How is West africa and south america before 1000 ce similar?

West Africa and South America before 1000 AD both had highly developed societies which were largely isolated from the rest of the world.

West Africa could be reached only by crossing the Sahara, or by sea along the dangerous West African route. This meant that contact between the Eurasian powers and the Benin Empire was so rare that it might as well not have happened at all.

The South American civilisations - the Maya, the Aztecs, the Moche - were completely isolated.

Most of the rest of the world was either bound into the great Eurasian trade networks, or else without a meaningful indigenous culture (as in Australia).

But Japan was also isolated at this period, though this was as much by choice as by geographical accident.

G'day Whispkin,

Thank you for your question.

Possibly. I cannot think of any other commonality in the history of the two areas. West Africa had started to develop centralised states but the Inca did not develop for some centuries later.

Regards