I’m a big fan of Robert Bauval’s work. I have been an avid reader of his writing since I first encountered the seminal ‘The Orion Mystery’ several decades ago. He is a deep, intelligent author that tests a reader’s intelligence and as an unorthodox, archaeo-astronomer that revisits and questions mainstream archaeology he often gives a fresh outlook on ancient sacred sites, giving modern scientific explanations of complicated alignments of these monuments to the stars. In doing this he justifies the very reason the priests and pharaohs built such temples and his methods, often ridiculed by so-called experts, give a rational and clear scientific explanation of the real advanced knowledge of the ancients which with his clear arguments demonstrates the irrefutable truth of his theories. In this Black Genesis, we head off into the desert, into the Egyptian Sahara or the Western Desert. In ancient times where global climate patterns were much different this wasn’t the barren, arid area that it is today but was a fertile, well-watered productive agricultural region with advanced settlements. Bauval argues that here, in the deeper darker regions of ‘Black Africa’ we discover the true origins of early Egypt. The site in focus in this book is Nabtya Playa, a relatively obscure recent discovery with a crude stone circle jutting out in the middle of the desert. Later we learn of the key astronomic alignments of Nabtya Playa with, as often in the case of ancient temples, the star Sirius or Sothis, the Dog Star, is a key indicator. It is Sirius that the Queen’s Shaft of the Great Pyramid of Giza aligns with and at its heliacal rising, when it initially shines right down the pyramid, the ancient priests could determine the annual flooding of the River Nile, so critical to the farmers who toiled under pharaonic rule. Modern technology is used to determine exact histories of Nabtya Playa and other sites with computer simulation of star movement in the known precession of the equinoxes giving archaeo-astronomers insight into exact times when ancient sacred monuments were most likely erected. We see other sites in the interior such as Jebel Uwainat (inside Libya) which has ancient hieroglyphics.Also, significant prehistoric rock art at Gilf Kebir. IN these remote adventures in an alien landscape, untouched by humans fro so long, we are at the cutting edge of archaeological discovery. One of the saddest parts of this tale is how these remote sites are not protected en0ugh by the Egyptian authorities who are supposed to protect antiquities. Rogue tourists and trophy hunters have disturbed the alignments of stones in the circles etc and also natural climate change and weather conditions mean that these very old ruins are often more susceptible to the extreme erosive conditions of nature in their geographical desert locations. It is interesting to not the significance of bulls as a venerable animal of sacrifice and worship, the practice of which was continued in later Egyptian kingdoms more familiar with us. The book looks deeply at the calculations for Zep Tepi (The First Time) That I have previously visited in another of Bauval’s books – ‘Keeper of Genesis’ which looks at the origins of the Great Sphinx. The Black Genesis idea, of a Black African origin for advanced Egyptian society under the early pharaohs is perhaps a bit more speculative and not concrete but there has been previous work suggesting certain theories akin to Bauval. He traces the son of Noah, Ham to be the founder of Hamites or Black Africans and even looking at analysis of genetic material on preserved early Egyptian Mummies it can be clearly seen as evidence that there is a real validity to the Black origins of the great ancient culture of Egypt. For me, the personal highlight of this book was reading about a really really obscure really remote site known as the Bagnold circle. This took me back to my study of Geography at UCL back in 1996 where remote stone desert circle where i picked up a dusty old book by R A Bagnold, a desert explorer in the early twentieth century. This dusty old university book was probably the best book I ever read during my degree course, a fully scientific academic study of the science of the formation of sand dunes. When the Bagnold Circle crops up in Bauval I was well chuffed to see that one of my favourite random Imperial travellers at least achieved some lasting fame for his devotion to the advancement of global knowledge, even if, unfortunately little remains intact of this Bagnold Circle.