04/15/2026
The Uses of Ancient Kemetic Heritage
The civilization of ancient KMT may seem remote to many African Americans, in time, in physical location, and in relationship to meaningtul priorities tor today in the United States. Yet there is an urgent need for African Americans to rescue and reconstruct this and other parts of all African heritage. As shown above, KMT was an integral part ot a culturally united continent. It is, because of KMT's abundant records, the best window on the dynamics of African culture generally. African Americans and other Africans in the diaspora still retain some general African cultural forms. Therefore, it is wrong to consider African Americans as if their heritage is merely obliterated. European or as if all their African heritage has been The existence of advanced African cultural developments in antıquity, continental cultural unity, and diaspo-ran cultural continuities may be of interest to many. However, it is the utility of these things that must be considered here. History and culture are ongoing creative processes that arise out ot any group's struggle to survive. For African Americans that struggle continues. As the struggle continues, there are several clear uses for the cumulative and continuing history and culture of our people:
The source of philosophy. In the face of an integrated ancient philosophical/religious system, the parent of world systems, it would be foolish for its heirs to act in ignorance of it. There is no reason for heirs of African systems to be more impressed by the answers to questions given in other philosophical/ religious systems than they are with their own. Ideas about worldviews (metaphysics), knowledge views (epistemology), and value views (axiology), have been fully developed by African ancestors. They still contain avenues to truths that are worthy guides to mental and spiritual life. In fact, they have guided European thought through such institutions as churches and fraternal orders such as the Masonic order.25
A foundation for group unity and identity. The destruction of group unity and identity is a precondition for ne enslavement of a people. The absence of grour inity and identity reduces the power of the grou and individuals within it. Group cohesion is a prerequisite to effective action. Group cohesion is rooted in shared culture.26
A source of resistance to alien domination. Cabral was astute in his recognition of the role of indigenous culture in the practice of freedom. He saw that only by dominate a native or culturally distinct population. It is for this reason that colonizers and oppressors all over the world have always declared war on ethnic cul-ture. Conquerors are fully aware of the power of history and culture.?
History teaches us that in certain circumstances, it is very easy for the foreigner to impose his domination on a people, but it also teaches us that whatever may be the material aspects of this domination, it can be maintained only by the permanent organized repression of the cultural life of the people concerned.
Implantation of foreign domination can he assured definitively only by physical liquidation of a significant part of the dominated population.... In fact, to take up arms to dominate a people is above all, to take up arms to destroy, or at least neutralize, to paralyze, its cultural life. For with a strong and indigenous cultural life, foreign domination cannot be sure of its perpetu-ation. 28
A basis for independence. Once freedom is won it must be sustained. It is pititul to see so many of those who have won their freedom, having paid a blood price for it, surrender their initiative and enter into voluntary cultural servitude. A free person or group must have an independent conception of identity, pur-pose, and direction. The history and culture of African people provide the foundation for the construction of independent visions, no matter where the sons and daughters of Africa are.
A basis for creatuty. Many African Americans are rightfully suspicious of romantic calls for a return to the past. Clearly, what is needed is reality and not romanticism in the contemporary world. Moreover, no return to the past is even possible for anyone. Yet one's what can must be used in the present as building material for the future. keal romantıcısm ap pears when misguided African American people try to build their futures out of the alien heritage of oth-ers, as if it were their own.
The use of one's past is not a rejection of technological creativities. It may help to put technology into perspective and to shape it. To know one's past is not to live in the past or to be stymied in the present. The past contains the seeds for the future.
Asa G. Hilliard
The Maroon Within Us
