Bronze in Benin history, culture

Oba of Benin, Omo’Noba Erediauwa.
Inset: Bronze bust of Queen IdiaThe sophistication of Benin works of art, particularly those that have come to be known as Benin bronzes perhaps, more than anything else, marks the ancient Benin Kingdom as a truly world great, writes Uchechukwu Olisah.

Benin Kingdom boasts of a rich blend of traditional and contemporary arts expressing, as cultural and arts historian, High Priest Osemwegie Ebohon, puts it, historical and aesthetic continuity of the 1,400 years of social organisation that has been able to sustain the kingdom’s heritage as a leading centre of craftsmanship in bronze, wood, ivory and bead works.

Bronze is any of a broad range of copper alloys, usually with tin as the main additive, but sometimes with other elements such as phosphorus, manganese, aluminum, or silicon. The term bronze, according to High Priest Ebohon, has been applied to most works containing copper. Specifically, he distinguished bronze works from those of brass, saying “bronze is a brass alloy with less than 5 per cent pewter. Brass is an alloy of copper and zinc.”

He said bronze plaques that ornamented the walls of the Oba of Benin’s palace in the 16th and 17th centuries were mostly in alloy. Ebohon pointed out that the iconographies of these bronze plaques illustrated animal figures invoking power and divine character. Copper alloys are said to offer stronger objects than those of pure copper. “These bronzes are easier to melt and cast, more resistant to chocks and give a purer sound than copper. Sometimes, two or three other metals are added to copper: lead and pewter, or lead, pewter and zinc. One then speaks of tertiary or quaternary bronze. The work’s final color varies according to more or less quantity of added metal,” he added.

Court objects in bronze plaques are held to be as important as objects in ivory or royal head and queens unique to the royal court of Benin. These court art bronze works are with a view to celebrating the greatness of kings and their entourage. Available records show that the works, today, known as Benin bronzes are a collection of more than 1,000 brass plaques from the royal palace of the kingdom of Benin. They were seized by a British force in the “Punitive Expedition” of 1897 and given to the British Foreign Office. Around 200 of these were then said to have been passed on to the British Museum in London, while the remaining were divided between varieties of collections. The seizure of the bronzes led to a greater appreciation in Europe for African culture.

Bronze casting is believed to have started in Benin kingdom since the 13th century. The bronzes depict a variety of scenes, including animals’, fishes’, humans’ and those of court life. They were cast in matching pairs (although each was individually made). It is thought that they were originally nailed to walls and pillars in the palace as decoration, while some also offered instructive scenes of protocol.

Additional information has it that the numerous commemorative brass heads, free-standing figures and groups, plaques in relief, bells and rattle-staffs, small expressive masks and plaquettes worn on the belt as emblems of office, chests in the shape of palaces, cult stands, jewelry, etc. cast by Benin metalworkers were created for the royal palace. The heads were said to be placed on the altars of kings, brass caster corporation chiefs and dignitaries. Occasionally, a brass head was surmounted by a carved ivory tusk engraved with a procession of different Obas. The altar functioned as a tribute to the deceased and a point of contact with his spirit. Using the bells and rattle staffs to call the ancestor’s spirit, the Oba offered sacrifices to him and to the earth on the altar.

Besides, majority of figures reportedly represented court officials, equestrian figures, queens, and roosters. There are also elaborately decorated human masks, animals, beakers, spoons, gongs, trumpets, arm ornaments, and large elephant tusks covered with bands in figured relief on objects in ivory. The representations of these objects served, above all, to exalt the king, the queen mother, princes and royal household, army commanders etc.

But majority of everyday Benin objects were said to be made for and associated with court ceremonies. The figures of a leopard were the sole property of the Oba as the leopard was the royal animal. Pectorals, hip and waist ornaments in the shape of human or animal heads were worn either by the Oba or major dignitaries. Brass staffs and clippers mounted by birds appeared during commemorating ceremonies.

Nigeria, which includes the area of the Kingdom of Benin, reportedly bought around 50 bronzes from the British Museum between the 1950s and 1970s and has repeatedly called for the return of the remainder, in a case which was parallel with that of the Elgin Marbles.

In the 13th century, the city of Benin was an agglomeration of farms enclosed by walls and a ditch. Each clan was subject to the Oba (monarch). The “Benin style” is a court art from the palace of the Oba and has nothing in common with tribal art. The Benin Oba employed a guild of artisans who all lived in the same district of the city. Bronze figures ordered by the king were kept in the palace.

The empire flourished until 1897 when the palace was sacked by the English in reprisal for an ambush that had cost the British vice consul his life. When British forces entered Benin City in 1897, they were surprised to find large quantities of cast brass objects. The technological sophistication and overwhelming naturalism of these pieces contradicted many 19th century Western assumptions about Africa in general and Benin - regarded as the home of ‘fetish’ and human sacrifice - in particular. Explanations were swiftly generated to cover the epistemological embarrassment. The objects must, it was supposed, have been made by the Portuguese, the Ancient Egyptians and even the lost tribe of Israel. Subsequent research has tended to stress the indigenous origins of West African metallurgy. Yet, it was the naturalism that proved decisive. Their status was marked by the establishment of the term ‘Benin bronzes’, despite their being largely of brass.

In 1914, Oba Eweka II lifted the ban on the sale of Benin art works, thereby liberalising art works in Benin Kingdom.