Noble Blood - Empires and the Benin Bronzes

Episode Date: July 16, 2024

The Benin Bronzes are some of the most famous artifacts in the world. And the story of how they were looted from the Kingdom of Edo in the 19th century by the British is the story of colonialism, revenge, and the European scramble for African resources.Support Noble Blood:— Bonus episodes, stickers, and scripts on Patreon— Noble Blood merch— Order Dana's book, 'Anatomy: A Love Story' and its sequel 'Immortality: A Love Story'See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Will Ferrell's Big Money Players and IHart Podcast presents soccer moms. So I'm Leanne. Yeah. This is my best friend, Janet. Hey. And we have been joined at the hips since high school.

Absolutely. A redacted amount of years later, we're still joined at the hip. Just a little bit bigger hips. This is a podcast. We're recording it as we tailgate our youth soccer games in the back of my Honda Odyssey. With all the snacks and drinks. Why did you get hard seltzer instead of beer? They hit a bogo. Well, then you got it. Listen to soccer moms on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of IHeart Radio and Grimm and Mild from Aaron Manky. Listener discretion advised. The late afternoon sun was beating down on Admiral Sir Harry Rosson's back as he ambled through the African city of Edo on February 18, 1897. Even though he carefully scanned each street and clocked every window he walked past, he was almost relaxed. The tension he had been holding in his body mere hours before had largely dissipated. After five days of moving through dense forest and facing guerrilla attacks from Etto's soldiers, it was a relief, no, a triumph to be strolling the streets. The Kingdom of Benin's King or Oba, and everyone else in the Kingdom of Benin's capital city, had fled.

That was an unfortunate outcome of the attack, as Admiral Rawson and his British forces had hoped to capture the Oba. The campaign was known as the, quote, punitive expedition, after all. In the minds of the British people, the Edo people, especially, their Oba needed to pay for killing British soldiers earlier that year. But regardless, the British had the city now. The British forces hadn't even known the exact location of Ido, and yet here they were. Admiral Rossin chalked that up to British superiority. As the British force of 1,200 people continued to explore the abandoned city, they took it upon themselves to inspect the larger buildings,

including the Oba's palace and the religious spaces. As Admiral Rawson and his men explored the palace, they first came upon stores of what they initially deemed, quote, cheap rubbish. But in sorting through the piles, they found, quote, several hundred unique bronze plaques of really superb casting, castings of wonderful delicacy of detail, some magnificently carved tusks and bronze groups of idols.

In the buildings clearly meant for religious ceremonies, they also found, quote, handsomely carved ivory tusks placed on the top of very antique bronze heads. The precious items were swiftly collected and packed up to be taken out of the Kingdom of Benin and transported to London for sale. Something had to pay for the expensive expedition. Might as well be these. Once they were done exploring the royal residences and the religious buildings, the British started destroying the city. On one hand, this was personal.

The Edo had killed British soldiers. and now they were facing the mighty wrath of the British Empire. But on the other hand, this was standard practice for the British in Africa, a scorched earth policy. Adhering to this maxim quite literally, after demolishing parts of the palace and some religious buildings, the British set the city ablaze. Admiral Rossin basked in the glow of the fire rolling through Edo.

He had more than accomplished. his mission. He left behind a few soldiers to hold the conquered territory until the British could return and fortify their new stronghold. And with the smoke emanating from still smoldering ruins, the Admiral set off back to London. Just four days after they had arrived, the British had toppled the King of Benin, destroyed the capital city, and looted the kingdom's most precious religious masterpieces. As they marched back through the forest, they carried with them what would become some of the most controversial artifacts of the 21st century, artifacts that still remain in the British Museum today. The Benin Bronzes. I'm Dana Schwartz,

and this is Noble Blood. The Benin bronzes might be familiar to some of you already. They are some of the world's most talked about artifacts, and for good reason. These pieces of art, which include items cast in bronze and brass, as well as ivory carvings, are, as of this episode, scattered across the world in private collections and museums, including most notably the British Museum. Nigeria, the modern state, which encompasses the Kingdom of Ido, has been working diligently to try to get these pieces back for almost a century.

But while some of the bronzes have been returned, most known Benin bronzes still reside in the hands of others. These pieces have made incredible journeys, from their creation to their use by the Kingdom of Edo as ceremonial and religious objects, to their seizure as looted items, to their status, as hotly contested artifacts across the globe. Today we'll trace that story, and that begins in the back alleys of Benin City.

Benin City, or Edo, was the capital of the Kingdom of Benin. Not to be confused with the modern nation of Benin, the Kingdom of Benin ruled over a portion of the Niger River Delta from around 1180 AD to 18,000. 1997 AD. The kingdom, also known as the Kingdom of Edo, began as a city state and relied on simple tributary relationships. The Oba, or King, would offer military protection in exchange for tributes. As a reference point, their system was strikingly similar to European fiefdom. The kingdom started developing into a highly centralized emphysexualized.

empire in the 14th century. With this centralization of power underway, Oba Aguolo was able to create guilds, including those for metal workers and brass casters, which still to this day have their headquarters and workshops located in a back alley in Ido. But we can point to this 15th century creation of guilds as a turning point in the development of Ido art. The artisans of Ida would make pieces of art out of brass, bronze, ivory, and coral, works of art which are collectively known as the Benin bronzes. The moniker the Benin bronzes is a bit deceiving, however. The name is used to refer to the sculptures and reliefs made from the 13th century onward in the Kingdom of Benin, regardless of what material the works are made out of. The pieces that are categorized as Benin bronzes are incredibly diverse.

There are some exaggerated faces, some individuals, and some scenes with groups together. The works depict court life, military victories, and important trade relationships. The story of a people's history told through art. If you've never seen them, I urge you to look up the Benin Bronzes to get a sense of the artistic style and their conventions. Fundamentally, Edo art was meant for the court, and it served two purposes. First, these sculptures and engravings were meant to record history. For the Edo people, history was an oral tradition, but they used these pieces of art to supplement

their stories. For example, some images represented battles in their successful conquest of their neighbors, while other sculptures preserved the likenesses of important rulers and members of the nobility. Wrapped up in that purpose were, of course, political motivations, politicians, kings, and noblemen, trying to make themselves seem more important. Obas would commission pieces that depicted them in a positive light. Not to get meta, being that this is a history podcast, but what is chosen to be remembered as history is never objective.

The obas, the kings of the kingdom of Edo, knew that, and certainly used that to their advantage. The bronzes also served as religious objects central to the beliefs of the Edo people. The Edo religion involved belief in an invisible supernatural world full of gods and spirits, in addition to traditional ancestor, veneration. One important aspect of their religion was divine kingship, which combined their belief in spirits as well as ancestor worship. Obas, both living and dead, were seen as holding the power

of life and death. Every new oba, once the former oba, his father had passed and he rose to the throne was tasked with putting together an altar for the recently deceased king. On this altar would be carved ivory tusks and brass heads cast to represent the former Oba or the former queen, the new Oba's mother. These altars also included statues of leopards, as they were symbols associated with kingship and power. The obas of Benin did have substantial power in the region. The kingdom began expanding in earnest starting in the 16th century. What brought the kingdom more power was their trade relationships with European countries, like Portugal, England, and France. Their location on the Niger River Delta primed them to act as

middlemen between European traders and other African states further inland, especially with regards to the slave trade. The Edo benefited greatly through the slave trade. When the Edo would expand their kingdom and take prisoners of war, they could turn around and sell those prisoners to European traders. So military expeditions allowed the Edo not only to expand their sphere of control, but also to trade with the Europeans. In the 17th century, the Edo Empire started to contract, having reached its largest in the 16th century, when it extended from the coast of the bite of Benin, almost to Accra in the west. The kingdom recovered some of its previous power in the 18th century, but declined somewhat again in the 19th. All this being said, by the 19th century, despite no longer

being the powerhouse it once had been, the kingdom of Ido was still powerful, and controlled much, if not all, of the palm oil trade through the Niger Delta. Unfortunately, it was their control of those trade routes in the region that put the kingdom at odds with the British. And when you were at odds with the British Empire in the 19th century, there was little that could be done to save you. In the 19th century, European nations were coming up against the economic necessity. of the Industrial Revolution. In order for their economies to continue growing and thereby allow their states to become more powerful, countries like Great Britain, France, Germany, Belgium, Spain,

Portugal, and Italy had to find new markets and new resources. But they couldn't look to Europe for those as industrial economies had already consumed the entire continent. So these European governments looked to Africa. Obviously, this is an oversimplification, but I think it's a helpful overview. Having colonized or established strong trade monopolies in most of the rest of the world, Europeans felt that Africa could satisfy their economic, quote, needs. Many countries already had trade relationships with nations in Africa, where they traded things like ivory, palm oil, and enslaved people. European states had trade relationships with African states south of the Sahara for hundreds of years, but in the 1880s, the European outlook towards the entire African continent changed,

as the European, quote, scramble for Africa ensued. In the late 19th century, European countries had led colonial excursions into various parts of Africa. For example, Britain, assumed control over Egypt and South Africa, while Belgium, or more specifically, King Leopold of Belgium, horrifically took over the Congo region of the African interior, which we covered on this podcast a while back in the episode The Red Paint on Leopold II. But as each European country gained a foothold in one part of the continent, the other European nations grew all that more eager to establish their own colonies, if for no other reason, then preventing other countries from becoming more powerful. As tensions arose, it soon became clear that unless they did something,

war would break out over the issue. In 1884 and 1885, in order to avoid war in Europe, Otto von Bismarck of Germany convened the Berlin Conference, where the seven major European powers meant to discuss, quote, the Africa problem. At this conference, the representatives of the Western powers took a map and divided up the African continent amongst themselves. Essentially, they decided who was to pursue control over which specific portions of Africa, with no regard for the nations and tribes and kingdoms who already inhabited the land. As I said, European countries had already begun to colonize Africa, but the Berlin Conference formalized those efforts. I could go off on a tangent to discuss the rationale that supported this incredibly

racist entitlement to the continent, but instead, I think for the purposes of this story, it'll be most illuminating to put Great Britain and their colonial efforts, specifically in modern-day Nigeria under a microscope, so to speak. After the Berlin conference, Great Britain walked away with a fair amount of the European continent designated as theirs. Included in, quote, their territory, was the land of the Niger Delta, where the Kingdom of Ido already held power. The British already had an established trade relationship with the Kingdom of Ido, which, as at this point in time was almost entirely the trade of palm oil, but had, as I mentioned, previously included human trafficking for the transatlantic slave trade and trade of ivory.

Ultimately, not much changed after the Berlin conference in that particular region, as the British and their company, the Niger Coast Protectorate, were already heavily engaged in regional trade. The biggest change was an increase in Britain's determination to take formal control. The Kingdom of Edo was one of the last independent states in Africa, which posed a problem for the British. The British had sent along many emissaries throughout the 1860s, 1870s, and 1880s to try to convince the Obas to become their protectorate. but the Obas, Oba Adolo, and then his son, Oba Ovanamaran, had repeatedly refused. That being said, the Obas had signed trade treaties, which the British hoped they could leverage and turn into control of the almost 800-year-old kingdom.

Seven centuries after its founding, by the 19th century Edo or Benin City, was a capital full of courthouses, mausoleums, religiously. compounds and palaces, not to mention people. The expansive metropolis bore evidence of every era of royal power and type of religious observance. I want to note here that much, if not all, of what we know about the Kingdom of Benin in the 19th century and the punitive expedition of 1897 comes from the British perspective. And almost all of those records are tainted by racist, and imperialist notions. For example, many descriptions of the kingdom of Edo describe gratuitous descriptions of human sacrifice

that the Edo supposedly practiced. According to Admiral Rawson, the British commander at the opening of this episode, the capital Edo stunk, quote, of human blood, sacrifices and corpses everywhere, with one area of the city, quote, simply strewn with bodies in every stage of decomposition, skulls and bones, end quote. Rawson was not alone in describing evidence of human sacrifice.

It was pervasive in British writings about the kingdom of Edo. Now, I won't dispute that the Edo practiced human sacrifice, but many historians assert that the British over-emphasized the practice in their writings in order to provide justification for their colonial expeditions. In the words of famous Brit Rudyard Kipling, it was the white man's burden to bring civility to Africa. Human sacrifice sufficed as evidence that the Edo people were uncivilized

and needed to be ruled and shown the way of civilization by the British Empire. We can even see evidence of that British just, justification, as well as its true desires to control trade, in the comments of Ralph Moore, who was acting consul of the Niger Coast Protectorate concerning British incursions on the kingdom's sovereignty. Quote, the object of the expedition was to open up that country for trade. The tyranny and oppression of its rulers prevent any civilizing influences extending into it, and render life and property so insecure as to prevent nearly all trade, end quote. Obviously, then, the only conclusion you can draw from that is they need to colonize.

The British clearly had the supposed moral rationale to support a military invasion of the Kingdom of Ido's territory, and in 1897, they were finally given the opportunity to act on those desires, setting into motion the chain of events, which would ultimately bring about the looting of the Benin bronzes. The British had hoped to use military force to topple the Oba and the Kingdom of Benin for some time, but they had always refrained for one reason or another. It was a tenacious acting consul general of the Niger Coast Protectorate named James Robert Phillips, who defied orders and in January 1897, headed towards Edo to begin efforts to topple the Oba, Oba Oven-Ramwen. As Phillips and his crew trekked through the forest towards Edo, they sent out a message to the

Oba that they wished to discuss trade and peace in the region. In reality, they hoped to take the capital by force and either force the oba into submission or even to capture him. The oba sent soldiers with a message for Phillips to halt. The oboe was unable to welcome any guests at that time, as it was the Iggy Festival and he had ceremonial duties to attend to. Further, if Phillips wanted to enter the capital later, he would have to come alone, attended only by a local chief. Phillips refused to heed that request and the multiple reiterations of it that followed, and the expedition pressed on. On January 4th, as Phillips and his men marched closer to the capital,

Edo's soldiers ambushed them. Without even emerging from the foliage, soldiers fired at the troop, killing all but two members of the British expedition. This act, which could be interpreted as an act of defense or an act of aggression, gave the British the opportunity they needed to invade the kingdom of Edo and topple the Oba and the Kingdom. once and for all. Immediately upon hearing of the massacre, the British launched what they labeled a punitive expedition. They assigned Admiral Sir Harry Rawson, who we met in the beginning of the episode, to lead the charge. The name punitive expedition reveals the sentiment behind Rawson's

mission, which was to take Benin City and, if possible, capture the Oba. He assembled a force of of about 1,200 men and on February 9th headed up the Niger River and into the forest towards Edo. While they didn't know exactly where they needed to head to get to the capital, as few British had ever made it to the city, their determination wiped away any doubt in their minds. This anchoring proved helpful as they faced attacks from Edo soldiers who were trying to protect their kingdom and their king. The Edo soldiers stayed hidden in the trees, therefore able to attack with the elements of surprise

without revealing themselves and opening themselves up to attack in return. Despite the best defensive efforts of the Edo soldiers, just over a week after the British launched their punitive expedition, they captured the city by force. As I discussed in the opening of the episode, Admiral Rosson and his men were able to wander the city freely as it had been abandoned by the Oba, who would surrender himself to the British later that year. Rosson's expedition's most important find was the Benin Bronzes. The British had mixed reactions to the bronzes, all of which, however, were tainted by their races. beliefs. On one end of the spectrum, Officer Ralph Moore declared they had been, quote,

hideously constructed. Reginald Bacon, the most complimentary of the bunch, wouldn't even attribute the brilliant and talent of the artwork to the Edo people, instead suggesting that the pieces were, quote, suggestive of almost Egyptian design and of, quote, Chinese work. Regardless of the British opinions, the British ever conscious of money, recognized the value in these pieces of art and swiftly packed them up. The bronzes were eventually brought to London, where 40% of the looted art was accessioned by the British Museum, another chunk given to the soldiers of the expedition as trophies, and the rest were sold largely to museums around the world, and in the hands of others was where the Benin bronzes would remain for decades.

The punitive expedition ultimately brought about the end of the Kingdom of Ido as the reigning power in the Niger Delta. After the sack of Ido or Benin city, the kingdom of Benin became absorbed into the British colony of Nigeria. However, the Ido people did not just disappear as the British assumed control of their land, nor did the monarchy entire. dissolve. In fact, the kingdom of Edo still exists within the Nigerian state, and there is a currently reigning Oba, Iwari II, the 40th in an unbroken line of rulers. Efforts in Nigeria to reclaim the bronzes began in the 1930s, and really took hold after Nigerian independence from Britain in 1960. It wasn't until 2021.

Over 100 years after the sack of Ido and almost 100 years after Nigerians first started calling for repatriation, that their efforts finally bore fruit when Jesus College Cambridge returned the first Benin bronze, a brass casting of a cockerel to Nigeria. Hundreds of pieces have since been returned to Nigeria or Nigerian ownership. I specify Nigerian ownership because some pieces are still located in museums in, for example, Germany, but as opposed to being owned by that museum, they're now there on loan. The question remains, however, who in Nigeria should get ownership over the pieces of art? Some argue that the Oba and royal family of the Kingdom of Benin should have ownership over the pieces.

After all, these sculptures and reliefs were originally created as religious pieces for use by the royal family. Others argue that the Nigerian state should have ownership over the pieces, which should be displayed in museums like the new Edo Museum of West African Art. Unfortunately, this debate over ownership has created tension within Nigeria over the objects and has slowed down the repatriation process. But the Nigerian government and the Nigerian people continue to advocate to bring home the beautiful objects known as the Benin Bronzes.

Only time will tell when or if they will ever be fully returned to Edo. That's the story of the Benin Bronzes, but keep listening after a brief sponsor break to hear about a fascinating discovery about where the material for the bronzes actually came from. What's up, everyone? I'm Ego Wodom. My next guest, you know from Step Brothers Anchorman,

Saturday Night Live, and the Big Money Players Network. It's Will Ferrell. My dad gave me the best advice ever. I went and had lunch with them one day, and I was like, and Dad, I think I want to really give this a shot. I don't know what that means,

but I just know the groundlings. I'm working my way up. through and I know it's a place they come look for up and coming talent. He said if it was based solely on talent, I wouldn't worry about you, which is really sweet. He goes, but there's so much luck involved. And he's like, just give it a shot. He goes, but if you ever reach a point where you're banging your head against the wall and it doesn't feel fun anymore, it's okay to quit. If you saw it written down, it would not be an inspiration. It would not be on a calendar of, you know, the cat, just Just hang in there.

Yeah, it would not be. Right, it wouldn't be that. There's a lot of luck. Listen to Thanks Dad on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. What's up, everyone? I'm Ago Wodom. My next guest, you know from Step Brothers Anchorman, Saturday Night Live and the Big Money Players Network. It's Will Ferrell.

Woo, woo, woo, woo, woo. My dad gave me the best advice ever. I went and had lunch with them one day and I was like and dad I think I want to really give this a shot I don't know what that means but I just know the groundlings I'm working my way up through

and I know it's a place that come look for up and coming talent he said if it was based solely on talent I wouldn't worry about you which is really sweet he goes but there's so much luck involved and he's like just give it a shot he goes but if you ever reach a point

where you're banging your head against the wall and it doesn't feel fun anymore it's okay to quit If you saw it written down, it would not be an inspiration. It would not be on a calendar of, you know, the cat. Just hang in there. Yeah, it would not be. Right, it wouldn't be that.

There's a lot of luck. Listen to Thanks Dad on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Earlier, I touched briefly on how the Kingdom of Edo benefited from the slave trade with Europeans. As the Edo conquered more territory, they would. would sell their prisoners of war from those battles to first the Portuguese and later the British. We know how important these trade relationships were to the Edo because they made reliefs that featured Portuguese traders. As I discussed, the bronzes chronicled the history of the Edo people in addition to acting as religious objects. Clearly, the Portuguese were important enough to the

Edo's history that they felt compelled to preserve their image. But the connection between the Benin bronzes and the Portuguese slave trade goes deeper than just some depictions of Europeans. Scientists and archaeologists have been working for decades to determine the source of the brass used in the metal pieces of the Benin bronzes. As a reminder, the bronzes were not actually made of bronze, or not. not all of them. Brass is an alloy mainly composed of zinc and copper, but also includes other elements. For our purposes, the most important of these additional metals is lead. By studying the lead

isotopes in the pieces, scholars can determine the origins of the brass. Now, it's long been suspected that the brass for the Benin bronzes came from manillas, or brass-rish-riched, that the Portuguese used as currency when trading enslaved peoples with West African tribes. So scholars put that hypothesis to the test and compared the composition of the bronzes to the composition of Manila's recovered from five shipwrecks and three land sites in West Africa, Western Europe, and off the east coast of the United States. And as it turns out, the bronzes were in. indeed made of metal from the Manillas, specifically early versions of the rings called

Taquois. So in another meta moment in this episode, the reliefs depicting Portuguese traders were made out of the very metal that the Edo received through trade from the Portuguese. Noble Blood is a production of IHeart Radio and Grimm and Mild from Aaron Menke. Noble Blood is hosted by me, Danish forts, with additional writing and researching by Hannah Johnston, Hannah Zwick, Courtney Sender, Julia Melani, and Armand Kasam. The show is edited and produced by Noemi Griffin and Rima I.mahili, with supervising producer Josh Thane and executive producers Aaron Manky, Alex Williams, and Matt Frederick. For more podcasts from IHeartRadio, visit the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts. podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

Will Ferrell's Big Money Players and IHeart Podcasts presents soccer moms. So I'm Leanne. Yeah. This is my best friend, Janet. Hey. And we have been joined at the hips since high school. Absolutely. A redacted amount of years later, we're still joined at the hip.

Just a little bit bigger hips. This is a podcast. We're recording it as we tailgate our youth soccer games in the back of my Honda Odyssey. With all the snacks and drinks. Why did you get hard seltzer instead of beer? Oh, they had a bogo. Well, then you got it. Listen to soccer moms on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed human.