Benin Empire History
Benin Empire: Forests east of the Volta and west of the Niger have been safe havens for many small groups of people for a long time. Some of these didn’t have written records of how they became important countries, but oral history, along with archaeological and linguistic evidence, has helped historians piece together the past.Â
One of these groups started the kingdom of Benin, which is in what is now southwestern Nigeria. People who speak the Edo language inhabit this area. At first, groups of families who hunted, gathered, and farmed together made societies that were more complicated. Family ties along patrilineal lines centered these societies around villages. The parts of society that make up social life, like religion and traditions, land rights, and running the government, were already in place.Â
Invaders from the grasslands of Sudan came to the area in the early second millennium arrived and moved south and southwest on horses because the weather was getting worse. They may have been fleeing their own country’s conversion to Islam. They stayed in the area and married local elders’ daughters. More growth happened through agglomeration than through war.
Villages turned into towns with walls around them. Graham Connah’s excavations have revealed that these walls were more like a honeycomb of straight earthworks that marked out an area than defensive fortifications. This makes me think that Benin City may have started out as a group of small villages. Each one was loyal to the king and had its own farmlands surrounded by walls and ditches.Â
In the farmland near Benin City, there is a set of walls that look like they were built by a lot of people because of how tall and big they are. A line of kings known as ogiso organized society in a hierarchy. A chief, responsible for all, divided the kingdom into numerous groups that paid tribute.
Seven powerful nobles, known as uzama, held posts passed down from generation to generation under the king. The king’s palace was both the spiritual heart and the power of time. This city-state didn’t make money through trade, but through payment. Its income was mostly based on farming, especially yams and palm oil. Still, as cities grew, traders and artists became more and more important.Â
In the eleventh century, the growth of trade had a big effect on the progress of technology, the accumulation of wealth, and the organization of state institutions. Around the year 1000, people were already growing cotton and weaving it. In the middle Iron Age, there was a lot of trade going northward in salt, cloth, metal, beads, and pottery.Â
It is believed that Ere, the second ogiso (tenth century), introduced numerous religious images to Japan, including human heads crafted from wood and terracotta. By Ere’s time, Benin society had advanced to a point where more people could engage in activities beyond survival.
Copper, which was used in metal and brass sculptures instead of wood and terracotta at the time, clearly shows that luxury goods were traded over long distances, since the closest copper sources were in the Saharan Aïr Massif and the Sudan around Darfur. Before 1300, there were a lot of copper items in Benin, which shows that trade was big and had been going on for a while.
Benin used the lost wax method of casting brass. People from the north may have brought it to Ife when they founded the city and subsequently spread its use from there. Prior to the 1400s, palaces were the exclusive locations for casting brass to create sculptured heads and other religious items for royal shrines. Benin legend says that around the year 1300, the people of Edo decided that the ogiso was no longer a good leader and asked Oluhe, king of Ife, to give them a king. Ife was the area’s spiritual center.
He sent his son Oranmiyan, who only stayed in Benin long enough to have a child with the daughter of a chief there. Their son, Eweka I, became Benin’s first oba (king). As a result, Oranmiyan was the leader of a dynasty that would last for more than 600 years. This seems likely because Benin’s oral history talks about the past in terms of royal time, linking important events to the reigns of specific kings.Â
Some scholars think that the story of Oranyan’s marriage to a chiefly Benin family might have been made up to hide the fact that outsiders had taken over Benin and made them their rulers at the time. Even if the story isn’t true, it seems like it has a clear message.Â
It says the dynasty comes from another world, but the Edo people wanted it to rule, and their society helped it grow. Eweka I’s rule was mostly quiet, but the royal power grew. It got easier to divide up work in town as time went on, and society became more stratified. But the Uzama held on to their ancient rights and ruled Eweka I, so basic social and political organization didn’t change much.Â
Before Ewedo’s rule (around 1255), the oba didn’t seem to be able to show their power. Because Ewedo knew that changes in rituals had deep meaning, he started by telling the uzama they couldn’t bring their ceremonial swords into his house or sit down in front of him. He then reorganized the army, took away the Uzama’s inherited right to run for national office, and put their choice of people in key roles. This allowed him to surround himself with managers who had to answer only to him.
Archaeological evidence shows that Benin continued to grow over the course of his rule as long-distance trade grew. In fact, bronze statues proliferated, and their use extended beyond altar pieces. Plaques embedded in palace walls or house pillars also utilized this metal. The kingdom of Benin’s Middle Ages ended when Eware the Great (1440–1480), the most famous oba, took the throne, and the Portuguese came to rule.
Also Read: THE RISE AND FALL OF THE OYO EMPIRE
