Emergence of the Nation. Every ethnic group in Nigeria has its
own stories of where its ancestors came from. These vary from tales of people
descending from the sky to stories of migration from far-off places.
Archaeologists have found evidence of Neolithic humans who inhabited what is
now Nigeria as far back as 12,000 B.C.E.
The histories of the people in northern
and southern Nigeria prior to colonization followed vastly different paths. The
first recorded empire in present-day Nigeria was centered in the north at
Kanem-Borno, near Lake Chad. This empire came to power during the eighth
century C.E. By the thirteenth century, many Hausa
states began to emerge in the region as well.
Trans-Sahara trade with North Africans
and Arabs began to transform these northern societies greatly. Increased
contact with the Islamic world led to the conversion of the Kanem-Borno Empire
to Islam in the eleventh century. This led to a ripple effect of conversions
throughout the north. Islam brought with it changes in law, education, and
politics.
The trans-Sahara trade also brought
with it revolutions in wealth and class structure. As the centuries went on,
strict Islamists, many of whom were poor Fulani, began to tire of increasing
corruption, excessive taxation, and unfair treatment of the poor. In 1804 the
Fulani launched a jihad, or Muslim holy war, against the Hausa states in an
attempt to cleanse them of these non-Muslim behaviors and to reintroduce proper
Islamic ways. By 1807 the last Hausa state had fallen. The Fulani victors
founded the Sokoto Caliphate, which grew to become the largest state in West
Africa until its conquest by the British in 1903.
In the south, the Oyo Empire grew to
become the most powerful Yoruban society during the sixteenth century. Along
the coast, the Edo people established the Benin Empire (not to be confused with
the present-day country of Benin to the west), which reached its height of
power in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.
As in the north, outsiders heavily
influenced the societies of southern Nigeria. Contact with Europeans began with
the arrival of Portuguese ships in 1486. The British, French, and Dutch soon
followed. Soon after their arrival, the trade in slaves replaced the original
trade in goods. Many of the coastal communities began selling their neighbors,
whom they had captured in wars and raids, to the Europeans in exchange for
things such as guns, metal, jewelry, and liquor.
The slave trade had major social
consequences for the Africans. Violence and intertribal warfare increased as
the search for slaves intensified. The increased wealth accompanying the slave
trade began to change social structures in the area. Leadership, which had been
based on tradition and ritual, soon became based on wealth and economic power.
After more than 350 years of slave
trading, the British decided that the slave trade was immoral and, in 1807,
ordered it stopped. They began to force their newfound morality on the
Nigerians. Many local leaders, however, continued to sell captives to illegal
slave traders. This lead to confrontations with the British Navy, which took on
the responsibility of enforcing the slave embargo. In 1851 the British attacked
Lagos to try to stem the flow of slaves from the area. By 1861 the British
government had annexed the city and established its first official colony in
Nigeria.
As the nonslave trade began to
flourish, so, too, did the Nigerian economy. A new economy based on raw
materials, agricultural products, and locally manufactured goods saw the growth
of a new class of Nigerian merchants. These merchants were heavily influenced
by Western ways. Many soon became involved in politics, often criticizing
chiefs for keeping to their traditional ways. A new divide within
the local
communities began to develop, in terms of both wealth and politics. Because
being a successful merchant was based on production and merit, not on
traditional community standing, many former slaves and lower-class people soon
found that they could advance quickly up the social ladder. It was not unusual
to find a former slave transformed into the richest, most powerful man in the
area.
Christian missionaries brought
Western-style education to Nigeria as Christianity quickly spread throughout
the south. The mission schools created an educated African elite who also
sought increased contact with Europe and a Westernization of Nigeria.
In 1884, as European countries engaged
in a race to consolidate their African territories, the British Army and local
merchant militias set out to conquer the Africans who refused to recognize
British rule. In 1914, after squelching the last of the indigenous opposition,
Britain officially established the Colony and Protectorate of Nigeria.
-DEBORAH S EZRA
KUW/U14/SLG/2028
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