Kingdom of Benin

Benin trades in slaves and ivory ~ Captain Hugh Crow

The Kingdom of Benin, also known as the Edo Kingdom or the Benin Empire (Bini: Arriọba ẹdo), was a kingdom within what is now southern Nigeria.

Quotes

• The Formosa runs through a fertile and beautiful country, hence the name, and it is said to bring down innumerable floating islands of considerable extent on its waves. The kingdom of Benin chiefly occupies the north-west of this river; and the capital, which contains about 50,000 inhabitants, lies on a creek branching from it. This country for a considerable distance from the sea is swampy and thickly wooded, and the first dry land is near the town of Gatto on the Benin river, which may be about thirty-five miles from the entrance of the creek. Benin trades in slaves and ivory. The number of blacks exported was at one time very considerable, but the unhealthiness of the climate reduced the trade with the English. The country inland to the northward, between Formosa and Ardrah, rises in a fine gentle ascent, commanding delightful prospects, and is said to be more healthy than the coast. The soil is fertile, and cotton, indigo, and other valuable productions, may be had in abundance.
• The streets of Benin are long and broad, so that it covers a considerable extent of ground. The kingdom extends twenty days' journey from north to south, and it claims sovereignty over Bonny and New Calabar. The trade is considerable, and is annually increasing. Many of the people on the shores and creeks are employed in the dry season in making salt, particularly in what is called the Brasspan country, which takes its name from the utensils supplied from Europe for the manufacturing of this article by evaporation from sea-water. The salt and other articles are carried into the interior in large canoes built about Bonny; and Robertson mentions Boussa, on the Niger, as a great mart for this trade, and the place where the people from the seaward meet with the caravans from Barbary to exchange their merchandize.
  • Captain Hugh Crow, Memoirs of the Late Hugh Crow, of Liverpool (1830), pp. 189–190