Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production
Speaker 1: of I Heart Radio. Hello and welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 1: I'm Tracy B. Wilson and I'm Holly Fry. We have
Speaker 1: talked about the artwork and other objects that have come
Speaker 1: to be known as the Benin Bronzes on several installments
Speaker 1: of Unearthed, including our most recent one. We also mentioned
Speaker 1: these pieces briefly at the end of our two parter
Speaker 1: I'm Lord Elegant and the Parthenon Marbles. We have not
Speaker 1: talked in detail, though, about how these cultural objects and
Speaker 1: works of art were taken from the Kingdom of Benin
Speaker 1: in Western Africa in the first place. What's happened in
Speaker 1: in what's typically described as a punitive raid or punitive
Speaker 1: expedition by the British. This is in an area that
Speaker 1: is part of Edo State in Nigeria. Today, the most
Speaker 1: most visible calls for the return of the Benin Bronzes
Speaker 1: started in the nineteen seventies, and they've really escalated over
Speaker 1: the past decade or so and the last few years.
Speaker 1: Some nations and institutions have committed to returning these pieces,
Speaker 1: but only a few have actually been returned at this point,
Speaker 1: including at least two that came from a private individual.
Speaker 1: So that is what we're going to talk about today,
Speaker 1: and just a heads up, there's a lot of heavy
Speaker 1: material in this episode, including slavery and colonialism, a lot
Speaker 1: of warfare and human sacrifice. The Kingdom of Benin was
Speaker 1: founded by the Edo people also known as the Beanie
Speaker 1: by about the eleventh century, and it's governed by the
Speaker 1: Oba and his court. This kingdom really started to flourish
Speaker 1: around the thirteenth century, including rebuilding the capital, which was
Speaker 1: originally named as Edo and today is known as Benin City.
Speaker 1: This capital was surrounded by ditches and earthwork walls, which
Speaker 1: also sectioned off parts of the city's interior. Although many
Speaker 1: of these walls are no longer standing, they're believed to
Speaker 1: have totalled a greater length than the Great Wall of China.
Speaker 1: According to ethno mathematician Ron Egglash, author of African Fractals,
Speaker 1: the city was laid out as a fractal in a
Speaker 1: pattern that was repeated on a smaller scale within compounds
Speaker 1: and then individual houses and then rooms. These widely quoted
Speaker 1: as saying that Europeans who first encountered this type of
Speaker 1: planning found it chaotic and disorganized, not realizing the underlying
Speaker 1: pattern that was involved. But that is really not how
Speaker 1: early visitors to the Kingdom of Benim described the capital.
Speaker 1: Multiple European accounts from the sixteenth through the eighteenth centuries
Speaker 1: described the city and its palaces as impressive and orderly,
Speaker 1: with comparisons to various cities in Europe. Dutch doctor Olford
Speaker 1: Dapper described the compound housing the king's court as quote
Speaker 1: easily as big as the town of Harlem in sixteen
Speaker 1: sixty eight. As another example, in sixteen nine, one Portuguese
Speaker 1: captain Lorenzo Pinto wrote, quote, great Benin, where the king resides,
Speaker 1: is larger than Lisbon. All the streets run straight, and
Speaker 1: as far as the eye can see, the houses are large,
Speaker 1: especially that of the king, which is richly decorated and
Speaker 1: has fine columns. The city is wealthy and industrious. It
Speaker 1: is so well governed that theft is unknown, and the
Speaker 1: people live in such security that they have no doors
Speaker 1: to their houses. The Portuguese had been the first Europeans
Speaker 1: to make contact with the Kingdom of Benin, and the
Speaker 1: two nations started a trading relationship, with Portugal establishing an
Speaker 1: embassy at the OBUs court, and Benin sending ambassadors to
Speaker 1: Portugal as well. Benin became wealthier through its trade with Portugal,
Speaker 1: with Benin's exports including gold, paper, ivory, fabric, animal skins,
Speaker 1: and palm oil. Benin had a guild system for artists
Speaker 1: and crafts people who worked in materials like ivory, wood,
Speaker 1: and brass. Although this artwork and the techniques used to
Speaker 1: produce it were developed before contact with Europeans, they really
Speaker 1: flourished thanks to Portugal's use of brass as a trade good.
Speaker 1: The kingdom's artist used lost wax casting methods to make
Speaker 1: brass plaques detailing the kingdom's history, as well as life
Speaker 1: size heads of leaders, ancestors, and historical figures. Eventually, Benin's
Speaker 1: exports to Europe and its colonies included enslaved people. This
Speaker 1: was a smaller part of Benin's economy than that of
Speaker 1: many other kingdoms, including Dahome, which we've covered on the
Speaker 1: show previously. Captain John Adams, who was in the area
Speaker 1: between seventeen eighty six and eighteen hundred, noted that ivory
Speaker 1: was a more important part of Benin's trade. One of
Speaker 1: the likely reasons for Benin's compare of least smaller involvement
Speaker 1: in the slave trade is that the Oba outlawed the
Speaker 1: enslavement and sale of males in the early nineteenth century,
Speaker 1: and there wasn't as much demand for enslaved women and girls.
Speaker 1: From the fifteenth through late nineteen centuries. Most of what
Speaker 1: Europeans knew about the Kingdom of Benin came from the
Speaker 1: writing of traders and travel writers, including British, Portuguese and
Speaker 1: Dutch travel writers, who wrote about their experiences in various
Speaker 1: parts of the kingdom. None of the people writing these
Speaker 1: accounts stayed long enough to get a thorough sense of
Speaker 1: the kingdom's history or culture. They were visitors writing about
Speaker 1: their general impressions of the kingdom, cities and towns, and
Speaker 1: its people. And if you're thinking what about missionaries, the
Speaker 1: Christian missionaries who went to the Kingdom of Benin before
Speaker 1: the nineteenth century didn't really establish a huge presence there.
Speaker 1: Although some people did convert to Christianity, in general, the
Speaker 1: high ranking people, including the Oba, did not. Europeans who
Speaker 1: tried to of in this area also faced things like
Speaker 1: malaria and other diseases. They didn't have any resistance to
Speaker 1: or experience with, so illnesses and deaths were really common.
Speaker 1: In general, most mission projects in Benin during this period
Speaker 1: did not last long. Eventually, Britain replaced Portugal as Benin's
Speaker 1: primary trading partner. Britain was deeply involved in the slave
Speaker 1: trade from Western Africa, and its trade with Benin included
Speaker 1: trafficking enslaved people. After Britain passed the Abolition of the
Speaker 1: Slave Trade Act in eighteen o seven, it started pressuring
Speaker 1: African kingdoms and nations that it had relationships with to
Speaker 1: end their own involvement in slavery, including the Kingdom of Benin.
Speaker 1: As that happened, palm oil became an increasingly large part
Speaker 1: of Benin's exports to Britain. This was especially true as
Speaker 1: the Industrial Revolution progressed, since, in addition to its use
Speaker 1: in cooking and to make soap, palm oil was used
Speaker 1: as an industrial lubric him. By the late nineteenth century,
Speaker 1: two things were happening that dramatically affected Britain's relationship with Benin.
Speaker 1: The first was Benin's approach to trade. The Oba had
Speaker 1: a monopoly on all trade, most of it conducted through
Speaker 1: the port of Ugoton also known as Gutau. Anyone trading
Speaker 1: at the market paid tribute to the OBA, and the
Speaker 1: OBA controlled what was available. People were not paying tribute
Speaker 1: or were otherwise breaking trade agreements they had with the OBA,
Speaker 1: than the OBA could shut down the market entirely. So
Speaker 1: as Britain became increasingly reliant on palm oil and also
Speaker 1: wanted more access to Benin's other trade goods, merchants and
Speaker 1: traders became increasingly frustrated by the oba's restrictions. For example,
Speaker 1: a Mr. Brown Ridge, who was an agent for a
Speaker 1: merchant company wrote in a letter quote, if Benin was
Speaker 1: under proper government and the resources of the country properly developed,
Speaker 1: I am firmly of the opinion that the exports would
Speaker 1: be very great. So long as the King of Benin
Speaker 1: is allowed to carry on what he is doing at present,
Speaker 1: it means simply lost to the merchants, as also the protectorate.
Speaker 1: That word protectorate ties to the other interconnected piece of
Speaker 1: this that was the Scramble for Africa. In the late
Speaker 1: nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, European powers aggressively expanded their
Speaker 1: colonial interests and attempts to control the African continent. British
Speaker 1: consul Edward Hewitt started trying to sign treaties with various
Speaker 1: monarchs in Western Africa in eighteen eighty four, including along
Speaker 1: the coast of what's now Nigeria. By that point, Britain
Speaker 1: had been involved in various parts of Africa for decades,
Speaker 1: so this was really a ramping up of its earlier involvement.
Speaker 1: Through this process, Britain claimed multiple kingdoms in West Africa
Speaker 1: under its protectorates, and at first this mostly prevented them
Speaker 1: from making similar agreements with other European nations. But beyond that, again,
Speaker 1: at least at first, Britain was relatively hands off. Years
Speaker 1: could pass between Britain adding a West African kingdom to
Speaker 1: one of its protectorates and Britain really taking concrete steps
Speaker 1: to control the area. Britain's activities in Africa went way
Speaker 1: beyond what was happening in West Africa, but that's really
Speaker 1: the part we're focused on here from the European point
Speaker 1: of view. Many of these claims to territory in West
Speaker 1: Africa were negotiated at the Berlin Conference also known as
Speaker 1: the Berlin West Africa Conference, which ran from November fifteen
Speaker 1: eighty four to February eighteen eighty five. At this conference,
Speaker 1: European nations mapped out which of them had the strongest
Speaker 1: claims to what territory and set standards for trade among
Speaker 1: those regions. The thousands of kingdoms, nations, and ethnic groups
Speaker 1: in Africa were not part of this negotiation at all,
Speaker 1: and there were no provisions for their involvement in their
Speaker 1: own governance. Just in terms of the region that later
Speaker 1: became known as Nigeria, there were at least two hundred
Speaker 1: fifty different ethnic groups involved. Much of what's now Nigeria
Speaker 1: today was outlined as British territory, but in practice Britain's
Speaker 1: influence didn't extend very far from the coast. British efforts
Speaker 1: to lay claims to the interior of the Kingdom of
Speaker 1: Benin and to secure free trading rights with the Kingdom
Speaker 1: ultimately led it to pursue this punitive expedition. Who will
Speaker 1: have more about that after a sponsor break. Although early
Speaker 1: European accounts of the Kingdom of Benin had described it
Speaker 1: as large, impressive, and orderly, during the late eighteenth and
Speaker 1: early nineteenth centuries, the kingdom had struggled. Both the Transatlantic
Speaker 1: slave trade and its abolition had affected the whole region dramatically,
Speaker 1: not just the Kingdom of Benin, so had the annexation
Speaker 1: of various African kingdoms by European powers, which we just discussed,
Speaker 1: and the Kingdom of Bening specifically. There was also a
Speaker 1: war over the Oba's line of succession that started in
Speaker 1: the mid nineteenth century. Throughout all of this, Benin had
Speaker 1: also been under increasing pressure from Britain to open up
Speaker 1: and expand its trade, especially its trade in palm oil.
Speaker 1: In eight, Captain Henry Galwi, deputy Commissioner and Vice Consul
Speaker 1: of the Benin District of the Oil River Protectorate, traveled
Speaker 1: to the capitol to try to get the Oba to
Speaker 1: sign a treaty with the British government. The Oba, named
Speaker 1: Ovan Romwin, seems to have verbally agreed to sign this treaty,
Speaker 1: but once the signing ceremony actually took place, he refused
Speaker 1: to touch the pen. A member of his court reportedly
Speaker 1: signed on his behalf. There are so many different interpretations
Speaker 1: and conflicting accounts of this moment. The Oba ruled by
Speaker 1: divine right as the kingdom's sovereign and its military commander,
Speaker 1: and up on his ascension as monarch, he was also
Speaker 1: understood to embody the kingdom's whole history and heritage. But
Speaker 1: Galway has been described as rude and arrogant, and either
Speaker 1: ignorant of the protocols involved with negotiating of the monarch
Speaker 1: of the Kingdom of Benin, or just not even considering
Speaker 1: those protocols to be something worth his notice. Some scholars
Speaker 1: have concluded that Ovan Romwin had verbally agreed to sign
Speaker 1: the Galway Treaty when he thought it was just a
Speaker 1: simple agreement of peace and friendship, but once the signing
Speaker 1: ceremony was happening and its interpreter read its actual terms,
Speaker 1: terms that stripped the Kingdom of Benin of its sovereignty,
Speaker 1: then he refused. Opinions also differ about whether Ovan Romwin
Speaker 1: signed the treaty through a proxy, under duress, or did
Speaker 1: not sign it at all. What's most clear is that
Speaker 1: Britain and Benin did not have the same understanding of
Speaker 1: this treaty and whether the Kingdom of Benin was bound
Speaker 1: to its terms. One of the treaty's provisions established free
Speaker 1: trade within the Opus territory, but four years later, in
Speaker 1: eighteen ninety six, Benin was still approaching trade as a
Speaker 1: monopoly that was entirely the ops prerogative. This had led
Speaker 1: to armed conflicts in some of the kingdom's more outlying
Speaker 1: villages and towns, and British officials based increasing pressure for
Speaker 1: merchants and traders to force Benin to abide by the
Speaker 1: treaty terms. British officials, including Galway, wrote that removing the
Speaker 1: Oba would be good for British trade. Consul General Ralph
Speaker 1: Moore wrote to the Foreign Office on June fourteenth, eighteen
Speaker 1: ninety six, saying that if they were not successful in
Speaker 1: getting a better trade arrangement by the dry season, quote,
Speaker 1: an expeditionary four should be sent about January or February
Speaker 1: to remove the king and his juju men. In another letter,
Speaker 1: More also said that such an expedition could quote prov
Speaker 1: the horrible human sacrifices and cruelties which were continually taking
Speaker 1: place therein. We will return to that idea in a bit.
Speaker 1: But More later went on leave. He returns to England
Speaker 1: and James Phillips was made acting Consul General in his absence.
Speaker 1: Moore had instructed Phillips to wait for his return, but
Speaker 1: instead Phillips wrote to the Obah himself, seeking an audience.
Speaker 1: The Oba replied that he was not available. He was
Speaker 1: observing a period of seclusion and preparation leading up to
Speaker 1: the Festival of Iguay, which is the Kingdom of Benin's
Speaker 1: most important cultural and religious festival. It's one that both
Speaker 1: honors the Oba and his ancestors and blesses the kingdom.
Speaker 1: The Obo's preparation for this festival are a time of
Speaker 1: spiritual cleansing and prayer. Customarily, foreigners are not allowed into
Speaker 1: the Oba's presence during this preparatory period or during the
Speaker 1: festival itself. So Ovian Romwin indicated that he would send
Speaker 1: a messenger in about a month to work at a
Speaker 1: time for Phillips and an attendant to visit. Phillips did
Speaker 1: not wait for this messenger, though. On November sixteenth, eighteen
Speaker 1: ninety six, he wrote to the Foreign Office seeking quote
Speaker 1: permission to visit Benean City in February next to depose
Speaker 1: and remove the King of Benin, and to establish a
Speaker 1: native council in his place, and take such further steps
Speaker 1: for the opening up of the country as the occasion
Speaker 1: may require. He suggested that this exhibition might pay for
Speaker 1: itself thanks to stores of ivory that he expected to
Speaker 1: find in the palace which could be seized and sold.
Speaker 1: Phillips did not wait for a response to this either.
Speaker 1: On January second, eighteen ninety seven, he left for Benien
Speaker 1: City with a retinue that included eight British officials, at
Speaker 1: least two hundred local porters, and a pipe and drum corps.
Speaker 1: In some accounts, these porters and the pipes and drums
Speaker 1: were really hired African soldiers in disguise. The party as
Speaker 1: you really described as being unarmed. But there was also
Speaker 1: correspondence going on between various British offices during this period
Speaker 1: about what would be needed for an expedition to remove
Speaker 1: the OBA. One such letter describes four hundred armed African
Speaker 1: troops to seven pounder guns, a Maxim which was an
Speaker 1: early machine gun, and a rocket apparatus that belonged to
Speaker 1: the Niger Coast Protectorate Force. It's likely that at least
Speaker 1: the British officials in this expedition were provided with weapons,
Speaker 1: but it's possible that those weapons were packed in their
Speaker 1: baggage rather than being carried on their persons. As Phillips
Speaker 1: and his party approached Beneen City, they were stopped and
Speaker 1: told to turn back. Again. The city was in the
Speaker 1: middle of observing its most important cultural and religious festival
Speaker 1: when Phillips refused, the oba's fighting force attacked, something that
Speaker 1: was done without the oba's knowledge or approval. Phillips most
Speaker 1: of his party were killed and only two British officials
Speaker 1: escaped the attack. This became known as the Benin massacre,
Speaker 1: and the British Admiralty learned about it on January eleven,
Speaker 1: eight seven. That was the day after it had sent
Speaker 1: word to Phillips ordering him to postpone the expedition because
Speaker 1: a large enough fighting force couldn't be raised in time
Speaker 1: to carry it out. When the Admiralty learned about this,
Speaker 1: it mounted a punitive expedition of twelve hundred men under
Speaker 1: the leadership of Sir Harry Rawson. This force divided into
Speaker 1: three columns, one of them under the command of Henry Galway.
Speaker 1: They departed for Beneen City on February ninth, burning outlying
Speaker 1: villages and killing civilians and soldiers who resisted as they went.
Speaker 1: Armed combatants were not the only people who were killed.
Speaker 1: Eyewitnesses also described the British force firing machine guns into
Speaker 1: the bush wherever they thought people might be hiding. Once
Speaker 1: they were in the capital, the British force looted the
Speaker 1: royal Palace and the Queen Mother's home and burned them.
Speaker 1: On February one, which was the last day of the expedition,
Speaker 1: a massive fire also destroyed many of the city's homes
Speaker 1: and buildings. Sometimes this fire is described as unintentional, but
Speaker 1: it really may have been an intentional blaze that just
Speaker 1: spread a lot farther than the British force had anticipated.
Speaker 1: Eight members of the British force are known to have
Speaker 1: been killed during this punitive expedition. The death toll among
Speaker 1: Benin's military and civilians is not really known, but it
Speaker 1: is assumed to be much much higher. None of the
Speaker 1: sources that I used for this episode even like attempted
Speaker 1: to estimate they were not keeping track at all, they
Speaker 1: being the British force that was carrying this out. As
Speaker 1: it was looting the capital, this British force found nine
Speaker 1: hundred brass plaques in a warehouse. These had been removed
Speaker 1: from the palace during a remodeling. There were also life
Speaker 1: sized brass heads depicting various monarchs and other ancestors. Other
Speaker 1: objects included brass depictions of animals, a store of ivory,
Speaker 1: tusks and various works of art and cultural objects. Members
Speaker 1: of the punitive expedition were given some of these items
Speaker 1: to keep. The rest were taken back to Britain, where
Speaker 1: about two hundred were given to the British Museum and
Speaker 1: the rest were auctioned off to pay for the expedition.
Speaker 1: It is not known exactly how many objects were taken,
Speaker 1: since they were not cataloged at the time, but it
Speaker 1: is estimated to be about three thousand works of art
Speaker 1: and other objects. The British force departed from Beneen City
Speaker 1: on February. The Oba and his surviving court had fled,
Speaker 1: but in the days and weeks that followed, they were
Speaker 1: captured and tried opan round when's chiefs testified that he
Speaker 1: had never left his compound during Phillips's earlier expedition and
Speaker 1: that he had ordered that no harm come to that
Speaker 1: British force, but he was convicted and exiled to Calibar.
Speaker 1: His chiefs were sentenced to be executed. One of them
Speaker 1: took his own life while awaiting trial, and British soldiers
Speaker 1: had his body hanged outside the palace, where they used
Speaker 1: it for target practice. After the Punitive Expedition. One subject
Speaker 1: dominated European discussions of Britain's actions in the Kingdom of Benin,
Speaker 1: and that was human sacrifice. And we're going to get
Speaker 1: into that after a sponsor break. Before James Phillips left
Speaker 1: for Benin City in early Britain's primary rationale for planning
Speaker 1: to remove the Oba was trade. Then the Punitive Expedition
Speaker 1: set out to punish Benin for the deaths of Phillips
Speaker 1: and most of the rest of his party. But after
Speaker 1: the Punitive Expedition was over, the focus shifted to the
Speaker 1: idea that Britain needed to take control of Benin to
Speaker 1: put a stop to horrifying practices there, particularly the practice
Speaker 1: of human sacrifice. Sort of rewrote that earlier history to
Speaker 1: make it seem as though this had always been the rational.
Speaker 1: As one example, Consul General Ralph Moore wrote to Lord
Speaker 1: Salisbury saying, quote, it is imperative that a most severe
Speaker 1: lesson be given the King's chiefs and jujumen of all
Speaker 1: surrounding countries, that white men cannot be killed with impunity,
Speaker 1: and that human sacrifices, with the oppression of the weak
Speaker 1: and poor, must cease. This, of course, ignores the fact
Speaker 1: that the Punitive expedition had killed the citizens of Benin
Speaker 1: with impunity, including the weak and poor, over the course
Speaker 1: of the Punitive expedition. To contextualize this, human sacrifice was
Speaker 1: distant multiple nations and kingdoms in Western Africa prior to
Speaker 1: contact with Europeans. Most sacrifices were carried out to honor
Speaker 1: deities or ancestors, or so the sacrificed person could carry
Speaker 1: a message to them. In some kingdoms, when a high
Speaker 1: ranking person died, especially the Oba, others would be sacrificed
Speaker 1: to accompany that person into the afterlife. Usually living people
Speaker 1: would be entombed with the deceased person's body, and they
Speaker 1: were understood to have done this willingly, although societal expectations
Speaker 1: that a person would sacrifice themselves also influenced these decisions
Speaker 1: enormously and then many kingdoms most are all of the
Speaker 1: people who did not offer themselves as sacrifices had been
Speaker 1: condemned to death for committing a crime. This was usually
Speaker 1: the case in the Kingdom of Benine. In some places,
Speaker 1: prisoners of war or enslaved people were also sacrificed. Today,
Speaker 1: all of this sounds deeply and irrevocably horror fining, but
Speaker 1: the first Europeans to witness or learn about this practice
Speaker 1: did not have quite the same response because where they lived,
Speaker 1: public executions were commonplace. Portugal conducted public executions until ending
Speaker 1: executions altogether in eighteen forty six. The United Kingdom did
Speaker 1: not outlaw public execution until eighteen sixty eight, and the
Speaker 1: last public guillotining in France was in nineteen thirty nine.
Speaker 1: From the fifteenth through the seventeenth centuries, Europeans often drew
Speaker 1: a parallel between public executions in Europe and human sacrifices
Speaker 1: in parts of Africa. This was especially true when the
Speaker 1: people being sacrificed had been condemned for committing a crime.
Speaker 1: Around the eighteenth century, though European attitudes towards human sacrifice
Speaker 1: started to shift. Human sacrifice then became a justification for
Speaker 1: the practice of slavery, even though nations in Europe were
Speaker 1: still carrying out public executions. Europeans in braazingly saw human
Speaker 1: sacrifice in Africa as barbaric, uncivilized, and cruel, so many
Speaker 1: Europeans this reinforced the idea that Africans were innately inferior
Speaker 1: and therefore deserved to be enslaved. Europeans also suggested that
Speaker 1: being enslaved was a better outcome than being sacrificed. This
Speaker 1: was an idea that people expressed explicitly. In a new
Speaker 1: account of some parts of Guinea and the slave Trade,
Speaker 1: William Snellgrave wrote, quote, it is evident that abundance of
Speaker 1: captives taken in war would be inhumanely destroyed. They're not
Speaker 1: an opportunity of disposing of them to the Europeans, so
Speaker 1: that at least many lives are saved and great numbers
Speaker 1: of useful persons kept in being. By the nineteenth century,
Speaker 1: as European nations started to outlaw the slave trade and
Speaker 1: the practice of slavery within their empires, more people started
Speaker 1: to view slavery itself as barbaric, but a lot of
Speaker 1: European writing about Africa continued to focus on the practice
Speaker 1: of slavery there, as well as the continuing practice of
Speaker 1: human sacrifice, as evidence that Africans were inferior. Over time,
Speaker 1: human sacrifice became increasingly associated with the Kingdom of Benin. Specifically,
Speaker 1: European descriptions of Benin from the nineteenth century are nothing
Speaker 1: like those seventeenth century accounts that we read earlier in
Speaker 1: the show. For example, Sir Richard Burton visited Benin in
Speaker 1: eighteen sixty three and described it as a place of
Speaker 1: quote gratuitous barbarity which stinks of death. He also wrote
Speaker 1: a lurid and gruesome account of fetish worship and human
Speaker 1: sacrifice in the region. Western observers reported an increase in
Speaker 1: the number of sacrifices happening in Benin in the late
Speaker 1: nineteenth century, although it's not clear how much these reports
Speaker 1: may have been exaggerated or influenced by evolving European attitudes
Speaker 1: to Africans as inferior and backward. To return to the
Speaker 1: Punitive Expedition, various colonial officials had mentioned human sacrifice and
Speaker 1: their letters before this point, and in some cases they've
Speaker 1: discussed putting a stop to it, but even in these
Speaker 1: earlier mentions that was often ancillary to the idea of
Speaker 1: opening up trade. Knowledge of the practice of human sacrifice
Speaker 1: in Benin also hadn't gone far beyond colonial and military
Speaker 1: leadership after the Punitive Expedition, though British eyewitness accounts were horrifying, graphic,
Speaker 1: and publicly available. For example, Sir Reginald H. Bacon wrote
Speaker 1: a book about the expedition in eighteen seventy nine titled
Speaker 1: Benin the City of Blood, and in it he wrote,
Speaker 1: quote crucifixions, human sacrifices, and every horror the eye could
Speaker 1: get accustomed to a large extent, but the smells no
Speaker 1: white man's internal economy could stand. Blood was everywhere, smeared
Speaker 1: over bronzes, ivory, and even the walls. Others described the
Speaker 1: British force finding a scene of slaughter in the capital,
Speaker 1: with victims of human sacrifice scattered through the city, some
Speaker 1: of whom had been members of Phillip's earlier expedition. And
Speaker 1: instead of the impressive walled streets that were so safe
Speaker 1: that people didn't feel the need for doors, there was,
Speaker 1: in the words of Captain Allen Wasser Gone quote, a
Speaker 1: collection of half ruined mud houses, not better than the
Speaker 1: huts in an ordinary native village. By the eighteen nineties,
Speaker 1: British visitors to Benin were describing these post expedition accounts
Speaker 1: as exaggerated. In more recent decades, some people, particularly historians
Speaker 1: and scholars from West Africa, have also put forth other
Speaker 1: explanations for what people like Reginald Bacon described. One is
Speaker 1: that many of the bodies assumed to have been victims
Speaker 1: of human sacrifice were really people who had been killed
Speaker 1: by British machine guns while high in the bush, whose
Speaker 1: bodies had been brought back to the capital to be buried.
Speaker 1: Another hypothesis is that the city's residents, knowing it was
Speaker 1: about to be captured by the British, intentionally defaced it
Speaker 1: to try to make it uninhabitable to them. Regardless, the
Speaker 1: accounts written by Bacon and others really painted the Kingdom
Speaker 1: of Benin as a horrific, violent place that was deserving
Speaker 1: of Britain's wrath. It influenced the way that people thought
Speaker 1: about Benin and about Africa more generally. News coverage was
Speaker 1: just effusive in its praise of British forces, and that
Speaker 1: coverage focused on the idea that Britain was freeing Benin
Speaker 1: from its own barbarism. Some of this was also threaded
Speaker 1: through with the idea that Britain needed and even deserved
Speaker 1: access to Benin's palm oil. This framing also implied that
Speaker 1: Britain deserved the artwork that had been looted from Benin
Speaker 1: during the expedition. Britain was entitled to it by virtue
Speaker 1: of being superior and as compensation for the expense involved
Speaker 1: with the invasion. After the fact, the idea of human
Speaker 1: sacrifice became a major justifying factor for all of this,
Speaker 1: for the expedition itself, for British claims to the Kingdom's
Speaker 1: artistic and cultural property, and for Britain's colonial rule of
Speaker 1: the Kingdom, even though what had motivated all this in
Speaker 1: the first place was first trade and then retribution for
Speaker 1: the Phillips Expedition's death. As we said earlier, the artwork
Speaker 1: British forces took from Benin was not kept as one collection.
Speaker 1: Pieces were auctioned off to museums around the world. At first,
Speaker 1: most of the museums who bought these pieces were ethnographic
Speaker 1: museums rather than art museums. Some of this was because
Speaker 1: many ethnographic museums were actively working to expand their collections
Speaker 1: at the turn of the twentieth century, but there was
Speaker 1: also implicit or sometimes explicit racism involved. Even though the
Speaker 1: objects taken out of Benin fit into European definitions of art,
Speaker 1: the fact that it was African led institutions to categorize
Speaker 1: it as ethnography. It wasn't until around the nineteen thirties
Speaker 1: that Art Museum started to show an interest in the
Speaker 1: Benin bronzes, as art or started to curate them as
Speaker 1: part of their art collections rather than their ethnography collections.
Speaker 1: Although Benin had managed to retain most of its sovereignty
Speaker 1: before eighteen seven, including after possibly signed the Galway Treaty,
Speaker 1: Britain took full control of the kingdom after the Punitive Expedition.
Speaker 1: Britain replaced the Oba with a system of colonial administration
Speaker 1: that involved in native council and warrant chiefs. Britain struggled
Speaker 1: to make this system work, though, and started trying to
Speaker 1: restore the monarchy with Opan round One's son, Awaka the Second,
Speaker 1: as a figurehead. When Oban Roun One died in nineteen fourteen,
Speaker 1: Britain placed his son on the throne, but with the
Speaker 1: monarchy positioned as subordinate to the colonial it administration. The
Speaker 1: British Protectorates of Northern and Southern Nigeria were joined to
Speaker 1: form Nigeria in nineteen fourteen as well. In Nigeria became
Speaker 1: an independent nation on October one, nineteen sixty In nineteen
Speaker 1: sixty three, Nigeria adopted a constitution that established itself as
Speaker 1: a republic, removing the monarchs of its many kingdoms from
Speaker 1: formal political power. Many many kingdoms still exist today, though
Speaker 1: with their monarchs still playing a cultural and less formalized
Speaker 1: political role. In nineteen seventy seven, a festival of arts
Speaker 1: and culture was being planned in Lagos, Nigeria that had
Speaker 1: adopted an ivory pendant of Queen Idia of Benin as
Speaker 1: its emblem. The festival's planning committee asked the British Museum
Speaker 1: to loan it the sixteenth century mask of this queen
Speaker 1: from its collection. There are contradictory reports of what happened next.
Speaker 1: According to the British Museum, this mask was just too
Speaker 1: fragile to move, but Nigerian sources reported that the museum
Speaker 1: had required the festival to provide three million dollars in insurance.
Speaker 1: This incident started to raise global awareness of the objects
Speaker 1: that have been taken out of Benin, collectively called the
Speaker 1: Beniin Bronzes. Even though most of the items are made
Speaker 1: of brass and some are made of other materials, efforts
Speaker 1: to repatriate at least some of the pieces have gone
Speaker 1: on for decades, and there are some real complexities involved,
Speaker 1: like if the bronzes are returned, who exactly should they
Speaker 1: be returned to? Most came from Beni City, specifically from
Speaker 1: the Oba's palace, so should they be repatriated to the
Speaker 1: Oba or to the Kingdom of Benin, or to Edo State,
Speaker 1: where Benien City is located, or to Nigeria as a nation,
Speaker 1: or to some museum or cultural institution built specifically to
Speaker 1: house these works. Such a museum is planned for Benin City,
Speaker 1: with the Beni Royal family and the Nigerian government involved,
Speaker 1: but that mean Zum has not been built yet. The
Speaker 1: Benin Dialogue Group was established in two thousand seven to
Speaker 1: work through these questions and other issues, and its most
Speaker 1: recent mission statement specifically references the creation of a royal
Speaker 1: museum to reunite Bening's historical artifacts, but progress toward that
Speaker 1: end has been slow. In eighteen, the late ful Laurens
Speaker 1: Hyland published an article in Art, Antiquity and Law titled
Speaker 1: Bening Dialogue Group Bening Royal Museum, Three Steps Forward, Six
Speaker 1: Steps Back. One reason why progress has been slow is
Speaker 1: that there is debate about the best path forward, including
Speaker 1: from within Nigeria, and there are also people who argue
Speaker 1: that the bronzes should not be returned, at least not
Speaker 1: all of them. In while at the British Museum, Nigeria's
Speaker 1: Edo State Governor Godwin Obaseki said, quote, these works are ambassadors.
Speaker 1: They represent who we are and we feel we should
Speaker 1: take advantage of them to create a connection with the world. Still,
Speaker 1: others feel that it's impossible to create a museum display
Speaker 1: they would really convey all the cultural and historical context
Speaker 1: of these objects. As of now, only a few pieces
Speaker 1: of artwork have been returned. Mark Walker traveled to Nigeria
Speaker 1: in twenty fifteen to return two pieces he had inherited
Speaker 1: from his grandfather, Captain Herbert Walker, who was part of
Speaker 1: the expedition. We've discussed announcements from various universities and museums
Speaker 1: and governments that they would return the bronzes that are
Speaker 1: in their collections. We've talked about those in several installments
Speaker 1: of Unearthed. Some of those returns haven't happened yet, and
Speaker 1: they also represent just a fraction of the thousands of
Speaker 1: pieces that were taken. So that is the context on
Speaker 1: all of those pieces that have come up as just
Speaker 1: a couple of sentences. Summaries on Unearthed episodes do you
Speaker 1: have listener mail to wrap us up. I do before
Speaker 1: we have listener mail. Uh. We just did our unearthed
Speaker 1: of the a year end of one and we talked
Speaker 1: about an announcement UM that that Homer Plessy was going
Speaker 1: to be pardoned, but the Governor of Louisiana needed to
Speaker 1: sign the pardon, and that was the final step that
Speaker 1: actually happened almost immediately after we recorded that episode. So
Speaker 1: as was plans when we did that recording, UM, the
Speaker 1: Governor of Louisiana, John Bell Edwards, did publicly sign the
Speaker 1: pardon of the late Homer Plessy, and there were people
Speaker 1: from both the Plessy and the Ferguson families there at
Speaker 1: the ceremony. So I just wanted to this is the
Speaker 1: earliest opportunity go ahead and say yes, that did happen.
Speaker 1: And then I also have email from Kelsey. Kelsey wrote
Speaker 1: to say thank you so much for your podcast. I
Speaker 1: first been listening years ago when I heard you did
Speaker 1: one on Frankie Manning and Lindy Hop As a dancer myself,
Speaker 1: it was so nice to hear his story and the
Speaker 1: story of the dance. I love. This email is also
Speaker 1: about a dance. I love the civic Northwest Ballets Nutcracker.
Speaker 1: I've lived in Washington State my whole life, and traveling
Speaker 1: to Seattle for the Nutcracker at Christmas time is something
Speaker 1: I've gotten to do a few times in my life
Speaker 1: as a child. It was a transformative experience. In the
Speaker 1: Mari sinback designs were all I knew. I was incredibly
Speaker 1: sad when I heard they were doing away with the
Speaker 1: sunback version, but the current production is fabulous. It was
Speaker 1: so cool to hear you mentioned Pacific Northwest Ballet in
Speaker 1: the podcast, as I think they are doing some incredible things.
Speaker 1: One new thing this year is a sensory friendly Nutcracker performance.
Speaker 1: Kelsey provided a link to UH document about that. The
Speaker 1: other is the introduction of the green tea cricket character
Speaker 1: for the Chinese dance. They have been very intentional and
Speaker 1: they're reworking of these dances. There are some pictures in
Speaker 1: this article, and there's a link to a story about
Speaker 1: the Nutcracker returning for the season with some of the
Speaker 1: UH the cricket pictures. I went down a rabbit hole
Speaker 1: looking for more about that cricket because that did seem amazing.
Speaker 1: Kelsey and on to say I'm a band teacher now
Speaker 1: in a suburb of Seattle, and my students performed the
Speaker 1: Nutcracker Suite for our concert this Christmas, so I've been
Speaker 1: listening to it quite a lot. You may also enjoy
Speaker 1: this podcast, which focuses on the music by Tchaikovsky. I
Speaker 1: have not listened to that podcast yet, but I did
Speaker 1: go look at stuff about the sensory friendly Nutcracker performance
Speaker 1: and the green tea cricket character for the Chinese stance.
Speaker 1: If anyone can hear a cat mewing in the background,
Speaker 1: that is my cat Onyx, who has struck up a
Speaker 1: new behavior called be as disruptive during re recording as possible. Uh.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much Kelsey for sending this email. I
Speaker 1: tried to find some video maybe if the new green
Speaker 1: tea cricket character in this ballet, and if if they
Speaker 1: may put that on online sometime at the future. I
Speaker 1: don't know. I don't want to speak for them, but
Speaker 1: that's not there yet, but the pictures of it looks
Speaker 1: so interesting. Um, and that has been done in conjunction
Speaker 1: with an organization that is just trying to move away
Speaker 1: from the anti Asian stereotypes in ballet. So thank you
Speaker 1: so much. Kelsey for sending this um if you'd like
Speaker 1: to send us a new or a history podcast at
Speaker 1: i heeart radio dot com and we're all over social
Speaker 1: media Missed in History, so you'll find our Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest,
Speaker 1: and Instagram. And you can subscribe to our show on
Speaker 1: the I heart radio app and wherever else do you
Speaker 1: like to get your podcasts. Stuff you Missed in History
Speaker 1: Class is a production of I heart Radio. For more
Speaker 1: podcasts from I heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.