Ouidah. Robin Law

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СКАЧАТЬ of the remembered royal genealogy, which may well be telescoped, even if not in part fictitious.⁵² All that can be said with confidence is that the settlement at Ouidah predated the beginnings of European trade there in the seventeenth century.

      In the long run, it may be hoped that archaeology will provide more concrete evidence on the early history of settlement in Ouidah. But to date no excavation has been undertaken in the town, apart from limited exploratory work within the courtyard of the former Portuguese fort during reconstruction works there in 1992;⁵³ more systematic excavation was concentrated at Savi, the former capital of the Hueda kingdom, rather than at Ouidah itself.⁵⁴

       Environment and economy

      The name Glehue, ‘Farmhouse’, is usually explained in local tradition as reflecting the fact that the town was originally established by Kpase as a farm.⁵⁵ Although this story may be no more than an inference from the name, the suggestion that Ouidah was originally an agricultural settlement is consistent with its location, some distance north of the coastal lagoon, on permanently dry and therefore cultivable ground. However, Ouidah’s proximity to the coastal lagoon clearly also played an important role in its early development, and it is likely that the settlement was sited with this also in mind.

      The configuration of the lagoon system is complex and varies seasonally with the level of the water, becoming more extensive during the rainy seasons (April to July and October/November). It has very probably also changed over time, through processes of silting and erosion. In recent times, the only permanently continuous waterway in the Ouidah area has been the lagoon immediately behind the coast, called locally Djesin (‘Salt water’). Early European sources, however, speak of two major ‘rivers’ in the Hueda kingdom. The second (called by Europeans ‘Euphrates’), to the north of the capital Savi, is evidently the more northerly ‘lagoon’ called locally Toho, which runs south-eastwards by Savi before turning east into Lake Nokoué; this is nowadays for most of its length no more than a marshy depression, but was presumably a more substantial watercourse in earlier times.⁵⁶ In addition, the area between Ouidah and the coastal lagoon is low-lying and swampy and subject to seasonal flooding, temporarily creating additional watercourses. The only significant area of cultivable land south of Ouidah is around the village of Zoungbodji, halfway towards the beach. Tradition suggests that Zoungbodji is of comparable antiquity to Ouidah itself, attributing its foundation to a man called Zingbo (or Zoungbo), who is regularly linked with Kpate in the story of the arrival of the first Europeans; in the usual version, Zingbo fled in fright at their approach, leaving Kpate to make the first contact.⁵⁷ In contemporary sources, however, the settlement of Zoungbodji is not documented until after the Dahomian conquest in the 1720s, when it became important as the location of a Dahomian military garrison. The only other substantial settlement is Djegbadji, situated on a group of islands in the lagoon to the south-west of Zoungbodji. This was in origin a settlement of the Hula people, although Hueda and later (after the Dahomian conquest of Hueda in the 1720s) Fon elements also settled there subsequently.⁵⁸

      In recent times, the lagoon has been an important source of fish, which are caught in static traps, as well as with lines and nets both from the shore and from canoes.⁵⁹ In the nineteenth century, it was noted that fish, rather than meat, formed the staple diet of most of the inhabitants of Ouidah; and dried fish was also traded from the coast into the interior, as far as the Dahomian capital Abomey.⁶⁰ In the late seventeenth century European visitors already noted that the ‘rivers’ in Hueda produced large quantities of fish;⁶¹ and there is no reason to suppose that this tradition of fishing did not date back earlier, before the arrival of the Europeans. Although the main centre of fishing in the area was presumably Djegbadji, families in Ouidah itself were also involved: the Déhoué family of Sogbadji, who claim to have been settled there prior to the establishment of the English fort in the quarter (in the 1680s), were traditionally canoemen and fishermen.⁶² One early eighteenth-century account also noted the existence to the south of Ouidah of salt-works, at which salt was obtained by boiling sea water in jars and was traded into the interior.⁶³ This evidently refers to Djegbadji, which remains a centre of salt production to the present day (as reflected in its name, meaning ‘On the salt marsh’). The reference to the boiling of sea water is inexact since later accounts make clear that salt was extracted in this area from the water of the lagoon.⁶⁴ Concentrations of salt are formed through the evaporation of shallow pools at the borders of the lagoon by the heat of the sun; earth is collected from these, the salt leached out by straining water through it, and it is the resulting highly saline water which is then boiled to produce the salt.

      Although Ouidah’s main commercial function in early times was probably in retailing the produce of the lagoon, fish and salt, overland into the interior, it probably also acted as an intermediary in trade conducted by the lagoon itself, which offered a medium of lateral communication and trade along the coast. In recent times, the lagoon has normally been navigable by canoe as far as Porto-Seguro (Agbodrafo), in modern Togo, 70 km west of Ouidah, while to the east it is navigable as far as Godomey, where a brief overland portage can be made to Lake Nokoué, from where navigation continues further east to Lagos and beyond, in modern Nigeria. Some nineteenth-century sources claim that the navigation along the lagoon to the east was originally continuous from Ouidah into Lake Nokoué, the interruption at Godomey being due to recent silting.⁶⁵ However, it was reported already in the seventeenth century that the lagoon was ‘lost in the earth’ at Jakin (Godomey);⁶⁶ recollections of uninterrupted travel by canoe eastwards seem to relate to an artificial clearing of the northern branch of the lagoon, the Toho, which was only temporarily effective.

      It is not strictly accurate to describe Ouidah as a ‘lagoonside port’, any more than as an ‘Atlantic port’,⁶⁷ since it is in fact situated over 3 km north of the permanently navigable waterway. Although the width of the lagoon varied both seasonally and from year to year, and in times of very heavy rainfall (as happened, for example, in 1686) the intervening land might be flooded, permitting canoes to carry goods over part of the distance to the town, this was clearly exceptional.⁶⁸ Nevertheless, Ouidah was sufficiently close to the lagoon to be able to benefit from the canoe-borne traffic along it: in the 1680s, for example, an English trader at Ouidah noted that trade could be done with Little Popo to the west for slaves, locally made beads and corn, communication being ‘by the river’, i.e. the lagoon.⁶⁹ Slaves were also supplied to Ouidah from Offra to the east, although it is not specified that these were brought by canoe.⁷⁰ In the nineteenth century, communication between Ouidah and Godomey was more usually on foot, although the journey was sometimes made by canoe along the lagoon.⁷¹ Beyond Godomey, Lake Nokoué and the lagoons further east provided a continuous navigable waterway, which was regularly used for trade. For example, in the mid-seventeenth century salt manufactured in the coastal area of Allada was being taken by canoe to Lagos, and thereby to ‘Lukumi’, or the Yoruba interior, from which locally made cloth was brought in exchange; and later Yoruba cloth was also taken further west to Ouidah.⁷² Very probably, such trade had also existed prior to the arrival of the Europeans, although its scale was certainly increased by their presence, Europeans purchasing African-made cloth and beads (both for resale on the Gold Coast to the west) and corn (for the provisioning of slave ships), brought along the lagoon, as well as slaves.⁷³

      The importance of trade along the lagoon also afforded opportunities and temptations for piracy, although here again this would presumably have become more profitable after the initiation of the European maritime trade and the stimulus it gave to the lagoon traffic. Burton in the 1860s was told that Ouidah had been ‘originally a den of water-thieves and pirates’.⁷⁴ This is corroborated by a contemporary account of the mid-seventeenth century, relating to ‘Foulaen’, which as noted earlier seems to be identical with Ouidah, which reports that it was accustomed to send ‘robbers’ to raid the coastal towns of Allada to the east.⁷⁵

      In contrast to the lagoon, the sea beyond it can have played only a marginal material (as opposed to religious) role in the life of early Ouidah. Unlike on the СКАЧАТЬ