BIAFRAThe Slave Trade and Culture PDF

The Slave Trade and Culture in the Bight of Biafra
The Slave Trade and Culture in the Bight of Biafra dissects and
explains the structure, dramatic expansion, and manifold effects of the
slave trade in the Bight of Biafra. By showing that the rise of the Aro
merchant group was the key factor in trade expansion, G. Ugo Nwokeji
reinterprets why and how such large-scale commerce developed in the
absence of large-scale centralized states. The result is the first study to
link the structure and trajectory of the slave trade in a major exporting
region to the expansion of a specific African merchant group – among
other fresh insights into Atlantic Africa’s involvement in the trade –
and the most comprehensive treatment of Atlantic slave trade in the
Bight of Biafra. The fundamental role of culture in the organization of
trade is highlighted, transcending the usual economic explanations in a
way that complicates traditional generalizations about work, domestic
slavery, and gender in precolonial Africa.
G. Ugo Nwokeji is assistant professor of African American studies

at the University of California, Berkeley. His research focuses on the
cultural history and political economy of Africa since 1500, with par-
ticular focus on international commerce in the Nigerian Niger Delta
and its hinterland. Professor Nwokeji is the author of the James A.
Baker III Institute for Public Policy’s The Nigerian National Petroleum
Corporation and the Development of the Nigerian Oil and Gas
Industry: History, Strategies, and Current Directions (2007) and multi-
ple journal articles and book chapters, as well as co-editor of Religion,
History and Politics in Nigeria (2005).
The Slave Trade and Culture
in the Bight of Biafra
An African Society in the Atlantic World
G. UGO NWOKEJI
University of California, Berkeley
cambridge university press
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São Paulo, Delhi, Dubai, Tokyo, Mexico City
Cambridge University Press

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© G. Ugo Nwokeji 2010
This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception

and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements,
no reproduction of any part may take place without the written
permission of Cambridge University Press.
First published 2010
Printed in the United States of America
A catalog record for this publication is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication data

Nwokeji, G. Ugo.
The slave trade and culture in the Bight of Biafra: an African society in the
Atlantic world / G. Ugo Nwokeji.
p. cm.
isbn 978-0-521-88347-4 (hardback)
1. Slave trade – Biafra, Bight of, Region – History. 2. Slavery – Biafra, Bight of,
Region – History. 3. Biafra, Bight of, Region – Social conditions. I. Title.
ht1334.b5n87 2010
306.3′620916373–dc22 2010021039
isbn 978-0-521-88347-4 Hardback
Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or

accuracy of urls for external or third-party Internet Web sites referred to in
this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such Web sites is,
or will remain, accurate or appropriate.
This book is dedicated to the memory of Don Ohadike,
historian and gentleman
Contents
List of Tables and Figures page ix

Map of the Bight of Biafra and Its Hinterland xi
Preface xiii
Foreword by Paul E. Lovejoy xxiii
1 Introduction 1
2 The Aro in the Atlantic Context: Expansion
and Shifts, 1600s–1807 22
3 The Trade Diaspora in Regional Context: Aro Commercial
Organization in the Era of Expansion, 1740–1850 53
4 Culture Formation in the Trading Frontier,
c. 1740 to c. 1850 82
5 Household and Market Persons: Deportees
and Society, c. 1740–c. 1850 117
6 The Slave Trade, Gender, and Culture 144
7 Cultural and Economic Aftershocks 178
8 Summary and Conclusions 204
Notes on Sources 209

Sources Cited 223
Index 265
vii
Tables and Figures
Tables
0.1. Estimated Volume of Biafra Captive Exports,
1551–1850, by Twenty-Five-Year Period page xiv
2.1. Estimated Volume of the Transatlantic Captive
Departures from the Bight of Biafra and All African
Regions Combined, Primarily Five-Year
Intervals, 1531–1740 33
2.2. A Sample of Captive Prices (in Copper Bars) in
New Calabar and Old Calabar, 1678–1704 36
2.3. The Volume of the Transatlantic Captive Departures
from the Bight of Biafra and All African Regions
Combined, Five-Year Intervals, 1701–1805 38
2.4. Time Spent by Ships at African Ports, 1751–1800 39
2.5. Daily Average Number of Captives Loaded
Per Vessel, 1701–50 41
2.6. Daily Average Number of Captives Loaded
Per Vessel, 1751–1800 41
2.7. Estimated Departures of Captives from Bight of Biafra
Ports by Quarter Century, 1651–1850 (in thousands) 46
3.1. Division of Spheres among Aro Lineage-Groups 61
3.2. Principal Aro Settlements at the Edge of the Igbo
Heartland 62
ix
x Tables and Figures
4.1. Arondizuogu Lineage-Groups before 1890 and

the Probable Original Occupiers of the Land 89
4.2. Sequence of Nucleation of Arondizuogu Lineage-Groups 92
4.3. Lexicostatistics of Arochukwu, Arondizuogu, Nri-Awka,
and Non-Aro Communities Around Arondizuogu 109
6.1. Proportion of Females Leaving the Gold Coast, the
Bight of Benin, and the Bight of Biafra, 1601–1864 151
6.2. Women, Girls, Men, and Boys Leaving Major
Embarkation Points in the Bight of Biafra,
Selected Quarters, 1651–1850 (in percents) 155
Figure
2.1. Arochukwu Structure 28
THE BIGHT OF BIAFRA
AND ITS HINTERLAND Map NIGERIA
Area
Rio
CAMEROONS
Nun GABON
0 25 50 75 100 km Cape
Bight Lopez
of
Scale 1:2 800 000 Biafra
MODERN
AFRICA
BENUE RIV
RIVER
ER
M I D D L E B E L T
er
iv
Idah
R
LA
ra
A
Anamb
Nsukka
A
N IG
H
S
I
Nike
Ma
m Eza
BENIN
u
CITY Udi
R
Awka
Agbo Asaba Ndieni
Nri Ndikelionwu
Ibusa s
Onitsha Ndiowuu
os R
Uburu
Cr
R
Igbo- Ajali
ive
G E
Ukwu Arondizuogu Afikpo

r
Osomari Okigwe
N I
Isieke Eda
I S
Oguta Abiriba
Nkwere Ohafia
Uzuakoli Abam
r
U
Abo
R
ve
Bende
Orashi
Owerri
A
Ri
AROCHUKWU
En
M
yo
A
ng
R
BIG
Inokun
o
Itu
Aba
Im
IO
HT
Old
IB
Calabar
IB
OF
Nung Asang
BE
Ne
Op
ob
w
N
o
Ca
An
la
BO
IN
ba NN on
d
n Brass r Y i
Nu
Rio
T OF BIAFRA
BIGH
xi
Preface
The human traffic through which African societies supplied the labor
needs of the Americas invokes many fundamental questions. Some of the
most persistent questions are why Africa supplied so many captives; how
the trade was organized; what its political, social, and cultural implica-
tions were; what the gender and ethnic composition was; and how the
trade affected the societies involved. The answers to these questions are
the primary focus of this book. They are addressed from the vantage
point of the Bight of Biafra, a major exporting region, extending from
the Niger Delta (exclusive of the River Nun) in modern Nigeria to Cape
Lopez in modern Gabon. The region supplied an estimated 13 percent of
all captives exported between 1551 and 1850, which made it the third
most important supply region after West-Central Africa and the Bight of
Benin. What marked out the Bight of Biafra slave trade was its unusual
trajectory. Departures of captives from the region increased fivefold
between the last quarter of the seventeenth century and the last quarter
of the eighteenth century (Table 0.1). Concomitantly, the majority Igbo
of the hinterland were probably the largest single African group arriving
in North America and several Caribbean destinations for much of the
eighteenth century. The traffic closed down quickly in the 1840s, but for
most of the preceding century, the Bight of Biafra had been the second
most important region for captives taken to the Americas (though lagging
well behind West-Central Africa). How did a region that once supplied
a small number of captives so quickly become the second most impor-
tant supply region in the eighteenth century, in spite of the absence of
large centralized states? In comparison to the well-known ever-increasing
demand for African slave labor that the sugar revolution stirred in the
xiii
xiv Preface
Table 0.1. Estimated Volume of Biafra Captive Exports, 1551–1850, by

Twenty-Five-Year Period
Period Bight of Biafra All Africa Biafra Percentage

of African Total
1551–1575 3,383 61,007 5.5
1576–1600 2,996 152,373 2.0
1601–1625 2,921 352,843 0.8
1626–1650 33,540 315,050 10.6
1651–1675 80,780 488,064 16.5
1676–1700 69,080 719,674 9.6
1701–1725 66,833 1,088,909 6.1
1726–1750 182,066 1,471,725 12.4
1751–1775 319,709 1,088,909 16.6
1776–1800 336,008 1,471,725 16.7
1801–1825 264,834 1,925,314 14.1
1826–1850 230,328 2,008,670 13.0
Grand Totals 1,592,478 12,231,600 13.0
Slavevoyages.org. Numbers with decimal points are not precise because of rounding.
Americas, there is still much to explore about how African regions met
this demand.
The Aro, who call themselves “Aru,” inhabit a conspicuous place in
the history of the inglorious slave trade. They dominated the slave trade
in inland Bight of Biafra from their Arochukwu homeland, north of the
Cross River–Enyong Creek estuary in the southeastern portion of the
Nigerian section of the region. The Aro were a peculiar group. Though
the region was marked by “stateless” societies, Aro organization did in
fact have characteristics of a state. Yet, it was rather a peculiar organi-
zation as a diaspora – rather than a state – which explains the rise and
expansion of the region’s transatlantic slave trade. The following chap-
ters elaborate this proposition.
This study treats the Aro trading network as a trade diaspora, in spite
of the relatively small geographic space of the Bight of Biafra. The enor-
mous ethnolinguistic diversity and the evolution of ethnic identity of
the region warrant such a perspective and explain the treatment in this
study of the slave-trade-era Aro as a separate cultural phenomenon, even
though they are today little more than a subgroup of the Igbo. By the
seventeenth century, Arochukwu culture and dialect had emerged as a
hybrid of Igbo, Ibibio, and Akpa elements; Arochukwu itself is located in
the Igbo-Ibibio-Ejagham borderland. Hybridity – a process undergone in
Preface xv
different forms and degrees by much of Atlantic Africa during the slave
trade era – continued in the Aro diaspora. The process was perhaps more
marked among the Aro than was the norm in the Bight of Biafra.
Although the vast majority of present-day Aro people either identify
themselves or are identified by others as Igbo, to impose such an iden-
tity on the period covered in this study is an anachronism. Arochukwu’s
multiethnic origin shaped Aro social structures and identity during the
period covered in this study. Contrary to the sections of pre-twentieth-
century Aro population that originated among groups that came to see
themselves as Igbo, the case with the Aro tracing their own origins else-
where is different. Neither can we simply conflate as Igbo the Aro com-
munities that still remain outside Igboland, principally among the Ibibio
in the Cross River region and the Igala in the Middle Belt. It should be
noted that the Igbo group covered a much smaller area before the late
nineteenth century than they came to occupy in the twentieth century.
That an Igbo group in the sense that we have come to know them in the
twentieth and twenty-first centuries did not exist in the era of the trans-
atlantic slave trade is not in question; what is subject to debate is whether
there were any people who identified themselves as Igbo and, if so, when
they began to do so.1
For the most part, the application of “Igbo” to much of the period cov-
ered in this book is not meant to project a pan-Igbo identity as currently
exists but to refer to a group of societies that later constituted Igboland.
A reading of historical and anthropological studies of the region, as well
as ethnographic observations during the late twentieth century, suggests
that Igboness came to involve (perhaps not exclusively) four basic ele-
ments in addition to a common language – two deities, the Ala/Anị/Ana
earth deity and Chi personal god, and reverence for two crops/foods, yam
(ji) and kolanut (ọjị). Except for peripheral societies that migrated into
the Igbo area after the overseas slave trade had gathered momentum in
the region, the societies that became Igbo seem to have in the main shared
a strong social and spiritual attachment to yam and kolanut, but only
those within the perimeter referred to as the Igbo heartland and which
had additionally subscribed to Ala and Chi deities are assumed to have
1
The earliest written reference to the group was when Spanish missionary in the Americas
Alonso Sandoval entered “Ibo” in his collection of ethnolinguistic groups, which was
how some people located in a place we now know as Igboland were referred to and
probably how some people referred to themselves as well ([1627] 1956:94). For various
perspectives, see Leith-Ross 1939:56; Oriji 1994:5; Gomez 1998, chapter 6; Nwokeji
2000:629–33; Northrup 2000; Chambers 2002; Byrd 2008:17–33, 56, 261n.
xvi Preface
become Igbo at the onset of the overseas slave trade.2 At any rate, the
process of Igboization would seem to have begun with – at least in part –
the embrace of yam and kolanut reverence.3 These two foods/crops – as
will be shown in this study – played important roles in shaping the struc-
ture of the slave trade in the Bight of Biafra.
2
Explicitly and implicitly, anthropologists have identified Ala as the most important deity
among the Igbo (Meek 1937:20, 24–33; Ottenberg 1959:136). There was a larger num-
ber of units in the Igbo pantheon, but some of these were not pan-Igbo even at the turn
of the twentieth century, in the sense that nearly all the groups that referred to them-
selves as Igbo had come to be associated beyond Ala and Chi. The heartland is the home
of an inner core, the “autochthonous” communities of Igboland – a group of societies
whose peoples have continuously occupied the area for so long that their traditions locate
their origins in the vicinity of their present abodes. For the autochthones, see J.O. Ijoma
1986c:11; Ifemesia 1979:21; Isichei 1976:67; G.I. Jones 1963; Ohadike 1994:12; Oriji
1994. The autochthones may be deemed the first-order Igbo, followed by the rest of the
heartland. Beyond the heartland, we find an outer ring of groups that had significant
non-Igbo elements, such as Arochukwu, several other Cross River Igbo groups, southern
Igboland – principally the Ngwa, Ndoki, and communities to their south – as well as the
societies around and beyond the city of Enugu. Finally, there are groups that migrated
into the region in the course of the transatlantic slave trade, mostly in riverine regions,
such as Onitsha, Oguta, Abo, Igga, and many of the West-Niger Igbo societies. Historian
John Oriji (1994:5) has drawn attention to the presence in the Igbo heartland of Amaigbo
(Ama-Igbo, meaning “Igbo Square”), the ancient town to which many Isuama Igbo com-
munities trace their origins, and the historic Igbo-Ukwu (“Grand Igbo”), in which the
archeologist Thurstan Shaw (1970a, 1970b) uncovered artifacts of ninth-century vintage,
which suggests that the nucleus of Igboland was perhaps the Amaigbo/Igbo-Ukwu axis
of the so-called Igbo heartland. The human figures found among the artifacts had the
distinctive ichi marks on their faces, a practice that continued in the Nri-Awka area up
to recent decades (Ifemesia 1979:18–19, 89). There is a dialectical variation in the ways
people of the Amaigbo and Igbo-Ukwu subregions of the Igbo heartland pronounce the
earth cult – Ala in the case of Amaigbo and Anị/Ana in the case of Nri. There are no
dialectical variations in the pronunciation of the other key terms – ọjị (kolanut), ji (yam),
and Chi, except for the nasalization that mark some dialects. The cultural landscape of
the region was, however, more fluid than this schema might imply. A given group may
have combined cultural forms that related more to groups outside than the ones inside
the category it is placed in, a reflection of relentless movement of people and ideas. Aro
diaspora communities were in very recent centuries established in areas long settled by
autochthones and heartland groups.
3
Originally, Ikeji itself celebrated the beginning of yam harvest among the Aro, although
the festival changed significantly after trading became the principal occupation of the
Aro. Kolanut also played a central role in Aro covenants with their trading and political
allies as well as in inducting newly acquired slaves into the household (Kanu-Igbo 1996b;
J.G. Okoro 1996). The present writer has not seen any evidence in support of the exis-
tence of Chi and the Ala cult among the Aro before the nineteenth century. An instance
of Ana emerges among the Aro diaspora of the Ndieni cluster, located in the Nri-Awka
region, in the late nineteenth century. Ikeji, Ihu, and to an extent the Ana cult (Ajana) are
discussed in detail in Chapter 4. The role of yam and kolanut in shaping the structure of
the slave trade is analyzed in Chapter 6. Aro traditions refer to gifts of kolanuts and yams
accompanying the Ihu “homage” rite, and to wives giving their husbands kolanuts during
the Ikeji festival (Arodiogbu 1996; Nwankwo and Okereke 1996).
Preface xvii
With their Arochukwu homeland located in the southeastern periph-

ery of what we now call Igboland and having significant sections of their
population speak languages and subscribe to customs significantly differ-
ent from what was later recognized as Igbo, the Aro had not subscribed
to Ala and Chi at the onset of the overseas slave trade, even though most
of them seem to have adopted kolanut and yam reverence. The process
of Aro Igboization intensified with Aro expansion into the Igbo heart-
land in the mid-eighteenth century, and the process accelerated during the
twentieth century. As emerges in the following pages, there is a difference
between the Aro who left the Igbo-Ibibio-Efik borderland to establish
settlements in the Igbo heartland and present-day inhabitants of those
settlements, themselves mostly descendants of non-Aro Igbo immigrants
who joined incoming Aro charter groups. The ethnolinguistic diversity
of the Bight of Biafra, the close relationship of trade and culture, and
the need to cast light on the background of the African diaspora in the
Americas justify a cultural perspective to the study of the region’s slave
trade.
The pivotal role the Aro diaspora played in the rise of the Biafra
Atlantic trade shaped and was shaped by both external forces and the
region’s political economy, defined as the totality of the region’s eco-
nomic, political, cultural, social, and ideological processes. The Aro built
their influence mainly by extending preexisting commercial infrastruc-
ture and adapting spiritual norms to new circumstances (Ijoma and
Njoku 1991:307; Northrup 1978b:142). And expanding trade in the
eighteenth century was, in the first instance, the function of increasing
Euro-American demand. Although shaped by internal developments, the
trade and its aftermath affected the region in many ways. By asserting
the collaborative relevance of both internal and external factors, this
study departs from the strong tendency in African studies to see histori-
cal agency as deriving from either one or, and the other. The interactive
approach seeks agency in both internal and external processes and exam-
ines how their interaction produced change. This approach throws light
on the Atlantic world into which the Aro sold people, not only for pecu-
niary ends but also for other reasons touching on particular visions of the
political and social order. By focusing on one region of Atlantic Africa,
the present study provides some basis for understanding developments
in the Atlantic region. The following chapters explore African patterns
of supply, American patterns of demand, and the sociocultural processes
underpinning them. This study should thus be read more than simply as
an analysis of the slave trade in the Bight of Biafra. It makes pertinent
connections and comparisons with other regions at many junctures; two
xviii Preface
of these connections – the use of the average daily loading rates of slave
ships to measure the intensity of slaving interregionally and the implication
for the gender structure of the slave trade of the culture and commerce that
developed around kolanut – are introduced here for the first time.
The arrangement of the chapters is both chronological and thematic.
There are chronological overlaps, but even within the affected sections,
I have strived to present the material chronologically. Chapter 1 details
the historical and historiographical contexts of the Biafra Atlantic slave
trade, and stakes out the claim that the rise and expansion of the Aro
merchant group and their organization as a trade diaspora were pivotal
to the massive expansion of the Biafra trade in the mid-eighteenth cen-
tury. In Chapter 2, I relate the chronology of Aro expansion during its
first and second phases to the oscillations in the Biafra Atlantic trade up
until 1807, when the British, carriers of the bulk of the region’s trade,
abolished the traffic. Focusing on the second and third phases, Chapter 3
situates Aro slaving in the regional context with an emphasis on Aro
organization between the 1740s and 1850s, a period that captured both
the expansion and decline of the Biafra Atlantic slave trade. I link cultural
and economic processes within the Bight of Biafra to the Atlantic slave
trade in Chapters 4–6, presenting slaving within the region, not just in
terms of economic relationships, but also in terms of collateral, social,
cultural, and ideological systems. Chapter 4 illustrates how the formation
and expansion of the Aro diaspora as a result of the expanding overseas
slave trade reconfigured the geocultural landscape of the Bight of Biafra
hinterland. On the other hand, endogenous sociocultural practices, such
as slavery, means of enslavement, and conceptions of the Atlantic world
helped to shape the composition of export captives. The means, process,
and structure of slaving are thus the subject of Chapter 5, with a focus
on who got enslaved or retained in the region, and who got shipped to
the Americas, how and why. Chapter 6 engages with the unusual gender
structure of the Biafra slave trade and explains it by patterns of domestic
consumption, ritual, warfare, gender division of labor in agriculture, and
long-distance trade. Chapter 7 continues the story of cultural changes
imposed by the Atlantic slave trade into the final phase of Aro expansion
between 1850 and 1902, highlighting the increased incidence of warfare
both as the long-term effect of slaving and as the immediate impact of
the end of the overseas slave trade. Detailed analysis of the demographic
impact has been left out because it has received attention elsewhere
(Nwokeji 2000). It suffices here to affirm that the demographic impact
was less severe in the Bight of Biafra and its hinterland than in most other
Preface xix
regions, not because fewer captives were removed from here, but because
the region gained population from immigration from outlying inland
areas, and did not suffer the adverse effect of the additional slave trade
from across the Sahara. Unlike other West African regions, that trade was
marginal in the region. Chapter 8 summarizes and concludes the study.
A detailed note on the sources appears at the end.
In the course of writing this book, I have accumulated debts of grati-
tude to numerous individuals and organizations. At the University of
Toronto Ph.D. program where it all began, the history department, School
of Graduate Studies, and the Center for International Development gave
generous funding. Over the years, funding has also come from the history
department and the Institute for African American Studies, both of the
University of Connecticut (UConn), as well as from the African American
studies department and the Chancellor of the University of California,
Berkeley. This book has benefited from the congenial atmospheres and
resources afforded me in the following institutions where I have held visit-
ing positions over the years – the history department of Emory University,
the DuBois Institute for Afro-American Research at Harvard University,
the Gilder Lehrman Center at Yale University, and Zentrum Moderner
Orient, Berlin, Germany. I enjoyed the assistance of many librarians and
archivists in several countries, but I would like to single out U.O.A. Esse
of the Nigerian National Archives, Enugu, and Father Leo Laden of the
Holy Ghost Provincialate, Dublin, Republic of Ireland. Among the elders
who taught me aspects of Aro and Igbo history are the late Eze John O.
Dike and Eze Jonas Ekemezie Uche, as well as K.G. Ufere, the late Aaron
Muotoh, Michael Sunday Igwe, the late Jacob Okoro, Ukobasi Kanu-
Igbo, J.G. Okoro, Thomas Okereke, the late Eneanya Akpu, and Azubuike
Nkemakonam Nwaokoye-Emesuo (Periccomo). The late Princewill Imo
gave me an insight into the Izuogu lineage in a way few are able and
willing to offer. Obi and Ngozi Uche helped me clarify some items in
the Aro vocabulary. Ohiaeri Okoro, Aloy Igbo and Fritz-Canute Ngwa,
and my cousins Ifeanyi Ike and Emeka Okoronkwo, helped during cru-
cial junctures of the fieldwork; Udi Ojiako provided me invaluable mate-
rial about and insight into Nri-Awka history. I would like to single out
J. Okoro Ijoma and the late Rev. Canon Amos Egwuekwe D. Mgbemene
(“AED”) for their assistance during my fieldwork, including giving access
to sources and contacts and their own invaluable intellectual reflections
on Aro history. All my colleagues in the history department of UConn
during 1999–2003 and in the African American studies department at
Berkeley since 2003 have given me every support possible.
xx Preface
Numerous scholars have contributed in many ways to the extent that

it is possible to inadvertently omit several, and I apologize to those who
I may leave out. I count myself extremely lucky to have been a student of
Martin Klein, who introduced me to slavery studies and supervised the dis-
sertation that gave rise to this book. He always asked the hard questions,
gave generously from his time and personal financial resources, and has
tirelessly motivated me over the years to publish this work. Almost like a
guardian angel, Paul Lovejoy has always been there from the time of my
introduction to slavery studies to now, giving me as much attention as he
would his own formal students, and he shared generously from his exten-
sive knowledge of the slave trade. David Eltis has been a wonderful mentor,
inspirer, and friend, and has always done more than I could ask for. Michael
Levin and Nakanyike Musisi were of great assistance at the University of
Toronto. Southeastern Nigerian scholars of my generation owe enormous
intellectual debt to those who have paved the way for us, most promi-
nently the late Adiele Afigbo, Ebiegberi Joe Alagoa (my teacher), the late
K. Onwuka Dike, the late Felicia Ekejiuba, Robin Horton, the late
G.I. Jones, Elizabeth Isichei, David Northrup, and Simon Ottenberg.
Many others deserve credit for comments on drafts of this book – five
anonymous reviewers for Cambridge University Press; Toyin Falola who
commented extensively on an advanced draft and has always provided
useful advice; Gloria Chuku, Jonathan Sadowsky, and Bob Shenton who
offered insightful comments on a very early draft, just as Steve Behrendt,
Robin Law, and Sean Hawkins did on several draft chapters. John Thornton
has been extremely supportive of this work and my career over the years,
among other things, drawing my attention to useful sources and shar-
ing his translations of pertinent passages from the writings of Christian
Georg Andreas Oldendorp (2000). Three other friends have also helped
me with translations – Heike Raphael-Hernandez Onyinye Obidoa with
portions of Oldendorp 1995a and 1995b, and Victor Madeira with pas-
sages of Alonso Sandoval’s book. David Dickson, the late Felicia Ekejiuba,
Jane Guyer, Susan Hargreaves, the late Martin Lynn, Obi Nwakanma,
Ikem Stan Okoye, John Peel, Richard Rathbone, Obiora Udechukwu,
and Innocent Uzoechi graciously helped with various resources when I
intruded in their lives.
Over the years, I have benefited enormously from advice by Jerome
Handler, the late Ogbu Kalu, Richard Roberts, David Richardson, and
Chris Youé. The following people – many of whom are also great friends –
have supported me in various ways: Ibrahim Abdullah, Bendi Agocha,
Andrea Arrington, Johnson Asiegbu, Edna Bay, Eli Bentor, Carolyn
Preface xxi
Brown, Alex Byrd, Michael Echeruo, Felix Ekechi, Peter Ekeh, Michael
Gomez, Gwendolyn Hall, Axel Herneit-Sievers, Jocelyn Jacquot, Joseph
Inikori, Ray Kea, Tony Kirk-Greene, Joseph Miller, Kristin Mann, Phil
Morgan, Ben Naanen, Onwuka Njoku, Chidi Nwaubani, Onaiwu
Ogbomo, Andrew Okolie, Rachel Sullivan, Vincent Bakpetu Thompson,
Maureen Warner-Lewis, and Hans Zell. My thanks also go to the late
Don Ohadike, to whom this book is dedicated.
Finally and by no means the least, I salute my family for doing every-
thing for me. My parents, Godwin Ukobasi and Christiana Ejenene
Nwokeji, challenged me to be the best I can be but they are no longer
around to see this book. I am grateful to my wife Nnenna and our chil-
dren Anaezi, Nwaka, and Ukaobasi, who have come to enrich my life
and have sacrificed much in the long course of writing this book. I also
salute my siblings and their spouses for their support: Georgy Umenaa
and Philip Umunnakwe, May Enda and Tony Okafor, Uche Cele and Fab
Amobi, Oby and Uche Ikoro, and Maureen and Obi Anadi. For many
stimulating intellectual exchanges, I am grateful to my father-in-law, His
Royal Highness Eze (Professor) Green Nwankwo. Of course, I alone am
responsible for any remaining errors.
Foreword
Paul E. Lovejoy
The interior of the Bight of Biafra has been somewhat of an enigma in the
attempt to reconstruct the history of Africa during the era of transatlantic
slavery. Its importance in the peopling of the Americas is clear. Perhaps
one in six enslaved Africans came from the region. And while there is
disagreement in estimating the relative proportions of people who can be
identified as Igbo, Ibibio, and other ethnic categories and, indeed, in the
meaning of these categories, it does seem certain that most people came
from the relatively densely populated areas immediately inland from the
coast behind the Niger Delta. Although Portuguese and other European
traders did acquire some enslaved Africans from the Bight of Biafra in
the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the overwhelming majority of
people from the region left in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries,
and especially in the century after circa 1730. The enigma is that it has
been difficult to document this migration, the causes of enslavement,
and any relevant political and economic factors that might explain the
phenomenon and its timing.
The reason for this difficulty relates to two factors. First, there is a
paucity of documentary and oral sources that might be used in historical
reconstruction for the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Second,
there seems to be what might be called a “wall of silence” in the region
about the past. Perhaps the lack of centralized institutions that can pre-
serve details of the past explains this problem. There seem to be few
historical benchmarks, such as the accession to office of political figures,
their deaths, major battles, and such chronologically specific details that
can be useful in historical reconstruction. There is historical memory, of
course, but it is often connected with titled societies and associations that
xxiii
xxiv Foreword
require initiation and secrecy rather than the accumulation of knowl-

edge about the chronological past. The political and social titles were
related to positions of rank, but these are difficult to identify with specific
individuals within a precise chronology. History tends to be telescoped,
therefore, which has meant that historians have had to be innovative in
attempting to provide a structure to analyze change over time.
For these reasons, G. Ugo Nwokeji’s study of the Aro is important. One
of the exceptions, the Aro have retained memories and traditions that
help to establish a chronology for the interior of the Bight of Biafra. As
the principal merchants in slaves and other commodities of long-distance
trade, Aro merchants have left traditions of origin, settlement, and inter-
nal migration that coincide with the expansion of the slave trade in the
Bight of Biafra. Nwokeji follows in the footsteps of K.O. Dike, F. Ekijuiba
and David Northrup, whose pioneering work established the Aro role in
the history of the Bight of Biafra. But the difficulty of historical recon-
struction tied to a chronological framework plagued their research. By
drawing on the latest estimates of the scale and timing of slave departures
from the Bight of Biafra, Nwokeji is able to establish a chronology that
can be correlated with Aro settlement patterns and oral traditions in the
interior. The results of his analysis will be subject to debate and refine-
ment, but the methodological breakthrough deserves notice.
How are historians to deal with gaps in documentation and histori-
cal memory that is telescoped? Why is it that in some places there is a
wealth of historical documentation, while in other places it is difficult to
reconstruct the basic chronology of the past? It seems as if some societies
and some eras want to remember and document events, whereas in other
contexts, such detail is not considered necessary and perhaps is even not
desirable. Does the effort to restrict knowledge as “secrets” of titled soci-
eties interfere with historical memory? Can we talk about the interior of
the Bight of Biafra as an area that was “without history” in that historical
details were secondary to the focus on attainment, as measured in titles
and membership, in which inheritance and tradition were tailored to the
future rather than to chronicling the past? How did such constructions
of knowledge and society affect those who were taken to the Americas
as slaves? Nwokeji attempts to confront these questions in a provocative
new interpretation of the history of the interior of the Bight of Biafra.
1
Introduction
In about 1733, Izuogu Mgbokpo, an Aro merchant from Arochukwu,

in the Cross River region of what is now southeastern Nigeria, settled
his people, or ndị (a generic term for offspring, henchmen, followers,
clients, and slaves), on a major trade route located some 30 kilometers
west of the upper Imo River in the densely populated central Igboland.
Called Aro-ndi-Izuogu (Izuogu’s people’s Aro, conventionally writ-
ten as Arondizuogu), this settlement eventually became the largest
and most populous Aro settlement. Other Aro merchants soon estab-
lished settlements farther northwest and in the densely populated part
of Ibibioland south of Arochukwu. These merchants were part of an
intricate network that accounted for the huge increase in the numbers
of captives leaving the Bight of Biafra after 1740. Neighboring people
supplied the Aro with produce, captives, and some porterage services,
while the Aro, in turn, provided foreign goods, indicating the extent of
the region’s entanglement with the emerging world economic system.
Among these goods, guns and gunpowder came from various European
centers, “george” cloth from the Netherlands and most other cloth from
India, while tobacco was being produced in the Chesapeake Bay region
in today’s United States, principally by Biafrans who had been exported
as captives of the overseas traffic.1
1
I reconstruct the foregoing detail from the following sources: NAE 81/27-OKIDIST
4/9/70; NAE OR/C/823-ORLDIST 3/1/359; NAE 12481A-MINLOC 16/1/1326; NAE
OKIDIST 19/1/1 1908–25; NAE ORLDIST 14/1/3; NAE 35/1920-OKIDIST 4/2/32;
NAE 38/22 OKIDIST 4/4/29; NAE CSE 1/85/6197A; Arodiogbu 1996; J.O. Dike 1996;
K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:205–08; Goodlife 1933, 1952; Heslop 1936; M.S. Igwe
1996; Michael Ike 1995; Mayne 1935; J.C. Nwankwo 1973; C. Okoli 1996; J.G. Okoro
1
2 Slave Trade and Culture in the Bight of Biafra
The Atlantic slave market provided attractive profits, but the Aro
always ensured that they retained within their group many of the people
they traded. As a small group, the Aro concentrated on group expansion
and depended economically on slaves as both merchandise and laborers.
Aro political contests, such as the civil wars and succession disputes, as
well as such social facts as marriage, tribute, and the incest prohibition
were deeply entangled with slaving. The people’s belief system and their
media of worship were grounded in, and reinforced by, slaving-related
processes. Their value system celebrated the ownership and prolifera-
tion of people and encouraged the sale of captives into Atlantic slavery.
The decision regarding whom to send into Atlantic slavery and whom
to retain was central to Aro political economy and, ipso facto, to this
study.
Aro slave trade involved both business and social engineering. The
overwhelming majority of captives that Aro traders bought from the
non-Aro people were random victims of war, kidnapping, and sundry
methods but many were innocent. The Aro welcomed craftsmen, artists,
medicine men, fortune seekers, refugees, and others who desired the pres-
tige and protection that Aro citizenship conferred during that time. But
even these noncaptive immigrants found that they could enter Aro society
only as protected persons under Aro patrons – normally males – who
were already well established there. The Aro concept of mmuba, mean-
ing, at the most basic level, “proliferation,” captured the phenomenon
of expansion. Aro oral history and folklore often refer to mmuba as an
end in itself, but this ideology also encapsulated the people’s desire to
increase the labor pool and to strengthen the Aro population for geopo-
litical purposes.
By the mid-nineteenth century, the Aro world comprised more than
150 diaspora settlements across the Biafra hinterland. These com-
munities celebrated common observances and maintained linkage
institutions, such as the annual Ikeji festival, the Ekpe society, and the
Ihu routine homage system. These institutions fostered and sustained a
strong pan-Aro identity that facilitated Aro political interests and com-
mercial hegemony. Yet, in spite of these linkage institutions, the Aro
diaspora was susceptible to the cultural influence of host societies and
1985:23–28; J.E. Uche 1996; Umo n.d. One enslaved African of Ibibio origin told German
Moravian missionary Christian Georg Andreas Oldendorp in Pennsylvania in the late
1760s that the Aro, whose land “was not too far from [Ibibioland],” supplied the Ibibio
with “riffles, sabres, powder, lead, linen, and the like” (Oldendorp 1987: 167).
Introduction 3
of the societies from which the Aro drew immigrants. For example, an
estimated more than 1 million inhabitants of the Aro settlements in cen-
tral Igboland, the vast majority of whom descended from people who
were not Aro 250 years ago, speak a dialect that deviates substantially
from the one spoken in metropolitan Arochukwu.2 The frontierspeo-
ple also brought with them new media of worship and developed new
taboos and even notions of class consciousness. These developments did
not result simply from the routine domestication that is associated with
frontier societies, colonists, or immigrant groups adapting to a new
environment; they were also shaped by the Aro struggle to dominate
trade in various parts of the Biafra hinterland. Ironically, while the Aro
diaspora altered Aro ways, sometimes radically, the Aro nevertheless
often remained aloof and distinct from the preexisting communities in
their immediate neighborhood, ostensibly in order to maintain strict
fidelity to Aro culture.
After the trade in palm oil replaced the Atlantic slave trade in the mid-
nineteenth century, most of the region’s food-producing groups devoted
more of their efforts to the production of palm oil and palm kernel oil.
Other groups became actively involved in the new trade, giving the Aro
keener competition than they had had in the days of the overseas slave
trade. These developments restructured the Aro economy and affected
Aro relationships with the non-Aro. By the 1890s, the Aro had begun to
produce foodstuffs for domestic consumption and, increasingly, for the
market, while continuing to dominate what was left of the slave traf-
fic, until the British Aro Expedition of 1901–02 overthrew the Aro and
imposed a new order. The present study elaborates the foregoing story
and situates it in Atlantic and regional contexts.
2
This estimate is from a 1.5 percent compounded annual growth rate of 45,000 inhabit-
ants in 1927 for Arondizuogu, by far the largest Aro diaspora settlement, plus a roughly
equal number of inhabitants for the rest of Aro settlements in central Igboland. A 1927
estimate put Arondizuogu’s population at 30,000 (see NAE 81/27-OKIDIST 4/9/70.
“Anthropological Report on Aros of Ndizuogu and Others”). The report itself shows that
colonial officials made their estimate based on one part of the town alone, the part that
fell into the Orlu District (making up most of the Arondizuogu territory west of the Imo),
leaving out the part that fell into the Okigwe District (east of the Imo and some territory
on the west bank). One 1935 report again covered only the Orlu part, as did the map
accompanying it (see Mayne 1935). I have increased this figure to 45,000 because the
1927 estimate underrepresented the population after leaving out east-Imo Arondizuogu.
This situation obviates any attempt to derive reliable census figures. Theresa Nwankwo
(1991:10) has claimed that a 1931 census put the population at 180,000, which would
drastically escalate present estimates. I have not seen this census.
Main Features, Organization, and Expansion

of the Overseas Slave Trade
Although the Biafra trade grew dramatically in the eighteenth century,
it represented a small part of the overall African Atlantic trade before
the 1740s. The region’s share of captives exported from all African
regions combined was only 5.5 percentage points in the first half of
the seventeenth century. Although there was an appreciable increase in
trade in the third quarter of the seventeenth century, the Biafra trade
quickly entered a long period of decline.3 By the 1670s, Bende, the prin-
cipal slave mart in the Biafra hinterland, was already well established
(Nwokeji 1997a). Captives leaving Bight of Biafra ports were carried
mainly on English ships; some 80 percent of Biafra captives ended up
in English America colonies during the eighteenth century.4 The region’s
share of total African trade rose by 13.6 percentage points between the
1700s and the end of the century. Eighteenth-century British slave trader
John Hippisley must have echoed his contemporaries’ sentiments when
he wondered “how Africa [was] able to supply … such prodigious num-
bers” (Hippisley 1764:1).
In the Bight of Biafra, the big surge in slave trade took place in the
1740s. The region exported an annual mean of about 13,800 captives
between 1741 and 1800; that number increased to about 20,000 a year
in the 1780s. Taking up only about 270 kilometers of coastline, the south-
eastern Nigerian portion of the Bight of Biafra was during this period the
site of the most intensive slaving in Atlantic Africa, accounting for 90
3
Except when otherwise stated, overall Biafra export figures are calculated from the
Expanded Online Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database (Slavevoyages.org). There are
many contending estimates. See Anstey 1975; Behrendt 1997; Curtin 1969, 1976; Eltis
1978, 1987, 1989b, 1995; Eltis and Richardson 1995a; Inikori 1976a, 1976b, 1978,
1992b; Lovejoy 1982b; Richardson 1989a, 1989b; Richardson and Behrendt 1995. See
Henige 1986; Inikori 1994a, 1994b, 1998; Lovejoy 1989; and Manning 1998b for analy-
ses of the historiography.
4
For the Biafra Atlantic slave trade to 1700, see Thornton 1999. John Thornton
states: “Undoubtedly … the greatest source of slaves for New Calabar [then the dominant
port] was the Igbo-speaking region” (11). As early as 1627, Spanish missionary priest
Alonso de Sandoval reported that Caravalies, as Biafra captives were then called, were
“innumerable” in Spanish America and spoke a variety of tongues (de Sandoval [1627]
1956:94, 96). A 1790s British House of Lords survey shows that the Bight of Biafra and
West-Central Africa accounted for 78 percent of all captives arriving in Jamaica from
known African ports. This pattern reflects that of other English colonies. Between these
two regions, the Bight of Biafra exported more (H. Klein 1978, 147–48, 150, 173). It
accounted for 40 percent of all British purchases just before abolition in 1807 (Law and
Lovejoy 1996).
Introduction 5
percent of the region’s overseas trade. The mid-century surge had impli-
cations for Biafra’s major ports. Bonny, serving mainly the trade from
the Igbo heartland, superseded Old Calabar as the region’s preeminent
port between 1726 and 1750; by 1750 it was the single busiest slaving
port in Africa north of the Equator. Turnaround rates at Biafra’s ports
also became significantly shorter than they were elsewhere. Indeed, the
1740s marked a turning point in the Biafra Atlantic trade. By the third
quarter of the century, the “trust” system, by which Europeans advanced
goods to African merchants on credit, had been well established (Lovejoy
and Richardson 1997, 1999). In addition to this extraordinary expan-
sion of trade, the Bight of Biafra exported higher proportions of females
than any other major coastal region. This characteristic deviated from
the focus of New World demand, which tilted heavily toward males. To
properly understand these unique features of the Biafra Atlantic slave
trade, a close examination of the institutions and processes that under-
pinned the trade in Africa is imperative.5
The Nigerian section of the Bight of Biafra was home to numerous
ethnolinguistic groups. The Igbo and Ibibio people predominated in the
region south of the Benue River, known today as southeastern Nigeria.
These two groups had long provided most of the export captives.6 German-
born Moravian missionary Christian Georg Andreas Oldendorp reported
a substantial Igbo and Ibibio presence in the Caribbean and North
America during the late 1760s. By the mid-eighteenth century, Biafrans
had become the largest African group in the Chesapeake.7 They were
also a substantial presence in the British Caribbean. Most of the captives
exported from Biafra – some 70 percent, according to most estimates –
passed through the Aro network (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990, 250;
Ijoma and Njoku 1991:300). The Aro were also the largest slaveholders
in the hinterland. More than any other group, they were linked directly
to region-wide institutions. Along with the coastal city state of Old
Calabar and Cross River Igbo warrior groups, the Aro participated in
5
Eltis 1986; Eltis and Engerman 1992, 1993; Galenson 1986:97–114; Geggus 1989:37–38,
40–41; Inikori 1992a; H. Klein 1978:174, 241–42; 1983:35–37; Lovejoy and Hogendorn
1979; Robertson and Klein 1983; Thornton 1991, 1998.
6
A 1953 census shows that the Igbo and the Ibibio made up respectively 68.56 percent
and 10.36 percent of the region south of the Benue River known today as southeast-
ern Nigeria. International Population Census 1953. (See “Population Census of Eastern
Region of Nigeria 1953.”)
7
Oldendorp [1777] 1995, 2000: ms. 427–28, 431–32, 459, 462, 464, 466. For the Virginia
evidence see Chambers 2005:10–11; Gomez 1998:115–16; Kulikoff 1986:321–23;
Morgan 1998:62, 63; Sobel 1987:5; Walsh 1997:67.
the Ekpe confraternity.8 This society settled credit matters and provided
local law enforcement, as well as monopolized the Nsibiri writing system.
The Aro controlled the Ibiniukpabi oracle, which served as the highest
court of appeal, including for the coastal city-states and communities on
the west side of the Niger River. Further, they maintained alliances with
Cross River Igbo warrior communities that facilitated Aro wars in differ-
ent parts of the region, operated the region’s rotational slave fairs, and
zoned virtually all parts of the region to individual Aro lineage-groups
as spheres of influence (mbia). Overseeing these mbia on a day-to-day
basis were a variety of permanent diaspora settlements corresponding to
the respective Aro lineage-groups. These settlements ranged from small,
peacefully established Aro presences within preexisting non-Aro lineage-
groups to large conquest settlements. The existence of Aro settlements in
areas separated by distance, language, and cultural practices within the
Biafra hinterland was an Aro hallmark.
In spite of this highly visible role, Aro organization and its basic chro-
nology are still in need of integration into Atlantic scholarship. Perhaps
the most promising line of inquiry is to relate Aro expansion to the
expansion of the Biafra Atlantic trade and to explain the correlation of
the two processes. Aro expansion occurred in four main phases. The first
phase – lasting from the beginning of the seventeenth century to the end
of the 1730s – witnessed the consolidation of the Arochukwu metro-
pole, the establishment of Aro influence in the Cross River Region, the
foundation of the principal market at Bende, Aro forays into Ibibioland
and central Igboland, and the rise of Old Calabar (the city closest to
Arochukwu) as Biafra’s principal port. The second phase – beginning
in about 1740 – witnessed great expansion in the Biafra export slave
trade, the establishment of Aro settlements in the Biafran hinterland,
and Bonny’s supersession of Old Calabar as Biafra’s principal port. This
period ended in 1808 when the British, carriers of some 80 percent of
Biafra captives, abolished slave traffic. The third phase of Aro expansion
began in 1808, following British abolition, to the end of the Atlantic
slave trade by 1850, the region’s deeper involvement in the overseas palm
oil trade, and the expansion of the domestic slave market. The fourth
and final phase began in the 1850s and ended in 1902, when the British
8
This society took the name Okonko in other areas, such as the Niger delta states and
southern Igboland where the Aro exported this institution. The role of this variant of the
society comes out most clearly in the work of John Oriji (Oriji 1982, 1983). The exami-
nation of the role of the Ekpe society as an agency of slave procurement awaits future
research.
Introduction 7
conquered Arochukwu. By the 1890s, the Aro had vigorously embraced

agriculture in an effort to minimize the pangs of the world depression
in the oils trade and to cope with their food needs. Along with a host of
domestic social implications, Aro adoption of agriculture generated con-
flicts when the group expanded into agricultural regions at the expense of
the preexisting communities. The Aro case highlights the interconnected-
ness of major changes in the Bight of Biafra with changes in the overseas
trade and its aftermath over three centuries.
The Aro in the Historiography of the Biafra

Slave Trade
The literature of the Bight of Biafra slave trade has often dealt separately
with the hinterland and coastal sections of the region rather than con-
sidering the two in their relationship within the Atlantic system. This
tendency has impeded the effective study of the region’s involvement in
the Atlantic slave trade. Consequently, Joseph Inikori has lamented the
neglect of the region in the production of studies dealing with the Atlantic
slave trade, despite a massive surge in captive export there in the sec-
ond half of the eighteenth century (Inikori 1994a:9). The literature of the
Atlantic slave trade has dealt with the coastal states rather than the hin-
terland, even though much of the trade was subject to influences from the
hinterland, while the work dealing with the hinterland did not actively
link the Aro to the Atlantic context.9
Aro historiography effectively began in the mid-nineteenth cen-
tury, when Europeans and Sierra Leone–based African returnees from
Atlantic slavery traveled the Niger River and began to pay special atten-
tion to the Aro. Based mostly on hearsay, their reports focused on Aro
omnipresence in the region via trade and/or oracular activities.10 British
attention to the Aro and efforts to suppress them left a trove of paper-
work, ensuring that Anglo-Aro relations and the Aro role in the domes-
tic slave trade during the postoverseas slave trade era – rather than the
overseas trade itself – loom large in the historiography. Interest in the
Aro continued into the early colonial period, although much of the
colonial-era literature was nonhistorical. Even the historical work that
9
For studies dealing with the Atlantic slave trade with a focus on coastal states, see Alagoa
1964, 1970, 1971a, 1971b, 1972, 1986; Cookey 1974; Hargreaves 1987; Latham 1973;
Nair 1972; Noah 1980; Wariboko 1991.
10
Allen and Thomson 1848a; Baikie 1856; Burdo 1880; Crowther and Taylor 1859; J.A.B.
Horton 1863:183–85; Hutchinson 1861.
germinated during that era did not produce much notable information
on the Aro trading system. Instead, it concentrated on Aro origins (G.I.
Jones 1939:101). In tune with the Hamitic hypothesis – the tendency to
attribute “civilizations” found in Africa to descendants of the Biblical
Ham – the British seemed bent on locating external provenance for the
Aro, one that would ultimately be linkable to Caucasian influence. The
resulting theories of Aro origins were so speculative that historian Adiele
Afigbo has insisted on putting them on the same footing as Aro sagas.
Afigbo’s analysis has itself come under severe criticism, illustrating the
continued interest in the subject.11
Major Arthur Leonard’s firsthand account of the Aro market at Bende
during 1896 was the first published work on the Aro. While Leonard
provided useful glimpses into a changing Aro society, as a harbinger of
British invasion, he was interested mainly in immediate strategic mat-
ters (Leonard 1898). Several British military officers generated useful
ethnographic information in a round of publications that appeared in
the wake of the Aro Expedition of 1901–02.12 The multivolume work by
colonial officer and anthropologist Amaury Talbot, published in 1926,
provided equal measures of useful and chimerical information on Aro
organization.13 In the 1920s and 1930s, the colonial government com-
missioned “intelligence” and anthropological reports that produced
significant knowledge of the Aro.14 From the 1930s through the 1960s,
local historians and other scholars in many communities in the region
did much spadework.15 The aforementioned sources did not, however,
11
Afigbo (1971b, 31; 1972a). Afigbo’s critique has, with some justification, been termed a
stretch (Nwauwa 1995, 110). As made clear in Chapter 2, however, Afigbo’s comments
on the genealogies collected by colonial administrators should be taken seriously.
12
A.G. Leonard 1906:34, 175, 183, 308–09, 287, 486; MacAlister 1902; Mockler-
Ferryman 1902:127, 222; Steel 1908; Venour 1902; Vickery 1906. For an illuminating
scholarly account of Aro-British relations up until the invasion, see Anene 1959.
13
Instances of the latter category are his claims that the Aro were of Carthaginian prov-
enance and that they ran a theocracy (Talbot 1926a:183; 1926b:50, 52, 338; 1926c:
592, 821).
14
See Anthropologists’ Papers 1927; Mathews 1922; Mayne 1935; Shankland 1933.
15
See Nwana [1933] 1950; Ojike 1947; Umo n.d. [1947?]; Igwegbe 1962, and Uku 1993.
A portion of Uku’s account that appeared in the West African Review (Dec. 1953) is
quoted widely. For more recent works see A.O. Anyoha 1977; Irono 1988; Mbadiwe
1991; E.O. Mmeregini n.d; E.O. Okoli 1977; J.G. Okoro 1985. For a representative
sample of theses, see Agu 1985; Anaba 1988; Chuku 1989; Emeruwa 1992; C. Eze 1987;
C.E. Igwe 1992; Imo 1980; G.C. Mmeregini 1978; Monye 1991; I.O. Nwankwo 1986;
J.C. Nwankwo 1973; T. Nwankwo 1991; D.C. Nwosu 1978; Onyensoh 1985; B.N.N.
Orji 1978.
Introduction 9
provide reliable chronologies and did not explicitly place the Aro in
regional trade, let alone the Atlantic system.
Serious historical inquiry into the Aro role in regional trade, however,
began with the seminal work of historian K. Onwuka Dike. Although
he focused on the coastal trading states, Dike referred to the Aro as the
“economic dictators of the hinterland,” and emphasized the role of their
oracle, Ibiniukpabi (K.O. Dike 1956:38). The role of oracles in Igbo social
organization has since been studied, as have the workings of Aro influence
and the importance of Ibiniukpabi, leading to the finding that this oracle
was not a major source of captives (S. Ottenberg 1958; 1971:24–26).16 It
was, however, the former British colonial officer and anthropologist G.I.
Jones who began to place the Aro in a regional chronological framework.
Based on the traditions of the coastal port states, Jones suggested that
the Aro had been formed by the mid-seventeenth century (Jones 1963,
134). This means that the Aro had been well established by the eighteenth
century when the Biafra Atlantic trade became prominent. Together, the
aforementioned works established the significance of the Aro in the region’s
political economy and commercial history. Unfortunately, however, these
important contributions did not stimulate scholarship in the hinterland.
Systematic analysis of hinterland trade began during the late 1960s.
The genealogy of this historiography starts with regional geographer
Ukwu I. Ukwu’s pioneering study of the regional marketing system, trade
routes, and delivery systems. Ukwu identified the conscious coordina-
tion of diaspora settlements with fairs and trade routes as the distinctive
feature of the Aro system (Ukwu 1967:1969). His work foreshadowed
the scholarly interest in regional trade, as well as in Aro operations and
the institutions that underpinned them, that developed during the 1970s.
Similar studies proliferated in the early 1970s (Ekejiuba 1972a, 1972b;
Northrup 1972; Ofonagoro 1972). Further, Afigbo mapped the extent of
regional trade and highlighted the hitherto neglected trade links between
southeastern Nigeria and the Middle Belt to the north, complementing
extant studies on Igbo–Middle Belt relations.17 It is noteworthy that the
relevant scholarship of the late 1960s and early 1970s concentrated on
trading mechanisms, trade routes, goods, and supply systems. It had little
to say on the implications of these processes for politics, culture, and
social organization.
16
K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990, 250; Ekejiuba 1972b, 12; J.O. Ijoma 1986c; Ijoma and
Njoku 1991:206, 300; Northrup 1978, 138; Ofonagoro 1972:83.
17
Afigbo 1973b, 1977; Boston 1968; Shelton 1971; Sargent 1999:173–89, 252–59.
A holistic approach to regional history developed from the mid-1970s.

Elizabeth Isichei’s (1973, 1976:49–67) work dealing with Igbo history
was the most notable example of this trend. The underlying theme of
Isichei’s work is transformations in the Igbo social economy. She traces
the process by which trade-induced migrations between the seventeenth
and nineteenth centuries helped to shape modern Igboland. The efforts
of many other scholars – university thesis authors, nonprofessional local
historians of increasing sophistication, and professional historians – have
since further clarified our understanding of this process through a pleth-
ora of cases studies. These contributions did not, however, relate Aro
expansion to the Atlantic slave trade.18
In their study of West Africa as whole, historians Paul Lovejoy and Jan
Hogendorn see the rise of the Biafra Atlantic trade in the mid-eighteenth
century as the culmination of four developments: expansion in the struc-
ture and organization of the coastal states; the role of the Ekpe society in
guaranteeing credit; the division of the lower Niger trade among the Ijo
and the Niger riverine states; and the consolidation of the Aro network
in the hinterland (Lovejoy and Hogendorn 1979:225–31). Lovejoy and
Hogendorn’s critical insight that the African slave trade was organized
around self-conscious regional cartels has received implicit support
from empirical findings about the institutional basis of the Aro network
in southern Igboland (Oriji 1982, 1983, 1987). Because Lovejoy and
Hogendorn’s study did not primarily focus on the Bight of Biafra, it did
not resolve the important question of the timing of the developments they
identified, an essential step in establishing the extent to which the trading
groups caused or resulted from them. The developments may have been
repercussions of major environmental and geopolitical changes in late-
sixteenth- and early-seventeenth-century West Africa, as Robert Sargent
has argued (Sargent 1999:15–20).
One common limitation of the Biafra literature is that, while gender
relations in the societies of the region have sometimes received attention,
the gender structure of the Atlantic slave trade has suffered neglect, even
though it has long been discernible to scholars not primarily focused in
18
For examples of pertinent studies done by professional historians, see Afigbo 1977,
1981a, 1981b, 1987; Ifemesia 1978, 1979; Ijoma and O.N. Njoku 1991; Oguagha 1991;
Ohadike 1994; Oriji 1987; O.N. Njoku 2000; Uya 1984. Of no less significance is the
work of anthropologist M. Angulu Onwuejeogwu 1975, 1981, 1987. For published
work dealing specifically with aspects of Aro history by a variety of authors, see K.O.
Dike and Ekejiuba 1990; Eni 1973; Ezekiah Muotoh 2000; Igwegbe 1962; Ijoma 1986b,
1994; Pita Nwana 1933; Ohia 2007; J.G. Okoro 1985; Uku 1993; Umo n.d. [1947?].
Introduction 11
the region.19 The gender structure of the slave trade has only recently
been the focus of analysis in the region (Nwokeji 1997b, 2000a, 2001).
Yet, the Bight of Biafra is of particular interest in understanding African
conceptions of gender. If, in other regions, the Euro-American drive to
secure men was only partially successful, it all but broke down in the
Bight of Biafra. In this region, the character of African warfare and the
role of women in the indigenous economy and in social institutions
shaped the age and gender structure of the slave trade differently from
elsewhere. Key elements in this process were African conceptions of slav-
ery and the division of labor, reproduction in the context of the lineage,
polygyny, and methods of enslavement. Because of the failure to tie the
Biafra trade to its Atlantic context, the implications for the aforemen-
tioned processes of the Aro being the preeminent trading group remain
unexplored.
Despite its limitations, the scholarship since the mid-1970s has repre-
sented two significant shifts. First, it reintegrated trade with its politics in
the manner Onwuka Dike enunciated in 1956. Some scholars now argue
that the Aro dominated regional trade precisely because they developed
strong state structures (see also K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1978, 1990;
Ijoma 1986b; Stevenson 1968). Second, this scholarship located the Aro
within the region-wide socioeconomic process. The Aro phenomenon
became central to the analysis of the regional political economy.
State and Diaspora

If there is a consensus about the Aro role in regional political economy,
the exact character of their social organization has been the subject of
fierce debate among specialists, best exemplified in David Northrup’s
Trade without Rulers (1978) and Onwuka Dike and Felicia Ekejiuba’s
The Aro of Southeastern Nigeria (1990). Each of these studies has been
up until now the basic reference on its subject – Northrup’s on regional
trade and Dike and Ekejiuba’s on Aro political economy, two themes that
are central to this study. Because these studies share a key concern with
Aro organization, the questions they raise are essential to the present
study.
19
For gender relations in the region, see Hargreaves 1987; Martin 1988, 1995; Oriji 1982.
For studies that have commented on the gender structure, see Eltis 1986, 1998; Eltis
and Engerman 1992, 1993; Eltis and Richardson 1997; Geggus 1989; Inikori 1992a;
H. Klein 1983, 35–37; Manning 1998a.
Like the present study, Northrup’s admirable and meticulously

researched work attempts to explain the existence of a complex com-
mercial structure in a region where decentralized political arrangements
were the norm. In a chapter titled “The God Men of the Slave Trade,”
Northrup correctly observes that the Aro were neither the only nor the
oldest trading group in the region, but that they transcended and combined
“into a single marketing grid the already existing regional networks of
trade through alliances with other leading trading people to bring them
into this economic structure” (Northrup 1978, 142). Northrup argues
that the people of the region evolved this complex commercial organiza-
tion without corresponding complex political institutions.
The uncommon nature of Aro organization does in fact invite scrutiny.
Perhaps the most conspicuous question mark on Aro statehood is the fact
that many Aro wars were indeed orchestrated and prosecuted by Aro lin-
eages and, increasingly, by individual merchant-warriors, rather than the Aro
as a whole. This was certainly not the case with such prominent West African
states as Benin, Dahomey, Asante, and even Oyo in its heyday.20 Northrup’s
argument refreshingly departs from state-centric approaches to the study of
precolonial African history by making a genuine attempt to study and under-
stand noncentralized societies on their own terms. Indeed, the existence of
states was not essential to the development of the slave trade.
Northrup insists, however, that Aro organization closely resembled
that of the rest of the Igbo. For him, the Aro “differed more by degree
than by kind” because they depended on, rather than transcended, the
segmentary organization that pervaded the region. He points to brutal
intra-Aro disputes as evidence of the weakness of Aro political organi-
zation, and to their supposed lack of “substantial state structures and
military force” as being responsible for their “inability to break through
to the coast to trade directly with European ships” (Northrup 1978:137,
139, 140–42, 145). Such far-reaching assertions deserve scrutiny given
that more evidence on Aro institutions has percolated in the more than
thirty years since Northrup’s remarkable work first appeared; that inter-
est in questions about the state persists; and that Aro organization and
regional trade are pivotal to the present study.21
20
This observation has been confirmed by Martin Klein’s recent survey of slaving in
decentralized societies, of which the Igbo region provides a prime example (M. Klein
2001, 63). Peter Ekeh has gone as far as arguing that slaving was actually heaviest in
decentralized societies (Ekeh 1990:680–82).
21
Although the Aro were central to Northrup’s work, his respondents were overwhelm-
ingly Ibibio (Nwauwa 1995:114). Northrup’s interviews with Aro people, although not
Introduction 13
To argue that politics played an insignificant role in Aro organization

is to separate economics from politics. It is not otherwise possible to
claim both that local alliances were indispensable to Aro organization
and that Aro expansion was economic, not political, as Northrup has
done (Northrup 1978:121, 142).22 Aro alliances have been widely linked
to Aro warfare precisely because they were a political phenomenon.23
The reality of social existence can be more complicated than the heuristic
distinctions scholars may seek to make between the concepts of trade and
politics. The people of the Bight of Biafra and, indeed, the rest of Atlantic
Africa, did not distinguish the political, spiritual, and material aspects of
their life as sharply as these categories imply at first sight.
Aro “inability to break through to the coast” and intra-Aro conflicts
have no necessary connection with state structures. A polity’s ability and/or
disposition to conquer all states in a given region is not a precondition for
a state. The Aro, in fact, experienced many more disputes than Northrup
highlighted, but such disputes do not necessarily mean the absence of
state structures; conflicts occur in all societies.24 Political philosophers
tell us that cooperation, competition, and conflict normally characterize
relations within the “political class” (see, e.g., Bottomore 1964:9). Much
more than in the Aro case, brutal civil wars visited eighteenth-century
Kongo Kingdom, often resulting in the overthrow of constituted author-
ity, decimation of the population of the capital, and its recolonization
with out-of-province people (Thornton 1992). Yet, the appeal of Kongo
political institutions and the legitimacy of the capital remained intact. As
Northrup himself recognizes, the “ability to achieve voluntary agreement
in time of crisis was the key to Aro organization,” and their tendency to
set up permanent diaspora settlements and commitment to a common
identity distinguished them from other groups (Northrup 1978b:104,
140, 142, 143). Contrary to Northrup’s claim, the diasporic characteristic
always indicated or necessarily borne out by respondents’ names, are self-evident in the
content of the interviews. In my estimation, seven of Northrup’s forty interviews were
among the Aro. They are Asiegbu 1973; Inokun 1972; Merem and Nwankwo 1973; K.
Oji 1972; F.E.S. Okoro 1973; Okori 1972; J. Udo 1972. For the transcripts, see Northrup
1972–73.
22
Northrup argues that the Aro were a political force only in Afikpo in Cross River
Igboland but were only economic imperialists elsewhere (Northrup 1978b, 121). Such
a distinction is unstainable given that such settlements as Inokun, Arondizuogu, and the
Ndieni cluster dominated both economic and political affairs.
23
Bentor 1994:104–08; K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:165–71, 174–86; Isichei
1976:82–87.
24
See, for example, K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:180–81; Igwegbe 1962:15–16, 43,
46–47, 91–93, 114–19; J.G. Okoro 1985:40–42.
of the Aro was a difference in kind, not simply of degree. The Aro were
the only group in the region that deliberately and consistently established
settlements abroad for the purposes of trade that were tied to the home-
land through systemwide institutions.
Fitting the Aro tightly into a stateless mold merely draws from and
reinforces the idealized notions of Igbo segmentarism rampantly assumed
in the literature.25 A detailed study of the Niger riverine states of Abo,
Oguta, Onitsha, and Osomari revealed that generalizations about an
Igbo political framework are only meaningful after each Igbo “cultural
area” has been studied in detail (Nzimiro 1972). Such research as has
been carried out in the past forty years or so no longer sustains the idea
that the region lacked rulers, or what Northrup (1981) called a “ruling
class.”26 For example, after examining the empirical evidence the mem-
bers of a multidisciplinary panel of Igbo social scientists generated, a
colloquy declared in 1986: “It will probably come as a surprise to many
of us, nurtured as we are on the principle [that is] now clearly under
severe pressure that Igbo enwegh eze (the Igbo have no king), to learn
that in traditional Igboland the ultimate authority figure was very often a
monarch of some kind” (Ahiajoku Lecture Colloquium 1986:ii). The fact
that the region had many rulers is not evidence that it had none (Afigbo
1981b). We cannot understand indigenous slavery and the Atlantic
slave trade by laying undue emphasis on leveling structures. The power
held by some individuals in the region over others determined people’s
fate – whether they would be enslaved and, if so, whether they would be
enslaved within the region or sent to the Americas.
Some of the most effective arguments against overemphasis on leveling
mechanisms come from Dike and Ekejiuba, who focus on stratification
and state institutions, as these characteristics concerned the historical
development of trade in the region. They insist that analyzing what the
Aro did, instead of pinpointing what they did not do, is more useful in
determining the true nature of their political organization. The ultimate
measure of Aro hegemony should emerge from a comparison with
regional polities unanimously acknowledged to have evolved state struc-
tures: the Middle Belt Igala kingdom suffered decentralization, disinte-
gration, and defections; Bonny (Biafra’s premier port state) split after a
25
Meek 1937; Green 1964; Carlston 1968:190–210; Echeruo 1979; Horton 1976;
Henderson 1972; Nwaubani 1994.
26
Afigbo 1973a; Anikpo 1985; Anyanwu 1993a:31–32; P.C. Dike 1986; Ubah
1987:168–72.
Introduction 15
civil war in 1869; and the Niger riverine Onitsha kingdom simply lacked
military muscle. Decentralization and disaggregation usually happened
to states – including Arochukwu – as a result of trade (K.O. Dike and
Ekejiuba 1990:81, 83–85). Dike and Ekejiuba periodize the history of the
Aro state into three phases – the pre-1650 period, the post-1650 period,
and the nineteenth century. The pre-1650 period corresponded with the
segmentary lineage system usually ascribed to the entire Aro history. The
period after 1650 was when King Akuma initiated state building, when
primogeniture prevailed, and Omu Aro (Aro coat of arms) was intro-
duced as a symbol of central authority.27 Finally, the nineteenth century
witnessed the accommodation of ethnic heterogeneity and a “dynamic
response” to external regions, such as “the absence of a centralized power
to challenge and compete with the Aro in the control of the [trade] of the
vast hinterland” (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:81–82, 96–103, 123).
The existence of spheres of influence among the respective Aro lineage-
groups is characteristic of state organization.
Yet, it is unlikely that the Aro had a high degree of centralization at
any point in their history. For instance, if the wars that produced Aro
settlements resulted from the initiatives and efforts of “a handful of Aro
households,” as Dike and Ekejiuba posit, these settlements can hardly
have simultaneously been private enterprises and state-sponsored proj-
ects (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:165). The crucial point perhaps is that
Aro expansion up to the early eighteenth century was state sponsored –
as illustrated in the appointment in a newly settled area of a resident
Mazi (Consul), usually a trusted confidant of the Aro king (K.O. Dike and
Ekejiuba 1990:69) – but had become the responsibility of private indi-
viduals just before mid-eighteenth century. This change perhaps resulted
from the rapid proliferation of diaspora settlements and the concomi-
tant expansion of the Bight of Biafra slave trade. This scenario contrasts
sharply with Dike and Ekejiuba’s own characterization of a trend toward
27
Okoro Kanu stresses Eze Agwu before Akuma was the first Aro to be addressed as
“Eze” as a title rather than a first name (Okoro Kanu 2000:15). Possibly, “Eze” was his
first name but because he turned out to be – in the words of Kanu – a “powerful” and
“accomplished ruler,” the largely acephalous Igbo adopted the name as a title to refer to
a person who exhibited authoritarian power, barring contrary evidence from elsewhere
in Igboland, notably Nri. Scholars are unsure of when such an institution emerged in Nri,
but they generally suggest a date much later than indicated by ninth-century artifacts
suggesting concentration of power in the hands of an individual or individuals. While M.
Angulu Onwuejeogwu asserts that the institution of Eze Nri did not emerge until “the
late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries,” Thurstan Shaw suggests the end of the
fifteenth century (Onwuejeogwu 1975:49; Shaw 1978:124).
increased centralization. Further, placing too much emphasis on a high

degree of centralization overstates the “assimilation” of immigrants and
slaves into Aro culture. While immigrant assimilation was crucial to the
Aro system, overemphasizing it obscures the profound impact that the
incorporated groups made on Aro culture, especially in the diaspora.28
Finally, the penchant for the centralized-state model promotes reference
to Aro settlements as “colonies,” a term that fails to capture Aro commu-
nities in their variety and complexities.
However, as is typical of the debate about precolonial African polit-
ical organization, which seems to assume that despotism is an essential
state characteristic, the aforementioned studies share a fixation with
the presence or absence of a centralized state. A state is effectively
assumed to be present wherever despotism exists and absent where
it is lacking. While Northrup showed successfully that nothing of the
kind existed in the region, he equates this absence with the absence of
state structures. On the other hand, political theorist Robert Stevenson
who, like Northrup, could not locate a despotic regime, lamented that,
although the Aro developed a state, it was not “full blown” (Stevenson
1968). Finally, Dike and Ekejiuba constructed an early autocratic state
that never was. Rather than accept the proliferation of settlements as
an essential feature of a trade diaspora in the context of expanding
trade, they bemoan the fact that this development “eroded the monop-
oly of power by the central government” (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba
1990:72). A high degree of centralization is not a necessary attribute
of a state and was not necessary for Aro expansion. Social scientists
have only recently begun to realize that the functions and effects of
states – including the most powerful ones – are enacted outside “insti-
tutionalized politics and established bureaucracies” (see Trouillot
2001:133). Like Michel Rolf–Trouillot, who made this observation,
some scholars may perhaps view this as a characteristic specific to the
state in the age of globalization; but states have exhibited this char-
acteristic for ages.
One can speak of an Aro state. The anthropologist Ronald Cohen
offers a simple but nuanced insight into state theory, which is relevant
to this argument. For Cohen, the distinguishing characteristic of a state
is “the formation and development of institutions counteracting the nor-
mal fissioning of the polity,” and he holds that “if a society fissions as a
28
Judith Okely (1996) has reiterated the pitfalls of the nondialectical characterization of
culture contact.
Introduction 17
normal or expectable part of political process,” it is not a state, regard-

less of the central government’s continuing ability to enforce decisions.
This is because states are “highly adaptive,” irrespective of the location
or specific characteristics of its constituent parts (R. Cohen 1981:81, 87,
92, 95). The Aro fit neatly into this formulation. Critically important is
the fact that no Aro groups ever seceded from the Aro fold at any point
in Aro history, in spite of their dispersion. The operations of specific Aro
institutions that promoted Aro interests and enabled the state to counter-
act fissioning are analyzed in the following chapters.
Even though one can speak of an Aro state, however, the key to
understanding Aro organization and regional trade is not the presence
of a state system or, for that matter, its absence, but in seeing the Aro as
a trade diaspora. Although so far ignored in regional literature, the sys-
tematic study of trade diasporas has been growing since the late 1960s.29
What Northrup described merely as Aro “predilection for commerce”
or “skill and single-mindedness” was, as anthropologist Abner Cohen
(1969:9, 98) illustrates with the Hausa experience, “not associated with
a basic personality trait, but with a highly developed economico-politi-
cal organization.”
Placing Aro settlements in the context of a trade diaspora throws light
on crucial aspects of trade organization, commercial politics, institutional
change, and cultural development. Thus, neither the variation in the sizes
of Aro diaspora communities nor their mode of organization was fun-
damentally peculiar. These elements made them a diaspora and gave
the Aro a distinct advantage in regional trade. “In short,” writes Abner
Cohen, who originated the concept of trade diasporas, a diaspora “is a
nation of socially interdependent, but spatially dispersed, communities”
(A. Cohen 1971:267). If there is a dominant theme to Aro history, it
ought to emerge from a systematic understanding of trade diasporas, not
in the existence or absence of a centralized-state system. The concept
of the trade diaspora has theoretical significance because trade diaspo-
ras are a universal phenomenon (Curtin 1975:62–63; 1984). They exist
today in the form that modern economic anthropologists refer to as
ethnically homogenous middleman groups (EHMGs) (see, e.g., Landa
1994). The Aro trading network was, therefore, a cultural phenomenon.
Anthropologist Karl Polanyi was correct in observing that the market
is only one of, and susceptible to, “a great variety of institutions” that
29
Baier 1980:57–67; A. Cohen 1969, 1971; Curtin 1971b, 1975, 1984; Eades 1993; Lovejoy
1980:28–45; 1982a; Lovejoy and Hogendorn 1979; Meillassoux 1971a; Roberts 1987.
underpin human existence.30 Thus, this study takes into account, not only
the market mechanisms, but also the geocultural context and implica-
tions of the slave trade.
The Aro diaspora presents a challenge for contemporary Igbo and
Nigerian cultural studies. The settlements are incompatible with the
existing taxonomies of Igbo subcultural areas. Daryll Forde and G.I. Jones
identify five subcultural groups for the Igbo: northern, or Onitsha; south-
ern, or Owerri; western; eastern, or Cross River; and northeastern (Forde
and Jones 1950). This spatial framework has advanced regional cultural
studies, but it is singularly inadequate for understanding the Aro cultural
experience. It restricts Aro settlements to Igboland, whereas many Aro
settlements existed and still exist in non-Igbo areas, such as Idomaland,
Igalaland, and Ibibioland. Inokun in Ibibioland was one of the largest Aro
settlements. Second, the Forde-Jones taxonomy locates the “Aro” in the
eastern or Cross River subgroup where the Aro metropole of Arochukwu
is located, and places Aro diaspora settlements in the cultural categories
of their respective vicinities. This framework implies that Aro settlements
lacked cultural personalities and had completely assimilated into neigh-
boring subcultures. Also, by not applying the Aro cultural category to
these Aro settlements, the taxonomy unwittingly collapses Aro (a group)
with Arochukwu (a place). Perhaps, a more appropriate taxonomy is the
one, advanced by Afigbo, based on interregional variations in the manifes-
tations of pan-Igbo achievement norms. For Afigbo, two distinctive ways
by which rewards and recognition were allocated to individuals sprouted
two subcultures – Igbo-Ọzọ, which emphasized title – taking, prominently
the Ọzọ, and Igbo-Abamaba, which emphasized membership of secret
societies (Afigbo 1991d). The Aro diaspora, like the homeland, clearly falls
into the latter category. Although this taxonomy is based on more mea-
surable criteria and does not claim to embrace all Igbo communities, it
shares the focus in Forde-Jones’s model in “areas” and so places different
Aro settlements in different “culture areas”. In short, the aforementioned
taxonomies ignore the distinctiveness of the Aro. Certainly, the Aro factor
renders futile any attempt to subdivide Igboland into subculture “areas”
and to straitjacket the Aro into being one more Igbo group.
There is a distinction between the terms “Arochukwu” and “Aro,”
and recognizing this distinction is crucial to understanding the Aro.
Arochukwu is a place, and Aro refers to a people and/or their culture
30
Polanyi 1957:245–46; Polanyi et al. 1957b:241; Bohannan and Bohannan 1968:220;
Curtin 1984:14; Ekkehart 1998.
Introduction 19
found in many Igbo and non-Igbo locations, including Arochukwu. This

distinction is distinguishable from art historian Eli Bentor’s claim that
the Aro diaspora has little cultural similarity with the Aro metropole.
For Bentor, Aro is primarily an identity – a way in which groups of
people represent(ed) themselves, rather than a cultural reference per se –
and the cultural and linguistic forms of Aro settlements are similar to
the communities in their immediate neighborhoods (Bentor 1994). By
implication, the Aro diaspora settlements cannot be located within an
Aro cultural frame and are not even a diaspora. Like Forde and Jones’s
approach, Bentor’s glosses over the cultural dimension of Aro-ness, a
conclusion he derived primarily from his observations of masquerading
in Arondizuogu – the most spectacular aspect of the Aro annual Ikeji
festival in the late twentieth century. Bentor is correct in observing that
deviations from Arochukwu practices are particularly striking in mas-
querading, which is a “a complex mixture of Aro, local, and innovative
cultural practices” (Bentor 1994:211).31 However, this observation does
not warrant conflating Aro diaspora cultures and those of their neighbors
or a conception of Aro-ness defined solely in identity terms. Rather, it
underscores the persistence of aspects of Aro cultural practices, despite
the incorporation of non-Aro ways. This was the case for both homeland
and diaspora; the Ikeji festival is in itself a pan-Aro institution, which
by virtue of its inherent yam reverence was rooted in Igbo culture. The
performance aspects of Ikeji may have changed in the diaspora, but
the rituals remained essentially the same as in the homeland during the
twentieth century. The most radical observation possible is that “Aro” is
primarily an identity and secondarily a cultural reference, but as Ikeji rit-
uals show, the cultural dimension has remained significant. Culture was
thus a principal element of Aro-ness. The development of the Aro culture
was tied to the history of the Atlantic slave trade.
Perspective
The rise and expansion of the Aro was the key influence that shaped
the character of the Biafra Atlantic slave trade. Aro incursions into the
densely populated Igbo heartland and the establishment there of their
most important settlements in about the mid-eighteenth century coin-
cided with the steady increase observed in the Biafra trade during this
31
For the Ikeji festival, also see K. Ike 1972; C. Okafor 1986:127–28; N. Okoli 1972 and
for masquerading in Igboland, see Nwabueze 1984.
time. The establishment of Aro frontiers in close proximity to the densely

populated Nri-Awka region coincided with another major shift in the
Biafra Atlantic slave trade; centrally located Bonny superseded easterly
Old Calabar as Biafra’s premier port during 1726–50. No previous stud-
ies have made the foregoing claims. The 1726–50 estimate locates the
time of this change more firmly than the recent estimate of 1730–79
offered by Lovejoy and Richardson (2004, 368–72). The shift of major
activity from Old Calabar to Bonny has been attributed to developments
in the port states and, especially, to the preferences of Euro-American
buyers (Hargreaves 1987; Latham 1973). So also are “important political
advantages at Bonny in credit security, commercial efficiency and the
promotion of impersonal exchanges” (Lovejoy and Richardson 2004,
372). While these developments at Bonny are important, they provide
at best a partial explanation for the shift. In actual fact, the shift in the
relative importance of the ports, the dramatic growth in the Biafra trade,
and higher volumes of captives largely reflected changes in existing trade
routes that accompanied the establishment of the Aro diaspora settlements
in densely populated central Igboland. Several of these communities were
unusually large. Arondizuogu and the Ndieni cluster (including Ujari,
now Ajali, and Ndikelionwu) on the banks of the Mamu River were
established virtually contemporaneously and through violence in the
mid-eighteenth century.32 Inokun in Ibibioland was the only other Aro
settlement that shared all these characteristics. This expansion followed
such seventeenth-century internal developments as consolidation of
Arochukwu in the Cross River region, the formation of the Niger riverine
states, and the expansion of the coastal states and changes in their orga-
nization, including the introduction of the credit-regulating Ekpe society
in Old Calabar.33
This study is self-consciously interactive, highlighting relationships
between the Aro and the rest of the region, between the Bight of Biafra
and the rest of Atlantic Africa, and between Atlantic Africa and external
32
Ndieni is a cluster of several Aro settlements on the northeastern fringes of the Nri-
Awka region in present Anambra State. The rest of Ndieni more or less proliferated from
Ujari and Ndikerionwu (Ndikelionwu) over time. For example, Ndiokwaraeze prolifer-
ated from Ujari when the descendants of Ujari’s founder’s first son Okwareze and their
dependents and clients left Ujari to establish it. Another Ndieni settlement Ndiowuu
proliferated when the descendants of Owuu Mgboro and his people, who had existed as
an appendage of Ndikerionwu, left Ndikerionwu to establish it (see Eni 1973:19–21).
33
Old Calabar adopted Ekpe “as early as the seventeenth century” from the Ekoi (Aye
1967:70).
Introduction 21
regions – trans-Atlantic and trans-Saharan. Without suggesting that Aro

history is synonymous with the history of the Bight of Biafra, West Africa
at large, or the external world, it can be said that Aro history makes
sense only in the context of regional and Atlantic history. Aro expan-
sion took form within the framework of the political economy of the
Bight of Biafra and West Africa, and it correlates with the expansion
of the Atlantic trade. The Aro were associated with region-wide insti-
tutions, were central to regional commerce, and incorporated persons
from virtually every part of the Bight of Biafra. The Aro were affected by
economic, environmental, and political change that originated elsewhere
in West Africa and beyond.34 These identifiable sociocultural processes
in the hinterland accompanied and mutually complemented the rise and
expansion of the Biafra slave trade, and shaped its composition.
34
Fred Cooper (1996) has explicated the interactive approach, distinguishing it from the
comparative method. Sargent (1999) has shown how environmental, economic, and
political change in one place in West Africa could affect other regions.
2
The Aro in the Atlantic Context
Expansion and Shifts, 1600s–1807
The dramatic rise of the slave trade in the Bight of Biafra during the
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries was remarkable, notwithstanding the
dense population of the region’s hinterland. Of all the captive-exporting
regions of Atlantic Africa, Euro-American buyers had the least incentive to
trade in the Bight of Biafra. Its harbors were apparently the most unpleas-
ant, discouraging Euro-American slavers from building permanent bases.
The mortality rates of captives from the region were significantly higher
than other African regions – 18.3 percent, compared to 10.8 percent
among captives from all other regions combined. In the Americas, Euro-
American slavers got lower prices for captives from Biafra than from
any other African region. The region supplied the largest proportion of
females in a trade that placed a premium on males. During the seventeenth
century, when the proportion of females embarked on African ports was
at its highest, only the Bight of Biafra actually sent more females than
males to the Americas – 50.6 percent as opposed to the African aver-
age of 41.5 percent (Table 6.1). That the region’s slave trade experienced
rapid expansion after 1650 despite the aforementioned impediments is
attributable, at least in part, to its ability to deliver captives quickly and
efficiently during the sugar revolution in the Americas.
The outlines of the process by which the Aro attained dominance of
the inland Bight of Biafra trading system that fed the region’s ports are
clear enough, but linking the process to oscillations in the Biafra Atlantic
trade and working out its basic chronology are another matter.1 The
1
For these outlines, see K. O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990; Ijoma and Njoku 1991; Northrup
1978b; Ukwu 1969:132–36.
22
The Aro in the Atlantic Context 23
challenge, then, is to periodize Aro expansion and correlate its dynamics

with those of the Biafra Atlantic trade, mapping how the development
of the Aro trading complex and demand conditions impacted each other.
What emerges is that the foundation of Arochukwu and the development
of the Aro diaspora corresponded neatly with basic trends in the region’s
Atlantic trade. The Aro case is unusual because, unlike the West African
states whose commercial expansion during the slave trade era relied on
the imposition of direct suzerainty over large areas, such as Oyo in the
Bight of Benin and Asante in the Gold Coast, the Aro built a trading pax
in the Bight of Biafra through a network of diaspora settlements. By plac-
ing the Aro trading system in the Atlantic context, therefore, we gain a
fuller understanding of how African societies helped shape the overseas
slave trade.
Efforts to describe and explain the expansion of the region’s Atlantic
trade have focused on the coastal city-states and concentrated on
structural changes related to trade in the nineteenth century.2 Detailed
studies of the individual trading states Bonny, Brass, Opobo, New
Calabar (Elem-Kalabari), and Old Calabar (Calabar) have thrown light
on the patterns and dimensions of regional trade but, except for stud-
ies emphasizing the role of internal long-distance trade in the institu-
tional development of the coastal states, little work has been done on the
hinterland, encouraging the implication that the hinterland did no more
than reflect coastal impulses. This paradigm was perhaps inevitable for
two reasons. With few exceptions, these studies dealt with the nineteenth
century, especially the later part, that is, after the Atlantic slave trade
era, when coastal traders had taken some initiative in hinterland trade.3
Second, such studies drew heavily on European sources and explained
Biafra trade from the European perspective.4 A critical reading of this lit-
erature is necessary to understand the system that produced the captives
sent to the Americas from the Bight of Biafra.
Attempts to understand this system must involve analysis of the relevant
structures and processes with a focus on the Aro. The captive, which had
become the principal “commodity” of the Aro by the eighteenth century at
the latest, opens a vista into the Aro political economy and Aro expansion.
2
Dike 1956; Jones 1963; Alagoa 1970, 1971a, 1971b, 1972; 1986.
3
Notable among these exceptions are Alagoa 1970, 1971a, 1971b, 1986; Cookey 1974;
Latham 1973; Lovejoy and Richardson 1997, 1999.
4
On Bonny, Hargreaves 1987; Brass, Alagoa 1964; Opobo, Cookey 1974; New Calabar,
(Elem – Kalabari), Wariboko 1991; and Old Calabar (Calabar), Latham 1973:26–28;
Nair 1972; Noah 1980).
To the Aro, the captive was both a commodity and a resource within an
institution of slavery. This connection between indigenous African slavery
and the Atlantic slave trade is an important theme of African history. The
question of whether slavery was important in African societies before the
Atlantic slave trade era or whether it resulted from the slave trade itself
has been of particular interest.5 Did the Atlantic slave trade feed on an
entrenched slave system or did slavery emerge because of the trade? Both
sides of the debate agree that the Atlantic slave trade interacted intimately
with indigenous slavery, but any role of preexisting slavery in the devel-
opment of the overseas slave trade – would likely differ from region to
region, according to the extent and spread of slavery.6
The extent of slavery in the Bight of Biafra vis á vis the export slave
trade unfolds from a few pertinent facts of regional history. First, up to
the beginning of the seventeenth century, the coastal city-states were still
fledgling formations. Second, the later large-scale slaveholders of the hin-
terland – Arochukwu, Abo, Asaba, Oguta, and Osomari – were only just
emerging at this time, out of a series of migrations.7 Third, if the theory
that abundant land (relative to population) promoted slavery has any
validity, the case for large-scale slavery in the Bight of Biafra is weak. The
region does not seem to have experienced abundant land at any point in
the last millennium. Localized cases of depopulation resulted from the
Atlantic slave trade, but they were a consequence of the overseas slave
trade rather than a cause of indigenous slavery (Nwokeji 2000a:632–33;
1997c:707–10).8 But none of the foregoing observations in itself proves
the nonexistence of slavery in the Bight of Biafra prior to the Atlantic slave
5
For the first view, see Fage 1969, 1975, 1980; Thornton 1998: chap. 3. The second view is
most closely associated with Davidson 1961, 1971; Rodney 1966, 1967; Inikori 1982b,
1992a, 1994a; Noah 1980:76–77; Thompson 1987. Other scholars have explained the
expansion, not the origin, of slavery in terms of the influence of the Atlantic slave trade
(see M. Klein 1978, 2001:56, 58; Klein and Lovejoy 1979; Lovejoy 1979, 1983, 1989;
Manning 1981, 1982:10; 1990; Meillassoux 1982). Except for Meillassoux, the scholars
in the third category describe nineteenth-century political economies as slave modes of
production.
6
For details, see Nwokeji forthcoming
7
K.O. Dike 1956:25–26; Henderson 1972:41–65; Noah 1980:1–19; Northrup 1978b:45–47;
Ogedengbe 1971; Ohadike 1994:xvi, xviii–xix, 46–48, 49–50; Onwuejeogwu 1987:34;
Oriji 1994:11, Nwokeji 2000a:629–30. As Latham explicitly states, “it is unlikely that
the Efik [of Old Calabar] were owners of many slaves when they were simple fishermen”
(Latham 1973:31). The coastal city-states had also come to depend on slavery by the end
of the eighteenth century, about which period relevant work exists (Hargreaves 1987:87,
91–92, 93, 101; Nair 1972:37).
8
For surplus land as a determinant of slavery, see Nieboer 1900; Hopkins 1973:24–25.
trade era. Our concern here is not the existence of slavery per se – because
it most likely existed in some form – but the extent to which it was prac-
ticed and its relationship to the export slave trade. The “crucial issue,”
Inikori persuasively argues, “is what the export slave trade [Saharan and
Atlantic] did to the extent and character of slavery in the region” (Inikori
1982b:45; 1992a:127, 130, 157).9 The Atlantic slave trade was however
but one of the factors that shaped domestic slavery in the region.
Slavery does seem to have become widespread by the second half of the
eighteenth century, however. Even if we assume that Olaudah Equiano’s
description of Igboland was based on accounts he garnered from Igbo-
speaking people in the Americas, his references to gifts of slaves and
fines paid in slaves, and to a man’s “family and slaves” sometimes being
“numerous” are instructive (Equiano 1995:37). We also know that a few
of the Aro settlements were founded in the mid-eighteenth century by
men whom Arochukwu slaveholders had enslaved as boys.10 Whereas
the available evidence points to widespread domestic slavery only in the
heyday of the Atlantic slave trade in the region, the question of whether
slavery in Africa aided the development of the Atlantic slave trade is not
as critical as once supposed. First, Africa was only one of many world
regions in which this ancient institution existed, so that its mere existence
cannot satisfactorily explain why the continent supplied slave labor to the
Americas. Second, there is no necessary connection between the extent of
preexisting slavery and the volumes of captives exported. The Bight of
Biafra became one of the most important supply regions, but regions
with well-established preexisting slave regimes – of which the kingdom
of Benin is a prime example – were not necessarily the most important
supply regions (Ekeh 1990:677n). Other reasons consigned Africa to the
role of captive supplier at that point in history.11 In fact, some recent
major studies have avoided altogether the relationship between slavery in
Africa and the Atlantic slave trade, without detracting from their impact
9
See also Ekeh 1990:677n. Cookey believes that slavery existed, but like Thornton
(1998: 86–88) and Kopytoff and Miers (1977) later claimed for all of Africa, he argues
that the slave status “lacked the odium which it subsequently acquired” (Cookey
1974:18).
10
Nevertheless, the initiative of ex-slaves in founding Aro settlements has sometimes been
overstated. Although K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba do this in an attempt to theorize the slave
element as the motive force of Aro dispersal, their own data show that this element was
relevant only in a handful of cases (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba, 1990:71, 75, 78, 97–98, 99,
120, 176, 206, 217).
11
Curtin 1990, 1993:171–76; Eltis 1993, 2000:57–84; H. Klein 1978:3–8; Menard and
Schwartz 1993; Walvin 1997:24; E. Williams 1944:6–10; Wolf 1982:201–04.
on the historiography (e.g., Law 1991b). Slavery was integral to Aro

political economy, but the origins of slavery within the group are not
as important in galvanizing the Biafra Atlantic trade as are the origins,
structure, development, and expansion of the Aro trading network. An
understanding of these issues must begin with a reconstruction of the
origins of the group.
First Phase: Aro Rise and the Biafra Slave

Trade, 1600s–1720s
All of what we know about Aro origins comes from oral traditions.
These traditions, like those of the other Cross River Igbo-speaking
groups, recall “Igbo” and non-Igbo Cross River origins, and Igbo influ-
ence predominated, as is reflected up to the present in their customs and
dialects of the Igbo language. Prior to the formation of the Aro, the area
of Arochukwu, was inhabited originally by what K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba
characterized as “ethnically unrelated groups – the Losi, Nkalagha and
Nchai” – whom the Igbo and the “Ibibio” referred collectively to as
Iwerri and Unene, respectively (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:45). This
area was also the site of immigration for various groups, principally the
Igbo and Ibibio. The incoming Igbo lineages derived principally from
two regions – the Igbo heartland and Cross River Igbo groups, par-
ticularly Ohafia, Abam, and Ada. A civil war, known in present-day Aro
lore as Aha Ibibi (Ibibio War), between the Igbo and the Ibibio led to
the arrival of a third major immigrant group known as the Akpa, an
itinerant collectivity said to have settled various locations in the south-
eastern Nigerian Middle Belt and the northern Cross River area. Aro
traditions are unanimous that it was the Igbo faction that invited Akpa
warriors to intervene in the conflict on their behalf. Akpa intervention
was decisive, according to most accounts, because the Akpa introduced
firearms into the equation.12
At the conclusion of the war, the victorious “‘Igbo’-Akpa” alliance
formed the Arochukwu confederacy. The structure of this confederacy
and the changes it has witnessed over time reflect not only the hetero-
geneity of Aro origins but also, perhaps, a history of power struggles
and shifts among the confederates over time, which the modern day Aro
12
For details of the events described here, see K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990: Ch. 2;
Ijoma 1986c:10–11; Okoro Kanu 2000:10–40. See also Ifemesia 1979:39; G.I. Jones
1963:30–31; Northrup 1978b:34–35.
never seem keen to dwell on. At the apex of the confederacy were three
confederates – Ezeagwu, Okennachi, and Ibom Isii – which the Aro refer
to as “kindreds” (Figure 2.1). The three confederates comprised uneven
numbers of a grand total of nine inalienable lineage components called
the Ọtụsị, all of which were conceptually equal politically, culturally,
and spiritually. Each of the nine Ọtụsị, in turn, served as an umbrella
for a number of the nineteen Arochukwu lineage-groups (or sections of
them), which the British referred to as “towns,” and Aro themselves as
“villages.”13 The various Aro diaspora settlements were connected to
these units, from which the founders of the respective diaspora settle-
ments were drawn. The heads of the nine Ọtụsị (singular form: Eze Ọtụsị)
constituted Ọkpankpọ, the highest ruling council headed by a troika –
Nna Atọ (Three Fathers) – chaired by Eze Aro (Aro king), who must be
the senior Ọtụsị of his lineage-group cluster or confederate. In effect, Eze
Aro was not an absolute ruler but a committee man.
The resulting confederacy reflected the defeat and marginalization of
the Ibibio. Many, if not most, of the Ibibio would have fled the site, and
those that remained behind would have been subsumed into Igbo and
perhaps Akpa collectivities or lineage-groups because none of the three
confederates or lineage-group clusters was Ibibio dominated. Ezeagwu
was constituted by the descendants, relatives, and associates of Ezeagwu,
said to have been a distant descendant of the legendary pioneer immi-
grant from the Igbo heartland called Ụrụ. Okennachi was constituted by
the relatives, followers, and associates of Nnachi, said to have immigrated
from Ada, a Cross River Igbo group claiming origins in Akunakuna, a
Cross River non-Igbo group to the northeast. Ibom Isii was constituted
by the Akpa group led by Akuma Nnubi. Instead, we see lineage-groups
and lineages claiming Ibibio origins staggered across Arochukwu towns
or villages.
The uneven distribution of the Ọtụsị among the confederates suggests
long-standing power struggles among the component parts. In an ideal
world, the three confederates would have had an equal number of Ọtụsị,
to march the putative equality of the Ọtụsịs and, by extension, the con-
federates. Yet, while Ezeagwu and Okennachi were composed of two and
three Ọtụsị, respectively, Ibom Isii was composed of four. The number of
13
Some of the villages or towns are split between the two Ọtụsị, but parts of the same
village belonged to Ọtụsịs in different “Igbo” confederates – Ezeagwu and Okennachi.
In the case of the “non-Igbo” Ibom Isii, this kind of overlap occurred only within the
confederate.
28
Arochukwu
Ezeagwu Okennachi Ibom Isii
Okwara Alu
Ezeagwu Okennachi Bianko Amaja Nnakuma Amata Ivejioku
Agwu Akuma
Amannagwu Ugbo Oro Asaga Ujari

Ibom Etiti
Isimkpu
Amasu
Obinkita Amoba Amankwu Amuvi
Amangwu
Atani Ugwuavo Utughugwu Ugwuakuma Agnagwu Amukwa
Figure 2.1. Arochukwu Structure

Ọtụsịs in each of the confederates is roughly proportional to the role it

played during the war. By all accounts, the non-Igbo Ibom Isii (Akpa con-
federate) initially wielded effective suzerainty over the two Igbo confeder-
ates. They had been invited by the Nnachi (Okennachi) group, whose role
in the war up to the time of Akpa intervention seems to have exceeded
that of the Amagwu group, even though the latter were and are still rec-
ognized as the originally leading group. The name Ibom Isii (six Iboms)
suggests that the Amagwu group may have started out with even more
Ọtụsịs than it came to have in subsequent centuries, which would have
given the non-Igbo enormous leverage in decision making. The apparent
reduction of the number of Ibom Isii Ọtụsị reflected perhaps the shift
of power over time from the non-Igbo Akpa group, which had wielded
effective power after its intervention in Aro affairs, to the Igbo. All this
also indicates that historically the Ọtụsị have perhaps not been as inalien-
able Aro traditions suggest.
There have been spirited efforts to date Aro origins since the colonial
period. The vast outpouring of the discourse came in the wake of the Aro
Expedition of 1901–02, through which the British subordinated the Aro
to colonial rule. The first systematic attempt to date Aro formation was
made by colonial anthropologist, H.F. Mathews, who in 1927 wrote that
it took place not “earlier than 1700 or 1730 but most probably around
1750.” Mathews’s heavy dependence on the genealogies of relatively
recent Aro families led him to conclude, erroneously, that Aro formation
had taken place only 150 or 160 years before 1927. This places Aro
foundation at either 1777 or 1767. Also, Mathews learned that blunder-
busses had played a decisive role in the war that produced the Aro state.
His investigations led him to believe that the first blunderbusses arrived
in Biafra early in the eighteenth century.14 Mathews’s conclusions have
promoted the view that the Aro were formed in the second half of the
eighteenth century, which effectively implies that the Aro, who actually
dominated the hinterland trade, arrived on the scene only after the slave
trade in the region had fully come into its own.15
14
Many of the details on Aro origins as presented by colonial officials are contained in
NAE ARODIV 20/1/15:Anthropologists Papers on Aro Origin: Discussion and the Basis
of the Widespread of Aro Influence, 1927.
15
For this view, see Latham (1973:26–28); Bentor (1994:79). The genealogies that Mathews
used are so flawed that even Apollos Nwauwa’s rigorous reinterpretation yielded con-
spicuously improbable results. Nwauwa’s chronological charts place the genealogies of
almost all the major characters of Aro formation in the generation 1690–1720 and the
establishment of “many of [Arochukwu’s] constituent villages … in the next genera-
tion (ca. 1720–1750)” (Nwauwa 1990:227, 233–36; 1991:296, 308). This chronology,
which places the foundation of Arochukwu in 1690–1720, is about one century late
and does not correlate Aro expansion with the expansion of the Biafran export slave
Using the traditions of the Niger Delta corporate kin groups, G.I.
Jones (1963:134) concluded that the Aro oracle, Ibiniukpabi, played a
crucial part in their formation. He attributed the blunderbusses’ element
in Aro traditions of origin to telescoping and places Aro formation at the
period before the mid-seventeenth century. This view is widely accepted.
Still, there have been suggestions that the Aro had been formed by the
early seventeenth century and probably before.16 These suggestions are
realistic, given the uncertainty about the length of the time lag between
the occupation of the Unene region (the Arochukwu area) and the foun-
dation of Arochukwu. If Arochukwu was formed in the early seventeenth
century, the region seems to have been occupied before then, probably
long before.
The chronology of the wider regional history brings early Aro his-
tory into sharper relief. Developments relating to the Middle Belt state of
Kwararafa in particular throw light on Aro origins and political structure,
and on the Biafra trade. The demise of the long troubled state of Kwararafa
dovetailed with the formation of the Aro state. The firearm-bearing Akpa
who intervened in the crisis that produced Arochukwu appear to have rep-
resented advance elements of Kwararafa migrants, in an exodus that had
commenced in the sixteenth century.17 The Kwararafa diaspora groups that
crystallized in the seventeenth century as a result of the centralizing project
of the successor state of Jukun shared a political culture in which power
trade. It places the foundation date of Arondizuogu within 1795–1825 and identifies
two settlements, Amawom and Nkalunta in the western Cross River Igbo area, as the
earliest diaspora settlements, formed in the mid-eighteenth century. If they were the first
diaspora settlements, they would have been established considerably earlier. At any rate,
if the location of these two obscure settlements outside the Igbo heartland would hardly
have generated the high volumes of captive exports observed in the mid-eighteenth cen-
tury. The genealogies from which these chronologies were derived came from families
of relatively recent origins, from whom the British drew the early warrant chiefs. To
legitimate their claim to authority, these individuals impressed on the British that their
lineages began with the establishment of Arochukwu (Ekejiuba 1972a:13n). Fieldwork
and information from local histories provide a better insight into dating Aro expansion
than is available in the colonial texts informed by such traditions.
16
For the first group, see K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:44; Isichei; 1976:6, 58, 76; Oriji
1994. The second group comprises Northrup 1978b:36; Ijoma 1986c:16; Ijoma and
Njoku 1991:204.
17
According to Sargent, the Jukun migrated into the region just north of Cross River region
in c. 1610. “Apa later became known as their homeland” (Sargent 1999:226, 236, 249).
Apa probably refers to the land of the “Akpa,” the group that decisively intervened in
Aro formation. If claims to Akpa origins of a section of the Aro are accurate, the Aro
would have been produced in the same process associated with Kwararafa’s conflict with
Kano and Bornu, as well as resulting migrations and internal conflicts.
devolved among major blocs in a multiethnic setting. Each bloc was repre-
sented in central administration, as an alternative to the centralized model
of Benin-derived kingdoms of the Middle Belt (Sargent 1999:218–19,
243–51). The multiethnic confederacy the Aro established in the Cross
River basin, described earlier in this chapter, resembled the pre-Jukun
Kwararafa political structure. The Akpa’s reputation as seasoned warriors
and strategists fitted into a culture shaped in the context of the volatile
Benue valley geopolitics associated with Kwararafa’s disintegration.
The notion that Arochukwu was founded in the early seventeenth
century at the latest is also compatible with new evidence regarding the
antiquity of the major slave market at Bende. The Bende market was
organized around the Aro trading network; its major and minor fairs,
respectively, were named after the Aro families Agbagwu and Bianko, so
that evidence of its existence implies Aro trading activity. Indeed, Bende
was thriving by the 1670s. French mariner John Barbot, who made at
least two voyages to the Biafra coast between 1678 and 1682, wrote in
1682 that “There is … a large market for slaves in Belli, a large town
west of Old Calabar inland” (John Barbot 1732:381, emphasis added).
In July 1699, James Barbot and John Grazilhier (1699:109), referred to
a “Bendi” market where 247 bars exchanged for twenty-three captives.
The inland market was, according to them, three or four days away from
the New Calabar port. The descriptions of both “Belli” and “Bendi” fit
into the location of Bende, situated in Cross River Igboland. These obser-
vations were made a century before Mathews’s projected date of Aro
formation – the second half of the eighteenth century.
Although the Bende market was in existence by the 1670s, exactly
when it came into being or when the Aro took control of it is unclear. It
is likely, however, that it would have taken considerable time – perhaps
several decades – between the foundation of Arochukwu and the 1670s,
when the market had attained such a strategic status in the slave trade
that information about developments there reached European traders on
the coast, who never ventured inland. It would likely have taken more
time still between Aro formation and Aro establishment of the market
or Aro control of it and its conversion to a slave mart. Given the forgo-
ing logic, it seems plausible that the Aro came into prominence in the
mid-seventeenth century (Afigbo 1980:87; Ekejiuba 1972a:13). Nothing
suggests that any other group controlled the Bende slave mart before the
Aro. In light of this new information about Bende and other evidence,
blunderbusses are not central to dating Aro formation. Firearms certainly
came into the region well before John Latham’s 1713 date. Guns and
gunpowder are known to have been imported in the second half of the
seventeenth century: over £1,000 worth of these goods were imported
between 1662 and 1703, and importation may well have begun even ear-
lier.18 Not surprisingly, the blunderbuss that Mathews saw in Arochukwu
was, by his own testimony, of “a primitive type.” It is now clear, based
on the foregoing, that Arochukwu was formed during the early Atlantic
slave trade era in the Bight of Biafra. This event fits into a general pat-
tern of immigration into the region, aimed at taking advantage of the
coastal trade in captives. The contemporaneous formation in the seven-
teenth century of the Niger riverine states – Abo, Oguta, Onitsha, and
Osomari – has been linked to non-Igbo people interested in the slave
trade (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:56, 57). Indeed, these societies all
came to be deeply involved in the slave trade.
The Aro formation appear to have resulted from three related
developments.
1. Conflict between expanding “Igbo” and “Ibibio” over a frontier

region.
2. Migration of Kwararafa elements away from their troubled home-
land under the weight of conflicts with Sudanic and, later, with
emergent Middle Belt states.
3. The fledgling Atlantic trade in which the Kwararafa diaspora and,
perhaps, local Igbo and Ibibio sought to partake.
The Atlantic trade provided the incentive for Aro expansion, just as
Aro modes of organization made the expansion possible and enduring.
Aro expansion correlates closely with the rise of the Biafra Atlantic
slave trade. The Biafra trade was in its infancy up to the mid-seventeenth
century, a period for which we lack evidence of Aro expansion (Table 2.1).
Between 1501 and 1650, captives leaving the region’s ports accounted for
only 4.7 percent of captives from all African regions combined. If the
sample of enslaved Biafrans in the Americas that Alonso de Sandoval
recorded in 1627 is anything to go by, the proportion of the Igbo in the
Biafra trade was still small; there was only one captive who was of “Igbo”
origin among fifteen slaves from the Bight of Biafra.19 This indicates that
the slave trade still drew heavily on coastal populations.
18
For gun importation during 1662–1703, see Eltis 2000:300. Latham’s 1713 date seems
to refer to commercial importation, while firearms could have trickled into the region
during more than 150 years of trade with Europeans (Nwauwa 1990:235).
19
De Sandoval ([1627] 1956:94). See also Hair (1967:263n).
Table 2.1. Estimated Volume of the Transatlantic Captive Departures from

the Bight of Biafra and All African Regions Combined, Primarily Five-Year
Intervals, 1531–1740
Period B. of Biafra All Africa Biafra %*

1531–1600 8458 255,173 3.3
1601–1605 0 35,799 0.0
1606–1610 0 56,127 0.0
1611–1615 0 46,184 0.0
1616–1620 1,142 102,749 1.1
1621–1625 1,779 111,985 1.6
1626–1630 468 71,509 0.6
1631–1635 0 59,380 0
1636–1640 1,630 60,820 2.7
1641–1645 11,323 67,119 16.9
1646–1650 20,119 56,222 35.8
1651–1655 7,679 60,171 12.6
1656–1660 17,112 95,516 17.9
1661–1665 17,236 102,954 16.7
1666–1670 20,432 126,585 16.1
1671–1675 18,321 102,839 17.8
1676–1680 16,072 119,552 13.4
1681–1685 13,481 145,546 9.3
1686–1690 8,228 115,018 7.2
1691–1695 10,603 128,356 8.3
1696–1700 20,696 211,201 9.8
1701–1705 12,981 211,590 6.1
1706–1710 8,999 182,651 5.0
1711–1715 17,323 210,977 8.2
1716–1720 17,292 242,431 7.1
1721–1725 10,238 241,259 4.2
1726–1730 31,591 307,133 10.3
1731–1735 28,647 282,593 10.1
1736–1740 27,936 315,410 8.9
Totals 349786 4,124,849 8.5
Note: *Numbers with decimal points are not precise because of rounding.
Source: http://www.Slavevoyages.org.
The opening up of new plantation regions in the Americas generated

significant increases in the volume of captives exported from Africa in
the second half seventeenth century. Between 1651 and 1680, the Bight
of Biafra supplied as much as 16 percent of all captives exported from
Africa. Although absolute numbers remained strong for the remainder
of the century, captives from the Bight of Biafra, as a percentage of all
African captives exported to the Americas, entered a period of decline

after 1680 (Table 2.1). The result is that, while the volume of captives
exported from all African regions combined increased by 68 percentage
points during the twenty-five-year period between 1676 and 1700, the
number of exports leaving the Bight of Biafra actually declined by 14.5
percentage points (Table 2.1). And the Biafra share generally remained
small between 1700 and 1740, when overall captive exports continued
to increase appreciably. The upsurge of captive departures that began
in the 1651–75 period suggests that there was a concentration of Aro
activities in neighboring Ibibioland at a time when the Aro had not yet
expanded westward and northwestward, and when Old Calabar was still
Biafra’s principal port. It seems that the Aro could no longer meet the
expanding Atlantic market demand with captives procured from their
relatively limited area of operation at the time. The mid-seventeenth-
century rise in exports soon ceased, and captives began to trickle to the
coast once again. John Barbot writes in 1682 that “trade is not so brisk”
in Bende “east of river Calabar,” and in the delta port of New Calabar.
“[S]everal ships are obliged to stay eight or ten months, according to the
circumstances of the natives”20 (emphasis added). John Barbot made his
observation out of frustration at the low turnaround rate of the New
Calabar trade, which did not abate until the end of the century; James
Barbot and Grazilhier commented in similar vein in 1699 (James Barbot
and Grazilhier 1699:109–16). Up to this time, New Calabar was the only
port in the Bight of Biafra to which European slave vessels paid regu-
lar visits (Thornton 1996:1, 5–6, 7). But trade was shifting eastward to
Old Calabar, closer to Arochukwu than New Calabar. Captain William
Snelgrave estimated that only a total of 20,000 captives had been
exported from Old Calabar by 1730 (Snelgrave 1730:505). Aro organi-
zation seems to have already had more impact on the coastal trade in the
mid-seventeenth century, but it was not yet able to meet Euro-American
20
John Barbot (1732:381, 383). John Barbot “made at least two voyages to the West coast”
between 1678 and 1682. His A Description was originally written in French in 1682 and
translated into English in 1732 (Donnan 1930:282). While Elizabeth Donnan’s version
implies that Barbot may have made more voyages, Paul Hair, Adam Jones, and Robin
Law pinpoint only 1678–79 and 1681–82. They doubt that Barbot made any further
voyages after 1682 (Hair, Jones, and Law 1992b:ix, xiii). But they conceded that the
John Barbot reference may have been made in connection with the journey of the Griffin
or with that of the Dragon, which apparently made its journey later, in 1699, and which
involved his brother, James Barbot. John Barbot may have borrowed from the journal of
his brother and his mates or may himself have been part of the Dragon’s 1699 trip (Hair,
Jones and Law 1992b:cxlix, lxxiii, xciii).
demand for captives, even though that demand still was much smaller
than it was to become.
Two demand conditions also influenced the trend observed in export
volumes in the Bight of Biafra before the eighteenth century. The first was
that captives from the Calabars “were not in high favor with the English.”
Discrimination against captives from the Old Calabar, in particular, was
reported in Barbados as early as 1675–76 (see Donnan 1930:108, 205).
They were referred to as “supernumerary Negroes” in 1679 (Stede and
Gascoigne 1679). Reinforcing this negative attitude was what European
sailors in the late seventeenth century described as the turbulence of Old
Calabar waters and its “intemperate air” (John Barbot 1682:300; Van
Nyendael 1702:467–68). “Intemperate air” conspired with malaria and
high mortality to discourage Europeans from establishing a permanent
presence in the region, as they did elsewhere in Atlantic Africa (Thornton
1996:1).
Though significant increase in the Biafra slave trade did not happen
until after 1650, there was some increase during the first half of the
seventeenth century. Out of recorded to have been enslaved 5,278 Africans
who were enslaved in Peru between 1560 and 1650, entries for “Biafra”
and “Caravali” total 682, or nearly 13 percent (see Bowser 1974:40–41).
Indeed, Biafrans “became quite numerous” in Peru between 1610 and
1640 (Thornton 1996:5). The Spaniards at Jamaica and Barbados were
buying captives from the Bight of Biafra as early as the 1660s (see Donnan
1930:108). In about 1668 and about 1693, a total of about 215 cap-
tives from “Callebar” were imported into the island of Bermuda (Bennett
1704:48).21 In 1672, a Royal African Company (RAC) document con-
cerning New and Old Calabar read in part, “whither many ships are sent
to trade [and where] slaves and teeth … are to be had in plenty.”22 Up to
1705, the British were trailing the Dutch, who had “the greatest share”
in the Old Calabar trade (John Barbot 1682:299–300; James Barbot, Jr.
1705:14). In June 1699, James Barbot learned of an English ship com-
manded by one Captain Edwards, who “got his compliments” of 500
captives in three weeks’ time in New Calabar (James Barbot 1699:432).
James Barbot, Jr., claimed to have seen ten or more slave ships in New
Calabar in October 1700 (James Barbot, Jr., 1705:14). In October 1702,
it was expected that there might be too many ships in New Calabar, but
21
Slightly more than a half of the captives were reshipped to North Carolina and
Virginia.
22
See “The Royal African Company, 1672.” See Donnan (1930:193).
Table 2.2. A Sample of Captive Prices (in Copper Bars) in New Calabar
and Old Calabar, 1678–1704
Date Men Women Girls Boys Place

a
Feb. 1678 36 30 NA NA N. Calabar
1682b 38 36 or 37 NA NA O. Calabar
1688c 56 or 60 NA NA NA N. Calabar
1698d 40–48 28–36 17–30 20–40 O. Calabar
1699e 52 36 NA NA N. Calabar
1703/1704f 48 36 NA NA N. Calabar
Note: 5s or 6s equaled 1 iron bar (i.e., 4 copper bars) (see Donnan 1931:14n).
Sources: a “Journal of the Arthur, Dec. 5, 1677 – May 25, 1678.” See Donnan (1930:226).
b
John Barbot (1682:300n). c Dapper, cited by Meek (1937:5).1 d John Barbot (1698:419).
e
James Barbot (1699:420).2 f James Barbot, jr., (1705:14); Donnan (1931:2n).
the situation was much worse again in Old Calabar (see Starke 1702:81).
Prices correspondingly increased, though James Barbot, Jr.’s comment
in December 1705 that New Calabar suppliers “rais’d price of negroes
from 40s.–50s. to £12 or £14” probably reflected short-term phenom-
ena (James Barbot, Jr. 1705:14n) (Table 2.2). Supply had fallen behind
demand, and although the market was still not as tight here as it was else-
where in Atlantic Africa, this trend could indicate a hinterland situation
in which protracted resistance on the part of central Igbo checked captive
supplies before the Aro eventually gained influence in the region.
In spite of increasing prices, probably due in part to fluctuations in the
value of the iron bar, which was in use then as currency, the British Board
of Trade reported in 1709 that, along with the situation at the ports
below the Equator, prices of captives were lowest in the Bight of Biafra,
“from whence the greatest number of Negroes are exported” (Board of
Trade 1709:56–57, 59). The Board of Trade was either behind the times
in its appraisal of the volume of the Bight of Biafra trade or it based its
report on a short-term fluctuation. Relatively smaller numbers of captives
left the region during the first four decades of the eighteenth century.
Shortfalls in supply and competition from independent traders compelled
the RAC to send factors23 “to try if an allyance cannot be made with the
princes of the Country of the Bight, and to learn what sort of Trade may
be carryed on there,” according to an internal report of February 1721
23
A “factor” was a resident trade representative of European companies. The factor oper-
ated out of the company’s “factory” (basically a buying and warehousing structure/build-
ing) or fort as the case may be. The factor was the one in regular contact with African
traders, making deals and purchases on behalf of his company.
(Royal Africa Company 1721:251).24 Clearly, demand was increasing at

a faster rate than supply because of the expansion of the American plan-
tation complex. This condition provided an incentive for hinterland slave
traders to expand the sources of captives.
Second Phase, 1740s to 1807: Surge in Trade

Aro efforts had yielded results by the 1740s, when captive exports from
the Bight of Biafra increased dramatically. During the 1740–45 period,
the volume of captives leaving the ports of the Bight of Biafra increased
61 percent over the previous five-year period, representing a 7 percent
increase in the Biafra share of African total (Table 2.3). Whereas the
region supplied 66,833, or 6.1 percent, of a total of 1,088,909 captives
exported from all African ports in the first quarter of the eighteenth cen-
tury, it supplied 182,066, or 12.4 percent, of an Africa total of 1,471,725
during the second quarter. This upward trend continued more or less
until the end of the second phase of Aro expansion in 1807. The slave
trade was expanding across the board, but the Bight of Biafra branch was
expanding at a higher rate.
The rise in the Biafra Atlantic trade during this period was accompa-
nied by a drastic increase in the turnaround rates for ships buying cap-
tives at Bight of Biafra ports. This phenomenon was obvious to Alexander
Falconbridge, who sailed frequently to the region as a slaver’s surgeon in
the third quarter of the eighteenth century.
The time during which the slave ships are absent from England, varies according
to the destination of the voyage, and the number of ships they happen to meet
on the coast. To Bonny, or Old and New Calabar, a voyage is fully performed
in about ten months. Those to the Windward and Gold Coasts, are rather
more uncertain, but in general from fifteen to eighteen months. (Falconbridge
1788:11)
Falconbridge’s observation is consistent with the quantitative evi-

dence. Two kinds of quantitative data are used here: the average number
of days a ship spent in African regions and the average daily number of
captives a ship loaded per day in African ports. Both measures show the
Bight of Biafra as having the fastest rates of loading captives during the
second half of the eighteenth century. During this period, a ship spent
an average of 109 days in the Bight of Biafra, compared to 203.6 days
24
RAC wrote the Bonny king on September 15, 1702, asking to be supplied “three men …
to two women” (cited in Eltis 2000:106).
Table 2.3. The Volume of the Transatlantic Captive Departures from the
Bight of Biafra and All African Regions Combined, Five-Year Intervals,
1701–1805
Period Bight of Biafra All Africa Biafra %*

1701–1705 12,981 211,590 6.1
1706–1710 8,999 182,651 4.9
1711–1715 17,323 210,977 8.2
1716–1720 17,292 242,431 7.1
1721–1725 10,238 241,259 4.2
1726–1730 31,591 307,133 10.3
1731–1735 28,647 282,593 10.1
1736–1740 27,936 315,410 8.9
1741–1745 45,382 287,564 15.8
1746–1750 48,509 279,025 17.4
1751–1755 57,975 361,496 16.0
1756–1760 35,319 281,462 12.6
1761–1765 59,566 367,023 16.2
1766–1770 86,975 451,937 19.2
1771–1775 79,873 463,396 17.2
1776–1780 30,124 292,271 10.3
1781–1785 61,245 362,658 16.9
1786–1790 89,997 505,335 17.8
1791–1795 83,022 459,366 18.0
1796–1800 71,620 389,040 18.4
1801–1805 80,287 453,906 17.7
Totals 984,901 14.2
Note: *Numbers with decimal points are not precise because of rounding.
Source: http://www.Slavevoyages.org.
for Sierra Leone, 215.9 in Windward Coast, 137.4 in Gold Coast, 145 in
the Bight of Benin, 162.3 in West-Central Africa, and 126.8 in Southeast
Africa (Table 2.4). Only Senegambia records fewer days – 103.7 – but
this figure is misleading and requires an explanation. The Bight of Biafra
consistently posted significantly higher loaded-captives-per-ship num-
bers than Senegambia, and the volume of captives embarked there far
outnumbered those that embarked at Senegambia (Table 2.4).
The relatively short times vessels spent in Senegambia ports reflects
the intention of ships’ crews to spend less time in the region more
than the ports’ capacity to supply captives quickly. Ships departed
Senegambia ports quickly because captives from there had a high
tendency to rebel. According to David Richardson, captives on ships
leaving Senegambia had the highest tendency to revolt of all other
African regions, and ships leaving Senegambia ports were fourteen
Table 2.4. Time Spent by Ships at African Ports, 1751–1800
Region Mean (No. of No. of Vessels Standard

Days in Port) in Sample Deviation
Senegambia 103.7468 154 79.0894
Sierra Leone 203.6883 77 132.0673
Windward Coast 215.94 50 130.6919
Gold Coast 137.4759 374 95.1905
Bight of Benin 145.0172 232 75.9383
Bight of Biafra 109.702 245 82.4087
West-Central Africa 162.3577 601 73.381
Southeast Africa 126.8 20 63.9651
Unknown 159.2143 84 106.3542
Total 145.8258 1837 90.5224
Note: Numbers with decimal points are not precise because of rounding.
Source: Data generated by David Eltis.
times more likely to experience revolts than those leaving the Bight of
Biafra (Richardson 2001:77). Before the mid-eighteenth century, ships
visiting Senegambia were generally larger than the ones sent to the
Bight of Biafra before mid-century, but they consistently loaded fewer
captives than those that traded in the Bight of Biafra. This means
that ships often left Senegambian ports with either unloaded space
or loaded with other African commodities. Perhaps as a result of this
phenomenon, slavers at mid-century began to send smaller ships to
low-yield Senegambia. The decline in the average tonnage of ships
that traded in Senegambia after mid-century certainly reflected the
decline in the general tonnage of French vessels during the second half
of the century as did the decline in the tonnage of Portuguese vessels,
which became very active in the region after 1790. The average size of
French ships was 258 tons during 1701–50, compared to 238.3 during
1751–1800. This decline was progressive. The average size of French
ships declined from 250.1 during the 1751–1775 quarter to 189.3
during 1776–1800. The decline in the size of Portuguese/Brazilian
ships took similar trajectory and was of an even greater magnitude
during the last quarter of the century when they became more active in
Senegambia, 222.1 tons compared to 342.2 tons in the preceding quar-
ter. This decline was steepest in the 1790s, when the size of Portuguese
ships declined to 146.7 tons from 266.7 tons in the 1781–1790 decade
(Slavevoyages.org).
Incidentally, mid-century witnessed a significant increase in the tonnage
of ships sent to the Bight of Biafra, in response to the region’s high yield
of captives. During the 1751–1775 period, the mean tonnage of ships

sent to the Bight of Biafra rose to 205, while that of Senegambia declined
to 162 over the same period. This trend escalated during the 1776–1800
period, when the tonnage for the Bight of Biafra rose further, to 233.6,
while that of Senegambia declined further to 125.6. The contrast in the
availability of captives between the two regions highlights the disparities
in the volumes of captives and numbers of voyages recorded, the turn-
around rates at principal ports, and the mean tonnages of the ships sent
to those ports. According to the Expanded Online Trans-Atlantic Slave
Trade Database (Slavevoyages.org), the total number of captives that left
Bight of Biafra ports between 1751 and 1800 was 655,717, from 2030
voyages and with a mean tonnage of 214.6, compared to Senegambia’s
total of 220,214 from 1046 voyages with a mean tonnage of only 174.74
over the same period. The high turnaround rate observed in Senegambia
does not reflect a greater availability of captives. After controlling for
unloaded space per ship, turnaround rates as an indicator of availability
of captives on the coast were far higher in the Bight of Biafra than in
Senegambia.
This fact is brought in sharp relief by the average daily number of
captives loaded per vessel. This represents the first time the average rate
of daily number of captives loaded per vessel has been used to analyze
the slave trade. The method is introduced here to control for uneven-
ness in the data, such as ship size, the number of days a vessel spent in a
port, and any nonhuman commodities that ships often loaded. The daily
average number of captives embarked per ship is derived by dividing the
total number of captives embarked on a particular port during a particu-
lar period with the average number of days a vessel spent on the port
over the same period. In other words, this method measures how fast a
ship loaded, irrespective of size and total duration of call on a particu-
lar port. Tables 2.5 and 2.6 show the average numbers of captives that
ships calling on major African ports loaded per day for the 1701–50 and
1751–1800 periods, respectively. While the principal ports of the Bight
of Biafra were not important enough for much of the first half of the
eighteenth century and are thus excluded from Table 2.5, which shows
Whydah as the fastest loading port, we see the two principal ports of the
region – Old Calabar and, particularly, Bonny – leapfrog Whydah dur-
ing the second half of the century. Whydah’s loading rate had declined
to 3.2 captives per ship per day from 4.7 captives per ship per day in the
first half-century, compared to Old Calabar, which had risen to 3.7, and
Bonny to 5.5 (Table 2.6).
Table 2.5. Daily Average Number of Captives Loaded Per Vessel, 1701–50
Imputed Principal Average No. No. of Number Standard

Port of Slave of Captives Vessels in Embarked Deviation
Purchase Embarked Per Sample
Vessel Per Day
Gambia 2.5 16 35,425 2.1
Anomabu, Adja, 3.0 38 43,218 3.4
Agga
Whydah 4.7 200 198,537 2.9
Table 2.6. Daily Average Number of Captives Loaded Per Vessel, 1751–1800
Imputed Average No. of No. of Vessels Number Standard

Principal Port of Captives Embarked in Sample Embarked Deviation
Slave Purchase Per Vessel Per Day
Gambia 1.7 56 66,459 1.4
Anomabu, 2.7 81 122,820 2.5
Adja, Agga
Whydah 3.2 87 109,010 1.7
Bonny 5.5 65 279,898 3.6
Old Calabar 3.7 53 131,144 2.8
This method is not foolproof for a number of reasons. The daily aver-
age number of captives that were loaded on a vessel at a particular port
depended in part on the total number of vessels that called there. For
example, a port hosting five ships would likely have loaded at faster rate
than when the same port had ten ships competing for the same trade – all
things being equal. While the daily average number of captives loaded
per vessel may not necessarily reflect a port’s actual supply capacity, we
can assume that in the long run the number of ships that called on a
particular port depended largely on its perceived ability to deliver cap-
tives. The daily average number of captives loaded per vessel is a useful,
if imperfect, reflection of the actual rates at which ships loaded captives
at African ports because information about trading conditions in the dif-
ferent ports, including supply capabilities, had become in the eighteenth
century more widely available to Euro-American slavers.25 Nevertheless,

the daily average number of captives loaded per vessel has a number of
advantages over the turnaround rates of ships. It focuses analysis on the
vessels about which we have the necessary information – dates of arrival
and departure and the actual average number of captives embarked in
specific African ports during sustained periods. The method gives an esti-
mate, as close as possible, of loading rates of ships than does the simple
matrix of how frequently ships arrive and depart.
The dramatic rise of the Biafra Atlantic slave trade from the 1740s
onward reflected not only the supply conditions that facilitated the fast
loading rate described above but also trajectories in Euro-American
demand. While captives from the region were generally not considered
premium grade by the planters, there seemed always to be pockets of
plantation Americas that desired them, reflecting ambivalent perceptions
about the enslaved Igbo, sometimes in the same regions, and perhaps
a rising profile of Biafra captives in the New World over time. Planters
of the Carolinas and to an extent those of Saint-Domingue rejected
Igbo captives, but not those of Jamaica; Virginian planters accepted
them enthusiastically (Gomez 2003:84–85). While Michael Gomez is
able to quote a report that described that the Igbo in sixteenth-century
Mexico as “difficult to manage and disposed to committing suicide when
subjected to the slightest punishment or ridicule,” Colin Palmer reports
that they “were considered tractable and hence were highly sought
after by some of the slaveholders” in early seventeenth-century Spanish
America (Gomez 2003:85; Palmer 1981:29). Writing in 1793, Jamaica-
based British planter Bryan Edwards dwelled on suicide as cause for “the
great objection to the Eboes as slaves,” and after heaping scorn on the
Igbo and their ways, he still took care to add that he could not “draw
any conclusion of natural inferiority in these people to the rest of the
human race” (Edwards 1793:73, 74–75). Despite Edwards’s somber
characterization of the Igbo, the course of the eighteenth century reveals
what seems to be an incremental willingness to accept Igbo captives. One
Theodore Morris ([1730/1?]:431) in Barbados bemoaned to Bristol mer-
chant Isaac Hobhouse in January 1730 or 1731 that “there has not been
a cargo of Ebbo Slaves Sould here a long time, and many People are
Enquiring for them.”
25
The reader should note that the major ports of West-Central Africa, such as St. Paul
and Malembo, have been excluded from this comparison. These ports offer a different
landscape because much of the inland organization of the slave trade that fed them was
under Portuguese control; thus they are not a true reflection of African organization.
Some slaveowners even had reasons to prefer the Igbo. Gwendolyn

Hall has suggested that Chesapeake planters – and to a lesser extent
planters in Lousiana as well – sought Igbo females, probably because of
the high reproductive powers that were ascribed to Igbo women (Hall
2005:141–42). In his memoirs, published in 1789, Olaudah Equiano
stated that “[t]he West India planters prefer the slaves of Benin or Eboe
to those of any other part of Guinea, for their hardiness, intelligence,
integrity, and zeal” (Equiano 1995:39). Equiano’s observation corrobo-
rates that of Captain Hugh Crow, who made regular trips to the Bight of
Biafra in the last twenty years of the eighteenth century. Crow gives the
impression that favorable comments on captives from the Bight of Biafra
had become the norm in his day.
The Eboes [are] a superior race, and the inhabitants, generally, are a fair dealing
people, and much inclined to a friendly traffic with the Europeans, who humor
their peculiarities. Their general honesty, when the loose nature of their laws as
respects Europeans. … The Eboes, tho’ not generally robust, are a well-formed
people, of the middle stature: many of their women are of remarkably symmetri-
cal shape, and if white, would in Europe be deemed beautiful. This race is … of
a more mild and engaging disposition than the other tribes … and though less
suited for the severe manual labor of the field, they are preferred in the West India
colonies for their fidelity and utility, as domestic servants, particularly if taken
young, as they then become the most industrious of any of the tribes taken to the
colonies. (Crow 1830:197–99)
Impressions were mixed, but captives from the Bight of Biafra had
gained wide acceptance by the second half of the eighteenth century, and
possibly, half a century earlier. Although he noted in 1788 that Biafra
captives were “weakly, and more liable to disorders,” Liverpool mer-
chant James Jones (1788:590) considered “the Trade [in Biafra] most
Advantageous … both as to Our Manufacturies and the Number had
from thence.” All this suggests a shift in Euro-American attitudes toward
Biafra captives or, at the very least, that an ever-increasing need for labor
left planters with no choice but to take captives from wherever they
could be found. Some who expressed very negative views of the Igbo
even offered advice on how to make them better slaves. In 1864, physi-
cian and poet James Grainger opined that they needed to be “bought
young” and Edwards recommended “the gentlest and mildest treatment”
(Edwards 1793:74).
The entry of Liverpool merchants and their subsequent takeover of
the trade from their Bristol counterparts in the Bight of Biafra is relevant
to understanding the expansion of trade despite the negative reviews of
the region’s captives. Liverpool merchants preferred to buy lower priced

captives and were willing to accept lower prices in New World ports
(Drake 1976:141). The conditions in the Bight of Biafra suited this
strategy well. Whereas the Bristol ships alone carried 300,000 captives
between 1680 and 1700, Liverpool became dominant toward the mid-
eighteenth century (Blindloss 1898:171). At least two-thirds of the voy-
ages in which the Liverpool tycoon of the second half of the eighteenth
century, William Davenport, invested, were dedicated to the trade in Old
Calabar and the Cameroons, both in the Bight of Biafra. Of 144 of these
voyages that have been traced, out of a total of some 160, as many as 98
went to the Bight of Biafra – 55 to Old Calabar and 43 to the Cameroons
(Richardson 1976:65).26 In January 1736, two mariners wrote to their
owner in Britain that “we buy Callabar and Angola Negroes … on which
account we take as many … as possibly we can, in order to render the
Negroe Account proffitable to the Company” (Merewether and Manning
1736). Thus, Liverpool operations emphasized turnover, illuminating
why the increase in the size of slave ship between 1664 and 1807 was
greatest in the Bight of Biafra, where it rose by 50 percentage points
in comparison to the previous 200 years.27 Liverpool domination of the
Biafra trade correlates with this development.
Certain demand factors, including a continuing New World demand
for labor and the rising profile of Biafra captives, especially the “Eboes”
from the port of Bonny, justified this strategy and contributed to the
expansion of the Biafra trade. These demand factors drove prices,
notwithstanding increased supply. While supply variables were impor-
tant, there is in the long run a direct relationship between price and the
quantity of captives (Eltis 1983:260). This appears to have been the case
in the Bight of Biafra. The average prices of Biafra captives in the New
World, especially the “Eboe,” hovered at quite competitive rates during
the peak years of trade (see G. Williams 1897:539–40). This phenomenon
was particularly striking in late eighteenth-century Spanish Louisiana,
according to Hall. “If Igbo men were despised … this is not reflected
in the prices during the Spanish period in Louisiana, when the mean
price of Igbo men was highest among the most numerous ethnicities”
(Hall 2005:141). The trend reversed with the advent of the U.S. period
from 1804 onward, but the fact that enslaved Igbo men commanded
26
See E. Williams (1944:61, 63), Hopkins (1973:96), and Minchinton (1976) for informa-
tive details concerning the Liverpool slave trade.
27
For changes in ship size, see Behrendt 1998:7, 8–9.
high prices in different regions and over long spells complicates planters’
apparent lukewarm attitude to them.
If increases in volumes of captive exports from the Bight of Biafra
reflected increasing demand for captives, they also manifested greater
organization, on both sides of the Atlantic, to meet the labor needs of
a rapidly expanding plantation complex in the Americas. On the Biafra
coast, the “trust” system of credit had become operative by the 1760s.28
Through this system, European buyers advanced goods to coastal trad-
ers on deferred payment basis, to be repaid in captives. In turn, coastal
traders advanced these goods to the Aro. The rise of the Biafra trade has
been attributed to this peculiar practice, which was made possible by
the operation of the indigenous Ekpe society (Drake 1976:149; Forde
1956:16; Latham 1973:27–28, 35–39; Lovejoy and Richardson 1999).
This institution was important, but like other important factors, it only
partially explains the rise of the region’s trade. Developments in the hin-
terland anchored by Aro organization facilitated the supply of captives to
the coast and justified European credit investment in the region.
Coastal Ports and the Hinterland

The pivotal relationship of Aro organization to developments on the
coast manifested by the mid-eighteenth century in Bonny’s supersession
of Old Calabar as Biafra’s principal port just as the Aro expanded west-
ward. The shift occurred during the 1726–50 period, when the volume
at Old Calabar rose to 66,800, nearly doubling the 34,400 in the previ-
ous quarter century, while Bonny’s rose to 93,200 – 22 times the paltry
4,200 in the previous period. Thereafter, the numbers embarked at both
Old Calabar and Bonny continued to rise, but while exports from Old
Calabar rose appreciably to 103,800 or 55.3 percentage points in the
1751–75 period, the rise at Bonny was again exponential – 193,000 or
107 percentage points. In the last quarter of the century, the volume from
Old Calabar declined to 82,500 while the number embarked at Bonny
rose even further to 207,900 (Table 2.7). Bonny not only became the
busiest port in the Bight of Biafra; it also became the busiest in Atlantic
Africa north of the Equator (Table 2.6).
Concomitant with the expansion of trade was the exceptionally fast
loading rate that occurred at the Bonny port. Captain Simmons of the
28
Cowan (1936:53–54); Latham (1973:27); Hargreaves (1987); Lovejoy and Richardson
(1997, 1999).
Table 2.7. Estimated Departures of Captives from Bight of Biafra Ports by

Quarter Century, 1651–1850 (in thousands)
Bonny New Old Cameroon Gabon/ All Total

Calabar Calabar Corisco Others
1651–1675 1.0 31.7 25.8 0 0 0 58.5
1676–1700 2.8 15.5 33.2 0 0 0 51.5
1701–1725 4.2 4.7 34.4 0 1.3 1.4 45.9
1726–1750 93.2 3.3 66.8 0 2.1 1.3 166.8
1751–1775 193.0 29.0 103.8 17.7 9.5 0.9 354.0
1776–1800 207.9 37.8 82.5 16.6 11.3 2.6 358.7
1801–1825 161.8 17.7 41.8 17.6 9.3 9.2 257.4
1826–1850 82.6 5.4 49.2 12.3 21.4 27.4 198.2
1676–1850 746.5 145.1 437.5 64.2 54.9 42.8 1491
Source: Eltis et al. 2000.
Vine, from Liverpool, “apparently [broke] the record” in 1766 when he

sailed with 400 captives from Bonny to Dominica. He “accomplished the
round voyage in seven months and ten days” (G. Williams 1897:529).
The development at Bonny was phenomenal.
Why did trade at Bonny expand so dramatically and why was the
turnaround rate exceptionally high? Historians have pondered how
this change came about, and many cite the declining demand at Old
Calabar as a factor. They have paid considerable attention to the role
of Euro-American buyers in bringing about the relative decline of Old
Calabar. Relatively poor health conditions at Old Calabar, the disinter-
est of West Indian planters in Old Calabar captives, high comey rates
(duty paid to coastal rulers to secure trading rights), and the rivalry
between the Liverpool and Bristol ships over captives regularly feature
as factors that promoted the shift. According to this view, European
traders could make £60–62 per head from Bonny and New Calabar cap-
tives, “against only £28–30 for slaves from Old Calabar” (Hargreaves
1987:181; Latham 1973:19–20). Indeed, the Liverpool-Bristol rivalry
seems to have been more intense at Old Calabar and may have put off
some buyers by 1767, when one Liverpool sailor wrote in 1767 that
he “never saw a worse prospect for making a voyage than at present”
(see G. Williams 1897:535). Also, exactions of comey at Old Calabar
had reached notable proportions and could well have deterred Euro-
American buyers (see Crosbies and Trafford et al. 1762:486; G. Williams
1897:529–48). Further, Bonny’s more convenient anchorage relative
to Old Calabar and its consolidation of “the perpetual alliance” with
boat-producing Brass against the other city-states, notably rival New

Calabar, have been cited as giving Bonny an advantage over Old Calabar
(Cookey 1974:19–20). While transatlantic demand explains the take-
off of the overseas slave trade, to attribute Bonny’s supersession of Old
Calabar to Euro-American factors or solely to coastal conditions glosses
over the crucial reasons for the change. The rest of this chapter will show
that the reasons Old Calabar gave way to Bonny as the leading port in
Biafra are more complicated.
The one demand condition that seems to have had significant
impact has barely received attention. The poor reputation of Biafra
captives in the Americas affected Old Calabar much more than Bonny.
The exceptionally poor reputation of captives from Old Calabar con-
tinued to inhibit the demand for captives that sailed from that port.
That captives from the Bight of Biafra had a tendency to revolt aboard
slave ships was a “common stereotype” among eighteenth-century
British slavers (Richardson 2001:73, 79). That they were prone to sui-
cide was another stereotype of the Igbo held by planters in several
regions of the Americas (Gomez 2003:84–86). James Jones, who sent
ships regularly to Bonny in the 1780s, claimed that he “always declined
sending” ships to Old Calabar (and the Cameroons) because the ports
“are Sickly, and Slaves inferior to any other, very Weakly and liable to
great mortality” (J. Jones 1788:590). Indeed, mortality rates among
captives leaving the Bight of Biafra were 7.5 percentage points higher
than among those leaving from the rest of Atlantic Africa, and within
Biafra, the mean mortality rate involving vessels from Old Calabar
was a significant 5.7 percentage points higher than those departing
Bonny (Eltis et al. 2000; H. Klein 2001:101). One Euro-American and
coastal element that may have been instrumental to the shift and high
turnaround rates in the region is the possibility that the Aro moved
captives to the ports where they could obtain higher prices, in this case
Bonny, and where they could sell their captives as “Eboe” rather than
the opprobrious “Calabar.” This phenomenon buttresses the impor-
tance of Euro-American preferences.
A combination of factors – external and domestic – accounts for the
ascendancy of Bonny. Eltis, Lovejoy, and Richardson have identified a
number of conditions that favored the major ports – their proximity to
“large stocks of potential slaves,” accessibility to slave vessels, greater
information there about commercial conditions, personal and commer-
cial ties between indigenous merchants of the ports and their European
counterparts, and domestic political factors. This perspective offers a
greater range of possibilities than explanations that focus exclusively on

external or internal factors, but as the authors themselves make clear the
particular factors they identified do not necessarily explain the trajecto-
ries of any one port (Eltis, Lovejoy, and Richardson 1999:20, 23–24).
Indeed, the explanation offers a clarification of why the major ports
generally remained important between 1626 and 1832, but not why the
relative fortunes of particular ports changed at particular periods. It was
the changes taking place in supply within inland trading networks that
gave Bonny the edge over its closest competitor, Old Calabar.
Captive supplies were actually shrinking at Old Calabar. One uniden-
tified European eyewitness’ report from Old Calabar, dated August 12,
1767, is quite informative.
There are now seven large vessels in the river, each of which expects to purchase
500 slaves, and I imagine there was seldom ever known a greater scarcity of
slaves than at present, and these few chiefly from the low country (emphasis
added). The natives [are engaged in a bloody internal conflict]. The river of
late has been very fatal both to whites and blacks. There have three captains
belonging to Bristol died within these few months, besides a number of officers
and sailors …. The major part of the vessels here have very dangerous disorders
amongst the slaves, which makes me rejoice that I have very few on board. I do
not expect that our stay here will exceed eight months. The adjoining coasts
of trade seem all to be very much thronged with shipping … . (reproduced by
G. Williams 1897:535)
The gist of this report is that European buyers went to Old Calabar
with large vessels, and each vessel was to collect as many as 500 captives.
Earlier in 1762, the Liverpool owners of the Marquis of Granby had
sent Captain Ambrose Lace hoping for a “larger than … expected” cargo
of 550 captives (Crosbies and Trafford et al. 1762:486). But the reality
was that captives were becoming comparatively scarce in Old Calabar,
and coastal middlemen calculated their prices based on supply and
demand. European demand at Old Calabar had placed pressure upon
supply, a situation that local rulers sought to exploit sometimes by hiking
the comey. Violent rivalry between two leading factions of Old Calabar
symptomized a structural problem. Old Calabar and European factions
hankered over dwindling supplies of captives (relative to demand) in
a series of messy, complicated, and violent incidents (see G. Williams
1897:535–36). Declining supplies at Old Calabar and increasing supplies
at Bonny as a function of the shifting focus of Aro operations, rather than
Euro-American demand patterns, best explain Bonny’s supersession of
Old Calabar as Biafra’s principal port.
If demand-side explanations fail to illuminate Bonny’s supersession of

Old Calabar, explanations based exclusively on coastal conditions offer,
at best, a limited perspective of the shift. High European mortality rates
at this time resulted, not from the intrinsic unhealthiness of Old Calabar
relative to other ports in the region, but from the long waits caused by the
shortage of captives at that port. In the post–slave trade era, the British
vice consul in the Bight of Biafra during the 1880s, Harry Johnston,
found Old Calabar to be “relatively healthy” – in comparison to other
ports, including Bonny (Johnston 1888b:753). Unless the climatic condi-
tions had changed significantly during the preceding century, conditions
at Bonny could not have been healthier than at Old Calabar.
Other coastal conditions do not satisfactorily explain the shift either.
Comey rates do not seem to have played a crucial role in decision mak-
ing in the Biafra slave trade and certainly not in the case of Bonny, where
comey was just as great. Neither did they hamper the palm oil trade at
Old Calabar that became important in the second half of the eighteenth
century (see Adams 1832; Northrup 1976; Ryder 1980:242). Nor did
they prevent the ascendancy of Bonny, where, as in New Calabar, the
comey rates were, after all, also considerable. By 1788, James Jones could
declare that “the Dutys paid [at Bonny and New Calabar are] very high
much more than at any other part of the Coast (emphasis added), and on
every ship alike without distinction as to size” (J. Jones 1788). In Bonny,
the custom duty for each ship was as high as £400 in 1792 (see Crow
1830:43). Rather than trade shifting away from Bonny because of high
comey rates, Bonny posted phenomenal sales despite its high comey rates.
Thus, comey rates had less impact on the shift than often suggested.
Nor does Bonny’s favorable anchorage explain its rise as a major outlet
for captives. After all, Euro-American buyers were aware of this advan-
tage by the turn of the eighteenth century, and probably before (see Starke
1702:74). Yet, it was not until the 1726–50 period that Bonny superseded
Old Calabar. If good and safe anchorage was a key factor in Bonny’s
rise, why then did Opobo later supersede Bonny, after 1869, in spite of
Opobo having an exceeding shallow channel? No do Bonny’s apparent
alliances with neighboring trading states pass muster as a reason for the
shift. While a strategic alliance could have been relevant in Bonny’s rise
to prominence, and while Bonny’s alliance with westerly Brass could have
given Bonny an advantage over New Calabar (which was sandwiched by
Bonny and Brass), this alliance has no necessary connection with Bonny
overtaking Old Calabar, located some distance away to the east of Bonny.
Further, it is impossible to gauge the relevance of this supposedly crucial
political alliance to the shift in trade that had become noticeable by the
1750s, since it is unclear when the alliance took effect. The explanation
for Bonny’s rise lies elsewhere.
The relative attractiveness of the ports to overseas buyers was largely
dependent on the ports, supply links with the hinterland, from where
the vast majority of export captives were drawn. The location of Bende
(eastern Igboland), which had been well established since the 1670s, sug-
gests the existence of a trade-route network that crisscrossed Igbo and
the Ibibio countries down to Calabar (Nwokeji 1997a). These routes led
southward to the ports of Bonny and New Calabar and northward into
the Igala and Idoma lands in the Nigerian Middle Belt, probably from
the early eighteenth century and toward the end of the second phase
or beginning of the second phase of Aro expansion. This would partly
have resulted from the policies of the Atta dynasty of the Igala kingdom
of Idah, which came into existence in c. 1687–1717. The Atta dynasty
“turned energetically to the development of slave trading, and became a
major supplier to the Niger River markets and the Aro overland system”
(Sargent 1999:8, 61). Of particular interest are the changes that took
place in trade-routes network. Four north to south routes had emerged
by 1750, according to Afigbo (1987).
1. The Niger waterway in the westernmost extreme of the region.

2. An overland route from the Middle Belt towns of Ejure and Idah
on the Benue River, through Nsukka, central Igboland, and Akwete
in southern Igboland to Bonny.
3. An overland route from the Middle Belt town of Ibi on the Benue
through Ejure to central Igboland and “to the coast.”
4. The easternmost route from Ibi through Wukari and Ogoja in the
Ejagam region, Ezza in northeastern Igboland, to Cross River Igbo
towns of Uburu and Bende, Arochukwu, and the Ibibio town of
Itu. This route most likely terminated at Calabar.
The second and third of these routes passed through central Igboland
and headed toward the central Niger delta, and the second route ter-
minated at Bonny. The Niger route was probably the oldest (Afigbo
1987:41). This picture squares with the trends in Biafra Atlantic exports.
The pattern of exports from Old Calabar suggests that the easternmost
route was also older than the central routes; New Calabar was the old-
est port of significance and received most of its trade from the Niger
route closest to it, as did Brass, the westernmost port in the region. As
Biafra’s easternmost port, Old Calabar, “dealt with the Ibibio along the
lower Cross River” and bought captives from the Aro (Cookey 1974:19).
Whereas the captives sold at Brass included significant numbers of non-
Igbo from farther north, Bonny received its trade principally from the Aro
network (Alagoa 1986:127). It was more practicable to reach the Niger
through the Brass River than through the Bonny River; the Bonny River
was not even a branch of the Niger (Burdo 1880:95; Whitford 1967:159).
Thus, Bonny received its captive supplies almost exclusively from central
Igboland. Its rise as the principal port had to await the development of
the central route. Old Calabar, which superseded New Calabar, received
its trade from the easternmost route via Arochukwu, so that a higher pro-
portion of non-Igbo captives were exported from there than from Bonny
(Nwokeji 2000a:621). The two central routes leading to Bonny through
the Igbo heartland were the new elements in the trade-route system
during the eighteenth century. The Bonny port, which became preeminent
by the mid-eighteenth century, linked these two routes via the major Aro
settlements in the greater upper Imo River area. Thus it is clear that both
internal and external dynamics were linked. The Aro mobilized captives
from the hinterland, and Euro-American traders bought and transported
those captives overseas, underscoring the fact that both internal processes
and external Euro-American circumstances shaped the region’s trade.
Conclusions
This chapter correlates with uncommon specificity changes in coastal
trading activities – in particular the rise of slave exports and shifts in the
relative importance of embarkation ports – not just with external factors
or internal developments confined to coastal trading societies, but also
with changes in inland organization of the slave trade. Aro expansion
into the Igbo heartland and the rise of the Biafra Atlantic slave trade
were linked. Aro incursions, manifested in the establishment of the prin-
cipal Aro diaspora settlements, were both a cause and effect of the Biafra
Atlantic system. The Aro had been trading in the Igbo heartland prior
to the shift in export activity from Old Calabar to Bonny in the mid-
eighteenth century, and their setting up of settlements in the heartland
resulted from the quest to satisfy increasing demand for captives. Trade
with Europeans encouraged Aro forays in the hinterland, which in turn
both increased Biafra’s supply of captives and shifted the thrust of trade
from Old Calabar to Bonny. As the Aro network matured in the Cross
River region, Old Calabar, situated near Arochukwu, became dominant
in the first half of the eighteenth century, as a result of the supply

situation at Old Calabar, where the Aro channeled most of their cap-
tives before the 1740s. This initial shift of trade eastward skipped Bonny,
which was located between New Calabar and Old Calabar, because the
central trade routes had not yet developed. Further expansion of trade
escalated Aro expansion. But Aro forays northwestward into the densely
populated central Igboland, and especially their creation of new settle-
ments there, shifted trade away from Old Calabar to Bonny – a port
that was more convenient port to these settlements. It is significant that,
although the overall reputation of Biafra captives may have risen over
the period among Euro-American buyers, the poor reputation of captives
sold at Old Calabar remained unaltered throughout the shifts and trends
observed, a fact that strongly suggests the centrality of the supply side to
these changes. The remarkably fast loading rate at Bonny relative to other
ports in the Bight of Biafra must have been the function of the delivery
system from hinterland sources of captives to the coast. More detailed
analyses are needed across African regions, which delineate the role of
inland trading organizations in shaping the structure of the Atlantic slave
trade, in particular, the trajectories of specific embarkation ports during
different periods. Chapter 3 fleshes out the empirical details of the role of
Aro institutions and trading mechanisms in the expansion of their opera-
tions and in changes in the Bight of Biafra slave trade.
3
The Trade Diaspora in Regional Context
Aro Commercial Organization in the Era

of Expansion, 1740–1850
The Aro trading complex had not only an Atlantic context but also a
regional political and economic one.1 The Aro created what K. Onwuka
Dike termed a regional “pax” under which large-scale trade flourished in
a multiethnic region, and their operations eased exchange and “brought
rapid impetus to economic expansion” in a region with a multitiered
currency system. Some further argue that the Aro brought stability to the
region.2 It bears noting, however, that the Aro were only one of several
groups in the seventeenth century that resulted from migrations into the
Bight of Biafra to partake in the slave trade. Both Arochukwu and the
Niger riverine states underwent a period of growth and consolidation
throughout the seventeenth century and after. Yet, it was the Aro, rather
than these states or any other groups, who came to dominate the hinter-
land trade. Did the Aro weave their trading network using an organiza-
tion similar to the organizations of other communities in the region or
did they fashion a truly unique model?
That the Aro used an organization based on a fundamentally different
model seems to have been the case. While Abo and Igala established a few
trading outposts, they did not open up new markets for captives per se.
1
For the regional context, see Dike and Ekejiuba 1990; Ekejiuba 1972a, 1972b; Ifemesia
1978:32–37; Ijoma and Njoku 1991; G.I. Jones 1989:34–36; Northrup 1978b; Ofonagoro
1972; Oriji 1981, 1982; S. Ottenberg 1958, 1971:24–27; Stevenson 1968:Ch. 9; Ukwu
1967, 1969.
2
For the first view, see Crowder 1978:65; K.O. Dike 1956:38–39; Ekejiuba 1991:313–14;
Isichei 1976:64 and, for the second, see Grier 1922.
53
These settlements only dotted the banks of the lower Niger.3 The most
spectacular development of the eighteenth century was the establishment
of Aro settlements virtually everywhere in the region. In fact, the Aro
soon carried their trade into the turfs of some of these immigrant trading
communities and even their parent communities outside Igboland, where
the Aro established settlements, including the main Igala market at Idah
at the northern reaches of the Lower Niger.4 These diaspora settlements
also enabled the Aro to participate actively in the Niger riverine trade.
Thus, they played a vital role in Aro trade, probably accounting for more
than 85 percent of all the captives that resulted from Aro operations
(K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:250). The diasporic character of Aro orga-
nization was the decisive factor in Aro ability to meet the demands of the
expanding Biafra Atlantic trade. Aro settlements coordinated activities
and strongly identified with the metropole.
Aro settlements were more than permanent settlements in the common
sense because their routine contact with, as well as determined cultural
and political fidelity to, the Arochukwu metropole were an essential
feature. As a pivotal element in Aro expansion and the expansion of the
Biafra Atlantic trade, the diaspora phenomenon calls for detailed exami-
nation. Placing Aro settlements in the diaspora context highlights, on
the one hand, the internal relations among Aro groups and, on the other,
their relations with the host communities. In this way, too, we can estab-
lish the process and direction of cultural evolution, the incorporation of
outsiders into Aro groups, and how the Aro system both resembled, and
deviated from, other trade diasporas.
The Diaspora Context

The Aro had five key elements of trade diasporas. First, a “central place”
that performed roles “which all require but it alone can perform” (Curtin
1975: 64) was often an important component of a trade diaspora. In the
Aro case, the central place was Arochukwu in the Cross River region.
Arochukwu was the seat of major Aro institutions, such as the central
council (Ọkpankpọ), the Ibiniukpabi oracle, and Eze Aro (Aro king), and
each diaspora settlement was institutionally tied to the Aro world only
3
These outposts included Akri-Atani, Akri-Uteri, Akri-Ugidi, Nsugbe and Oko See Afigbo
(1977:131), Isichei (1976); K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba (1990:83).
4
For Oguta, see Ofonagoro (1972:89); Isichei (1976:62); Northrup (1978b:130); G.I.
Jones (1989:36). For Igala, see Dike and Ekejiuba (1990:200).
The Trade Diaspora in Regional Context 55
through its parent Arochukwu lineage-group. A second element is in the

relationship of trade diasporas to their host communities, which range
from dominated diasporas to dominant ones, with most falling into the
former category. The third similarity between the Aro and other trade
diasporas is cultural aloofness from the host population. Whatever their
size, structure or specific history, Aro settlements stood out from the
local population. Fourth, in spite of the tendency to emphasize cultural
exclusiveness, trade diasporas were “cross-cultural carriers of culture”
or “cultural brokers.” For example, although the trade diasporas of the
Senegambian trade, such as the Maraka, the Juula and the Jahaanke,
“adopted the language[s] and some aspects of the culture of the [host
societies],” they continued to claim Soninke origin.5 The Aro diaspora
settlements, too shared, much and mixed with the groups among whom
they lived, notably the Igbo, but they steadfastly held on to a separate
Aro identity. Fifth, trade diasporas historically made ideological and/or
religious references to universalist monotheism, and often claimed a spe-
cial place within it. The best example is the Jews, who were the most
widespread of all trade diasporas. The known African trade diasporas,
such as the Hausa and the Sonninke-speaking groups of West Africa, and
the Swahili of East Africa, operated within the framework of Islam. These
Muslim merchants presented themselves to, and were accepted among,
most African groups, operating as standard bearers of Islam. Although
the Aro were non-Muslim, their religion also espoused a universalist
monetheist deity, Chukwu, and the Aro alone were its children. Like
other trade diasporas, the Aro successfully inserted themselves into a spe-
cial place in the world of Chukwu. These characteristics distinguished the
Aro from other groups in the Bight of Biafra.
While being non-Muslim made the Aro unique among most other
African trade diasporas, they also differed from most other trade diaspo-
ras anywhere. Unlike other diasporas, the Aro diaspora almost always
had access to military resources, which was often a decisive factor in their
dealings with hinterland groups. Trade diasporas also tended to be slow,
if not always averse, to incorporate outsiders, but the Aro embarked on a
programmatic incorporation of non-Aro into the Aro group (Chapter 6).
In addition, the Aro invariably wielded political influence over their host
communities, a marked departure from other trade diasporas, which tended
5
The theoretical and comparative insights in this paragraph are drawn from Curtin
(1975:63–64; 1984:2, 3, 5, 25). See Kea (1982:ch. 2) for an elaboration of a central place
in a different context.
to be politically marginal within their host societies. These differences

compel a detailed examination of Aro methods.
The number and diversity of Aro settlements in a region as small as the
Nigerian section of the Bight of Biafra are bewildering. The complex his-
torical circumstances that accompanied the formation and development
of about 150 Aro trade diaspora communities during the Aro expansion
have given rise to competing taxonomies, from which two to five types
have emerged depending on the criteria used. These taxonomies derive
from mode of establishment, size, or function of the diaspora settlements.6
The most useful typology eschews function as a comparative criterion
and uses mode of formation, size, and structure to derive the following
types: (1) large settlements founded by conquest that grew to dominate
the land, superimposing their names on it (as in Arondizuogu, the com-
munities of the Ndieni cluster, and Inokun); (2) those founded peacefully
that constituted separate villages or wards within preexisting non-Aro
communities (as found in Oguta, Bende, Umuahia, and the Port Harcourt
area); and (3) the numerous compounds or lineages within preexisting
non-Aro villages that peacefully sprouted as trading posts (C. Okafor
1986:116–19). All typology is of course merely heuristic, and exceptions
obtain even in this classification.
Although no single model can account for all trade diasporas, the
principal Aro settlements – Arondizuogu and the Ndieni cluster –
exhibited remarkable uniformities in the timing, spacing, and patterns
of establishment. They were all established around the mid-eighteenth
century at the edge of the densely populated Igbo heartland, and force
was typically used. The perimeter of the Igbo heartland had the larg-
est concentration of large Aro settlements. Among the many features of
the Aro expansionist strategy, five stand out: (1) the timing and loca-
tion of the major settlements in the densely populated central Igboland;
(2) the virtual partitioning of the Biafra hinterland among Arochukwu
lineage-groups; (3) alliances with non-Aro groups through the agency
of Aro private enterprise; (4) the use of force in establishing the large
settlements; and (5) conscious efforts at group expansion and inher-
ent motivation for successful merchants to create new settlements. The
rest of this chapter examines these processes and the institutions that
articulated them, in order to explain the hinterland dimensions of the
expansion of the Biafra Atlantic trade.
6
See Umo (n.d.:10); S. Ottenberg (1958:301); Stevenson (1968:204); Dike and Ekejiuba
(1990:196–97); Ijoma and Njoku (1991:305).
Timing and Location of the Major Settlements

As was common among trade diasporas, the Aro settlements were estab-
lished in areas with existing channels of exchange.7 The Aro established
settlements whenever any trader or kin-related traders deemed it necessary
to do so in furtherance of trade. Settlements therefore tended to follow
existing trade routes that linked the principal markets that had been
adopted by the Aro. In areas with rudimentary market infrastructures,
such as Ikwereland in southern Igboland and other peripheral areas,
the Aro established new markets (Ifemesia 1978:33; Ukwu 1969:134,
135). The Aro found reliable exchange structures in the upper Imo River/
Nri-Awka region, which they had in fact used for some time before the
1740s. This region maintained a complex trade network that encom-
passed Igbo-Ukwu, a community that had acquired items produced out-
side Africa as far back as the ninth century AD and established trading
groups of Awka and Nkwere. It was not a surprise, therefore, that the
most important Aro settlements were concentrated in central Igboland
between Nkwere and the Nri-Awka region.
Aro traders seem to have commonly established settlements in familiar
territories. The founding of these settlements was the culmination of
long-established trading contacts with the people of the greater central
Igbo region. The founders of the Aro settlements of the Igbo heartland
either had already acquired dependents from the Nri-Awka area (and
beyond) or had themselves been acquired originally as children from the
region. For example, Izuogu Mgbopko, the founder of Arondizuogu, had
as dependents Amazu from Oro (Awlaw) in the Oji-Mmam River area,
west of Awgu in the savanna, and Iheme from Nise near Awka in the Igbo
heartland. Izuogu is said to already have had a key contact in the upper
Imo region – Nzeadachie of Umulolo (see J.G. Okoro 1985:23; 1996). In
time, Umulolo traditions even claimed that the clan’s legendary projenitor,
Lolo, was an Aro man (see Goodlife 1933:7, NAE CSE 1/1/5 28935). The
founders of the Ndieni cluster had also had long-standing contact with
the greater central Igboland, including Nri-Awka. The founder of Ujari
(Ajalli), Oti Emesinwa, is said to have acted at the prompting of his father
who had traded in the Nri-Awka area. The Nri-Awka origins of some of
these mid-eighteenth-century traders show that the Aro had traded with
the region sometime before, in part because these men had been acquired
as small boys a few decades earlier. The Aro traders who made regular
7
Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:197; Ukwu 1967, 1969.
trips to the Nri-Awka axis included men the Aro merchant–warlords

had acquired from the greater central Igboland. Ikerionwu Ufere, who
soon established a settlement north-northwest of Arondizuogu, had been
acquired from Ifite in Awka, also in the Nri-Awka area. Owuu Mgbori,
whose descendants founded Ndiowuu, had himself also been acquired
from the Nri-Awka region.8 All this seems to support the suggestion that
most of the Igbo who were sent to the export slave trade were drawn
from the Nri-Awka area, and Douglas Chambers specifically mentions
the U.S. Chesapeake region up to the 1740s (Chambers 2005:30, 37; S.
Martin 1995:174; Oriji 1987:159–60). Indeed, the two Igbo place names
Oldendorp gathered from enslaved Igbo in North America during 1767
and 1768 – Alo (Alor) and Okwa (Ukwa) – are in the Nri-Awka region
(Oldendorp 2000: ms. 432, 434). The region seems to have begun to sup-
ply significant numbers of captives through Aro operations prior to the
establishment of the Aro settlements in central Igboland.
The most important Aro settlements to be established during the eigh-
teenth century were in the area that had the highest population densities
in the Biafra hinterland and Atlantic Africa. Arondizuogu in particular
was “situated in the heart of the Ibo country with easy access from this
broken country to the uplands in the west and north, through gaps in
the encampment to the Cross River basin in the east, as well as to the
southern coastal plains” (Ukwu 1967:651; 1969:134). With the Ndieni
cluster, this settlement commanded the trade routes from the Igbo heart-
land in all directions, leading ultimately to destinations outside Igboland
(Cookey 1974:6). Another basic rationale for the strategic siting of settle-
ments was the Aro need for a constant supply of provisions for their
ever-growing populations and for transit captives.
If Arondizuogu was the first full-fledged diaspora settlement of the
Aro, as is generally accepted, the date of its foundation should clarify the
timing of the Aro diaspora. In the absence of written records, genealogies
provide a guide to the chronology. Early Arondizuogu writers give great
antiquity to the settlement – 1620 or 1635 (Umo n.d. [1947?:17]; Igwegbe
1962). Others have put forth later dates – 1728 or 1720–30 (K.O. Dike
and Ekejiuba 1990:205; B. Orji 1978:8). Based on six generations of
genealogy and his awareness of the role of the Atlantic slave trade in Aro
expansion, Jonathan Okoro suggests that the settlement was founded in
8
See Umo (n.d.); Igwegbe (1962) and J.G.Okoro (1985) for Arondizuogu; J.C. Nwankwo
(1973) for Ndikerionwu; and Eni (1973:9) for Ujari. Eni claims that Ujari was established
in the 1730s.
1750. Notably, he observes that this period was “still within the peak
period of the slave trade in West Africa, and the colony was set up as
a convenient base for the collection of slaves” (J.G. Okoro 1985:43).
One calculation from the genealogies collected by colonial officers during
the early twentieth century suggests 1790–1820 (Isichei 1976; Nwauwa
1990). According to this scheme, the Atlantic slave trade was almost over
when the community was founded. This faulty date resulted from gene-
alogies collected among descendants of recent immigrants, who sought
to advance their position within the colonial-era indirect-rule system
whereby the British apparently ruled the people through their traditional
rulers. Clearly, the foundation of the settlement happened considerably
before the late eighteenth century.
Researchers in the Bight of Biafra commonly use thirty years as the
standard for the male generational marker (Nwauwa 1990; Sargent
1999). There should never be a standard to apply to all societies,
except where too little is known to allow for special circumstances and
specific cultural practices that influence the demographic process. Each
society is different, and special circumstances might exacerbate differ-
ences in generational averages among different societies. The thirty-
year paradigm assumes that a male was always the first child and that
first male children (who were not necessarily first born or by the first
wife) all survived. High infant mortality and late marriages on the part
of men ensured that these constants hardly applied to any real situa-
tion. According to an Aro elder, Michael Igwe, “Before a man could
say in those days that he was getting married, he would be up to fifty
years, or at least forty” (M.S. Igwe 1996). His testimony most likely
exaggerates the phenomenon, but it does indicate that early marriages
cannot be assumed. When men eventually did marry, it sometimes took
several years and additional wives before they had male children. The
problem is further complicated by the fact that one can hardly trace
the lines of first sons with consistency. Because Arondizuogu leadership
is based on gerontocracy, rather than promogeniture, there are few
traces left in oral tradition on which one can base the genealogies of
the ruling house on first sons. Reliance on later sons, whose genealo-
gies are nonetheless known, stretches the generational gap even wider.
For example, the following calculation based on the genealogy of the
late Eze, John Dike II, exhibits such a problem. Dike II was one of
his father’s last children, born when Dike Oti would have been well
into his seventies (P. Imo 2003). Given the foregoing demographics,
forty-five years seems a more accurate marker in this case. John Dike
was born in about 1918 as the son of Dike, and using the forty-five-
year rule, this date puts the hypothetical birth date of Dike Oti at
1873.9 John’s grandfather, Oti Okoronkwo, would have been born
about 1828. Oti’s father, Okoronkwo, would have been born in 1783.
From this, we derive at 1738 birth date for Awa, Izuogu’s second son,
born of Izuogu’s junior wife.10 This would have put Izuogu’s own birth
date in about 1693. As Izuogu seems to have traded in the area for
some time when he founded the settlement, he would have been suf-
ficiently advanced in age, perhaps forty years. This puts the date of the
formation of Arondizuogu at about 1733, with a five-year margin of
error. This range is largely correspondent with genealogies collected
from the pioneer lineage-groups. Izuogu was the great grandson of
Nnachi, the Igbo pioneer of the Aro state.
The intensification of Aro activities in central Igboland that is evident
from the concentration of the major Aro settlements there, starting about
the 1740s, suggests strongly that the trade of these Aro communities was
oriented toward Bonny and New Calabar. Given that this trend was the
most significant element in Bonny’s supersession of Old Calabar (and New
Calabar) during the 1726–50 period, the correlation of these byproducts
of Aro expansion to the expansion of the Biafra Atlantic trade compels
the examination of the mechanisms of Aro expansion.
Zoning of the Hinterland

Aro concentration in densely populated central Igboland resulted from
its division of the entire Biafra hinterland into spheres of operation
among the Aro lineage-groups (Table 3.1). The method by which the
hinterland was zoned is also hazy, but it seems that individuals and
lineages opened their own spheres and maintained contacts according
to familiar lines of trade.11 Once a family or group of traders from a
particular Aro lineage-group had opened up initial contacts at a place,
all other Aro traders usually respected it as the sphere of that pioneer
family or group, which became the designated Aro link to the host
community. By respecting one another’s domains, Aro groups were
9
This date is clearly inaccurate, as Dike Oti would have been born about twenty-five years
earlier, but this should be offset by other stages in the genealogy that are shorter than
forty-five years.
10
Awa’s elder brother was Uche born of Izuogu’s senior wife.
11
E.g. J. O. Dike 1996; Obinani 1996; Michael Ike 1995; Kanu-Igbo 1996b; J.G. Okoro
1996; J.O. Okoro 1996.
Table 3.1. Division of Spheres among Aro Lineage-Groups
Aro Lineage-Group Markets

Agbagwu Itemc, Ohaozarac, Mgbidif, Ose-Motof
Amangwu Ituc, Ohaozarac, Ezzaf, Onuekef, Affium6
Amankwu Enuguc, Isuamab, Nri-Awkab, Arondizuogu areaf
Amannagwu Bonnya, New Calabara, Ogutaf, Abamf, Ukwaf
Amasu Calabar via Umomc, Ekic, and Uwetc, Lokpantaf,
Lokpaukwuc, Ibiasoegbef
Amoba Afikpob, Ohaozaraf, Amasirif, Uburuf
Amukwa Uzuakolic, Ovimf
Amuvi Ohaozarac, Enuguc,e, Igbo hinterland up to Nsukkaa,
Awgue, Isuochif, Ihubef, Achif
Asaga Okigwec,d, Igbo hinterland up to Nsukkaa, Orlu-Ogutae,
Abakalikif, Ikwof, Ezaaf, Izzif
Atani Bonny,a,c, Okirikac, Ngwac, & Degemac, New Calabara,h,
Ajatakirif, Ayamaf, Affiumf, Ihialag,h
Ibom Adac, Oburac, nde-Ikelionwu areaf, nde-Owuu areaf,
Ogwef, Ebijiakaraf, Ihialag,h
Isinkpu Bonny1,c, Okirikac, Ngwac, Degemac, New Calabara,
Okporo-Enyif, Itu-Ntaf, Nkaluntaf
Obinkita Ibibioc,d, Bonny–New Calabara, Mbiabongf, Nturif, Ikot-
Umossienf, Ikot-Edetf
Oro Akunakunac,d, Aro-Ikpa areaf
Ugbo Uburuc, Igbo hinterland up to Nsukkaa, Amasirif
Ugwuakuma Ekoic, Ewef, Ikorokporaf
Ugwuavo Abakalikic, Igbo hinterland up to Nsukkaa, Okposi-
Akezef, Onicha-Isuf
Ujari Enyongc, Ujari areaf, Ihef, Okijaf, nde-Okoroji areaf
Utughugwu Akunakunac, Nneatof
Sources: a K. Oji 1972; b G.I. Jones 1989:35–36; c Anthropologists’ Papers 1927:Appendix

1V; d Grier 1922:34; e Kanu-Igbo 1996; f Aro-Okeigbo Ancestral Almanac 1996; g E. Ike
1985; h I. Ugboaja 1985.
able to erect a moral economy of trade and minimize conflict among

themselves. The pioneer Aro-community historian Kanu Umo tells
us that
each village or town community in Aro-land had an emissary to different peoples

outside. With each of these they had an oath of allegiance in which the Aros swore
safe conduct to “Chukwu” whilst, on the other hand, the peoples swore loyalty
and staunch reliability to their intermediaries and lords. … the relative principle
between the … peoples was purely democratic such that any encroachment would
be a vital stet – to (sic) the democracy intended. (Umo n.d. [1947]:10)
Just as individual Aro traders knew, and were expected to respect, the
boundaries of the zones of influence, their non-Aro suppliers knew their
particular Aro men. As one respondent testified:
It was already recognized at home before they came out. Individuals focused
on lines familiar to them. The customers who supplied them with trade goods
already knew their [Aro] men. Aro groups never collided over spheres of influ-
ence. … Nobody would move from the Amankwu team to buy captives being
supplied to the Ujari; nobody from the Ujari team would buy those being sup-
plied to the Amuvi, and so forth. (Kanu-Igbo 1996)
An Aro person from one lineage-group went into another Aro lineage-
group’s area of influence only if sponsored by somebody from the group
wielding influence (Kanu-Igbo 1996; J.O. Okoro 1996). “In those days,
trade through commission agents was part of trade. [Trader A] may find
the price of a commodity unfavorable. [He] then decides to shift it to [his
friend, trader B] to consider if [B] could cope with the price. [Trader B]
may even decide to send it to [trader C]. Buying the commodity did not
give [trader C] the right to trade in [trader A’s] area of trade” (Kanu-Igbo
1996). One Aro tradition from Ihiala in the southern periphery of the
Nri-Awka area relates that an Aro person who scouted for pilgrims to
the shrine or for non-Aro caravans in an area controlled by another Aro
group forfeited the commission accruing from such a transaction (E. Ike
1985). There can be no doubt that the Aro quarreled among themselves
over spheres, but they evidently contained the quarrels sufficiently to pre-
vent such problems from disrupting their activities.
In zoning the region and in forging commercial ties, the Aro capitalized on
their multiethnic origins and the strategic location of their homeland.12
The zoning of spheres directed the various lineage-groups often to
the areas of their ethnic origins. Thus, Arondizuogu, an Amankwu
offshoot, controlled much of the Nri-Awka market. Amankwu, in turn,
Table 3.2. Principal Aro Settlements at the Edge of the Igbo Heartland
Settlement Parent Arochukwu lineage-group

Arondizuogu Amankwu
Ndiokwaraeze (Ndieni) Ujari
Ujari (Ndieni) Ujari
nde-Owu (Ndieni) Ibom
12
Dike and Ekejiuba 1990; Ijoma and Njoku 1991:208; G.I. Jones 1989:35; Northrup
1978:48.
was a branch of the “Igbo” pioneers of Arochukwu. The other major

Aro settlements in central Igboland, collectively referred to as Ndieni,
were offshoots of an assortment of parent Arochukwu lineage-groups
(Table 3.2). In the territory lying between Arondizuogu and the Ndieni
group were a group of preexisting clans. Ninety-nine-year-old Jacob
Okoro, in 1986, narrated the complicated zoning arrangement as it
applied to central Igboland:
There are nineteen “villages” in Aro-Chukwu. … the Aro “villages” shared out
eastern Nigeria into areas of influence. Arondizuogu’s share was the region from
Uzuakoli to Okigwe up to Akokwa, Uga and the rest of the places. These were the
places that this Amankwu dominated. The people whose area of influence bor-
dered that of Arondizuogu was nde-Ikelionwu, the Ibom people here. The Ibom
and Amankwu peoples knew their areas and one group would not intrude in
another group’s domain. A person from one group went into another group’s area
of influence only through a person of the group responsible for the area. This other
person took a cue from the person that brought him. He could secure trade goods
only through the person that brought him. So, nde-Ikelionwu and Arondizuogu
had a boundary. This was at Ekwuluobia. Nde-Ikelionwu was responsible for
one side, including Umunze and Oka. Arondizuogu had Ekwuluobia up to Unu
(Orlu). The group with which Arondizuogu shared a boundary there was Atani.
Arondizuogu did not go beyond there to buy captives. Arondizuogu people could
only go there through the Atani group. Nde-Owu and Ujari (Ajali) were respon-
sible for the area from Umunze. The Ibom group and nde-Ike also shared the
area. Ajali, Ibom and nde-Ike were all involved in the same place. Arondizuogu
controlled Adazi and Nimo. Nde-Ikelionwu controlled Umuchima, Oko and
other places. The Ajali people had a stake in these places too. Beyond these places
were places like Eziama, Nokpa and others. … The peoples of Ugbo and Amoba
controlled them. (J.O. Okoro 1996)
Obviously, Arochukwu lineage-groups did not carve out large, neat zones,
but respectively controlled small spheres of mostly noncontiguous com-
munities, which were interspersed with communities controlled by other
Aro lineage-groups.
The methods employed by various Aro groups to penetrate the differ-
ent areas depended on local circumstances. One notable local variant –
observed in the Nri-Awka region – saw the Aro planting large settlements
near the peripheries rather than at the core of the high-density areas, as
was done elsewhere. Although major Aro settlements did not pervade the
area, the Aro nonetheless formed lineages in many communities there.13
13
The settlement in Ihiala in southern Nri-Awka was quite substantial (see I.O. Nwankwo
1986). This evidence shows that, contrary to Northrup’s view, Aro settlements do not
To fully understand the character of Aro expansion, one has to come to

terms with the changes associated with it.
Private Enterprise and Alliances

While the Aro state consciously promoted an expansionist policy, pri-
vate enterprise increasingly became central to the project. The character
of expansion underwent fundamental change in one important respect
during the second phase of expansion dating from about 1740 to 1807.
While the first phase of Aro expansion witnessed the direct involvement
of the Aro state, the second phase rested on private enterprise. The role of
Mazi (Consul) in the first phase of expansion contrasted sharply with that
of the freelancing merchants that held sway from the eighteenth century
onward. The appointment of a resident Mazi, usually a trusted confidant
of the Aro king, for the outlying communities, as far as Afikpo (north of
Arochukwu), was perhaps the first act of Aro expansionism during the
seventeenth century. The Mazi and his retinue of advisers and followers,
linked “the local administration … to the Aro system” (K.O. Dike and
Ekejiuba 1990:69). The Aro also constituted themselves into amadi (aris-
tocracy), and controlled trade and the Afikpo market.
There is no evidence that the Mazi traded on the king’s behalf or that
the king’s trade necessarily preceded that of other traders, as it did in
Polanyi’s port of trade (Polanyi 1963). Yet, Afikpo at this time seems to
resemble the port of trade in that there does not seem to have been a
clear-cut distinction between private and state spheres there.14 However,
“halt” at the edge of the Nri-Awka region (Northrup 1978b:131, 134–35). For refer-
ences to the Aro settlement in Ihiala, see Onwuejeogwu 1987:40; C. Okafor 1986:126;
Oriji 1994:39–40, 48, 53, 64, 105.
14
Polanyi refers to existence in the port of trade of an apparently private trader, who is in
reality a state trade and/or financial officer (Polanyi 1963:32). In Robin Law’s studies of
Dahomey, which raise the usefulness of analyzing precolonial African economy in terms
of private/state enterprises, it appears that the functions of the Mazi corresponded roughly
to Dahomian “Captain of the Market,” in a foreign land. The latter’s duties “included …
the maintenance of order and the collection of a sales tax on all transactions in the mar-
ket,” and the regulation of the cowry currency and prices (Law 1977, 1978:42–45; Law
1991:51; Law 1996). The rulers of the Malinke and Wolof of Senegambia appointed
lieutenants to supervise trade (Aschcroft-Eason 1997). In the mid-seventeenth and early
eighteenth centuries Benin, the king’s traders were called Fiadors – Portuguese for guaran-
tors (see Anonymous Dutch, pp. 50–51; Van Nyendael 1702:434). Falconbridge (1788:8)
reports of “officer boys” in Old Calabar during the second half of the eighteenth century.
In the Congo River emerged the office of the Mafouk, which was “central to the broking
systems in the major states along this coast [and] which had emerged during the slave
trade as the royal official responsible for regulating trade with Europeans; he appointed
through the Mazi, the Aro king seems to have controlled the conditions
of trade in an era when the Aro council (Ọkpankpọ) probably had not yet
come into existence or was less influential than it later became. The role
of the Mazi as a state office became less important thereafter, although
the freelancing merchants retained the appellation and the term came to
apply to virtually every person of achievement and to all well-born male
elders sometime in the nineteenth century. The period from the eighteenth
century onward was the era of private enterprise.
The ascendancy of private enterprise changed the character of Aro
expansion. It was accompanied by the introduction of violence into the
process. We do not have any evidence that the Aro resorted to violence
before the eighteenth century. The intensifying warfare as groups jos-
tled to take advantage of the slave trade and the need of warring groups
for powerful allies called for the services of Aro merchants who built
and supported alliances as well as initiated conflicts. Aro wars in the
eighteenth century did not involve the entire Aro community; typically
merchant-warlords and their followers were involved.
The merchant-warlords were a motley crowd of successful and
adventurous merchants. Whatever their backgrounds were, there is suf-
ficient evidence to call into question Dike and Ekejiuba’s claim that the
merchant-warlords were “acculturated Aro.” According to them, the
ambitious among the “acculturated Aro”, “excluded from politics at
Arochukwu could find scope for their energies in the various settlements
which the expanding Aro commerce necessitated … In other words,
exclusion from politics at home did not spell doom for the ambitious
individual.” In fact, Dike and Ekejiuba are explicit in stating that such
individuals “were more strongly motivated to pursue risk-taking, and
long-distance trading ventures for their survival in the Aro system than
the prudent and proud elite and the ruling groups.”15 Of course, the
dynamism and risk-taking propensities of certain persons of servile and
recent origins are well-known. These characteristics fed on the fact that
Aro society honored achievement. Many acculturated Aro contributed
the brokers (maekedores) who received the caravans bringing produce from the interior”
(Lynn 1997:64). In the early nineteenth century, they were referred to as “governors”,
whose powers were “great and almost uncontrolled” (Bold 1822:72). At Addamugu,
immediate south of the Niger-Benue confluence, the office of Nufia or “Captain of the
Port” existed by 1841 (see Allen and Thomson 1848a:273). John Adams reports about
“the king’s trader” in Benin (Adams 1832:31). This phenomenon of African trade should
make an interesting study.
15
Dike and Ekejiuba, 1990:71, 75, 78, 97–98, 99.
significantly to the advancement of Aro cultural and material life (see

Nwokeji 1997c). Yet, their exclusion from established elites provides
only a part of the explanation for Aro expansion.
The exclusion of certain categories of traders from mainstream
Arochukwu politics cannot be used as a basis for generalizing about the
settlements. Unlike Ikerionwu the founder of Nde-Ikerionwu, who had
entered Aro society as a slave boy, Izuogu Mgbokpo, the founder of the
largest Aro diaspora settlement, Arondizuogu, and Oti Emesinwa, who
founded the Ndieni settlement of Ujari, were hard-core Aro amadi. The
amadi status was ascriptive, had several gradations, and approximated
nobility. Both Oti and Izuogu belonged to Amadi Nkume Asaa, the high-
est order, reserved only for the descendants of the founders of the Aro
state.16 Aro diaspora settlements sprang up in response to opportunities
created by the expanding Atlantic slave trade; it was trade, more than
political ambition, that originally motivated the establishment of Aro
settlements. The merchants did not create political formations initially,
but “trading centers.” Consequently, they lived in Arochukwu through-
out their lifetime; it was their descendants and dependents who settled
permanently in the diaspora. The merchant-warlords of the eighteenth
century came from various backgrounds – from within Aro ruling groups,
recent immigrants, and recently acculturated ex-slaves.
Securing bases did sometimes pose a problem for the Aro. In most
situations, they established settlements peacefully (Uku 1993:15). The
general pattern is summarized as follows:
Pioneer Aro traders probably shuttled between Arochukwu and their market
destinations. In the process, they built up a chain of rest-houses along the routes.
16
For information about Oti Emesinwa, see Eni 1973. Although Dike and Ekejiuba argue
that the merchant-warlords were often not free- or well-born, elsewhere in their book,
they describe Izuogu, correctly, as the great grandson of Nnachi, “one of the co-founders
of Arochukwu” and argue in apparent contradiction of their thesis that “the population
of Ndizuogu … is made up exclusively of people of Aro extraction [and] those who have
long associated with them” and that the diaspora settlements “freed the Aro nobility
from the strenuous competition for power” (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:72, 176, 206,
217). They also note that the “Aro saw the need for colonizing strategic routes in the
interests of their trade. Successful Aro traders used their agents[,] who were either sons or
trusted household retainees and lieutenants, to pioneer the new settlements and develop
an intelligence network over the entire region” (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:120). For
the record, whereas it may be true that the population of Arondizuogu has a higher
proportion of originally Aro people and their long-term associates, the settlement is not
composed “exclusively” of these people. In all probability, up to one-third of present-day
Arondizuogu families trace the origin of their entry into the society in the second half of
the nineteenth century.
Gradually, the more important of such places developed into trading centers
and finally into Aro settlements. The settlements became launching pads for the
commercial penetration of the Aro into new areas and for the founding of new
settlements, partly through Aro initiative and, partly on the invitation of local
people. It was very common for non-Aro communities to invite the Aro to estab-
lish in their areas in order that they would benefit from Aro trade and protection.
(Ijoma and Njoku 1991:300)
In exchange for their support, merchants exacted tribute or other advan-

tages from preexisting groups (Nwokoye-Emesuo 1996; Uku 1993:14).
The Ngwa of southern Igboland had a saying that Onye Aro Mbi la ke
ya whe oma mmera ya (Harboring the Aro is good fortune) (Onyensoh
1985:17). After the Aro had been established, “chiefs who sought Izuogu’s
protection against their enemies pledged their land and became his
subjects. They paid regular tributes in slaves, labor and food, thus con-
tributing to the economic and manpower needs of the new settlements”
(K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:129n, 165–66). Not only communities in
need of protection sought Aro help; communities that threatened others
were sometimes Aro allies. Equiano made this observation:
Perhaps [raiders] were incited to this by those traders who brought the European
goods … amongst us. … When a trader wants slaves, he applies to a chief for
them, and tempts him with his wares. It is not extraordinary, if on this occasion
he yields to the temptation with as little firmness, and accepts the price of his
fellow creature’s liberty, with as little reluctance as the enlightened merchant.
Accordingly he falls on his neighbors, and a desperate battle ensures. If he pre-
vails and takes prisoners, he gratifies his avarice by selling them; but, if his party
be vanquished, and he falls into the hands of the enemy, he is put to death; for, as
he has been known to forment their quarrels, it is thought dangerous to let him
survive. (Equiano 1995:40)
In this desperate struggle for survival, the Aro would have been “invited”
by one side or the other, or by both.
Non-Aro communities also welcomed the Aro because of Aro abil-
ity to dispense “justice,” including the removal of categorized persons
to Atlantic slavery (see J.G.C. Allen n.d.:149; Grier 1922:35). Where the
Aro were required to pay rent, it was usually a token amount. The annual
tenancy renewal required the presentation of “kola” in Ngwa communities
in one of the areas with strong Aro presence. In one community, the
“rent” consisted of only two gallons of palm wine, eight manillas, and
one cock (Wamuo 1973). In Ibibioland, the acquisition of land required
a case of drinks, a piece of cloth, a gun, and some salt (J. Udo 1972). The
Aro contracted igba ndu (covenant) with their hosts as an instrument of
protectionism. Igba ndu often involved mixing protagonists’ blood for

mutual consumption. This ritual was deemed to carry a spiritual force
capable of killing a protagonist who defaulted from the terms of an
agreement.17 Kinship ties were forged and exploited. Marriages figured
prominently in these ties. Although this practice creates “the obligation of
inlaws,” as inlaws and sons of local women, the Aro widened their con-
tacts and increased trade (Levin 1992:103). Kinship ties were reinforced
by massive immigration. Immigrants into Aro settlements operated freely
in their natal homes under the umbrella of Aro enterprise.
Eighteenth-century merchant-warlords did not negotiate as officials of
the Aro state. After reaching an agreement to aid a community or to set
up a base in an area, they would display tender palm fronds, which were
a central symbol in the Aro national emblem (Omu Aro), to signify that
the area was under Aro protection (Nwokoye-Emesuo 1996). The mer-
chant-warlords negotiated of their own accord for fighters from Cross
River Igbo communities, utilizing blood and marriage bonds.
The role of private enterprise in Aro expansion can, however, be over-
emphasized. Although it is common for immigrants from a given region
of a sending society to cluster in particular locales of the receiving society,
the pattern by which Aro lineages controlled certain spheres outside the
Arochukwu homeland had institutional underpinnings and was backed by
the state. This factor – along with Aro oracular influence – shielded the
Aro from the violent victimization that Thomas Sowell has identified as the
common lot of trade diasporas (Sowell 1996:5–6, 28–29, 31). Rather than
a state program, Aro expansion from the eighteenth century onward was a
function of private enterprise, encouraged and regulated by the state.
The Role of Force in Central Igboland

In spite of the ties, strategies, and practices that facilitated the establish-
ment of Aro settlements among non-Aro hosts, the Aro deemed force
to be particularly effective in the Igbo heartland. Here, the Aro did not
always wait for preexisting groups to “invite” them. Their massive and
consistent application of force in this region is widely recognized as atyp-
ical Aro methods.18 Wars were not ordinarily in the interests of Aro trade.
17
For details regarding igba ndu, see Dike and Ekejiuba (1990:118–19, 163, 164, 198–99,
244–45); Ekejiuba 1972c; Ukwu 1969:127, 131–32.
18
See Dike and Ekejiuba 1990; Ijoma 1986c, 1994; Ijoma and Njoku 1991; Northrup
1978b:138; C. Okafor 1986.
This seems to have been the key deterrence for wars, not that the Aro
made war only on numerically inferior groups instead of such populous
groups as Onitsha, Ogidi and Igbo-Ukwu (Northrup 1978:138–139).
The view that the presence of populations of potential adversaries was
the primary criterion for Aro to make wars gives the impression that
the Aro were war-mongers who would make war on any group except
those strong enough to give them a good fight.19 The Aro resorted to
wars in central Igboland despite strong opposition from populous societ-
ies, including the Nri during the nineteenth century (Chapter 7). There
were other reasons the Aro did not make war on certain groups, whether
large or small. In the first instance, the Aro would have seen little pur-
pose in making war upon communities with whom they enjoyed peaceful
relations. Besides, speculating on the size of the communities which the
Aro did not make war against runs the risk of anachronism: present-
day populations are not always an accurate measure of the historical
strengths of societies. Wars had severe impact on many communities, and
subsequent demographic developments have been uneven. Some societies
gained from immigration out of devastated areas, while others lost out in
the same process (Nwokeji 2000a). In one extreme case, Ora, in the vicin-
ity of Arondizuogu, was completely destroyed during the establishment
of the Aro settlement. Present-day population densities reflect, in part, the
effect, rather than the cause, of wars. Rather than being a deterrent, the
presence of numerically strong groups could have been the very cause of
the conflicts in the region.
If the size of potential foes was not necessarily a determinant of Aro
invasions, we are still left to explain why warfare prevailed during the
mid-eighteenth-century establishment of the principal Aro settlements in
the greater upper Imo/Nri-Awka region. The resort to warfare was more
likely a consequence of the tighter land-tenure rules that were a corol-
lary of population pressure in the area and that anthropologist Thurstan
Shaw attributes to “the antiquity and effectiveness of yam cultivation and
the exploitation of the oil palm.”20 The quest for space would likely have
increased levels of intransigence in the preexisting societies and led to the
breakdown of diplomatic alternatives. The situation was probably helped
by Aro’s determination to establish themselves strongly in a region that
had great potential for them; Aro incursions into the heartland were, in
the first instance, a function of the search for captives, and as has been
19
For such a suggestion, see Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:75; 164, 166–67, 177–79; 208.
20
Cited by Ohadike 1994:2. See also Nwokeji 2000a: 632.
already mentioned, they met with some resistance. This point is impor-
tant because in pursuing their interests, the Aro generally preferred peace
to war. They made war part of their overall strategy in order to dominate
trade.
The wars of this period are well documented in Aro historiography.21
With the use of armed force, each of the principal Aro settlements
destroyed or subdued the most important power in its immediate
neighborhood. The most spectacular example was Izuogu’s destruc-
tion of Ora, east of the upper Imo River, in one of the severest acts
of violence committed during the Atlantic slave trade era. “What hap-
pened to Ikpa-Ora had no parallel in this part of the world. The people
were massacred and the entire population was wiped out. The ter-
ritory was plundered and completely laid waste. [The land has] ever
since, remained desolate … The territory became known as ‘the land of
blood’ ” (J.G. Okoro 1985:24). The complete destruction of Ora does
not seem to have been necessary for the establishment of Arondizuogu
because Arondizuogu was sited thirty kilometers west of the Imo and
about forty kilometers west of Ora. Nevertheless, the massacre instilled
fear into the communities of the upper Imo River region, leaving them
with “awful expectations” (J.G. Okoro 1985:25). Mobilizing warriors
for this purpose from the Cross River Igbo community Ohafia was easy
for Izuogu, in part, because his mother came from there. The Ohafia
people therefore intervened in favor of their nwadiana (child of a local
woman married to an outside man).22 Conflicts among the preexisting
communities also worked in Izuogu’s favor. These conflicts gave him
opportunities to increase his influence over the communities. Acting as
a broker for the warring groups increased his access to captives, receiv-
ing some as gifts from leaders who sought to maintain friendly relations
with him and buying war captives from their captors.23 The traditions
of Uruala to the southwest of Arondizuogu report that at one time all
21
Dike and Ekejiuba 1990; Igwegbe 1962; C. Okafor 1986:121–122; J.G. Okoro 1985.
22
Igwegbe 1962; C. Okoli 1986:121–22; J.G. Okoro 1985:23–24.
23
Izuogu is said to have attacked Ora because Ora rejected Izuogu’s demand for a tribute
of 400 captives (see K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:177). Traditions relate that Okoli
Ijoma’s forces displaced the present Ugwuoba on the Mamu River from their original
site around Enugwu-Ukwu, some sixty kilometers to the south (see Agu 1985). Although
Veronica Agu bases her thesis on traditions collected mainly in Awka, I found corobo-
rating evidence in a colonial-era intelligence report, which noted that Ugwuoba (and
Amsim) “acknowledge no relationship at all” with the rest of Mbasato-Awka, Amawbia,
Ebenebe, Nawgu, Nibo and Nise. See NAE MILGOV – 13/1/17: Mbanasataw-Awka
Division, 1936.
the able-bodied men of the community were slaughtered during a con-

flict with Arondizuogu (Alaka 1984; Ipere 1983). Whatever the specific
permutations that helped to cause it, the establishment of strong bases
in this region seems to have been critical in Aro operations, and the
establishment of Igbo heartland Aro settlements was concurrent with the
massive expansion of the Biafra Atlantic slave trade.
Mmuba: Expanding the Group

The growth of Aro operations partly depended on Aro strategies for
boosting human capital as their commercial network was expanding.
But it is important to note that while group expansion resulted from
a conscious effort to increase the Aro population, this did not neces-
sarily lead to an increased number of Aro settlements. The prolifera-
tion of settlements was largely a function of an inherent motivation
for entrepreneurial activity within the Aro system; the system rewarded
leaders who created new settlements, which, in turn, advanced the inter-
ests of the whole system. As in the Arochukwu metropole, the political
economy of the Aro diaspora centered on the slave – as merchandise,
for labor, and as a lineage member. As one colonial-era anthropologi-
cal report puts it, “The original Aro party was not yet very numerous
but it quickly collected around it a large number of local followers
by purchase of slaves, sheltering of refugees from other villages, and
so on.”24 Many of my respondents during 1995 and 1996 explained
Aro expansion, especially the phenomenal population increase in the
major settlements, by reference to the concept of mmuba. As one of the
most outstanding elements of Aro expansion, mmuba refers to a range
of phenomena that at once embraces human proliferation, prosperity,
and even territorial expansion. I have not found an appropriate English
synonym, although in some contexts the term human proliferation is
adequate. Mmuba was not just a practice; it was also a mentality. It
encouraged the marrying of numerous wives, the acquisition of slaves,
and the aggressive promotion of immigration. Mmuba helps to explain
the accelerated manumission processes that characterized the Aro slave
system. One Aro elder gave a perspective of how mmuba worked in the
Aro slave system.
24
NAE 81/27 – OKIDIST 4/9/70:Anthropological Report of Aros of Ndizuogu and
Others,” 31 March 1927.
You kept the person as your slave. You brought the person up. When the person
grew up and he was a good person, you got a wife for him and he had children. …
After the slave had married and prospered, he could begin to buy his own slaves,
and people continued to multiply. In turn, the persons he bought replicated the
same pattern. What was important is that people recognized the person under
whom they were (J.O. Okoro 1996).
The Aro also boosted their group by promoting a partial exogamy

that allowed Aro men to marry non-Aro women without giving out Aro
daughters, enabling Aro populations to increase at the expense of other
groups (Levin 1992:103).
Of course, other African societies promoted the expansion of their
populations, but the Aro raised these efforts to an extraordinary level.
Conscious of their small numbers, the Aro drive for proliferation was
extremely intense and even programmatic. Their slave-trading role, that
is, their role as distributors of human beings, facilitated their drive for
proliferation. Different sources have estimated the descendants of origi-
nally non-Aro families at ninety percent of the present Arondizuogu pop-
ulation. If this is accurate, the numbers of originally non-Aro who were
incorporated by other Aro groups could be even higher, especially in light
of the fact that Arondizuogu has the largest concentration of originally
Aro groups of all the Aro diaspora settlements.25 The Arochukwu metro-
pole also incorporated many non-Aro over the centuries. This has also
been the case with other Aro settlements about which relevant research
has been done.26
At the expressive level, at least, the ownership of people was an
end in itself among of the Aro. At some point, the people adopted
the deity Oda, the icon of the intercessor of proliferation. Most likely
of Nri-Awka provenance, Oda served to usher into each household
every new baby and every newly acquired person (G. Anyakoha
1996; Igwilo 1996b). Oda was probably borrowed from Amesi on
the eastern periphery of the Nri-Akwa region in the general vicin-
ity of Arondizuogu. According to Amesi scholar Bernadette Ezeliora,
Oda was the “benevolent mother goddess … believed to be the giver
of children” (Ezeliora 1994:18). A new member of the family was
brought before the deity to symbolize his or her entry into the family.
25
For the various estimates, see Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:206, 217; J.O. Dike 1996; M.S.
Igwe 1996; T.O. Okereke 1996; Ufere 1996.
26
Emeruwa 1992; C. Eze 1987; G.C. Mmeregini 1978; I.O. Nwankwo 1986; J.C. Nwankwo
1973.
Medicine men prepared Oda to arrest infant mortality and other forms
of premature death.
The practical utility of the compulsive acquisition of people is hard
to fathom at first. Anthropologist Claude Meillassoux’s view that
the channeling of surplus exclusively to reproduction in precolonial
African societies meant the “destruction of surplus” might suggest that
the Aro penchant for accumulating people was counterproductive and
could not have advanced their trade. Reproduction was in fact a form
of reinvestment; it entailed such forms of “social insurance” as the
accumulation of women; “conspicuous consumption [and] redistribu-
tion as gifts.”27 The broad conceptualization of capital as being any
resource for future wealth, and not in the restrictive sense of build-
ings, machinery, and so forth, as has been noted in the West-Central
African case, was held by the Aro as well.28 In a slave-trading group, an
increase in population meant an increase in the pool of slave dealers.
Partial exogamy carried practical advantages. The marrying of non-
Aro women and barely marrying out Aro women, not only aided popu-
lation increase, but also facilitated the acquisition of the languages
and dialects of the groups the Aro wives came from. These “mistresses
of language” imparted the necessary linguistic proficiencies to their
young Aro children (Umo [1947?] n.d.:18). Some nineteenth-century
European visitors to the Biafra hinterland believed that the Aro spoke
virtually all the languages in the region (e.g., Baikie 1856:319–40;
Burdo 1880:159). In fact, like traders from other trading groups in
the region, the Aro trader was often bilingual or multilingual depend-
ing on the range of his operations (Afigbo 1981a:20). The enormity of
the pool of languages the Aro commanded reflected the range of Aro
operations and their incorporation of outsiders, especially women. The
wives of Aro traders sometimes accompanied their husbands on trad-
ing tours. “The wives helped to supervise their husband’s food, [and
looked] after the currency and trade goods. They took care of very
young slaves between ages … one and five while they traveled from the
market to the settlements” (Ekejiuba 1972a:18). Thus, the Aro chan-
neling of surplus to reproduction was not destructive.
The measure of Aro affluence went beyond the number of slaves one
owned or wives one had: it was the total number of dependents, includ-
ing slaves, ex-slave clients, and all kinds of immigrants that one brought
27
Meillassoux cited by Coquery-Vidrovitch and Lovejoy 1985b:14.
28
See Miller 1988:42–43 for West-Central Africa.
into the society. The successes of one’s dependents in both trade and the
acquisition of people enhanced one’s status. Having many slaves was
esteemed, but it was even better to have many dependents who were
themselves prosperous with many dependents of their own. Dependents
of one’s (ex-)dependents were deemed to be as advantageous, ultimately,
as one’s dependents within the Aro hierarchical order. This was the key to
the accelerated manumission embedded in the Aro slave system. The idea
that a slave system could be based on accelerated manumission sounds
contradictory, but the Aro slave system did in fact draw strength and
sustenance from manumission. This is obviously what one source has
referred to as “seemingly contradictory organizing principles of hierarchy
and incorporation” (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:56, 264–65). In not-
ing the transcendence of slave status in the Biafra region, another source
notes:”[t]he designation ‘slave’ could be little more than a sign of origin
and association with the commercial firm of the slave’s original master.
Once slaves had assumed … independence and an effective social free-
dom that placed them in the class of slave owners, emancipation had
effectively taken place. Here was a system that promoted slaves as a
means of securing strict loyalty and dependence” (Lovejoy 1983:180).
The Aro system typifies this model.
The imaginary and real benefits of having many (ex-)dependents
encouraged Aro communities to welcome the refugees that vio-
lence and famine produced, particularly in the Nri-Awka region.
Established members of Aro society often gave asylum to economic
and political refugees from other communities, but on the condition
of dependency. These refugees boosted the sizes of Aro communities.
The refugee factor is so strong that one of my respondents emphasized
that most immigrants to Arondizuogu were refugees from war-torn
communities of the Nri-Awka region (Nwokoye-Emesuo 1996).
This phenomenon seems to have been particularly acute during the
period from the second quarter of the eighteenth century to the end
of the nineteenth. The most dramatic case uncovered by the pres-
ent writer during 1995–96 fieldwork concerns Owa, an erstwhile
community once located by the Agulu Lake in the Nri-Awka region.
Refugees from Owa poured into Arondizuogu, the largest Aro set-
tlement, when an alliance of Owa’s four neighbors sacked it dur-
ing the mid-nineteenth century and divided up its territory among
themselves (Maduadichie 1996). Owa has a place in Arondizuogu
folklore only because of this tragic event and because it was the
ancestral home to many people in Arondizuogu, most of whom are
the descendants of the Owa immigrants.29 The massive incorpora-

tion of refugees facilitated the rapid increase of Aro population in an
era when most African populations were either dwindling in size or
stagnating. Reproduction could not have constituted the destruction
of surplus under this circumstance, contrary to Meillassoux’s claim.
Reproduction and surplus coexisted among the Aro. We may now
turn attention to the institutions that enabled the Aro to integrate
slaves into their society and extend citizenship status to immigrants,
ex-slaves, and persons of slave descent on an institutionalized basis,
while facilitating the slave trade.
Relevant Institutions
Aro dominance of the hinterland slave trade rested on identifiable insti-
tutions. These institutions defined the means and ways of relating to the
non-Aro, the community’s modes of expansion, the settlement of civil
disputes, and rules of credit, among other functions. Chapter 4 offers a
detailed description of linkage institutions that were focused on inter-
nal Aro relations; here, it is more useful to examine the institutions that
directly promoted Aro influence over the non-Aro because they played a
central role in Aro expansion. Such institutions often had political over-
tones, so that even when they were geared primarily toward intra-Aro
relations, they were ultimately a means of dealing with the non-Aro. The
Arochukwu metropole alone sponsored these institutions in its capacity as
the “central place” in the diaspora: they were the Ọkpankpọ (Aro central
council), the Ibiniukpabi oracle, and the Ekpe/Okonko confraternity.
The Aro central council, Ọkpankpọ, the highest level of authority in
the Aro system, was the main institution by which the Aro counteracted
fissioning. Ọkpankpọ maintained “a structured control of Aro bands in
pursuit of military, political and social exploits in South-Eastern Nigeria”
(P.C. Dike 1986:15).30 The centralizing function of Ọkpankpọ was evident
29
This dimension excited my curiosity about Owa. I had assumed that it must have been
an existing small and obscure community, but then I wondered how such a small com-
munity could have supplied the large number of people predicted by the frequency with
which late twentieth-century Arondizuogu families trace their origin there. When I
sought further information and planned to visit the community, I was jarred to learn that
it no longer existed. See further details in Chapter 6.
30
Afigbo 1971b:32; Dike and Ekejiuba 1990; Ijoma 1986c:22–24; Lovejoy and Hogendorn
1979:230.
in keeping the diaspora settlements as integral parts of their respective

parent Aro lineage-groups. As a result, the settlements were not repre-
sented directly in the council, but indirectly through the ọtụsị to which
their respective parent Arochuwku lineage-groups (“village”) belonged.
Every diaspora settlement, regardless of its location, belonged to a par-
ent Aro lineage-group. This way, the diaspora settlements were subject
to the authority of Ọkpankpọ through intermediaries – the heads of the
respective parent lineage-groups. Sometimes, headship of the parent lin-
eages fell on individuals resident in the Aro diaspora, depending on their
ancestral pedigree. This way, coping with the proliferation of diaspora
settlements required little adjustment on the part of the Arochukwu.31
The Ọkpankpọ did not have to control the diaspora settlements by the
use of force. The effectiveness of the Aro network and the pride of being
Aro helped to ensure that it was in the interest of the Aro diaspora to
remain in the Aro system and enabled the Aro state to successfully fore-
stall fissioning.
If the Ọkpankpọ gave the Aro internal cohesion, direction, and
political purpose, the Ibiniukpabi, the temple of the universalist Aro
God (Chukwu), gave them a spiritual aura and authority in their deal-
ings with the non-Aro. Ibiniukpabi was one of the most effective agen-
cies of Aro domination. It served to siphon captives and maintain Aro
influence. Described as the most important agency of Aro influence, the
oracle blossomed in the first phase of Aro expansion from its humble
beginnings as a medium of “local nature spirits” (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba
1990:130, 134). Its intelligence network became widespread, and it cre-
ated and sustained a reputation for clairvoyance among the non-Aro.
Through the influence of the oracle, the Aro presented themselves, and
were regarded, as the “children of God” (Umu Chukwu). The oracle
served as an important siphon of captives because litigants were some-
times said to have been “eaten,” a euphemism for sale into Atlantic
slavery, but more often, they were asked to pay fees and fines in cap-
tives. Those unable to pay the requisite fines got sold into slavery (see
Ijoma and Njoku 1991:307; S. Ottenberg 1971:24–26, 212). Apart from
its judicial function, the oracle was a resort for non-Aro people seeking
divine intervention in such existential misfortunes as epidemics, infertil-
ity, bad harvests, and serious illnesses. The Ibiniukpabi remained a key
31
Although they do not mention the word “state,” Lovejoy and Hogendorn (1979:230)
imply this when they note that one of the functions of Okpankpo was to punish those
merchants who violated the zoning system.
component of Aro influence throughout the Bight of Biafra until British

destroyed it in the beginning of the twentieth century.
The Aro sponsored versions of their institutions in different parts of
the region as a way of promoting trade. Thus, the Ibiniukpabi oracle had
such localized variants as Kamalu at Ajatakiri, Igwkeala at Umuneoha,
Ojukwu at Diobu, and Agbala at Awka.32 In spite of the existence of these
clones, the operation of the Ibiniukpabi was a core function of the metro-
pole. The temple at Arochukwu remained the one of last resort. Second,
the Aro settlements and Aro merchants continued to advertize and popu-
larize the Ibiniukpabi itself, which justifies one early twentieth-century
British observer’s characterization of Aro diaspora settlements as “mission
stations” (J.G. Allen n.d.:iii). The Aro diaspora advertised and promoted
the oracle, manipulating information and local people’s fears. “Over and
above their firm grasp of current events, the Aro of the dispersion were
consummate students of local institutions, local religion and had the knack
of discovering the theoretical basis of many local beliefs and practices. …
It was therefore part of Aro intelligence to see that the verdicts and other
interpretations given by the oracle were in line with local beliefs and that
they conformed with the idiom and supernatural ideas of the local non-
Aro people” (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:137–38).
The adjudicative role of the oracle was specifically for the non-Aro
(see K. Oji 1972). This is why there was a saying to the effect that Nwa
Aro a nahu a si ib’ye na Ibiniukpabi na-aju ya (An Aro person does not
summon another Aro person on behalf of Ibiniukpabi). This meant, on
the one hand, that an Aro person knew better than to expose himself
to the Ibiniukpabi ruse and, on the other, that Ibiniukpabi was “a pre-
scription of a code of conduct which specifically means that Aro group
identity, internal fidelity, coherence as well as external aggression and
imperialism [were] the raison d’etre, the lifeblood of Aro hegemony.” The
second meaning underscores the close relationship that existed between
the Ekpe and Ibiniukpabi.33
Although the role of the Ekpe should throw light on Aro organization,
Ekpe rites are shrouded in secrecy. We know that the Ekpe cult effectively
served as a police force and a judicial outfit, and was used to regulate
credit. Just as the oracle adjudicated cases among the non-Aro, the Ekpe
confraternity regulated and adjudicated disputes among the Aro and
32
Cookey 1974; Mathews 1922:8; Ofonagoro 1972:76, 88.
33
P.C. Dike 1986:15). The use of Nsibiri, the Ekpe language (see Amankulor and Okafor
1988:40–43; K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:77, 142, 287–88.
performed a wide range of law enforcement functions. The society thus

formed part of the judicial apparatus and it made public the decisions
of the lineage-group councils and the Ọkpankpọ. In southern Igboland,
where the society was called Okonko or Ekpe Aro (Aro Ekpe), it was
the “most powerful administrative organ, especially in Ngwaland.” The
members of this society, referred to as “friends of the Aro,” controlled
trade. The establishment of this institution during the eighteenth century
in southern Igboland expanded trade (Oriji 1983:315–17). Although sev-
eral references have been made to the Ekpe and the Nsibiri in the existing
literature, these institutions have yet to be studied meaningfully.34 The
Ekpe was shared with the Cross River groups, including Old Calabar,
who used it for the same purposes.
The origins of the Ekpe are unclear. If, however, the confraternity and the
“trust system” between coastal and European traders had shared origins, as
has been suggested, their association goes back to the seventeenth century
when the trust system was already in place.35 As early as 1682, John Barbot
(1682:299) reported that some inhabitants of New Calabar and Bonny
acted as “factors, or brokers, either for their own countrymen, or for the
Europeans; who are often obliged to trust them with their goods, to attend
the upper markets, and purchase slaves for them.” Perhaps, the dominant
view is that the Aro adopted Ekpe from the Efik and/or other Cross River
groups.36 Evidence from Cuba, where the Ekpe offshoot Abakua operated
from mid-1830s onward, indicates that Calabar or the Balondo of south-
western Cameroon may have been the original home of Ekpe. Yet, the first
language used by the Matanzas, Cuba, cell of Abakua was Isuama Igbo,
though the society soon dropped Igbo for a rather obscure language of the
Brikamo or Usagare, the place where Ekpe is claimed to be “perfected”
(Miller 2009:3, 101–02). Reading Ekpe origins from the evidence of mid-
nineteenth-century Cuba is risky, given that Ekpe had already become
widespread among various groups in the Bight of Biafra. There are pos-
sibilities that the society diffused to the other Cross River groups via the
Aro or that it diffused to the Aro independent of the Efik and other Cross
River groups. According to an Ibibio respondent that David Northrup
34
Membership of the society is the route to the Nsibiri script, the knowledge of which will
enrich our understanding of the history of the Bight of Biafra. The problem is that Ekpe
membership prohibits a member from revealing the Nsibiri and other secrets.
35
The joint origin of the two institutions is implied by Lovejoy and Richardson 1999,
although they seem to suggest that this was in the eighteenth century.
36
For Old Calabar, see Noah 1980:30 and for the Aro, see Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:40,
58, 287.
interviewed in 1972, the Aro gave the Ekpe to certain Ibibio communities.
In return, the community gave the Aro “very many slaves” among other
gifts (U.U. Obong 1972). One such community became famous for Ekpe
and assumed the name Ikot Ibit Ekpe.
The possibility that the society diffused to the Aro independently of
other Cross River groups seems more promising. It has recently been
argued, based on fieldwork among coastal Cameroonians, that Cross
River cultures were enriched by institutions and practices brought by
slaves from the grassfields in the north, which “occasionally gave rise
to a new cult agency” that their masters “adapted to existing ideas and
needs in the forest” (Röschenthaler 2006: 73 n5, 87). Precisely which
society/societies the institution diffused from or when are unclear, but the
Jukun is among those mentioned. If slaves could disseminate this culture
among coastal Cameroonians, nonslave migrants from the north could
also have bequeathed the cult to their host societies. The powerful Akpa
from the north – who, as suggested in Chapter 2, probably derived from
Jukun-related groups – may already have adopted the society at the time
of their arrival at Arochukwu in the late sixteenth or early seventeenth
century, independent of the Efik and other Cross River groups, and were
thus well placed to introduce the cult to other Aro groups. Ekpe or Ekpe-
like societies may have existed among the Jukun and other Middle Belt
peoples of present-day Nigeria and Cameroon before the Atlantic slave
trade era; however, it seems that this cult crystallized in the forest region
of the Bight of Biafra when the trade was already underway.
Other strategies aided Aro expansion as well, not least of which was
the structure and organization of the market. The Aro rotated the fairs
between Bende and Uburu to foster rivalry between the two groups over
Aro patronage. This strategy enabled the Aro to maximize its advantages
and maintain control of hinterland commerce (see Ekejiuba 1972a, 1972b;
Ukwu 1969:135). The four-day fairs were spaced so that each had a cycle of
twenty-four days. This system facilitated the participation of suppliers from
different parts of the region. Strategically interspersed between the fair sites,
Aro diaspora settlements were useful to passing traders from different parts
of the region. “The trading settlements … became ‘free cities’ to which all
who wished to ‘traffic and exchange’ safely repaired, international courts
where individuals and clans in conflict sought justice from the undisputed
authority of the Oracle” (K.O. Dike 1956:39, 45). As hubs of commercial
transactions, the Aro diaspora communities provide a framework for under-
standing precolonial urbanization. Although some hinterland groups, such
as the Awka and the Nkwere, had participated in long-distance trade, Aro
incursions stimulated and professionalized trade in predominantly agricul-

tural societies (see, e.g., Isichei 1976:64). According to Ukwu, the presence
of Aro diaspora communities boosted commerce in such societies. Some of
the inhabitants of the diaspora settlements acted as “trade callers,” advisers
about Aro relations with the non-Aro and money lenders (Grier 1922:35;
G.I. Jones 1989:36; S. Ottenberg 1971). Aro ascendancy was not, however,
wholly a direct result of organizational mastery. Soon enough, local myths
developed ascribing to the Aro divine rights to trade.
Conclusion
To understand expanding trade in the eighteenth century, it is best to see Aro
organization in conjunction with other factors at play in central Igboland.
In the Nri-Awka region, for example, the impetus for enslavement was a
pressure on resources. High population densities in the region had since the
time of ancient Igbo-Ukwu been the cause of migrations into less populated
areas, such as the west Niger and northern Igboland.37 Centuries of inten-
sive agriculture seem to have exhausted the soil. Aro traditions regarding
the peopling of central Igbo Aro settlements refer frequently to famine in
the Nri-Awka region. And warfare, which was a constant experience from
the seventeenth century onward, contributed to slaving there as well.38
In spite of Aro’s role as slaveholders who created institutions that
facilitated the slave trade and sometimes employed coercion and vio-
lence in their dealings with the non-Aro, there is hardly any evidence
of a widespread non-Aro perception that the Aro were exploiters. The
Aro were virtually immune from molestation. This is probably because
they contracted kinship networks across the region and, perhaps more
importantly, because Aro interests were linked closely to those of the
influential groups and individuals in other societies. Non-Aro consum-
ers needed the foreign goods that the Aro supplied, and individuals and
groups needed the Aro in their struggles among one another over political
power and economic opportunities. Moreover, the Aro committed their
allies to igba ndu (covenant), which deterred the allies from delinquency
and apparently justified Aro retribution in the event of a breach of the
covenant, saving the Aro from the odium of being perceived as bullies or
37
Afigbo 1981a, 1981b, 1987; G.I. Jones 1963:30; Ohadike 1984.
38
For references to famine in the Nri-Awka area, see M.S Igwe 1996; Kanu-Igbo 1996a; C.
Okoli 1996; G.N. Okoli 1996. For warfare in the region, see Agu 1985; Amaechi 1987;
E.O. Okafor 1978; Nkeokelonye 2005:129–31, 181–221.
aggressors. The Ibiniukpabi oracle essentialized these transactions, com-

mending the Aro widely as Umu Chukwu. The seemingly omnipresent
Ibiniukpabi was the final resort in the knottiest of cases. As slave deal-
ers, the Aro performed the role of disposing of dissenters, local political
rivals, and incriminated persons, who were sold into slavery as punish-
ment or reprisal. Aro expansion was largely instrumental in promoting
the Biafra Atlantic trade, not only because of the location and timing of
Aro settlements and the strategies, mechanisms and institutions described
in this chapter, but also because of the very character of Aro settlements.
4
Culture Formation in the Trading Frontier,

c. 1740 to c. 1850
The diasporic character of Aro expansion both facilitated the expansion

of Bight of Biafra Atlantic trade, as described in Chapters 2 and 3, and
defined the cultural context of Aro commercial and geopolitical expan-
sion. Like other trade diasporas, Aro settlements outside the Arochukwu
metropole were sites of cultural exchange. Of necessity, new cultural
forms within a diasporic system reflect cultural influences from both the
metropole and the natal homes of nonmetropolitan immigrant groups,
as well as those of specific host societies. The Aro diaspora scattered
throughout western Bight of Biafra reflects these ties, illustrating both
how cultural practices shaped the slave trade and how the slave trade
reconfigured the cultural landscape of the region.
The idea that the Aro commercial system within Igboland, where most
of the settlements were located, was the successor to Nri cultural hege-
mony places the Aro in the broader context of Igbo cultural evolution.1
The establishment of Aro diaspora settlements in central Igboland
from about 1740 onward promoted contact of unprecedented intensity
between the Aro and the Nri “culture area.” Nevertheless, the evolving
relationship between the Aro and Nri cultures was not a linear progres-
sion in which Aro culture replaced the Nri one. Rather, there was an
active interaction between Nri and Aro cultural forms, on the one hand,
and between these and cultural influences from local groups, on the other.
Aro incursions into Igboland and elsewhere involved the “Igboization”
1
For this view, see Afigbo (1991c: 1–2); Dike and Ekejiuba (1990:161–90); Ekejiuba
(1991); Ijoma and Njoku (1991).
82
Culture Formation in the Trading Frontier 83
of the Aro, and the “Aroization” of the non-Aro.2 Thus, Aro expansion
involved trade as much as it involved culture.
The massive incorporation of outsiders into Aro society had implications
for culture formation in a manner that was perhaps more intense,
or at least different from, what was the norm in, other trade diaspo-
ras. Arondizuogu, the largest Aro diaspora settlement, epitomized the
incorporation of large numbers of non-Aro groups and the development
of a frontier culture during a period of expansion and decline of the slave
trade and the unprecedented proliferation of Aro diaspora settlements.
Aro tendency to incorporate outsiders was most marked in Arondizuogu
(Bentor 1994:120). This settlement offers a useful case study for under-
standing cultural formation in the Aro diaspora and the role of the Aro
diaspora in the expansion of the Biafra Atlantic slave trade.
The problem of locating all of the Aro within existing taxonomies of
Igbo subgroups (Chapter 1), calls for a framework that accounts for both
the complexities of locating the Aro culturally and the major cultural
influences in the Aro diaspora. Although the immediate cultural envi-
ronment had an impact, Arondizuogu culture developed more from the
interaction of the dominant Aro ethos, the cultural input of persons who
came into the society through slavery, voluntary immigration, and, least
of all, the influence of preexisting groups in the immediate neighborhood
of Arondizuogu. Most of the immigrants came from the Nri-Awka region.
While resembling Aro ways in some critical respects, Arondizuogu cul-
tural formation also reflected migrant and slave origins of the group.
Distinguishing between the historical Arochukwu in which the founders
of the settlements originated and present-day Arochukwu is a prerequisite
for any comparison of the latter and the Aro diaspora. The Arochukwu
state was less than 300 years old in the 1730s when the first major settle-
ments were founded Arochukwu institutions continued to evolve thereaf-
ter. In the frontier environment of the new settlements, some Arochukwu
customs became anachronistic and gave way to cultural forms that were
attuned to the new realities. By historically examining cultural exchange
involving the Aro and other Igbo and non-Igbo groups, we are able to
distinguish what actually happened from what might seem apparent to
the twentieth-century observer. While the Aro in the Igbo-speaking areas,
such as Arondizuogu, have identified themselves as Igbo since the twenti-
eth century, they desisted from identifying themselves with any particular
ethnic group in the region during the period of study. They settled among
2
Eli Bentor (1994) also uses the concept of Aroization.
all groups, and consciously promoted a distinct identity and cultural per-
sonality. This strategy was characteristic of trade diasporas, which begin
and take shape in frontier situations.
The use of the frontier concept to characterize relationships among
African groups has gradually gained ground in the past half century.3
While anthropologist Igor Kopytoff’s insight that frontiersmen “came to
the frontier with a mental model of what constitutes a good society” is
helpful in understanding the Aro experience, his argument that merely
“cultural and sociological” reasons drove frontier formation in Africa is
less persuasive. According to him, the frontier continually shifted outward
as the more established sections of society became “corrupted” (Kopytoff
1987b:13, 17–18). This essentialist model – metropolitan culture mon-
gers immune from instrumental and structural concerns – is inadequate
for understanding the Aro frontier. Among the Aro of the upper Imo
River, it was not just a commitment to culture that determined the evolu-
tion of the new culture; it was also outside influences, not least of which
were the consequences of the Atlantic slave trade. The outward growth of
the frontier was a product of people’s quest for living space, personal and
group freedom, and economic opportunities, principally trade. Toward
the end of the nineteenth century, the economic impetus for extending the
frontier began to also include the quest for agricultural land (Chapter 7).
The forces that conditioned the Aro frontier culture included the new
environment, the cultural packages that immigrants both from the metro-
pole and other backgrounds brought, as well as the influence of neigh-
bors of the Aro. The Aro did not meet a terra incognita in the diaspora
upon which to impress their “mental model”; instead, they encountered
terrains with robust social organizations adapted to these terrains.
Preexisting Societies: Ecology, Social Organizations,

and Relationships
The upper Imo River valley had been settled by four distinct sets of
groups before the eighteenth century. The history of these societies
is obscure, but colonial intelligence reports of the 1930s, a growing
body of published work by nonprofessional historians of the respective
3
De Gregori (1969); Kopytoff (1987a); V.B. Thompson (1995). For the use of “slaving
frontier” to refer to the innermost reaches of Atlantic slaving operations, see Miller
(1988:148–53); Neumark (1957); Lovejoy and Richardson (1997:3). Slaving frontier has
served to describe relationships involving slave-using and slave-supplying societies in the
Upper Nile region (James 1988:148–53).
communities, and oral traditions reported in several recent student the-

ses nonetheless provide a partial understanding of the early history of
these communities.4 One way of reconstructing the early history of these
autochthonous groups is to relate the available traditions to studies of
consanguinous groups and to certain generalizations about this era made
in the general context of Igbo history.5
The landscape is central to understanding the history of these groups.
The British administrator, C.J. Mayne, observed in 1935 that:
The country is of a broken character throughout and imposing landscapes are

general. It would not be out of place, perhaps, to mention that one view particu-
larly impressed the writer by its grandeur, and brought to mind a certain land-
scape in Scotland, which was represented by Millais in his famous masterpiece
“Over the hills and far away”. A number of small rivers, tributaries of the Imo
river, journey in a southernly direction through the Ndizuogu country and add to
the beauty of the scenery. The water supply for Ndizuogu is derived from these
sources but numerous springs are available and the supply of water is plentiful
(Mayne 1935:3).
Much of the “Sylvan wealth throughout the area and … the number of
iroko trees” survived to impress Mayne. The Umualoma people of the
“Isu” group, who largely inhabited the area, were the custodians of this
wealth. The many raphia palm trees (Raphia vinifera) in the area provided
them with plenty of wine (as did oil palm) and the bamboo thatch they
made their roofs with. The tradition of tapping palm wine was still strong
4
To the east, northeast and south – east were what are presently referred to as the Otanchara
and Otanzu groups, both of which straddled the upper Imo. Umuobom was located to
the south of the area that Arondizuogu settled initially – 30 kilometers west of the Imo.
Finally, the communities collectively called Mbanasaa (Seven Towns) were located to the
west through the north, but, unfortunately, data are scantiest on the older of these com-
munities – Isuokpu (now Umualoma), Uzii, Osina, and Umuobom. Arondizuogu Aro
referred to neighboring communities generically as “Isu”, but this term seems to have
acquired a pejorative quality at some point. A colonial anthropological officer suggested
in 1927 that this derogatory term “may have acquired some such meaning as ‘peasant’.”
See NAE 6/1927A – CSE 1/12/1:Anthropological Officer, Owerri, to District Officer,
Okigwe, 23 February 1927. Theses dealing with “Isu” groups include Alaka 1984; M.M.
Anaedobe 1977; S.O. Eke 1978; F.N. Egbo 1987; P.N. Ogbuozobe 1986; U.E. Ohaegbu
1991; J.C. Okoli 1977; Onyenkpa 1981; Onyiuka 1983; S.I. Uche 1988; C.O. Udeagha
1978; N.N. Udeagha 1980; A.E. Udueze 1982; C.S. Umeh 1984; P.N. Uwazuruike 1987;
Nnolim 2007.
5
The traditions from these groups that I have seen show the same trend (e.g., Alaka 1984;
Ipere 1983; Ihimnaegbu 1986; Uwazuruike 1987). The 1930s intelligence report dealing
with the “Nkalu” clan (including Akpuru, Obodo – Ukwu, Osina, Uzii, Uruala) reported
that “the Nkalu claims to have been where it is now since the beginning of time” (Heslop
1936?:11).
in Umualoma in the late twentieth century. The rich vegetation also con-
tained such semi-domesticated edible plants as castor oil beans (Ricinus
communis); breadfruit ([artocarpus?] Treculia africana); ube (Dacryoides
edulis); starapple (Chrysophylum albidum); uchakiri (Vitex doniana),
and oil bean (Penthacclettara macrophylla). There were also edible
wild vegetables, fruits, and spices, such as uturukpam (Pterocarpous
mildbraedi); uziza (Piper guineense); utazi (Gongronema ratifolium);
okazi (Gnetum africanum); utu (Landolphia owariensis); mkpodu
(Napolenaea imperilis); oil palm (Elais guineensis), and more.6
Animal husbandry has considerable antiquity in the Igbo heartland.
Oral traditions of the upper Imo valley mention the abundance of domes-
tic animals, a phenomenon that goes back at least to the eighteenth cen-
tury. Writing about mid-eighteenth-century Igboland, both Oldendorp and
Olaudah Equiano give the impression that domestic animals were abun-
dant among the Igbo. Equiano’s account is consistent with the oral tradi-
tions from central Igbo communities. According Equiano, the “manner of
living is entirely plain … bullocks, goats, and poultry supply the greatest
part of their food. These constitute likewise the principal wealth of the
country, and the chief articles of commerce.” They lived with the relative
abundance of agricultural products and poultry (Equiano 1995:35, 36).7
The share-raising of domestic animals, such as goats, dogs, chicken,
and ducks, seems to have become a common part of their social orga-
nization.8 There is, however, no conclusive evidence indicating when it
6
These botanical names are variously from A.O. Anya (1982), Basden (1912) and B.N.
Okigbo (1980). I have presented the Igbo and botanical terms where the English translation
of any plant is unknown. Zac O. Gile, n.d. “Indigenous and Adapted African Vegetables”,
International Society for Horticultural Science. http://www.actahort.org/members/
showpdf?session=7671 (also see Igbokwe 2001; J. Okafor 1999; and E.C. Okeke 2009).
7
Relying on enslaved the Igbo in the Americas, Oldendorp was not specific regarding the
part of Igboland he was referring to (Oldendorp 2000: ms. 431). The local studies include
Maduagwu n.d.; Anaedobe 1977; J.C. okoli 1977; N.N. Udeagha 1980; Udueze 1982;
C.S. Umeh 1984; Ogbuozobe 1986; Egbo 1987; C.O. Udeagha 1987; Uwazuruike 1987;
S.I. Uche 1988; Onyekwelu 2001:2; Nnolim 2007. The academic theses among these
sources are all accompanied by transcripts of the oral traditions the authors collected, so
I was able to read the testimonies myself and not rely only on the interpretations these
scholars offered.
8
S.U. Uche (1988:18). Share-raising was a form of accumulation, which is how the prin-
cipal character in Achebe Things Fall Apart, wealthy Okonkwo, got his start in life. It
involves an owner giving a female baby animal to another person to raise, so that the
owner and the keeper shared the expected offspring that the animal would begin to bear
upon maturity. The offspring were shared equally – compensating the owner for his prop-
erty and rewarding the other party for their effort in raising the parent animal. If the
number of any set was odd, the person who had the smaller share would make it up
became an important part of social organization in the area. Possibly the

groups practiced domestic slavery, with social rather than occupational
differentiation. Oldendorp learned from his Igbo respondents during the
late 1760s that Igbo priests held slaves, who had “two free days a week,
[were] not treated badly and [had] few beatings” (Oldendorp 2000: ms.
428).9 The practice, among the Umualoma people especially, which sur-
vived into the twentieth century, of keeping numerous dogs for hunting
game, may have already started by this time. British colonial officers found
that “the ancient Ibo game laws still count[ed] for something” among the
preexisting groups (see Heslop 1936:8).
One striking feature of the social organization of the pre-Arondi-
zuogu upper Imo River communities may have been the presence of cer-
tain specialists who produced goods for the market. One such group
consisted of commercial butchers (ogbuerighi, which literally trans-
lates as “he that slaugthers but does not consume” – in other words,
he who slaughters for the market). Another group of specialists with
considerable antiquity in the area consisted of winetappers (ote mmi).
Winetappers and butchers would likely have combined these activities
with some farming. The existence of winetappers provides a framework
for understanding precolonial wage labor. The existence of a group of
wine owners who were not tappers created a condition for the employ-
ment of the professionals, even if most wine owners tapped their own
wine.10 Tappers received their payment in kind. The tapper usually took
all the produce until the wine had started to flow freely. This time was
during the sharing of the next set of siblings. The sharing lasts the entire child-bearing
duration of the animal. Share raising gave the wealthy both help with raising animals
and an opportunity to forge and promote social ties. Sometimes, the animals were given
to very young children, even babies, who could not themselves look after the animals, in
expectation that their parents would raise the animals.
9
One Akokwa scholar has been suggested that slavery existed among the people before
the Atlantic slave trade (S.U. Uche 1988:29). This is improbable, given that the tradition
of origin of this society accepted by this and other scholars indicate that Akokwa was
founded between the early and mid-eighteenth century, long after the Atlantic slave trade
had begun. It does, however, suggest that slavery likely existed among the older preex-
isting groups of the region. It is perhaps also an indication that slaving for the Atlantic
market began effectively in Akokwa after the arrival of Arondizuogu.
10
The tapper went round the trees routinely three times in a day – at dawn, in the early
afternoon, and just before dusk. Each time, he opened up more stem for wine. During
the dawn and dusk visits, he also took away the wine that percolated into the calabash.
This professional group had been well established among the people that later became
Arochukwu. The Ujari lineage-group is said to have descended from professional win-
etappers (see K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:60). For a contemporary description of palm
wine, see Equiano (1995:37).
usually his discretion. The owner of the palm wine tree received the pro-
duce on two days (Eke and Oye) of the four-day market cycle (izu) while
the tapper took the wine on the other two (Awho and Nkwo).11 While
wine owners could afford to consume their wine and serve it to guests
and workers, the tapper could not afford to consume all product of his
labor and would have to dispose of the surplus. John Barbot reported as
early as the 1680s that palm wine, of which there was a “great plenty,”
was one of the commodities the Igbo supplied to the coastal peoples
(John Barbot 1732:461). This means that by 1866, when W.E. Carew of
the Church Missionary Society (CMS) reported the abundance of palm
wine in a lower Imo River market, the commercialization of the product
was already centuries old in the region.12
As an integral part of the Igbo heartland, the preexisting groups
had long practiced settled agriculture, cultivating such crops as cow-
pea (Vigna unguiculata), cococoyam (Colocassia) benniseed (Sesamum
Indicum), corn (Zea mays), and white yam (Dioscorea rotundata).13
Land use practices before the slave trade era are still unclear, but
British colonial officer Heslop, perhaps surmising from oral traditions,
observed in the 1930s: “When there was still primeval forest, it was
customary that any man farming on the verge of the forest had the right
to reclaim part of the forest bordering on his farm” (Heslop 1936:9).
Heslop intended to portray a situation of resource abundance, but his
comment about the reclamation of virgin forest actually suggests that
there was increasing pressure on resources. By the late seventeenth cen-
tury, as new groups began to arrive in the greater upper Imo, the period
of abundance seems to have begun to give way to a period of greater
scarcity and intergroup competition for resources. The ecology of the
region seems to have been a “pull” factor for streams of migrants. When
the Izuogu established a trading center on the elevation in the contested
zone, interfacing Umuobom, Uzii and Isuopku, and Akokwa, sometime
in the 1730s, (Table 4.1) the Aro were not the only group migrating to
11
There is a tendency to translate izu as “native week” or “Igbo week,” but this is an
awkward and even misleading translation. The two units – izu and week – are incom-
mensurate. The four-day izu has the following cycle: Eke, Oye, Afo and Nkwo. Baikie
(1856:316) records this incorrectly as Eke, Oye, Nkwo and Afo.
12
The Carew report is cited by Isichei (1976:66). Writing about Akokwa before the advent
of Arondizuogu, Akokwa scholar, S.U. Uche (1988:2, 7), tells us that Akokwa had prac-
ticed farming and hunting; that they also did some blacksmithing and weaving; and that
Akokwa began to trade after the arrival of Arondizuogu.
13
The use of only this species of yam for new yam festivals and other rituals in Igboland
underline its antiquity (O.N. Njoku 1991:117).
Table 4.1. Arondizuogu Lineage-Groups before 1890 and the Probable

Original Occupiers of the Land
Lineage-Group Preexisting Community(ies)

Ndi-Adumoha Akokwa (initially) Umuduru 2,5,8 (from c. 1850)
Ndi-Akaeme Umualoma, 2,5,7,8 Umuobom 2,7
Ndi-Ndi-Akunwanta Umualoma,2,5,8
Ndi-Amazu Akokwa 2,5,8 Umualoma 4
Ndi-Aniche Uzii 8
Ndi-Anyake Umuduru 5,8
Ndi-Awa Agbobu 1,2,5,8
Ndi-Ejezie Agbobu 5,8
Ikpa-Eze Umualoma 2,4,5,8
Ndi-Imoko-na-Onu Agbobu 2,5,8
Ndi-Nduvwuisi Umuduru 3
Ndi-Njoku Agbobu 2,5,8 Umuduru-Okwe 2,5,8
Ndi-Ogbuonyeoma Umuobom 2,5,7,8 Umualoma 5,8
Ndi-Onuoha Same territory as Ikpa-Eze
Ndi-Uche Agbobu & Umuobom (initially) 6
Umuduru-Okwe 2,5,8 (c.1790 –)
Ndi-Ucheagwu Agbobu
Ndi-Ukwu Umualoma 2,5
Ndi-Uwaonu Agbobu
Sources: 1. Eze J.O. Dike (1996); 2. NAE OKIDIST – 19/1/1 1908–25 Intelligence Book,
Okigwe Division, 1908–25:21; 3. G.N. Okoli (1996); 4. Kanu-Igbo (1996b); 5. NAE
ORLDIST – 14/1/3; 6. J. Uche 1996; 7. NAE 35/1920 – OKIDIST 4/2/32:Land Cases; 8.
NAE 38/22 OKIDIST – 4/4/29:Political Report on Ndeziorgu, 14 April 1922:13.
the area.14 Competition over increasingly scarce resources contributed

to the fragmentation of these communities, a situation that began to
change in the mid-eighteenth century. Despite traditions attesting to
political unity among preexisting groups from the inception of these
14
Traditions from Umuduru, Umunze, and Akokwa show that these communities had
recently migrated into the region – the first from the Nri-Awka region and the last two
from the Cross River Igbo area. These groups engaged mainly in occupations similar
to those of the preexisting groups, although the newcomers seem to have brought new
occupations as well. For instance, Akokwa is said to have come with blacksmithing
skills (S.U. Uche 1988:2, 7). Umunze seems to have established itself as the dominant
power in the north of the region, probably through the help of Ohafia and Arochukwu
(Maduagwu n.d.:12–15, 25). Umunze community historian B.O.J. Maduagwu puts the
date of Umunze’s arrival in the region at 2000 years ago. This is extremely unlikely
because Umunze traditions, which Maduagwu accepts, claim that the group descended
from Ohafia, which more estimates to have been established sometime between the fif-
teenth and sixteenth centuries (see K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:ch. 2; O.N. Njoku
2000:14). Equally relevant in understanding Umunze’s antiquity is the claim that Umunze
communities, there are sufficient indications that it was Aro presence,

in particular, that motivated them to amalgamate into towns and town
clusters. This did not, however, happen before fragmentation had cre-
ated opportunities for pre-Aro immigrant groups.15
Aro Settlement and Lineage-Group Formation

Izuogu’s intervention in the area is attributed to a conflict between the
Isu group and Ora. The Isu, who were moving toward the Imo River
valley from the Awka-Orlu upland, asked Izuogu to intervene in their
favor, an opportunity Izuogu exploited to the fullest (K.O. Dike and
Ekejiuba 1990:177). Ora was located about seven kilometers east of the
Imo and about 40 kilometers from the place in the west Imo area that
Izuogu had settled initially. The claim that Izuogu intervened in favor
of the Isu groups finds support in Akokwa traditions claiming that rela-
tions between Akowkwa and Arondizuogu were cordial (e.g., F.N. Egboh
1987:31, 34–35; S.U. Uche 1988:5, 21, 22, 32, 39–40). The Akokwa, it
should be recalled, were recent Cross River Igbo migrants inhabiting the
western uplands of the West Imo. Over time, cordial relations sometimes
gave way to conflict as the territorial expansion of the Aro population
took place at the expense of their neighbors.
As the Arondizuogu population increased, the community fanned out,
and more lineage-groups emerged. Each free man needed a homestead,
and each lineage-group a hamlet. A complex system of boundaries delin-
eated the territories of the Arondizuogu lineage-groups in the area of
the Eke Obinikpa market. Precisely when the different groups arrived
is not known. The traditions present their formation synchronically,
but certain elements from the same traditions and the genealogies show
that the progenitors of the different groups arrived at different times
and that the various groups were enfranchised as lineage-groups at dif-
ferent times. For instance, we learn that the mid-nineteenth-century
was able to subdue their enemies with the help of Ohafia and the Aro. Maduagwu him-
self informed me in February 1996 that Umunze pays annual homage to the Cross River
warrior group of Ohafia – an indication of Umunze’s provenance.
15
The clearest indication of group consolidation is seen among Umuchu, sandwiched
between Arondizuogu and the Ndi – Eni cluster. Umuchu was formed from a number
of neighboring small groups for defense purposes (Nnolim 2007:21–23); the same for
Amaokpala in the Ndi-Eni area (Onyekwelu 2001:1–2). Seven towns in the immediate
surrounding of Arondizuogu, which may each have been originally fragmented formed a
cluster known as Mbanasaa (meaning “seven towns”).
warrior-merchant, Okoro Udozuka, paid the required enfranchisement

fee for his lineage-group, Ndiakunwanta. Before this, the Ndiakunwanta
lineage-group had existed in conjunction with another junior lineage-
group, Ndiukwu, as one unit (E.N. Okoli 1977:35). This incident under-
lines the fact that other lineage-groups had already been enfranchised.
We learn from another source that the son of the founder of the
Ndinduvwuisi lineage-group established the group’s present abode in the
east Imo at about the turn of the twentieth century. Nwambego Okoli –
who was aged more than 100 years when I interviewed her in 1996 – told
me that she and her husband, who was Nduvwuisi’s dependent’s son,
partook in this migration (G.N. Okoli 1996). One is therefore able to
estimate the entry date of the lineage-group’s primal ancestor, Nduvwuisi,
at about 1840. The fact that Ndinduvwuisi is ahead of two other lineage-
groups, means that the founders of these lineage-groups arrived later
than Nduvwiusi.
The lineage organization of the emergent Arondizuogu community was
a hierarchy of hegemonies, based on the entry status of early settlers as
charter group members, clients, ordinary immigrants, or slaves. The rule
of precedence, which guided the order of seniority of the lineage-groups,
provides a signpost for sequencing the arrival of the founders of the
lineage-groups. When the rule of precedence was waived, as the shunting
observed after 1825 (steps 5 and 6 in Table 4.2), this is explicit in the
traditions and recognized by all parties. This situation arose from the
ability of the formerly junior lineage-group (Ndiakaeme) to pay a cer-
tain levy ahead of the formerly senior one (Ndiogbuonyeoma). Although
the traditions do not say so, this payment may have been the franchise
fee. No other kind of levy could have assumed such importance. The
incident led to a civil war between the two lineage-groups, the cause
of which virtually everybody still acknowledges. For another example,
the traditions hold that Ndiakunwanta is the “youngest” lineage-group.
True, Ndiakunwanta was the last to be franchised as a lineage-group,
along with the Udozuka transaction related in the previous para-
graph. But in fact, Akunwanta made his entry into the society in about
1825, before three other lineage-groups (step 5 in Table 4.2). Prior to
enfranchisement, Ndiakunwanta had been remained an integral part
of the Iheme lineage-group. We also know that certain lineage-groups
themselves were founded by sons of the pioneers, after a first-generation
set of lineage-groups had been founded. Based on this kind of informa-
tion and genealogies, therefore, we can establish a rough chronology
using seniority and patterns of settlement.
Table 4.2. Sequence of Nucleation of Arondizuogu Lineage-Groups
1. c. 1733 Izuougu(a) Amazu(b) Iheme(c) Ejezie(d)

2. c. 1770 Izuougu(a) Amazu(b) Iheme(c) Ejezie(d) Adumoha(e)
3. c. 1790 Uche(a1) Awa(a2) Amazu(b) Aniche(c1) Ejezie(d) Onuoha(c2)
Ikpa-Eze(c3) Ogbuonyeoma(c4) Akaeme(c5) Adumoha(e)
4. c. 1815 Uche(a1) Awa(a2) Amazu(b) Aniche(c1) Ejezie(b) Onuoha(c2)
Ikpa-Eze(c3)Adumoha(e) Anyake(f)Ogbuonyeoma(c4) Akaeme(c5)
Ukwu(c6)
Ikpa-Eze(c3) Adumoha(e) Anyake(f) Ogbuonyeoma(c4) Akaeme(c5)
Ukwu(c6) Akunwanta(c7)
Ikpa-Eze(c3) Adumoha(e) Anyake(f) Akaeme(c4) Ogbuonyeoma(c5)
Ukwu(c6) Akunwanta(c7) Nduwvuisi(g)
Ikpa-Eze(c3) Adumoha(e) Anyake(f) Akaeme(c4) Ogbuonyeoma(c5)
Ukwu(c6) Akunwanta(c7) Nduwvuisi(g) Ucheagwu (h) Uwaonu(i)
Using the sequence of entry into the frontier as an indicator of

nucleation, that is, the order by which the various groups actually became
lineage-groups, is consistent with what we know of African societies.
Kopytoff’s observation that “being first” was a critical index of lineage
seniority applies in the Arondizuogu case (Kopytoff 1987b:36, 52–61).
Therefore, proximity to the original location suggests the sequence of
the arrival of their primal ancestors. The cases that seem to deviate from
this rule, such as the two lineage-groups originating from Izuogu’s sons,
Ndiuche (first) and Ndiawa (second), which were now both located away
from the original settlement and Ndiamazu, just north of the original
area, result from a later migration. Even these anomalies help to peri-
odize the settlement of other lineage-groups. Uche was disinherited and
never succeeded Izuogu in the first area of settlement in the Eke region.
As a result, Ndiuche was the first to move, after Izuogu’s death.16 The
reasons for Uche’s disinheritance and its implications for the settlement’s
geopolitics is analyzed later in this chapter.
The following lineage-groups were established at the initial area of set-
tlement, an indication of their respective progenitors’ time and sequence
of arrival in Arondizuogu. Eventually, the lineage-groups of Ndi-Iheme,
originating from Izuogu’s dependent and pioneer, Iheme, came to occupy
16
This area is the site of the present site of National High School and Ojike Memorial hos-
pital. Thereafter, the lineage-groups relocated to the Umuobom country (B. Asuzu 1992;
D. Igwe 1992; E.U. Igwe 1992:4; E. Uche 1992; J.E. Uche 1996).
almost the entire region. Ndi-Iheme later nucleated into seven lineage-
groups. Ndiamazu, originating from another of Izuougu’s dependent and
pioneer, Amazu,17 settled the region to the immediate north-west of the
initial area. Ndiejezie was located on Umualoma land slightly removed
from the initial area in the north-easternly direction. Ndiadumoha,
originating from Adumoha, who had become Izuogu’s direct dependent
after Iheme had used him to redeem himself from Izuogu, settled ini-
tially by Ndiamazu. Ndiadumoha later moved eastwards into the marshy
Umuduru country, in a location removed from the initial area.
Initially, the sequence of nucleation is unclear. The genealogies and
the traditions nonetheless permit a more accurate representation of the
sequence of entry into Arondizuogu society. The migrations that accom-
panied lineage-group formation implied continual expansion and the set-
ting up of new frontiers eastwards and northwards in the direction of
Umualoma. Given this pattern, it becomes clear why the youngest lin-
eage-groups, whose founders entered the society after 1840 (step six in
Table 4.2), did not have a place in the favored upcountry, west of the
Imo. Although the founders of these younger lineage-groups had entered
Arondizuogu society in the mid-nineteenth century, it was not until very
late in that century and early in the twentieth that their descendants
could secure settlements of their own. By the time the new arrivals were
ready to establish settlements, only the east Imo remained unoccupied by
Arondizuogu groups. The Ndi-Ndiakunwanta lineage-group, formed after
1840, was the exception, but this was mainly because of the personal con-
quests of Okoro Udozuka at the expense of Umualoma. But formation of
lineage-groups after the pioneers had been well established was not a free-
for-all affair. It must have been sanctioned by the rest of the lineage-groups.
Ndiakunwanta had to pay 3,600 “monies”/”markets” (nnu ahia teghete,
or £180, which is equivalent to £12,800 in 2010 U.K. pound sterling), one
barrel of gunpowder, and one cow to secure recognition as an autono-
mous lineage-group in about the late 1870s (E.N. Okoli 1977:35).18
17
Some Ndiamazu traditions claims that Amazu was Izuogu’s trading partner (e.g., M.S. Igwe
1996). It is, however, likely that Amazu, who originated from Oro in the Oji River, came as
Izuogu’s dependent – his first direct dependent. The basis for this assertion is that, though
Iheme may have arrived before Amazu, Iheme had come in the first instance as Izuogu’s wife’s
slave boy, whom she later gave to her husband. It is said that the name Iheme derived from
the prayer, ihe emene di m (let no harm befall my husband) (Kanu-Igbo 1996a).
18
This value is derived using the Retail Price Index (RPI). Other 2010 values for the same
1870 amount, using other criteria, are £17,600 (GDP deflator), £106,000 (average earn-
ings), £124,000 (per capita GDP), £244,000 (Share GDP) (Economic History Services,
http://eh.net/hmit/ukcompare/).
The Frontier and the Nri-Awka Region

One practice with implication for slaving and culture formation was the
specific and consistent interest with which the Aro settlements in central
Igboland cultivated people from the Nri-Awka region. The enterprise,
resourcefulness, and adaptability that the Aro associated with people from
this region recommended them as wives, dependents, and immigrants. A
special relationship thus existed between the Aro and the people of the
Nri-Awka area. One of my respondents declared that Arondizuogu people
“were going to Nkanu-kwuru-Nkanu [the length and breath of Nkanu, i.e.,
Nri-Awka region,]” adding, “Is there any place in this Arondizuogu where
you would not find Nkanu people …?” (Akpu 1996). The mid-nineteenth-
century merchant-warrior, Okoro Udozuka, is said to have made the best
of these arrangements (Akpu 1996; E.N. Okoli 1977). “He was staying
in his mother’s land while trading in slaves because his grandfather’s rela-
tives were helping him get enough slaves” (Igwegbe 1962:34). Besides his
numerous children by an army of wives, Udozuka “was able through the
institution of slavery to build a miniature empire for himself.” His “sub-
jects” numbered more than 200 and “contributed so much to the increased
population of Ndiakunwanta” (E.N. Okoli 1977:35).
It was not only through slavery that people of the Nri-Awka region
inundated Arondizuogu; kinship ties also played a large part in the pro-
cess. Nri-Awka immigrants also often desired to have their relatives join
them in Arondizuogu (M.S. Igwe 1996; Kanu-Igbo 1996b). Even the
enslaved were generally allowed to maintain noninstitutional, supernu-
merary kinship affiliations with their natal societies, from which they
often took wives. They also introduced other Arondizuogu men to women
in their natal homes. As agents of Aro concerns, these Nri-Awka immi-
grants into Aro society – whether they were originally regular immigrants
or enslaved – freely and frequently made business trips to their natal
societies, with which they maintained trade links. Apart from bringing in
more people, these immigrants routinely adopted shrines from their natal
societies. In time, the master class came to subscribe to these shrines,
which became the dominant media of worship among the Aro diaspora.
The willingness of Aro slave masters to incorporate the enslaved and
to embrace aspects of their culture is consistent with the Igbo willing-
ness – noted by anthropologist Simon Ottenberg – to both readily incor-
porate outsiders and acquire “new religious shrines … by trade and
purchase” (S. Ottenberg 1959: 140). Not surprisingly, immigrants from
the Nri-Awka area made lasting impact on Arondizuogu culture.
The Aro case also raises a point that is often ignored in the analysis
of slave incorporation in Africa. The enslaved people’s relationship to
society was not just characterized by assimilation into a dominant cul-
ture. The extension of the aforementioned liberties – though designed to
serve Aro interests and not necessarily those of the enslaved – departs
from Kopytoff and Miers’s assertion that the change in the life of the
enslaved “was usually dramatic and total” and that he lost “his social
personality, his identity and status [and] suffered a traumatic and some-
times violent withdrawal from kin, neighbors, and community, and often
from familiar customs and language.” The social experience of people of
slave origin was hardly consistent with what Kopytoff and Miers char-
acterize as “playing dead” (I. Kopytoff and Miers 1977:14–15). Enslaved
people in Aro settlements did actually influence the culture of host societ-
ies, contrary to the phenomenon of “social death” advanced by Orlando
Patterson in his monumental Slavery and Social Death (1982). Despite
this formulation, however, Patterson sees “absolutely no evidence from
the long and dismal annals of slavery to suggest that any group of slaves
ever internalized the conception of degradation held by their masters,”
and that enslaved people never lost “the quintessential human urge to
participate and want a place” (Patterson 1982:97). But his argument that
all slavery is an alternative to death – as apt as it is in many historical
instances – is too rigid to accommodate the Aro experience. The enslaved
in Aro society certainly were not usually – if ever – “denied all claims …
on his more remote ancestors” and disallowed from freely integrating “the
experience of their ancestors into their lives,” as Patterson has asserted
(Patterson 1982:5). Aro masters and their societies did under several sig-
nificant circumstances – probably even routinely – encourage and enable
slaves to reach back to their ancestors. It must be conceded though that
these privileges presupposed certain codes of conformity on the part of
the enslaved that sustained and reproduced the Aro slave system. Except
for “free” migrants, the incoming people did not bring shrines or deities
upon arrival; they did so after they had earned the confidence of their
owners.
Apart from the Aro’s special interest in Nri-Awka people, the social
and economic conditions in the Nri-Awka region exposed its people to
enslavement and emigration. Needy parents often sold their children.
Igbudu and Ebuteilo of Ndiakunwanta in Arondizuogu were brothers
by the same mother in Nimo. Ebuteilo, in particular, later acquired many
people from the region (Maduadichie 1996). Similarly, the Ndieni Aro
heavily acquired people from non-Aro communities in their immediate
neighborhood.19 The present Arondizuogu people take this dimension of

their history for granted. The following is typical of the kind of explana-
tions that I got during fieldwork.
The Anambra [Nri-Awka] people … were more prudent than the people from
many communities in our immediate neighborhood. And they did not have food
… At that time, there were no cities. Many people arrived here due to yam
cultivation possibilities.20 These people multiplied in the process. At that time
too, Mazi Izuogu Mgbokpo traversed that country in his slave dealing business.
After he had settled here, he got his own people from the same place that he
got trade slaves. He retained those with good character. Those retained in this
process may have come overwhelmingly from Anambra. (M.S. Igwe 1996)21
The presence of a large group of immigrants from the Nri-Awka region

had a foundational impact upon the Aro diaspora in central Igboland. A
review of the workings of pan-Aro institutions in the diaspora places this
impact in its true context.
Linkages
An analysis of the Aro cultural network is an analysis of linkage institu-
tions, rites, or practices in both the metropole and the diaspora and of
those that linked them. In addition to the formal institutions through
which the metropole regulated the operation of the diaspora – the Aro
central council (Ọkpankpọ), the Ekpe secret society, and the Ibiniukpabi
oracle – already discussed in Chapter 3, there were those that governed
conventions and rites. Linkage institutions maintained political prece-
dence and routine contact within the diaspora populations and between
the metropole and the diaspora. The Aro diaspora paid regular visits to
Arochukwu to conduct and discuss trade, take the non-Aro to Ibiniukpabi,
receive advice from oracular priests, partake in the annual Ikeji festival,
join the Ekpe society or partake in its rites, and visit kin members.22
19
Chinyele 1972; J. Ike 1972; Iloha 1972; C. Kanu 1972; J, Kanu 1972; Ngene 1972;
Nwene 1972; F. Obi 1972; N. Okoli 1972.
20
Only those arriving in the last decade of the nineteenth century onward did so for the
purposes of farming because farming became important only at that time. This claim
exemplifies telescoping in the traditions. “Anambra” is the present state in Nigeria domi-
nated by the Nri-Awka.
21
The traditions of the Nri-Awka communities recognize these movements into Arondizuogu
as well. Among the traditions that I have seen, the ones from Awka seem most explicit
on this matter. They mention large-scale “migrations” to Arondizuogu (Agu 1985; I.
Oguocha 1996).
22
N.A. Anyakoha (1996); Chinyele (1972); Dike and Ekejiuba (1990); C. Okafor
(1986:124–25); J.G. Okoro (1985).
Aro settlers abroad also attended town or clan councils in Arochukwu

“and ‘gave advice’ which was invariably taken” (Grier 1922:35). In
1973, one Aro respondent told the historian Northrup, in an Aro set-
tlement of Nung Okoro in Ibibioland where the respondent had been
born: “Every year we would return home [to Arochukwu] for the New
Yam Festival. Other meetings would be held among the Nung Okoro
settlers to discuss trade matters and aid traders who had ill luck” (F.E.S.
Okoro 1973).23 This practice appears to have been widespread in Aro
diaspora settlements.
The Aro of Arochukwu (metropole) are reluctant to see Aro people vis-
iting Arochukwu from the various diaspora settlements as visitors, and this
attitude implies a reluctance on the part of metropolitan Aro to promote the
idea of the people of the diaspora building institutions of their own and/or
developing alternative identities. The Aro made it a point to call these visits
“returning home,” and this practice survives today. During my fieldwork
in 1995 and 1996, the elders quickly corrected me each time I referred to
my trip to Arochukwu as a visit. Many persons from the diaspora have
remigrated back to Arochukwu and integrated into the lineages that their
sojourning ancestors left behind in Arochukwu. Many others maintain
dual residences in the metropole and the diaspora. The Eze-Ogo (ruler) of
Amankwu in Arochukwu during my fieldwork was an Arondizuogu man
whose ancestors left Arochukwu in the eighteenth century. He left his Ndi-
Njoku lineage-group in Arondizuogu to assume that role (Obinani 1996).
These linkages did not result from later developments. Izuogu
Mkpokpo himself, who set up Arondizuogu, never resided there per-
manently. Tradition is unanimous that he participated regularly in
Arochukwu council meetings. Most Aro in the diaspora maintained resi-
dences in Arochukwu, and many were buried there. In early 1996, the
Ndiamazu lineage-group of Arondizuogu won a major court case over
the house that their primal ancestor, Amazu, had retained in Arochukwu.
One Arochukwu man had attempted to claim the property. Ndiamazu
won this case with the help of Jacob Ogbonna Okoro (c. 1897–2001)
who maintained double residence in Arondizuogu and Arochukwu since
1927.24 Ndiamazu people collected rent on this property and put it in
23
The festival originated in pre-trade Arochukwu, to mark the harvest of the new yam, but
it came to lose its agricultural purchase over time as the Aro became traders, to the extent
that homeland and some diaspora Aro had come to mark it at the opposite ends of the
agricultural season by the nineteenth century.
24
Because I was on my way to Arondizuogu, Okoro requested me to, and I did personally con-
vey letters from him to some Ndiamazu leaders, in which he reported the end of the case.
their common fund. As late as 1900, Okoroji, the founder of Ndikoroji,

an Aro settlement near Arondizuogu, was buried in his home at Ujari in
Arochukwu (Okoroji 1996; K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:308). Even
people who became Aro in their lifetime or first-generation Aro born in
the diaspora often wished to be either buried in the metropole or that
some of their funeral rites be performed there. The practice of burying
diaspora Aro in Arochukwu continued until the imposition of British
colonial rule.25
The best example of the institutions that linked the Aro metropole
and its diaspora is, perhaps, the Ihu rite. In this rite, every adult free male
regularly renewed obeisance to his oldest male relative (in the immediate
family), ex-master, patron, or host. Ihu was specifically tied to the annual
cycle of the Ikeji festival, and the rite of passage. The physical embodi-
ment of Ihu consisted of a particular assortment of seven meat parts
of the ritual beast, usually a goat or a cow.26 Ihu was tied specifically
to two occasions: death and the annual Ikeji festival, described as the
“annual festival of thanksgiving and propitiation” (C. Okafor 1986:124).
Ikeji marked an annual renewal of loyalty to masters and seniors in the
lineages. As the renowned Arondizuogu folklorist and singer, Azubuike
Nkemakonam Nwokoye-Emesuo (alias Perricomo) told me, Ihu was a
“census” of surviving dependents (Nwokoye-Emesuo 1996). Ihu cel-
ebrated interpersonal and group hierarchy. Each free adult male took Ihu
to his immediate male superior. The superior could be the oldest relative
in the immediate family, ex-master, patron, or host – depending on indi-
vidual circumstances. According to one of my respondents:
The system of this person acquiring that person and that person acquiring yet
another was quite complicated. The way that people clarified who was who was
the ihu, observed during the Ikeji festival in Arondizuogu. For instance, my father
came to Arondizuogu [from Arochukwu] through Anumba. When he celebrated
the Ikeji, he gave ose ihe to Anumba as ihu. For his part, Anumba gave to Mazi
25
Arochukwu elder Kanu-Onuoha (1996) recalled the 1928 second burial at Arochukwu
of Okoro Udozuka of Arondizuogu. Such funerals would have involved considerable
material cost, but before the late nineteenth century, the diaspora people were generally
affluent enough to support this important rite of passage or to have that financed by
relatives.
26
These parts are rib cage (with seven ribs on each side) (ose anu), chest (ntinana), upper
bowel (isi akpakwuru), a tiny portion of the liver (umeji), a small portion of the spleen
(anyinya), a small piece of flesh from the upper abdomen (ofufe enu), and a small part of
the lower abdomen (ofufe ana). I am grateful to the late Orizu Nwokeji (1996) for this
information. The meat parts were also accompanied by “five big yams”, one keg of palm
wine and four kolanuts (Muotoh 2000:43–44).
Ufere [of Ndiamazu] because it was Ufere who had brought Mazi Anumba. He,
Mazi Ufere himself, had an elder/superior under whom he was. That person was
a descendant of Mazi Izuogu Obunukpo Akuma Nnachi. Mazi Izuogu was the
person who left this Arochukwu to open up the way up to Arondizuogu to estab-
lish a settlement. (J.O. Okoro 1996)
By clarifying relationships within and among kin groups, and routin-

izing precedence and seniority, Ihu tied all Aro, both in the homeland
and diaspora, to a standardized system of identifying, acknowledg-
ing, and legitimizing Aro authority structures. Ihu from all the Aro
lineage-groups, including their offshoots in the diaspora, flowed ulti-
mately to Eze Aro at Arochukwu. The system served to perpetuate
ex-slaves as political and social juniors after their emancipation at
the level of production. This junior status also applied to clients and
guests. The system encouraged ex-slaves and immigrants to acquire
wealth and dependents, but routinized precedence based on charter
status, heredity, and age.
As a gesture of gratitude, Ihu was obligatory; but, as a measure of
precedence, it was also compulsory. What would happen if a person
refused to give Ihu? One respondent echoed many others when he
answered: “A human being could not even discuss that … failure to give
Ihu amounted to rebellion. The punishment was removal from society –
mmevu (wasting) – which could be sale or execution. Did he who refuses
to observe Ihu fall from heaven?” (Arodiogbu 1996). Unlike the feudal
tithe, Ihu was not economically exploitative in any significant sense for
men, but was designed as a ceremonial observance to essentialize access
to productive resources in past and present relationships. The Ihu system
exploited women directly. The women of a household were required to
make fixed annual contributions from proceeds from the economic trees
they controlled. The household head used these proceeds, and added to
it when necessary, to buy the sacrificial beast. In short, women may have
borne the economic brunt of Ihu, although the demands seem hardly
significant – given the material requirements for the annual sacrifice vis à
vis the possible number of women in a household.
The Ihu rite was central to a system that required every male entrant to
have either a master or patron. The system secured for the guest, client or
ex-slave a permanent place in the lineage hierarchy, thus making belong-
ing to Aro society a cardinal condition for belonging in it. It encouraged
slaves to work toward their emancipation and to acquire wealth and
dependents. Although many societies exact tribute from incoming ele-
ments, Ihu stands out because its observance was not restricted to any
single status group but was incumbent on all. It also encouraged defer-
ence based on age within all status groups.27
In the face of these relationships, British colonial anthropologists
noted the following. “The Aros were clan-conscious rather than town-
conscious, and today the average man will declare with pride that he
is an Aro before he gives the name of his town, recalling the spirit of
St. Paul triumphantly declaring ‘Civis Romanus sum’, followed by the
information ‘I come from Tarsus, no mean city’” (Anthropologists’
Papers 1927:16). Later, a colonial officer reported that the people of
Arondizuogu had “retained their Aro customs.”28 While these realities
demonstrate strong linkages, they also mask the deviations from the Aro
cultural grid.
Deviations in the Frontier

The Aro diaspora also showed signs of separate patterns of cultural evo-
lution. It bears noting that many milestone events and developments that
shaped and reshaped Arochukwu institutions had not yet occurred when
Arondizuogu and the other major Aro diaspora settlements were being
formed. For example, the ascendancy of the “Igbo” faction of Arochukwu
had not yet happened when Izuogu founded the upper Imo River valley
settlement in the 1730s.29 The ascendancy of the Igbo faction marked a
watershed in the Arochukwu political culture. Also, status groups that
were identified in the nineteenth-century Arochukwu had not yet crys-
tallized in the middle of the eighteenth century. The amadi nkume asaa
(literally, the amadi of the seven stones – euphemism for the founding lin-
eage-groups), the upper-crust amadi (nobility), derived from the number
of the Arochukwu lineage-groups (ọtụsị, or “stones”) which reached asaa
(seven) only after 1850 (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:68, 71, 91). In
Arochukwu symbolism, one stone denoted one lineage-group cluster. As
a result of these historical developments, the following simple, three-class
structure had developed in Arochukwu by the nineteenth century. The
highest echelon was the amadi, which “was rigid enough to amount to
caste.” This group consisted of the direct descendants of the foundation
27
Only two recent studies have mentioned Ihu – although they do not analyze it in detail
(see Bentor 1994:167; K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:210, 274).
28
NAE EP 12481 – MINLOC 6:1. 306: Intelligence Report on the Ndizuogu Village Area,
Orlu District, Okigwe Division, Owerri Province: Resident’s Covering Report.”
29
For this development, see Dike and Ekejiuba (1990:63, 67).
families of Arochukwu society. The second group was the amuda, con-
sisting of immigrants, their descendants, and those of slaves. The ohu, the
first-generation slaves, were the lowest group (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba
1990:79, 284; Uku 1993:3, 18–20). The status hierarchy in the different
diaspora settlements was bound to take different courses, reflecting the
specific circumstances of each settlement.
The starting point of the status distinction in Arochukwu, then, was the
foundation families. All nineteen Arochukwu lineage-groups were either
foundation communities or direct offshoots of these.30 Consequently, all
the lineage-groups had their amadi and corresponding lower orders. Not
surprisingly, therefore, status formation in Arondizuogu took a differ-
ent turn where the history-specific phenomenon of the seven stones was
absent. The differences in status formation between Arondizuogu and
Arochukwu reflected their differing circumstances of societal formation
and the fact that the Arochukwu institutions continued to undergo trans-
formations after the establishment of Arondizuogu. The Arondizuogu
case was more complicated. Arondizuogu was formed with just Izuogu’s
family and the persons of his household (Table 4.2). Of the resulting
original nine lineage-groups, eight were founded by persons of Izuogu’s
household. After the increase of the lineage-groups to sixteen in the
course of the nineteenth century, Izuogu’s direct descendants came to
compose the ruling minority of only two lineage-groups, Ndiawa and
Ndiuche, while the ruling minorities of all fourteen other lineage-groups
descended from Izuogu’s dependents. The ruling groups of the remain-
ing two of the present eighteen lineage-groups of Arondizuogu come
from the descendants of Izuogu’s brothers, Njoku and Udensi. These
last groups, Ndinjoku and Ndimoko, migrated late into the region dur-
ing the 1850s and 1870s, respectively, as separate and autonomous
Aro settlements (see T.O. Okereke 1996). Izuogu’s direct descendants
constituted minority ruling elites in Ndiawa and Ndiuche. By virtue of
their position, these elites also exercised authority over the rest of the
lineage-groups, forming the amadi both in these lineage-groups and
over Arondizuogu at large. The direct descendants of the other lineage-
group founders, for their part, constituted the minority amadi within the
respective lineage-groups, as they also massively incorporated outsiders
through slavery and other forms of immigration. These incorporated
outsiders formed subordinate lineages within the lineage-groups, and
30
The best informed discussions of this subject are Dike and Ekejiuba (1990) and J.O. Ijoma
(1986c).
those acquired by the subordinate lineages formed sub-subordinate lin-

eages, and so forth. The outstanding feature of this system is that while
the original non-Aro founding lineages were subject to the authority
of lineages that descended directly from Izuogu, the non-Aro founding
lineages constituted the amadi within their lineage-groups because they
had enfranchised lineage-groups, in contrast to later-arriving lineages
in Arochukwu. In contrast to the simple three-class hierarchy described
above for Arochukwu, Arondizuogu had a complex hierarchy of hege-
monies, or a “hierarchy of hierarchies.” The Arondizuogu structure
reflected conditions peculiar to the diaspora.
Changes in such a key area as class structure between the metropole
and the diaspora foreshadowed other cultural changes. One such change
was in the Ikeji festival, where the diaspora introduced new elements, and
even changed the season for holding it. At the formative stages of the Aro
diaspora, the Aro everywhere returned to Arochukwu to celebrate the
annual festival. At one point that is not yet clear, the diaspora communi-
ties began to celebrate theirs at different times that did not conflict with
the Aro general Ikeji as well. In Arondizuogu, the season changed from
August, when the metropole celebrated it, to April.31 August generally
coincided with the beginning of the harvest season, while April generally
coincided with the beginning of the planting season. The literary transla-
tion of Ikeji-yam – “staking” (for preservation) – suggests strongly that
the original purpose of the festival was to usher in the harvest season.
Some Arondizuogu elders have speculated that the reason for the change
was to ensure that the rain did not interfere with the masquerade perfor-
mance, the hallmark of the Ikeji festival in Arondizuogu: the drier month
of April provided better weather for masquerade performance than did
rainy August. But the change of the Ikeji season to April brought home
the fact that agriculture had little clout in a trading society. Change was
possible only because yam agriculture was not central to the spiritual life
of Arondizuogu at the time. Otherwise, not even the likelihood that rain
would ruin the event could have occasioned a change. If the festival had
originated in an early agricultural era, before the Aro became a predomi-
nantly trading community, agriculture did not become important again
31
Initially, after the change in seasons, the different Arondizuogu lineage-groups had cel-
ebrated Ikeji variously, but consecutively during the long season from March to April.
Since the emergence of the Arondizuogu Patriotic Union (APU) in the 1930s, the whole
of Arondizuogu have celebrated the festival on the same dates in April. For a compre-
hensive history of this union and informative details of Ikeji and its evolution, see Ohia
2007.
among the Aro until the last decade of the nineteenth century, after the
festival had been in existence for centuries. The shift of the Ikeji season
from August to April not only marked a shift in season but also the sepa-
ration of Ikeji and the new yam festival. The new yam festival, which in
late twentieth-century Arondizuogu was celebrated in September, when
the rest of the Igbo and Arochukwu celebrated it (the latter calling it
“Ikeji”), was most probably (re-)introduced or revived when yam agricul-
ture became important in Arondizuogu. Yam agriculture did not become
important in Arondizuogu until the final decade of the nineteenth cen-
tury, when the people began to establish settlements in areas east of the
original Arondizuogu site. This (re-)introduction of the new yam festival
should explain why Arondizuogu celebrates in September today, to avoid
a conflict with the Arochukwu event in August.
The domestication of the Ikeji festival in the diaspora served prac-
tical and symbolic purposes. The need to protect the settlements and
to legitimize them in the eyes of the preexisting societies called for a
more demonstrative presence that Ikeji provided. Since the frontierspeo-
ple were always concerned with security against the occasional hostile
neighbor, it would not have been in their interest to embark on a predict-
able annual mass trip to the distant metropole. Simultaneously, Ikeji pro-
vided opportunities for diplomacy. As Chinyere Okafor has pointed out,
people in the diaspora and in the preexisting communities exchanged
visits during festivals. Ikeji gave the Aro the opportunity to reciprocate
these invitations (C. Okafor 1986:124). Internally, the festival offered
the ruling members of the diaspora a regular opportunity to renew and
routinize their hegemony over their wards through the Ihu institution.
Such symbolisms were essential to maintaining order and control in the
dynamic diaspora environment. The festival was remarkable for its blend
of metropolitan and frontier practices. The rituals were metropolitan,
while the entertainment aspects bore the signature of preexisting and
Nri-Awka groups.
The Aro diaspora deviated more completely regarding incest rules. In
the Aro metropole, loose incest rules permitted marriage between sec-
ond cousins. But in the central Igboland frontiers, rigid incest rules pre-
vailed. Among the all Aro, women could only marry men of the same or a
higher status – never below. These practices implied the social isolation of
unmarried women among the original Aro migrants to the frontier, who
could not marry the majority of men in society because these men came
from lower status groups. Because the original Aro in these settlements
often descended from one person or, sometimes, from a few close blood
relatives, creating a scarcity of eligible men for the original Aro women.
The impact of this restrictive marriage practice on the marriageability of
high-status Aro women would have been great. It also created an artificial
scarcity of women for men of slave origin, who either had to secure wives
from non-Aro groups or remained unmarried. This partial exogamy, by
which Aro men married outside women without giving out any of their
own, as mentioned in Chapter 3, ruled out the rest of Igboland as a source
of spouses for high-status unmarried women. In Arondizuogu, as in the
other Aro frontier settlements, men outside Izuogu’s pedigree were out-
side the eligible pool, as were comparable classes in both Arochukwu and
in the diaspora. High-status women were left to marry only men from the
amadi nkume asaa, but this was a small and very exclusive group found
only in Arochukwu and those diaspora settlements whose founders were
Aro amadi. The adoption of strict incest rules in the diaspora resulted
from the influence of Igbo norms, especially those of Nri-Awka.
Yet, in one important respect, Arondizuogu deviated, not only from
Arochukwu, but also from the rest of the Igbo world, notably the Nri-Awka
culture area from which most of the frontier populations were drawn.
Both Arochukwu and the rest of the Igbo observed the “twin taboo,”
which was based on the belief that twins were spiritually unclean and
purveyors of communal misfortune. The Igbo are known to have thrown
twins into the “bad bush” (unused bush, often a virgin forest, where all
things considered sacrilege and evil were thrown). The involvement of
Arochukwu in the twin taboo is ironic, given the people’s emphasis on
group expansion. Perhaps because their slave trading activities made
them more likely to see human beings as commodities, the Aro tended to
eschew Igbo practices that wasted human lives. For example, while the
Igbo normally threw into the bad bush children who cut their upper teeth
first, the Aro diaspora in the perimeters of central Igboland preserved
them. Despite the varying attitudes of Arochukwu and the Aro diaspora
toward the twin taboo, however, Arochukwu shared the Igbo world’s
perception of twin birth as a major abomination and both Aro groups
considered twins sellable commodities.32 Given the twin taboo prevail-
ing in much of Igboland, the Aro tendency to buy and sell twins and the
apparent absence of a similar practice elsewhere in Atlantic Africa, the
32
The taboo against twins in Arochukwu is so strong that it survives to date. For instance,
it was first ascertained that I was not a twin during my fieldwork in February 1996
before I was admitted to a historical site, Ogbuti Okoroji (the house of the late nine-
teenth-century slave trader, Okoroji), even though the Nigerian government had declared
it a national monument in 1972.
Bight of Biafra would have sent a relatively significant number of twins

into the slave trade. The members of the British Niger Expedition of 1841
give us a view of this practice among the Igbo.
The little victims are no sooner born than one or both are taken away, placed in
the neighboring thicket in earthen pots or baskets, and left there to become the
food of hyenas or other wild beasts. The unfortunate mother is separated for
ever from her conjugal alliance; she is obliged to pass a long period or repen-
tance and purification, in a rude hut some distance from the town; and if she
outlives all these trials, mental and physical, and returns once more to society, she
is regarded as an especial object of Fetish wrath, and no woman will knowingly
sit in her company, or hold communion with her. (Capt. W. Allen and Thomson
1848a:243)
Arondizuogu oral traditions reveal the community’s deviation from

Igbo and Arochukwu twin discrimination. Sometime in the 1820s, a
woman from Abatete in the Nri-Awka area, fleeing the consequences of
having given birth to twins, found her way to Arondizuogu. With her were
her male twin children, Achusim and Onyevwuchi, whom she concealed
in a long basket covered with fresh leaves. Uchendu, the ex-dependent of
Akaeme, the founder of the Ndiakeme lineage-group, granted asylum to
the woman and her children, under the usual condition of dependency.33
Today, Ndi-Achusim and Ndi-Onyevwuchi, descendants of these twins
are principal lineages in the Ndiakeme lineage-group. As this story dem-
onstrates, immigrants from the Nri-Awka and other areas did not wholly
transpose their cultures in Arondizuogu. Arondizuogu deviated not only
from Arochukwu but also from the Nri-Awka region.
Still, Aro influences and practices remained. For instance, in spite of the
massive immigration of originally non-Aro elements, Arondizuogu did
not adopt a specialist shrine for agriculture. A colonial officer interpreted
the nonexistence of the Ana shrine (the shrine of land and agriculture)
to be evidence of Arondizuogu “stranger” status in the area (see Mayne
1935:8). If what “strangers” means is that Arondizuogu was compara-
tively recent in the region, many other Igbo communities were also of
33
This date is an estimate from genealogies. Traditions related by various respondents
in different lineage-groups show the same basic pattern (Arodiogbu 1996; Ekwobi
1996; Igwegbe 1962:30–31; Igwilo 1996a; C. Okoli 1996). Whatever truth there may
be to this story, it suggests to me that the idea of accepting twins has been entrenched
in Arondizuogu folklore since the early nineteenth century. None of my respondents
seemed aware that this act deviated from the Aro norm. They simply used the incident
to illustrate the principle of mmuba. Igwegbe (1962) renders the traditions in the same
manner.
recent origin and were the results of migration, and recent migration to
the area did not prevent these communities from invariably adopting the
Ana, or analogous agrarian-oriented cults. Residency status did not deter-
mine the adoption of the earth shrine. Arondizuogu did not adopt it only
because agriculture was, until a decade before British colonial conquest,
marginal to the trade-based political economy. Up to the 1890s, the com-
munity depended on its neighbors for the supply of provisions. Although
oral traditions often tout the “strangers” idea, the term is not useful in the
Igbo historical context. As part of a strategy of colonial domination, the
British played up the idea to help intimidate the intractable Arondizuogu
community and to isolate it from neighboring non-Aro communities. In
itself, the stranger status is not useful in understanding the prevalence or
otherwise of the Ana cult. The cult’s diffusion was not coterminous with
the series of migrations that mark the histories of many Igbo groups.
After all, most of Arondizuogu peoples originated from areas in which
the Ana cult prevailed.34 They could have brought it with them, but, as
already mentioned, the cult had little reason to exist in a trading fron-
tier. Instead, ancestral cults were, according to Dike and Ekejiuba, often
central among trading groups, such as the Aro (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba
1990:132). As with the adopted shrines, these ancestral cults were impor-
tant in Arondizuogu – even among immigrants.
However, evidence from the Ndieni, a commonwealth of other major
Aro communities in central Igboland, complicates the trade-based expla-
nation for the absence of agricultural shrines in a trading frontier. Up
to the 1920s, these Aro groups still subscribed to Ajana, the earth deity
of the respective preexisting groups amid whom their ancestors had set-
tled a century and a half earlier.35 The reason for this difference between
Arondizuogu and Ndieni may lie in Arondizuogu’s more thorough sub-
jection and its greater displacement of preexisting groups than Ndieni
experienced with its neighbors. In the Ujari case, according to an Ujari his-
torian, the preexisting community of Akpu offered Ujari people land that
“was near the grove around the shrine of a local deity called Ajana.”36 Like
the Ujari, other Ndieni communities generally settled in close proximity
to preexisting societies, establishing Aro dominance over time, often by
34
For the centrality of the Ana cult, see Meek (1937:Ch. 2; Green 1964:26–28, 100). In
Arochukwu, the trade cult, Inyamavia, prevailed.
35
NAE ONPROF – 7/16/150:Awka Division Intelligence Notes on the Towns of Ajalli
Native Court Area 1929. See abstract of file, p. 2.
36
The Ujari community had just been harried out of their original place of settlement at
Uvume by the hosts (Eni 1973:12).
war. Arondizuogu, on the contrary, made war at the outset. Although

they sometimes married women and acquired people from neighboring
communities, Arondizuogu maintained some spatial and social distance
from the preexisting groups; thus, it was people from the Nri-Awka area
who had significant influence on the evolution of Arondizuogu culture.
Yet, the Nri-Awka influence did not lead to the emergence of the Ana
cult there. Although all cultures evolve from interaction with other cul-
tures, and each is, therefore, a synthesis, Arondizuogu and the Ndieni
cluster showed the marked influence of their immediate neighbors, and
this seems to have been especially true of the Ndieni cluster. The specific
situation of the Aro diaspora settlements made them not only distinct
communities in their neighborhoods, but also distinguished them from
metropolitan Arochukwu and from other Aro diaspora communities,
each of which had its own distinguishing characteristics.
Dialect Formation
Language is an important distinguishing characteristic of the Aro diaspora.
The Aro dialect of Igbo in the upper Imo River region is a reflection of the
historical interactions of religion, commerce, the large-scale incorporation
of elements from other societies, and marriage. One way to measure the
distinctness or otherwise of any Aro diaspora community is to compare
its dialect to those of its immediate neighbors, metropolitan Arochukwu,
and the major source of originally non-Aro immigrants. The task is best
accomplished by comparing vocabularies – the basic methodology of
lexicostatistics, which establishes the relationship between two or more
languages, including how long ago they separated from a single, common
language. However, the task in this case is primarily to determine the
extent to which each of three major dialectal areas influenced the dialect
of a fourth group – Arondizuogu.
Unfortunately, however, the Igbo orthography does not capture some
basic phonemes in Igbo dialects, a limitation that is striking in the case.37
Such a limited orthography forecloses any necessity, or even the possibility,
37
John McCall encountered the same problem with respect to his work among the Ohafia
(McCall 2000:161). Although interested in the historical development of language, both
traditional and modern linguistics ignore the sociocultural contexts in which languages
emerge. Yet patterns of speech shape and are shaped by “dominance and exchange pat-
terns of kinship and other idioms of speech” (H.C. White 1995:5, 41). To be sure, the
Igbo orthography ignores sociocultural realities. When I once raised this matter on the
electronic interactive medium, Igbonet, early in 1995, the views of the other contributors,
of interdialectical comparisons. To carry out the historically significant

task of comparing the Arondizuogu dialect with the dialects of its popu-
lation sources, therefore, it is necessary to transcend the existing orthog-
raphy. Historian Elizabeth Isichei apparently had to employ a unique
consonant (wh, pronounced like the English word “who”) to represent a
word from the Awka dialect (whum) (Isichei 1978:67). I have adopted the
consonants wh and vw (both as in the Urhobo orthography) to represent
the Arondizuogu phonemes not otherwise represented. Also adopted is
“rl” to represent a sound in eastern Nri-Awka Igbo that seem to combine
“r” and “l,” with the “r” sound predominating (Table 4.3).38 The rl sound
resembles is identical to the sound of the single “r” in Spanish.
Another complicating factor in the lexicostatistics of the Aro diaspora
is that the derivative dialects are not homogenous. Arochukwu comes
closest to homogeneity; yet, different Arochukwu lineage-groups
speak slightly varying dialects. Ibom, Ujari, Amankwu and especially
Amannagwu speak something closest to the quintessence of Aro dialect,
while the rest are, to widely varying degrees, influenced by the dialects of
different Igbo groups and Ibibio.
Adopting the lexicostatistical approach and an appropriate orthog-
raphy with which to execute it place the ethnolinguistic history of the
Aro diaspora in clear relief. Fifty-five randomly selected words show the
diverse origins of Arondizuogu dialects, with the Nri-Awka dialects dom-
inating. While eleven words are all used in Arochukwu, preexisting com-
munities and the Nri-Awka region, two words originate from both from
Arochukwu and preexisting communities, two from both Arochukwu and
Nri-Awka, and four from both Nri-Awka and preexisting communities.
Four originate exclusively from Arochukwu and one exclusively from the
dialects of the preexisting communities, but as high as nineteen words
including one Igbo linguist, favored the existing orthography. They rested their case
on the political imperative of Igbo integration, a view that illustrates the connection
between language and politics and sacrificing cultural interaction and historical context.
This view is not only at variance with the postmodernist sensibility to the multiplicity of
identities but it also certainly hampers the historical understanding of Igbo societies.
38
Such nuances in Igbo phonemes complicate scholars’ efforts to transliterate names of
enslaved people in the Americans because the people who first transcribed the names
approximated the sounds with the orthographic traditions the transcribers were familiar,
regardless of whether Igbo orthography would later incorporate the sounds. Maureen
Warner-Lewis uses “rl” to throw light on “Durl,” the name of the father of the Igbo
Archibald Monteith, who was enslaved in Jamaica, as transcribed by Europeans. Warner
Lewis suggests that this name represents the name that appears in standard Igbo as
“Duru,” observing that despite the apparent strangeness of “rl” in Durl, “erery Igbo
speaker recognizes this word to have been Duru” (Warner-Lewis 2007: 28).
Table 4.3. Lexicostatistics of Arochukwu, Arondizuogu, Nri-Awka, and

Non-Aro Communities Around Arondizuogu
English Arọndizuogu Arọchukwu Nri – Awka Preexisting

Communities
1 Market/Trade ahịa avịa afịa/avịa/afịa ahyịa
2 Big Nnukwu ukwuu Nnekwu/ Ukwu
nnukwu
3 Small/Little Oberle Nta ọbele/oberle ntakịrị
4 Male nwoke/oke ikom/oke Nwoke Nwoke/oke
5 Female nwanyị Inyom/ Nwanyị/ nwanyị
nwanyị nwanya
6 Elder Okoha ochie-ochie okenye/ichie Okenye
7 Child nwata, nwanta nwata, nwata/
nwatakịrlị nwatakịlị, nwatakịrị
nwatakịrlị
8 Children ụmụazị ụmụrịma ụmụaka ụmụazhị
9 Body ahụ Azi Arụ ahụ
10 Land Ana Ala Anị/Ana Ala
11 Shrine, Temple arlụsị arụsị alụsị, arlụsị arụshị
12 Afternoon Ukorli Ukori efifie, evivie Ehihie
13 Morning ụtụtụ ụtụtụ ụtụtụ ụkụtụ
14 Night Abani Abani Anyasi abali, anyashi
15 Patron Deity ịnyamahịa inyamavịa NA NA
of Trade
16 To Waste, to mmewhu/ mmevu/ mmefu/ mmefu, nlalu
Eliminate imewhu imevu mmewhu
17 To Spoil mmevwi mmebi/mbibi Mmebi mmebi,
mmeghi
18 To Oppress mmewu mmegbu mmegbu Mmegbu
19 Stone, Rock Nkume nkume Okwute Okwute
20 Money Ego ikpeghe/ Ego Ego
okpogho
21 Leg ọkpa ọkpa Ukwu ọkpa
22 Take ngaa/werlụ were nnaa/welụ/ were
werlụ
23 Ancestral ọwhọ ọvọ ọfọ, ọvọ, ọfọ
Wand ọwhọ
24 House uno ụlọ ụnọ uluo, ulo
25 Welcome nnọ/neekwaa neekwaa nnọ ilọ/ilọla
26 Food Nni Ndi Nni Iri
27 Meat anụ anị anụ anụ
28 Here ịbaa/nọọnwa ịbaa,ebonwa/ ebaa/nọọnwa Ngaa
eb ọọwanani
29 There ibeahụ ibeọhụ/ Ebanwa ebeahụ
ibeohụnanị
(continued)
Table 4.3 (continued)
English Arọndizuogu Arọchukwu Nri – Awka Preexisting

Communities
30 Water mmirli Mmini mmili/mmirli Mmiri

31 Now Ha ugbue ugbua/kịtaa Ugbua
32 Then/ That mgbeahụ mgbeọhụ ogeanwa/ eshiahụ
Time ogeafụ
33 When Mgbe mgbe Oge/mgbe Eshi
34 Friend Enyi Enyi oyi/enyi enyi
35 Play egwu/ egwu/ egwu/ egwu/
egwurlegwu egwuregwu egwuliegwu/ egwuregwu
egwurliegwu
36 Dance Egwu Uri Egwu uri
37 Love, Likeness ịwhụnaya ịvụnanya ịfụnanya/ ịhụnaya
ịwhụnaya
38 Work ọrlụ ọrụ ọlụ/ọrlụ ọrụ
39 No Mba ọdighi Mba/waa oolo
40 Hate asị Iro/asị asị ashị
41 War Agha Aha Agha agha
42 Sun anyanwụ/ anyanwụ/ anyanwụ/ anyanwụ/anwụ
anwụ anwụ anwụ
43 Star Kpakpando kpakpandụ Kpakpando kpakpando
44 Moon/Lunar ọnwa ọnwa ọnwa ọnwa
Month
45 Dry Season ọkọchị ọkọchị ọkọchị ọkọchị
46 Wet Season Udummirli udummiri Udummili/ udummiri
Udummirli
47 Stomach awhọ Avọ afọ/avọ/awho afọ
48 Head Isi Isi Isi ishi
49 Leg ọkpa ọkpa ụkwụ ọkpa
50 Show Gosi Zi Gosi Zhi
51 Senerosity/gift amarla amara Amala/ Amara
amarla
52 First Day in Eke Eke Eke Eke
the Market
Cycle
53 Second Day Oye Orie Oye Orie
in the Market
Cycle
54 third day in Awhọ Avọ Afọ/Avọ/ Afọ
the market Awhọ
cycle
55 Fourth Day Nkwọ Nkwọ Nkwọ Nkwọ
in the Market
Cycle
originate exclusively from Nri-Awka dialect(s). Arondizuogu developed

twelve unique words and word forms. (Table 4.3).39 Overwhelmingly,
however, the version of the Nri-Awka dialect adopted by Arondizuogu is
the one spoken by the people of eastern Nri-Awka, in the Ekwuluobia –
Igbo-Ukwu – Nanka Area. Arondizuogu shares many words with pre-
existing groups, but this is not always the case with the pronunciations.
People in the preexisting groups nasalize most of their sounds. The
Arondizuogu pronunciation of the letter “r” is identical to that of pre-
existing communities and the communities of eastern Nri-Awka region,
where the “r” rolls, as in Portuguese and Spanish “r” when it does not
begin an Iberian word. Among the Arondizuogu and the communities of
eastern Nri-Awka region, “r” takes the latter form in every case, while it
varies among preexisting communities. The Arochukwu pronunciation
always takes the regular “r” (as in English), identical to much of southern
Igbo pronunciation.
Language mutation has continued since the establishment of Arondizuogu.
The process and pattern of immigration that produced the frontier culture
continued in the nineteenth century but were, of course, altered following
the imposition of British colonialism very early in the twentieth century. As
a result, there is often the possibility that, wherever the Arondizuogu word is
unique, it is an archaic variant of the Nri-Awa, especially eastern Nri-Awka,
and, rarely an archaic variant of Arochukwu word. Since colonial times,
eastern Nri-Awka speech has come under the influence of western Nri-Awka
dialect(s), especially Onitsha (Onicha). While the possibility of borrowing
from archaic Arochukwu or preexisting dialects is there, it is by far less. As
Arondizuogu people turned greater attention to new economic and political
centers that emerged under the colonial and postcolonial political economies
than they once did to Arochukwu, the Arondizuogu dialect moved much
farther from that of Arochukwu during the twentieth century. In spite of the
non-Aro influences on Arondizuogu dialect, however, “pure” Arochukwu
dialect remained the one of wisdom and for philosophical reflections, to be
invoked on appropriate occasions. The elderly population of Arondizuogu
in the late twentieth century tended to switch to archaic Aro when they
wanted to sound astute, cerebral, or to command respect. Despite the lin-
guistic changes they encountered, the Aro diaspora still retained a special
place in the language for the homeland dialect.
39
Wherever there are two variants of an Arondizuogu word, I have placed the western Nri-
Awka version first. When there is a northern Nri-Awka variant, the alternatives appear
in the following order: western, northern, and eastern.
The scenario was different in one section of Arondizuogu. Ndiuche,

one of the two lineage-groups that descended directly from Izuogu’s own
children, developed along separate cultural lines, in ways that this chap-
ter has not captured. Although Ndiuche is contiguous to Arondizuogu
territories, Ndiuche dialect today reflects a mixture of Arochukwu dialect
and those of the preexisting societies. This situation is in turn a reflection
of their history of alienation and separate development.
Although he was the eldest son to survive Izuogu, Uche was prevented
from exercising his primogeniture right of inheriting the bulk of his
father’s estate and suzerainty over his dependents. Various versions of
Arondizuogu traditions have sought to explain this anomaly. One version
holds that Izuogu faced execution for the murder of a fellow Aro amadi
but that the Arochukwu community was prepared to execute one of
Izuogu’s sons in lieu of his father. Uche lost his primogeniture rights after
his mother failed to produce him to ransom Izuogu, and it was Awa’s
mother who presented her son instead. Luckily for Izuogu, the Arochukwu
community had a change of heart and allowed Izuogu to present a slave
instead. But because of the disloyalty of Uche and his mother, Izuogu
named Awa as his inheritor (Igwilo 1996a; C. Okoli 1996). Another ver-
sion claims that Uche lost his primogeniture rights because he refused to
give the head of his mother Eriaba (Mpi) for the burial of Izuogu and that
Awa gained such rights because he gave up his mother Egbocha. This tra-
dition claims that it was customary for the first son to give up his mother
for human sacrifice, and that Uche reneged on this obligation (J.G. Okoro
1996). Ndiuche tradition dismisses these versions, suggesting instead that
Izuogu’s well-established dependents and henchmen supported Awa over
Uche as inheritor because Awa’s mother, like them, came from the Nri-
Awka region (J.G. Okoro; Jonas Uche 1996).
While the first story expressly claims that Izuogu decided in his life-
time that Awa would inherit his estate (Arodiogbu 1996; J.O. Dike 1996;
M.S. Igwe 1996), the two other versions imply that the matter was decided
after Izuogu’s death. Only the first story seems plausible, even if it does
not satisfactorily explain Awa’s ascendancy. Aro law did indeed stipulate
the execution of an amadi who murdered another amadi. What is unclear
is how Izuogu apparently got himself a waiver. Even more problematic
is the claim that Izuogu’s dependents backed Awa because they shared
affinity with Awa through his mother. There is no evidence to suggest that
people from the greater Nri-Awka felt a particular affinity with a person
from Umuchu, the natal home of Awa’s mother. In spite of Izuogu’s mar-
riage to a woman from Umuchu, Arondizuogu did not see this society as
an integral part of Nri-Awka; instead they deemed it to have had a close

affinity with other preexisting groups from whom Arondizuogu did not
usually draw dependents. The most problematic version is the one that
claims that the head of Izuogu’s wife was needed for Izuogu’s burial. If
such a request was made, it must have been without precedent, and there
is no evidence – not even a claim – that anybody after Awa was required
to sacrifice his mother for the burial of his father. Although Oldendorp
was told by his American-based Igbo respondents in the 1760s that in
an unspecified part of Igboland “with every notable man who died his
first wife and various servants were buried with him, to serve him in the
other world,” no such custom has been uncovered in Arochukwu or any
other Aro community (see Oldendorp 2000: ms. 468). Possible expla-
nations for Awa’s supersession of Uche include that Izuogu may have
had special affection for Awa; Awa had the personal qualities and abil-
ity to rally Izuogu’s dependents to his cause, and then they rationalized
the unusual development to legitimate Awa’s authority; Or, as explored
below, that Awa’s mother, Egbocha, was the principal influence in inheri-
tance dispute.
This development had enduring implications for the settlement. First,
it demonstrates the great influence of ex-slaves from the Nri-Awka
region in shaping the course and structure of Arondizuogu geopolitics.
Second, the exceptional power that one of these dependents, Iheme, and
his descendants came to acquire in the Arondizuogu politics seems to
have originated in his role in Awa’s emergence as Izuogu’s heir. If any
Izuogu dependent was predisposed to support Awa, as the Ndiuche
claim, it would have been Iheme. Unlike other dependents, who were
acquired directly by Izuogu, Iheme is said to have come into Izuogu
society as the dependent of Awa’s mother, Egbocha. Indeed, Iheme’s full
name is claimed to be Ihemenedim, meaning, “let my husband be safe,”
and was given to him when Egbocha transferred Iheme to her husband
Izuogu. Egbocha could have influenced Iheme to support young Awa
in his dispute with Uche. In all likelihood, Iheme came to influence the
victorious Awa more than any other dependent of Izuogu because of
this special relationship. Another indication of Iheme’s critical role in
this development and the influence he gained from it is that Iheme and
his descendants – as opposed to Awa and his descendants, who were
the inheritors of Izuogu’s estate – came to occupy the Eke Obinikpa
region where Arondizuogu had settled originally, Ndiawa. It seems that
Ndiawa did indeed settle in this location at one point. One rivulet at the
north end of the Eke Obinikpa market is named after Ndiawa (Mmiri
Ndiawa, meaning “Ndiawa water”), suggesting that Ndiawa was specif-

ically located by it at some point. Today, that rivulet marks the boundary
between two Ndi-Iheme lineage-groups. It is otherwise odd that the rivu-
let should bear this name, which it retains to the present day. The rea-
son for this seeming abrasion is unclear. It should be noted that Izuogu
and his sons – who from all indications were minors when their father
died – did not permanently settle at Arondizuogu. Izuogu operated from
Arochukwu while his people were settled at Arondizuogu. It seems that
Ndiawa later secured their current space about sixteen kilometers to
the east with the help of Ndi-Iheme and other loyal lineage-groups. The
apparent oddity of Ndiawa being many kilometers away from Ndiawa
Water has escaped the attention of local historians, and its implications
have thus been left unexplored until this book. Yet, this tiny and other-
wise insignificant rivulet bears loud witness to a crucial power shift in
Arondizuogu history. The rise to prominence of Iheme from a lowly to
the most powerful dependent and the triumph of Awa over Uche illus-
trate the power and influence that Aro women wielded in shaping power
structures and outcomes of political disputes. Much of the power Iheme
came to wield derived from his relationship with Izuogu’s wife Egbocha,
whose dependent he was.
In spite of their alienation, Ndiuche developed along similar lines to
the rest of Arondizuogu. Just as Arondizuogu people overwhelmingly
married women, acquired slaves, and welcomed immigrants from the
Nri-Awka area, Ndiuche’s populations derived mainly from preexisting
communities. Ndiuche went as far as incorporating preexisting groups,
such as Umuago, unlike the rest of Arondizuogu. In part, the Ndiuche’s
focus on establishing relationships with and incorporating preexisting
groups reflected its inability to compete with Arondizuogu for trade
with the densely populated communities of the Nri-Awka region. On the
other hand, Ndiuche may have developed a bias against persons from
that area, given the indictment that Ndiuche traditions heap upon them
for Ndiuche’s marginalization in Arondizuogu. The lineage-group also
assimilated mercenaries who had come to the society with their fami-
lies. Today, Ndiuche, along with the two settlements formed by the later-
arriving descendants of Izuogu’s half-brothers, Ndinjoku and Ndi-Imoko,
is essentially an integral part of Arondizuogu. At the same time, Ndiuche
maintained kinship ties with the preexisting society from which Uche’s
mother had been drawn in the eighteenth century. These ties seem to have
been made even stronger as a result of Ndiuche’s alienation from the rest
of Arondizuogu. This chapter has not captured the cultural developments
of these late arrivals, who came to the area in c. 1850s and c. 1860s,
respectively, but it should be noted that, in spite of their incorporation of
significant numbers of non-Aro, their dialects are closer to the dialect of
Arochukwu than to Arondizuogu. They must have found the multicul-
tural character of Arondizuogu remarkable.40
Conclusions
Far from severing regular ties with the Arochukwu metropole from the
onset, the Aro diaspora settlements and the metropole were linked, and this
linkage can only be understood as a historical process. One must separate
earlier periods from later ones, when host and immigrant cultures (and
in the twentieth century, colonial, capitalist, and Christian presence) had
made their marks on the diaspora settlements. Aro diaspora perceptions
of the settlements in the mid-eighteenth century had changed somewhat
in the mid-twentieth century when Kanu Umo remarked that: “Ndizuogu
settlers are naturalized or, in other words have become planted in the set-
tlement that the average medial Settler (sic) is not very much interested in
home Aro and her ways” (Umo n.d.:21). Still, the severance of relations
had not even by the mid-twentieth century gone as far as is claimed in the
recent literature for much earlier periods (e.g., Northrup 1978). As Umo
himself – despite his synchronic tendencies – points out for the first half
of the twentieth century, “an infinitestimal minority in cursory compari-
son with the block population, are being deadly concerned with home
affairs. During the ‘Ikeji’ annual festival some outside settlers … usu-
ally go home to enjoy the ‘Ekpe’ and ‘Ayanma’ displays” (Umo n.d.:22).
When these pan-Aro observances are considered together, it is clear that
the Aro maintained what one can call a system. In this way, they differed
from the Hausa diaspora in mid-1960s Ibadan, which apparently did not
feel the pull of home. Many new migrants into the Hausa diaspora came
to look for a relative who had left and never visited home (A. Cohen
1969:39–42). The far greater geographic range of the Hausa diaspora
was, of course, a major reason for their less frequent trips to their home-
land. Although many Aro, to a lesser degree, also did not opt to return
home permanently, they nevertheless always retained that option, were
always welcome back in Arochukwu, and often maintained dual resi-
dences. The examination of Aro organization as a trade diaspora explains
40
In an implied comparison with Arondizuogu, Thomas Okereke of Ndi-Imoko told me
early in 1996: Ndi-Imoko “tradition and customs are purely Aro” (T. Okereke 1996).
the ways by which cultural processes, commercial politics, and institu-

tional change shaped the Biafra Atlantic trade, and vice versa, during the
era of Aro expansion. As an increasing number of captives came to be
retained in the region, the Aro diaspora facilitated the process by which
some captives were sent overseas and others retained within the region,
illustrating the interaction between the overseas slave trade and slavery
within the Bight of Biafra. This process is the subject of Chapter 5.
5
Household and Market Persons
Deportees and Society, c. 1740–c. 1850
The rise of the Atlantic slave trade increased not only the number
of captives exported to the Americas but also the number who were
retained in the region. The increasing importance of slave use in African
political economies during the Atlantic slave trade era had implica-
tions for the trade in quite material terms: it implied a relationship
between indigenous slavery and the Atlantic slave trade, which raises
two inversely related central questions about Aro political economy.
Why did the Aro retain people when the trade in people was the basis
of their wealth and power? And why did the Aro and other slave-
holders sell people when their social organization was based on group
expansion?
In the Angolan case, Joseph Miller has asked and persuasively
answered the second question. According to him, West-Central African
entrepreneurs, who calculated their advantages based on the number
of dependents that remained with them and the degree of their depen-
dency, became slave traders reluctantly. They released “a portion of
their hard-won dependents” to Euro-American slave traders as a last
resort in order to acquire the imported goods that were necessary to
attract dependents, even if the foreign slave traders came across as
agents of a bad spirit and harbingers of death for those they took with
them (Miller 1988:40, 105). Biafran entrepreneurs shared with their
West-Central African counterparts a tendency to retain large numbers
of dependents, especially from the mid-eighteenth century onward, but
unlike the West-Central African entrepreneurs, they neither intended
nor hoped to retain all the captives that came into their possession;
instead, the Biafran entrepreneurs – particularly professional Aro and
117
coastal traders – had by the mid-eighteenth century often come make a

sharp distinction between captives they intended to keep and those they
intended to sell.
Notwithstanding the existence of specialist slave traders who sought
profit in every transaction, some people were destined for the overseas
market, not because of the proceeds that accrued from their sale, but
for the simple reason that their natal communities wanted to get rid of
them. Thus the trade complied with, not only economic and political
imperatives and choices, but also social, cultural, and ideological ones.
The slave question involved the pecuniary choice between selling peo-
ple for material proceeds or retaining them for labor purposes; the
juridical choice of imposing enslavement or another form of punish-
ment; the social and ideological choice of whom to sell and whom to
retain; and the cultural choice of which group or gender to incorporate
and which to sell. For better or for worse, some indigenous people had
the power to make these choices and exercised it over others, leaving
an imprint on the composition of the export captives. Slave traders,
who were often slave owners as well, mediated these transactions. Just
as Euro-American planters gave shopping lists of preferred captives to
slavers’ captains, slave owners and prospective slave owners in Biafra
had “mental models” of good and bad captives. Slavery’s special func-
tion of group expansion makes the Aro case especially provocative.
Local Aro literature and, particularly, the traditions acknowledge that
slavers had predetermined destinations for the victims. Equally impor-
tant, the circumstances of a captive’s enslavement figured prominently
in their choices of whom to retain and whom to send into Atlantic
slavery.
The circumstances of enslavement have thus far figured little into
discussions about the structure of the Atlantic slave trade, where any
attempts have been made at all to analyze these circumstances. The
scholarship has relied almost exclusively on export-captive samples for
evidence. The sample most often cited comprises Africans whom the
British Anti-Slavery Squadron rescued and resettled in Sierra Leone and
who were interviewed by the German-born missionary linguist Sigmund
Koelle of the CMS in the late 1840s or early 1850s. As analyzed by his-
torian Paul Hair, the overwhelming majority of captives in this sample
were enslaved through warfare or kidnapping1. The recently released col-
lection of Oldendorp’s diaries suggest that the dynamics had not changed
1
Hair (1965:196–97). The sample is from Koelle (1963).
Household and Market Persons 119
much since the second half of the eighteenth century (Oldendorp 2000).
Although scholars have relied heavily on the Kolle sample, as they will
likely now also rely on the Oldendorp data, both sources actually tell us
only about those captives who were exported to the Americas during the
respective periods; they do not necessarily offer great insights into the
general nature of slaving in Atlantic Africa. To rely on such data in assess-
ing the general character of slaving in Africa is to ignore the bias inherent
in them and to assume that hinterland slave users did not discriminate
between the people they retained and those they sold away. It is also
unclear how much can be extrapolated from the general Atlantic-African
information to explain the situation in the Bight of Biafra. We must there-
fore analyze these sources in conjunction with the pertinent ethnographic
evidence and historical evidence from the Bight of Biafra.
The nature and scope of Aro operations permit the use of evidence from
across the region to understand the means of enslavement. In outline, the
slave systems of the Aro and coastal city-states were similar, and both
differed from the systems found in most parts of the Biafra hinterland.
This distinction has been made clear in the Aro case, where slavery
emphasized incorporation based on acculturation and accumulation. “In
contrast, Igbo and Ibibio patrilineages and village heads continued to be
ascriptively filled and were respected not because of achieved position
but as the link between the villages and ancestral spirit” (K.O. Dike and
Ekejiuba 1990:209). Nonetheless, the rest of the Igbo and Ibibio groups
do not seem to have become significant holders of slaves until after the
suppression of the Atlantic slave trade in the nineteenth century.
Two further reasons justify the emphasis on the Aro and the coastal
states instead of other groups in the region. First, slavery existed among
the Aro in the heyday of the Atlantic slave trade. Second, the incorpora-
tive nature of these systems warranted the careful selection of household
persons (domestic slaves), which impinged on the composition of cap-
tives for export overseas. The preferences of indigenous slave users and
the way modes of enslavement influenced these preferences determined
the composition of slavery on both sides of the Atlantic and thus throw
light on slavery in both regions. As historian Herbert Klein has noted,
“since African slavery was quite dissimilar from the American chattel
plantation variety, its demands for slaves were quite distinct as well”
(H. Klein 1978:241).
It is appropriate to begin by distinguishing between the household and
market categories of captives. Understanding the meaning of the term
slave in its historical context clarifies our understanding of why people
wanted to keep enslaved persons in the household. In the postslavery era,

this approach also seeks the original meanings of approximate African
terms, which seem to have changed, at least in Igboland, from what they
were in the days of slavery. Such changes in meaning are common to
slavery, not only in Igboland but elsewhere. The metamorphosis of the
meaning of slavery in the Western world has influenced present-day con-
ceptions of slavery as well. In classical Latin, the word was servitus, but
because slaves came to be mainly slaves from the Caucasus, the reference
metamorphosed to sclavus, or “slave” in English beginning in the ninth
century. It was in plantation America during the seventeenth century that
the term “slave” came to refer to a person without rights.2 Because of the
differences between American plantation slavery and African slavery, on
the one hand, and differences between African slave systems on the other,
Igor Kopytoff and Suzanne Miers have recommended the use of local ver-
nacular terms in characterizing slavery in African societies (Kopytoff and
Miers 1977). In spite of the heuristic value of this idea, local terms might
serve either to obfuscate kinship idioms designed to whitewash slavery
or to convey a sense that the master class had more power over slaves
than the reality would suggest. In this manner, a local term might func-
tion as an ideological tool for controlling the slave population. The Igbo
term ohu usually equated with slave, referred to inferiority or inauthentic
status. It hardly referred to a person without rights. Yet, postslavery era
descendants of the master class have used ohu to mean a person without
rights when it has been politically advantageous to do so. How do we
find a term that captures a historical relationship?
Choosing a label is complicated, but it does provide an opportunity
to offer a much-needed corrective in the conception of ideology of slav-
ery in African studies. Anthropologist Jack Goody suggests a distinction
between “the label ‘slave’ (or its local equivalent) as a statement of ori-
gin and as a statement about present status. … We can best understand
the problem if we think of the double meaning that occurs in our use of
labels for nationality or classes; sometimes we refer to origin; sometimes
to present position, though less confusion arises when we know the con-
text” (Goody 1980:16). In Aro slavery, we have not just double, but triple,
meaning – acknowledgment of present reality, denial of present reality,
and essentialization of past reality. The term “slave” acknowledges reality
when the real slave is referred to as slave; it denies present reality when
the slave is glorified as kin; and essentializes past reality when one group
2
Curtin (1971a:81–82; 1990:29); Davidson (1971:61–62).
labels as slaves people of slave origin who are no longer slaves. Because
colonial reports tended to focus on the slave – versus-free differentiation,
modern scholars of slavery in Africa have tended to dismiss the contrary
indications that are found in the oral traditions as strands of apologist
ideology. Ironically, however, those who stress the prevalence of a more
rigid regimen claim that colonial reports whitewashed slavery and uti-
lized information that was collected when the institution was already in
decline. This view that the ideology of slavery promotes the kinship idiom
is one-sided; the ideology of slavery does more than simply give a benign
veneer to a harsh system, by, for example, attempting to essentialize slav-
ery where masters’ control over slaves was tenuous or where slavery had
effectively ended. When early ethnographers and modern scholars talk
about a “slave” owning a slave, they may actually be referring to a former
slave owning a slave. A broader view of ideology allows us to transcend
the mainstream ideology of slavery, which essentializes slavery with regard
to people who were no longer slaves. Contrary to the prevailing tendency
in African studies to see only the side of dominant ideology that expressed
the kinship idiom that was used to whitewash slavery, charter groups often
denied kinship and free status to previously enslaved groups, after they
had earned full citizenship status, or after the charter groups had lost their
ability to enforce the servile subordination of the ex-slaves. Rather than
simply deemphasizing the oppressive character of slavery, colonial reports
sometimes also ignored or understated “the degree of assimilation which
wealth or the kinship idiom could produce” (Northrup 1981:118–19).
The key parameters that figured in the consideration of who became a
household or a market person throw light on indigenous slavery and its
relationship with the overseas human traffic.
Household and Market Types

A “person of the household” meant more than simply a person of the
house or a house slave or domestic slave. The household was the unit
of production and the locus of exchange and trade. It incorporated the
nuclear family, the polygynous family, and other persons or families, who
could be slaves, refugees, long-term guests, or clients. Most importantly,
a person of the household did not need to live within the spatial confines
of the household. He or she could live in separate or outlying compounds
within the same community or away in noncontiguous settlements or
distant diaspora communities. A rite of passage marked the conversion
of an outsider – including a slave – into a person of the household. The
cornerstone of this ritual was an invocation for the multiplication of

household members. By contrast, market persons were treated like com-
modities or, otherwise, as something that must be dispensed with. In spite
of his more favorable placing, a person of the household could be killed
or, as more often happened, resold if he was lazy, rebellious, or committed
any malfeasance, according to accounts of nineteenth-century Aro and
coastal city-states (Uku 1993:19, Waddell 1970:318–21). Novelist Buchi
Emecheta’s lucid portrayal of early-twentieth-century Igbo slavery – that
the best chance for a person of the household was to be “docile and
trouble-free” – also reflected the nineteenth-century situation (Emecheta
1977:63). A household person that satisfied these conditions was not sold
merely because the price was right. It was in the interest of the master or
mistress to treat the household person humanely. Oppressed slaves often
ran to other masters, usually in rival communities, who were glad to have
them. This kind of situation routinely “produced winners and losers of
people” (Martina Ike 1996b). Rather than maximizing profits, the sale of
a household person served immediate needs – when it happened at all. As
will be clarified in the following pages of this chapter, the nature of these
transactions warranted that buyers understood both the circumstances
leading to a sale and the attributes of individual captives. These circum-
stances and attributes modulated an indigenous user’s choice to retain a
particular person or sell him into Atlantic slavery. Decisions about cap-
tives’ fates were often a function of established criteria, principally the
captives’ skills, region of origin, and means of enslavement.
Preferences 1: Skills
The incorporation of skilled outsiders was important in Aro society.
There is some evidence that the Aro began to do this during their for-
mation in the early seventeenth century. Other Igbo evidence shows the
continuing importance of craftsmen. Oral traditions inform us that the
upper Imo River Aro settlement Arondizuogu harbored skilled dissidents
from non-Aro societies and other skilled immigrants during the eigh-
teenth and nineteenth centuries.3 One of my Arondizuogu respondents,
in 1996, referred to such acquisitions and showed me some apparently
slave-produced archaic works of art, including a special war drum called
3
See Dike and Ekejiuba (1990:58; 73), C. Iroh (1991); O. Mgbemena (1991); Okorie
(1991); O. Udensi (1991); T.O. Okereke (1996); J.E. Uche (1996) for the Aro, and Equiano
(1995:42–43) and Uchendu (1977:123) for Igboland.
Ikperikpe and some religious icons dating to about the mid-nineteenth

century (Igwilo 1996a, 1996b). Another source of information indicating
the deliberate retention of skilled captives comes from the home of the
nineteenth-century Arochukwu merchant-warrior Okoroji, which has
been a Nigerian national monument since 1972. The custodian of this
structure, Emmanuel Okoroji, a descendant of the merchant warrior and
Eze-Ogo (king) of the Ujari lineage-group in Arochukwu told me in 1996
that one of the platforms in the building was used for questioning new
captives about their occupation (Okoroji 1996). If, for instance, a cap-
tive was a skilled or talented hunter, he was retained and given a gun and
shown a gaming domain. The animal skulls contributed by the enslaved
hunters hung from the building’s ceiling in neat symmetries, according to
animal species. This finding parallels an account from Dahomey wherein,
as in the Aro case, the direct evidence comes from the nineteenth cen-
tury, but family genealogies suggest that the phenomenon of slave dealers
retaining captives who were highly skilled in craft or specially talented
in artistic performance goes back further – to the heyday of the Atlantic
slave trade. The families concerned retained their skills and peculiar dance
forms into the twentieth century (see Adandé 1997). Given the tendency
of the African slave-owning elites to retain skilled artisans and talented
artists, it is plausible that a greater proportion of these categories of cap-
tives were retained than were exported, at least in the bight of Biafra and
Dahomey.
Preferences 2: Regional
Region played no less a role than skills in determining the fate of a
captive. Based on positive stereotypes, indigenous slave holders pre-
ferred captives from certain sections of the region to others. Again, the
evidence of this is clearest among the Aro. For reasons explicated in
Chapter 4, the Aro had an ongoing interest in cultivating persons from
the Nri-Awka region. This means that even when every other factor
that could determine the fate of a captive was taken into consider-
ation, a captive from outside the Nri-Awka region was more likely to
end in the market than an Nri-Awka counterpart. Aro preference for
Nri-Awka people went beyond captives. In fact, the Aro, especially the
diaspora in central Igboland, incorporated huge numbers of Nri-Awka
people as refugees and voluntary immigrant[s], and seldom incorporated
non-Nri-Awka for these purposes. This process gained momentum in
the mid-eighteenth century, following the foundation of the major
Aro settlements in central Igboland at the southeastern edge of the

Nri-Awka region.
An analysis of the regional patterns of the Aro incorporation of
outsiders and the sub-ethnic composition of the captives exported to the
Americas indicate that Aro preferences affected the composition of cap-
tives exported from the Bight of Biafra. Such an indication emerges from
a detailed study of the sub-ethnic composition of the Aro diaspora within
the Bight of Biafra. The Aro preference for Nri-Awka seems to have been
established early in the history of the Aro diaspora settlements of central
Igboland. Of the three principal dependents of Izuogu, the founder of
Arondizuogu, only one, Iheme, came from the Nri-Awka region. By con-
trast, the Nri-Awka group provided the progenitors of virtually all the
later lineage-groups formed from about 1770 onward – seven out of nine,
or 78 percent (Table 4.2). Even when incorporated groups did not origi-
nate in the Nri-Awka area, they followed the tradition of acquiring peo-
ple from Nri-Awka region as slaves, clients, wives, and guest immigrants.
This was also true of other Aro settlements in the vicinity of the Nri-
Awka region, whether their founders were originally Aro or non-Aro. It is
therefore not accurate to suggest, as has been done recently, that the Aro
took care to incorporate slaves from faraway areas rather than areas in
close proximity.4 While it was essential to enslave deportees, such as dis-
sidents, other “trouble makers,” and kidnaping victims, in communities
far from their natal homes, the Aro did not draw most of the people they
enslaved from faraway. The Aro settlements in the Igbo heartland drew
an overwhelming majority of their slaves from a 70-kilometer perimeter
to their west and northwest. People from this region, even when they
were slaves, maintained kinship ties with the people they had left behind
in their natal homes. In fact, men of slave origin often obtained spouses
from the communities in which they themselves originated.5 Although it
has become an orthodoxy in African slave studies, the idea that slaves
were of necessity procured from far away ultimately derives from obser-
vations of slave systems elsewhere. Thus, the Aro pattern controverts the
widespread view that kinlessness was a necessary condition for slavery.6
It appears that from the mid-eighteenth century onward, the sub-ethnic
composition of the outsiders incorporated into Aro society differed from
4
For the suggestion that the Aro deliberately incorporated people from far away places, see
Dike and Ekejiuba (1990:74).
5
Igwegbe (1962:12); Dike and Ekejiuba (1990:206); Kanu-Igbo (1996).
6
The most forceful idea statement about kinlessness as a necessary condition of slavery is
perhaps in Moses Finley (1968:308–09).
the composition of the captives the Bight of Biafra sent to the Americas.
While captives from the Nri-Awka region dominated the enslaved
Igbo population in the Americas up to the early eighteenth century
(Chapter 3), their numbers had declined substantially by the nineteenth
century. The sub-ethnic breakdown of the Sierra Leone sample makes
this point. The sample is small, but, significantly, none of the five Igbo
respondents comes from the Nri-Awka region, and only one of the fifteen
Igbo “countries” represented in Sierra Leone, “Mudioka” (Umudioka),
falls in within the Nri-Awka area (the present Anambra State), a region
of sixty odd claus or towns.7 Even then, it is equally possible that this
was another Umudioka, the one located outside of the Nri-Awka area,
near Orlu. Most of the Sierra Leone Igbo respondents have been traced
to Isuama in south-central Igboland (including the Orlu area) and Agbaja
in present Enugu State in northern Igboland.8 Although we have little
information about the sub-ethnic composition of Igbo captives sent to
the Americas during the second half of the eighteenth century, the mas-
sive Aro incorporation of Nri-Awka people suggests that it was likely
to have been closer to the nineteenth-century pattern in which captives
from the Nri-Awka region accounted for a relatively small proportion
of those exported. While this dimension of the geography of regional
slaving calls out for further research, it is reasonable to hypothesize that
Aro expansion and the concomitant rise of the Biafra Atlantic slave trade
corresponded with increasing proportions of southern Igbo people and
declining proportions of Nri-Awka people arriving the Americas from the
mid-eighteenth century onward.
Other Preferences
Social and religious taboos also affected preferences. Individuals catego-
rized as abnormal were likely exported overseas, as long as their abnor-
malities would not discourage Euro-American buyers. As many of those
who were deemed abnormal in the Bight of Biafra would have passed
Euro-American standards of normality when measured principally in labor
worth and potential, the presence of the Aro in the region made it easier
7
This evidence is from Koelle (1963:8).
8
Northrup 1978b:62; Oriji 1981:318. Among these subgroups, Isuama is the reference
least used in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries was the most populous and it was
actually a cluster of several major Igbo subgroups, such as Mba-Ano, Mbanasaa, Mbaise,
Orlu area (including Nkwere) and the Owerri area. It is home to virtually all the autoch-
tonous Igbo communities. For an outline of Isuama’s boundaries, see Ojiaku (2008:5).
for the other communities to dispose of certain categories of individuals

who would otherwise have been killed or consigned to the “bad bush.”
“Before the arrival of the Aro[,] people who committed ‘abomination’, eg,
possessed 6 fingers, were twins, girls who menstruated prematurely, chil-
dren with extra teeth or [who] cut the upper teeth first were thrown into
the bad bush. With the Aro, they became merchandize.”9 Although the
Aro adopted many individuals who fell into these categories, they would
have shipped the vast majority of them to the Americas. It is unlikely that
Aro communities could have absorbed the large numbers of people who
had been routinely consigned to a state of abnormality by the societies of
the region. Even physically deformed captives sometimes found their way
to slave ships. Of the 67,000 captives freed from Americas-bound vessels
intercepted by the British navy between 1819 and 1850, thirty-one were
identified as physically disabled. Unfortunately, we cannot draw major
conclusions from this small number, but it is notable that captives leaving
Bight of Biafra ports accounted for as many as twenty-two of the thirty-
one captives with disabilities, or 71 percent.
Means of Slaving 1: War and Kidnapping

Without question, therefore, warfare was an important source of cap-
tives everywhere. Warfare and other kinds of violence occurred with such
a high during the slave trade era that they are said to have permanently
changed the political sociology of Africa (Ekeh 1990). Euro-American
slavers on the Biafra coast in the eighteenth century routinely told war
stories. Between 1788 and 1790, a few slave traders admitted the impor-
tance of wars in generating captives when questioned by a British par-
liamentary committee that was investigating the slave trade. The most
graphic account from Biafra comes from one Isaac Parker. A ship’s mate,
Parker had in 1765 deserted his cruel captain at Old Calabar, where he
lived for five months with a local chieftain, Dick Ebro of New Town.
Parker testified in 1790 that Dick Ebro organized routine captive raids
on unsuspecting communities, in which Parker had participated (Parker
1790:126–27). Wars remained an important source of captives until the
end of the overseas slave trade in the mid-nineteenth century, according
to the accounts of contemporary British visitors and African missionaries
(Laird and Oldfield 1837:106; Crowther and Taylor 1859). As will be
9
Meek (1937:31, 224–25); Goodlife (1952:6); Onyiukah (1983:27). “Bad bush” refers to
the sacred forest, which was never cut and into which repugnant items were thrown.
shown in Chapter 7, the Aro themselves fought wars in many parts of

the region up to the end of the nineteenth century, as opposed to simply
relying on the Cross River Igbo warrior groups, contrary to what schol-
ars have thought until the present study (see especially K.O. Dike and
Ekejiuba 1990:161–95).
But a comparison of the Bight of Biafra with other regions shows
that wars had differential impact on the composition of captives. In
the Gold and Slave Coasts, where the evolution of professional armies
has been analyzed, states also employed raiders by the seventeenth cen-
tury. William Bosman reported that “Prisoners and Ornaments of Gold”
formed the booty there. By the eighteenth century, captives became the
region’s principal export. Although wars did not always primarily aim to
capture people, captives taken in war accounted for the single largest cat-
egory of the captives sold into the Atlantic market. These captives would
have been mostly combatants in regions that supplied mostly females and
children to the Saharan and domestic markets. The same was true for the
Upper Guinea Coast and eighteenth-century West Central Africa.10 War
captives were always likely to be exported, and even militarized states
tended to send prisoners of war into the external slave trade.
For its part, kidnapping was so widespread and obvious that slave-
ship surgeon Alexander Falconbridge thought, in 1788, that most captives
from Africa entered the slave trade in this way (Falconbridge 1788:13).
Kidnapping was common enough; Igbo victims in Sierra Leone and at
least two New World locations recorded their ordeals (Equiano 1995;
Monteith 1966). The manner in which they were harried to the coast
is akin to real life stories from oral traditions (e.g., E. Okoli 1996). The
Igbo association of kidnapping with panyaring, a term used by European
slave traders in the Bight of Biafra to describe seizure of person, often
to recoup debts from their Biafra suppliers, points to the close relation
between kidnapping and the Atlantic slave trade slave suppliers. Up to
today, the word panya in Igbo folklore refers to forceful removal to the
unknown.11
The pervasiveness of kidnapping evinces pressured social relations
at the interpersonal and intergroup levels and highlights some of the
contradictions of slave-trade-era Africa. Generally, reaction to kidnap-
ping varied with the victim’s relationship to the society. As among the
10
Bosman (1705:182). For the Gold Coast, see Reynolds (1974:9–15); Kea (1982: ch. 4).
For the Slave Coast, see Law (1992:103–26); and for Upper Guinea Coast, Thornton
(1983:42, 45).
11
For descriptions of panyaring, see Blake (1861:112); G. Williams (1897:584).
Diola of Senegambia, the people of the Bight of Biafra vehemently disap-

proved of the practice if the victim was an insider – usually conceived as
a resident of a village or member of a lineage-group, or a person from
another village or lineage-group closely related to them by blood, mar-
riage, or occasionally, by historical friendships or alliances.12 Among the
Aro, the culprit (kidnapper) was either killed or sold away. The pun-
ishment was invariably more severe if the victim was an amadi. If at
all, only extremely powerful persons might conceivably get away with
kidnapping. The King of Old Calabar “was a partner with the man-
stealers of other countries, while punishing a manstealer with death in
his own [country].” In the Bight of Biafra, as in the Diola case, people
from other communities – in other words, outsiders – were often fair
game.13 In the Bight of Biafra, protagonists in internecine conflicts often
sought to reduce the populations of rival units by kidnapping and sell-
ing off the members of those groups to the Aro (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba
1990:248). Evidently conceptions of insider and outsider statuses pro-
moted kidnapping.
The salience of warfare and kidnapping is further highlighted by the
Oldendorp and Koelle data, but of which show the two processes as the
dominant sources of enslavement. As broken down by Hair, the Koelle
sample shows war captives to be the largest group making up 34 percent
of all the exslaves Koelle interviewed, and captives who had been kid-
napped came in a close second at 30 percent. Oldendorp found from the
enslaved Africans in the Caribbean and North America, about whose
mode of enslavement he gathered information in the second half of the
eighteenth century, that the kidnapped victims were the largest single
group among the African captives sent to the Americas, followed by
war captives: “One can see from their own testimony that the slaves
were for the most part guiltless and without issue taken by slave chasers
and high[way] robbers, captured and sold to the European. Following
these stolen people were those taken in war, as the majority of wars are
actually just invasions for the simple purpose of capturing people …
Then come those who were either given as debt or were given as pawn
12
For what it worth, Equiano recalled a case in which a man was arraigned for kidnap-
ping a boy. “[A]lthough he was the son of a chief or senator, he was condemned to make
recompense by a … slave.” Equiano (1995:35).
13
See also Anyakoha (1996); J.O. Dike (1996); Kanu-Igbo (1996b); M.S. Igwe (1996);
Igwilo (1996a); Maduadichie (1996); Muotoh (1996); E. Nwankwo (1996); E. Okoro
(1996); J.G. Okoro (1996). For the Old Calabar case, see Waddell (1970:429). See Baum
(1999:114–17) for the Diola case.
at some point but were never redeemed” (Oldendorp 2000: ms. 489).
Oldendorp also reported that the enslavement of people in lieu of the
death penalty was rare. Both the Oldendorp and the Koelle data show
war and kidnapping to be the two most important sources of the cap-
tives they interviewed. But Oldendorp and Koelle differ on the relative
importance of the two modes of enslavement, with Oldendorp assigning
greater importance to kidnapping.
Can we then infer that kidnapping was the most important single
source of enslavement among Atlantic-bound captives in the late eigh-
teenth century, and wars the most important in the early nineteenth?
This is quite possible. It could also mean that the greater importance of
warfare in producing captives during the nineteenth century reflected
the increased incidence of warfare during that century. If we factor in
the greater exponential potential of incidents of war because of the rela-
tively large numbers of captives usually involved, however, war captives
may account for a greater share of the sample than the nominal figures
suggest.
On the average, an incident of war or raiding was likely to yield more
captives than an incident of kidnapping. On the one hand, Oldendorp
referred to thirteen people who became captives in only twelve incidents
of kidnapping. On the other, he referred to twenty-four who became
captives in only fifteen incidents of war or raiding. Apart from this
twenty-four captives, in five of the war/raiding incidents he described,
Oldendorp makes references to unspecified numbers of “children,” as well
as “many,” “many others,” “several others,” and “a number of others”
captives, respectively, were also being taken. Oldendorp’s interpreta-
tions of some incidents may differ from those of this writer. He notes, for
example, the overlap between invasions and “slave chasers’ robberies”
and that they differed “only in regard to their method of catching people”
(Oldendorp 2000: ms. 489). His conclusion was clearly informed more
by his own ethnographic observations than the actual data he presented.
This exponential factor and the lack of information about the destina-
tions of the “many other” captives suggest that wars and raiding may
have yielded more captives than can be derived from the information col-
lected from individual captives in the Americas. The exponential factor
also certainly underlines the importance of warfare as source of captives
during the eighteenth century.
It would be a stretch to read too much from the few specific descrip-
tions Oldendorp and Koelle give about captives from the Bight of
Biafra, but the picture that emerges bucked the general African trends
suggested by the data. Oldendorp’s specific descriptions of captives

from the Bight of Biafra seem to show a lower incidence of enslavement
by warfare and kidnapping and a higher incidence of enslavement by
indebtedness than appear to have been the African norm. For their part,
Koelle’s specific descriptions of ex-slaves from the Bight of Biafra reveal
a higher incidence of enslavement by kidnapping and a lower incidence
of enslavement by warfare than was the norm. Indeed, a face-value
reading of this sample and of the experiences of certain individuals
sent to New World slavery have led to an emphasis on kidnapping in
explaining modes of enslavement in the Biafra hinterland. Yet, the data
do not account for the individuals who were retained as slaves within
the region.
To be useful in understanding enslavement as a whole, including the
enslavement of those enslaved internally within the region, the export
samples need to be “unpacked.” The difference between Atlantic-
bound captives and those retained in the region is crucial to this study.
Indigenous slave users discriminated between whom they kept and
whom they sold to Atlantic slavery. Accordingly, reliable conclusions
on the general character of enslavement must incorporate the charac-
ter of both export captives and of internal slavery. The composition
of captives and means of enslavement were related. One respondent
of Oldendorp from the coastal city state of Kalabari (New Calabar)
told him that prisoners of war were sold, “who are then passed from
one master to another in such a way that one of them might have half
a hundred masters before being sold to the Europeans on the coast”
(Oldendorp 1987: 167). That these captives passed through 50 masters
being sold is most likely an exaggeration, but this testimony does suggest
not simply that most captives were enslaved through warfare – which
is how historians have interpreted the samples drawn from America-
bound captives – but that the vast majority of war captives invariably
ended in the Atlantic trade among the Kalabari. The limitations of the
Oldendorp and Koelle sources include also the fact that they derived
their data virtually exclusively from males. There is no reason to think
that Oldendorp interviewed women, and only two of the 177 excap-
tives in Koelle’s data were women.
Quite apart of the differential impact of warfare and kidnapping by
regionn, the importance of both in slaving can be overemphasized. First,
as historian John Thornton has reminded us, slave-trade-era African
warfare is not reducible to slave capture or disputes directly related to
the slave trade; Africans fought wars for myriad other reasons. Second,
the role of warfare varied from region to region.14 The Aro relied heavily
on Cross River Igbo warrior groups to fight Aro wars, which were often
reprisals against communities that had offended the Aro or resisted their
trading overtures. Headhunting rather than slave-catching was the pri-
mary motivation of the warriors, and so warfare was not a major source
of captives in the Bight of Biafra, although captives inevitably were
taken.15 In contrast to the Western Sudan, where warfare as a means
of procuring captives was institutionalized, cutting human heads was
an avenue for attaining full citizenship status and prestige within the
warrior communities throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centu-
ries. The killing of war prisoners by the militarist states of Senegambia
became widespread only following the decline of the Atlantic slave trade
and as a security measure because they could no longer dispose of cap-
tives at Atlantic markets (Klein 1983:72; Meillassoux 1982:89, 90).
As common as kidnapping was during the slave trade era, however,
it was, like warfare, less important for enslavement as a whole than the
export samples suggest. The exclusive reliance on these samples in trans-
atlantic scholarship tends to exaggerate the importance of kidnapping,
but most regional specialists working with other evidence deemphasize
it, which suggests that the means of enslavement were highly varied.16
Kidnappers knew that they were often breaking the law and that the
punishment for this was often harsh; they often had to carry their victims
far away from the place of capture to prevent them from escaping and to
avoid discovery. Kidnapping was a risky venture – riskier if the intended
victim was a man, who was more likely to escape and expose the kidnap-
per’s identity if known. An attempt to kidnap a man could result in the
kidnapper himself being seized and sold. Children were easier to capture,
subdue, confine, or to trick than adults. Logically, a lot of kidnapping
efforts targeted children.17 But one can deemphasize warfare and kid-
napping without necessarily denying that “any of these sources was. …
14
For accounts showing that sale into Atlantic slavery was deemed extreme punishment,
see Lovejoy (1983:56, 61, 68–78); Curtin (1990:37–38, 119); Thornton (1992:99, 110).
15
This conclusion has been anticipated by K.O. Dike (1956:40); Northrup (1978b:65–69);
Afigbo (1981a, 1981b).
16
K.O. Dike (1956:40); Afigbo (1980:86; 1981a:21; 1981b:267); Ijoma (1986a); Dike and
Ekejiuba (1990).
17
In the late eighteenth century, Aniaso, or Archibald Monteith, was tricked by a young
prospective suitor of his sister, who asked the unsuspecting ten-year-old boy to accompany
him to the market, where Aniaso was sold into slavery (Monteith [1853] 1966: 30–31).
Equiano also claims that kidnappers were themselves sold into slavery when caught
(Equiano 1995:38).
disruptive to society,” contrary to what one source has suggested.18 The

activities of Cross River Igbo warriors were disruptive enough, but they
produced fewer captives than did warfare in which securing human heads
was not the primary purpose of fighting. The capacity for disruptiveness
and the capacity for generating captives are two different issues. It is
equally important to note that even enslavers had an interest in law and
order as well, no matter how imperfect and self-serving such interest may
have been. The means by which a person became a captive was some-
times more important than his or her market value in determining where
that person was sold.19
Means of Slaving 2: The Politics of Law and Order

The interaction of politics, economic practices, and legal and belief sys-
tems in African societies suggests that ideas of law and order would
have been central in enslavement. Sale into Atlantic slavery was widely
deemed an extreme form of punishment in Atlantic Africa, and so was –
at least in theory – reserved for those who committed serious offenses or
who challenged the existing political and social order.20 Captain William
Snelgrave’s observation that “the Negroes … dread foreign slavery
above all things” sums it up. This dread was particularly acute in Biafra
(Snelgrave 1730:506). The zeal and determination with which captives
from the Bight of Biafra revolted and, especially, escaped captivity even
by taking their own lives, often confounded their Euro-American cap-
tors. Asked pointedly by a British parliamentary committee in January
1790 whether captives from Calabar and Bonny “shew reluctance at
being carried off the coast,” Captain James Fraser, who had twenty years
experience in the slave trade and had since 1772 been commanding
ships to Biafra and Angola answered: “They shew more reluctance than
the Angolan slaves. They are too often of the opinion that the White
men intend to eat them” (Fraser 1790:34, 38). This is consistent with
what Alexander Falconbridge, as a slaver’s surgeon who made several
trips to the African coast in the same period, reported (Falconbridge
18
For such a suggestion, see Noah (1980:74–75).
19
It nevertheless is unlikely that kidnapping was the predominant means of enslavement
in the region as some scholars have maintained. See Isichei (1976:45–47); Northrup
(1978b:77–80); Oriji (1987:161–63); Geggus (1989:40). For examples of kidnapping see
Equiano (1995); Monteith (1853:29–52).
20
Davidson (1971:65); Miller (1988:116, 128); Thornton (1991); Lovejoy (1994a); Bay
(1997).
1788:30–32). At Old Calabar, captives dreaded being “sold over the

great waters, or eaten at sea” (Waddell 1970:321). Until the 1840s, the
Igbo still widely believed that the captives sold to the New World “were
killed and eaten, and that their bodies were used to make red cloth”
(Niger Expedition 1842:56). Equiano’s mid-eighteenth century expe-
rience tallies with these assessments. Because “there was much dread
and trembling … and bitter cries” among Equiano and his fellow Biafra
captives when they arrived in Barbados in 1756, the planters got expe-
rienced slaves to assure the newly arrived that they would not appear
on the menu (Equiano 1995:57). If indeed Equiano did not witness this
experience firsthand, as has been recently suggested, his account does at
least indicate that this assessment was spreadwide among contemporary
mariners. The members of the 1841 Niger Expedition made sure to
inform King Osai of Abo in August 1841 that “wicked white men come
and buy slaves; not to eat them as your people believe, but to work them
harder than they can bear, by flogging and ill-using them” (Allen and
Thomson 1848a:221).
Extreme fear of the Atlantic world, coupled with indigenous religious
ideas, would likely have played a part in the well-known suicidal tenden-
cies of New World–based enslaved Igbo. Igbo belief in transmigration
was deep (Equiano 1995:41). Oldendorp writes that belief in the migra-
tion of souls and reincarnation by the Kalabari and “several other black
nations,” which would no doubt have included the Igbo, caused many a
suicide in the West Indies on the part of enslaved Africans, who imagined
resurrecting in their homelands (Oldendorp 1987: 199). William Baikie,
who commanded the British Niger Expedition of 1854, reports from Abo
that Igbo people believed “that after death, those who have been good
on earth may either go to Orisa and abide with him, or they may, if they
like, visit any country on earth; and so slaves often, when dying, say they
will go and revisit their land; if, on the other hand a wicked man dies, it
is understood that he is driven to O’komo.”21 Given that it was deemed a
taboo in contemporary Igboland, this interpretation might well provide a
clue on the appeal of suicide among the enslaved Igbo.
The idea that captives were to be eaten in the Americas probably took
root in the early years of the slave trade when individuals who would
normally have been put to death – because of still-limited use for them
in the domestic economy – made up higher proportions of overseas-
bound captives than they did in later years. The development of the
21
Baikie (1856:312). Oku muo refers to hell.
slave trade into a well-established business and the corruption of African

institutions for the sake of that traffic cheapened the standards of justice
and decreased the proportion of hardcore criminals and other locally
unwanted elements among captives sent to the Americas. While these
captives continued to be routinely sent to the Americas, nonoffenders
and individuals guilty of simple malfeasance came to preponderate. In
spite of this change, early images of the Atlantic slave trade as the lot of
dispensable elements died hard.
The Aro equated sale to the Atlantic market with being used for
human sacrifice (see J.G. Okoro 1996). To “take away” (mmevu) was
the idiom for sale into Atlantic slavery, invoked primarily in questions
of intra-Aro social control.22 One respondent captured this practice in a
popular saying meant for the purpose: Onye umunna ya si na o ye-eje,
o ye-eje (N.A. Anyakoha 1996). This statement literally translates as “he
whose kinsmen have decided would embark on a journey must travel,”
meaning that if a person’s kinsmen decided to sell a person, that person
must be sold. But in the Bight of Biafra the practice of punishing people
by selling them was not restricted to the Aro; it was widespread indeed.
The Aro are, however, of interest, not simply because they sold off their
own undesirables as well, but also because they mediated such transac-
tions in the hinterland. Colonial anthropologists of the early twentieth
century viewed the Aro as having performed the function of removing
convicted persons.
Persistent troublemakers were not tolerated. The simple village code only permit-
ted execution of thieves and witches: other minor offences were punished by the
enforced payment of a fine or compensation to the victim. But if these penalties
proved insufficient to control the more intransigent characters the ultimate pun-
ishment was to be sold into slavery, and the Aro “missionaries” waxed fat on
these sales, whereby the villagers effectually disposed of their incorrigibles and
the slave dealers profited by the transaction.23
Respondents from different parts of Igboland and Ibibioland attest to

the practice of selling away “evil doers,” “trouble makers,” adulterers,
criminals, or “stubborn children.”24 Among Koelle’s Sierra Leone–based
22
N.A. Anyakoha (1996); J.O. Dike (1996); Echemazi (1996); Kanu-Igbo (1996);
Nwaokoye (1996); Ufere (1996).
23
This quotation is from J.G.C. Allen (n.d.:149), but also see Grier (1922:35).
24
E. Akpan (1972); L.U. Akpan (1972); Ebu (1972); J. Inokun (1972); S. Isangedighi, et al.
(1973); U.U. Obong (1972); I.A. Odung (1972); A. Okori (1972); Russell (1972); J. Udo
(1972); Udonyah (1972); D.K. Eshiet (1973); Ibok (1973); Wamuo (1973).
respondents was one Okon (or John Thomas, as they called him in
Sierra Leone) from the Igbo warrior community of Ohafia, northwest of
Arochukwu, who was sold at Bonny for adultery in about 1820. He was
married to two women and had a ten-year-old child (Koelle 1963:8).25
Apparently, whether adultery was deemed a criminal or a lesser offense
depended on the status and gender of the perpetrator. It was unlikely that
a wealthy man or some other member of the elite would be sold as pun-
ishment for committing adultery with the wife of a dependent or some
other low-status woman. On the contrary, selling away was usually the
fate of a man who committed adultery with the wife of a man of superior
standing.
The judicial role of the Aro oracle, Ibiniukpabi, reinforced the Aro
role as disposers of people who had been incriminated in their communi-
ties. As agents of the oracle, the Aro paraded themselves as harbingers
of “peace” and “truth” who mediated disputes and disposed of “bad”
people, even though their main interest was in the human traffic. Baikie
recorded in 1854 that one unidentified informant had alone located up to
twenty Ibiniukpabi victims in Cuba. Another informant had bumped into
several in Sierra Leone (Baikie 1856:313). The role of the oracle in pro-
curing captives seems to have been unique in the Biafra case, but while
earlier studies portrayed the oracle as the major direct source of captives,
recent studies have correctly deemphasized it.26 The oracle neverthe-
less played an important role in dealing with dissidence and criminality.
Faced with the choice between owning up to a crime and being sent to
25
Although Koelle mentioned “Mbofia” instead of “Ohafia,” there can be little doubt that
he meant Ohafia. His location of Mbofia south of Ebiriba (Abiriba) is imprecise (Ohafia
is located east of Abiriba, not south), but it is as close as a description can be without
reference to maps. Even then, he correctly locates Ohafia east of Bende and roughly
north of Otutu (Ututu). The fact that Okon spoke a language “similar to that of Aro”
suggests Koelle meant to reference to Ohafia. The term “Mbofia” does not specific to any
particular locale or community. It is a generic reference – meaning “bush country” – to
the uncouth, badly behaved. The pronunciation of the term varied in dialectical areas.
The variant “Mbofia” was used by the Cross River Igbo, exclusive of Arochukwu, and by
northern Igbo, most of the Nri-Awka area, and the Niger riverine and west Niger com-
munities. The Isuama area and southern Igboland pronounced it “Mbohia.” The Aro and
the Awka pronounced it “Mbovia.” From all indications, however, the Aro do not refer as
such to Ohafia, who were one of the most reliable allies of the Aro. Mbohia, as recorded
by Baikie during 1854, lay “north or north–northwest of O’zuzu,” which in turn lay
northwest of Ngwa, close to Ogoni (Baikie 1856:309). Ozuzu was located northwest of
Ngwa (p. 308); it would not have been close to Ogoni, which lies southeast of Ngwa,
beyond the Ikwerre. “Ozuzu” is a term Koelle used to refer to yet another Igbo group in
Sierra Leone. It is actually a community, west of Ngwa.
26
Afigbo (1980:86; 1981b:267); Ijoma (1986a); Dike and Ekejiuba (1990).
be “eaten” overseas or denying and, therefore, risking being “eaten” by

the oracle, the mental state of an accused or guilty person must have
been one of extreme fear and anxiety. In spite of the profit that ultimately
accrued to the Aro, the initial sale by the non-Aro to the Aro of captives
in this category was not always the result of pecuniary considerations on
the part of the sellers. In Ibibio communities, the handling of proceeds
from such sales ranged from burial under a plantain tree (and, therefore,
not used) to deposit in a common fund (see Ebu 1972; J. Inokun 1972;
Udonyah 1972). In some Igbo communities, “those people who were not
wanted, such as trouble makers, would be handed over to the Aro free of
charge” (Mefo and Ibe 1972).
There was a thin line between criminality and dissidence. Both
offenses often concerned men of prime age and resulted in their sale into
the Atlantic market, but the procedures for adjudicating the offenses dif-
fered. Once an individual had been identified as a dissident, people who
had been deemed competent to take such summary measures sold him
immediately. In the case of a loser in a political contest, the victorious
party did the selling. Such an action did not require elaborate consulta-
tions or ceremonies (see, e.g., Igwilo 1996a). “The Aro buyer came as
a casual visitor to the house of the seller and both of them began to
negotiate for the Aro’s walking stick as if it was the article to be sold.
When the price was settled, the person to be sold was called in and sud-
denly grabbed” (O. Okoroafor 1972). Similar tricks were employed in the
open market (Igwilo 1996a; Okoli 1996). The procedure for adjudicating
criminal cases was different. But while dissidents were sold summarily,
persons convicted of a crime would first go through some form of legal
procedure before competent authorities. Criminality included not only
the commission of theft and murder but also witchcraft and adultery
(see Akpabio 1936:47). Enforcement of criminal sanction was not always
fair, especially when a suspect was an outsider. For instance, on August
9, 1786, the Old Calabar chiefs put on board a slaver one “gentleman”
from neighboring Bakasi on the apparently baseless suspicion that he
had killed their ruler, Duke Ephraim, presumably by witchcraft (Duke
1956:47, 98). In this case, the procedure for punishment for alleged crim-
inality was the same as with dissidence.
Summary sale into the Atlantic market was also common in cases
where a master no longer wanted a slave. Many of these resales had
been enslaved internally at a more amenable age. Having been rejected,
these captives had little chance of being retained in the region dur-
ing the Atlantic slave trade era. It is evident from the diary entries of
the prominent late-eighteenth-century Old Calabar merchant, Antera

Duke, that one slave, named Toother, was earmarked for exporta-
tion. Toother was put on the Liverpool ship Gascoyne, captained by
Peter Comberbach, that sailed from Old Calabar to Dominica on
February 8, 1786.27 Resale appears to be the most common punish-
ment for slaves, at least among the Aro. In about 1805, an Igbo boy,
Adibe (or George Rose, as he later became known in Sierra Leone)
was kidnapped and sold. He lived with an Arochukwu master and
spoke the Arochukwu dialect, but in 1826 his master sold him into
Atlantic slavery. The British navy intercepted the Portuguese ship that
was carrying him to the New World. Freed from captivity, Adibe told
his story to Koelle in Sierra Leone.28 There must have been strong
reasons for his master to resell him specifically to the Portuguese at
Bonny, as opposed to selling him to other Aro traders or to Bonny
middlemen.
The practice of reselling insubordinate slaves to the Atlantic extended
far into the hinterland. The story of a slave called Macaulay is similar
to Adibe’s. Macaulay had been born in Mamagi (Nufi) just south of the
Niger-Benue confluence where, as a boy, he was “stolen by the Filatahs.”
His kidnappers sold him to a Muslim mallam at Egga, who sold him
again to a Buddu woman. At some point, the woman’s husband insisted
that Macaulay be sold off. As in Adibe’s case, there would have been
compelling reasons for Macauly’s mistress’ husband to insist on the sale
of Macauly. She sold him to the king of Abo, who soon resold him to
King Pepple of Bonny, who in turn sold him to Spanish slavers, from
whom he was rescued after the British captured their Americas-bound
vessel (Allen and Thomson 1848b:118). In Bonny, recalcitrant slaves –
who could include the likes of Toother, Adibe, and Macauly – were sold
into New World slavery, even if they were hardworking (Hargreaves
1987:101, 108). This practice was indeed widespread within the Bight
of Biafra.
Historian Walter Rodney’s depiction of legal and religious power as
the “greatest weapon in the hands of the African ruling class” underscores
27
Duke (1956:43, 75, 94). Duke’s diary has the ship as Combesboch, but a search of
the DuBois Database strongly suggests that this is the Gascoyne, captained by Peter
Comberbach. No ship in the database is named Combesboch. The spelling discrepancy
between Comberbach and Combesboh is probably a mistaken reading of Duke’s diary,
which was originally handwritten by those who prepared the manuscript for printing.
28
Koelle (1963:8). Most of my Aro respondents, at least, implied that resale was
common.
the importance of the judicial process in generating captives (Rodney

1967:10). Eighteenth-century European observers reported that a con-
viction on trumped-up charges led to the sale of many captives. This
pattern, apparent in many other parts of Africa, also held in the Bight
of Biafra (see e.g., Blake 1861:113, 114–15, 118). If the Atlantic slave
trade served African rulers as an avenue for punishing offenders, it also
served as a way of getting rid of political enemies at little or no cost
(Curtin 1990:119, 120; 1993:177). In the Bight of Biafra, many vic-
tims of the slave trade were known dissidents in their communities.
The practice of sending dissidents into the Atlantic slave trade was dis-
tinct in the Bight of Biafra, according to two Liverpool ship’s masters,
Captains John Adams and Hugh Crow, both of whom specialized in the
Biafra trade in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. They
both identify a group of high-born Igbo whose members were regularly
sent into the overseas traffic, despite their tendency to revolt and to
incite revolt, and the ships’ masters’ aversion to taking them aboard.29
This category of captives were the victims of what has been described
as the Aro power of “removing any one opposing or ‘even desirous of
opposing’ [Aro] authority” (Steel 1908:7). The summary nature of deal-
ing with dissidence suggests that political deportees would have made
up large number of the captives exported to the Americas from the
Bight of Biafra.
Common people may have feared that deportation to the Americas
put them into the hands of voracious cannibals, but merchants and other
prominent individuals who regularly sent people into Atlantic slavery
were sufficiently informed about what happened to captives in the New
World. By the 1720s, the ruling groups of Dahomey were sending into
overseas slavery convicts who had been sentenced to capital punish-
ment in the 1680s (Law 1991b:184). The ruling groups viewed the sale
into Atlantic slavery as a punishment worse than execution, which was
reserved for the bitterest rivals of the princes who triumphed in struggles
for succession (Bay 1997a). Unlike in Dahomey and Senegambia, where
people traveled forth and back to the Americas, better informing the local
populations about conditions there, the Bight of Biafra seems to have
lacked a significant number of resident European traders and African
29
Captain John Adams, who carried captives from the Bight of Biafra between 1786 and
1800, noticed “a class of Heebos [whom] masters of slave-ships have always had a strong
aversion to purchase.” These captives had enjoyed an “exalted rank … in their own
country” (Crow 1830:199; Adams 1832:41). These were ozo men, holders of the highest
social rank in the Nri-Awka area.
returnees from America. Information about the outside world nevertheless

did reach the Bight of Biafra.30 For instance, the early-nineteenth-century
Muslim jihadist of the Sokoto Caliphate, Mohammed Bello, discussed
the characteristics of individual European and American countries. In the
Bight of Biafra, Old Calabar merchants were in personal contact with
correspondents in Europe by the 1770s at the latest. The king’s advisers
in Bonny styled themselves “parliament gentlemen” during the eighteenth
century. Even the hometowns of European sailors, however remote, were
known to coastal merchants. For instance, in 1804, King Pepple of Bonny
teased Captain Hugh Crow of Liverpool about the smallness of the Isle
of Man, Crow’s natal home. It is no surprise then that, decades later, at
Fernando Po, Pepple’s exiled son stunned William Baikie by reciting the
names of all the British ministers and describing the exploits of Napoleon
Bonaparte and Wellington in great detail.31 To this example must be
added a sensational case in which two Old Calabar princes returned to
their home in 1774 after years of enslavement in the Caribbean and a
short spell of freedom in England. They had been seized in 1767 during
a violent internecine conflict in Old Calabar in which European slave
traders had actively participated. The princes were able to secure their
freedom and to return to Old Calabar on the strength of the transatlantic
network they had become part of while growing up in the Bight of Biafra
(Sparks 2002). This shows that movement back and forth the Bight of
Biafra, on the one hand, and Europe and the Americas, on the other, was
more widespread than is usually assumed. There is no doubt, then, that
the ruling groups, especially on the coast, had a good idea of the use
Biafra captives were put to in the Americas.
That there was awareness of the outside world in the Bight of Biafra
means that such information likely filtered to the hinterland through
the Aro. Throughout their participation in the slave trade, the Aro were
regular visitors to the coastal states, and they maintained temporary set-
tlements there. In turn, coastal elites regularly visited the Aro oracle to
settle criminal cases and rulership contests. Baikie reports King Pepple
of Bonny as saying that he (Pepple) and his people made “pilgrimages”
30
Captain Hugh Crow reports taking a 15-year-old boy, Finebone, who was travelling
from Bonny to England in early 1793 (Crow 1830:45). Also, John Africa, a Bonny court-
ier, “had been several times in England” by 1807 (Crow 1830:139). For the Senegambian
case, see Ashcroft- Eason (1997); Law and Lovejoy (1996:14–16).
31
Baikie (1856:333). About Mohammed Bello, see Lovejoy (1994b); Old Calabar mer-
chants, see Lovejoy and Richardson (1996); G. Williams (1897:543); and for Bonny, see
Falconbridge (1788:8) Crow (1830:87).
to Aro.32 Indeed, there was more than the direct cross-fertilization of

information involved in the Aro relationships with the coastal groups.
The oracle was able to bamboozle its coastal customers with the knowl-
edge of “everything – the names of all ships trading in the river, of the
[overseas-based] merchants to whom they belong, and of the supercar-
goes” (Hutchinson 1861:53). If coastal merchants knew about Europe
and the Americas, so did the Aro who dealt with them on a regular basis.
Thus, sending away people or retaining them within the Bight of Biafra
did not always happen at random; deportation would have been the lot
of individuals meant to be punished severely, as in the Dahomian case.
Social scientists have begun to realize that much-vaunted Igbo egalitar-
ian norms often lent themselves to abuse and that certain individuals held
far more power in slave trade-era Igboland than is usually assumed. A
specialized political class that exacted tribute and labor had the resources
and the time to engage in “political manipulation.”33 Sometimes, individ-
uals fell victim simply by crossing the paths of powerful men, sometimes
over competition for women (Maduadichie 1996; J.G. Okoro 1996). That
people were sold by “great men, who hated them” – or feared them – had
been known widely among nineteenth-century Old Calabar people (see
Waddell 1970:429). Among the Efik, Ibibio, and Aro as well as the Cross
River and southern Igbo, powerful men were invariably members of the
34
powerful Ekpe or O^ konko^ ^ society. The key point here is that, whether
sold on trumped-up or real charges, people were disposed of for reasons
other than their market value. Many were forced into the trade for rea-
sons relating to conceptions of the political and social order.35
32
Baikie (1856:336); Hutchinson (1861:46–47, 54); G.I. Jones (1963:69, 87, 147, 152,
210); A.G. Leonard (1906:486, 254). For Aro settlements in coastal societies, see
Anthropologists’ Papers (1927:Appendix 1V); K. Oji (1972); G.I. Jones (1989:35–36);
Aro-Okeigbo Ancestral Almanac (1996); Kanu-Igbo (1996).
33
Anikpo (1985:35–38); P.C. Dike (1986); Ahajioku Lecture (1986:iii). Okonko is the ref-
erence for Ekpe in southern Igbo communities.
34
Membership did not, however, mean immunity to sale. An Ekpe member could be seized
and sold in a foreign community whose people might not have known or cared about
his Ekpe status. Also, an Ekpe member could be sold officially as punishment for serious
malfeasance. At any rate, seizing a person for sale was stealing, and thieves did not dis-
criminate, except if they could foresee severe repercussions (Igwe 1996; Kanu-Igbo 1996;
C. Okoli 1996).
35
There may be exceptions to the rule of selling people as punishment. Traditions of Oron
on the west bank of the lower Cross River claim that the sale of a community member
was taboo and that the people never participated in the slave trade. Here, “a person
who constituted a nuisance to the community” is said to have been “buried alive with
common consent.” The claim that community did not participate in the slave trade is
doubtful; the same traditions acknowledge that slavery was practiced among the people
Means of Slaving 3: Economic Necessity

Other captives were victims of economic necessity. Because these peo-
ple were often reluctantly sold by their families and not usually stig-
matized as violent or malevolent, they were popular with indigenous
slaveholders. Once agreed, a ritual was performed to separate the per-
son from his kin (Uchendu 1977:125). The probability that such peo-
ple would be sold to Europeans declined over time as domestic slavery
expanded and absorbed this category of captives. The intended victim
rarely participated in the discussions leading to his sale. Often, he
or she did not know about it and would unsuspectingly follow the
would-be seller to the market (Nwokoye-Emesuo 1996). One of my
respondents told me that his own uncle used the respondent’s father,
an Arochukwu free person, to settle a bet he lost at the Bende fair
with a trader from Arondizuogu, in what I estimate to be about 1870.
The uncle promised to return on the next fair day (in 24 days’ time)
to redeem the respondent’s father, but he never did return until he, the
uncle, died (J.O. Okoro 1996). While it is not clear that the respon-
dent’s uncle intended to sell his younger brother, camouflaging the
sale of relatives and wards as temporary means of resolving financial
emergencies seems to have been common. In the 1880s, Arondizuogu
merchant Igwegbe Odum (alias Omenuko) sold his apprentices, some
porters, and a relative in the Bende market to another Aro merchant
named Oji, after Omenuko had lost his wares to an overflown river.
Omenuko told them:
This man, named Mazi Oji, is kind to me because of the disaster that has hit
me on this trip. He has therefore told me that it is a shame that I have lost all
my wares, and for me and all my porters to go back to our land empty-handed.
Because of this, he has suggested that I and some of my porters return home today
so that this my relative and some of my other porters [go with him] for three days
to enable him to give you things to carry back to me. I will depend on these things
to survive. (quoted by Nwana 1950:7)36
Omenuko’s sale of his apprentices may have been a result of a business

misadventure, but social practices fostered economic conditions that
routinely ensured the flow of captives. The experience of O^ fodobendu
^
Nwaoma (Ofodobendo Wooma) or Andrew the Moor, an Igbo who
by the late nineteenth century (see Uya 1984:79, 112–13). There is no indication that the
practice of slavery among the Oron was more recent than in other communities.
36
The text was translated by the author.
enslaved in Pennsylvania between 1746 and his death in 1779, points

to a relationship between enslavement and share-raising. His needy
elder brother pawned him to secure two goats from another man for a
two-year term, but the creditor sold O^ fodobendu
^ before the end of the
term. O^ fodobendu
^ then passed through a chain of slave traders before
reaching the coast, ending up first in Antigua in 1741 and was quickly
transshipped to New York when he was 12 (Thorp 1988: 447–51).
Whether O^ fodobendu’s
^ brother gave him temporarily as a pawn or
had actually sold him by subterfuge, using share-raising as a smoke-
screen, O^ fodobendu’s
^ experience demonstrates how intricately linked
share-raising could be with enslavement.
Owerre-Ezukala, north of the major Aro settlements in central Igboland,
provides a model by which the interaction of religion, marriage, work,
and credit effectively facilitated enslavement in the nineteenth century.
Men were expected to marry, and an unmarried man was the object of
derision. Even upon death, the leaders of umuada (the women born in
the extended family), cursed his body and forbade him from reincarnat-
ing. Men were under great pressure to marry; yet, bridewealth included
as many as two heads of cattle (Ukonu 1979:17). Suitors often had to
borrow money to meet this requirement, and their creditors sold them
or exact other usurious compensation when they were unable to repay.
The following describes how unpaid debt might be settled: “The council
[of elders] might choose youngmen randomly to accompany the plaintiff
in order to seize property to the value of the debt or the compensation
from the defendant. If a large amount was involved, the plaintiff might be
authorized to sell the defendant, or to take him over for a specified period
to repay the debt by … labor” (Eni 1973:36–37). In a society in which
marriage was so important and men paid excessive bridewealth, sellable
debtors were in plentiful supply. The system obviously also produced a
small class of lenders who doubled as slave dealers. Thus, the institution
of marriage routinely forced men into production relations that led to
their enslavement and the reproduction of a creditor-enslaver class.
While those who became slaves this way were many, they were
seldom among those sent to the Americas. John Barbot, who made
trips to the Bight of Biafra in the late seventeenth century, reports that
only “a very few [are] sold to us by their own kindred, or parents”
(John Barbot 1732:352). For his part, Captain Snelgrave, who visited
the region many times during the first three decades of eighteenth cen-
tury, reports that the people sold their own only in times of extreme
need (Snelgrave 1730:505; 1734:159). This information accords with
what we know about the Biafra hinterland during the eighteenth and
nineteenth centuries (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:249, 255; Isichei
1976:46–47).
Conclusions
The relationship between the means of enslavement and the composition
of captives exported from the Bight of Biafra shows that cultural factors
shaped the structure of the slave trade there just as much as market forces
did. The deportation element, that is, the sale of people into Atlantic slav-
ery for judicial and political reasons, for instance, does not lend itself
to cost-benefit analysis. Market forces had a rather limited role to play
in the decision to retain a person in the region or to sell him to Euro-
American slave buyers. Internal slave users did not bid for captives in the
categories that were considered undesirable, who were rarely available
on the local market anyway. The deportation element and the role of
persons of the household in lineage expansion (especially among the Aro)
transcends conceptions of people merely as commodities or even as units
of labor. Market forces were not the primary determinant of whether
dangerous war captives, kidnapping victims (who could find their way
back home), rebellious slaves, incriminated persons, or rivals ended up
in the Atlantic market. Quite apart from economics, the choices slave
holders made reflected their idea of the ideal society, even though such
an idea was manifestly unjust, and the means of achieving it inherently
violent. Some palpably nonmarket circumstances limited their choices,
compelling them to choose not to choose certain categories of captives,
irrespective of region.
6
The Slave Trade, Gender, and Culture
Whether a captive ended up in the Americas or was retained in the

region was not only a function of his or her origin, skills, or means of
enslavement but also of indigenous conceptions of gender. This chapter
shows that constructions of gender roles helped to shape the age and sex
structure of the Atlantic slave trade. Understanding the gender structure
of the transatlantic slave trade is critical to understanding the societies
of the Bight of Biafra and the rest of the Atlantic world. Considering
the issue from the broad perspective of contact between the Old World
and the New, two salient characteristics of that structure have emerged
in the literature. First, as is now well known, males predominated in the
Atlantic slave trade, though compared to other branches of pre-nine-
teenth-century migration, both coerced and free, females and children
were well represented. Second, the proportion of African women and
children carried across the Atlantic was far from constant or uniform;
sex and age ratios varied strongly by region and over time (Eltis and
Engerman 1993:308; Eltis and Richardson 1995a). Attempts to explain
these broad patterns have generally focused on the economic functions of
slaves on both sides of the Atlantic, and especially, on the requirements of
the plantation complexes of the Americas, without which a transatlantic
slave trade would not have existed. Even though New World planters
demanded men, they quickly discovered that enslaved African women
had a high work rate.1 Planters forced black men and women alike to
1
Fogel and Engerman 1974:75–77; D. G. White 1985:67–68, 98–105; Beckles 1989:7–23;
Higman 1976:194; Craton 1978:142–47; Walvin 1992:119–21; Moitt 1989; Berlin
1998:111.
144
The Slave Trade, Gender, and Culture 145
labor in the fields, and the price differential between males and females
was generally much lower in the Americas than on the African coast (Eltis
and Engerman 1992:253).
The labor needs of New World planters were articulated in the categor-
ical instructions Euro-American shipowners gave to West Africa–bound
agents. Let us consider just two examples of these instructions from the
peak years of the Atlantic slave trade. On October 7, 1725, a group of
Bristol merchants, who then dominated the Biafra trade, directed Captain
William Barry of the Dispatch to buy 240 “Choice slaves” from the
obscure port of Andoni. None of these should “exceed the years of 25 or
under 10 if possible, among which so many men, and stout men boys as
can be had seeing such are most Valuable at the Plantations” (Hobhouse
et al. 1725:327). Although plantation America and the organization of
the slave trade had undergone important changes, due partly to major
wars, rising shipping costs (Eltis and Engerman 1993:314–15), and a sub-
stantial drop in the male/female price differential in Biafra ports (Inikori
1992a:137–38), Africa-bound ship captains continued to receive similar
instructions. On July 18, 1803, seventy-eight years after Captain Barry’s
instructions, Thomas Leyland (1803:651), owner of the Enterprise and
a member of the Liverpool merchant community that had since the
1740s assumed the helm of the British slave trade, charged Bonny-bound
Captain Caesar Lawson with the following instruction:
By Law this vessel is allowed to carry 400 Negroes, and we request that they may
all be males, if possible to get them, at any rate buy as few females as in your
power, because we look to a Spanish market for the disposal of your cargo, where
Females are a very tedious sale. In the choice of the Negroes be very particular,
select those that are well formed and strong; and do not buy any above 24 years
of Age, as it may happen that you will have to go to Jamaica, where you know
any exceeding that age would be liable to a Duty of £10 per head.
Some Americanists have supplied details about how New World planters
chose the sex configuration of captives, but the gender structure of the
slave trade reflected African choices as well.2
African gender studies, on the other hand, have rarely focused on the
era of the Atlantic slave trade. Economic historians have generally avoided
gender questions, and historical demographers who address the issue
have usually assumed uniform sex and age ratios for all African regions.
2
For the American angle, see Littlefield 1981:56–73; Sheridan 1994:241–42, 253; Wax
1973.
To the historical demographers, the main question to be resolved was

why males were preponderant among those forced to leave Africa.3 The
few historians who have explored the gender structure of the slave trade
see the predominance of males in overseas export as more a function of
supply than of demand. For them, African suppliers of captives channeled
women and children away from the Atlantic and men toward it. Women
could be sold for more in domestic African slave markets, whereas men
commanded higher prices in markets supplying the Atlantic.4 Women thus
constituted a large majority of slaves within Africa. A survey of available
price data in African regional markets seem to confirm this hypothesis
(Lovejoy and Richardson 1995a). The discovery of the high value that
Africans placed on women is especially useful in suggesting that African
conceptions of gender helped to shape the structure of the Atlantic slave
trade. But this new emphasis on the ability of Africa to shape the pat-
tern of coerced migration still means that it is the economic function of
slaves and market forces that receive the most attention. Although social
processes are acknowledged, the emphasis remains on market forces,
which crystallized in three overlapping markets – Atlantic, Saharan, and
3
African gender studies have been the subject of special issues of three major Africanist
journals since the early 1970s (Wipper 1972; Bay and Hafkin 1975; Marks and Rathbone
1983). Only the last has contributions (Donald Crummey, “Family and Property amongst
the Arnhara Nobility,” pp. 207–20, and Anne Hilton, “Family and Kinship among the
Kongo South of the Zaire River from the Sixteenth to the Nineteenth Centuries,” pp. 189–
206) dealing with the era covered in this chapter, and only Hilton’s deals with Atlantic
Africa. Most other historical works on this sphere have concentrated on the nineteenth-
century transition from the Atlantic slave trade to other economic activities, made most
explicit in Roberts 1984. See also Coquery-Vidrovitch 1997; Robertson and Martin A.
Klein 1983a; Robertson 1984; Martin 1988. Other exceptions include Bay 1977, 1998;
Alpers 1984; Greene 1996; Ogbomo 1997. The interdisciplinary volume edited by Flora
Kaplan provides the widest range of precolonial case studies about gender, overwhelmingly
from West Africa. These case studies provide a window into the intricacies of gendered
power structures, allowing us to discern that rather than all African women simply being
objects of gender constructions, some were actually players whose power helped to shape
the slave trade (Kaplan 1997). Sandra Barnes’s contribution makes a vigorous case for the
focus on elite women power, mostly in terms of its role in shaping political conflict; Edna
Bay grounds some of the key themes of elite women with an empirical analysis of their
power Dahomey; Sabine Jell-Bahlsen, Flora Nwapa and Helen Henderson provide use-
ful analyses of elite women in Igbo communities, mainly post-eighteenth century (Barnes
1997; Bay 1997; Jell-Bahlsen 1997; Nwapa 1997; H. Henderson 1997). However, the
volume’s focus on elite women is of necessity a limited view of how gender constructions –
particularly with regard to labor – affected the slave trade, and try as one may, several
of the contributions cannot be read backward beyond the mid-nineteenth century. For
historical demography, see Thornton 1980, 1981; Inikori 1981; Manning 1981; 1990:61.
4
Robertson and Klein 1983; Manning 1990:42; Lovejoy and Richardson 1995a, 1995b.
domestic – and which generated significant price differentials between

males and females.
Even the few studies to take up interregional variations in the age and sex
of captives follow a similar tack. One view suggests that women were sold
in inland markets because they attracted higher prices there and men were
moved to the coast for the same reason. Women and children were impor-
tant in overseas markets only where the major provenance areas were near
the coast. Transportation costs are deemed the critical factor in such deci-
sions. If Atlantic markets put a lower value on women and children than
on men, then it was not worth the expense to move women and children
long distances to reach those markets (Hogendorn 1996; Manning 1998a).
This argument makes sense, but it is more useful for explaining the differ-
ences between inland and coastal markets than between one part of the
coast and another. Different coastal regions with nearby provenance zones
still exhibited marked differences in the age and sex patterns of those sent
into the trade. Strikingly, West-Central Africa, the region with the longest
supply lines in Africa, had one of the largest ratios of children entering the
trade. Transportation cost thus did not play as significant a role in shaping
the gender structure of the slave trade as often assumed.
The proportion of women who entered the transatlantic slave trade
was higher at the Bight of Biafra than at any other coastal region of
Africa. Here, too, the market approach dominates attempts to account
for this exception. For economic historian Joseph Inikori, outside
forces – specifically, planters in the Americas – overwhelmed the impact
of trans-Saharan and internal markets. Inikori explains the large propor-
tion of females leaving the Bight of Biafra by suggesting, first, that African
suppliers moved male captives to ports in adjacent regions where prices
were higher, and, second, that Euro-American buyers were prepared to
accept females only in this region (Inikori 1992:141–43). While letters
of instruction to Africa-bound supercargoes and captains confirm that
buyers predominantly demanded men, Euro-Americans sometimes made
favorable comments on Biafra women.5 But neither merchants nor plant-
ers expressed a consistent preference for Biafra women, nor did the
occasional favorable comment translate into effective demand. Males
typically outnumbered females from the Bight of Biafra, and after 1730,
as the region grew in importance to the Americas, the proportion of males
increased.
5
Edwards 1793:74; Adams 1832:41; Crow 1830:198; Lander and Lander 1832:240–41;
Leonard 1898:207.
The present study does not reject outright the conclusions of any of the
recent work on age and gender in the slave trade. It does, however, attempt to
recast the question of gender by taking into account African factors to explain
not only the overall demographic structure of the trade but also interregional
differences.6 In particular, it draws on the insights of the historian Sandra
Greene, even though her work has been chiefly concerned with the impact of
the slave trade on Africa, whereas the present study examines how African
constructions of gender interacted with and shaped the Atlantic slave trade.
For the Ewe group on the both Gold Coast and the Slave Coasts, Greene
links demographic pressures on land arising from conflict to the evolution
of a culture of conspicuous consumption, both of which stemmed ultimately
from the slave trade. She traces the impact of this process on constructions
of gender and gives a central role to ethnicity in her analysis. In short, she
recognizes that gender relations often varied from group to group (Greene
1996). Differing conceptions of gender among African peoples are central to
explaining the structure of the slave trade as well as its impact.
While markets mediate both economic and noneconomic values,
economic behavior has many cultural determinants. As was made clear
in Chapter 5, there are some obvious patterns of behavior in the Bight of
Biafra (and no doubt elsewhere) that are difficult to account for in terms
of maximizing profits. It seems unlikely that economics will explain why,
for example, the region’s specialized warriors decapitated the men they
captured in warfare instead of selling them, especially when Europeans
went to the coast looking first and foremost for men. Profit maximization
was only one factor that shaped African conceptions of gender. Of the three
slave markets known to have coexisted in Africa during the Atlantic slave
trade era, the Saharan market was generally female oriented, whereas both
females and children predominated in the domestic market. The Atlantic
market concentrated on dealing in males, preferably adult males. The spe-
cific configuration of any of these markets in a particular region, as well as
the nature and local uses of other commodities produced there, might be
expected to have some impact on the gender structure of export captives.
In the Bight of Biafra, the institution of female slavery was marginal and
the influence of the Saharan market was remote.
The role of two agricultural products – yam (ji) and kolanut (ọjị) –
distinguished the Igbo from their neighbors and was also a major factor
6
Significant steps have already been taken in this direction. See Eltis 1986:257–72; Eltis
and Engerman 1992:237–57, 1993:308–23; Eltis and Richardson 1997:29–33; Geggus
1989:23–44; Nwokeji 1997b.
in these outcomes. Kolanuts are produced by trees of the Sterculiaceae

family, which are native to Atlantic Africa’s tropical forest. The fruit
consists of two to twelve nuts (seeds) enclosed in an apple-sized, oblong-
shaped carpel, depending on the size of a carpel and/or of the nuts
(Hutchinson and Dalziel 1928:247, 253–56). While yam and kolanut
were known to Igbo neighbors, such as the Ibibio, Anang, and Oron,
the Igbo were unique in the high degree of social and spiritual impor-
tance they attached to such products, and this, in turn, determined their
social and economic value among the Igbo. As a well-educated Igbo
elder put it recently, the Igbo accord the kolanut and the yam “spe-
cial recognition” and handle them in a “reverential manner.”7 Probably
because of their centrality in Igbo spirituality in which men played an
authoritative role, the use of these products reinforced male domina-
tion in the starkest of ways. But the kolanut and yam did also shape the
gender structure of captives sent to the Americas from Bight of Biafra
ports. As will be made clear in the discussion of gender division of labor
in agriculture that follows, yam production was partly the reason for
the relatively high female ratio of captives leaving the region.
For its part, the significance of the connection – or the lack thereof –
between the kolanut and the trans-Saharan trade lies in its role in shap-
ing the gender structure of the slave trade in three regions – the Bights
of Biafra and Benin, and the Gold Coast. Kolanut reverence among the
Igbo partly accounted for the virtual absence of the trans-Saharan trade
in the Bight of Biafra’s forest region, which would have absorbed many
female captives that ended up in the Americas. Interaction between the
domestic and Atlantic markets, on the one hand, and the virtual absence
of interaction between the domestic and trans-Saharan markets, on the
other, resulted in a higher proportion of females leaving the Bight of
Biafra – and to a lesser extent the Bight Benin – than from regions that
were more susceptible to trans-Saharan influences and put a different
value on female labor. Effectively, therefore, this chapter compares the
patterns in the Bight of Biafra with other regions of Atlantic Africa with
a focus on trading patterns, consumption patterns, social structure, and
ideology, including the gender division of labor.
7
Ojiaku 2008:14. Ojiaku places palm oil on the same level of importance among the Igbo.
Though this may have been the case before palm oil was heavily commercialized in the
nineteenth century and even though the product continues to have use value, it is no lon-
ger handled reverentially if it ever was. Although the Oron and Anang – as well as the Efik
and Ibono – see themselves as different peoples, historical and linguistic evidence strongly
suggests that they are subgroups of the Ibibio (Essien 1991:48; E.A. Udo 1983).
An Overview of Key Quantitative Data

The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database is an invaluable resource when
probing these issues. Information on the sex and age composition of cap-
tives is available for 656 voyages from the Bight of Biafra, which were per-
haps up to 20 percent of all the slaving voyages that left the region after
1600. More important than the size of the sample, however, is the ability
to examine the shares of men, women, and boys and girls. For the centu-
ries between 1601 and 1864 for which adequate data are available, ratios
of females in the transatlantic trade are higher than for those leaving other
regions of Atlantic Africa. In the second half of the seventeenth century,
when the traffic from the Bight first became significant, females were con-
sistently in the majority. The region was the only large provenance zone
in Atlantic Africa, or any part of the Old World from which people sailed
for the New, for which this was the case.8 If more than half the deportees
in the seventeenth century were female, it was only 42.5 percent and 35.5
percent in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, respectively (Table 6.1).
The above eighteenth-century figure is deceptive. The 1726–50 quarter
suffers from insufficient sample size; sex and age information is available
on only two vessels in the Bight of Biafra, compared to 156 vessels for all
African regions. When we exclude the data from this period, the female
ratio of captives leaving the Bight of Biafra increases to 43.7 percent, com-
pared to 32.6 percent for all other African regions combined.
The female ratio does, however, disguise a dramatic change in the dis-
tribution of women and girls. Whereas women had constituted nearly
half of those forced to leave the Bight of Biafra in the seventeenth century,
fewer than one in six captives leaving Biafra ports in the final quarter
century of the trade (1826–50) were adult females. Girls, who had made
up less than 10 percent of females in the Biafra traffic before 1700, came
to outnumber women by the third quarter of the eighteenth century. In
other provenance zones the proportion of girls also increased over time,
but women always remained more numerous than girls outside the Bight
of Biafra. Among males, the percentage of men had remained relatively
stable before, during, and after the rapid increase in the trade. It was 46
percent in the seventeenth century, dipping to just under 40 percent in the
eighteenth century, then recovering to its earlier level after 1775 and until
1850. Most of the increasing male ratio in the trade during the first three
8
This was the case in the Gold Coast before the seventeenth century, a phenomenon
explained below.
Table 6.1. Proportion of Females Leaving the Gold Coast, the Bight of
Benin, and the Bight of Biafra, 1601–1864
Period Gold Coast Bight of Bight of Biafra All African

Benin and Gulf of Regions
Guinea Islands Combined
1601–1700 43.70% 40.60% 50.60% 41.50%
1701–1800 32.80% 38.50% 42.50% 36.40%
1801–1864 33.00% 33.30% 35.50% 32.40%
Averages 33.90% 37.70% 41.50% 36.10%
Source: slavevoyages.org
quarters of the eighteenth century came from increased numbers of boys,

whose share overall doubled between the seventeenth and eighteenth cen-
turies. This pattern again differentiates the Bight of Biafra from the rest
of Africa, where men consistently made up more than half of those enter-
ing the trade before 1800 and where, in the nineteenth century, their ratio
slipped somewhat. Boys were thus proportionately more important in the
Bight of Biafra than elsewhere in sustaining and, indeed, driving upward
the high male ratios before the nineteenth century.
Market Forces, Division of Labor, and Culture

These intriguing differences between the Bight of Biafra and the rest of
Atlantic Africa are best understood in terms of interactions of indigenous
conceptions of gender and the process of Atlantic slave trading. The gender
division of labor is often at the core of constructions of gender. It is in this
division that productive roles of gendered persons in freedom and slavery
are located and defined. Women likely did have a larger economic role
in sub-Saharan Africa than they did in most other continental groupings
of societies. In all African societies, women’s and men’s “spheres” were
separate but interrelated and complementary.
Given the preponderance of men sent into the slave trade, women prob-
ably formed the majority of the population of many African societies during
the era of the overseas slave trade. In one region in Angola, which seems to
be the only place where a census count was taken before the nineteenth cen-
tury, there were 70.9 male slaves and 81.8 free males to every 100 women.9
During the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, Benin women
9
Manning 1981:501, 1990:42; Thornton 1977, 1980; Miller 1988:159–67.
were said to “have so much Employment, that they ought not to sit still.” In
the same period in Whydah in Dahomey, women “Till[ed] the Ground, for
their Husbands only.” In West-Central Africa, the Capuchin priest Denis de
Carli reported that, while seventeenth-century Kongo men served in large
armies and carried “great Logs of wood of a Vast weight,” they neverthe-
less enjoyed considerable leisure time. Women, on the other hand, worked
from morning to evening tilling the ground, sowing all crops, cultivat-
ing, and harvesting in addition to their family and household duties. The
same was true of contemporaneous coastal societies of the Upper Guinea
Coast, a region that also exported small proportions of females, according
to reports written in both halves of the seventeenth century. In southern
Mozambique, men were said to have done next to nothing.10 The forego-
ing situations reflected the immediate agricultural needs in many African
societies in which women performed the bulk of agricultural labor.
Yet do all these indications of a major economic role for women mean
that the cultural determinants of unbalanced sex ratios were the same in
all sub-Saharan societies and remained constant over time? For historian
Catherine Coquery-Vidrovitch, the pattern that held in most of West Africa
was also valid in the Bight of Biafra. She claims that among the Igbo “it was
women who worked in the fields” (Coquery-Vidrovitch 1997:11). But if
the economic role of women was so great, why was a higher proportion of
females sent into the trade from this region than from elsewhere in Atlantic
Africa? Interregional differences in the gender division of labor suggest
interregional differences in conceptions of gender that may have affected
the sex ratios in both the slave trade and in societies supplying that trade,
at least as much as did the requirements of planters in the Americas.
Enough is known about women’s work in the Bight of Biafra to ques-
tion Coquery-Vidrovitch’s observations (Ekechi 1981:41; Hargreaves
1987:94). In this region, both males and females contributed significantly
to agriculture. The hoe per se has never been, as Coquery-Vidrovitch
claims, principally a women’s tool among the peoples of the Bight of
Biafra. Generally, men used the big hoe to till the ground, and women and
children used the small one for weeding.11
The division of labor was particularly clear-cut among the two groups
that supplied the overwhelming majority of the region’s captives – the
10
For Dahomey, see Bosman 1705:344; for Benin, Van Nyendael 1702:463; for Kongo, de
Carli:622, 629, 630–31; for southern Mozambique, Alpers 1984:39–40; and for Upper
Guinea Coast, Rodney 1970:103, and Thornton 1983:44, 1992:107.
11
Leith-Ross 1939:89–92; Forde and Jones 1950:13, 70; Uchendu, 1965:24; Paul Bohannan
and Laura Bohannan 1968:66; Njoku 1991:120.
Igbo and the Ibibio. Females performed a wide range of tasks, such as
weeding and planting vegetables and other crops – pumpkins, maize,
okra, beans, pepper, and cocoyam (Colocassia). Tilling the ground,
planting and stemming yam, building, and climbing trees were exclu-
sively male tasks. Both men and women were involved in clearing, but
it was nevertheless a predominantly male activity.12 In several Igbo com-
munities, the historical agricultural role of men was such that women
assumed a major role only in the twentieth century largely because men
were at the time diverting their labor to the new opportunities created
by the colonial economy (Chuku 2005:88). In the coastal societies, male
slaves dominated the market for manual labor related to trade and did
the same when agriculture became important. Most women performed
“non-slave, low-status” domestic, agricultural, and commercial activities.
Captain Hugh Crow, in his regular visits to the region from the late eigh-
teenth century to 1807, observed that in Bonny it was the women who
fetched condiments for the kitchens of European ships.13 So unimportant
was women’s role in agriculture made to seem in the patriarchal order
that even in the second quarter of the twentieth century the missionary
G.T. Basden omitted it altogether in his otherwise informative chapter
on “women’s work” (Basden 1966:325–33). The major role of males in
the agriculture of the Bight of Biafra–Igbo societies, in particular, is not
replicated in other African regions that supplied captives to the Americas.
The one place where a similar phenomenon has been observed is a small
part of Senegambia – the Balanta country. Here, as in the Bight of Biafra,
men, rather than women, dominated agriculture, and, again, as in the
Bight of Biafra, the societies he studied supplied a higher proportion of
female captives to the Atlantic trade than was the norm (see Hawthorne
2003:14–15, 137–39).
It is not always easy to determine how much of the gender division
of labor antedated the slave trade and shaped its gender structure or
how much of this division was a direct result of the trade. Historian
John Thornton presents a useful method for measuring change during the
Atlantic slave trade. He assumes that the preponderantly male exports
affected the women the transatlantic traffic left behind in two major ways.
First, the export slave trade depleted the size of the working population
12
In the twentieth century, these crops included the new varieties of yams, which were
considered as inferior: Forde and Jones 1950:13, 70; Green 1947:170–71; Uchendu
1965:24–25; Ifemesia 1979:62; Mba 1982:29–30; Nwala 1985:178.
13
Crow 1830:44; Nair 1972:37, 42–43; Latham 1973:91–96. The quotation is from
Hargreaves 1997:95–97.
and by so doing increased the dependency ratio. Since the remaining

working population was mostly women, the burden of providing sub-
sistence to the dependent population fell heavily on women. Second,
with about 20 percent fewer males to perform male roles, women had to
step into the breach or leave such tasks undone. Invariably, this situation
resulted in lower production and lower quantities of high-protein food
because women did not take over hunting (Thornton 1983:41). Thus the
division of labor was altered, and females increasingly assumed tasks and
responsibilities hitherto performed by men.
If Thornton’s model holds for regions throughout Atlantic Africa, then
Biafra societies, which sent significantly higher proportions of females
and children overseas and so must have had more balanced population
pyramids, would have escaped some of the ruptures that the model pre-
dicts. The African regions where women have been found to constitute
the majority of the slave populations were also areas where women cost
more, performed the bulk of agricultural labor and were recognized as
doing so. Slavery in those regions centered on women. The Capuchin
missionary Michael Angelo reports that, in seventeenth-century Kongo,
“Young Women [were] of the same Value as Men” (Angelo 1704:620).
Unlike in these regions, Biafra slavery did not rest on women. It is most
interesting that research on Bonny, the populous Ngwa of southern
Igboland, and the Aro indicates that female slavery for domestic purposes
was marginal.14
To better understand these intriguing differences between the Bight
of Biafra and other regions, it will be useful to evaluate the differences
in the sex ratios between captives leaving different Bight of Biafra ports.
The evidence here is rather more limited than it is at the regional level.
Not only is the sample smaller (544 voyages for all identified ports), but
the distribution over time is uneven (Table 6.2). Of the three major ports
Bonny, Old Calabar, and New Calabar, few observations exist for Bonny
before 1776. Further, information on New Calabar is totally lacking for
the period between 1700 and 1776 and is meager for the nineteenth cen-
tury. A continuous series is thus possible only for Old Calabar, which
overall embarked far fewer captives into the Atlantic trade than did
Bonny. This discrepancy is unfortunate because the dramatic increase in
the volume of the trade from the Bight of Biafra is associated with the rise
of the port of Bonny to predominance. Bonny surpassed the other ports
14
For the entire Igbo, Nwokeji 1998b:325–26; for the entire Biafra, Nwokeji 1997b; for
southern Igboland, Martin 1988:25; for Bonny, Hargreaves 1987:94–97.
155
Table 6.2. Women, Girls, Men, and Boys Leaving Major Embarkation Points in the Bight of Biafra, Selected Quarters,
1651–1850 (in percents)
Period Women Girls Men Boys
Bonny/New Old Calabar Bonny/New Old Calabar Bonny/New Old Calabar Bonny/New Old Calabar
Calabar Calabar Calabar Calabar
1651–1675 46.3 45.7 4.2 3.7 39.2 43.7 10.4 6.9
1676–1700 45.4 50.5 3.9 3.2 44.2 39.8 6 6.4
1776–1800 37.8 30.7 8.2 10.5 46.8 46.8 6.8 12
1801–1825 21.3 19.7 17.9 13.4 49.6 53 11.2 14
1826–1850 13.7 15.9 17.8 19.2 51.3 42.8 17.2 22.1
1651–1850 31.2 30.9 11 12.4 47.3 42.6 10.3 14.3
The quarters 1701–1725, 1726–1750, and 1751–1775 are omitted because of a lack of data. For a full representation of the data for 1651–1850,
including measures of variance and tests of significance, see http://www.wm.edu/oieahc. Rows do not always total 100 percent owing to varying sample
sizes for each demographic group.
in numbers of captives dispatched in the third quarter of the eighteenth

century, and between 1776 and 1825, it sent between three and four cap-
tives to the Americas for every one captive who left from Old Calabar
and New Calabar combined.
In the earliest years of significant slave trading in the Niger Delta-
Cross River region, no significant differences occurred in the demographic
structures of the traffic from New Calabar and Old Calabar, despite the
distance between the two ports and the reputedly different hinterlands on
which they drew. Statistically significant differences among major ports
emerge only in the later period, although there are large gaps in the data
for the crucial middle half century of the eighteenth century when the
Bight of Biafra trade was increasing so rapidly. From 1776 onward, the
flow of captives from Bonny, by now the dominant port of departure,
had captives with a different mix of sex and age from those leaving Old
Calabar, and New Calabar’s profile was closer to that of the geographi-
cally adjacent Bonny than to the more distant Old Calabar. More females,
in particular, more women, left Bonny and New Calabar than left Old
Calabar, and among males, the increasing share of boys, a striking feature
of the nineteenth-century trade, had become salient in the last quarter of
the eighteenth century. If patterns observed in the nineteenth century had
also held in the eighteenth, a significant proportion of captives leaving
Old Calabar would have originated in western Cameroon, especially
the highland grassfields, where women dominated agriculture as in the
rest of African supply regions.15 After 1800, most of the statistically sig-
nificant differences between the major ports of Bonny and Old Calabar
(once more the New Calabar data are inadequate) disappear, except for
the last quarter century of the trade, when the age profiles of departing
males are different – more men leaving Bonny and more boys leaving Old
Calabar.
In summary, flows of captives departing from the major ports in the
Bight of Biafra generally show little difference in age and sex mix, with all
15
A database of Africans on board recaptured Americas-bound vessels in the nineteenth
century shows that no less than 10 percent of captives leaving Old Calabar between 1822
and 1837 came from western Cameroon (Nwokeji and Eltis 2002b:204). The proportion
of Cameroonians among captives leaving Old Calabar in the eighteenth century would
have been much smaller than is suggested by the nineteenth-century sample; above all,
the Cameroons slave trade did not come into its own until after the mid-eighteenth
century. Information about the gender division of labor in western Cameroons comes
from historian Fritz-Canute Ngwa and his students at University of Beua, Cameroon, on
October 26, 2002.
three ports (together accounting for 85 percent of all departures from the
Bight of Biafra) deviating from other African regions, though the Bight of
Biafra, in common with most other African regions, sent increasing pro-
portions of males and children into the Atlantic slave trade over time. To
the extent that there were differences among ports in the Bight of Biafra
(and readers should keep in mind the gaps in the data in the important
mid-eighteenth-century period), they show up in the last quarter of the
eighteenth century when the slave trade from the Bight of Biafra was at
its peak. Bonny in these years (and possibly, too, in the preceding two
quarters when data are lacking) sent more females into the trade than
did the Cross River port of Old Calabar, probably due to the presence of
western Cameroonians among captives leaving Old Calabar.
Fieldwork among the Aro supports the argument that female slavery
was marginal in the region. Asked whether men routinely acquired slave
women, respondents indicated that even if a man retained a female trade
captive in his household, the relationship invariably changed to that of
husband and wife. Alternatively, the man might give her to his wife as
a slave or to one of his sons or dependents as a wife. One respondent
reported that, among the Aro, women were a small part of slavehold-
ing: “There were [women slaves], but not so many. A female slave would
be given to a slave man because a woman could not establish an ama
[lineage].”16 Moreover, as one elder noted, an important reason for the
accumulation of male slaves is that they could be used in fighting wars
(M.S. Igwe 1996). According to another elder, the Aro believed that
Women were difficult. Their mobility was minimal. It was only practical to buy
a woman and she became your wife or that of your son, or she became a fellow
woman’s slave. Except if she was sold to a far away place or overseas, it was not
very practical. In certain circumstances, people bought female slaves, but they
invariably ended as wives. I do not think, however, that a person set out to buy
a woman so that she would become his wife. What I am sure of is that women
bought women slave. (N.A. Anyakoha 1996)
Whether women were significantly less mobile or not, the attitude

reflected in this comment seems to have affected the choice of enslav-
ers. Another respondent explained how slave women became wives: “A
man could buy a woman from the market and bring her home. You
16
Kanu-Igbo 1996. See also Akpu 1996; Anyakoha 1996; M. S. Igwe 1996; Maduadichie
1996; E. Nwankwo 1996; C. Okoli 1996; Elizabeth Okoro 1996; J. G. Okoro 1996;
J. O. Okoro 1996; J. E. Uche 1996.
know that man-woman matters are complicated. … If he was the sort

that had a soft spot for women, he might decide to keep her longer and
might marry her. … A woman who came as a slave was effectively the
man’s wife once she got pregnant and bore children for him” (M.S. Igwe
1996). Historian Susan Martin has observed a similar phenomenon with
respect to southern Igboland (S. Martin 1988:25). Female slaves usually
belonged to females, whom feminist anthropologist Ifi Amadiume has
misidentified as “female husbands.”17 Although present in modern-day
Igboland, this form of slavery – considered as marriage – likely evolved
in the twentieth century and incorporates the basic slave/mistress relation
of earlier times.18
After the 1771–75 period, when the slave traffic from Biafra peaked,
Bonny sent more females into the trade than did other ports. The rise of
Bonny probably meant that the long-term trend toward fewer females
entering the trade slowed down due to the relatively high female ratio
among captives departing from there, mitigating a precipitous decrease
17
Amadiume 1987. Contrary to Amadiume’s claim, many of my respondents indicated
that slave women were eventually labeled “wives” (Akpu 1996; Anyakoha 1996; M.S.
Igwe 1996; Maduadichie 1996; C. Okoli 1996; E. Okoro 1996; E. Nwankwo 1996;
Igwilo 1996; Martina Ike 1995; Aloy Nwankwo 1996; M. N. Okoli 1996; Umunnakwe
1996).
18
The change must be associated with slavers’ response to the antislavery efforts of the
British colonial administration, which peaked in the 1930s. This was when child dealing,
especially in girls, became endemic. Most of the transactions were cloaked as “marriage,”
confusing the colonial administrators who came to regard all bridewealth payment as
slave dealing (Nwokeji 1998b:337). Buchi Emecheta’s novel Slave Girl, set in the 1900s
through the 1920s, confirms that these marriages were indeed slavery: “Many of the
market women had slaves in great number.” The female slaves referred to in the novel
are all owned by mistresses. Even Chiago, who was sold by her father and purchased by
another man, is presented to her buyer’s wife. Yet selling girls to mistresses is actually
expressed in terms of “marry[ing] her away” (Emecheta 1977:50, 58, 60–61). When it
did not involve slavery, it was probably proxy marriage contracted by the first wives of
male Christian converts who sought to maintain Christian status while being polygynous,
as Oliver Akamnonu’s novel, Taste of the West, makes clear (Akamnonu 2008: 99–102).
Marriage differed from slavery because, unlike a slave, a married woman and her total
labor power were not alienated from her lineage (Kilkenny 1981: 158–59). In her impor-
tant biography of the wealthy, late-nineteenth, early-twentieth-century Onitsha market
woman Omu Okwei, Felicia Ekejiuba writes that Okwei “acquired beautiful girls mostly
‘adopted’ children or children pawned to her by her debtors.” In 1921, Okwei admitted
that one Uyanwa was her slave as Okwei struggled to retain the right of inheriting the
property that Uyanwa’s husband, a European United African Company manager to whom
Okwei had given her in “marriage,” would leave behind (Ekejiuba (1967: 633–46). As
in Emecheta’s novel, the story revolves around girls. The idea that the “female husband”
relationship is an ancient institution seems to have sprung from the unfortunate tendency
of much existing literature to view Igbo women as unchanging.
in the proportion of the overall females entering the Bight of Biafra slave
trade. Bonny was the main outlet for captives from central Igboland. The
expansion of the Biafra trade, the rise of the Aro network, the shift of
trade from Old Calabar to Bonny, and changes in gender ratios were cor-
related developments. In the Bight of Biafra, then, unlike in other African
regions, preexisting gender constructions seem to account for the export
of a high proportion of females.
The objective here is to recognize, first, that men played an important
role in agriculture, second, that scholars of the slave trade have given this
male role insufficient attention in the recent literature, and third, that the
gender ideology that emerged (or was “constructed”) in some societies in
the Bight of Biafra had more to do with preexisting cultural norms than
with the reality of what women could or could not do. On this last point,
among the Tiv of the Middle Belt in the hinterland of the Niger Delta,
male and female roles in agriculture were initially carefully defined and
to a large extent, separated. The Tiv explained this division as a function
of the physical inequality of men and women and the need for females to
be modest, even though the differentials in the strength requirements of
tasks on either side of the divide are not obvious and modesty is cultur-
ally determined (Bohannan and Bohannan 1968:66).
Cultural, as opposed to biological, factors were important in the allo-
cation of crops and crop tasks in most of Igboland and had important
implications for the slave trade. Although yam was the staple food in many
societies bordering on both the Bight of Benin and the Bight of Biafra,
including the adjacent Middle Belt, only among the Igbo and the Ibibio of
Biafra was it regarded as the king of crops and cultivated exclusively by
men. Among the Igbo and Ibibio, yam, if available, would be eaten before
anything else, but the significance of yam was more far-reaching among
the former. As anthropologist Charles Meek put it, “all other crops [were]
merely subsidiary” to the yam among the Igbo. Alexander Falconbridge
observed that “Yams are the favorite food of the Eboe.” This preference
remained constant into the twentieth century, which cannot be said of
their neighbors. While ownership of a large yam barn was also a mark
of high status among the Oron on the Cross River for the known pre-
colonial period, cultivation of the most valued species quickly “petered
out” during the colonial period (Uya 1984:61), which was when Basden
observed that yam “stands to [the Igbo] as the potato does to the typical
Irishman. A shortage of the yam supply is a cause of genuine distress, for
no substitute gives the same sense of satisfaction.” More important, the
amount of yam a person possessed was a key measure of his wealth, and
yam had varied ritual functions as well. Women’s role in yam cultivation
was restricted to weeding. The so-called subsidiary crops such as maize,
cocoyam, okra, and beans surpassed the yam in both nutritional quality
and yield, but yam was considered supreme because it was in the male
domain. Literary luminary Chinua Achebe calls yam “a very exacting
king” and writes that “for three or four moons it demanded hard work
and constant attention from cock-crow till the chickens went back to
roost.” Basden further assessed the cost effectiveness of yam cultivation:
From an agricultural point of view, the yam is a very extravagant vegetable to

grow. Each tuber requires a full square yard of land which, in itself, is a big
demand. For seven or eight months of the year, regular attention must be given
to its care, absorbing much time and labor. If wages had to be paid, it is doubtful
whether a yam farm would pay its way, let alone yield profit.
Although Basden’s observation reveals the Igbo and the Ibibio fixa-
tion on the yam, perhaps beyond the point of economic rationality, the
crop did yield reasonable economic returns (Achebe 1996:33; Basden
1966:389–90, 394; Falconbridge 1788:21; Meek 1937:16–17, 32–35,
49, 168, 188, 215, 238; Onyekwelu 2001:82–84).
Yam production owed something to women’s input, but females occu-
pied a lesser agricultural role in the Bight of Biafra compared to other
African coastal regions. In Biafra, anthropologist Victor Uchendu writes,
“women’s crops follow the men’s.” Apart from symbolizing the degrada-
tion of women’s role in agriculture, this statement indicates that part of
women’s labor (principally weeding) went to yam production. Women
were made to plant their crops, in Uchendu’s words, “between the spaces
provided by the yam hills.”19 Yams occupied the central point of the hill
or mound of earth, while women’s crops were planted around its base,
a symbolic representation of perceived inferiority of women’s crops and
women’s labor. This mentality affected day-to-day decisions and food-
preference patterns. Because women did not primarily work yam and
were not acknowledged as important in its production, this region’s
leaders, it would seem, were more willing to countenance the forced
migration of females. By contrast, in the Gold Coast, Upper Guinea
Coast, and West-Central Africa, females were vital to the production of
rice or corn, and, as a result, smaller proportions of females were sent
19
Uchendu 1965:24–25; P. Ottenberg 1959:207; Ifemesia 1979:62; Amadiume 1987:28–30,
37–38. Among the Owan, northwest of the Igbo, where yam was also gendered, men and
women appeared more powerful in localities where they respectively controlled this crop
(Ogbomo, 1997:97).
into the Atlantic traffic from these regions. Interestingly, in Yorubaland,

where men also had a major agricultural role (at least, in the nineteenth
century), the proportion of women sent into the trade from the eigh-
teenth century onward is closer to that in the Bight of Biafra than in the
Gold Coast, Upper Guinea Coast, and West-Central Africa.20 Was the
gender division of labor in agriculture alone responsible for the rela-
tively high proportion of females among the captives that left Bight of
Biafra ports?
Means of Enslavement
If, as was shown in Chapter 5, the means of enslavement shaped the
composition of captives exported overseas, it would have had an impact
on the gender and age composition as well. Although enslavement strat-
egies might be expected to have adjusted to whatever means supplied
the market best, some practices in the Bight of Biafra are hard to explain
in those terms. Male captives were more valuable than their female
counterparts in Atlantic markets, but instead of Bight of Biafra warriors
targeting male captives, they cut off heads as a matter of honor – pro-
vided the victims were men. Surviving prisoners tended to be women
and children (Nwokeji 1997b). The fact that the Upper Guinea Coast,
through which the Western Sudan supplied captives to the Atlantic,
recorded the highest proportion of men, and the Bight of Biafra, the low-
est indicates significant differences in social processes, including enslave-
ment mechanisms. In the Senegambia section of the Upper Guinea Coast,
where the economies of the Bambara and Tukolor states – particularly
the resources needed to socially reproduce their warrior class – were
heavily dependent on slaving during the eighteenth and nineteenth cen-
turies, warfare was so central to slave procurement that it assumed the
proportions of a means of production (Roberts 1980). All kinds of war
20
For gender division and specialization among the Yoruba, see Belasco (1980:7, 59,
68), Toyin Falola (1984:54), Coquery – Vidrovitch (1997:11). It is important to note
that recent studies of the Yoruba have suggested the fluidity of gender (Matory 1994).
Oyeronke Oyewumi has gone as far as denying any notions of the gender division of
labor and suggests that the concept of gender is alien to Yoruba culture (Oyewumi 1997,
esp. 64–77). Even Jane I. Guyer (1980:362), who deals specifically with gender division
of labor in Yorubaland, notes in a comparative context that the notion was “phrased in
terms of pragmatism rather than metaphysics.” These are useful pointers. Nevertheless,
we must still come to terms with why one sex was over-represented in some activities
and not in others, and why the sexes were sent into the Atlantic traffic in a significantly
unequal distribution.
wasted lives, but a model geared to the procurement or “production” of

captives mostly by a professional warrior class like that of Senegambia
would likely “produce” more captives, including males, than the model
practiced by the warrior groups of the Bight of Biafra, which revolved
around part-time, albeit skillful, headhunters. Both were destructive,
but one was primarily a “productive” activity and the other primarily
a destructive one. The pressure on the Cross River Igbo warrior to pro-
duce men’s heads could be expected to result in large numbers of women
and children being forced into the slave trade in the Bight of Biafra.
Kidnapping, judicial processes, and specifically, political struggles guar-
anteed that men were well represented (Nwokeji 1997a, 1997b). Those
sent away on account of rivalry, dissent, or other acts considered deviant
were usually men.
Gender, Kolanuts, and the Regional

Market Structure
The aforementioned social and cultural forces combined with the peculiar
market structure of the Bight of Biafra to shape the unusual sex ratio of
the region’s slave trade. Both the Saharan and domestics markets placed a
premium on female captives (Lovejoy 1983; Robertson and Klein 1983b).
The focus of the domestic market in the Bight of Biafra was male rather
than female, but more relevant to the point at hand, the Saharan market
was virtually nonexistent in the Bight of Biafra during the Atlantic slave
trade era, effectively leaving the region with a two- rather than three-
market structure. Not even the relentless pursuit of kolanuts by Hausa
traders – the great purveyors of trans-Saharan commodities – could bring
the trade to the forest region of the Bight of Biafra during the overseas
slave trade era. The kolanut trade would have facilitated trans-Saharan
commerce, which in turn would have impacted the gender composition
of captives leaving the Bight of Biafra.
It is a puzzle that Hausa traders did not go to Igboland in search
of kolanuts. The Igbo did produce kolanuts, and the Hausa were the
most voracious consumers of the product, which they used in a wide
variety of ways that ranged from stimulant to snack. Before their mass
consumption by the Hausa, kolanuts were a luxury item limited to
royalty (Lovejoy 1980:2). With mass consumption, kolanuts became
probably the single most important Hausa import from the forest belt
by the eighteenth century, when trade in the commodity began to sup-
port a vast commercial system in which Hausa trade diasporas played a
pivotal role.21 The nuts remained so valuable into the nineteenth century
that Hausa caravan traders en route to Asante still used them to pay
tolls to local authorities because they were “much relished and not easy
to get” (Herskovits 1936:18). Given the proximity of kolanut-produc-
ing Igboland to Hausaland, a trade in kolanut between the two regions
should have resulted as, according to Onuora Nzekwu (1961:305), it
did between the Cameroon section of Bight of Biafra’s forest region and
Bornu in present-day northeastern Nigeria. Why, then, did the kolanut
not support the trans-Saharan trade in the Igbo-dominated part of the
Bight of Biafra, in spite of its potential to generate substantial demand
among the Hausa majority of the savanna?
The special significance of kolanut in Igbo life is one important factor.
Much of the information we have about the kolanut in the Bight of Biafra
comes from twentieth-century sources, but since there is no hint in Igbo
oral traditions, or in the relevant historical and ethnographic studies, that
the significance of the kolanut has changed significantly since the days
of the slave trade, this evidence is valuable in understanding the role of
kolanut in Igbo life before the twentieth century. As has been mentioned,
several West African groups used kolanut, but none – certainly in the Bight
of Biafra – seems to have attached to it as much social and ritual signifi-
cance as did the Igbo.22 The special niche that kolanut had occupied in Igbo
life is well stated by one character in Achebe’s storied novel Things Fall
Apart: “He who brings kola brings life” (Achebe 1996:6). Kolanut served
as the mandatory focus of prayers; its rites invoked ndị-ichie (the ances-
tors) at the commencement of any significant occasion, such as festivals,
contracts, covenants, adjudication of cases, asking for important favors,
and rites of passage. During festivals, women of the household, extended
family, or town – depending on the level at which the particular rite was
celebrated – usually supplied the kolanuts. Women presented kolanuts to
men as special gifts in appreciation for a favor done or simply to demon-
strate obeisance. The kolanut also had immeasurable quotidian uses. It
was the first thing a host was expected to present to a visitor.23 Individuals
21
Lovejoy has observed that kolanuts have “been singled out as the commodity of most
interest” in the trade between the Hausa of Nigeria and the Asante in today’s Ghana
(Lovejoy 1980:1).
22
One other group among whom kolanut meant more than mere stimulant and/or snack
were the Ibibio. Anthropologist P. Amaury Talbot has described how kolanut was used
welcome guests and for divination (Talbot 1967:238).
23
The presentation of kolanut by a woman to a man required no ceremony; the man
would simply accept the kolanuts, thank the woman and keep them for future
who could afford kolanut beyond the aforementioned uses also used it as
a stimulant or snack, but social and spiritual uses predominated. The rit-
ual of “breaking” kolanut was an elaborate four-step process, with minor
local variations.24 The fact that kolanut and yam were among the earliest
Igbo crops seems to account for the spiritual and social importance they
acquired in Igbo culture.25
occasions. If, however, the kolanuts were presented at the beginning of an occasion,
the kolanuts or some of them were utilized for the prayers. Both men and women
ate kolanut among the Igbo, but it was taboo for women to break kolanut except
in the absence of a male. As long as a male is old enough to break kolanut, which
could be as young as 4, he was his responsibility to do so. For the ritual and social
aspects of kolanut, see Talbot 1926b:316; Meek 1937:21, 22, 32, 62, 151, 167, 168–69,
170, 174, 194, 205, 239, 241, 245; Nzekwu 1961; Uchendu 1965:84–85; Ezeliora
1994:43, 60–61; Muotoh 2000:44–46; Ohia 2007:25–26; Achebe 1996:18–19; Metuh
1973:5; H.A.P. Nwana n.d.: 34–36; Onwuka Njoku 2000:70; Alisa 2003. Igbo Catholic
priest Asonye Ihenacho has likened the ritual around kolanut with the Christian Holy
Eucharist (Ihenacho 2004:106, 160–65). Oral tradition from Amaokpala in the Ndi-
Eni area asserts that dispute over kolanut protocol was the immediate cause of one war
between Amaokpala and Aro Ndikelionwu in the second half of the nineteenth century
(Onyekwelu 2001:4–7).
24
The first step involved the relay presentation of the kolanut(s) (icho oji) that recognized
every person present in the order of their relationship to the host, representing the sym-
bolic “travel” of the kolanut to the respective hometowns of all adult males present, with
the kolanut ultimately “returning” to the host. The second step consisted in the offer of
prayers to the ancestors, usually by the oldest male present. The third act consisted in the
actual breaking of the kolanut(s) by the oldest male present (or his delegate), who would
give one cotyledon to the ancestors by throwing it on a shrine or the ground as may be
deemed appropriate, take one cotyledon or a piece of it for himself. Finally, the youngest
male present passed the remaining pieces to all present. The remainder was then returned
to the host as aka oji, which literarily translates as “hand of kolanut” but actually refers
to the share of the person (hand) who had brought the kolanut.
25
Following the theory advanced by Russian botanist and geneticist Nikolai Vavilov that
the region of the greatest diversity of species of any plant is likely to be the location
where the plant was first domesticated, life scientist A.O. Anya has significantly argued
that what we know today as Igboland was the center where these two particular plants
were first domesticated (Anya 1982). Although Anya did not analyze the implications
of kolanut and yam in terms of gender, slavery or interregional trade specifically, he did
stress a relationship among the economy and ecology and social organization.
What is clear is that even the cosmological and religious constructs of a society – the
way it sees the world around it and the forces which shape its world are functional
derivatives of the ecological and economic situation. The lgbo polity must, therefore,
be understood against the background of its evolution and stability through the mil-
lennia: it was a viable organism designed to mediate and conserve relations in a sophis-
ticated and successful but nevertheless predominantly sedentary agricultural economy.
Even the religious and moral attributes which are associated with this culture bear the
imprint of its ecological and thus agricultural origin (Anya 1982).
Whether or not Igboland was where the kolanut was first domesticated, as Anya has
suggested, the antiquity of the use of kolanut (and yam) in Igbo life is beyond doubt.
There are several other reasons that long-distance trade in kolanut

did not develop in the north. The Igbo preferred a different species of
kolanu from the one preferred by the Hausa. To the Igbo, Cola nitida –
the species preferred by the Hausa – was grossly inferior to Cola
acuminata and was unsuitable for ritual and social purposes. The Igbo
placed much value on the multiplicity of cotyledons or segments of a
kolanut – the greater number of cotyledons the better and the fewer,
the worse. A monocotyledon kolanut was deemed taboo and discarded
as ojị ogbu (dumb kolanut). The preferred C. acuminita typically had
a minimum of three but often several more. Yet, the much-desired C.
acuminata had a poor yield relative to C. nitida, taking upward of ten
years to produce its first fruits, and the yield was thereafter agoniz-
ingly slow. Mature C. acuminata trees do not produce any fruits at all
in some years.26 C. acuminata is also more perishable, requiring more
elaborate preservation arrangements than C. nitida. Even if the Igbo
had tried, it was unlikely that they could have developed an export
trade based on C. acuminata. The combination of relatively poor yield,
higher perishability rate, and robust domestic demand would have
made C. acuminata too expensive to compete with products from else-
where. On the other hand, the Asante, who produced the more prolific
C. nitida, were not significant consumers, nor did kolanuts have social
or spiritual purchase among them, a fact that enabled them to supply
vast quantities of the product at competitive prices. For the Igbo to
compete with the Asante for the Hausa kolanut market, they had to
produce C. nitida, quite apart from surmounting the other obstacles to
the north-south trade with the Hausa.27 There are also indications that
the Hausa preferred C. nitida to C. auminata (Dickson 1969:72–73,
103; Abaka 2005:19, 20). Hausa traders could thus afford to bypass
the region throughout the Atlantic slave trade era, channeling captives,
mainly from the Middle Belt, and trade goods from across the Sahara
toward the Gold Coast.
26
With modern agricultural methods, C. acuminata bears fruits in seven to eight years, but
it needs to be watered regularly (www.tradewindsfruit.com). Since the Igbo did not water
fruit trees regularly, their kolanut trees would have taken somewhat longer to yield fruits.
27
Despite the impression given by Anya that the Igbo have produced multiple varieties kola-
nut for centuries, however, it is unclear that C. nitida was among their products before
the twentieth century. One strong indication of this is that the twentieth-century Igbo
identified C. nitida specifically with the Hausa, referring to it as ojị Ausa (Hausa kolanut)
or “gworo,” which is the generic Hausa reference for all kolanut. Hausa traders in the late
nineteenth and early twentieth centuries may in fact have given C. nitida the little popular-
ity it gained in Igboland, if they did not introduce it in there in the first place.
While there is evidence of goods entering the region from Asia and
the Middle East as early as the ninth century and probably considerably
before, suggesting long-standing trade links with regions across the Sahara,
nothing shows that such trade contacts survived into the slave trade era.
The religion of Islam, which usually accompanied the trans-Saharan trade
in West Africa, was lacking in the Bight of Biafra because trade contacts
with the north were made before Islam became a significant force in West
Africa. One other indication of the marginality of the trans-Saharan trade
in the region is that the Middle Belt does not appear to have accounted
for a large share of the captives exported through Bight of Biafra ports
in the period up to 1700, even though the Hausa and the Bornu raided
the Middle Belt for captives as early as the early sixteenth century.28 After
the seventeenth century, Hausa traders drew from the Middle Belt most
of the captives they sold in Gold Coast markets, where they were valued
as ndonko (foreigner slaves) (Herskovits 1926:20; Lovejoy 1982, 271;
Reynolds 1974, 12). This practice escalated in the nineteenth century and
the Hausa continued to send many of the victims to Gold Coast markets
(Herskovits 1936:17, 20, 22; Mason 1969). Based on his frequent slaving
voyages to the Bight of Biafra in the last twenty years of the eighteenth
century, Captain John Adams confirmed that captives leaving the Bonny
port rarely included people from north of the Igbo. No evidence of trade
from across the Sahara exists for this period for the forest region of the
Bight of Biafra. Certainly, there were no horses, and in spite of all the talk
about their high mortality rates in forest conditions, horses became an
instant attraction when they eventually reached the forest region of the
Bight of Biafra during the nineteenth century. It is true that several crops –
such as bananas, plantains, cocoyam (or Colocassia esculata) and even the
Dioscorea species of yam – and domestic animals such as goat and fowl
that have long been considered basic items in the diet of people of the Bight
of Biafra are said to have derived from South Asia sometime in the distant
past. Other than these artifacts of the Igbo-Ukwu vintage, dating back to
the ninth century, are the only goods from the Indian Ocean commerce
known to have traveled into the region from across the Sahara.29 Other
28
In the 1520s, Leo Africanus reported of Hausa raiding their neighbors and Hausa mer-
chants being involved in trade with distant lands, principally “the Region abounding in
Gold” (Africanus 1896:831, 832). Raymond Mauny is of the view that the raids were
directed against against southern groups (Middle Belt) (Mauny 1961:190). See also
Barbour and Jacobs 1985: 127.
29
Adams (1832:33). See Hair (1967:262–64) for ethnolinguistic distribution of Americas –
bound captives up to 1700, Sargent (1999:8, 9, 13, 106–31) for Benin expansion
items that may have continued to enter the Bight of Biafra from the Indian
Ocean during the Atlantic slave trade era were more likely to have done so
via east-west routes through Central and East Africa in the east and Benin
in the west. The four-day market cycle, which Central African communi-
ties as eastward as the Kongo shared with groups in the Bight of Biafra, is
probably an indication of long-standing commercial interactions between
this part of West and Central Africa.30 Clearly, there were important struc-
tural reasons for the failure or virtual absence of the trans-Saharan trade
in the Bight of Biafra during the centuries of the overseas slave trade. These
reasons go beyond the simple idea that the forest is a great impediment to
the horse- and camel-driven caravan trade. Hausa traders did, after all,
trade as far as Kumasi in the Gold Coast, a trade which Leo Africanus
informs us was well in place by the 1520s when he visited West Africa
(Africanus 1896:831, 832).
The isolation of the forest region of the Bight of Biafra from the
trans-Saharan trade during the Atlantic slave trade era seems to have
also been associated with the rise and special circumstances of the state
of Kwararafa in northeastern Middle Belt by the fourteenth century.
Incessant conflicts with neighboring Muslim Hausa states, including
the trans-Saharan commercial powerhouses Kano and Borno, forced
Kwararafa southward, transforming it “from a Sudanic state with lim-
ited access to the trans-Saharan commercial system to a troubled mid-
dle belt polity competing for Benue commerce and overland trade to
[Old] Calabar in the south.” Kwararafa then clashed perennially with
the Middle Belt polities, until its demise and supersession by non-Is-
lamic states in the seventeenth century (Sargent 1999:8, 211–40). These
conflicts in both the north and south disrupted the trans-Saharan trade
in the Middle Belt, especially in the eastern axis adjacent to the Bight
of Biafra, a process that culminated in the decimation of the Kwararafa
successor state Jukun by the Tiv and Igala by the eighteenth century. The
westward and northward expansion of Benin after 1500 enabled the
kingdom to link the transatlantic trade to northerners, who increasingly
desired goods from the trade, but no comparable process promoted
and northern states’ development of interest in transatlantic trade goods, Lovejoy

(1994: Appendix) for a nineteenth-century sample, Herskovits (1936) and Adamu
(1979). For the importance of the horse in West African history, see Law (1980:23),
and for the provenance of key crops and domestic animals from South Asia, see Forde
1953: 210–11.
30
For a suggestion of east-west routes, see Afigbo 1977:119; and for Central African mar-
ket cycle, see Vansina 1961:100.
north-south exchange in the Bight of Biafra.31 The trade that resulted

was significant only in comparison with the Bight of Biafra; Benin influ-
ence apparently did not sustain a large volume of trade between the
Hausa and the greater Bight of Benin. The region, like the Bight of
Biafra, did not have kolanuts for export, but here it was due to lack of
significant production. It also appears that the instability in the Middle
Belt worked to discourage Hausa traders from nurturing a kolanut trade
with the Bight of Benin, leaving Gold Coast kolanuts as the cost-effective
option. Given the influence of trans-Saharan demand in influencing
low female ratios among captives sent to the Americas via West African
ports, the kolanut, by its failure to generate the trans-Saharan trade in
the Bight of Biafra, is implicated in the gender structure of the region’s
overseas slave trade.
If the absence of the kolanut trade in the Bight of Biafra was some-
how linked with the relatively high female ratio among captives exported
from there, some correlation between the kolanut trade, on the one hand,
and the gender structure of the Atlantic slave trade in both the Bight of
Benin and the Gold Coast, on the other, is also to be expected. As Table
6.1 shows, the Bight of Benin has the highest female ratio after the Bight
of Biafra. After the seventeenth century, when the female ratio of captives
sent to the Atlantic from this region had parity with the African mean,
the region sent a higher proportion of females than was the norm, except
for the Bight of Biafra. Significantly, the kolanut trade did not take off in
the Bight of Benin until the overseas slave trade had ended, toward the
end of the nineteenth century, after liberated Africans from Sierra Leone
and, more important, Hausa merchants had begun importing kolanuts
to Lagos from Sierra Leone and the Gold Coast, respectively (Dickson
1969:150–53; Lovejoy 1980:6, 94, 114–17, 145).32 The late development
31
See Lovejoy and Hogendorn 1979:225 for the decimation of the Jukun trade, and Sargent
1999:93, 191, 194 for the role of Benin in facilitating north–south trade in the seventh
century.
32
This import would have catered, in part, to the needs of the Lagos Afro-Brazilian com-
munity, among whom Kristin Mann found kolanut to be of some economic and cul-
tural significance during the second half of the nineteenth century (Mann 2007:127). It
was also around this time that the Egba Yoruba of Abeokuta joined the kolanut trade
(Biobaku 1965:10). Evidence from the nineteenth century suggests that the Yoruba used
kolanut in divination and as can be gleaned from the work of Saburi Biobaku also as
status symbol and the symbolic “breaking kola together” (sharing a kolanut) was used
to mark the settlement of disputes (see Biobaku 1965:14–15 n1, 28, 106n; Ojo 1966:53).
No doubt, kolanut was important among the Yoruba, but Afolabi Ojo appears to have
exaggerated its historical, social and spiritual significance among them when he stated
in the 1960s: “Kolanuts remains the choicest present and offering on all occasions: no
of the kolanut trade between Bight of Benin’s forest belt and Hausaland
during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries reflects the fact that trade
between the two regions was not as robust as is usually assumed and
pales in comparison to contemporary trade between Hausaland and the
Gold Coast. When in the first half of the twentieth century anthropologist
Melville Herskovits asked Hausa elders who had participated in the cara-
van trade late in the previous century, “whether or not trading was car-
ried on to the south into the territory of the Yoruban peoples of Southern
Nigeria, or into Dahomey, the reply was negative – for both countries
it was said that ‘the donkey doesn’t go there’” (Herskovits 1936:19).
Had this trade been robust and had production of kolanut resulted as
expected in Bight of Benin’s forest belt, more Hausa traders would have
traded in this region and likely would have bought more female captives
from there than they did, reducing the pool of female captives available
for overseas export through Bight of Benin ports.
The Gold Coast provides perhaps the starkest example of the kola-
nut trade impacting the gender structure of the slave trade. The propor-
tion of females sent overseas from the region was noticeably higher than
the African mean during the late seventeenth century, but their numbers
declined drastically in the eighteenth century, suggesting changes in the
pattern of demand for female captives in the hinterland (Table 6.1).
Evidence from the nineteenth century, which in all likelihood held for the
eighteenth century as well, shows that female captives were sold at a pre-
mium in inland Gold Coast, where Hausa traders operated (Herskovits
1936:20). This trend suggests the existence of a virile northbound export
market for female captives in the Gold Coast. Since we know that the
Atlantic market placed a higher value on males, this export market would
have seen the trans-Saharan sector featuring Hausa buyers, who resold
the bulk of the female captives to buyers from across the Sahara. The
sharp decline seen in the female proportion of Atlantic-bound Gold Coast
captives has recently been attributed to the decline of the male labor-
intensive gold economy and the rise of nonmining sectors, principally agri-
culture (Nwokeji, forthcoming). To this must be added the kolanut trade
ceremony or function, ancient or modern, is complete without it. Its antiquity and useful-
ness are further attested to in its being entrenched in the life and thought of the people”
(Ojo 1966:52–53). These comments effectively place kolanut among the Yoruba on the
same pedestal as among the Igbo, but the ubiquity of kolanuts in historical and anthro-
pological studies of the Igbo appears to be unmatched in Yoruba studies, and the kolanut
ritual is not as prominent in Yoruba life as Igbo. In fact, the only source Ojo cites in sup-
port of his comments is Igbo scholar Onuora Nzekwu (1961).
which, as Kwamina Dickson and Lovejoy have shown, crystallized in the

late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries (see Dickson 1969:72–73,
103; Lovejoy 1980). The increased male ratio of captives leaving Gold
Coast ports after the seventeenth century was – even if in a small way –
also reinforced by the aforementioned supply of male captives by Hausa
caravan traders. The surplus male captives from the north – that is, those
not enslaved by Gold Coast masters – ended in the Atlantic markets. The
kolanut trade was not the only explanation for the gender structure of
the slave trade as a whole, but it does need to be taken into consideration
in assessing the impact of trans-Saharan demand on the structure of the
overseas slave trade.
The kolanut also invokes the role of culture in shaping markets as
well as the relation of culture to economics in shaping the overseas
slave trade. It is suggested here that, while economic considerations
motivated Gold Coast producers to take advantage of Hausa demand,
the role of the kolanut in Igbo culture acted as an impediment to the
development of trade with the Hausa, even if we exclude the other iden-
tified obstacles to that trade. Because of the marginality of the Saharan
market in the overseas slave trade era in the Bight of Biafra and to a
lesser extent, in the Bight of Benin, effective demand for female cap-
tives from the Saharan market did not exist in the former and seems
not to have been as robust in the latter as is usually supposed. Saharan
demand had little influence on the Atlantic and domestic markets for
captives in the Bights, particularly the Bight of Biafra, in comparison
to what happened elsewhere in West Africa, a compelling factor in the
relative high female ratios among captives sent into the Atlantic from
the two regions.
Changes in Gender Structure over Time

If the share of females entering the trade in the Bight of Biafra was
apparently always larger than that of other major African regions, why
did it decrease over time? In Niger Delta and Cross River ports, the
percentage of females remained near parity until the first quarter of the
eighteenth century, fell to about 41 percent in the third quarter, when it
stabilized, and fell again in the fourth quarter to just above one-third, a
figure that held for as long as the trade lasted in the nineteenth century.
The second-quarter plateau between these downward shifts coincides
with the rise of Bonny to its position as a major departure point. The
decline in the share of females is apparent in all African regions, but in
the Bight of Biafra it appears to be associated with Igbo lineage practices

and the character of Aro expansion. This development – though perhaps
not decisive – would have left fewer females for the Atlantic traffic.
The central importance of reproducing the lineage in most African
societies accounts for this behavior. Association with large groups of
people through kinship networks conferred a prestige separate from the
economic rewards that the labor of those people generated. Lineages
could expand through the addition of outsiders or through natural
increase. In most parts of Atlantic Africa, procreation was the primary
means of expansion, a phenomenon that placed a premium on fecundity.
In late seventeenth-century Benin, the Dutch witness David Van Nyendael
observed that “the fruitful Woman is highly valued, whilst the Barren is
despised” (Van Nyendael 1702:447, 462, 463). Similarly, according to
Coquery-Vidrovitch, the African “woman’s value and status depended
first on her fertility and second on her cooperativeness, initiative, and
ability to work” (Coquery-Vidrovitch 1997:16). Among Igbo women,
bearing children was a source of joy; daughters would strengthen existing
ties and create new ones, and sons would consolidate a woman’s place in
her husband’s lineage. Not having children often led to a miserable life,
and Igbo folk tales suggest that infertile women were often objects of
mockery and victimization.
Within the context of the value of children in Biafra societies, the
rise in child ratios – which with the decline in male ratios were major
distinguishing features of nineteenth-century Biafra Atlantic captive
exports – is initially puzzling. Increased child ratios, however, reflected
the increased proportion of girls sent into the overseas traffic, not of
boys. Similarly, increased female ratios derived in part from the greater
increase in girl ratios. These are clear indications of the region’s greater
readiness to export females, and especially girls, than was found in other
regions.
The increase in girl and decrease in boy ratios reflected the male
(especially boy) bias of the indigenous institutions of the family and
slavery. Boys were so important that a man “must have a son or be writ-
ten off the dynasty” (Ojike 1946:6). The preference for boys seems to
have taken roots in Biafra societies before the Atlantic slave trade, and
we see evidence of the incorporation of boys acquired from outside to
boost lineage-groups. The founders of at least two major Aro settlements
are known to have entered Aro society in this way from communities
in the Nri-Awka area sometime in the first half of the eighteenth cen-
tury (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:178–79, 181, 208). These boy slaves,
Ikelionwu Ufere and Owuu Mgboli, grew up, became free, rich, and
famous, and established Ndikelionwu and Ndiowuu, respectively, in
the eastern Nri-Awka area. The higher numbers of children and young
adolescents sold in the internal markets suggest that indigenous slavery
focused on increasing the existing population by integrating outsiders
(K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:74, 250–51; Ekejiuba 1972b:12). The
basic reason for slaveholders’ preference for children within the Bight of
Biafra was the ease of assimilating children into kin groups in most soci-
eties. This calculation remained important even in the late nineteenth
century when the labor consideration seems to have been predominant.
Adults might pose social problems if incorporated into the household.
Although the price data are sketchy and they do not distinguish between
boys and girls, we might still ask what implication this trend would
have had on prices in the hinterland. In contrast to the assumption that
girls fetched higher prices than boys in African markets (e.g., Galenson
1986:107–10), ceteris paribus, a higher cost of boys (relative to girls) in
the Biafra hinterland should be assumed.33
Although such values are scarcely unique to the Igbo, the extension of
Aro influence had some exceptional features that have implications for the
falling female ratios in the Bight of Biafra. The Aro network was the only
non-Muslim trade diaspora and a large African organization espousing
what Uchendu describes as “big compound” ideals to acquire slaves pri-
marily by trade (Uchendu 1965:54–56). Military activity was probably
33
Most available prices are quoted in different currencies and exchange rates are not avail-
able. Moreover, sources are often vague in describing the categories of captives whose
prices they quote. For example, although British observers in Abo tell us that a sixteen-
year-old cost sixty shillings in 1832 and a woman “something more,” the age of the
woman and sex of the sixteen-year-old are unclear (Laird and Oldfield 1837:103, 106).
Another Abo price in 1854, is quoted at one pair of ivory for three captives (Baikie
1856:56). In about 1855, four to six adult captives exchanged for one horse in the major
fairs of the hinterland. Whatever may be the specific value of ivory or horses, the sizes of
which could vary significantly, it is clear that these prices were very low, at least in part, a
reflection of the ending of the slave trade. These low prices for adults are consistent with
contemporaneous information on the hinterland fairs, where an adult sold for one bull-
ock (Ekejiuba 1972a:21). Late nineteenth-century information shows that adults above
twenty-six years old, disparagingly called otankwu (s/he who consumes palm nuts), were
the least expensive. They sold for only 40 mkpona (brass rods) or £3, compared with
£5 to £10 for apapa and 400 mkpona or £30 for asamiri (Fox 1964:23). Although Fox
gives the exchange rate at 1 mkpona = 1s. 6d, the conversion of the figures results in rates
drastically different from his £30 = 400 mkpona. This works out at 13.33 mkpona = £1.
The low prices offered for the otankwu not only reflects low desirability for them but
also the effect of the elimination of the overseas market. For the complexity of African
price data, see Law (1991a).
a less important means of getting captives in the Bight of Biafra than in

other regions. The Aro did not rule directly over the source populations,
and their influence spread primarily through trade, cultural prestige, and
religious clout, not conquest. They augmented their own population
through the massive incorporation of people as immigrants, refugees,
clients, and slaves. The Aro acquired women principally as wives and
overall absorbed more females from central Igboland than males. Those
men they did take in – by whatever means – invariably found wives from
elsewhere (Chapter 4). In other words, for each new male entrant, there
was at least one female entrant as a wife. A principal mechanism ensuring
this practice was that immigrants, including ex-slaves, could not normally
marry Aro women, and they often chose to marry from their natal homes.
In this, they were encouraged by Aro men who also saw the region as a
prime reservoir of wives. The preference for Nri-Awka women derived
from the Aro drive to expand business ties and a belief, firmly entrenched
by the nineteenth century, that Nri-Awka women made good wives. Since
most marriages originated from third-party introductions, commercial
and nuptial ties reinforced each other. Many Aro from the central Igbo
settlements were the sons or grandsons of Nri-Awka women. It is difficult
to find a man who did not marry from the Nri-Awka region.
The Aro tendency to accumulate women and the rising influence of
the Aro network – though not decisive – would have contributed to
the decline in the ratio of women leaving the Bight of Biafra. Women
accounted for 46 percent of the total 51 percent of female departures
between 1650 and 1700 but a mere 15 percent of the total 35.3 percent
of females in the last quarter of the trade.34 Thus, while the proportion
of women decreased radically over these periods, the proportion of girls
increased sharply as well. While the girl share of the trade moved errati-
cally, about a third of the increase occurred in the nineteenth century. The
increased shares of men and girls reflected a short-term need for women
in the Bight of Biafra in the nineteenth century and the premium placed
on boys as instruments of the lineage.
Sex Ratio and Polygyny

Despite the dramatic fall in the portion of women, polygyny – an institu-
tion that both fascinated and remained largely beyond the comprehension
of European visitors to Atlantic Africa – does not appear to have either
34
The female ratio is drawn from www.Slavevoyages.org.
shaped or been shaped by the demographic composition of the slave trade,

notwithstanding the strong opinions of some modern scholars.35 There
is no evidence in the Bight of Biafra of a rising incidence of polygyny
during or after the expansion of captive departures from the region. If the
decreasing female ratio of export captives is an indication of increasing
incidence of polygyny, this would have been more because there was an
increasing need for women’s labor than, as has been suggested in recent
literature, the mere abundance of women in the population, caused partly
by the increasing share of men sent into the Atlantic trade. If the abun-
dance of women in populations left behind by the overseas slave trade
had been the cause of polygyny, then the ending of that traffic would have
reduced the incidence of polygyny.
But this is not the case; the incidence of polygyny instead rose in
the Bight of Biafra and elsewhere following the suppression of the
overseas traffic in the mid-nineteenth century, a phenomenon historian
Nakanyike Musisi in another context calls “elite polygyny” – defined
as marrying more than four wives (Musisi 1991:757–86). By this time,
the palm oil trade had become more valuable than the slave trade. In
the slave trade era, dramatic examples of polygyny tend to come from
the Slave Coast and West-Central Africa rather than from the Bight
of Biafra and the Gold Coast. Bosman reported that in the late sev-
enteenth and early eighteenth centuries Gold Coast men “content[ed]
themselves with one, two, three, and the most considerable Men, with
eight, ten or twenty Wives,” while men in the Bight of Benin port
town of Whydah had “forty or fifty, and their chief Captains three or
four Hundred, some one Thousand, and the King betwixt four and
five Thousand.” Joseph Miller documents that “the numbers of young
wives surrounding older males … astonished visitors to the interior of
Angola” in West–Central Africa.36 This difference between the Bight of
Biafra and the Gold Coast, on the one hand, and the Slave Coast and
West-Central Africa, on the other, could be either the cause or effect of
35
Philip Curtin (1964:252) has observed that “polygyny stood out as a special evil” to
Europeans of the Enlightenment. The British slave trader John Hippisley pointed to
the gender imbalance of export captives and men lost in wars. But the tendency for
the richest men to have many wives “does not prevent the poorest from having one
or two …. The number of women must, therefore, exceed that of men” (Hippisley
1764: 14–16, 16n). For a modern opinion that the trade encouraged polygyny, see
Manning 1990:41; 1981:501, 503.
36
Bosman 1705:344. The importance of sex ratios in polygyny is well recognized by mod-
ern scholars, for example, Manning 1990:42; 1981:501, 503; Miller 1988:163; Thornton
1980:425.
the higher proportions of females among the captives sent from these
regions.
The sex ratio does not, however, appear to be the principal factor driv-
ing polygyny. In one region in Kongo (West-Central Africa), for instance,
a baptismal register for the years 1774 and 1775 reveals that only fifty-four
(10.6 percent) of the 507 recorded families were polygynous. Among this
polygynous group, perhaps forty-six (9.2 percent of all the families in the
register) had only two wives. Only one man, described as “the lord of
the area,” had as many as four. As John Thornton notes, “the majority of
marriages were monogamous” (Thornton 1977:411–12). His conclusion
accords with what we know of the conditions in the vast majority of Bight
of Biafra societies, beyond the trading states, and likely also for much of
Atlantic Africa, at least up to the early nineteenth century. Of the fifty-six
ex-slaves in the Koelle Sierra Leone sample who were married at the time
of enslavement, only ten (18 percent) were polygynous – four of them had
only two wives each; only two had three wives; there was one each with
four, five and seven wives, and another (an Ewe) had married two wives
and inherited twenty-two or more wives from his father (Hair 1965:194).
How representative were these statistics? Because the ex-slaves in Koelle’s
sample were mostly young at the time of enslavement – only nine or 5
percent were more than forty years old – the rate of polygyny among them
appears to be considerably less than in the general African population. But
if, as Hair has observed, the average age of marriage for the contempo-
raneous African male population was twenty-five, and 53 percent of the
male respondents was aged twenty-five or more, with more than half of
these being over thirty years old at the time of enslavement, then the Koelle
sample is more representative of the general population than appears to be
the case at first. In light of low life-expectancy rates in precolonial Africa,
the ex-slaves who were married at the time of enslavement would have
been closer in age to the average age of married men in the general popula-
tion because they were likely drawn overwhelmingly from the ones who
were older at the time of enslavement. Yet, while West-Central Africa, with
a similar rate of polygyny with the Bight of Biafra and indeed much of
Atlantic Africa, sent into the Atlantic slave trade the lowest proportion of
females after the Upper Guinea Coast, the Bight of Biafra sent the highest.
This comparison suggests that polygyny was not universal in Africa and
that men married women, not simply because of the abundance of women,
but also because men needed women’s labor and reproductive resources.
In the final decades of the slave trade from the Bight of Biafra, the
declining female ratio was reinforced by a change in the economic role
of women in the Niger Delta and Cross River areas. Palm oil production
became a major activity in the region. Because palm oil was a labor-
intensive industry in which the Aro had a major role (though less so
than the slave trade) and because by the late 1830s the value of palm oil
exports surpassed those of captives sent to the Americas, the pressures on
the Aro to hold women at home are evident. Less easy is a quantitative
assessment of this effect.
Conclusion
African conceptions of gender shaped the sex and age structure of the
overseas slave trade. These constructs emerged from factors altogether
more profound than the merely economic. The unusual pattern in the
sex ratio of captives exported from the Bight of Biafra is perhaps best
explained by the cultural determinants of the male and female roles in
agriculture, the virtual absence of the trans-Saharan market, and by
enslavement methods in an environment of decentralized political power.
The convergence of these factors resulted in large numbers of women
being sent into the overseas trade. The region with female ratios closer
to those of the Bight of Biafra is the Bight of Benin. This is because the
gender division of labor in the Yoruba region of the Bight of Benin and
the region’s involvement in the trans-Saharan trade were more similar to
those of the Igbo in the Bight of Biafra than is often recognized. Though
the influence of the trans-Saharan trade seems to have been consider-
able in the Bight Benin during the early stages of the transatlantic slave
trade era, the former trade seems to have waned after the seventeenth
century, following the rise of the kolanut trade between the Hausa and
the Asante of the Gold Coast. The kolanut trade seems to have diverted
trans-Saharan trade from the Bight of Benin to the Gold Coast.
This proposition is indicated in fluctuations in the female proportions
of captives exported through both the Bight of Benin and the Gold Coast.
While the female ratio declined sharply in the Gold Coast with the rise
of trans-Saharan demand via Hausa traders between the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries, it increased appreciably in the Bight of Benin dur-
ing the same period with what appears to have been a decline in trade
with the Hausa. While females accounted for 40.6 percent of captives
exported through Bight of Benin ports and 50.6 in the Bight of Biafra
during the seventeenth century; the corresponding figures were 38.5 per-
cent and 42.5 percent in the eighteenth century; and 33.3 percent and
35.5 percent in the nineteenth century (Table 6.1). The continuing lag
in the Bight of Benin female ratio in comparison to the Bight of Biafra

may have reflected a greater role of warfare in the procurement of cap-
tives in the Bight of Benin. The gradual decrease in the female ratio over
time may have resulted from both the peculiar nature of Aro expansion
and the drive to incorporate new members into the lineage in the Bight
of Biafra, where this trend was steepest. Across the board, however, the
Atlantic slave trade intensified gender inequality everywhere, creating a
wider role for women (and therefore an increased demand for women in
the domestic economies) so that this process may have been self-correct-
ing in the long run.
7
Cultural and Economic Aftershocks
Cultural transformations of the Atlantic slave trade era and the after-
shocks of the traffic conspired to promote new value systems in the
second half of the nineteenth century that were markedly different
from earlier times. These changes occurred in the production and mar-
keting of the commodities that had replaced captives in the overseas
trade. The Bight of Biafra dominated the production of palm oil,
which had become the key commodity in West African trade. This
fact bespeaks an intensive economic activity in the region that had
far-reaching implications for the social structure, understood as an
identifiable pattern of social relationships among the principal groups
and institutions in society over the long term. Profound cultural,
demographic, and economic changes deriving from the Atlantic slave
trade and the increasing involvement of the British in the internal
affairs of the region converged in a maelstrom of violence. This pro-
cess is consistent with the violence that pervaded Africa during the
nineteenth century.
Nowhere in Atlantic Africa, however, was this violence as intense and
widespread as in the Bight of Biafra. The impact of external trade had
been perhaps more far-reaching here than in any region in Africa during
the period. The slave trade era had witnessed continuing Aro expansion
and its consolidation of existing diaspora settlements. Although trade
remained a significant part of Aro life, the Aro trading economy entered
a terminal crisis. The nature and intensity of warfare changed, and agri-
culture became a significant part of the equation in Aro life. Particularly
striking was the Aro’s development of a martial ethos – militarization and
its representations as an integral part of its value system – personified in
178
Cultural and Economic Aftershocks 179
the proliferation of the merchant-warriors that increasingly controlled

bands of Aro fighters. In a milieu and time in which the most success-
ful slave traders were the most respected, and the most ruthless were
the most feared and even revered, this fueled a state of instability rarely
witnessed even during the long centuries of the overseas slave trade. The
emergence and valorization of the merchant-warrior increased the inci-
dence of Aro wars against non-Aro groups, of Aro civil wars, and of
violent rivalries among the major Aro merchant-warriors as the clash of
colossal egos mixed with competition for spheres, clients, fame, and –
from the 1890s – land, straining and reshaping intergroup relations in
the region. This constituted a profound cultural shift because before the
mid-nineteenth century the Aro had been averse to directly partaking
in martial activities. In fact, they had taken pride in not being warriors
themselves.
The perception of the Aro as a people disinclined to martial activities
endured long after the group had embraced a martial ethos. European
observers, especially in the wake of the British Aro Expedition of
1901–02, held this view, and modern scholars have accepted it as a
permanent characterization of the Aro value system up to British con-
quest. In fact, the Aro attitude to martial activities began to change in
the second quarter of the nineteenth century. There is thus a perplexing
disconnect in the literature between the well-known Aro military activi-
ties of the second half of the nineteenth century and perceptions of the
Aro as nonmartial. The change in Aro attitude to fighting became con-
spicuous in the second half of the century, making it the most violent
era in Aro history. Centuries of slaving fostered institutions and prac-
tices that had escalated both organized and random violence. The fact
that the Aro, who were slave dealers, now spent their time and energy
destroying life suggests a significant change in their value system. Why,
then, did militarization take root among the Aro? Answers to this ques-
tion lie not only in the emergence of martial ethos among the Aro but
also in the macroeconomic and structural implications of the transition
from slave to palm produce exports, as well as of British imperialist
maneuvers.
Atlantic Economic Context

Dramatic changes in the structure and volume of the external trade had
far-reaching political and social consequences for all West African societ-
ies, but this transformation was bound to be extraordinary in the Bight
of Biafra. The circumstances of the region were peculiar.1 For much of

the century, the Biafra economy was the most dynamic in Atlantic Africa.
Palm oil, which perhaps accounted for three-quarters of the total value
of all African exports in the 1860s, was almost all produced in the forest-
belt hinterlands of the Bight of Biafra and Bight of Benin, and the Bight
of Biafra was in pole position and the largest producer worldwide. So
central was the palm-oil trade that it was reportedly of greater value in
this period than the slave trade ever was.2 The development of the palm-
oil trade was accompanied by substantial economic growth, the greatest
in all of West Africa (Northrup 1979:5). Since the region accounted for a
substantial share of the value of African exports, it is safe to assume even
in the absence of comprehensive import data that it would have domi-
nated imports as well.
The economic and social change in the mid-nineteenth century that
resulted from trade expansion and the transition from slave to nonslave
exports also involved transformations in the organization of trade that
resulted from technological changes associated mainly with the advent of
the steamship. The introduction of the commercial cargo steamer obvi-
ated the huge capital outlay that was needed to operate a ship, just as
the use of currency obviated the need for buyers to be importers as well.
These changes opened the African trade to the small-scale European
trader, who was able to penetrate inland markets, ultimately dislodging
local middlemen.3 According to British trader Harry Cotterell, who pio-
neered the new system in the Bight of Biafra and was active in the delta
trade from 1863 onward:
We found that our system of working the trade by steamers answered well, as
compared with the old-fashioned way followed by other Merchants of sending
sailing ships out with full cargoes, and keeping them waiting for months in the
River until they were loaded, as in addition to our advantage of getting out fresh
goods by each steamer, we also had the advantage of sending our Produce home
by them, thus getting it to the market, and the proceeds converted into the goods
1
Various studies have detailed the local effects of this change. Davidson (1961); M. Klein
(1968, 1971, 1972); Newbury (1969); Hopkins (1973:125–35); Reynolds (1974); Inikori
(1979, 1986, 1994a, 1994b); Noah (1980); Lovejoy (1983:159–83; 1989); Manning
(1986, 1988, 1990:140–47); Eltis (1987:223–42); Eltis and Jennings (1988); Becker
(1988); Law (1993, 1995b); Zeleza (1994:370–89); Sundiata (1996). For work dealing
with nineteenth-century changes in the region in the Bight of Biafra, see Dike (1956);
Northrup (1976, 1978, 1979); Noah (1980); Lynn (1981, 1997); Martin (1988); Oriji
(1982, 1983).
2
Hartley (1977:8); Eltis and Jennings (1988:946).
3
Lynn 1997:5, 7, ch. 6. See also P.N. Davies 1976:89n; Zeleza 1993.
two or three times, while other Merchants had theirs waiting until their ships
arrived, when the same process was again repeated. (Cotterell n.d.:38)
Dramatic economic change was also caused by the imperialist activi-

ties of the British, who happened to be seeking to suppress the overseas
slave trade as well as their imperial designs. But the successful ending
of the overseas slave trade in the region did not end British meddling in
regional affairs. To justify their imperialist agenda, the British articulated
a connection between imperialist encroachment on African societies and
the ending of the overseas slave trade, but the two were not necessar-
ily connected. True, the British were committed to ending the overseas
slave trade, but their intervention in the region drew its impetus from
economic self-interest. In their bid to displace local traders, European
traders enlisted official support of the British, who had already been flex-
ing their muscles for decades, in trying to curtail the independence of
coastal states. The overbearing presence of the British, highlighted by a
series of bombardments and sponsored expeditions against certain key
indigenous traders, mainly along the Niger waterway, tangled the impe-
rial power with many local ruling elites.4 The European presence also
incited and emboldened weak indigenous groups to stand up to oppressor
groups, escalating existing rivalries and creating new ones as rival power
groups sought to renegotiate existing arrangements to their advantage.
These developments posed a serious challenge to Aro dominance, forcing
the group to change its methods.
Continuing Importance of the Slave Trade

It is a well-acknowledged paradox of nineteenth-century West African
history that the suppression of the overseas slave trade and the rise of the
export commodity trade led to increased slaveholding in the region. The
British primary goal of controlling the new trade in the Bight of Biafra at
the expense of the indigenous middlemen was a palpable source of ten-
sion. If the importance of ending the slave trade was secondary to efforts
to dominate trade in British calculations, ending domestic slavery hardly
figured in at all until the twentieth century (Brown 1996; Ohadike 1988;
Nwokeji 1998b). The goal of the British was the uninterrupted production
of palm produce and European traders’ displacement of inland middle-
men in the name of “free trade.” Eager to promote the commodity trade,
4
For a documentation of these invasions, see J.U.J. Asiegbu 1984.
the British in the Bight of Biafra welcomed and even advocated the use of
slave labor in the production of export commodities. This was evident in
discussions British officials and traders had among themselves and with
the regional rulers with whom they came in contact (T.J. Hutchinson
1858:113, 264; Whitford [1877] 1967;163). In 1858, British governor of
Fernando Po and former consul in the Bight of Biafra Thomas Hutchinson
praised Kings Eyo and Eyamba of Old Calabar for having in 1842 sought
technical assistance in exploiting slave labor in the cultivation of coffee
and cotton and in the manufacture of sugar. “These men, with a sagac-
ity which did them much credit, saw that the slave population, becom-
ing superabundant by the forbiddal of their exportation, would require
employment to keep them from mischief, as well as to contribute to their
daily sustenance.” Apparently, Commander Raymond of Royal Navy’s
Spy, with whom coastal kings had made an antislave trade treaty, was
equally impressed (see T.J. Hutchinson 1858:113). In fact, Hutchinson
saw the enslavement of people within the region not only as a source
of labor for producing export staples but also as a direct solution to the
Atlantic slave trade. He argued that
the external as well as internal slave trade will only be effectually put an end to
when the chiefs and masters in Africa are taught, and understand, how far more
profitably to themselves they can exercise slave labor in the cultivation of their
soil, than by selling it. They will then be brought to see, that it is not consistent
with common sense, transporting away the native Africans to Brazil to cultivate
and manufacture sugar, to America to grow and pick cotton, to Cuba to aid in the
tilling of tobacco, when the very same products can be obtained from their own
ground at home. (Hutchinson 1858:264)
In about 1875, a British trading agent on the Niger, John Whitford ([1877]
1967:163), urged an Abo prince to “make your slaves collect palm-oil to
exchange for those desirable things” – a sure reference to European prod-
ucts. British policy of promoting commodity production as an alternative
employer of slave labor formerly exported to the Americas fueled the
domestic slave market.
Demand for labor in the region sustained a sizeable slave mar-
ket. Although the use of slave labor in palm produce production was
minimal, the extreme labor intensity and inefficiency of the industry
stretched household labor to the limit and indirectly encouraged the
growth of slavery in other industries. With much woman and child
labor occupied by working in aspects of the multifaceted palm pro-
duce production process, particularly the tedium of cracking palm
kernels, entrepreneurs in other industries looked to the slave market
for the recruitment of labor.5 The interactions of the three economic

zones – coastal, palm belt, and the northeastern – which Northrup
argues emerged during the nineteenth century, casts light on the
expansion of slavery (Northrup 1979:5–11). The labor needs in all
three regions were directly or indirectly related to the palm-oil trade.
In the coastal zone, traders utilized manpower as assistants and por-
ters and to man the canoes that the traders used for transporting their
wares (Northrup 1979:6–7, 12). King William Dappa Pepple of Bonny
accepted captives in liquidation of debts owed him, and increased his
own slaveholding (Hargreaves 1987:222). Virtually everywhere in the
zone, wealthy merchants established food producing, slave-worked
“plantations” of mainly yams and plantains.6 The second zone con-
sisted of the densely populated central Igboland, which formed a part
of the palm belt, and the more stratified inland trading communities.7
Given that women did much of the oil extraction work, the cessa-
tion of the overseas traffic would have had a salutary effect on labor
in a region that exported by far the highest proportion of females in
the heyday of the Atlantic slave trade.8 Significantly the demand for
captives in the palm belt and among the trading groups of the zone
appears to have been on the increase in the 1860s (Northrup 1979:8;
Oriji 1981:318). The third zone, according to Northrup, was the area
north and east of the palm belt, the slave-dependent food basket of
the region. Low population densities had characterized this region at
the beginning of the nineteenth century, but settlements here spread
and expanded as the century wore on.9 Complementing the significant
natural population increase was the addition of “large numbers of
slaves” bought from Aro traders.10
Although the palm produce industry was a minor direct employer of
slave labor, agriculture and trade depended heavily on slave labor, and
5
For details, see Nwokeji 1999:201; Hartley 1977:716–18; A. Martin 1956:12; S. Martin
1988:33; R.K. Udo 1970:73.
6
Becroft, et al. 1844:268, 271; Cookey 1974:15, 63; Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:252;
Ekejiuba 1972b:14; Latham 1973:91–96; Lovejoy 1983:178; Nair 1972:37, 42–43;
Walker 1875.
7
The palm belt also encompassed the entire Ngwa and Isuama as well as much of the
Cross River areas, especially Ibibioland.
8
For the role of women in palm produce production, see Becroft et al. 1844:274; S. Martin
1988:32; R.K. Udo 1970:73.
9
Also Floyd 1969:50–51. These processes were a source of bloody conflicts among groups
in this region, such that were still prevalent in the early colonial period (see Bridges
n.d.:68–69).
10
Northrup 1979:9–10; W.R.G. Horton 1954:311; G.I. Jones 1961.
British policy promoted massive slaveholding. The Aro controlled a thriv-

ing domestic slave market as they had controlled its overseas-oriented
counterpart, and were thus able to continue to maintain some influence
throughout the region.
Continuing Aro influence drew also on the ongoing expansion of
their diaspora communities and markets, as well as the establishment of
new ones. This expansion had three dimensions. First, existing diaspora
groups expanded through addition of new lineage-groups. For example,
three new lineage-groups emerged in Arondizuogu between 1840 and
1850 (see Table 4.2 in Chapter 4), and the Ndieni cluster added new
lineage-groups from migrants from the Nri-Awka area, assimilating
some of their neighbors in the process.11 Second, the diaspora settlements
themselves established diaspora settlements of their own. For example,
between the 1850s and 1870s, the Ndieni settlement Ndeikelionwu and
sections of Arondizuogu established settlements in the southwestern
Nri-Awka region and northeastern Imo River region, respectively (Umo
n.d.:57; I.O. Nwankwo 1986). Third, more Aro from the homeland
poured into existing diaspora settlements, as when the merchant-warrior
from Arochukwu, Okoroji, founded a settlement immediately northeast
of Arondizuogu (G.C. Mmeregini 1978; Okoroji 1996), and two Aro
groups, Ndinjoku and Ndimoko, moved into the upper Imo River, just
east of Arondizuogu (see Umo n.d.:57). This expansion explains the obvi-
ous increase in Aro activities in northeastern Igboland in the second half
of the nineteenth century, which resulted in some of the many Aro settle-
ments in that region.12
Existing slave marts continued to wax and new ones seem to have
been opened in the Middle Belt and along the Niger into west Niger.13
Apart from local traditions, reports of African repatriate missionaries
and of European officials, missionaries, explorers, and traders, have
described numerous Niger slave markets and Aro role in the second half
of the century.14 The Ibiniukpabi oracle remained a major instrument
11
Agu (1985:17); Chinyele (1972); Dike and Ekejiuba (1990:180–81); J. Ike (1972);
M. Iloha (1972); J. Kanu (1972); Ngene (1972); Nwene (1972); C. Okafor (1986:122);
N. Okoli (1972).
12
For Aro activity in late nineteenth-century northern Igboland, see W.R.G. Horton
(1954:311); G.I. Jones (1961); Northrup (1979:10).
13
It was in the nineteenth century that the Aro became truly influential in the Middle
Belt (Ijoma and Njoku 1991:208). For Aro settlements and markets in this region, see
Mathews 1922:9.
14
Baikie (1856:308); Crowther and Taylor (1859:23, 256, 288); Moor (1902:1). For rel-
evant traditions, see Mefo and Ibe (1972); Chukwura (1977); Kwentoh (1977).
of Aro influence. European visitors during the second half of the nine-
teenth century frequently reported on this influence.15 The new state of
Opobo established in 1869 made trade with the Aro the cornerstone
of its economic policy. King Jaja, whom A.A. Cowan described as “the
most powerful potentate the Oil Rivers ever produced,” was desirous
to court and protect Aro trade (Cowan 1935:400; Johnston 1923:178).
He “made certain that those within his sphere of influence respected the
authority of the Aro oracle.” In one instance, he had a leading citizen of
Ndoki, north of Opobo, flayed alive for ignoring the oracle’s injunction
(Cookey 1974:90). The Obi of Abo named one of his sons Chukwuma,
signifying a person whose birth was connected with the Aro oracle,
Chukwu (Ibiniukpabi).16 In the 1890s, as many as 800 persons from the
Niger communities visited the oracle yearly, according to British High
Commissioner Ralph Moor in 1902.17 The influence of the oracle rein-
forced the domestic slave trade.
While the internal slave trade continued, Aro society and economy
began to change fundamentally in the late nineteenth century. The catalyst
was not Aro an inability to compete in the produce trade, but the conse-
quences of production and marketing – the same forces that sustained the
internal slave trade. Thus, the main problem that confronted the Aro was
not the end of the Atlantic slave trade per se, but the response of non-Aro
groups to the palm-oil trade, the macroeconomic consequences of palm
produce production, and British imperialist maneuvers. Aro influence
worried the British, who took care to monitor Aro activities, especially in
the Niger riverine states of Oguta, Atani, and Assay (Anene 1959:22–23).
The Aro were an obvious target for British imperialists, who could justify
their actions by citing the Aro role as the principal slave traders.
It was not until the 1890s, however, that the Aro came under the
direct searchlight of the British. Why did it take the British so long
after the onset of European commercial encroachment on the interests
of coastal middlemen to encroach on Aro commercial spheres in the
hinterland? The coastal traders’ success, up to the 1880s, in holding
their own against British maneuvers accounts for the time lag. Until
this time, the British were still “pacifying” coastal middlemen and had
15
Baikie (1856:336); J.A.B. Horton (1868:183–85); Hutchinson (1861:46–47, 54); Moor
1902:1–2; ; A.G. Leonard (1906:486, 254); G.I. Jones (1963:69, 87, 147, 152, 210).
16
Names of persons born after consulting Chuwku were Chukwuma, Uzoaru, Ukpabi,
Chukwu (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:150).
17
CO 520/14: “Memorandum Concerning the Aro Expedition,” April 24, 1902, p.10;
Moor (1908:22).
not yet decided to rule them directly or to turn on the Aro. With the
establishment of the Oil Rivers Protectorate in 1891, the British for-
mally declared their rule over the Niger Delta and explicitly set about
establishing “control over the tribes of the coast who acted in all cases
as middlemen or carriers for the transport of trade goods to the interior
and that of the produce factories of the [European] merchants which
were all situated on the coast line at the mouths of the various rivers.”
British planners also realized that “the Government of the territories
could not be regarded as in any sense established” until the “country
of the producers,” specifically, “this Ibo country dominated by the Aros
was dealt with.” The British reckoned that the Aro “could practically
cause almost cessation of trade by stopping production.”18 Fearing
that the Aro were expressly misrepresenting “the Government and the
whiteman,” the British began to send officials to assess the Aro, begin-
ning in 1892 when they made “overtures” to Aro traders on the Cross
River and explained “the aims and objectives of the Government.” Aro
responses developed from “tolerant contempt” for the British, as Moor
put it, to angst that the British were scheming to encroach on their turf.
British affirmations of good intentions did nothing to assuage Aro fears
and anxiety.19
These pressures were building against the backdrop of dwindling
world commodity prices. A major international economic depression
seems to have driven British moves to subjugate inland traders, given
that successful subjugation would increase the profit margins of the
European traders and cushion them from the depression. By the 1890s,
the British had also inched closer to ending slaveholding, and their
intervention in the inland trade and the fall in world commodity prices
had begun to impact Aro interests adversely. British forays into inland
markets, suppression of coastal middlemen and dwindling world com-
modity market prices all converged in the 1890s to push the Aro over
the edge.
18
CO 520/14: “Memorandum Concerning the Aro Expedition,” pp. 4–5, 6, 12–13.
19
They continued along these lines through such emissaries as Roger Casement in 1894,
Captain A. Turner in 1896, as well as the party of Major Leonard and F.S. James. Further
attempts in 1897 culminated in a meeting in the Cross town of Itu between Aro repre-
sentatives and British Consul General Major Gallwey in March 1898. The Aro thwarted
these attempts, but the encounters had given the British much valuable intelligence on
the Aro. CO 520/14: “Memorandum Concerning the Aro Expedition,” pp. 6, 7–8, 9;
Leonard 1898.
Militarization and Violence

The Aro understood that the British had begun a policy of undermin-
ing Aro influence by playing other groups against them. They witnessed
hostile British actions, such as persuading the coastal communities to
stop patronizing the Aro oracle and banning the importation of rifles and
even cap guns. Not only did the firearms embargo reduce the amount
of firepower at Aro disposal, the British also intended it to increase Aro
cost of doing business, calculating the Aro would purchase captives and
commodities at higher prices with alternative imported items, such as
cloth, tobacco, and spirits.20 The embargo also increased the premium for
firearms, illustrating not only the heavy militarization of the region but
also the urgency of British threat.
For their part, the beleaguered Aro interpreted any local resistance to
their influence as a manifestation of British machinations and perceived
resisting groups as collaborators with the British. They were determined
to resist British encroachment, which they did with considerable success
(Lynn 1997:167).21 By 1899, however, their exasperation came to a head;
they abandoned diplomacy as a way of dealing with the British, resorting
to force in communities friendly with the British (Gallwey 1902). When in
1899 the Aro “proclaimed a Ju Ju [curse] of barrenness on all women who
should crack palm nuts and deal in kernels … the kernel trade in some
localities fell off 50 per cent or more.”22 In the same year, the Aro incited
and assisted the Ibibio, certain communities on the upper Cross River,
in the delta and along the Niger to oppose the British.23 On November
21, 1900, the Aro invaded the town of Obegu in southern Igboland as a
punitive action for its friendship with the British, and, by British account,
massacred some 400 people.24 Similarly, “under a shallow pretext,” they
attacked in May 1901 several Ibibio communities which were friendly
to the British, “killing large numbers, in one case wiping out a whole
20
CO 520/14: “Memorandum Concerning the Aro Expedition,” pp. 8–9, 12.
21
Anthony Nwabughuogu (1982) has argued that penetration into the interior by European
traders and, therefore, the displacement of African middlemen in the lower Niger did not
start until 1905. While this may be true for the Cross River region, where Nwabughuogu
draws his data exclusively from, the Niger delta was different. In the Niger, unlike
the Cross River region, European traders and firms had been a common feature since
the mid-nineteenth century, evidenced by the activities of William Cole (1862), Harry
Cotterell, John Whitford (1877) and Harold Blindloss (1898).
22
CO 520/6/33280: More to Secretary of State, October 11, 1900.
23
CO 520/14: “Memorandum Concerning the Aro Expedition,” pp. 9–11.
24
CO 520/14: “Memorandum Concerning the Aro Expedition,” pp. 14–15.
village, and carrying off all they could seize to sell as slaves.”25 No doubt,
the British viewed such incidents as hostile acts, and they were inclined
to blame the Aro for any obstacle they faced. Their reports were not
simply exaggerations by British officials intent on justifying their colonial
project. Traditions from among the Aro and other groups in the region
confirm the trend reflected in the reports. The wars of the era are fresh
in the memory of Aro people, and they reflected the changed Aro percep-
tions of violence and its place in their relationships.26
Other Causes of Militarization

Aro militarization also drew from economic and cultural changes within
Aro society. By the 1890s, intensifying competition from non-Aro traders,
an increase in the regional population, and the involvement in palm-oil
production of hitherto food-producing groups, which resulted in dwin-
dling food supplies, compelled the Aro virtually everywhere to embark on
food production on a large scale. Faced with a food shortage, which was
bound to affect a nonfood producing group severely, the Aro saw food
production not only as a way of resolving the food shortage but also as a
commercial opportunity. The palm-producing groups provided markets
for Aro agricultural surplus. Agriculture on a large scale required a mas-
sive labor supply and abundance of arable land, but as a trading group,
the Aro had settled in small, semi-urbanized compact settlements without
considering agricultural suitability.27 The Aro thus had to acquire both
labor and land, a need that fueled militarization. One might expect that
as slave traders with ready access to people and with whom the non-Aro
often desired to be associated, the Aro would easily be able to increase
their labor pool in a period of expansion, but this was not to be.
25
CO 520/12/25807: Moor to Secretary of State, July 7, 1901, p. 3.
26
Mbonu Ojike, born in the 1900s in the Aro diaspora settlement of Arondizuogu,
recalled his father and his father’s friend “talk invariably … about wars” they had wit-
nessed in “the good old days” (Ojike 1946:9). Missionaries in the Okigwe area, near
Arondizuogu, in 1910 reported about the impact of “continual wars” and slave raiding
(Isichei 1976:85). I was informed that merchant-warriors from late-nineteenth-century
Arondizuogu carried out operations in northern Igboland (Maduadichie 1996).
27
“The trading settlements … became ‘free cities’ to which all who wished to ‘traffic and
exchange’ safely repaired, international courts where individuals and clans in conflict
sought justice from the undisputed authority of the Oracle” (K.O. Dike 1956:39, 45).
A British observer in the early twentieth century described them as “mission stations”
(J.G. Allen n.d.:iii). Some of their inhabitants acted as “trade callers” and some others as
money lenders (G.I. Jones 1989:36; Ottenberg 1971).
The very process of acquiring people fomented friction and civil crisis;
wars arose, among other reasons, as a means of acquiring and retaining
dependents. One of the most frequent causes of conflicts among the
merchant-warriors was the granting of asylum to (or the acquisition of)
disgruntled slaves by “powerful nobles” from groups competing with the
ones the dependents defected from (K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:180;
Igwegbe 1962:114). This was the case in the skirmishes involving rival
merchant-warlords Okoro Idozuka of Arondizuogu and Okoli Ijeoma
of Ndeikelionwu. Okoro Idozuka’s internal enemy, Ozigbo Okereke of
Ndiogbuonyeoma, also called Itejirisinkakwu (a pot used to cook bush rat,
meaning “atrocious” pot), allied with Okoli Ijeoma. Okoro Idozuka was in
the habit of making punitive expeditions against those who “kidnapped”
his men (E.N. Okoli 1977:31, 33). In spite of the violence that accompa-
nied this activity, these disputes did nothing to stop the massive expansion
of the Aro populations that was observed during the period.
The acquisition of land was even more contentious. Struggles over land
gave free reign to the martial ethos among the Aro. Arondizuogu groups, in
particular, fought against one another in the scramble for land seized from
non-Aro groups. As one of my respondents put it, “we first opened up the
place and later began to quarrel over boundaries” (Maduadichie 1996).
Eastward migrations to the Imo River and other areas from the last years
of the nineteenth century onward resolved the crisis of agricultural space
among the Aro, but it increased Aro conflicts with their non-Aro neigh-
bors. Land grabbing placed a higher premium on having dependents than
ever before, and at the same time presented the dependents with the oppor-
tunity to raise their economic and social standing through acts of valor.
The Nri-Awka cultural influence was a major agent of militarization
and increased violence among the Aro. Nri-Awka traditions often refer
to the Aro as predators, but martial ethos probably diffused to the Aro
diaspora from the Nri-Awka area. The contemporary history of the Nri-
Awka region is replete with wars and violence, and their repercussions, as
the region’s oral traditions and numerous undergraduate theses in Nigerian
universities and colleges testify.28 Since these wars often involved strug-
gles over arable land and living space, which had been scarce in Igboland
for at least the previous century, militarization would have taken root
in the region before it diffused to the Aro. One warrior from a nearby
war-like community in eastern Nri-Awka reportedly founded one of the
28
Amaechi 1987; Anaedobe 1977; Ezenibe 1977; Ifediora 1987; Ogbuozobe 1986; E.O.
Okafor 1978; J.C. Okoli 1977; C.S. Umeh 1984.
quarters of the Ndieni Aro settlement of Ndikelionwu (J. Ezeilo 1980).

The Nri-Awka cultural influence accounts for the regional variations in
Aro attitudes to warfare. Whereas the Aro who were operating out of
Arochukwu, Ibibioland, and southern Igboland continued to rely heavily
on Cross River Igbo fighters, their counterparts in close proximity to the
Nri-Awka region increasingly organized and fought their own wars. The
brand of warfare that the Aro came to adopt differed from that of their
machete-wielding, surprise-invading Cross River Igbo allies, whose pri-
mary war objective was to decapitate as many people as possible; rather,
it resembled that of the Nri-Awka region. The Nri-Awka model of war-
fare had in the nineteenth century come to be marked by giving advance
warning to the enemy and the use of overwhelming force and a wider
array of weaponry, ranging from charms to firearms, with occasional
raiding, plundering, and as has happened to Owa, often land grabbing as
a major objective. Meek has observed that although the use of firearms
in wars was forbidden, this rule “was frequently broken.” Even though
he does not pinpoint Aro merchant-warriors, we have already seen that
they relished pushing the boundaries (Meek 1937:243). Nri-Awka was
also invariably organized around what Onwuejeogwu (1981:49–50) has
described as the “personality cult,” a phenomenon that combined strong
character, drive, entrepreneurship and big ego in a “big man” (Talbot
1926c:838, 844; Eni 1972:15–17; Nnolim 2007:35–36; Onwuejeogwu
1975:51; Onwuejeogwu 1981:28, 61, 170; Onyekwelu 2001:5–7). The
Aro merchant-warrior of this era embodied the personality cult. With the
direct participation of the Aro in wars, the hitherto localized destabilizing
influence of martial ethos among small, fragmented Nri-Awka polities
became more systematic in the hands of an ambitious, networked trading
group backed by widespread oracular influence and commercial power.
Features of Militarization
In addition to the increased incidence of Aro wars during the second half
of the nineteenth century was the phenomenon of Aro civil wars, which
had been extremely rare in Aro history up to this point. The earliest inci-
dence of Aro civil wars of the nineteenth century was perhaps the Ọgụ
Amakọba (Allied War), between Ndieni groups of Ndikelionwu and Ujari
in what appears to have been the 1820s.29 Such conflicts became more
29
The date of this war is inferred from genealogy. Ijeoma was the fifth son of Ikerionwu,
the mid-eighteenth-century progenitor of Ndeikelionwu. Ijeoma died shortly after the
frequent in the second half of the century, as Aro groups feuded over
spheres of influence and agricultural space. British Major A.G. Leonard,
who had ventured into Igboland as far as the main Aro market town of
Bende in 1896, reported that the Aro traders had split into rival factions
(Leonard 1898:205). Another British observer, Roger Casement, had
reported in 1894 that two Arochukwu lineage-groups were at war with
one another (see Northrup 1978b:141). One such conflict had occurred
in about 1862 between Arondizuogu and the Ndieni cluster.30 In fact,
each Arondizuogu lineage-group at one time or another engaged another
in a war that involved “a significant element of firearms.”31
Not only did militarization increase friction among Aro groups, it also
promoted reliance on external alliances in intra-Aro disputes. During the
Allied War of about the 1820s, for example, Ndeikelionwu under the
leadership of Ijeoma relied on an alliance that included several non-Aro
communities in the vicinity of Ndieni to make a protracted war on fellow
Ndieni group Ujari.32 These alliances developed at the same time the Aro
civil wars became frequent.
Defensive requirements against invasions and raids facilitated the evo-
lution of new residential structures. Up to second half of the nineteenth
century, the Aro maintained a compact residential structure, reminiscent
of what Equiano describes for the eighteenth century.
Each master of a family has a large square piece of ground, surrounded with a
moat or fence, or enclosed with a wall made of red earth tampered, which, when
dry is as hard as brick. Within this, are his houses to accommodate his family and
slaves, which, if numerous, frequently present the appearance of a village. In the
middle, stands the principal building appropriated to the sole use of the master
and consisting of two apartments; one in which he sits in the day with his fam-
ily, the other is left apart for the reception of his friends. … These houses never
exceed one story in height. (Equiano 1995:37)
While this compact residential structure survived in Arochukwu and,

to a lesser extent, in Ujari, it broke down in many Aro settlements in the
1890s, notably in Arondizuogu. This was when many people migrated
to outlying low-density regions in pursuit of agricultural land, a process
Allied War, suggesting that he was probably advanced in years at the time of the war (Eni
1973:15–17).
30
This date is provided by Dike and Ekejiuba (1990:180).
31
M.S. Igwe (1996); Igwegbe (1962); Maduadichie (1996); E.N. Okoli (1977:34). The
quotation is from Igwe.
32
For details of these alliances, see Eni (1973:15–17).
that produced highly dispersed settlements in the new areas. At the same
time, Aro architecture changed in response to the defense requirements
of the period. Architectural change was marked in Aro settlements in
central Igboland, where some merchant-warriors built two-storey struc-
tures; the upper floor served as a guard post, while the base housed the
cannons and other ordnance.33 One of these structures was still intact in
Arondizuogu in 1996.
The frequency of wars inevitably led to specialization in different fac-
ets of war-making. Specialized strategists and tacticians, generically called
ọkpa ịta, got credit for valor (M.S. Igwe 1996). Men who bestrode the
commercial and military life of the time emerged in all the central Igbo
Aro settlements. Perhaps the two most prominent merchant-warriors of
this period were Okoro Udozuka of Arondizuogu and Okoli Ijeoma of
Ndieni. These merchant-warriors were sometimes generally known as
agawhu (bandit, outlaw, crook, hero). Depending on the context, this
awe-inspiring term evoked abhorrence and contempt or endearment and
reverence. Men of valor generally enjoyed high status as heroes or, at
least, were feared. Nicknames like Ogburie (may the conqueror appro-
priate the booty), Ụgbọgụ (war chest/war vessel), and Ọsụachara (grass
terminator/general terminator) gained currency. Some of those names,
such as Nkpụñụghụñụ, Ogbujingidi, Otirigidi, and Ogbunyịvwa, have no
definite meanings outside their onomatopoeic value, which at any rate is
suggestive of ruthlessness and inspires awe. Okoro Idozuka, also called
Agadagbachiriụzọ (the pillar that blocks the way), took an additional
awe-inspiring alias after every major triumph (Igwegbe 1962; E.N. Okoli
1977:33–34).
The moral economy of the region all but broke down. The Aro had had
merchant-warriors before this time, including men like Izuogu Mgbokpo
of Arondizuogu, Ikelionwu Mgboro of Ndikelionwu and Oti Emesinwa of
Ujari (Ajali). These merchant-warriors were primarily entrepreneurs, but
they commanded respect by virtue of their wealth in trade goods and people
and their ability to influence non-Aro using tact and diplomacy, while not
hesitating to mobilize the Cross River Igbo warriors when this approach
33
Information about Aro architecture is based on fieldwork observation and interviews with
respondents in Arochukwu, Arondizuogu and Ujari. Information from Ndeikelionwu
comes from N. Okoli (1972). I am particularly indebted to Ezumoha Okoroji 1996;
Igwilo (1996b); Mgbemene (1996); Okoro Ndubisi (1996); J.G. Okoro (1986). I first
became interested in the towers after reading J.G. Okoro’s (1985) concern about their
disappearance. There is also detailed information in Ojike (1946:21–25). Some of these
structures are now disappearing.
failed. Taking part in fighting was beneath him. The merchant-warrior of

the second half of the nineteenth century was also an entrepreneur, but he
thrived on ruthlessness, craved to be feared, and was willing to demonstrate
his military prowess. It was not just how the merchant-warriors saw them-
selves; being a warmonger and a war maker became respectable. There
were few taboos in the eyes of the merchant-warriors, who seemed to relish
their guts and ability to perpetrate outrage. The merchant-warriors upset
what appears to have been a mutually respectful relationship between
the Aro and scared Nri. As Onwuejeogwu reports, for example, Eze Nri
Ezenwali spent considerable time in the second half of the century trying –
ultimately unsuccessfully – to check the activities of Aro merchant-warrior
Okoli Ijeoma of Ndikelionwu through war and diplomacy (Onwuejeogwu
1975:51; 1981:28, 61, 170). Ironically, most of the Aro merchant-warriors
now harassing the communities of the Nri-Awka region were descendants
of men and women from that region, a fact that also underscores the prov-
enance of Aro warrior ethos of the nineteenth century.
As in life, the warriors received great honor and reverence in death.
Typically, during the funeral of a late-nineteenth-century Ndieni mer-
chant-warrior, a cock “was torn mouthwise” and its blood spilled in the
eyes of the man. “The heart of a live ram (emblem of fortitude) was dug
out and placed on the [dead] warrior’s chest. His spirit was prayed to
reincarnate with the fortitude of a ram and the bravery of a lion.”34 In
Arondizuogu, ọgbụgba, a war dance that only the strongest men dared to
participate in, followed at the central market, Eke Obinikpa, the last act
in the funeral of a great man. The dancers dressed up in war gear, danced
to the tune of the ikperikpe (war drum) and dared anyone to challenge
them for a duel. Ikperikpe specialists used the instrument to glorify the
feats the dancers had performed in battle and to inspire future exploits.
A sample of a lyric used on these occasions rendered to me in 1996 is
instructive in understanding the mentality that prevailed in the period
(Igwilo 1996a). Only those with the will and resources mobilized a suf-
ficient following of agile youths that attempted to perform it. The per-
formers received congratulations after a successful outing (Ojike 1946).
Okoro Idozuka demonstrated his mettle with an impressive performance
of this dance during the funeral of his brother-in-law, the founder of an
Arondizuogu lineage-group (E.N. Okoli 1977:36). Ọgbụgba illustrates
how much warrior ethos had penetrated even the artistic life of the Aro
diaspora.
34
Eni (1973:42). Parentheses are Eni’s.
The emergence of agawhu among central Igbo Aro was consistent

with the culture of violence of nineteenth-century West Africa. Daryll
Forde noted the rise of “petty war leaders” across the region (Forde
1953:218). Elizabeth Isichei identifies “New Men” whose emergence
generally characterized nineteenth-century Igbo history (Isichei
1976:104–07). These men were invariably Aro allies, and in Awka, they
used their profits to build flamboyant houses and to take prestigious
titles (N. Nworji 1986). One such man, Ejiofo of Oba, a returnee from
Arochukwu, settled on the eastern flank of the town in the direction
of Ichi. He “became so powerful … encroached into and seized many
people’s lands (sic). He kidnapped and sold into slavery everybody who
dared to question his authority” (Obi-Buenyi 1986:5–6). According to
one northern Igbo tradition, people from those communities visited Aro
settlements to trade and returned to sell their people (Nwamba 1973).
The late-nineteenth-century trader Onyeama of Eke in northern Igboland
fits this description (see Onyeama 1982:21). Given that similar characters
and the conflicts they inspired sprouted in coastal societies as well, Aro
merchant-warriors and militarization were a conspicuous extension of
region-wide escalation of violence.
Consequences of Militarization
Not surprisingly, the wars of the nineteenth century left permanent scars
on the region. Owa in the Nri-Awka axis is one of the communities known
to have disappeared completely during the mid-nineteenth century. Oral
traditions of the area attribute Owa’s destruction to its neighbor Nimo,
which was joined in an alliance by Adazi-Nnukwu and Oraukwu. These
towns shared the despoiled Owa territory. Two other towns, Umu-Ori
and Ozu, are said to have also been destroyed in that part of the Nri-
Awka region during the same era (Ogbukagu 1997: 323, 330, 331–33).
As noted in Chapter 3, Owa exists in Arondizuogu folklore only because
many of its inhabitants descended from Owa refugees, including the
founder of a major lineage-group, transferred to Arondizuogu. Traditions
relate that an Aro merchant-warrior displaced the present-day Ugwuoba
on the Mamu River from their original site around Enugwu-Ukwu
(Agu 1985).35 Many of the people of Amaokpala, a preexisting group
35
Indeed, Ugwuoba people were reported in the 1930s to have acknowledged “no relation-
ship at all” with the rest of Mbasato – Awka, Amawbia, Ebenebe, Nawgu, Nibo and
Nise. See NAE MILGOV. 13/1/17: Mbanasataw-Awka Division, 1936. Agu attributes
in the Ndieni area, “were scattered in many places,” including Nkwere,

Ekwulobia, and Ihiala. Perhaps, the largest concentration of these refu-
gees were in Nkwere, where they cloned Amaokpala deities (Onyekwelu
2001:2–3, 7).
The following incident illustrates the close relationship between
firearms, violence, slavery, displacement and general insecurity in the
Nri-Awka region in the late nineteenth century. After Ezenne Ezeanakwe,
a prominent person in Adazi-Nnukwu in the Nri-Awka region, shot and
killed his friend – apparently inadvertently during a funeral gun salute –
he was required to proceed on a seven-year exile, in addition to three of
his five children being sold into slavery as a reprisal and the two others
going into hiding. While his son Anaeto who was sold to Arondizuogu was
later redeemed and returned to Adazi-Nnukwu by Ezeanakwe’s other son
Ojiako, his two unidentified daughters never returned, though her family
suspected that one of them ended up being “married” into the prominent
Bob-Manuel of the coastal city-state of Degema. Ezeanakwe was himself
later killed while fighting in one of the wars involving his town (Ojiako
2010; “Genealogy”). Indeed, Ezeanakwe’s life and experience sum up
the violence and insecurity that pervaded nineteenth-century Nri-Awka.
Displacement often came with destruction and transplantation.
The rise of martial ethos among the Aro overheated the social and
political landscape to the extent that it strained relations between the
Aro and the Cross River Igbo warrior groups that had fought Aro wars.
Growing Aro pugnaciousness and belligerence tested the limits of the moral
economy that governed the warriors’ participation in wars. “These war-
riors would … be satisfied that there was really an injury that warranted
reparation or enforcement of a mutually agreed contract which had been
broken. Contrary to the received notion, they were not at the beck and call
of the Aro.” Traditions of the “Abam” recount occasional refusal to fight
for the Aro if they were not satisfied with the cause.36 The breakdown of
this alliance was felt most in central Igboland; some of it was probably
connected to aggression against Nri by the Aro merchant-warriors. As
the warrior communities increasingly grew unwilling to tangle with ever-
increasing Aro conflicts, the Aro took war matters into their own hands,
and established their own fighting units and traditions.
the displacement of Ugwuoba to Okoli Ijeoma of Arondizuogu, but the antecedents of

his Ndieni namesake suggests to the present author that the latter was the culprit.
36
J. Okoro Ijoma (1994:43); Isichei (1976). The quotation is from Ijoma. For more on the
nature of this relationship, see Onwuka Njoku 2000:61–72.
Apart from the strain in the Aro relations with the warriors, the
declining relevance of the machete-wielding head hunters was also a
consequence of the proliferation of firearms. Firearms were by far more
effective offensive weapons than machetes, and the British embargo in
the 1890s did not change that. The spread of firearms was a key devel-
opment of nineteenth-century West African history. Not only had the
weaponry stock of African societies increased over time, principally from
the exchange of captives for guns and gunpowder, but importation of
weapons increased during the nineteenth century. Imports into Africa
increased most dramatically between the 1820s and 1860, from £10.6
million to £41.3 million (in 1988 British sterling). The value of British
exports to Africa increased tenfold between 1817 and 1820 and 1846
and 1849 (Eltis and Jennings 1988:940, 941). Per capita gun imports
into Africa were probably highest in the 1860s.37 Because the elite groups
of this region had the most purchasing power in western Africa, they
were the ones who would have acquired much of the weaponry imported
before the ban took effect. The likely existence of a weapons stockpile in
the Bight of Biafra would have been enough to stimulate militarization,
and increased importation in the second half of the century made such a
prospect even more likely – a fact that prompted the British to suspend
imports of this item. More than simply increasing the frequency of war-
fare, however, the increasing influx of firearms changed its character and
the structure of relationships and alliances. As Cross River Igbo fight-
ers did not significantly modernize their tactics and, certainly, did not
modernize their arms, the Aro invariably relied less on them over time.
The increasing participation of the Aro in fighting wars was therefore
also consequence of changes in the structure of warfare in the region.
Faltering alliances with Cross River Igbo neighbors, the accumulation
of firearms, and the rise of martial ethos among the Aro reinforced one
another in a vicious cycle of violence.
Decadence
Violence during the second half of the nineteenth century symptomized
deeper systemic malaise than had originated in the slave trade and its
37
European and American exports to Africa are estimated as follows: one gun per 118
persons in the 1780s, one gun per 145 persons in the 1820s, and one gun per 103 per-
sons in the 1860s (Eltis and Jennings 1988:954). The quantities could be higher; guns
were recorded under “iron wrought” (p. 361). Except for ordinance, firearms were not
normally recorded separately in British Customs figures (Johnson 1984:364).
ending. The effective ending of the Atlantic slave trade in the 1840s occa-
sioned major changes in economic and social practices. For example,
those deemed as miscreants and political enemies and had typically been
exported overseas in the heyday of the Atlantic slave trade now ended
up in the hands of indigenous slave owners, creating problems of social
control. Sale to Euro-American buyers had given the authorities a way
of dealing with these individuals. Their sale raised revenues and made
expenditure on prisons unnecessary (Curtin 1990:119, 120; 1993:177).
One respondent, who lived long enough to have witnessed the immediate
post–slave trade era, recalled in 1996 that the Aro bought two dissenting
Ọzọ titled men from leaders of their communities in about 1900 (G.N.
Okoli 1996). Her description of their Ọzọ marks and the circumstances of
their sale recall the image of rebellious captives that Captain John Adams
carried regularly to the Americas in the late eighteenth century (Adams
1832:41). The acquisition and retention of such individuals added to the
tensions and violence of the period. This category of people would often
have been killed during the second half of the nineteenth century, or their
incorporation into their owners’ societies would have been a potential
source of violence.
Of importance in understanding these tensions is the fact that the reckless
oppression of dependents on the part of Aro notables breached the moral
economy of slavery. The remnants of late-nineteenth-century architecture
eloquently testify to increasing oppression. A dark, windowless room
that served as a detention chamber (mkpuruisi) became an indispensable
part of the homes of late-nineteenth-century Aro slave owners. Torture
platforms, such as the one observed in the residence of late-nineteenth-
century merchant-warrior Okoroji, seem to have been widespread as
well. These structures were necessary to control recalcitrant captives now
employed domestically. If the ideology of slavery emphasizing the social
mobility of acquired persons and their assimilation into Aro society had
seemed realistic and facilitated acquired people’s embrace of Aro society
before the mid-nineteenth century, such an ideology was harder to sus-
tain in the face of the systematic and routine oppression that prevailed
in the second half of the century. Increased oppression was the necessary
consequence of the insecurities of a master class threatened by the pres-
ence of large slave populations.
Dependents and subordinate groups did not always choose to remain
victims. For example, two large subordinate groups in Arondizuogu
formed a “grand alliance” against the local amadi group sometime in
the second half of the nineteenth century, and won a “decisive victory”
(see Igwegbe 1962:15–16). Other oppressed people embarked on solo

and unorthodox forms to resistance. The story of Ogbuofelu, acquired
from Nnobi in the Nri-Awka region in the 1890s, recurred during field-
work in Arondizuogu. One respondent said in a rueful tone shared by
Ogbuofelu’s owner’s grandson that “no one died naturally among us. The
cause [of the unnatural death of many in the lineage] was this idiot that
they brought from Nnobi called Ogbuofelu.”38 Clearly, increased oppres-
sion contributed to the tensions of the period.
The deepening sense of oppression associated with late-nineteenth-
century transitions also affected the social order and had implications on
the spiritual life of the Aro diaspora. It led to the emergence in the largest
Aro diaspora settlement, Arondizuogu, of the osu, an Igbo caste system
that deemed some individuals and families to “belong” to particular dei-
ties. Forbidden all social contact with the regular community, these people
lived by, and performed custodial services for, the shrines of the specific
deities they supposedly belonged to. People who became osu remained
so along with their descendants in perpetuity (see Nwokeji 1998b:323n;
2000b). Unlike Senegambia where castes were occupational groups and
interacted with the general population, however, the osu were outcastes,
whom others consigned to cater to the shrines or who placed themselves in
the services of those shrines.39 The osu were an occupational group only to
the extent that they tended to the shrines and received part of the sacrifice
made to the shrines. They also did subsistence farming. Oldendorp was
clearly referring to the osu when he noted from his interview of Igbo-area
respondents: “There are various people under him, which can be called
living sacrifices. No shears come to them, no hair of theirs can be cut.
They do not marry, do not have their own house, rather they are always
with others, they eat and drink by themselves, take what they will and
no one prevents them. The priests are named from among these people”
(Oldendorp 2000: ms. 466). The osu responsibility for tending shrines
supports the suggestion that the institution represented a priestly function
before the Atlantic slave trade, but that the trade changed its character
(J.G. Okoro 1996; Umo n.d.:20). Every market had a priest who was also
called osu, after the name of the market that he served. Thus, there were
Osueke (for the Eke market), Osuawho (Awho market), Osunkwo (Nkwo
market), and Osuoye (Oye Market). In other words, Aro people used the
term osu to designate the priest. Just “like pastor means servant of God,
38
C. Okoli (1996). Ogbuofelu’s owner’s grandson is Igwilo (1996a).
39
For the Senegambia case, see M. Klein 1968:10; Tamari (1991).
osu means servant of a shrine” (J.G. Okoro 1996). Although these names
are common among the Aro, it is unclear that all or even most of the bear-
ers of the names were priests.
While the institution seems to have been well-established among the
Igbo by the nineteenth century, the Aro did not discriminate against the osu,
and their society did not develop the institution, except in Arondizuogu
in the late nineteenth century. When, for example, Oti Emesinwa made
his early trips to the Nri-Awka region from his Arochukwu base in the
mid-eighteenth century, outcasts (presumably osu) were among the indi-
viduals he “gathered around” him, showing that the Aro were willing
to incorporate the osu. Later, he and his Ujari group settled among the
Umu-Ajana (people of the earth shrine) of preexisting Akpu, on whose
land the Ujari settled (Eni 1973:9, 15). This location was reminiscent of
an osu quarter, but there is not even a hint that the Ujari were bothered
by such an arrangement. Thus, the Aro embraced a group which central
Igbo people rejected. Why then did the institution emerge in Arondizuogu
toward the end of the century?
If the Atlantic slave trade changed the character of the institution in
other parts of Igboland, it was the ending of the trade that generated these
changes in Arondizuogu.40 Flight from the oppression that hallmarked
the tensive transition of the late nineteenth century was the immediate
cause of the osu institution in Arondizuogu. Aggrieved Mgbawho Ogirisi,
a slave of Okoro Udozuka’s wife, fled to the Ududonka shrine with her
children during a time that would have been the 1890s, becoming perhaps
the first osu family in the town. One free family, running away from their
creditor, sought refuge in the Haba deity in another lineage-group.41 At
the destination deity, the refugee would say the ritual:”Arusi, mbaa!”
(Shrine, I submit myself to your protection).42
The Arondizuogu version of the osu institution differed in character
from that of the rest of Igboland in other ways. Some of my respondents
40
Kanu Umo (n.d.:19) has claimed that the shrines that produced the institution became
part of Arondizuogu “after the decline of ‘Chuku’” (i.e., the Ibiniukpabi oracle).
Ibiniukpabi did not decline until after the British Aro Expedition of 1901–02. As late
as 1878, the Belgian mariner Adolphe Burdo had noted Ibiniukpabi’s influence as far as
the Niger River (see Burdo 1880:159–61). The shrines in Arondizuogu coexisted with
Ibiniukpabi. Ibiniukpabi’s main function was judicial, for the non-Aro. The Aro, both in
the metropole and in the diaspora, had the shrines they worshipped.
41
M.S. Igwe (1996); Kanu-Igbo (1996b); Maduadichie (1996); A. Muotoh (1996);
J.G. Okoro (1996).
42
This particular dimension was given by Kanu-Igbo (1996b). He could not tell the mean-
ing of the word mbaa. It is probably not an Igbo word.
stressed that, unlike in other parts of Igboland, nobody sacrificed to the

shrines persons who became osu; the victims themselves chose to become
osu, albeit under indirect duress.43 Also, contrary to the situation in most
Igbo societies, all of my respondents stressed the fluidity of the osu insti-
tution in Arondizuogu. They also stressed that it no longer existed by the
late twentieth century. This difference touches at the core of the osu sys-
tem – the immutability of the osu condition elsewhere in Igboland. While
the osu condition was (and still is) immutable in other places, it may be
nullified in Arondizuogu with the simple performance of the appropriate
rites of passage.44
While the transitions of the late nineteenth century created the mate-
rial conditions for the emergence of the osu institution in Arondizuogu,
the broader cultural impact of people from the Nri-Awka axis created the
ideological environment. Individuals – whether slaves, ordinary immi-
grants, or refugees – came to Arondizuogu with various cultural pack-
ages. The historian J.G. Okoro told me in English that “Arondizuogu
did not result from the migration of one race. People came with dif-
ferent kinds of manners and customs. There is no single way of shrine
worshipping in Arondizuogu” (J.G. Okoro 1996). The result is that every
lineage-group has shrines that reflect the provenance of its population or
sections of it. Among the myriad shrines that sprang up in Arondizuogu,
only the Ngene Okwe at nde-Awa has Arochukwu provenance. These
various shrines were adaptations of the parent shrines of the same names
in various parts of the Biafra hinterland.45 The idea of seeking refuge in
shrines as an escape from oppression emanated from the shrines, beliefs,
social constructions, fears and myths of immigrants from other parts of
Igboland, particularly those from Nri-Awka.
43
For osu as a priestly function originally, see R. Okeke (1986); Isichei (1976). For the
sacredness of the osu, see M.S. Igwe (1996); Igwegbe (1962:102); J.G. Okoro (1996).
44
M.S. Igwe (1996); Kanu-Igbo (1996b); Muotoh (1996); C. Okoli (1996); J.G. Okoro
(1996). The fluidity of the Arondizuogu variant of the institution probably led the
historian J. Okoro Ijoma (1994:41) to deny that the osu institution even existed among
the Aro.
45
For example, a pioneer member of Arondizuogu and founder of the Ndiamazu lineage-
group, Amazu, came from Oro in the Oji River region of today’s Enugu State with
Iyi-Ogba. Another, Iheme from Nise near Awka, came with Ajagu. Udogwugwu of nde-
Ejezie came from Eziama, the original home of Ejezie, the founder of the lineage-group.
Nde-Ukwu has Ochichi from Achi. Many subordinate groups within these lineages also
brought shrines corresponding to their original homes. For example, Nkwo Adazi of
Ndiamazu was brought by the section that immigrated to nde-Amazu from Adazi near
Nri. The same was the story of Haba in nde-Aniche. Haba was adopted from Agulu.
The pursuit of conspicuous consumption promoted greed,

impoverished people and rendered them vulnerable to enslavement by
their creditors. A growing culture of conspicuous consumption ensured
the extremely high cost of funerals, marriages, and other ceremonies.
“Gun salutes,” or multiple firing of canon, as well as human sacrifices –
practices that developed during the overseas slave trade era – became
regular features of the funerals of the rich. Slave-ship captains ordered
gun salutes when coastal kings boarded newly arrived ships to collect
customs, and human sacrifice developed as the overseas trade cheapened
human life.46 Even though the sale of human beings generated revenues,
diminished value for human life was an inevitable consequence of a cul-
ture of violence and death that resulted from slave capture, warfare,
raiding, and resistance. Although slave traders calculated the value of
their captives in terms of profits, nothing would stop them sacrificing
the captives if they calculated that such sacrifice would replenish their
cost in manifold proportions. The primary focus of their interest was
not human life but profit, which they could apparently achieve through
either destruction or preservation, as they might calculate in any given
circumstance. Economic and spiritual considerations were linked. These
extremely expensive, decadent and sometimes gruesome undertakings
deepened stratification. Human sacrifice also fed on and promoted the
domestic slave trade, as perpetrators had first to acquire the individuals
needed for the purpose. Even head hunting is associated with the late-
nineteenth-century history of Arondizuogu.47 These untoward practices
represented cultural changes that were the consequences of either the
overseas slave trade or of its suppression.
How can one argue that the slave trade was socially malevolent
and at the same time argue that its ending made the situation worse?
Indeed, in spite of significant increases in population and material condi-
tions, the ending of the slave trade and the corresponding growth of the
commodity export trade failed to relieve the affected societies of violence
46
The practice of “gun salutes” had developed by the end of seventeenth century when
European slave traders used it to entertain and honor both themselves and prominent
Africans they dealt with. For example, on or about May 1, 1699, the slaver Albion-
Frigate fired seven-gun salute for King William of New Calabar when he went aboard to
collect duties. In late June of the same year, King William and master of another English
ship at the port were also each recipients of a seven-gun salute; later, Captain Edwards
of the Albion-Frigate received another seven rounds, when “he returned ashore” (James
Barbot).
47
Dike and Ekejiuba (1990:252–53); Ekejiuba (1972b:14); Ofonagoro (1972:80). For
head hunting, see Maduadichie (1996).
and insecurity. The ending of overseas slave export did not end the slave
trade. Human sacrifice escalated as stratification deepened. Warfare
became more frequent and more deadly as, among other factors, old
slave trading elites resisted the challenge of powerful groups that emerged
from the new economy. Finally, increased slaveholdings and inability to
export recalcitrant slaves increased social problems and oppression. In
the case of the Aro, the development of the warrior ethos and militariza-
tion added to the conundrum of violence.
A Comparative Perspective
The extent of the region’s involvement in the broader Atlantic and
global contexts bespeaks not only the impact of external trade on these
changes but also how these changes compared with changes elsewhere
in Atlantic Africa. Nowhere else in Atlantic Africa, except perhaps
Senegambia, did the ending of the overseas slave trade provoke as
much tension as in the Bight of Biafra. The crisis that led to the even-
tual disintegration of the Oyo Empire had originated in the dynam-
ics of the overseas traffic itself, rather than its ending, a process that
was completed during the slave trade era.48 In the Gold Coast, rather
than disintegrate under the weight of the ending of the traffic, Asante
expanded and consolidated its hegemony. In fact, the Gold Coast had
witnessed its own crisis in the seventeenth century, when gold export
plummeted and thereafter trade in captives lagged, which drastically
reduced the region’s stature in Atlantic Africa’s economy. The Islamic
jihads that contributed so much to the pressures of the nineteenth cen-
tury in much of West Africa had nothing to do with the ending of the
slave trade; they had been in progress well before. One fact that escapes
the notice of historians is that, in comparison to earlier periods, most
regions outside the Bight of Biafra witnessed political stability in the
immediate aftermath of the ending of the transatlantic slave trade. In
West-Central Africa, the effect of the ending of the overseas traffic also
differed from the Biafra case. To start with, unlike in the Bight of Biafra,
where the trade ended quickly (by the late 1830s), captive exportation
lasted the longest in West-Central Africa, which in the nineteenth cen-
tury exported more captives than it did in any previous century, and did
so until as late as the 1860s.
48
For the Oyo Empire, see Law 1977:245–99, esp. 255, 268, 274–75.
Conclusion
This chapter has highlighted the impact of the Atlantic slave trade not
already anticipated in earlier chapters, as well as the impact of the ending
of the traffic. The political, social, and ideological developments of the
nineteenth century received impetus from the expanded internal slave
trade and ongoing cultural transformations that resulted from the mas-
sive incorporation of non-Aro. The developments also resulted from Aro
attempts to continue their dominance of trade against the backdrop of
challenge from many other groups, often with British encouragement. The
widening of the commercial sector encouraged other hinterland groups to
become heavily involved in trade and in palm-oil production, at the same
time that coastal traders were moving inland to trade rather than continue
to depend entirely on the Aro as intermediaries between the hinterland
and the coast. Extensive economic activities in the region, highlighted by
its role as the center of palm produce production worldwide, accounted
for the attention the British paid the region as the imperial power sought
to influence affairs here. As traders and an influential group, the Aro drew
much of this attention. The intensification of militarization and violence
among the Aro must be understood in the contexts of long-term cultural
evolution among the Aro and the nineteenth-century regional political
economy of the Bight of Biafra.
8
Summary and Conclusions
In this book, I have departed from the sharp distinction that is often made
between the roles of internal and external agencies in bringing about
change in African history. Rather than seeing agency and causation in
terms of these binary opposites, the book acknowledges the collaborative
relevance of African and external agencies in shaping the transatlantic
slave trade and its impact. Central to this approach is an emphasis on the
interactions between slaving and culture and between the Bight of Biafra
and the rest of the Atlantic world. Such a perspective has shaped the five
main questions that have underpinned this study. These questions have
implications for both the history of the region and the Atlantic system
at large.
The first question concerns the dramatic rise of the Biafra Atlantic
trade during the mid-eighteenth century. The emergence of the Aro
in the early seventeenth century and their expansion that gathered
momentum in the second quarter of the eighteenth century, facilitated
the expansion of the Biafra Atlantic slave trade and shaped its character.
Although this study has emphasized that Aro organization rested on
identifiable institutions that had both state and diaspora characteristics,
an Atlantic perspective is key to an understanding of the slave trade and
its aftermath. The region responded to escalating labor demand in the
Americas, and it was the Aro organization that ensured the gathering,
bulking, transportation, and delivery of huge numbers of captives to the
coast. The cultural corollary of this economic process was that, while
captives from the region embarked on their forced journey to various
American destinations with their experiences, including those relating
to their deportation, the slave trade reconfigured the cultural landscape
204
Summary and Conclusions 205
of the region, including the culture of the Aro who orchestrated the
traffic in the hinterland.
An Atlantic perspective also throws light on a second question
addressed in this study, namely, why there was a relatively high propor-
tion of females in the Bight of Biafra slave trade. The gender structure
of the slave trade provides a window for a more thorough understand-
ing of transatlantic interactions involving African patterns of supply,
American patterns of demand, and the sociocultural processes underpin-
ning them. By focusing on the region’s institutions and sociocultural pro-
cesses – including the spiritual and social importance the Igbo attached
to yam and kolanut – comparing them with other African regions, and
relating them to developments elsewhere in the Atlantic region, the study
has explained the unusual gender structure of the region’s slave trade.
Gender is part of a third, larger question about the means by which
individuals became slaves or captives and why some were sent overseas
and others were retained in the region. For example, while warfare in
the region produced large numbers of women and children, it reduced
the numbers of men because the region’s principal warriors fought for
men’s heads, creating the possibility that war captives would be, over-
whelmingly, women and children. At the same time, captives convicted of
various criminal offences or classified as dissidents were overwhelmingly
men. Dissidents, incriminated persons, and kidnap victims were sent into
Atlantic slavery, while individuals who were enslaved out of economic
necessity were mostly enslaved locally in the region, illustrating that the
means of enslavement was a key determinant of where a captive served
as slave. I have used both export samples and local sources to derive
reliable information on the general character of enslavement, including
the difference between those forced into Atlantic slavery and those who
remained within the region. Until this study, scholars have relied exclu-
sively on export samples in explaining the composition of the slave trade,
an approach that distorted the reality of enslavement in Africa during the
centuries of the Atlantic slave trade.
The fourth question with which this study was concerned is how the
Aro coped with the suppression of the Atlantic slave trade in the nine-
teenth century and the long-term impact the export slave trade had on
indigenous value systems. Many decades of significant integration of
people from the war-ridden Nri-Awka region and the violence inherent
in a slaving culture had resulted in a definite change in the Aro value sys-
tem by 1850, specifically, the embrace of warrior ethos. Previous studies
either ignored or glossed over these developments and have failed to link
them to the impact of the Atlantic slave trade. Consequently, the irony in
stories of the ravages of nineteenth-century Aro merchant-warriors, who
commanded forces equipped with firearms, existing alongside a wide-
spread belief that the Aro never took part in war but completely relied on
the machete-wielding Cross River Igbo fighters to prosecute their wars
remained unresolved.
A final central question that spurred this study is how such a large-
scale commercial complex flourished in the Bight of Biafra, a region
apparently characterized by segmentary political organization. This
study has identified the evolving role of the state in Aro expansion, in
particular the shift by the second quarter of the eighteenth century from
state-sponsored expansion to expansion driven by state-supported pri-
vate enterprise. Rather than emphasize either the presence of state or its
absence as the key factor, however, this study has emphasized that the
role of a trade diaspora is distinct from that of centralized state systems.
The social organization of a trade diaspora enabled the Aro to establish
and control a vast and sophisticated trading network and to preserve
their identity and unity in the face of radical developments, especially
during the nineteenth century. In contrast to explanations of Aro expan-
sion that stress predilections and attributes of individual Aro, this study
has pointed to identifiable institutions that had both state and diaspora
characteristics.
Given their political and judicial influence, one might wonder if the Aro
did not constitute an imperialism rather than a trade diaspora. After all,
commerce was an important component of British imperialism – perhaps
the best example of imperialism in modern history. The existence of a
range of specialized political institutions in Aro organization supports such
a proposition. At the apex of Aro organization was the Nna Ato (Three
Fathers) chaired by Eze Aro (Aro King). Ọkpankpọ (Aro central council)
was the most important of these institutions. The relevance of Ọkpankpọ
to the present question of imperialism has been noted by the anthropolo-
gists P.C. Dike and Simon Ottenberg, who use the term “imperialism” to
characterize Aro influence. As discussed below, the Aro promoted clones
of some of their institutions in areas that were within the Aro network.
In spite of these imperial characteristics, the Aro are best seen as a
trade diaspora. Unlike the British, for example, who often (although
not always) maintained specialized sections of imperial agents (traders,
soldiers, administrators, and missionaries), every male Aro was, at least
until the 1890s, primarily involved in trade. Up until the mid-nineteenth
century, their fighters were exclusively non-Aro. These Aro communities
Summary and Conclusions 207
were involved in trade, and they incorporated significant numbers of

non-Aro elements.
The cultural developments recounted in the foregoing pages shaped
economic change and the structure of the Atlantic slave trade. I make no
attempt to deny the economic basis of Aro slaving. As anthropologist Peter
Gose has noted, culture itself is played out in the understanding and prac-
tice of the economic process (Gose 1994:xii). In this respect, the claims
made in this study that demand conditions and prices encouraged the
expansion of the Biafra trade, on the one hand, and that cultural elements
shaped the categories of export captives, on the other, are compatible.
The first claim touches on quantity, and the second on composition – two
complementary, rather than contradictory, variables. Two implications
may be drawn from this interplay of supply and demand dynamics. First,
while slave dealers decided on whom they sold to Euro-American buyers
(in this case, mainly kidnap victims, war captives, deviants, and incrimi-
nated persons), they directed most of these to the most profitable mar-
ket, except when it was too dangerous to do so. Bonny had become this
market by the mid-eighteenth century. Second, the demand pull affected
the composition of export captives, just as the supply conditions affected
quantity. Without Euro-American demand for captives, fewer persons
would have been kidnapped, captured in war, or fallen victim to judicial
processes. The heavy presence of captives from these categories, procured
in response to demand, defined the composition of export captives. Aro
exploitation of the hinterland, in particular the densely populated Igbo
heartland, made captives available in large numbers and assured buyers
reduced docking periods at Bonny. The fast turnaround rate reduced buy-
ers’ contact with the Biafra disease environment that was so inhospitable
to Europeans. In short, Aro trade as an economic enterprise thrived as
much as it did in part because of effective economic decisions; however,
slaving among them and other groups in the Bight of Biafra was not a
purely economic phenomenon.
Fundamentally, the study has thrown new light on Africa’s role in shap-
ing the Atlantic system and highlighted the ways one African region shaped
the Atlantic slave trade. But the impact of external processes remained
important throughout the era. In the first instance, the trade expanded in
response to the expanding plantation complexes of the Americas. While
forces within the Bight of Biafra shaped the trade, it was also subject to
influences from Atlantic-wide processes. For example, the War of Jenkin’s
Ear, 1739–48, and the Seven Years’ War, 1756–63, impacted the trade by
disrupting shipping. In the end, too, external developments played the
prominent role in ending the traffic. The slave trade involved African
patterns of supply, American patterns of demand, and a whole range of
processes underpinning them. Thus, a study of this kind also highlights
the interaction of regional developments with those in the rest of the
Atlantic world. The internal developments included macroeconomic
processes, demographic trends, institutional development, and political
and ideological change. On the other side of the Atlantic were mines
and plantations that depended on African slave labor. In European cities,
such as Bordeaux, Bristol, Liverpool, and Nantes, were financiers and
merchants who organized the trade. These are well-known developments,
but the interactive approach allows us to appreciate the extent to which
African history helped to shape Euro-American processes.
Notes on Sources
Besides the scholarly literature, other kinds of sources inform the

present study – export figures, memoirs, mariners’ journals, archival
material, missionary records, and oral data – each with its peculiar
strengths, problems, and context. The overwhelming majority of the
quantitative data for captive exports comes from the Trans-Atlantic
Slave Trade Database. The present study initially used the first edi-
tion on CD-ROM (1999), but the database has since been revised
and expanded in an online version (www.slavevoyaes.org). Wherever
needed figures could not be generated from database, David Eltis always
kindly provided them. Ironically, estimates for exports from the Bight
of Biafra have been revised downward in the new Trans-Atlantic Slave
Trade Database, meaning that the share of the slave trade for other
regions, principally West-Central Africa, increased proportionately.
The data used here were revised accordingly. Despite the changes, how-
ever, the basic trends in the volume and age and sex ratios of captives
exported from the region remain virtually intact. The basic arguments,
therefore, remain unaltered, although the changes inspired recalibra-
tions in some interregional comparisons presented in the study, such
as the rate at which slave ships loaded in African ports and the gender
structure of the trade.
The archival material used in the study contains mostly concrete,
dateable information. Still, several caveats about the use of these sources
are necessary. First, the archival sources are strong only for the early
twentieth century. Second, tracking down the relevant material was a
tedious process. Many files that came under the slavery label contained
209
210 Notes on Sources
unrelated material,1 much of which tells us more about general social

trends than slavery per se. For example, the reports of the command-
ers of the antislavery task force that began its work in 1933 and other
reports and items of correspondence, often produced undifferentiated
slavery-related data. The colonial intelligence and anthropological
reports conform to Patrick Manning’s characterization of them: they
reflect “the political objectives of the administration [and] the social
realities of the early twentieth century better than … the history of
slavery in Africa” (Manning 1990:16). In a moment of introspection,
one colonial officer wrote that, in place of an “organized judicial and
administrative system” for the Aro, “so great was the desire to destroy
Aro power that little of the indigenous system was permitted to sur-
vive” (Shankland 1933:3). Court records, especially those relating to
land cases, illuminate changes that followed the suppression of the
Atlantic slave trade. Finally, concerning archival sources, a marriage
register kept in 1919 and 1920 by the officer in charge of the Okigwe
District, which included the largest Aro settlement, helps to reconstruct
changes in marriage practices and occupational trends in the aftermath
of the overseas slave trade. The occupations of the parents of the cou-
ples found in the register enable us to push the chronology of occupa-
tional changes one generation back.
The missionary records used here are from the Holy Ghost Fathers
in Dublin, Republic of Ireland, the Church Missionary Society in
Birmingham, England, and the Primitive Methodists in London. However,
the actual use of these records in this study belies the effort put into
sourcing and collating them, and the gracious support I received from
the Holy Ghost Fathers in Dublin. First of all, the records are strongest
on the Niger riverine communities where Christianity arrived earlier – in
the mid-nineteenth century. Second, many of the records of the mission-
ary societies that operated in Igboland have only contextual relevance.
The missions have rich documentation on such issues as female circumci-
sion, polygyny, and even fattening. I found no files on slavery. In 1995,
in Dublin, when I asked why, Rev. Fr. Duignan, a Holy Ghost priest who
spent his active service in Igboland from the late 1930s onward, told me
that by the time he began his missionary work, the missions had already
made their contacts – principally through the schools. Besides, the Igbo,
1
For example, the Enugu archives file, “Cases of Slave Dealing,” includes all manner of
cases such as petty theft, marital squabbles, and land disputes that say little about slaving.
NAE 1/1920 – OKIDIST 4/2/1:”Cases of Slave Dealing.”
according to the retired pastor, had not been forthcoming on the question
of slavery (Duignan 1995).
Although the Aro were a literate group, I have not been able to master
their script enough to benefit from the information embedded in it.
Together with the Cross River Igbo warrior groups and the Ibibio, the
Aro had a script called nsibiri (or nsibidi in the Ibibio language).2 This
study could have benefited from the script, but literacy in it is restricted
to the Ekpe confraternity.
These problems reinforce the role of oral tradition in this research,
despite its many pitfalls. I formally interviewed forty-five respondents
and discussed Aro slavery and slave trade with many more people,
mainly in Arondizuogu and Arochukwu. I also studied hundreds of
other traditions collected by such illustrious earlier researchers as David
Northrup, Elizabeth Isichei, and the various authors of undergraduate
theses in Nigerian universities. The purpose of this effort was threefold: to
interrogate and buttress my evidence, infuse non-Aro perspectives into
the study, and situate the Aro in the regional context.
Given that oral traditions constitute a significant part of the material
utilized in this study and given their rather controversial reputation, it
is necessary to clarify related methodological issues. My understanding
of oral tradition is broad and consistent with the ideas of Jan Vansina
and E.J. Alagoa, to whom oral tradition refers to all orally transmitted
testimonies about the past, especially those passed from generation to
generation, as well as a people’s folklore (Alagoa 1966, 1968; Vansina
1961:142–64; 1985:25–27). But given that traditions tend to appear in
synchronic form when cast in the longue durée, how does one deal with
the important question of chronology? By posing this question, I do not
mean that indigenous groups lacked a sense of chronology, that is, about
what happened before or after, or the coincidences of events. They did,
by and large.
Conscious of the established standards of my discipline, I urged respon-
dents to endeavor to cite concrete examples of the issues and events they
discussed and to indicate when they occurred. They did not always do so,
leaving me to devise remedial strategies in my conceptualizations, data
collection, and analysis. This is one reason that I, unlike some scholars,
prefer to use the term “respondents” to “informants” for people inter-
viewed. Many of them not only resisted my attempt to hedge them in
through my professionally informed prescriptions, but they also taught
2
For details about Nsibiri, see Dayrell 1911; Macgregor 1909; Talbot 1912: Appendix G.
me a lot about their history while relying on their own devises.3 From
this, I learned like a critical student. While traditions may not refer to
specific or actual events, they embody the cosmogony of a people and
indicate historical trends. They also express abstract and real possibil-
ities, as well as limitations, in such a people’s society. As Afigbo has
observed,
the functions of oral tradition in a preliterate society go beyond the need to vali-
date social structures, groups or institutions. They also serve as ideologies as well
as represent a genuine attempt to reconstruct a meaningful story of the past. The
interpretation of the past in the light of the present and vice versa is not peculiar
to oral tradition. It is also characteristic of history in the best tradition of the
word. It is this fact that makes Groce’s famous dictum that all history is contem-
porary meaningful and valid. (Afigbo 1981b: 233n)
There is no one word that means “history” in the Igbo language. My

Aro respondents referred to it as akuko mgbe ochie (story of old times).
It seems that most other Igbo societies refer to it as akuko-ala (society’s
story). As literary critic Emmanuel Obiechina elaborated, the latter term
encompasses history in the Western sense, plus a corpus of morals (see
Obiechina 1994). Most of my respondents preferred to use the English
word – history – including those whose knowledge of English was slight.
It was clear that the people did not conceptualize history simply as char-
ter narrative to validate the present, and they did not always tell charter.
This observation departs from the widespread impression that oral tradi-
tions are invariably apologies for present politics.
Everyone that I spoke to – not just interviewed – conceptualized his-
tory as a distinct and knowable body of knowledge. One of my more
helpful respondents said the following about Eze Izuogu, the ruler of
Arondizuogu: “Go to him. He is a nice man. He might not know it all,
but he will not tell you lies” (Michael Ike 1996). Many people lamented
that, had I done my research a few years earlier when this or that man
or the occasional woman was living, she or he “would have told you
all about it.” There was remarkable consistency in the mention of par-
ticular names, such as the late Obasi Bassey Igbo of Ikpaeze and late
Udoji Mmeruonye of Ndiakunwanta. The social backgrounds of these
persons varied widely, but they were united in their acclaimed knowledge
3
Bentor reports of a similar experience in Arondizuogu. “I began to feel irritated. Things
were not working the way they should. … My hosts resisted the division of labor. I had
to rethink my relationship with them. My own response was to abandon terms such as
informant and field research” (Bentor 1994:3, 4).
of “history.” Yet, this kind of recognition implies that a historian could

interview one person and find out all there is to historical knowledge!
The essential point here, however, is that history for the Aro people is,
above all, a body of knowledge and truth, of which there are pundits and
which should not be contaminated with falsehood. One of the men that
I interviewed was recommended widely by persons from various back-
grounds, but, in almost every case, I was warned to beware of his lies!
This means that there is an objective body of historical knowledge –not
simply group charter – which even the enemy (or one who is known for
telling lies sometimes) alone might posses.4
Due to the sensitive nature of the subject of slavery, an overwhelming
majority of the respondents with whom I had lengthy interviews reached
a point where they refused to answer certain questions. Such questions
as whose ancestors were slaves and how the Aro came to occupy certain
regions were often sensitive. Some respondents preferred to refer me to
particular individuals to answer such questions. In some cases, the reason
for not discussing given issues was that a particular respondent was
afraid of misrepresenting history; at least I was given that impression.
Women often hesitated to discuss matters concerning their husband’s lin-
eages, always pointing out that “a biaru m abia” (“I came here [from
elsewhere]”). Depending on circumstances, this response grew out of
apprehensions over the prospect of appearing impertinent to male elders
of her husband’s lineage or was simply an inoffensive way of withholding
information for unstated reasons. Several respondents decided to involve
other individuals in their interviews. In other instances, male and female
respondents refused pointedly to answer particular questions, insisting
that answering those questions was inimical to present relations. For
the same reason, a respondent often told me something but charged me
emphatically never to “write it down.” One is thus caught in the tension
between research ethics and analytical rigor, both of which I have strived
to satisfy.
Given that this view of history – as something some people are skilled
in, the sanctity of which should be vigilantly protected, even from the
acclaimed experts – I cannot insist on regarding the traditions that arose
from this experience as mere charters. Charters are disseminated as
widely as possible because they are meant to serve group interests. Neither
4
The reputation as a knowledgeable historian is obviously a cherished one. To maintain or
claim it, some respondents in the diaspora communities switched to archaic Aro dialect,
or resort to theatrics or other antics.
should one insist on calling these persons “informants,” implying non-

creative, passive suppliers of data. Far from it, the people I interviewed
did not simply supply with me data but instead sometimes dictated the
pace and direction of the discussion. Besides, to describe these people
merely as informants implicates the researcher in the implied passivity.
On the contrary, the researcher plays an active role in teasing out histori-
cal data. Thus, the appellation “informants” is appropriately reserved
for providers of folkloric data, such as relevant proverbs, idioms, and
folk tales.
In my experience, charters are more likely to result from group
interviews. Group interviews were not part of my original plan for field-
work, but circumstances forced them on me. Such circumstances arose
when a potential respondent decided to include lineage members, often
their seniors, for unknown reasons or because those members were visiting
for a weekend from a city. In other instances, people intruded in the inter-
views, sometimes by accident, other times deliberately. Group interviews
generally failed to yield much reliable information. In one interview in
an Arondizuogu lineage-group, one lineage-level amadi (aristocracy)
intruded when I was interviewing a man of humbler origins. After listen-
ing for a while, the intruder began vigorously to urge my respondent to
stop answering my questions. The intruder charged that I was asking
questions like a “trained person,” asserting that my method was uncan-
nily similar to that of dynamic radio anchor the late Chima Eze. It should
be observed that I knew nothing about the family origin of my respondent
beforehand, but his submission to the intruder’s authority came across to
me as reluctance on his part to seem to be speaking for his lineage-group.
Even though I was not seeking a spokesperson for the lineage-group,
he had nevertheless feared the intruder might interpret it that way. The
intruder’s presence ruined the remainder of the interview. Unfortunately, I
could not return to this respondent because the incident occurred toward
the end of my fieldwork. But this encounter also revealed the current class
situation. Despite his humble origins in terms of lineage, the respondent
would have been more confident in his participation in the discussion had
he been richer and/or more educated than the intruder, in which case, he
could have felt confident speaking for himself, while the intruder would
have shown him more respect. In another lineage-group, one intruder
insisted that I should see their “chief” and other elders. Defensively, this
respondent explained to the intruder that we were discussing procedural
matters and “minor issues,” and that he had already advised me and my
company on how best to approach the elders.
I have found genealogies to be particularly useful in sorting out the

problem of chronology. This process opens doors to other historical
issues. Until very recently, itu eye (genealogical recitation), was required
of every male Aro in public deliberations. The possibility of distortion
was remote in a society where everyone knew almost everyone else and
where ancestral claims were verifiable. Thus, genealogy plays a major role
in Aro life. A point that has been missed so far in the historiography of
the dispute over Aro warrant chieftaincy during the early colonial period
is that the main issue was not the antiquity that contestants claimed
for their lineages; false claims hardly ever stood. It was about statuses
of ancestors at the point of entry and the nature of their relations to
other groups. Because those who got appointed as warrant chiefs during
the early colonial period were descendants of relatively recent entrants,
colonial anthropologists constructed a genealogical chart that dated Aro
formation wrongly at “most probably around 1750” (Anthropologists’
Papers 1927).
The issues that were, and still are, often vigorously contested in Aro
traditions concern who achieved what and, especially, the specific status
(i.e., slave, client, or immigrant) of an ancestor at the point of his entry
into Aro society. It was not, and still is not, through whom he came.
The annual Ihu rite (homage) takes care of these issues. As detailed in
Chapter 4, this rite routinized ties among individual males in a hierar-
chical order defined by social origins, age, and kinship affiliation. It is
rare, if at all, for an Aro to deny the provenance of his or her ances-
tors. Also, disputes regarding who came into the society before another
or who came later are extremely rare, if they exist at all. I wish to
observe in this connection that even in the long-standing dispute over
the Arondizuogu throne, dominant ndiawa have never claimed senior-
ity over Ndiuche; its claim of precedence is based on Uche’s alleged
disinheritance by Izuogu.5
5
There are contesting traditions regarding Uche’s supersession by Awa. The popular version
relates that Izuogu disinherited Uche, his first son, in favor of Awa, during Izuogu’s life-
time. It is claimed that Izuogu had inadvertently killed a fellow Aro amadi (aristocrat) over
a disagreement in an Aro council meeting. In the last analysis, Izuogu was asked to present
one of his sons. Failing to do this, Izuogu would pay with his own head. Uche’s mother,
Mpi, took her son away in order to protect him. By contrast, Awa’s mother, Egbocha,
offered her young son. As luck would have it, Izuogu was spared the ordeal when, either
he was pardoned or a slave was accepted in his son’s stead. Consequent upon this expe-
rience, Izuogu made Awa his heir. But the tradition put forward by nde-Uche does not
acknowledge this incident, claiming instead that Izuogu’s dependents used their matriclan
The implication of the foregoing for oral tradition is the minimization

of one of its central defects, that is, the confusion often associated with
lineal precedence. A colonial anthropological report of 1927 noted
that the Aro had “an undimmed recollection of their past history”
(see Anthropologists’ Papers 1927:2). Another, in 1935, observed that
Arondizuogu did not have any legends (see Mayne 1935). In spite of
twentieth-century manipulations, these observations are consistent with
those of modern scholars who have done fieldwork among the Aro (Bentor
1994; K.O. Dike and Ekejiuba 1990; Northrup 1978:34). As a result, one
does not start to reconstruct Aro history from “time immemorial.” While
debates about entry statuses still create problems, Aro genealogies are
reliable enough for establishing rough chronologies.
I have compared the results of my calculations with the dates given by
other researchers.6 In some cases, as in the formation of Arondizuogu,
my calculations correspond with other estimates. Where comparative
chronologies are absent in the literature, for example, the entry points of
Arondizuogu lineage-groups, I have relied solely on my own. In analyz-
ing the genealogies, for example, the formation of individual lineages,
which appeared in the traditions to be separated only by a few years,
turns out to have spanned a century and a half. Also, the movement of
two Aro groups into the upper Imo River, said to have been made by
Izuogu’s brothers, and by implication to have happened in the same gen-
eration as the formation of Arondizuogu, actually took place more than
one century later (in the late 1850s and early 1870s), and it involved the
descendants of the supposed pioneers.7 Having put the chronologies in a
chart, as was done in Chapter 4, a pattern emerges regarding the physi-
cal location of the lineage-groups. Also, the dates established in these
chronologies help us to learn about what was happening in those other
societies from where the Aro recruited immigrants. For instance, the time
connections with Awa to support Awa in Awa’s wrongful bid for power. Whatever be the
case, both traditions affirm the fact that Uche was Izuogu’s first son and that Izuogu’s
dependents determined the outcome of the succession dispute between the two princes.
6
Bentor 1994; Dike and Ekejiuba 1990; Ekejiuba 1972a; Eni 1973; Ijoma and Njoku
1991; Isichei 1976; G.I. Jones 1963; Latham 1973; Northrup 1978; Nwuauwa 1990,
1991; J.G. Okoro 1985; Oriji 1994.
7
Following the tradition, J.G. Okoro writes: “The success of [Izuogu’s] business adventures
soon attracted his brothers Njoku and Imoko, to the commercial centers. They also joined
in the business and later founded their own colonies which, with time, became merged
with that of Mazi Izuogu under one name by mutual consent” (J.G. Okoro (1985:12). The
dates for Ndinjoku’s and Ndimoko’s arrivals are my estimates, working from the genealo-
gies of the settlements concerned.
of refugee influx from Owa in the Nri-Awka axis helps us to estimate a

date for the catastrophic obliteration of that society.
Genealogies are, however, more complicated than the foregoing may
suggest. For example, a slave acquisition or immigration that a tradition
may connect to a particular name within a lineage may actually have been
associated with another person within that same lineage at an earlier or
a later period. Lineage members of different generations are sometimes
related to one another in a synchronic form. Thus, it is not enough to
focus on one lineage in establishing chronologies on cross-lineal matters.
Material culture found during fieldwork also helped me a great deal
in understanding Aro history. Architectural structures and their compo-
nents are living contemporaries of the past. They tell lively stories about
settlement patterns, occupations, warfare and other processes. Religious
icons go very far in unknotting important aspects of the people’s cosmog-
ony. On a final note, although I owe much of my understanding of the
subject to my encounter with traditions, it seems that I learn a new thing
each time I re-read the published eyewitness sources, especially mariners’
journals. John Thornton translated Oldendorp (2000) from German, and
Heike Raphael-Hernandez helped with one passage of this source. Victor
Madeira translated all relevant sections of Sandoval ([1627] 1956).
The authority of one prominent eyewitness has become a subject of
contestation during the preparation of this study. Olaudah Equiano’s
widely read autobiography, Interesting Narrative, has long been regarded
as the quintessential slave narrative globally, and Equiano’s claim to hav-
ing been born and raised in Igboland had since the 1960s bestowed on
his comments a prominent niche in the reconstruction of the hazy history
of eighteenth-century Igboland. Equiano’s testimony seemed to receive
a boost in the 1980s from the research of Catherine Acholonu, whose
analysis of the linguistic and ethnographic information gleaned from
Equiano’s narrative led her to narrow the searchlight to a small area on
the western periphery of the Igbo heartland. There, she found a town
called Isieke, where some of the key ethnographic and historical facts
mentioned by Equiano seem to check impeccably. She also located an
Ekwealuo family, whose living members remembered a story of a boy
who went missing long ago (Acholonu 1987, 1989). Even if we rule out
the several other Isiekes in Igboland on the basis of Acholonu’s linguis-
tic claims, several aspects of her findings are questionable.8 It suffices to
8
Since Chinua Achebe had in article published in 1978 identified Iseke as Equiano’s natal
home, it is unclear that Isieke resulted wholly from Acholonu’s linguistic analysis (Achebe’s
point out that Acholonu’s work did not assuage the skepticism about
Equiano’s account that has been raised by such scholars as S.E. Ogude
and Afigbo. Both noted that Equiano quarried large portions of his
account of Igboland from contemporary descriptions of Africa authored
by others as well as indulged in fiction and embellishment. Nonetheless,
these critics attributed these shortcomings to natural lapses in memory
that should be expected in a story told by an adult who was removed at
a tender age from the context he was describing. They did not question
Equiano’s claim to have been born in Igboland (Afigbo 1981:147–84;
Ogude 1982).
The landscape of the Equiano discourse has shifted entirely in the
past ten years. Preoccupation with where in Igboland Equiano origi-
nated and which elements of his descriptions of the Igbo country are
accurate and which are not has given way to whether Equiano was born
in Africa at all and, ipso facto, whether his descriptions of Igboland can
be relied upon as an eyewitness account. The literary scholar Vincent
Carretta has uncovered evidence that suggests that Equiano was prob-
ably born in South Carolina rather than Igboland, which Equiano pur-
ported to write about in parts of his Interesting Narrative (Carretta
1999, 2005). Central to Carretta’s work are two documents – a record
of Equiano’s baptism at St. Mary’s Church in the then London suburb
of Westminster in January 1759 and one of his service on the Racehorse
during the Arctic expedition of 1773 (Carretta 1999, 2005). Carretta
deserves a lot of credit for his startling discoveries, not only of the docu-
ments that cast doubt on Equiano’s nativity, but also of related informa-
tion that strengthens our hands in scrutinizing Carretta’s own inferences
article is cited by Ogude 1982:34). Acholonu’s interprets “Oye-Eboe,” the name Equiano
claimed his people called red-colored slave traders, as Oyibo, claiming it is the term the
Igbo used to refer to light-kinned people rather than Europeans. It is unclear when the
Igbo began to make such a distinction, if they did at all. The Igbo referred to White
people/Europeans as Bekée. It is likely that late-nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century
Igbo may have borrowed “Oyibo” from the Yoruba, who used (and still use) it to refer to
Europeans or White people, which is probably why that reference is more current among
the western Igbo who had greater intercourse with the Yoruba. Perhaps, the most curious
aspect of Acholonu’s findings is that Equiano’s family name Ekwealuo has survived since
the eighteenth century and continues to be used as surname by the family. In the actual
fact, the Igbo practice of surnames prescribed the use of the name of somebody’s imme-
diate ancestor, usually father, as surname. The practice of static surnames – a European
rather than precolonial Igbo practice – was adopted with Christianity and colonialism in
the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, so that family names of the eighteenth
century did not survive into the twentieth century. Also, the name Ekweanua/Ekweanuo
is more plausible as Equiano’s last name than Ekwealuo.
and conclusions. Without question, information about a Carolina birth

in the two documents, which Equiano used over the years and never
confronted directly, even in his autobiography, places a question mark
on his nativity.
The question then is whether the newly discovered records should be
treated as sacrosanct and Equiano’s affirmation of his nativity consid-
ered a falsehood. Carretta claims that Equiano fabricated his African
nativity claims, to boost the abolitionist movement with a much-needed
voice of an African who witnessed traumatic capture into slavery and
the horrendous Middle Passage. Many scholars, however, think that the
Equiano evidence can be interpreted in different ways (see Blackburn
2005:37; Bugg 2006:572; Lovejoy 2006; Nwokeji 2006:840–41; 2009:7;
Torrington 2005). Whether Equiano’s claim to African birth is true or not
may never be established beyond reasonable doubt; by the same token,
the baptismal register and the muster lists do not provide conclusive evi-
dence that he was born in the carolinas.
The specific situation of Equiano, first as a slave boy and later as
a free man in eighteenth-century Britain, during the years his appar-
ent Carolina nativity was documented should be taken into account.
Carretta does not give much weight to the probability that Equiano may
have had little to do with the birth place that appears in his baptismal
record. Equiano’s baptism was sponsored by the relatives of his master
Michael Henry Paschal, an officer in the British Royal Navy, probably
at Paschal’s behest. It should be borne in mind that as somebody who
concealed Equiano’s slave status from the British naval authorities and
illegally took Equiano’s salary, Paschal had an interest in how Equiano’s
identity was represented. It was in Paschal’s interest to represent Equiano’s
birthplace as America rather than Africa. A young African-born boy in
eighteenth-century Royal Navy as an officer’s servant was more likely to
draw attention to slavery than a boy born in the Americas. By failing to
report that Equiano was his slave, Paschal did actually falsify the record
of Equiano’s real status or, at the very least, demonstrated his willingness
to do so (Nwokeji 2006; 2009). Under these circumstances, therefore,
we must allow for the possibility that Equiano – a young slave boy – was
not the original source of that information. Paul Lovejoy has compel-
lingly asserted that the very fact that Paschal’s cousin Mary Guerin, who
had acted as Equiano’s godmother, later attested – alongside respected
members of the British public – that Equiano spoke only an African
language at the time he arrived in England blights the information in the
baptismal record (Lovejoy 2006:336).
Carretta suggests that Equiano giving South Carolina as his birth

place for the Arctic expedition of 1773 rather than Africa, despite being
a free man, shows he was not born in Africa. But as literary critic Bryan
Carrey has observed, it was indeed uncommon for former slaves to use
their African names.9 As we learn from Carretta’s own work, Equiano
did even more than this when he identified himself as Africa-born while
applying for employment with the bishop of London in 1779, before the
take-off of the abolitionist movement he was supposed to boost by alleg-
edly falsely claiming he was born in Africa. Equiano using his slave name
Vassa for the most part until publishing his autobiography does not carry
the evidential weight assigned to it by Carretta.
Questions about the newly discovered documents counsel against a
rush to discard Equiano’s own claim that he was born in Igboland. Some
scholars – notably Lovejoy – have insisted that the nativity testimony
that Equiano supplied in his autobiography is at least as good as the
information in his baptismal record and the muster list of the Racehorse.
According to these scholars, Equiano’s thorough embodiment of Igbo
values and command of historically accurate descriptions of Igboland
demonstrate that he lived the Igbo experience (Byrd 2006:124–26; Kroll
2007; Lovejoy 2006:325, 331, 336; Nwokeji 2001:10; Ogude 2003).10
For Angelo Constazo, Equiano, rather than misrepresent his nativity
in his autobiography, had vested interest in being truthful about it. He
would probably have known that misrepresenting his nativity would
destroy the credibility of his narrative and undermine the abolitionist
movement (Constanzo 2003). And Robin Blackburn has noted that the
image of a conniving fabricator does not fit the character of Equiano that
emerges in the Narrative (Blackburn 2005:37). Alexander Byrd takes it
for granted that Equiano came from the hinterland of the Bight of Biafra
(Byrd 2008:21–27, 42–43;159, 249).
The evolution of this discourse has caused a continual reassessment
in the use of the Equiano source as this study progressed. I have always
treated Equiano’s work with a measure of skepticism because of his very
young age at the time of initial enslavement to the time he made the
9
www.brycchancarey.com/equiano/nativity.htm.
10
At the conference “Olaudah Equiano: Representation and Reality,” conference held at
Kingston University-upon-Thames on March 22, 2003, Ogude who first raised serious
questions about Equiano’s work in modern times, argued that his reading of the auto-
biography left him in no doubt that Equinao was born in Igboland. I have not read this
paper, but I heard Ogude’s presentation at the conference and had a conversation with
him afterward.
forced Atlantic crossing (Nwokeji 2001:9–10). We cannot however dis-

card entirely Equiano’s comments about the eighteenth-century Biafra
hinterland for the following reasons. To do so is to treat the newly
discovered documents as sacrosanct in the face of lingering questions
about them and the fact that other claims in Equiano’s narrative tend
to check well wherever they can be verified. Further, many of his com-
ments about Igboland have been widely acknowledged as historically
accurate, including by Carretta himself. If we can use other New World
sources of the slave trade era who never visited Africa, such as Sandoval
and Oldendorp, we can use Equiano’s as well, knowing that he prob-
ably actually lived the experiences he related. If, however, he did not, his
account would be rendered less reliable because, unlike the other writ-
ers who mentioned their sources, Equiano would have falsely claimed to
have witnessed what he reported. I have got rid of the Equiano’s evidence
entirely in at least one instance and toned down my reliance, including
corroborating his account with other sources. As the Equaino controversy
shows, different sources often enough tell different stories – sometimes
different angles to the same story – and each kind of source places all the
others in perspective.
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Index
Italic page numbers indicate maps or tables.
Abo state/society, XVIn2, 14, 24, 32 Ajana (deity), 106

abolitionist movement, 219, 220 Akamnonu, Oliver
See also British abolition of slave trade Taste of the West, 158n18
Achebe, Chinua, 160, 217–218n8 Akpa ethnic group, XIV, 26–31, 30n17, 79
Things Fall Apart, 86n8, 163 Akuma, (Aro king), 15, 15n27
Acholonu, Catherine, 217–218, 217–218n8 Ala (deity), XV–XVII, XVIn2, XVIn3
Adams, John, 138, 138n29, 166, 197 Alagoa, Ebiegberi Joe, 211
adultery, 135 Allied War (Ọgụ Omakọba), 190–191,
Afigbo, Adiele, 8–9, 18, 50, 212, 218 190–191n29
Afikpo slave market, 13n22, 61, 64 amadi (class), 64, 66, 100–102, 104, 112,
African diaspora in the Americas, XVII 128, 197, 214, 215n5
Africanus, Leo, 166n28 Amadiume, Ifi, 158
agawhu. See merchant-warlords Amaigbo (town), XVIn2
age structure of slave trade, 11, 144–148, Amankwu (dialect), 108
150, 156, 161, 176, 209 Amankwu (lineage-group), 28, 61, 62,
See also boys as slaves; children as 62–63, 97
slaves; girls as slaves Amaokpala people, 90n15, 163–164n23,
agency, XVII, 6n8, 56, 76, 79, 204 194–195
agriculture Amazu (Isuogu’s dependent), 57, 93,
See also kolanuts; palm oil trade; yams 93n17, 97, 200n45
of the Aro, 7, 102–103, 105–107, 178, 188 the Americas
and civil war, 191 captives deported to, XXIII, 4–5, 32, 117,
and food shortages, 188 119, 124–125, 128, 141–142, 197
gender division of labor in, XVIII, 149, demand for captives in, XVII, 20, 22–23,
152–153, 156, 159–161, 169–170, 33–37, 42–47, 117–118, 197, 204,
176 207
in the Igbo heartland, 88 Igbo slaves in, 44, 125
and immigration, 80 plantations in, 33, 37, 42–43, 45,
slave labor in, 183 118–120, 147
vs. the trading society, 102 slave standards in, 125–126
and warfare, 189–190 slave traders from, 117
Agwu, Eze (Aro king), 15n27 amuda (class), 101
265
266 Index
Ana (deity), XV, XVIn3, 105–109, 106n34 and the Aro slave trade, 178
Andrew the Moor, 141–142 and Aro state structures, 11–19
Angelo, Michael, 154 Arondizuogu lineage-groups in, 102
Anglo-Aro relations (post-Atlantic slavery), and the Biafra geocultural landscape,
7–8 XVIII
Angola, 117, 151 cohesion of, 17
Anị (deity). See Ala; Ana and cultural deviation, 100–107
antislavery task force, 210 culture formation in, 83–84, 100–101
Anya. A.O., 164n25, 165n27 economic vs. political, 13, 206
architecture of the Aro, 191–192, 192n33, and human proliferation, 71–75
197, 217 hybridity in, XV
archival sources. See under sources and the Ikeji festival, 102
overview incest in, 103–104
Aro, rise of and indigenous slavery, 25
first phase (1600-1720s), 26–37, 64 lineage-groups in, 60–62, 61, 62, 76, 184
second phase (1740s-1807), 37–45, 64 linkages with Arochukwu, 96–100, 115
Aro agriculture, 7, 102–103, 105–106, on the Niger River, 54
178, 188 and Nigerian cultural studies, 18
Aro central council (Ọkpankpọ), 27, 54, oppression and spiritual life in, 198
65, 75–76, 78, 96, 206 origins of, 26–27
See also Aro diaspora/expansion; Aro the osu in, 198
organization political economy of, 71
Aro commercial organization. See Aro and private enterprise, 15, 56, 64–71
organization; Aro trade networks/ and regional slave preferences, 125
diasporas and the slave trade, XVII–XVIII, 15,
Aro culture, XIV–XVII, XVIn2, XVIn3, 20–21, 45, 54, 115–116, 178
1–3, 16, 18–19, 22–26, 82–83, 95–97 slave trade routes during, 50–51, 66n16
Aro diaspora settlements state-sponsored, 15–16
and agriculture, 188 strategies of, 56
Aro influence continued by, 184 systems in, 115
and Arochukwu, 115–116 timing and location of, 57–64
vs. centralization, 15–16 and warfare, 15, 68–71, 106–107,
cultural interpretations of, 19 188–189, 193
as free cities, 188n27 and women slave ratios, 177
immigrant populations of, 2–3, 16 Aro economic imperialism, 13n22, 206
institutions of, 76–80, 98 See also Aro diaspora/expansion; Aro
lineage-groups of, 6, 60, 61, 62, 76, trade networks/diasporas
90–93, 102, 108 Aro identity, XV, 18–19, 42–45, 55, 77,
and the Nri-Awka region, 124 83–84, 178–179, 206
overviews, XVIn2, 54–64 Aro imperialists, 77, 206
Aro diaspora/expansion Aro languages and dialects, XVII, 60–62,
See also Aro central council; Aro 61, 62, 73, 76, 78n34, 107–111
organization; Aro regional Aro lineage-groups, 6, 12, 15, 60, 61,
dominance; Aro trade networks/ 62–63, 68, 76
diasporas; Arochukwu region; Aro merchant-warlords, 58, 65–66, 66n16,
Atlantic slave trade; Biafra 68, 189, 194
hinterland; culture formation; Igbo See also warfare
ethnic group; Igboland Aro militarization. See Aro warfare
and agriculture, 188 The Aro of Southeastern Nigeria (Dike and
alliances in, 64–71 Ekejiuba ), 11
Aro influence continued by, 184 Aro organization
Index 267
See also Aro diaspora/expansion; Aro slaves’ cultures absorbed in, 94–95, 197
regional dominance; Aro trade and social mobility, 197
networks/diasporas women in, 154, 157, 173
and the Aro’s ascendancy, 80 Aro statehood, 11–19
in Atlantic scholarship, 6, 8 Aro trade diasporas. See Aro trade
and the Atlantic slave trade, 34–35, 45, networks/diasporas
54, 115–116, 204 Aro trade networks/diasporas
characteristics of, 204 See also Aro organization; Aro regional
as economic/political, 13, 206 dominance
and the Ekpe, 77–78 and agriculture, 188
overview, 11–19 and Aro rule, 173, 206
state characteristics of, XIV, 204 and the Atlantic slave trade, 23–26
as trade network/diaspora, XVIII, Bende market as central to, 31
115–116 British encroachment on, 185–186,
Aro political economy, 2, 11, 117 186n19, 203
Aro politics/political organization, XVII, combined, XIV
XXIII–XXIV, XVIn3, 11–14, 16–17, as defining Aro characteristic, 17, 206
23–24, 26, 30, 53–56, 75–76, 195, elements of, 54–56
206 free cities in, 188n27
Aro regional dominance, 181, 186–187 in the hinterland, 10
See also Aro diaspora/expansion; Aro regional context overview, 53–81
organization; Aro slave trade in southern Igboland, 10
Aro script (nsibiri), 6, 78n34, 211 as study focus, XIV, 11, 18
Aro slave trade Aro warfare, 12, 65, 68–71, 106–107,
See also Aro diaspora/expansion; 178–181, 187–196, 188n26, 203
Atlantic slave trade; Biafra See also Cross River Igbo warriors;
hinterland; domestic slave trade; merchant-warlords; warfare
slave traders Aro-Anglo relations (post-Atlantic slavery),
and the Aro economy, 71, 207 7–8
and the Aro political economy, 2, 26 See also British headings
vs. Aro warfare, 6, 179 Arochukwu region
British abolition of, 2–3, 181–184 See also Aro diaspora settlements; Aro
and British imperialism, 181–185 diaspora/expansion; Aro trade
and culture formation, 83 networks/diasporas
dominance of, XIV, 1–3, 11, 22–23, 31, architecture of, 191
75 and the Atlantic slave trade, 23
and the Ekpe, 79 class structure in, 100–101
emerging, 34–35 cultural developments in, 83
and firearms, 196 and cultural deviation, 100–107, 113
human commodity in, 104 early ethnic groups in, 87n10
and human proliferation, 72 formation/consolidation of, 6, 20,
indigenous, 6–7 31–32, 53
institutions of, 75–80, 132–143 Ibiniukpabi oracle in, 77
labor pools of, 188 Igbo ascendancy in, 100
and the Nri-Awka, 80, 94 Igbo-Akpa confederacy in, 26, 31
overviews, 118–128, 134–143 and Igboland, XVII, XVn1
and the palm oil trade, 183–184 Ikeji festival in, 102–103
as punishment/reprisal, 76, 81, 99, 118, immigration into, 26–27, 32, 53
131n14, 132, 140n35, 195 indigenous slavery in, 25
routes of, 50–51 languages and dialects of, 107–112,
slave demographics in, 2 109–110
268 Index
Arochukwu region (Cont.) Atlantic slave trade

lineage-groups of, 27, 55, 63, 101, 191 See also Aro slave trade; Biafra slave
linkage groups of, 96–100 trade; indigenous slavery
marriage possibilities in, 104 and Aro diaspora/expansion, 19, 22–26,
as place vs. ethnic group, 18–19 32, 35–36, 51, 53–54, 58–60, 66,
politics/political culture of, 66, 100 70–71, 82, 115–116, 118, 125,
shrines originating in, 200 204–206
slavery in, 24, 50–51, 65–67, 71, 75, 123 and Aro organization, 34–35, 45, 54,
structure in, 28 115–116, 204
as trade diaspora center, 54 and the Aro political economy, 117
twin taboo in, 104, 104n32 and Arochukwu, 23
zoning in, 63 and the Arondizuogu settlement, 87n9
Arondizuogu diaspora settlement captives destined for, 117
agriculture in, 103, 105–106 and domestic slavery, 25, 130
ancestors of, 72, 102 end of, 6, 126, 131, 181, 196–197,
and the Atlantic slave trade, 87n9 202–203, 205, 207–208
colonial domination resisted by, 106 expansions and shifts, 22–26
cultural development in, 83 and gender inequality, 177
and cultural deviation, 100–107 gender structure of, 10
establishment of, 20, 29–30n15, 57–60, in hinterland vs. coastal areas, 7, 23, 38,
66, 66n16, 70 45–52
founding of, 1, 57, 60 and human sacrifice, 201
Ikeji festival in, 102–103, 102n31 and the Ibibio, 32
immigrants in, 115 and the Ibiniukpabi oracle, 76
landscape surrounding, 85 and the Igbo, XV, 4n4, 5, 20, 32, 42, 51,
languages and dialects of, 107–112, 58, 70–71
109–110, 111n39 vs. indigenous slavery, 5, 24–25,
as largest Aro settlement, 1, 13n22, 83 117–118, 181–182, 197
leadership, 59–60 and kolanuts, 170
lineage-groups of, 60, 62, 89, 90–93, overview, 4–7
92, 102, 102n31, 184, 200n45, vs. palm oil trade, 3
214–215 slavery prior to, 87n9
merchant-warlords revered in, 193 suppression of, 119
multiple lineage-group shrines in, 200, Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database of,
200n45 150
Nri-Awka cultural impact in, 107, 200 volume of, 33
osu caste system in, 198–200, 199n40, Atta dynasty, 50
200n44 autochthonous communities, XVIn2, 85
and the Owa community, 74–75, 75n29 Awa (Izuogu’s son), 60, 112–114,
Patriotic Union (APU), 102n31 215–216n5
population of, 3n2, 58, 66n16, 90, 94 Awka trading group, 57, 70, 77–78, 108
power shift in, 114 See also Nri-Awka region
skilled slaves in, 122–123 Ayanma displays, 115
slavery and population expansion in, 94
slavery ending in, 199 Baikie, William, 133, 135
trade diaspora in, 56–58, 60, 62 Barbados, 35, 42
and twin taboo, 105 Barbot family, records kept by, 31, 34–36,
and warfare, 107, 191 34n20, 78, 88, 142
Asante state, 12, 23, 123, 163n21, 165 Basden, G.T., 153, 159–160
asylum. See slave defections Bello, Mohammed, 139–140
Atani people, 63, 185 Bende slave market, 4, 6, 8, 31, 34, 50, 56,
Atlantic economic context, 179–181 79, 191
Index 269
Benin kingdom, 12, 25, 31, 43, 64–65n14, Aro trade oriented toward, 60
149, 151–152, 168, 168n31 captives departing from, 46
Bentor, Eli, 19, 83, 212 captives loaded per vessel in, 41
Bermuda, 35 civil war’s effect on, 14–15
Biafra hinterland documentation on, 154, 156
Aro control in, 15, 22, 53, 75 female slaves exported from, 158–159
Aro expansion into, XVIII, 2–3, 6, 9–10, as historical focus, 23
18–19, 45, 50–51, 58, 205, 207 Igbo slaves exported from, 51, 159
British encroachment into, 185 lineage-groups of, 61
captives drawn from, 50 loading times in, 40
map of, XI percentage of slave exports, 155
population of, XIX, 22, 188 preeminence of, 5–6, 20, 44–48, 51, 60,
and the slave trade, 7, 23–24, 43, 45–52, 159
75, 119, 134 resistance among slaves brought to, 132
zoning of, 60–64 routes to and from, 50–52
Biafra slave trade vs. trans-Saharan slave trade, 166
See also Aro slave trade; Atlantic slave trust system in, 78
trade; gender structure of slave voyage times to England, 37
trade; Igbo ethnic group; Igboland; Bosman, William, 127
indigenous slavery; slave traders boys as slaves, 36, 137, 151, 155, 156, 171
in the Biafra hinterland, 7, 23–24, 43, See also children as slaves; gender
45–52, 75, 119, 134 structure of slave trade; girls as
historiography of, 7–19 slaves
mental models in, 118 Brass (slave port), 23, 47, 49–51
overview, XIII–XIV, XVIII, 4–7 Bristol (England), 42–46, 48, 145, 208
quantitative date on, 150–151, 151 British abolition of slave trade, XVIII, 2–3,
Bight of Benin, XIII, 38, 39, 151, 159, 168, 4n4, 6, 181–184
170, 176–177, 180 British Anti-Slavery Squadron, 118
Bight of Biafra British Aro Expedition (1901-02), 3, 29,
See also Aro diaspora/expansion; Aro’s 179, 199n40
rise; Atlantic slave trade; Biafra British Board of Trade, 36
hinterland; historiography; slave British Caribbean, 5
ships British colonial antislavery efforts, 158n18
British incursions into, 181–188, 187n21 British colonial rule, 98, 106, 111, 158n18
captives exported from, XIII–XIV, XIV, British imperialism, 178–179, 181–188,
4n4, 5, 22, 33, 33–42, 38, 41, 46, 187n21, 206–207
123–125, 140, 143, 151 British incursions in Biafra, 181–188,
economy of, 180 187n21
evidence of slavery from, 119 British Niger Expeditions, 105, 133
indigenous slavery in, 24 British slave trade, 4, 4n4, 43–46, 48
kidnapping in, 127–130 British theories on the Aro, 8
map, XI Burdo, Adolphe, 199n40
political economy of, XVII, 9, 11, 21
regional relationships, 20–21 Cameroon (Bight of Biafra subregion), 44,
slave prices in, 36, 36 46, 47, 78, 79, 156, 156n15, 163
slave trade ended in, 202 Cape Lopez, Gabon, XIII
turnaround rates in, 37–38, 39 capitalism, 115
warfare/violence overview, 178–203 Carew, W.E., 88, 88n12
women slaves exported from, 151 Carli, Denis de, 151–152
blunderbusses, 29–32 Carretta, Vincent, 218–221
See also firearms Casement, Roger, 186n19, 191
Bonny (state and slave port) caste systems, 198–199, 200n43, 200n44
270 Index
Chambers, Douglas, 58 cultural deviations in the frontier, 100–107

Chesapeake Bay, 1, 5, 43, 58 culture formation overview, 82–116
Chi (deity), XV–XVII, XVIn2, XVIn3 currency systems, 36, 53
children as slaves, 57 Curtin, Philip, 174n35
See also boys as slaves; gender structure
of slave trade; girls as slaves Dahomey state, 16, 64n14, 123, 138, 152,
in Atlantic vs. domestic slave trade, 169
144–148, 154, 157 Davenport, William, 44
captured in warfare, 127, 129, 161–162, decadence, 196–202
205 demand for captives/slaves. See the
kidnapped, 131 Americas; European demand for
parents’ sale of, 95 captives; plantations
as punishment/reprisal, 134, 195 demographic impacts, XVIII–XIX
ratios, 171–172 deportees overview, 117–143
and slave wives, 158, 158n18 dialect formation, 107–115
in the West-Central African slave trade, Dickson, Kwamina, 170
147 Dike, Eze John, II, 59–60, 60n9
Chima, Eze, 214 Dike, K. Onwuka, XXIV, 9, 14–16, 25n10,
Christianity, 115, 217–218n8 26, 53, 65, 66n16, 206
Chukwu (deity), 55, 61, 76, 185, 199n40 The Aro of Southeastern Nigeria
See also Ibiniukpabi oracle (co-author), 11
Church Missionary Society (CMS), 88, division of labor. See gender division of
118, 210 labor
civil war. See warfare, civil documentary historical sources,
class structures, 100–101 XXIII–XXIV
coastal states slave trade, 7, 23, 32, 45–52, domestic slavery, i, 6–7, 25, 43, 87, 119–
118–119 122, 130, 182–183, 185, 197, 201
See also slave traders See also indigenous slavery; market
Cohen, Abner, 17 persons; slave wives; woman as slaves
Cohen, Ronald, 16–17 Duignan, Reverend Father, 210–211
colonialism, 115, 217–218n8 the Dutch, 35
See also British colonial rule
conspicuous consumption, 201, 201n46 economic aftershocks overview, 178–203
Constazo, Angelo, 220 economic necessity of slavery, 141–143
Cookey, Sylvanus, 25 Edwards, Bryan, 42
Cooper, Fred, 21n34 Efik societies, 24n7, 78, 149n7
Corisco (slave port), 46 Egbocha (Awa’s mother), 112–114, 215n5
Cotterell, Harry, 180–181 Ejiofo of Oba, 194
Cowan, A, A., 185 Ekeh, Peter, 12n20
Cross River Igboland, XVIn2, 5–6, 13n22, Ekejiuba, Felicia, XXIV, 14–16, 25n10, 26,
18, 26–27, 30n15, 31, 50, 68, 70, 65, 66n16, 158n18
89n14 The Aro of Southeastern Nigeria
See also Igboland (co-author), 11
Cross River Igbo warriors, 127, 132, 162, Ekpe society, 2, 6, 6n8, 10, 20, 20n33,
190, 192–193, 195–196, 206, 211 45, 75, 77–79, 78n35, 96, 115, 140,
See also Aro warfare; warfare 140n34, 211
Cross River region, XIV–XV, 1, 6, 20, Eltis, David, 47, 209
26–27, 30n17, 51, 54, 78–79, 156, Emecheta, Buchi, 122
186–187, 187n21 Slave Girl, 158n18
Crow, Hugh, 43, 138–139, 153 Emesinwa, Oti, 57, 66, 66n16, 199
Cuba, 78 English America colonies, 4
cultural aftershocks overview, 178–203 See also the Americas
Index 271
Enugu (Igbo city/state), XVIn2, 125, documentation on, limited, 130

200n45 overview, 144–177
Equiano, Olaudah, 25, 43, 67, 86, 128n12, as study focus, XVIII, 10–11, 209
133, 191, 217–221, 217–218n8, 220n10 genealogies as source studies, 214–217
Interesting Narrative, 217 girls as slaves, 36, 150, 155, 158n18,
ethnic heterogeneity, 15 171–173
ethnically homogenous middlemen groups See also boys as slaves; gender structure
(EHMGs), 17 of slave trade
ethnolinguistic diversity, XIV, XVII Gold Coast, 23, 38, 39, 127, 148–149,
European demand for captives, XVII, 150n8, 151, 160–161, 165–170, 174,
XXIII, 20, 22, 34–37, 42, 46–47, 117, 176, 202
197, 207 Gomez, Michael, 42
European presence in Atlantic Africa, 35, Goody, Jack, 120
178–179, 181–188 Gose, Peter, 207
Ewe ethnic group, 148 Grainger, James, 43
Expanded Online Trans-Atlantic Slave Grazilhier, John, 31, 34
Trade Database (slavevoyages.org), Greene, Sandra, 148
4n4, 40, 209 Guerin, Mary, 219
Eyamba, King, 182 Guyer, Jane I, 161n20
Eyo (King), 182
Eze Aro (King), 54, 99, 206 Hair, Paul, 34n20, 118, 128, 175
Eze as title, 15n27 Hall, Gwendolyn, 43–44
Ezeagwu confederacy group, 27, 27n13, 28 Hamitic hypothesis, 8
Ezeanakwe, Ezenne, 195 Hausa ethnic group, 17, 55, 115, 162–163,
Ezeliora, Bernadette, 72 163n21, 165–170, 165n27, 166n28,
Ezenwali (King of Nri), 193 176
Eze-Ogo (King), 97, 123 head hunting, 196, 201
hinterland. See Biafra hinterland
Falconbridge, Alexander, 37, 127, Hippisley, John, 4, 174n35
132–133, 159 historiography of the Biafra slave trade,
female husbands, 158, 158n18 7–19, 23
firearms, 26, 32n18, 187, 190–191, See also sources overview
195–196, 196n37, 206 Hogendorn, Jan, 10
See also blunderbusses Holy Ghost Fathers (Dublin), 210
Forde, Daryll, 18–19, 194 household slaves. See domestic slavery
Fraser, James, 132 human proliferation (mmuba), 2, 71–75,
frontiers, 3, 20, 32, 58, 84, 84n3, 92–96, 105n33
103–104, 106, 111 human sacrifice, 134, 198, 200–202
See also trading frontier overview Hutchinson, Thomas, 182
funeral rites, 98, 98n25, 193, 195, 201 hybridity, XIV–XV
Gabon (slave port), XIII, 46 Ibibio ethnic group

Gallwey, Major, 186n19 and the Aro, XIV–XV, 27, 79, 187–188
Gambia (slave port), 41 and the Atlantic slave trade, 32
gender division of labor, XVIII, 11, in civil war, 26, 32
149–154, 156n15, 161, 161n20, 176, dominance of, 5
182–183 and the Ekpe, 79
gender structure of slave trade gender division of labor among,
See also boys as slaves; children as 152–153
slaves; girls as slaves; slave wives; identity of, XXIII
women; women as slaves immigration of, 26
and the Atlantic slave trade, 205 kolanuts’ importance to, 163n22
272 Index
Ibibio ethnic group (Cont.) war specialists among, 192

in Nigeria, 5 in West Niger, XVIn2
population of, 5n6 yams cultivated by, 148–149, 159, 205
slavery in, 119, 136 Igbo-Abamaba subculture, 18
subgroups of, 149n7 Igbo-Ibibio-Efik borderland, XVII
yam cultivation among, 159–160 Igbo-Ibibio-Ejagham borderland, XIV–XV
Ibibioland, 1–2, 6, 18, 20, 34, 67, 97, 134, Igboland
190 See also Arondizuogu diaspora
Ibiniukpabi oracle, 6, 9, 30, 54, 75–77, 81, settlement; Atlantic slave trade;
96, 135, 184–185, 187, 199n40 Cross River warrior groups
See also Chukwu agriculture in, 88
Ibom dialect, 108 the Aro in, 3, 6, 10–11, 13n22, 19, 20,
Ibom Isii confederacy group, 27–29, 51–52, 57–58, 60, 62, 69–71, 80,
27n13, 28 82–83, 124, 184
Ibom lineage-group, 61, 62 Arochukwu homeland in, XVII, XVn1
Ibom people, 63 and the Atlantic slave trade, 5, 20, 51,
Idozuka, Okoro, 189, 193 58, 70–71, 199
Igala kingdom, XV, 14–15, 50, 53, 54, 167 autochthonous communities of, XVIn2
Igba ndu (covenant), 67–68, 80 Cross River region of, 5–6, 13n22, 18,
Igbo, Obasi Bassey, 212 20, 26–27, 29–30n15, 50–51, 58,
Igbo ethnic group 68, 89n14
See also Atlantic slave trade; Cross River dialects in, 3
Igbo warriors; preexisting societies as Equiano birthplace, 218, 220, 220n10
and Aro identity, 42–45 force used in, 68–71
ascendancy of, 100 and immigration, 10, 26, 80
in the Atlantic slave trade, XV, 4n4, 20, indigenous slavery in, 25
32, 42, 51, 70–71 marriage possibilities in, 104
in civil war, 26, 32 merchant-warlords in, 194
culture of, XIII–XVI, XVn1, XVIn2, missionary societies in, 210
82–84 nucleus of, XVI
egalitarian norms of, 140 the osu in, 199–200
gender division of labor among, slavery in, 123
152–153, 159 slaves from, 51–52, 58, 69–70
historiography of, 7–11 societies of, XV, 3
identity of, XXIII southern, XVI, 10, 57, 158
kolanuts cultivated by, 148–149, subcultures of, 18
163–165, 165n27, 170, 205 trade routes through, 50–52
languages of, XV, 26, 78, 107–111, warriors from, 5–6, 68, 70, 131
107–108nn37-38 women slaves in, 158
lineage-group, 27 Igbonet (electronic interactive medium),
and the Middle Belt region, 9 107n37
in Nigeria, 5 Igbo-Ukwu (people/town), XVIn2, 57, 69,
and the osu, 198–200 80, 111, 166
politics in, 14, 140 Igga (state/society), XVIn2
slavery in, 87, 119 Igwe, Michael Sunday, 59
slavery terminology in, 120 Iheme (Izuogu’s dependent), 57, 92, 93n17,
slaves from, 36, 42–45, 47, 52, 69–70, 113–114, 124
122, 166, 176 Iheme lineage-group, 57, 200n45
subcultures of, 18 Ihenacho, Asonye, 163–164n23
terminologies for White people/ Ihiala settlement, 62, 63n13, 195
Europeans, 217–218n8 Ihu homage rite, XVIn3, 2, 98–100, 98n26,
twin taboo in, 104–105 103, 215
Index 273
Ijeoma, Okoli (of Arondizuogu), Izuogu, Mazi. See Mgbokpo, Izuogu

194–195n35
Ijeoma, Okoli (of Ndeikelionwu/Ndieni), Jaja (King), 185
189, 190–193, 190n29, 194–195n35 Jamaica, 4n4, 35, 42, 108n38
Ijo state, 11 James, F.S., 186n19
Ijoma, J. Okoro, 195n36, 200, 200n44 Jewish trade diaspora, 55
Ikeji festival, XVIn3, 2, 19, 96, 98, Jones, G.I., 9, 18–19, 30, 34n20
102–103, 102n31, 115 judicial processes, 76–78, 135, 138, 143,
Ikpa-Ora community, 70 162, 199n40, 206–207, 210
Ikperikpe (war drum), 122, 193 Jukun state, 30, 30n17, 79, 167, 168n31
immigration
See also Aro diaspora/expansion Kanu, Okoro, 15n27
and agriculture, 80 Kanu-Igbo, Ukobasi, 199n42
and the Akpa, 26, 30 Kanu-Onuoha, 98n25
among the amuda, 101 kidnapping, 2, 118, 124, 126–132, 128n12,
into Aro settlements, 2–3, 16 137, 143, 162, 189, 194, 205, 207
into Arochukwu, 26–27, 32, 53 King William. See Pepple (King)
and the Bight of Biafra, XIX, XXIII kinship, 68, 80, 94, 107n37, 114, 120–121,
and cultural assimilation, 79, 94–95 124, 171, 215
and cultural transposition, 105–106 Klein, Herbert, 119
hinterland slaveholders developing from, Klein, Martin, 12n20
24 Koelle, Sigmund, 118, 128–130, 134–135,
of the Ibibio, 26 135n25, 137, 175
and Igboland, 10, 26, 80 kolanuts
and the Jukun, 30n17 in the Atlantic slave trade, 170
languages and dialects, 107 and British incursion, 187
and the Nri-Awka region, 83, 89n14, cultural significance of, XV–XVII,
114, 171–172, 184 XVIn3, 149, 163–164, 163–164n23,
population densities causing, 80 163n21, 164n24, 168–169n32, 205
skilled slaves among, 122–123 and the Hausa, 162–163, 165, 176
and slave trade expansion, XXIV and the Igbo, 148–149, 163–165,
of women, forced, 160 164n25, 165n27, 170, 205
incest, 2, 103–104 reverence for, 149
indigenous slavery, 5, 14, 24–25, 117–119, in rites and festivals, 98n26, 163,
141, 181–182, 197 163n23, 164n24
See also Atlantic slave trade; domestic and the slave trade, XVI, XVIII
slavery; market persons; slave species of, 165, 165n26
traders and trans-Saharan commerce, 162–163,
Inikori, Joseph, 7, 25, 147 168–170
Inokun settlement, 13n22, 18, 20, 56 and the trans-Saharan slave trade, 149,
institutions of the slave trade, 75–80, 176
132–143 and warfare, 163–164n23
Interesting Narrative (Equiano), 217 Kongo Kingdom, 13, 152, 154, 166–167,
Isichei, Elizabeth, 10, 108, 194, 211 175
Isieke (town), 217, 217n8 Kopytoff, Igor, 25n9, 84, 92, 95, 120
Islam, 55, 166, 202 Kwararafa state, 30–32, 167
Isu group, 85, 85n4, 90
Iwerre region, 26 languages and dialects. See Aro languages;
See also Arochukwu region; Unene Arochukwu; Arondizuogu diaspora
region settlement; culture formation; Igbo
Izuogu. See Mgbokpo, Izuogu ethnic group; Nri-Awka region
Izuogu, Eze, 212 Latham, John, 24n7, 31
274 Index
Law, Robin, 34n20, 64n14 Manning, Patrick, 175n36, 210

law and order, 132–140 market persons, 117, 119, 121–123,
Leonard, Arthur, 8, 186n19, 191 131n17, 132, 141
leveling mechanisms, 14 See also domestic slavery; household
lexicostatistics, 107–108, 109–110 slavery; indigenous slavery
lineage-groups marriage, 59, 68, 103–104, 107, 142, 158,
Amankwu, 28, 61, 62, 62–63, 97 158n18, 173, 175, 201, 210
Aro, 6, 12, 15, 60, 62–63, 68, 76, 99 See also partial exogamy
of Aro diaspora settlements, 6, 60–62, Martin, Susan, 158
61, 62, 76, 90–93, 102, 108 Mathews, H.F., 29, 29–30n15, 31–32
Aro diaspora/expansion, 6 Mauny, Raymond, 166n28
Aro influence continued by, 184 Mayne, C.J., 85
Arochukwu, 27, 55, 63, 101, 108, 191 Mazi (Consul), 15, 64–65, 64n14
Arondizuogu, 60, 62, 89, 90–93, 92, Mazi Izuogu. See Mgbokpo, Izuogu
102, 102n31, 184, 200, 200n45, mbia (Aro spheres of influence), 6
214–215 McCall, John, 107n37
Bonny, 61 means of enslavement, XVIII, 119, 122,
founded by the amadi, 100–102 130–131, 132n19, 143–144, 161–162,
Ibom, 62 205
Igbo, 27 Meek, Charles, 159, 190
Iheme, 27, 200n45 Meillassoux, Claude, 73, 75
interviews in, 214 merchant-warlords, 68, 178, 188n27, 189,
and kidnapping, 128 190, 192–194, 206
Ndiakaeme, 105 See also Aro merchant-warlords
Ndiakunwanta, 93, 95 Mgbemene, Amos Egwuekwe D., 192n33
Ndiamazu, 92–93, 93n17, 97, 99, Mgbokpo, Izuogu
200n45 amadi status of, 66
Ndiawa, 92, 101, 113-114, 215 ancestors of, 66, 66n16
Ndi-Iheme, 92–93, 114 in Arochukwu, 97, 99
Ndiejezie, 93 as Arondizuogu founder, 1, 57, 60,
Nri-Awka, 103, 124 99–101
Ọtụsị, 27–29, 27n13, 76 descendents/dependents, 92–93, 93n17,
shrines of, 200, 200n44 101–102, 104, 112–114, 215–216,
synchronic relations among members, 215n5, 216n7
217 in Isu-Ora conflict, 90
Ujari, 61, 62, 87n10, 123 lineage-groups, 101, 104, 112
unified by the Ihu rite, 99 as merchant-warlord, 193
warfare among, 191 as slave trader, 97
linkage institutions, 2, 75, 96–100 as warrior, 70
Liverpool (England), 43–44, 46, 48, Mgbori, Owuu, 20n32
136–139, 145, 208 Middle Belt region, XV, 9, 14, 31–32, 50,
Lovejoy, Paul, XXIII–XXIV, 10, 20, 47, 79, 159, 165–168, 184, 184n13
170, 219–220 Middle Passage, 219
Miers, Suzanne, 25n9, 95, 120
Madeira, Victor, 217 migration. See immigration
Maduagwu, B.O.J., 89–90n14 Miller, Joseph, 117, 174
male slaves, 5, 11, 22, 36, 43, 144, missionary societies, 210
150–155, 161–162, 170, 173 Mmeruonye, Udoji, 212
See also boys as slaves; gender structure mmuba (human proliferation), 2, 71–75,
of slave trade; women as slaves 105n33
Mann, Kristin, 168n32 Monteith, Archibald, 108n38, 131n17
Index 275
Moor, Ralph, 185–186 Nri-Awka people

mortality rates of slaves, 22, 47 as Aro dependents, 57
culture of, 103, 189–190, 200
Ndeikelionwu (Ndieni settlement), 20n32, ichi markings on, XVIn2
63, 172, 184, 189–192, 190n29 languages and dialects of, 108, 109–110,
Ndeikelionwu people, 20n32, 163– 111, 111n39
164n23, 164 lineage-groups of, 103, 124
ndị (group/people), 1 personality cult among, 190
Ndiakaeme lineage-group, 105 politics of, 190
Ndiakunwanta lineage-group, 93, 95 slave market of, 62
Ndiamazu lineage-group, 92–93, 93n17, and warfare, 190
97, 99, 200n45 Nri-Awka region
Ndiawa lineage-group, 92, 101, 113–114, Aro exchange structures in, 57
215 Aro expansion into, 124
Ndi-Iheme lineage-groups, 92–93, 114 and the Aro frontier, 20, 58, 94–96, 104
Ndiejezie lineage-group, 93 Aro slave trade in, 80, 94
Ndieni diaspora cluster, XVIn3, 13n22, 20, Arondizuogu and immigrants from, 184
20n32, 56–58, 62, 63, 66, 95, 106, Arondizuogu culture influenced by, 107,
184, 190–191 200
Ndiuche dialect, 112 Arondizuogu market control in, 62
Ndiuche lineage-group, 92, 101, 112–115, and cultural deviations, 104
215, 215n5 cultural politics in, 112–114, 123–125
Ndizuogu. See Arondizuogu diaspora Igbo norms in, 104
settlement Ihiala settlement in, 62, 63n13
Ndoki society, XVIn2 and the Ihu homage rite, 103–105
New Calabar (state and slave port), 23, and immigration, 83, 89n14, 114,
31, 34–37, 46, 46–52, 60, 61, 78, 130, 171–172, 184
132, 154, 155, 156 merchant-warlords from, 193
New Men, 194 and the Ndieni cluster, 20n32, 57, 184
Ngwa, Fritz-Canute, 156n15 and the Oda deity, 72
Ngwa society, XVIn2, 67, 154 slavery impetus in, 80
Ngwaland, 78, 135n25, 183n7 slaves from, 114, 123–125
Niger Delta/River, XIII, 6–7, 30, 50–51, 54, slaves of status in, 138, 138n29
156, 159, 181, 186, 187n21 warfare/violence in, 69, 74, 189–190,
Niger Expeditions (British), 105, 133 193, 195–198, 205–206
Niger riverine states, 11, 14–15, 20, 32, 53, women of, 173
54, 185, 210 nsibiri (Aro script). See Aro script
Niger slave markets, 50, 184 nucleation, 92, 92–93
Niger slave route, 50 Nwabughuogu, Anthony, 187n21
Nigeria, XIII, 1, 4–5, 9, 18, 50, 56, 63, 75, Nwankwo, Theresa, 3n2
79, 96, 104n32, 123, 163, 169 Nwaoma, Ofọdọbendu, 141–142
See also Hausa ethnic group Nwauwa, Apollos, 29–30n15
Nkwere trading group, 57, 79, 125, 195 Nwokoye-Emesuo, Nkemakonam
Nna Atọ (Three Fathers) council, (Perricomo), 98
27, 206 Nzekwu, Onuora, 163, 168–169n32
Nnachi (Aro pioneer), 60, 66n16
Northrup, David, XXIV, 12n21, 13–17, Obegu (town), 187
13n22, 63n13, 79–80, 97, 211 Obiechina, Emmanuel, 212
Trade without Rulers, 11–12 Oda (diety), 72–73
Nri, Eze (King), 15n27, 193 Ogbuofelu (slave), 198
Nri cultural hegemony, 82 Ogirisi, Mbgawho, 199
276 Index
Ogude, S.E., 218, 220n10 Ora community, 69–70, 90

Oguta society/state, XVIn2, 24, 32, 56, oral historical sources, XXIII–XXIV, 2,
61, 185 209, 211–217
Ohafia people, 26, 70, 89–90n14, 107n37, Oriji, John, XVIn2, 6n8
135, 135n25 Oron people, 140–141n35, 149, 149n7,
ohu (slave/slave class), 101, 120 159
Oil Rivers Protectorate, 186 Osai (King), 133
Ojike, Mbonu, 188n26 Osomari state, 14, 24, 32
Okafor, Chinyere, 103 osu caste system, 198–200, 200n43, 200n44
Okennachi confederacy group, 27–29, Ottenberg, Simon, 94, 206
27n13, 28 Ọtụsị lineage-groups, 27–29, 27n13
Okereke, Ozigbo, 189 overseas slave trade. See Atlantic slave
Okereke, Thomas, 115n40 trade
Okigwe District, 3n2, 63, 188n26, 210 Owa community, 74–75, 75n29, 190,
Okoli, Nwambego, 91 194–195, 217
Ọkọnkọ society. See Ekpe society Oyewumi, Oyeronke, 161n20
Okoro, J. G., 192n33, 200, 216 Oyo state, 12, 23
Okoro, Jacob Ogbonna, 63, 97, 97n24
Okoro, Jonathan G., 58–59, 192n33, palm oil trade, 3, 6, 49, 149n7, 174, 176,
214–216, 216n7 178, 180–185, 188, 202–203
Okoroji (Aro merchant-warrior), 123, 197 palm wine, 67, 85–88, 87n10, 98n26
Okoroji (Ndikoroji founder), 98, 184 Palmer, Colin, 42
Okoroji, Emmanuel, 123 panyaring (kidnapping), 127
Okoroji, Ezumoha, 192n33 Parker, Isaac, 126
Ọkpankpọ (Aro central council). See Aro partial exogamy, 72–73, 104
central council See also marriage
Okwaraeze (Ndiokwareze founder), Paschal, Michael Henry, 219
20n32 Patterson, Orlando, 95
Okwei, Omu, 158n18 pax (trading), 23, 53
Old Calabar (state and slave port), 41 Pepple (King), 137, 139, 182–183, 201n46
as Biafra’s principal port, 34, 40 personality cults, 190
vs. Bonny’s preeminence, 5–6, 20, 45–48, plantations, 33, 37, 42–43, 45, 118, 119,
51, 60, 159 120, 147, 183, 208
British slave trade in, 44 Polanyi, Karl, 17–18, 64–65, 64n14
captives departing from, 41, 46, 155, polygyny, 11, 173–175, 174n35, 210
156–157, 156n15 Portugal, 42n25
documentation on, 154, 156 preexisting societies, 84–90, 85n4, 87n9,
Ekpe society in, 20n33, 78 103, 106, 108, 109–110, 114, 194, 199
enslaved princes returning to, 139 preferences for slaves, 20, 43–44, 47, 118,
female slaves departing from, 157 122–126, 147–148, 171, 173–174
as study focus, 23 prices for slaves. See slave prices
Oldendorp, Christian Georg Andreas, 5, private enterprise, 15, 56, 64–71
58, 86–87, 113, 118–119, 128–130, profits from slave trade, 2, 46, 118, 122, 134,
198, 217, 221 136, 148, 160, 182, 186, 194, 201, 207
Onitsha state, XVIn2, 14–15, 18, 32, 69,
111 Raphael-Hernandez, Heike, 217
Onwuejeogwu, M. Angulu, 10n18, 15n27, rebellion. See resistance to slavery
190, 193 resistance to slavery, 38–39, 48, 69–70,
Onyeama of Eke, 194 197–198
Opobo (state and slave port), 23, 49, 185 revolt. See resistance to slavery
Opobo state, 23, 49, 185 Richardson, David, 20, 38, 47
Index 277
Rodney, Walter, 137–138 Sowell, Thomas, 68

Rolf-Trouillot, Michel, 16 state and diaspora, 11–19
Royal African Company (RAC), 35–36, steamships, 180
36n23 Stevenson, Robert, 16
sugar, XIII–XIV, 22, 182
Sandoval, Alonso de, XVn1, 4n4, 32, 217, suicide among slaves, 42, 132–133
221
Sargent, Robert, 10, 21n34, 30n17 taboos, 3, 104, 125, 133, 140n35, 163n23,
Senegambia region, 38–40, 39, 55, 64n14, 165, 193
127, 131, 138, 153, 161–162, 198 Talbot, Amaury, 8, 163n22
Seven Years War, 207 Taste of the West (Akamnonu), 158n18
Shaw, Thurstan, XVIn2, 15n27, 69 taxonomies, 18, 56, 83
Sierra Leone, 7, 38–39, 39, 118, 125, Things Fall Apart (Achebe), 86n8, 163
134–135, 168, 175 Thornton, John, 4n4, 25n9, 130, 153–154,
Slave Coast, 127, 148, 174 217
slave defections, 189 Three Fathers (Nna Atọ) council,
Slave Girl (Emecheta), 158n18 27, 206
slave owners, 74, 118, 121, 123, 197 titled societies, XXIII–XXIV, 18
slave prices, 22, 36, 36, 44–45, 48, 207 Tiv ethnic group, 159, 167
slave ships trade callers, 80, 188n27
British, 4, 44–46, 48 trade diasporas. See Aro trade networks/
loading rates, XVIII, 45–46, 52, 209 diasporas
sizes/loads of, 39–42, 41 trade routes, 1, 50–51, 163
turnaround rates, 5, 34, 37–40, 39, 42, Trade without Rulers (Northrup), 11–12
44, 46–47 trading frontier overview, 82–116
slave suicide, 42, 132–133 transatlantic slave trade. See Atlantic slave
slave trade routes, 50–51, 66–67, 66n16, trade
167 Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database
slave traders, 37, 117–118, 123, 139, 179, (www.slavevoyages.org), 4n4, 40, 150,
201, 201n46 209
See also Aro slave trade; coastal states trans-Saharan commerce, 162–163,
slave trade; indigenous slavery 166–168, 176
slave wives, 157–158, 158n18, 161, 174, trans-Saharan slave trade, 21, 149, 162,
199, 205 165–170, 176
See also women as slaves trust system, 5, 45, 78
slavery, means of, 132–143 turnaround rates. See slave ships,
Slavery and Social Death (Patterson), 95 turnaround rates
slavery as economic necessity, 141–143 Turner, A., 186n19
slavery as punishment/reprisal, 76, 81, 99, twin taboo, 104–105, 104n32, 105n33
118, 131n14, 132–140, 140n35, 171,
195 Uburu slave market, 50, 61, 79
slavery terminology, 120, 127 Uche (Izuogu’s son), 112–114, 215,
slaves, skilled, 122–123 215–216n5
slavevoyages.org (Trans-Atlantic Slave Uche, S.U., 88n12
Trade Database), 4n4, 40, 209 Uchendu, Victor, 160, 172
Snelgrave, William, 34, 132, 142 Udozuka, Okoro, 91, 93–94, 98n25, 192,
social death, 95 199
sources overview, 209–221 Ufere, Ikelionwu, 58
See also historiography of the Biafra Ugwuoba people, 70n23, 194, 194n35
slave trade Ujari dialect, 108
Southeast African slave trade, 38, 39 Ujari lineage-group, 61, 62, 87n10, 123
278 Index
Ujari people, 20n32, 62–63, 106, 106n36, and the slave economy, 148
190, 199 and slavery, 118, 126–132, 157,
Ujari region, 57, 58n8, 62, 66, 87n10, 98, 161–162, 188–189, 205
190–191, 199 Warner Lewis, Maureen, 108
Ukwu, Ukwu I., 9, 80 West African states, XIII, 23
Umo, Kanu, 61, 115, 199n40 West Niger, XVIn2, 80, 184
Umu Chukwu (children of God), 76, 81 West-Central African slave trade
Unene region, 26, 30 as capital resource, 73
See also Arochukwu region; Iwerri children in, 147
region dependents in, 117, 127
Upper Guinea Coast, 127, 160–162 end of, 202
upper Imo River region, 1, 51, 57, 70, prominence of, XIII, 4n4, 38, 39, 209
84–85, 85n4, 107, 122, 184, 216 and slave wives, 174
women in, 160–161, 174–175
Vansina, Jan, 211 Western Sudan, 131
Vassa (Equiano slave name). See Equiano, Whitford, John, 182
Olaudah Whydah (slave port), 40
Vavilov, Nikolai, 164n25 Windward Coast, 37–39
violence. See Aro warfare; British women
imperialism; Nri-Awka region, See also gender division of labor; gender
warfare/violence in; warfare structure of slave trade
vocabulary comparisons, 107–108 as business assets, 173
cursed with barrenness, 187
war captives, 70, 127–130, 143, 161–162, as domestic slaves, 148
205, 207 economic roles of, 151–152
War of Jenkin’s Ear, 207 forced immigration of, 160
warfare in human proliferation, 73
See also Aro merchant-warlords; Aro in the Ihu rite, 99
warfare; Cross River Igbo warriors; in the indigenous economy, 11
Nri-Awka region; women political power of, 114
and the age structure of slavery, 11 and restrictive marriage practices, 104
and agriculture, 189–190 as sacrificial victims, 112–113
among lineage-groups, 191 and the twin taboo, 104–105
and Aro diaspora/expansion, 15, 68–71, as war captives, 127, 161–162
106–107, 188–189, 193 and yam cultivation, 160
and Aro identity, 178–179 women as slaves
and Aro slave trade, 6, 179 See also slave wives
Aro state created by, 15 in Atlantic vs. domestic slave trade,
and Aro trade, 68 144–148
and Arondizuogu, 107, 191, 193 Biafra exports of, 5, 22
civil, 2, 13, 15, 26, 32, 91, 179, 190–191 as marginal, 148
and decadence, 196–202 preferences for, 43, 147
and the end of the slave trade, 202 in quantitive data, 150–151
and firearms, 196 ratios, 149, 151, 156–158, 160–161,
and the gender structure of slavery, 169, 176–177, 183, 205
XVIII, 11, 205 values of, 161
and the Igbo-Akpa alliance, 26 and warfare, 205
in Igboland, 68–71 women owners of, 158, 199
and the indigenous economy, 11
and kolanuts, 163n23 yam festivals, 88, 88n13, 97n23, 98n26,
Nri-Awka model of, 190 102–103
Ọtụsịs’ roles in, 27, 29 yams
Index 279
cultivation of, 88, 96, 153n12, 159–160 reverence for, XV–XVII, 19, 149,
cultural significance of, 205 159–160
and the gender division of labor, 149, as ritual gifts, XVIn3
160 species of, 166
and the Ibibio, 159–160 Yoruba culture, 161, 161n20, 168–169,
and the Igbo, 148–149, 159–160, 168–169n32, 176, 217–218n8
164n25, 205

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The Slave Trade and Culture in the Bight of Biafra

G. Ugo Nwokeji is assistant professor of African American studies

Cambridge University Press

© G. Ugo Nwokeji 2010

This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception

First published 2010

Printed in the United States of America

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication data

isbn 978-0-521-88347-4 Hardback

Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or

List of Tables and Figures page ix

Notes on Sources 209

4.1. Arondizuogu Lineage-Groups before 1890 and

Ukwu Arondizuogu Afikpo

Table 0.1. Estimated Volume of Biafra Captive Exports, 1551–1850, by

Period Bight of Biafra All Africa Biafra Percentage

With their Arochukwu homeland located in the southeastern periph-

Numerous scholars have contributed in many ways to the extent that

require initiation and secrecy rather than the accumulation of knowl-

In about 1733, Izuogu Mgbokpo, an Aro merchant from Arochukwu,

Main Features, Organization, and Expansion

conquered Arochukwu. By the 1890s, the Aro had vigorously embraced

The Aro in the Historiography of the Biafra

A holistic approach to regional history developed from the mid-1970s.

State and Diaspora

Like the present study, Northrup’s admirable and meticulously

To argue that politics played an insignificant role in Aro organization

increased centralization. Further, placing too much emphasis on a high

normal or expectable part of political process,” it is not a state, regard-

found in many Igbo and non-Igbo locations, including Arochukwu. This

time. The establishment of Aro frontiers in close proximity to the densely

regions – trans-Atlantic and trans-Saharan. Without suggesting that Aro

The Aro in the Atlantic Context

Expansion and Shifts, 1600s–1807

challenge, then, is to periodize Aro expansion and correlate its dynamics

on the historiography (e.g., Law 1991b). Slavery was integral to Aro

First Phase: Aro Rise and the Biafra Slave

Ezeagwu Okennachi Ibom Isii

Amannagwu Ugbo Oro Asaga Ujari

Figure 2.1. Arochukwu Structure

Ọtụsịs in each of the confederates is roughly proportional to the role it

1. Conflict between expanding “Igbo” and “Ibibio” over a frontier

Table 2.1. Estimated Volume of the Transatlantic Captive Departures from

Period B. of Biafra All Africa Biafra %*

The opening up of new plantation regions in the Americas generated

African captives exported to the Americas, entered a period of decline

Date Men Women Girls Boys Place

(Royal Africa Company 1721:251).24 Clearly, demand was increasing at

Second Phase, 1740s to 1807: Surge in Trade

Falconbridge’s observation is consistent with the quantitative evi-

Period Bight of Biafra All Africa Biafra %*

Table 2.4. Time Spent by Ships at African Ports, 1751–1800

Region Mean (No. of No. of Vessels Standard

of captives. During the 1751–1775 period, the mean tonnage of ships

Imputed Principal Average No. No. of Number Standard

Imputed Average No. of No. of Vessels Number Standard

century more widely available to Euro-American slavers.25 Nevertheless,

Some slaveowners even had reasons to prefer the Igbo. Gwendolyn

the region’s captives. Liverpool merchants preferred to buy lower priced