MC_A Concise History of Africa

did to the economy of West Africa, affecting the Yoruba states as it did all other parts of the region. A Concise History of Africa

state in present-day Nigeria. There were ancient walls 60-feet (18-m) high surrounding the city, which stretched for about 750 miles (1200 km), and various other constructions suggested there was a large and organized population. Stable and balanced government was created by Oba Ewuare in the 15th century, when the city was divided between the court and an area for craftsmen, who produced the celebrated bronze and brass castings that became a speciality of the kingdom. A bas relief from the palace has been likened to the Bayeux Tapestry in France. The first contact with Europeans was by the Portuguese in 1472, followed soon after by visits to Benin city itself for the purpose of trade. This was initially in pepper and ivory, but there was a more lucrative trade in slaves, traded directly from Benin and via the island of São Tomé. The power of Benin was ended in the 19th century when British troops destroyed the capital, the break-up of the Oyo empire having already destabilized the surrounding states Abomey (in present-day Benin) was the capital of the ancient Kingdom of Dahomey, its royal palaces being a group of earthen structures built by the Fon people between the mid-17th and late-19th centuries, and now a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The Atlantic slave trade, a crucial element in the so-called three-cornered trade between Europe, West Africa, and the Americas, grew and flourished between about 1500 and 1800 into a forced migration of at least 11

million people. It is impossible to over-emphasize what the removal of this number of able-bodied people

37