Papers given at a conference at SOAS in 1980 with contributions from C P D Harvey (environmental contexts); C Ehret (linguistics); Nicholas David (interpretation of archaeologival data from the 1979 BIEA expedition); Else Johansen Kleppe (The Debbas on the White Nile); L P Kirwan (Greek and Roman expeditions); R S O'Fahey (Fur and Fartit: history of a frontier); P Robertshaw (Eastern Equatoria in the context of later history); G J Dimmendaal (libguistic contacts between Eastern Nilotic and Surma groups); J Mack (material culture and ethnic identity); S Tornay (archeologie, ethno-histoire et ethnographie); B Mark Lynch (early pastoralist social organization); R Oliver (reflections on the British Institute's expeditions).