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Reviews tagging 'Colonisation'
The Golden Rhinoceros: Histories of the African Middle Ages by Francois-Xavier Fauvelle, François-Xavier Fauvelle
1 review
aegagrus's review against another edition
3.0
François-Xavier Fauvelle's tone is expansive and grand, but in truth his project is a modest one. To his credit, he is deeply conscious of the limitations of his source material, and does not present extrapolations as fact. Fauvelle is able to draw out a few important observations, principally about the complexities of commercial relationships between the medieval Arabian and African worlds: the diversity of religious factions involved (heterodox Muslims such as Ibadis, Jews, and local Christian polities), the importance of certain trade goods (salt, cowries), and the degree to which many of these exchanges linked populations with minimal to no knowledge of one another through sophisticated legal arrangements with intermediaries.
However, almost inherently The Golden Rhinoceros fails to live up to its promise as a work of narrative history, both dealing with a fairly narrow set of sources and venturing fairly limited arguments about those sources. Interestingly enough, the vignettes in archaeological (and paleographical) methodology surrounding the sources were more effective. I came away with a better appreciation for the strange dynamics of archaeology in the colonial world, and some of the physical and cultural barriers to effective excavations (for instance in the section on Ethiopian monoliths and monasteries). Though in some ways peripheral to the book Fauvelle is trying to write, these discussions found the book at its most compelling. If Fauvelle had embraced his opportunity to make interventions here, and made these sections and themes his central focus, I think his book would have come out as a more essential contribution.
However, almost inherently The Golden Rhinoceros fails to live up to its promise as a work of narrative history, both dealing with a fairly narrow set of sources and venturing fairly limited arguments about those sources. Interestingly enough, the vignettes in archaeological (and paleographical) methodology surrounding the sources were more effective. I came away with a better appreciation for the strange dynamics of archaeology in the colonial world, and some of the physical and cultural barriers to effective excavations (for instance in the section on Ethiopian monoliths and monasteries). Though in some ways peripheral to the book Fauvelle is trying to write, these discussions found the book at its most compelling. If Fauvelle had embraced his opportunity to make interventions here, and made these sections and themes his central focus, I think his book would have come out as a more essential contribution.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Slavery, Colonisation, and War