₦airaland Forum

freepeople:
I trust the Cameroonians gendarmes to make the mincemeat of ill-disciplined Nigeria's troop.

Any attempt to step one inch into the Cameroonian border will mark the end of the entity called Nigeria.

GEJ and his political hacks wants to distract Nigerians from the internal crisis with external aggression.

Remember that Cameroon has a military pact with France; and France had a 100 years old alliance and non-aggression treaty with Britain.

This will be the case of Cameroon(Nigeria) versus Nigeria(Biafra).

I will keep my fingers crossed

Continue posting, abeg. Aren't you taking this a little out of hand?

[quote author=tpia@ link=topic=840239.msg9916844#msg9916844 date=1325975436]these kids have a lot of problems no doubt although that might be an exaggeration.

if the parents knew what they're getting their kids into, having an anchor baby or anchor babies wouldnt look so attractive.[/quote]I am sure some of these "parents" know very well what they're getting their kids into, but they no send.

moremi2008:
You are half European and half Nigerian. Why is this relevant to your argument. Did your Dad marry [b]another [/b]white woman after he divorced his green-card provider? If yes, are you sure that the first marriage was for green-card? If no, then your "gbaromi-deleru" is too much! Abeg jor!

I'm not here to convince you, since what you believe in is not my problem.

I am curious sha, why all the hostility, no bi say you are mad for no reason?

Labeling humans as "green card children" is extremely offensive, and the fact that people start laughing about it is even more offensive. It's wrong to label humans to make them seem less worthy. Do not put the blame on the kids for their father's mistake.

PhysicsQED:
@ StarFlux, the Benin kingdom in its entirety was not densely populated compared to some other places. This was specifically noted by Olfert Dapper's description of Benin that he published in 1668.

In the capital city itself, there were also a significant number of slaves, and occasionally immigrants, from some nearby groups.


But there really is no reason why the prominence of a place should correlate directly with the size of the ethnic group.
It simply doesn't follow that being a large ethnic group necessarily results in a prominent kingdom springing up from that group or vice versa.


@ Tpia@, care to mention the base the Portuguese established in Benin? I'm pretty sure they were based in São Tomé.

The Portuguese also visited the Ijebu kingdom in the 1500s. Did they establish a "base" there too?

The Portuguese visited several parts of the coast of West Africa and Benin was definitely not the first place they visited.

Whatever we might want to think, Benin is still fundamentally located inland, not at the coast, and its outlets such as Ughoton and Gelegele are still not at the coast, so I do not think one should insinuate that the Portuguese be given such disproportionate credit (all of the white or non-African scholars that studied Benin's history in depth completely failed to do this, but somehow I'm not surprised when other Africans, or fellow Nigerians try to do this  ) for Benin's prominence when the Portuguese visited so many places in west and central Africa yet failed to do so much in the rest of Africa that they allegedly did for Benin.

Benin was not the only place described as great or mighty by Europeans when they got there, anyway. Olfert Dapper (his sources, that is) said in 1668 that "Ulkami" (obviously "Olukumi" a term used by some Yoruba speakers and applied to Yoruba speakers by some), a kingdom described as being next to Allada (called "Arder" in the text, but clearly referring to Allada, Dahomey) was a "mighty place" and the scholars that have read that passage have all identified this with Oyo. This means that off of its reputation with other groups, Oyo was being promoted to Europeans by those groups less far into the interior.

The obstacle as far as European promotion of Oyo was just that Oyo was further in the interior. However Oyo's real connection was in the north, not with Europeans. Samuel Johnson even went so far as to claim: "It should be remembered that the coast tribes were of much less importance then than now, both in population and in intelligence ; light and civilization with the Yorubas came from the north with which they have always retained connection through the Arabs and Fulanis."  (The History of the Yorubas, Chapter IV)

One could claim that Borgu, Nupe, etc. elevated the Oyo kingdom to an empire and to a level of military conquest it would not have had otherwise and one can try to write off Oyo's independent rise to power as wholly northern inspired, but nobody has any real issue with Nupe and Borgu for what they did for Oyo like you seem to have with the Portuguese and what they supposedly did for Benin. (And I am aware that Nupe once sacked Oyo (and the Alaafin and his court took refuge in Borgu), but that doesn't change the reality that the Oyo cavalry was Northern inspired.) Nevertheless, attributing credit solely to Oyo's neighbors for its historical might would not really be justified. Anybody who reads up on Oyo, would understand how important the indigenous culture and society was to the rise of the kingdom.

As for the Portuguese, two Portuguese ships visited and traded with the Ijebu kingdom in 1553 and some Portuguese even lived in Ijebu Ode at one point. Yet I have never read anywhere where it was claimed that the Portuguese established a "base" in the Ijebu kingdom and there is really nothing to suggest that they did.

I don't really see why Benin should have had any greater rapport with the Portuguese than the Portuguese had with anybody else, or why numerous other "Benins" did not arise in the area stretching from Badagry to the Mahin area or other places on the coast or inland from the coast at any point in time following Portuguese contact if the Portuguese were the catalyst for rises to power in and around the Benin area.

By the way, you said earlier in another thread that Yorubas contributed greatly to the Benin empire and I partially agree with that but what I have to point out is that merely having Yorubas or Portuguese among them can't explain the level of Benin's development. As mentioned earlier, there is nothing like a Benin in the area stretching from Badagry to the Mahin area.

So while I partially agree with your earlier statement, and I acknowledge that Binis, like many other groups, can't be of perfectly homogeneous ancestry (even some very common and basic Edo words (like mouth, mother, etc.) for which there is no other word are identical to or similar to  Yoruba, Igbo, or other groups' words), I have to point out that without the autochthonous culture's political system, defenses, and the unique culture in place, there is no reason it should have had anything more going for it than the other Nigerian kingdoms, and no definite reason it should have been greater than any of the settlements across the coasts or inland from the coasts. One can read R.E. Bradbury's analysis of the unique aspects of the culture in some of his articles in Benin Studies to get a better perspective.

If not for the actual Binis, there is really no reason why Benin would be mentioned with any more interest or admiration than any of the more minor and less prominent kingdoms that existed in Nigeria and the Guinea coast.

You are right. Thanks for another great reply, very informative.

[quote author=Ileke-IdI link=topic=662174.msg8277113#msg8277113 date=1304804948]I'm still trying to understand how such a vibrant and powerful empire because a minority.

Binis [i]should [/i]be one of the largest ethnicity in Nigeria, if I get my history right.[/quote]This is also something I don't understand. If anyone would be kind enough to explain.

Good translations are actually important.
Do not let loanwords take over your language by not translating or doing half good translations. It is important to take care of your language, because language is identity. This is why I love topics like these. Even though I don't personally speak Igbo, I hope you guys will take care of your language so it can live on.

Keep up the good work.

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