Talk:Ancient Libya

Desertification etc

The page mentions "desertification", as well as some unknown "catastrophic event". I do not know what the author of these paragraphs thought of, or what time period (s)he contemplated, but this may be relevant: 365CE Crete earthquake and tsunami. I am not adding it to the page, as I have no idea what the original authors were referring to. clsc (talk) 23:47, 21 December 2016 (UTC)

Ancient Libyans were not hunter gatherers

When animals and plants were first domesticated in the near east two major life styles had emerged. Farming and pastoralism gradually replaced the hunter gatherer life style everywhere . The article clearly says that Ancient Libyans were nomad hunter gatherers living off their goats, camels and other livestock which is an oxymore, you're either a pastoral nomad or a hunter gatherer . BTW, camels were not attested in Ancient Egypt, they were introduced later in history .

The first appearence of the name

According to my source, the name libu is mentioned from the period of Merenptah, but i read that Ramesses II was the first one who fought against them. Can someone correct it, if it is wrong? Best regards Read3r 14:26, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Article Cleanup Co-Ordination Point

This article needs to be corrected to be written in comprenhensive English. Read3r 14:18, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

Cleaned up

I've tidied this page up a little. It's still far from perfect. SuzanneKn 23:11, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

Thanks! Read3r 08:06, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Unfortunately, the following sentence:

[[Oric Bates]] is a historians who considers that the name ''Libu'' or ''LBW'' would be derived from the name ''Luwatah''<ref>Bates Oric, ''The Eastern Libyans'' pg 57</ref> whilst the name Liwata is a derivation of the name Libu.

is no clearer than the original version:

[[Oric Bates]] is one of those Historians who believe that the name ''Libu'' or ''LBW'' would be derived from the name ''Luwatah''. He wrote in the page 57 as a note in his informative book ''[[The Eastern Libyans]]'' that the name Liwata is a derivation of the name Libu.

Liwata derives from Libu, which derives from Luwatah? That doesn't make sense. First, can these forms please be attributed to specific languages? My impression is that Libu is the oldest form, which is based on Egyptian LBW and Greek Libye, while Luwatah and Liwata are Arabic, so I suspect that Oric Bates really writes that the Arabic forms ultimately come from Libu, not the other way round. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 18:15, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Let's get the Original Pic of the Libyan

That pic is of a falsified reproduction. Real Libyans as drawn by Egyptians look more like Asiatics and not Europeans.

If you have any better picture, please upload it. BTW, it is nonsense to say the Libyans look more Asiatics than Europeans. Not because i believe they look more Europeans than Asiatics. That is not very interesting. But because they are Africans. Black Africa is not only a racial tought, but also nonsensical, this as long as North africa is African. Greetings!Read3r 15:23, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Help request for Psylli

Anyone with knowledge to help out with Psylli which needs a similar cleanup to the one this article went through. Donama (talk) 02:08, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

Correct some statements about "berber" grammer

In general it appears that most "berber" dialects use an "i" ant the start and "en" at the end of a word to indicate the plural. And to indicate a female the word starts with a "t" or "th" and ends with a "t"... Contrary what it is stated in the article in the sixth paragraph or so of the article Ancient Libya

Correct some statements about "berber" grammer

In general it appears that most "berber" dialects use an "i" at the start of a word and "en" at the end of that word to indicate the plural. And to indicate a female connotation, the word starts with a "t" or "th" and ends with a "t"... Contrary to what it is stated in the article in the sixth paragraph or so of the article Ancient Libya

"step-pyramid like"

Shouldn't it be "step-pyramid-like" instead? I have corrected it for the time being. Feel free to undo if I'm wrong.--Adûnâi (talk) 09:59, 25 August 2016 (UTC)

External links modified

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Written history

Did NOT start in Egypt, as the article claims. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.12.21.141 (talk) 17:05, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

Libya vs Aethiopia

It is a common refrain that Sub Saharan Africa was known as "Aethiopia", while North Africa was known as "Libya". Are there any citations for this claim? I have read herodotus, and he includes Aethiopia as a subregion of Libya, but I would love some scholarly sourcing if the claim is to remain HiddenHistoryPedia (talk) 23:24, 31 July 2025 (UTC)

@HiddenHistoryPedia Its easy to find academia behind this. here you go 105.111.85.149 (talk) 05:19, 1 August 2025 (UTC)

The article does not, in fact, do that. It instead discusses how various groups in the (North) African interior are described in various ways, including in ways which we would associate with peoples of the regions farther south, and in other ways - sometimes as "Aethiopians", and other times not. We also have this gem:

"Presque tous les auteurs anciens qui parlent des régions situées au sud de l’Atlas, pays qu’ils appellent la Libye intérieure ou supérieure, citent des populations mélanodermes qu’ils nomment parfois Ethiopiens occidentaux pour les distinguer de ceux qui habitent au sud de l’Egypte."

You should read the texts you cite. HiddenHistoryPedia (talk) 04:12, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

@HiddenHistoryPedia I think I understand what this is about, The ancient greeks recognized 3 continents only, Europa, Asia and Libya. Aethiopia was only a region or part of the continent they named Libya and not a seperate continent by itself, I think you could maybe mention it this way in the article if you want, I understand your point and I just want to help.

Thank you very much for editing the article and helping to improve its informational quality. Deceptecon (talk) 15:06, 9 July 2026 (UTC)

I think there is room to discuss how ancient authors related their ideas of Libya and Aethiopia - certainly, they sometimes used the term "Aethiopian" in contrast to the term "Libyan" - but it was obviously more nuanced than a simple "they did not consider Aethiopia[ns] to be part of Libya", as indicated in the quote above, wherein Aethiopians are said to live in a part of Libya. Some authors even associated Aethiopia (or an "Eastern Aethiopia") with Asia instead of Libya. That discussion would be better handled in the Aethiopia article. HiddenHistoryPedia (talk) 15:12, 9 July 2026 (UTC)

I agree, I hope you continue making positive contributions like this, Deceptecon (talk) 15:15, 9 July 2026 (UTC)

References