The source is a single study that had a hard time separating Iranian skulls from Anglo-saxon ones, doesn't even support the claim. The claim itself is insanity, made for political reasons; any expert in biology knows that race is displayed in skeletal structure. Police regularly identify race from skeletons. This is article co-opted by people who care more about politics than objectively presenting the facts and the evidence, and has a lot of work to be done. J1812 (talk) 12:20, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

This was actually something that was first brought up by Boas nearly a century ago. There are indeed differences in phenotypic features between various peoples, but it doesn't necessarily correspond to race. Race is a cultural construct, and racial classification schemas vary between cultures (the Brazilian model of "race", for example), and varied throughout various periods in history: it was constantly subject to revision because it's based on nothing more than perceived differences, and the grouping of various traits that were considered "typical" (but which always had too many exceptions to be considered wholly reliable). We're not saying that race isn't a a reality; it surely is, but it's a social reality. That medical examiners (not police, who have no expertise in the matter) make these claims is somewhat controversial. Primarily because police investigators often tout it as being authoritative. It's an educated guess to build a profile, as it's only made on the basis of probability. Many such assessments have been controverted by later evidence, and challenged by expert testimony. It wouldn't be difficult to collect a multitude of sources stating all of this, as it's extremely well known and established in the various subfields of anthropology. I assure you, it's not based on politics. It's based on that anthropologists, for generations, could find nothing to support a biological basis for race, but only that population groups sometimes differed. Quinto Simmaco (talk) 12:58, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

J1812, you seem to think this article is about the race of Ancient Egyptians. It isn't, although sometimes it veers into it when it shouldn't. It is meant to be about the history of the controversy, describing the controversy itself. We have a separate article about the Ancient Egyptian population Dougweller (talk) 14:42, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

I was also annoyed by this statement. My objections include that it is of low or no relevance to the article (it seems more like an attempt to introduce a politically correct agenda), that anthropologists are not necessarily well-equiped to judge the issue, that the medical sciences disagree when it comes to e.g. incidence and treatment of heart disease, that geneticist disagree e.g. in that there are genetic markers that strongly correlate with race and that these are highly useful when investigating human migration, evolution, and similar phenomena, and that the concept of race is most definitely present in the mind of the general public and of interest to many of its members (and most definitely pertinent to the understanding of the controversy and its history), whether races are of biological interest or not. In addition, while the usefulness of the race concept and the exact definition of race can validly be disputed, there are strong forces that try to enforce an ideologically driven and highly questionable perception of truth (wiz. that there are no races, that races are exclusively a "social construct", or similar) regardless of scientific backing. Wikipedia should take great care not to give such non-scientific and non-encyclopedic voices undue space. I strongly suggest that the sentence be removed, seeing the lack of relevance alone as being a sufficient reason to strike it. 80.226.24.12 (talk) 10:16, 25 April 2015 (UTC)

I think it's important to point out that people that study medicine do scientifically identify race. After all, people of different races have different risks. For example, sickle cell is overwhelming found as a risk among black people but not white people. Because of this kind of real life need for racial categories medical science can't abandon the concept of race, instead it looks at race as being something that is based on genetic similarity. So no, just because physical anthropologists don't believe in race doesn't mean there isn't a debate here.

Sickle cell is a result of where your ancestors lived, not what race you are. The vast majority of black people on earth today do not have sickle cell issues, and some people of other races do have it as well. You have successfully demolished your own argument. :) Wdford (talk) 08:20, 28 November 2015 (UTC)

Wdford is applying Lewontin's fallacy. While any single gene (such as sickle cell) won't tell us someone's race, genes on the aggregate will do so with near-certainty, since lots of very weak correlations will combine into one very strong correlation. J1812 (talk) 14:20, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

Lewontin has been proved correct - Edwards was using limited data, and was stretching the data inferences beyond scientific limits. There is no "fallacy". Wdford (talk) 17:09, 8 March 2016 (UTC)

Debate and badary culture

The paragraph which states that the ancient Egyptian facial characteritics remain a debate, followed by an obscure source of the claim should be deleted. It's like saying the race of Native Americans or ancient Chinese remains a topic of debate. It's already know the Egypt is a north African middle eastern Mediterranean country, not a sub Saharan one. Secondly, the badarian culture being related to Nubians is missing a sentince that came after it in previous version of this page but was deleted, that said The badarian immigrated to Nubia as well. This page is one of the most racist pages in Wikipedia and shouldn't even exist. It full of misinformation and tricking information, which has no relation to the topic such as Champollion comment that Egyptians are portrayed the same as Nubians which we know by now is never the case --24.52.201.176 (talk) 12:28, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

I think you misunderstand the nature of this article. It is not about the actual race of Ancient Egyptians but about the arguments put forward in the past, many of which were indeed racist, dishonest, misinformation, etc. Doug Weller talk 16:00, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

not every topic debate made by people deserves a page that supports its controversy. Or else every fact can be controversial and needs a page. --24.52.201.176 (talk) 09:25, 29 February 2016 (UTC)

This is a rather large topic in modern discourse on the ancient world and I'm unsurprised there's a page on it. Ogress 17:30, 8 March 2016 (UTC)

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Haplogroup R1b

Haplogroup R1b is not entirely uncommon in the Nile Valley, as it is found at moderate frequencies among the Siwa Berbers. However, whether the pharaoh Tutankhamun actually carried the clade is uncertain since the haplotype markers weren't released [11]. Soupforone (talk) 05:19, 27 December 2016 (UTC)