The kingdom of Kush, centred first on Napata and then on Meroe, built more than two hundred steep-sided royal pyramids, far more than Egypt itself, marking a distinct Nubian monumental tradition. From around the third century BCE Meroe became a major centre of iron smelting, leaving vast slag heaps that testify to large-scale production. The city sustained itself on iron, trade in gold, ivory and cattle, and a system of reservoirs (hafirs) that stored seasonal water. Meroe developed its own Meroitic script, still only partly deciphered.
Kush shows independent African monumental urbanism and an early sub-Saharan iron industry at city scale, supplying tools and weapons that underpinned the region's settlement and trade.