This partly-coloured engraving shows a human sacrifice ceremony in the kingdom of Dahomey. With many onlookers and the king under a large umbrella, a group of people sitting in baskets were about to be thrown off a wall, called the "throwing the presents from the Ah-toh" platform. Forbes explained that "On the last day of May. . . the human sacrifices are offered by the king, his gifts to his people. In the centre of the. . . marketplace, a platform was erected twelve feet in height, enclosed by a parapet [at] breast high" (p. 44). Frederick E. Forbes went to Dahomey in the Bight of Benin region on a British anti-slavery mission in 1849 and 1850. On his first voyage, he "rescued" an Egbado princess, Sara Forbes Bonetta, whom he "gifted" to Queen Victoria.
The Human Sacrifices of the Ek-Gnee-Noo-Ah-Toh
SI-OB-836
1849-1850
The Human Sacrifices of the Ek-Gnee-Noo-Ah-Toh
Frederick E. Forbes, Dahomey and the Dahomans: Being the journals of two missions to the king of Dahomey, and residence in his capital, in the years 1849 and 1850, vol. 2 (London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1851), facing p. 44.
English
Pre-Colonial Africa: Society, Polity, Culture
Africa--Western Bight
Jerome Handler; Michael Tuite; Henry B. Lovejoy Graduate Research Assistants: Tiffany Beebe; Travis May
2-Jun-16; 26-Aug-19
ForbesAhtoh