A History of the Sudan

by P.M. Holt, M.W. Daly

A History of the Sudan by Martin Daly and PM Holt, sixth edition, has been fully revised and updated and covers the most recent developments that have occurred in Sudan over the last nine years, including the crisis in Darfur.

The most notable developments that this text covers includes the decades-long civil war in the South (with the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement in January 2005); the emergence of the Sudan as an oil-producer and exporter, and its resulting higher profile in global economic affairs, notably as a partner of China; the emergence of al-Qaeda, the relations of Sudanese authorities with Osama bin Laden (whose headquarters were in the Sudan in the 1990s), and the Sudanese government's complicated relations with the West.

This text is key introductory reading for any student of North Africa.

Genres: History, Africa, Sudan, Nonfiction

224 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1979

About the author

Peter Malcolm Holt (1918–2006), a Fellow of the British Academy, was an historian of the Sudan, of the Middle East more widely, and of the development of Arabic studies in early modern England. Born at Leigh in Lancashire, he went to Lord Williams's Grammar School at nearby Thame, and then read History at University College, Oxford from 1937 to 1940. Having obtained a Diploma of Education (1941), he joined the Education Department of the Government of the Sudan, where he worked as a secondary school teacher and inspector. In the year before the Sudan became independent in 1956, Holt was appointed as a Lecturer in the History Department of the School of Oriental and African Studies. Articles investigating aspects of the earlier period of Sudanese history represent part of his scholarly output during the 1960s. While the main body of Holt's academic research occupied three, approximately successive, phases (the Sudan, Egypt under Ottoman rule, and the early Mamluk sultanate in Egypt and Syria), the development of Arabic studies in seventeenth-century England remained an abiding interest.

Reviews

[Megan Mcswain · Rating 5 out of 5]

The best concise history of Sudan. Clearly getting dated. Still, indispensable for understanding.

[Dennis Fischman · Rating 3 out of 5]

When I was growing up in the 1970’s, we hardly learned anything about Africa in school. I have been trying to patch that hole in my education through reading on my own. Sudan should be in the news much more than it is: it’s the scene of war, famine, and disease, at least as bad as what’s going on in Gaza and worse than Ukraine. I am determined to pay it attention as it deserves.

There is not much available in English on the history of Sudan before the Darfur famine. This book is scholarly in an old-fashioned way: it focuses much more on competition between political factions and their leaders, and less on everyday people and their lives, than I like. Still, I now have a basic sense of the geography, tribal divisions, and timeline of rulers. I can build on that.

[Binston Birchill · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a serviceable history of the Sudan for the period it covers but at times it suffers from being too concise, painting a picture with insufficient strokes. We never got to know the different regions and peoples of Sudan, not much was presented other than the framework of the ever-shifting overlordship, even that only at a high level view.

My copy is the third edition and was written in 1979 and largely stops around 1970, so a newer publication will obviously be of use to those interested in the last 50 years.