Great Benin

The British Punitive Expedition against the Kingdom of Benin in 1897 spawned an outpouring of curiosity about this African kingdom, its stunning bronze sculpture (confiscated booty), and its tyrannical king. H. Long Roth’s Great Benin is one of the classic pieces of literature written about Benin. It is not a product of direct observation—the author never traveled in West Africa—but rather of careful research on eyewitness accounts and museum collections. When the Portuguese encountered the powerful Kingdom of Benin in the 15th century, it was a flourishing center of trade and fine craftsmanship. By the end of the 19th century, however, it was a weakened kingdom showing only traces of its former glory. “There was no wealth, nor was there even power, except the power of the influence of fetish, and the sense of the spirit of a long past of atrocities, which, if not supernatural, were at any rate unnatural to a degree which is indescribable,” wrote Cyril Punch, an English trader who visited Benin City in the 1880s and 1890s. His notes, sketches, and photographs provided much of the source material for this book. In this volume, Roth covers Benin's history, government, laws, customs, fetish and kindred observances, and slavery—as well as carved and cast works of art from Benin’s Golden Age.