Animal Traffic in the Sahara

Abstract

It is clear that camels, horses, donkeys and mules were an essential form of transport and traction from at least the 1st millennium BC in the Sahara. This chapter outlines the long-term histories of the species that were made to cross the Sahara and how these fit into our understanding of Trans-Saharan trade. Recent excavations in the Sahara at Jarma and Aghram Nadharif provide an excellent opportunity to reassess our understanding of the role of animals in Trans-Saharan travel and trade. Equid skeletal material is present in proto-urban Garamantian contexts in the Libyan oases at around the same date that trade with the Mediterranean becomes evident archaeologically. Similarly, dromedary remains have been recovered from several 1st to early 2nd century AD Saharan contexts. Archaeological sites further north – including those of the Libyan Valleys Survey, Berenice, Leptiminus and even distant Carthage – provide further evidence that these animals were an integral part of transport in ancient North Africa and the Sahara. The faunal evidence can be compared with a variety of other attestations: in the ostraca of Bu Njem, a range of reliefs and other visual evidence. In addition, we suggest that the size of Mediterranean amphorae found in Garamantian Fazzān indicate that the camel, donkeys and mules/horses were used contemporaneously in pre-Islamic caravan trade.