Kingdom of Benin

0:01Hello and welcome to Dead Funny History, the show that brings the past back to life. Literally. Literally. I'm Greg Jenner, I'm a historian and I want to tell you about something cool. Well up to a point. The Kingdom of Benin was a fascinating and powerful kingdom in what is now southern Nigeria in West Africa and it stretched from the late 12th century all the way to the 19th century. The capital city was once known as Edo which also refers to both the people and the language. Is there Edo in Japan? Yeah, Edo is also the old name for Tokyo in Japan but that's a totally different Edo. This Edo was on the west coast of Africa and today is still called the Edo State in Nigeria, and the modern capital of that state is Benin City.

0:44However, the Kingdom of Benin had its origins in the 900s, when people were living in small rainforest communities, with leaders called Ogisos, which meant rulers of the sky. Cool name. See that up there? What? The clouds? I rule those. Nice. Even that cloud that looks like a mongoose? Especially that cloud that looks like a mongoose. In the late 12th century, this system collapsed and was replaced with the Kingdom of Benin. Accounts vary as to how that happened, partly because a lot of what we know about the early days of Benin comes from oral history, meaning it's been passed down with spoken words.

1:27But written histories can sometimes be unreliable too, Especially when they're written by people who, spoiler alert, invade another civilisation. Dear diary, today I oppressed a whole nation and nicked all their stuff. They were really grateful and said I was the best. Everybody clapped. The end. One account of how the Kingdom of Benin began is with a love story. I mean, kinda a love story? The kingdom was in chaos, so the Ogisos asked a neighbouring king to help restore order. This king sent his son, a prince called Oramian, who then had a kid with the daughter of a local chief, and their child was called Iweka, and it was Iweka who became the first ruler of Benin.

2:15The Ogisos were gone, and this new line of rulers were called the Obaz. The kingdom of Benin continued to do well, and then, around the year 1440, things got even better. There was an Oba called Eware and he got loads done. Eware's to-do list. Rebuild Benin City and the Royal Palace. Check. Make my army really strong. Double check. Invade loads of our neighbours and appoint my own governors. OK, but... Also, us Obas are kind of gods now, so let's backchat or I'll smite you. Right, you are. Yep, the Oba expected to be treated like a god. People had to approach him on their knees. Imagine how hard it would have been to bring him food.

2:59Your soup or bop? But the people of Benin worshipped lots of other gods too. A little bit of our cenob were to create it all. A bit of our locu for waterfalls. A bit of our vie to birth some life. A bit of our guwu to end that life. A little bit of a gu for metal and beef. Beef as in wars, not beef as in cows. An awful lot of Benin gods, there you go. We're not sure why the names all begin with O. Yeah, there are a lot of vowels. For Benin alphabeti spaghetti, you'd need a whole other tin of pasta hoops. After Oba Ewuare, there was Oba Ozolwa. Believed to have won 200 battles. And Oba Esijay? Expanded the country eastwards, it's becoming an empire.

3:49Oba Ohabua? The empire has never been bigger. And Oba Ehengbuda. Stopped a load of rebellions by local chiefs understandably upset about all that invading. So by the end of the 16th century, the Kingdom of Benin was really thriving. But what is an Oba without their hundreds of wives? Yep, some reports say that Obas may have had between 600 and 4 ,000 wives. To get an idea of the scale, the singer Craig David met a girl on Monday and was her boyfriend by Wednesday. To get close to that number of spouses, he would have had to keep doing that for 77 years. Really makes you think. Queen mothers, called an iubas, were also pretty special.

4:35Queen Edia helped her son Oba Isidje with his military campaigns. In return, he had sculptures made of her and gave her a palace. Now that is how to treat your mum. Yeah, here's the palace my kids got me. What did you get for Mother's Day? Carnations and toffifee. Again. The royal court was huge, with hundreds of workers. Court governor jobs were usually passed from father to son. Oh, he's got my eyes. Then he's got my stressful admin job when I die. But there were other jobs too. People in smaller communities grew vegetables, but there were also guilds in the city for doctors. Say, oh! And drummers and musicians, dancers and acrobats.

5:22Yeah, everything you need to make a banging series of Benin's Got Talent. There were also lots of craftspeople, but a really important profession in Benin was the military. Benin's soldiers would have had swords, spears, crossbows and by the 17th century, guns. And now we've mentioned guns, we might as well talk about their first meeting with... Hola, it's us, the Europeans. The first recorded encounter between Benin and Europeans was in 1486, when a Portuguese emissary presented Oba Azulua with guns and coconuts. Sounds to me like his plan was to open a coconut shai, the best part of any summer fate.

6:05Well done, Oba. Now let's try welly-wanging. First, we'll have to invent the welly. The English first arrived in Benin City in 1553, and most of the sailors got sick. Not like when you go to the all-inclusive hotel in Benidorm and everyone gets a tummy ache. I'm talking deadly yellow fever and malaria. But the English persevered and sent another ship. Well, it's not like most of the crew will die in the exact same way a second time, is it? Most of the crew did die in the exact same way the second time. Not another one! But they tried a third time and this time they didn't all die in the exact same way.

6:50Contact with Europe created opportunities for trading goods, which included ivory, pepper, cloths and metals. And around this time there was a lot of incredible artwork being made in Benin. Everything from masks and jewellery to sculptures, much of which had religious significance. We now call these the Benin bronzes, though lots of it was actually made of brass. But Benin brass sounds like a marching band. Lots of these incredible bronzes were paid for by Me! The Oba! which often meant that the bronzes celebrated Me! The Oba! And to make sure Benin bronze work stayed valuable, the way they made it was a closely guarded state secret.

7:35So the artists all worked in guilds and if you wanted to get them to make you something, you had to ask, you guessed it, Me! The Oba! Pretty intense. There were even some reports that bronze workers could be executed if they made pieces for someone else. Imagine if independent art was still illegal now. They'd have to arrest everyone on Etsy. You're nicked for making whimsical keychains of anime men with their tops off. I have no regrets. But contact with Europe didn't only result in more art. It also resulted in the increase in the trading of enslaved people, an awful practice which was already part of the social structure of the Kingdom of Benin before the Europeans came and made it even worse.

8:22Yet, despite the cruelty of this system, European visitors often remarked on the friendliness of the people they met. Someone said good morning. Turns out it wasn't a malaria-induced hallucination. They were being nice. Sounds a lot like what happens to Londoners when they visit somewhere that isn't London. The Europeans even said that theft wasn't really a problem when compared with European cities. So I think maybe we can argue that theft is something that the Brits brought with them. The empire spread railway engineering, good manners and pilfering. European accounts of life in Benin also described human sacrifice.

9:02Sometimes this was the sacrifice of servants to accompany their master in the afterlife. But there are also accounts where Europeans may have mistaken the execution of criminals for human sacrifice. After all, if you don't speak the Edo language, they do both end up with a dead person at the end. What are we watching? Where's the subtitles on this? Another change with the presence of Europeans was religion. After meeting Portuguese missionaries, Ober Esidie allowed his son to be baptised as a Christian in 1515. Hallelujah! Congrats on choosing the religion of peace. Now here are some guns. Amen.

9:43But the presence of Catholicism did little to change the people of Benin's traditional religion. A little bit of Pope, yes, that's our guy. A bit of transubstantiation, we don't know why. Europeans even pop up in some Benin artwork. They usually have straight shoulder-length hair, pointy noses and often carry guns. They kind of look like Lord Farquhar from Shrek. Some of you may die, but it's a sacrifice I am willing to make. And some of these Europeans acted like Lord Farquhar too. By the 17th and 18th centuries, the Kingdom of Benin was in decline. and by the late 19th century, the British were less interested in trade and more interested in invading.

10:32By the late 19th century, Britain had colonised much of modern Nigeria, Ghana, the Gambia and Sierra Leone, but Benin remained independent. And so the Brits thought to themselves, best put a stop to that. It started with an expedition in 1897 led by James Robert Phillips, who apparently had no dodgy reasons whatsoever for wanting to invade Benin. Dear diary, planning to overthrow the Abba in Benin because I am very concerned about how they treat prisoners. Definitely not to get hold of all their valuable natural resources. They'll be really grateful and say I'm the best. Everyone will clap the end.

11:18Hey, me. Philip set off with a small group of officers and traders. The Oba could tell this wasn't a friendly visit and killed several of the British men and a large number of local workers. The British government then responded in February 1897 by sending a large military force and destroying Benin City, even burning down lots of important buildings. But not before the invading soldiers had added pillaging to their crime roster looting thousands of pieces of artwork from the palace and elsewhere in Benin City, some of which were deeply sacred to the people of Benin. Having lost his house, his art and many of his people, the Oba was sent into exile.

12:05And the Kingdom of Benin was swallowed up by the British Empire. It wasn't until 1960 that Nigeria finally became independent from British rule, with Benin's old territory being Edo State in that new country. Today there is an Oba who lives in Benin City and lots of important work is being done around the world to get artefacts like the Benin bronzes back to their rightful home in Nigeria. So maybe someday there will be a happier ending to the story. So how much do you remember from today's speedy history lesson? Let's find out. Pencils at the ready. Question one. The Kingdom of Benin was part of what modern-day country?

12:50Nigeria. Question two. What was the name of the rulers in the Kingdom of Benin?

13:00Fubaz. And question three. What is the name of the famous artworks stolen from Benin during its invasion by British soldiers in 1897?

13:13but in bronzes. Well done. I hope you enjoyed your snappy history lesson. That's all for this series. Thanks for listening. Take care. Bye. This was a BBC Studios audio production for Radio 4. Dead Funny History was written by Gabby Hutchinson Crouch, Athena Kublenu and Dr. Emma Naguse. The researcher was Dr. Emmy Rose Price Goodfellow. It was hosted by me, Greg Jenner, and performed by Malianne Rees and John Luke Roberts. The script consultant was Barnaby Phillips. Thank you.