Africa is the cradle of life and the birthplace of architecture home to ancient cities, complex spatial knowledge systems, and cultural lineages that long predate colonial narratives of “discovery.” Yet architectural history has often relegated the continent to the margins, framing it as peripheral rather than foundational. This lecture challenges that erasure. Drawing on the case of Somalia and the wider Horn of Africa, it examines how architecture emerges not only from moments of stability but from continuity, memory, and cultural resilience. Somalia becomes both a lens and a proposition: a territory shaped by rupture yet rich with spatial intelligence, identity, and historic depth. In Copenhagen, this conversation expands into the pre-launch of the Pan-African Biennale, inviting the Danish architecture community to engage with a continental project that seeks to reshape how African architecture is represented, debated, and imagined. The session opens a dialogue on how global architectural discourse can shift when Africa is positioned not as an afterthought, but as a source, an origin, and a leading voice in defining the future of the built environment.