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Even excluding the wonders of Egypt, the African continent is a treasure trove of archaeology, with sites dating from millions of years until a few centuries ago. In chronological order, some of the most important are:

Laetoli

A trail of fossil footprints made by a pair of early hominids (Australopithecus afarensis), around 3.6 million years old. The prints were made in soft ground and preserved after being covered by a layer of volcanic ash.

Gona

A site in the Awash region of Ethiopia that has yielded the world’s oldest stone artefacts. The tools consist of pebbles modified for chopping, scraping and hammering. They are assigned to the Oldowan tradition (see Olduvai Gorge).

Olduvai Gorge

A 48 kilometre long ravine in the Serengeti area of Tanzania. Erosion of layers of ash deposited over the last 2 million years has exposed animal bones and important hominid and human ancestor fossils, classified as Paranthropus boisei, Homo habilis and Homo ergaster.

Sterkfontein Cave

One of several fossil-rich limestone caves in South Africa, famous for the discovery of a number of australopithecine skeletons since 1936. Perhaps the most famous is ‘Little Foot’, an almost complete Australopithecus africanus skeleton found in 1994. A new australopithecine species dubbed Australopithecus sediba, from a fossil site about ten miles away, was announced in 2010.

Blombos

A South African coastal cave, important in research into the evolution of Homo sapiens, about 100 000 years ago. Key finds were pieces of worked bone, pierced shells hailed as the world’s oldest jewellery, and chunks of red pigment marked with lines, controversially claimed as the world’s oldest art.

Meroe

The last great city of the Kingdom of Kush, northeast of Khartoum, Sudan, It was built after the Egyptians occupied the Kushites’ previous lands c. 571 BCE. As well as palaces and temples, Meroe is famous for its steep-sided pyramids marking the underground tombs of the elite.

Aksum

In the Ethiopian Highlands, a flourishing city in the first 500 years of the Christian era, wealthy from trading ivory, metal and slaves via Red Sea ports. A key 4th century CE Christian centre, its unique architecture influenced builders for centuries after its decline in the face of the spread of Islam in the 7th century. Known for its stelae, carved columns up to 33 metres tall, that marked graves.

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Terracotta (pottery) sculptures of humans and animals from this Nigerian site are the oldest examples of African figurative sculpture outside Egypt. Made by skilled artists, they were produced from c. 500-300 BCE into the first centuries of the current era.

Great Zimbabwe

An Iron Age settlement in Zimbabwe, dating from the late 13th to 16th centuries CE, famous for its stone walled structures. It was the centre of an agricultural society wealthy from exported gold via Indian Ocean ports. Once thought to be the legendary city of Ophir, or the seat of the Queen of Sheba, it is now known to have been the home of the ancestors of Zimbabwe’s Shona-speaking peoples.

Ndedema Gorge

In South Africa’s Drakensberg Mountains, KwaZulu-Natal, a valley containing numerous richly painted Later Stone Age rock art sites, meticulously documented in the 1960s by Harald Pager. Though undated, most probably date to within the last thousand years. Linked to the religious beliefs of the San (‘Bushman) peoples, the most common motif is the largest antelope, the eland (Taurotragus oryx).

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