AFROCENTRIC CULTURE BY DESIGN: Heni Christophe revoltionary, 1st Black King on the western hemisphere

Saturday, March 7, 2009

Heni Christophe revoltionary, 1st Black King on the western hemisphere

This particular brother was born into slavery. Became a revolutionary, not only that but elevated into the fist Black King on the western hemisphere. (Haiti)
He was born of a fierce type of people that would fight for their freedom.
The brutality of ther french was a liilte too much to bear ,which lead Christolpher to take action. The three principle figures in the Haitain Revolution were...Toussaint ,L'Overture, Jean Jacaue Dessalines and Christophe. He wasamong 545 Free Negros known as the Fontages Legion. Figjhting to liberating their brothers who weren?t free. He was an extrodinary indivdual....read more and enjoy the knowledge.
Hotep Know Thyself
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October 6

Henri Christophe On this date in 1767, Henri Christophe was born. He was a West African slave and became the first Black king in the Western Hemisphere (Haiti).
Christophe was born on the island of Grenada, a British colonial acquisition. His parents were slaves brought to Grenada with thousands of other West Africans to work in the sugar industry. These slaves in the sugar industry were known for their fierce and determined nature to resist the institution of slavery. The revolutionary nature of Henri Christophe has its roots deeply embedded in his African ancestry. Christophe’s obstinate, argumentative, and obdurate nature led his father to sell his services to a French ship's captain as a cabin boy, before had reached the age of ten.
The ship's captain sold Henri to a French sugar planter in the French province on the island of Saint Dominique called Haiti, which was a Carob Indian name meaning "the land of the mountains.” The brutality of the French planters led to much discontent among the slaves in Haiti. These acts of brutality were witnessed by Christophe and set the stage for his role in the Haitian revolution. He participated in the American Revolutionary War in the French contingent. As a sergeant, he was among the 545 Haitian free Negroes known as the Fontages Legion. Fighting to make men in another country free from oppression created a thirst for freedom within Christophe.
In June 1794, the Spaniards and the English who wanted to share the wealth created by the sugar industry threatened Haiti. The Spaniards constituted the greatest threat and a battle for control of Haiti ensued. The three principal figures in the Haitian revolution were Toussaint L'Overture, Jean Jacques Dessalines, and Christophe. Toussaint joined the French forces against the Spaniards, became a general of the slaves, and marched to several villages, liberating his brothers who immediately joined his forces. After distinguishing himself in battle, Christophe was made a sergeant by Toussaint and later made a general by Dessalines.
The French forces were defeated and Haiti was declared an independent republic on November 27, 1803. The Republic of Haiti was divided into two states, and Christophe was elected president of the Northern State in February of 1807, and Alexandre Petion was elected president of the Southern Republic of Haiti in March. The division between the republics was to last for a decade. President Christophe set out to improve all aspects of life in the Northern Province. One of his major concerns and preoccupations was the defense of his country from internal and external aggression. He had a huge fortress built on a mountain peak overlooking the Le Cap harbor, 3,000 feet above the sea. The citadel was named "la Ferriere," which means the blacksmith's pouch.
The huge stronghold, which still exists today, was built in the shape of a ship, covering 16 acres, with some of the walls soaring 140 feet high. The education of the Haitians was Henri Christophe's second priority. He solicited teachers from the United States and Britain to build schools. This ultimately raised the former slaves to a literacy level unequaled in the Western Hemisphere. To continue the improvement of Haitian life, Christophe decided to create the first Black kingdom in the Western Hemisphere. At a council of state on March 28, 1811, he declared Haiti a kingdom, with himself as King Henri I. Christophe offered the ruler of the south, Alexandre Petion, the opportunity to be absorbed. Petion refused and the relationship between the two men and their respective countries remained strained until Petion's death in 1818. In August 1820, Christophe suffered a stroke that left him partially paralyzed.
When the news spread of his infirmities, the seeds of rebellion began to grow. On October 2, 1820, the military garrison at St. Marc led a mutiny that sparked a revolt. The mutiny coincided with a conspiracy of Christophe's own generals. Some of his trusted aides took him to the Citadel to await the inevitable confrontation with the rebels. Christophe ordered his attendants to bathe him, dress him in his formal military uniform, place him in his favorite chair in his den, and leave him alone.
Shortly after the attendants left his side, Christophe committed suicide by shooting himself in the heart with a silver bullet on October 8, 1820.
Reference:
The Shomberg Center

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ALKEBULAN-CENTRIC

KEMETIC SCIENCE - The Master Keys to the Study of Ancient Kemet~ 1. Cultural Antiquity and Continuity Starts in Pre-Dynastic Times and Go to 640 A.D. We must remember this when reading or listening to presentations about Kemet. Even those who eventually conquered Kemet adopted its culture. 2. Older is Better. The older architecture is superior to the later works. It's as if the art and discipline was forgotten with time. 3. The Entire Orientation of the Ancient Kamites is Southern. Word for face and South, right and West, left and East, North and back of head are respectively the same. 4. The Origin of the Kamites is Southern. 5. Leadership is Southern. The main leadership that ruled ancient Kemet always came from the South 6. All Invasions Were Destructive. No one donated culture to ancient Kemet. 7. Arabic Migration Mixes with Nubian People in the Kemetic Valley at and After the Time of Muhammad. Arabic people come in from Syria and Assyria in large numbers for the first time as the first large population of settlers after Muhammad. And with Islam, you have the first change in the fundamental culture of Kemet. 8. Science Generated Religion. The ancient Kemetic people got religion by studying aspects of nature. Nature, when viewed systematically, represents "God" anywhere you look. If you keep seeing the same patterns and rules repeated over and over again in nature, you suddenly realize that there is something bigger that you can't grasp that is behind all this. Therefore, you study yourself into religion. The religion that the Kemetic people developed through study is the same religion that others borrowed from the ancient Kamites without study. Science generated religion, it generated philosophy, and it generated general culture (religion was not Sunday). 9. There is No Dualism in Kemetic Culture. Dualism in interpretation philosophically or culturally is a western phenomenon. (Example, Kierkegaard: It's got to be either this or that). The priest was a scientist. No split between a person searching truth through one means and a person seeking it through another. No split between science and religion, the sacred and the secular. ~ (From a lecture given by Dr. Asa G. Hilliard, III, a.k.a. Nana Baffour Amankwatia

Professor Cheikh Anta Diop (1923-1986)

In His Lab , At the University of Dakar. An outstanding Historian, Egyptologist, Philosopher, and Chemist, ---“In this chapter I hope to demonstrate that the origin of the civilization of Egypt (khem) was black African, specifically Ethiopian or Anu . . . The history of Black will remain suspended in air and cannot be written correctly until African historians dare connect it with the history of Egypt. In reviewing Egypt’s beginnings, we find an advanced civilization already intact from the earliest Dynasty. This fact has perplexed historians down through the ages. Common sense dictates that if Egypt began fully mature, then its civilization must have originated elsewhere . . . . [Herodotus] The ‘Father of History’ was told that the first man to rule Egypt was Min, who lived so long ago that Egypt was still under water: ‘in (Min’s) time the whole country, except the district around Thebes, was marsh, none of the land below Lake Moeris, was then showing above water. To this place from the sea [Nowe] is seven days passage up the river . . . . Cheik Anta Diop, The African Origin of Civilization: Myth or Reality (originally published Nations Negres et Culture) 1955 - (Published in English in 1974)

QUEEN NZINGA - Warrior Queen - (1583-1663)

In the sixteenth century, the Portugese position in the slave trade was threatened by England and France. As a result, the Portugese shifted their slave-trading activities to the Congo and South West Africa. Mistaking the title of the ruler (ngola) for the name of the country, the Portugese called the land of the Mbundu people Angola—the name by which it is still known today. Here, the Portugese encountered the brilliant and courageous Queen Nzinga, who was determined never to accept the Portugese conquest of her country. An exceptional stateswoman and military strategist, she harassed the Portugese until her death, at age eighty. She became renowned for the guerilla tactics she employed for resisting the technologically superior Portugese army. She was a brilliant strategist and, although past sixty, led her warriors herself. Never surrendering, she died on December 17, 1663. Her death accelerated the Portugese occupation of the interior of South West Africa, fueled by the massive expansion of the Portugese slave trade.

QUEEN TIYE - 1415-1340 BCE

Born in Nubia, Queen Tiye was the Great Royal Wife of Amenhotep III, mother of Amenhotep IV (later known as Akenhaton), and mother-in-law of Nefertiti. Highly prestigious during the reign of both her husband and son, she exerted her influence as queen consort and queen mother of Egypt over a fifty-year period. In addition, she shaped Egyptian fashion and altered the prevailing view regarding royal women. Married at an early age, her husband fiercely admired her and displayed his love lavishly by building temples and massive statues where she sits by him as an equal, a feat unparalleled in that time; dedicated a number of shrines to her; and even created a monumental artificial lake for her. She was glorified by her husband as "... The most praised, the lady of grace, sweet in her love, who fills the palace with her beauty, the Regent of the North and South, the Great Wife of the King, the lady of both lands..." Wielding her power and taking charge at this juncture in the nation's history, she used her political influence and astute decisions to maintain Egypt's authority. She averted key national crises by becoming Secretary of State when her husband's physical and mental powers deteriorated with age; and redirected political decisions to her attention when her son Akenhaton neglected his political duties while preoccupied with his religious innovation (named the Heretic King, Akenhaton was the first ruler in recorded history to believe in monotheism).

ANCIENT BLACK CHINESE

The Africans or blacks that founded civilization in China were often called li min "black headed people" by the Zhou dynasts. This term has affinity to the Sumero-Akkadian term sag- gig-ga "black headed people". In northern China the blacks founded many civilizations. The three major empires of China were the Xia Dynasty (c.2205-1766 B.C), Shang/ Yin Dynasty (c.1700-1050 B.C) and the Zhou Dynasty.The Zhou dynasty was the first dynasty founded by the Mongoloid people in China called Hua (Who-aa). These li min are associated with the Chinese cultural hero Yao. The founders of Xia and Shang came from the Fertile African Crescent by way of Iran. According to Chinese legends the first man Pan Gu, used a hammer 18,000 years ago to make man. The skeletal remains from southern China are predominately negroid. (Chang 1964, p.70) The people practiced single burials.

MANI TRIBE IN THAILAND

The Chinese legends designate various culture heroes as the inventors of various aspects of Chinese civilization. The Chinese term for emperor is Di. Huang Di (Yellow Emperor), is the Chinese culture hero credited with introducing boats, carts 'chariots, the bow and arrow, ceramics, wooded houses and writing.Chinese civilization began along the Yellow river . Here the soil was fertile and black Chinese farmers grew millet 4000 years ago, and later soybeans. They also raised pigs and cattle. By 3500 B.C., the blacks in China were raising silkworms and making silk.

AFRICA'S OLDEST KNOWN BOAT

8000 years ago, Nigeria. "Africa's oldest known boat" the Dufuna Canoe was discovered near the region of the River Yobe. The Canoe was discovered by a Fulani herdsman in May 1987, in Dufuna Village while digging a well. The canoe’s “almost black wood”, said to be African mahogany, as “entirely an organic material”. Various Radio-Carbon tests conducted in laboratories of reputable Universities in Europe and America indicate that the Canoe is over 8000 years old, thus making it the oldest in Africa and 3rd oldest in the World. Little is known of the period to which the boat belongs, in archaeological terms it is described as an early phase of the Later Stone Age, which began rather more than 12,000 years ago and ended with the appearance of pottery. evidence of an 8,000-year-old tradition of boat building in Africa throws cold water on the assumption that maritime transport developed much later there in comparison with Europe. Peter Breunig of the University of Frankfurt, Germany, an archaeologist involved in the project, says the canoe’s age “forces a reconsideration of Africa’s role in the history of water transport”. It shows, he adds, “that the cultural history of Africa was not determined by Near Eastern and European influences but took its own, in many cases parallel, course”

AFROCENTRIC CULTURE BY DESIGN

Saturday, March 7, 2009

Heni Christophe revoltionary, 1st Black King on the western hemisphere

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