Benin City. The lost city of the Edo people.

By: Luis Pellegrini

"A bird that takes flight only to remain perched on a termite mound remains stuck to the ground." This ancient proverb of the Edo people was followed to the letter by the descendants of this ancient African ethnic group who, for centuries, dominated much of the territory now occupied by Nigeria and Benin. The men and women of the Edo people, from the 14th to the 18th centuries AD, spread their wings and took flight. But not to remain perched on a termite mound, but rather to build one of the richest, most powerful, and most refined civilizations in the entire history of Black Africa. When the Portuguese Europeans arrived there at the end of the 15th century, they were simply awestruck by the magnificence and splendor of this culture. Its capital, Benin City (which gave its name to the current Republic of Benin), rivaled and in many respects proved even more advanced, at the end of the Middle Ages, than most European capitals. To this day, throughout Africa, the term Edo People signifies beauty, elegance, culture, and refinement.

The traditions of the Edo people arrived in the Americas, notably in Brazil, brought initially by slaves of that ethnicity, and later by those of the Yoruba ethnicity, who were closely related to the Edo. The Yoruba were vassals of the Edo for centuries, and only assumed a certain regional supremacy after the collapse of the Edo empire at the hands of the British at the end of the 19th century.

It was then, starting in 1897, that the Great City of Benin began to disappear without a trace. In fact, it had begun to slowly decline in the 15th century, following internal conflicts related to the increasing intrusion of Europeans and the slave trade on the kingdom's borders.

In that year, 1897, Benin was sacked and burned by British troops. Today, a modern city stands on the same plain, but the ruined remains of its ancestor are not even mentioned in tourist guides. Perhaps there are remnants beneath the Nigerian forests, left to decay and oblivion. They will one day be brought to light by the hands of archaeologists.

This does not mean at all that the values ​​of Edo culture and civilization have disappeared. On the contrary, they are very much alive in present-day Nigeria and Benin, where the descendants of the ancient Edo people retain that same name and today constitute one of the most important, richest, most modern, and well-organized ethnic groups. And in Brazil, within the immense aristocracy of Afro-Brazilian traditions, such as Candomblé, Xangô, Tambor de Mina, and Umbanda.

The article below, about the Edo Empire, was written by an expert, the Nigerian Mawuna Remarque Koutonin, himself a descendant of the Edo ethnic group. At the end, there is a gallery with photos of Edo works of art and a rare video that gives an idea of ​​the splendor that still remains in the culture of the Edo people today.

The Surprise of the Portuguese Navigators

By: Mawuna Remarque Koutonin. Source: El País newspaper, Madrid

This is the story of a lost medieval city that few have heard of. Benin City, formerly known as Edo, was the capital of a pre-colonial African kingdom in what is now southern Nigeria. Founded in the 11th century, the Kingdom of Benin was one of the oldest and most developed in West Africa.

According to Fred Pearce of New Scientist magazine, the walls of the capital were "four times longer than the Great Wall of China and required a hundred times more material than the Great Pyramid of Giza." Situated on a plain, Benin City was surrounded by massive walls to the south and deep moats to the north. Beyond these fortifications were walls dividing the capital's surroundings into approximately 500 villages. "Enclosing a territory of 6500 square kilometers, they were built by the population of Edo," explains Fred Pearce.

A pioneer in public lighting.

It was one of the first cities to benefit from the early stages of public lighting. There were enormous metal lanterns everywhere, especially near the king's palace. They ran on palm oil and remained lit all night, illuminating the paths to the palace.

When the Portuguese discovered the city in 1485, they were surprised to find a metropolis in the middle of the African jungle, encompassing hundreds of towns and villages. They called it the Great City of Benin, at a time when virtually no other African city was recognized as such by Europeans. In 1691, the Portuguese captain Lourenço Pinto wrote: “The Great City of Benin, where the king resides, is larger than Lisbon. As far as the eye can see, the streets stretch in a perfect straight line. The houses are large, especially the king's palace, richly decorated and adorned with fine columns. The city is rich and industrious. It is so well governed that theft is unknown there, and the inhabitants feel so safe that the houses have no doors.” In comparison, London at that time was a medieval city plagued "by robbery, prostitution, murder, corruption, and a flourishing black market, dominated by those who were quickest to wield a knife or empty other people's pockets," writes Bruce Holsinger, a historian at the University of Virginia.

The planning followed strict rules of symmetry, proportionality, and repetition, now known as fractal geometry. The mathematician Ron Eglash, who in his book *African Fractals* (1999) studies the characteristic patterns of architecture and art in numerous regions of Africa, observes that the city and neighboring villages were designed to form perfect fractals, patterns reproduced in the divisions of each house and in the groupings of houses, according to mathematically predictable lines. Eglash writes: “When Europeans arrived in Africa, the architecture seemed disorganized and therefore primitive to them. It never occurred to them that Africans might resort to a form of mathematics that they themselves had not yet discovered.”

In the center of the city stood the royal residence, from which 30 straight paths radiated, each 35 meters wide. The main streets were connected to underground cisterns that allowed rainwater to be collected and prevent flooding. These streets were extended by a network of parallel and perpendicular paths. The grass that grew in the streets served as pasture for the animals. “The houses are well aligned along the streets, one next to the other,” describes the Dutchman Olfert Dapper, who visited the city in the 17th century. “Provided with sloping inclines and staircases, they are generally large and contain long galleries, especially the residences of the nobility, as well as numerous rooms separated by well-built clay walls.” He adds that “each house has a well with fresh water.”

Exuberant decoration

The city was divided into eleven sectors. Each was a smaller-scale replica of the royal residence, including various living quarters, workshops, and public buildings connected by gates and passageways. The whole complex was decorated with motifs that made Benin City famous. The exterior walls of the royal residence and its enclosures were decorated with horizontal stripes (agben) and clay engravings depicting animals, warriors, and other symbols of power, the contrasts accentuated by the strong sunlight. Objects from nature—stones or fragments of mica—were also pressed into the damp clay (giving the walls the shimmering appearance of a starry sky), and the palace pillars were covered with bronze plaques depicting the victories and other feats of ancient kings and members of the nobility.

In the 12th century, long before the European Renaissance, the rulers and dignitaries of the city, then at its peak, lavished gifts and riches on artisans who demonstrated their skills in intricately crafted bronze, wood, and ivory sculptures.

The Great City disappeared without a trace. It began to decline in the 15th century, following internal conflicts related to the increasing intrusion of Europeans and the slave trade on the kingdom's borders.

In 1897, the city was sacked and burned by British troops. My great-grandparents, physicians to the king, were among the many residents who fled. Today, a modern city stands on the same plain, but the ruined remains of its ancestor are not mentioned in tourist guides. Perhaps remnants lie beneath the Nigerian forests, left to decay and oblivion.

Photo gallery of artworks from the Edo tradition.

Video: Great Edo People of Nigeria