GREENVILLE - So Cleopatra was not the ebony queen of the Nile, and Aristotle did not pillage ancient Egyptian intellect and custom.
I have this on good authority.
Five years ago, a white female historian upset the Afrocentric crowd by daring to write the truth - exposing a historical charade that was being perpetrated as gospel. The historical account remains true today.
The book was titled "Not out of Africa," written by Mary Lefkowitz, a humanities professor at Wellesley College. In her book, Lefkowitz says Afrocentrists have systematically been guilty historical heresy. Unsubstantiated myths, if you will.
Strong stuff.
It is historical information that made me angry at first glance. I say this, because during my formative education in the New Jersey public schools in the 1960s, black participation in history was reduced to loin-clothed natives in Africa, slaves toiling the cotton fields in the Delta and across the South and Dr. George Washington Carver's scientific work with the peanut.
Actually the history texts of my day did not give Carver his due, because his research - conducted at an institute that grew into a university at Tuskegee, Ala. - revolutionized agriculture.
During my school days, I was taught that Christopher Columbus discovered America. I learned much later that an African king reached the shores of North America three centuries before the Spanish explorer's arrival in the so-called New World.
My joy was unabashed when I learned blacks and other minorities played an integral role in America and across the globe - all spreading from the crucible of civilization, Africa.
I took pride in thinking I had retrieved that body of historical knowledge that Eurocentrist scholars with a racist agenda had taken from me.
Now Lefkowitz is telling me I had been lied to, again.
In the ensuing years, there have been vigorous denunciations of Lefkowitz's work, even though many of her Afrocentric critics have not read the book, and have not to this day. I should know, because I first rejected the work on face value, too.
After my initial indignation subsided, I sat down and read Lefkowitz's book, and found that the lady makes valid points.
"The events of this century have shown that it is dangerous to allow propaganda to usurp historical truth," Lefkowitz wrote. "Even if the group sponsoring the propaganda feels their intentions to be noble…."
Lefkowitz painstakingly debunked the Afrocentric thesis that Cleopatra was a black African. Cleopatra, Lefkowitz said, was a descendant of Macedonians.
"To learn about Africa we must look where the Afrocentrists fail to look," she said, "to the historical Egypt described by the ancient Egyptians themselves. …"
A recognized expert on classical Greece, Lefkowitz said Afrocentrists base a large part of their historical argument on the writings of the Greek historian Herodotus, who visited Egypt around 430 B.C. and wrote about similarities he observed between the Egyptians and Greeks.
Many things are narrowly defined in black and white.
Unfortunately, if one strays from that historical pathway, as Lefkowitz has apparently done - labels of bigot and racist are hurled about.
From the Lefkowitz book, I found myself in a painful human paradox. I felt a sense of historical betrayal.
The truth can hurt, especially if one does not want to hear it.
Trust me, I am listening now.
In my zeal to "re-color" history, correcting the historical epitaph, I discovered my own personal prejudices. I blamed whites exclusively, while some blacks were equally engaged in promoting their own subjective brand of history.
Now that I know, "feel good" history doesn't feel so good anymore.
