The Sahara

  It is hardly surprising that groups such as al-Qaeda in the Maghreb have managed to obtain a foothold in parts of the region, namely southern Algeria, Mali and Niger. Even less surprising is the willingness of regional governments to seize upon the presence of al-Qaeda to brand any of their own understandably fractious citizens as potential terrorists. It is, after all, far easier to secure foreign financial assistance in the War on Terror than work to improve the lot of those who are not going to vote for a corrupt regime.

  Solar potential

  Classical Inspiration

  “I am getting confused in my mind between these various goddesses. Are they all the same person?

  Originally. She is older than all the gods. Perhaps her most archaic form is the Goddess Libya.”

  ‘‘A Conversation at Paphos”, imagined by Robert Graves in The White Goddess

  However in thrall the western cultural landscape is to the mythological and literary imprint of ancient Greece and Rome, their myths did not spring into existence fully formed. Both civilizations relied on earlier, often non-European sources of inspiration. They frequently borrowed from foreign mythologies, adapting them to fit their worldview, and Egypt was the non-native source from which they borrowed most extensively. The Greeks in particular knew something of Egypt before they established close ties with the country, their earliest impression being that it was the archetype of a distant and mysterious place: the land of the Pharaohs and half known things, where myth and reality lived side-by-side and indistinguishable from one another.

  Evidence that Greece had an interest in lands outside its borders can be found in the story of how Africans came to have black skin. Greek mythology has it that the god Apollo, who is also the sun god Helios, drove his fiery chariot and four horses through the sky from the east to the west each day. One evening, either to impress his sisters or because friends had teasingly doubted his paternity, his son Phaeton pleaded to be allowed to ride the chariot. Apollo reluctantly acceded to his son’s request but the horses sensed an inexperienced driver and bolted. As they veered from their usual course, the sun-chariot came too close to the earth as it passed Africa, burning everything in its path, which is why its inhabitants have black skin.

  This story retained its appeal and the ancient Roman poet Ovid used it in his Metamorphoses. “The Aethiopes then turned black, so men believe, as heat summoned their blood too near the skin. Then was Libya’s dusty desert formed, all water scorched away.” The scorching was so severe that the Sahara remained evermore a barren desert, and the Africans black.

  Egypt was important enough for the Greeks that Herodotus devoted the whole of Book Two of his Histories to it. By the time the Histories were written, between the 450s and the 420s, Herodotus’ readers believed Egypt to be a land filled with sacred mysteries, ancient traditions and knowledge that was as close as possible to primordial. In contrast to the eighth century BCE of Homer, when myths were understood to be straightforward narratives without consideration for their accuracy, in Herodotus’ time they came to be seen as something almost legendary, rather than the literal truth. To convey a sense of this ancient knowledge, it was still important for Herodotus, Cicero’s “father of history”, to write about meeting Egyptian priests when he was there, to show that he was learning about the world before recorded Greek history.

  Although a proud Greek, Herodotus was happy to note the importance of these Egyptian guardians of tradition, seeing them as having access to an unbroken succession of ancient texts, which he frankly admits his countrymen did not. Despite Plutarch calling him the “father of lies”, Herodotus is clearly telling the truth when he acknowledges the Egyptian origin of many Greek gods, saying, ‘‘As for the stories told by the Egyptians, let whoever finds them credible use them.” The characteristics of deities are often altered but their Egyptian roots are clear, as with Osiris, who became Dionysus, and Apollo who replaced Horus.

  After the full-scale invasion and absorption of Egypt into the Greek Empire under Alexander the Great and his successors more than a century after Herodotus’ visit, the country was substantially, although never absolutely, Hellenized. Early in his career Alexander realized that he could not ignore Persian-ruled Egypt before pursuing conquests in the east. He also understood that to leave a secure Egypt he would have to be accepted by the local priests. Although it was billed as a fight to expel the Persians, Alexander’s motives in invading Egypt were entirely self-interested. An important part of his strategy was his consultation with the Oracle of Zeus-Ammon. If he gained approval for his conquest of Egypt from the Oracle he would have the priestly class on side.

  Alexander’s boyhood education - Aristotle was one of his tutors - convinced him that when his empire grew he would pursue a system of syncretism, the unification and reconciliation of different religious beliefs into one new system. For this reason Alexander had to be recognized as an incarnation of Ammon. Upon his arrival at Siwa he was duly greeted as “son of Zeus”, thus receiving confirmation of his divine antecedents and a blessing for his future conquests.

  Although it grew up along the Nile, as previously noted, Egyptian civilization relied on the Sahara for much of its religious symbolism. Egyptians located the land of the dead in the desert, the land of shadows, which was central to Egyptian theology. The father of Egyptology, Professor Flinders Petrie, wrote about the “sacred league”, a priestly union between Libya and the Greek mainland that dated back as far as the third millennium BCE, with the sacred Ammon oak cared for by the Garamantes. Robert Graves in his White Goddess, drawing on Petrie, describes Zeus Ammon as “a sort of Heracles with a ram’s head akin to ram-headed Osiris, and to Amen-Ra the ram-headed sun-god of Egyptian Thebes from where Herodotus says that the black doves flew to Ammon and Dodona.”

  Religious syncretism, by combining or altering existing features, also allowed for the re-creation of Egyptian gods as new Hellenic deities, for instance combining Ammon-Ra, with his/her (Ammon was thought to be a hermaphrodite at this time) oracle at Siwa to create the most senior deity, god of the universe, heaven, earth and most importantly empire. Any perceived foreignness around this new god was regarded favourably as an indication of its ancient roots, only enhancing the god’s authenticity and reputation.

  In his account of the abortive attempt of Cambyses to conquer Ammon, Herodotus refers to the Islands of the Blessed, a name which occurs elsewhere as the resting place of heroes and notable mortals, or paradise. Also known as the Fortunate Isles, the Islands of the Blessed are in Plato’s Gorgias a place where “every man who has passed a just and holy life departs after his decease to the Isles of the Blest, and dwells in all happiness apart (safe) from ill.”

  Plutarch, in his life of the Roman statesman Quintus Sertorius, describes the climate there as one where, “the air was never extreme, which for rain had a little silver dew, which of itself and without labour, bore all pleasant fruits to their happy dwellers, till it seemed to him that these could be no other than the Fortunate Islands, the Elysian Fields.” Commonly located by later writers in the furthest western ocean, possibly meaning the Canary Isles, Herodotus unequivocally places them in the Sahara, identifying the isles as oases. Complementing the Egyptian view of the desert as the Land of the Dead, it makes sense to imagine the oases as idyllic places of rest and reward.

  Of all the gods in the Egyptian pantheon, those who became best known in a largely unchanged form were Osiris and his sister-wife, Isis. Even though the story of Osiris’ murder and dismemberment at the hands of his brother Set, and his reincarnation, is one of the most important of all Egyptian religious stories, Egyptian texts are fragmentary and we rely on Greek texts to tell the story in full. Set’s actions were often destructive, driven by his tempestuous mood and malevolent power, which is why early Egyptians felt most comfortable when they thought he was confined to his realm of desert wilderness. In an allusion to the desert, one of the Pyramid Texts stat
es that Set killed his brother in “a quiet place”.

  Later retellings, however, such as Diodorus Siculus in the first century BCE and Plutarch in the first century CE, change important details of the story. For instance, Diodorus has Osiris murdered in a public place before witnesses by “his brother Typhon (the Greek name for Set)”. In a more elaborate scheme, Plutarch, again referring to Typhon, claims that Osiris was first locked in a made-to-measure wooden chest, essentially a coffin, which was then filled with molten lead and thrown into the Nile, which carried Osiris to the Mediterranean, where he drowned. Certain later Greek texts place the murder of Osiris during “the night of the great storm”. This may explain why since Herodotus, Set was identified as Typhon, son of Gaea and, according to Hesiod, the god of storm winds.

  Set, as Lord of the Oases and protector of their vines, remained prominent through the entirety of the Greco-Roman period of Saharan history. Apart from deadly heat, Set was also associated with such aspects of the desert as flash floods and sandstorms. By the Greco-Roman period he was more likely to be reviled than worshipped, hated for rebelling against the gods and trying to kill Zeus. The name Set-Typhon was invoked by both Greeks and Romans to destroy enemies, as Set had destroyed his brother, or else to separate lovers as Set did with Isis and Osiris.

  Although the myth of Osiris was well established among the Greeks, it was only after the Roman Empire settled in Egypt that it gained an even wider audience. The Metamorphoses of Apuleius, or The Golden Ass, by the Roman writer Lucius Apuleius, is the only full-length Latin novel to have survived intact and is known as the world’s first novel. It tells the story of a sorcerer’s apprentice, Lucius of Madaurus, who is turned into a donkey by a witch before being subjected to a number of humiliating misadventures. Isis eventually restores Lucius to his human form and, to offer thanks, Lucius becomes a priest of Osiris. As the ruler of the underworld , Osiris is indelibly linked to the Sahara but Osiris’ story spread beyond the desert and even classical Europe. Beginning with the theological necessity of the death of Osiris, which allowed for his resurrection and subsequent rule over the dead, one does not have to think too hard to imagine this myth in a Christian setting.

  As Osiris’ sister and consort, Isis also enjoyed a cult following in Rome, sometimes accompanied by other Egyptian figures such as young Harpocrates, reinvented with wings as Eros, or Anubis, the dog-headed god who helped Isis to search for Osiris’ body parts. It is the Roman cult of Isis that Mozart colourfully portrays in The Magic Flute, including the following prayer offered to the gods in Act Two:

  O Isis and Osiris, give

  The spirit of wisdom to the new couple!

  May that which guides the wanderer’s steps,

  Strengthen them with patience in danger.

  Egyptian mythology happily allowed for therianthropic gods, combining human and animal body parts. This included portrayals of souls as human-headed birds, living as ghosts, able to fly and enjoy such offerings that relations would leave at their tombs. For the Greeks, such beings were exclusively female. Retaining their wings and claws, they renamed them harpies and portrayed them as malevolent spirits responsible for punishing evil-doers, what Robert Graves in The Greek Myths refers to as “fair-haired and swift-winged daughters of Thaumas by the Ocean nymph Electra, who snatch up criminals for punishment.”

  According to the tradition cited by Graves, the Libyan Desert was also home to another fearful creature, the Gorgon Medusa and her sisters, Stheno and Euryale. Indeed, the Hellenes tended to view the whole of ancient Libya, that is the Sahara, as a world of demons and evil, lying as it did beyond the civilizing effect of mainland Greece. The goddess Libya herself, representing the whole of alien North Africa, was said to be a daughter of King Epaphus of Egypt, a son of Zeus, who appeared to Jason of the Argo fame, dressed in goatskins.

  Riddle of the Sphinx

  The most famous mythical Egyptian creature adopted and recast by the Greeks is the Sphinx. It is worth mentioning that the Greeks subverted the Egyptian idea of therianthropes: whereas the Egyptians had animal heads on human bodies, the Greeks, with the exception of the minotaur, had human heads on animal bodies. This animal, whose name is from the Greek meaning “the strangler”, was for the Egyptians the result of the union of Gaia, the earth, and Pontus, a sea-god and son of Gaea, whom she produced herself In the Egyptian tradition the Sphinx represented the divine power of the (male) Pharaoh in the form of a human-headed lion, watching over Egypt in life and death. For the Greeks, the Sphinx was a winged female whose role was to torment the city of Thebes.

  In this guise the Sphinx was famous for the riddle she posed to travellers who crossed her path. The most famous version runs: “What being, with only one voice, has sometimes two feet, sometimes three, sometimes four, and is at its weakest when it has the most?” Giving an incorrect answer to the riddle resulted in the Sphinx throttling and eating the unfortunate victim. The story goes that the Sphinx’s reign of terror ended when Oedipus arrived at Thebes and guessed the correct answer. In Graves’ version of Oedipus’ encounter with the Sphinx, he replies, ‘“Man... because he crawls on all fours as an infant, stands firmly on his two feet in youth, and leans on a staff in his old age.’ The mortified Sphinx... dashed herself to pieces in the valley below.”

  From the neoclassical period in Europe, Sphinx statues became commonplace at the entrance of buildings, freemasons in particular adopting the creature as symbolic of a wise, silent guardian. Like the Greeks and Romans, freemasonry used the antique to claim ancient legitimacy. In the late nineteenth century the Sphinx became a favourite subject of writers and artists looking to portray the darker side of myths of the sexually proscribed and echoing the Biblical story of Adam and Eve, the tree of knowledge and forbidden fruit.

  The Sphinx was also a favourite subject of nineteenth-century artists, whose portrayals of the creature changed greatly between the century’s start and end, from the literal interpretation of the myth in Jean-Auguste Dominique Ingres’ 1808 Oedipus and the Sphinx to Gustave Moreau’s sexually charged 1864 painting of the same name. By 1895, in Franz von Stuck’s The Kiss of the Sphinx it is hard to see anything but the supposed licentious nature or intent of the Sphinx, the original questioning of wayward travellers being transformed into a nightmarish, lust-filled vampiric embrace.

  In the presumably less sexually charged atmosphere of the US Army Military Intelligence Corps, the Sphinx is that unit’s regimental insignia, and it was also the cap badge of the now disbanded Gloucestershire Regiment, which adopted the emblem after battling the French in Egypt in 1801. At one point, being attacked from front and rear, the Glorious Glosters were forced to fight back-to-back. They were consequently accorded the unique honour in the British Army of wearing a cap badge on the front and rear of their headgear. It is pleasing to see that, whether conceived in a pre-literate or post-Enlightenment era, the Sahara still manages to give birth to myths, ancient and modern.

  Ask me no questions…

  Poetic Muse

  “Lesbia, you ask how many kisses of yours

  would be enough and more to satisfy me.

  As many as the grains of Libyan sand

  that lie between hot Jupiter’s oracle,

  at Ammon, in resin-producing Cyrene,

  and old Battiades sacred tomb.”

  Catullus (c. 84-c. 54 BCE)

  The Sahara has been a source of inspiration for poets for as long as they have been exposed to it. What ancient European poets such as Catullus and Lucan knew about the desert was derived from myths and conquests. One of the more memorable of the classical verses based on historical events is by Lucan. In book nine of his Pharsalia, he recalls the Saharan meanderings of Cato the Younger and his band of followers during the course of the civil war in Rome when Cato was in opposition to Caesar:

  Now near approaching to the burning zone,

  To warm
er, calmer skies they journeyed on.

  …

  As forward on the weary way they went,

  Panting with drought, and all with labour spent,

  Amidst the desert, desolate and dry,

  One chanced a little trickling spring to spy.

  In Cato: A Tragedy, written in 1712 by the poet, playwright, and politician Joseph Addison, Cato remembers his time in the Sahara, asking,

  Have you forgotten Libya’s burning waste,

  Its barren rocks, parch’d earth, and hills of sand,

  Its tainted air, and all its broods of poison?

  Making use of the famous Roman’s life-long struggle against tyranny, Addison’s play embraced the theme of opposition to monarchies and government oppression, in favour of republicanism and libertarianism. The play, with its Saharan imagery, proved inspirational to George Washington and other Founding Fathers. So enamoured was Washington of the play that in the midst of the War of Independence he had it performed to inspire the Continental Army, while they were camped at Valley Forge in the winter of 1777.

  A similar vein of myth and conquest ran through the verses of later eighteenth- and nineteenth-century western poets, although these also turned for inspiration to the non-Saharan Alf Layla wa Layla, or A Thousand and One Nights. Largely set in Baghdad and other lands far from the Sahara, the Arabian Nights, as they also became known, quickly became the staple reference for anything considered Oriental, including the deserts of North Africa, by otherwise ignorant European poets and writers. First available to European readers in French, by 1713 at least four English editions had been published. In the absence of anything more scholarly, the Arabian Nights established itself as a primary source on the East in the western imagination. Peculiarly, it was concurrently read and understood both as a record of the people and places of the region and as a work of fantasy, complete with spirits and sorcery.