BENIN PLAQUES
resent the first recorded account of the plaques’
history from members of the Benin court.
Roupell was an occupier and his account must
therefore be approached with some skepticism,
but it cannot be dismissed.
The sixteenth-century clothing on Portuguese
figures in the plaques provides a long-accepted
initial date for the plaques’ commission, but the
production timeline described above suggests
that the corpus was likely created in a shorter
time than previously supposed. The political
history of Benin in this period further corroborates
the oral history Roupell recorded. When
Esigie claimed the throne, his relationship with
his courtiers was seriously compromised due
to the war of succession that had placed him
there, the above-mentioned war with Idah (capital
of the Igala kingdom today), and the wars
of expansion led by his father, Ozolua (reigned
c. 1480s to 1516 or 1517). While he greatly
expanded the size and therefore the wealth
of the Benin kingdom, Ozolua’s never-ending
military campaign overtaxed the militias serving
the court, and his own warriors reportedly
killed him. Esigie inherited a divided court, an
army of weakened local militias, and a number
of newly conquered vassal states that had previously
revolted in an attempt to slip out from
under Benin’s control.
Esigie created new ceremonies during his reign
that established public expressions of support
for the king. The plaque corpus may be part of
Esigie’s efforts to repair his relationship with
the court. I propose that the plaques produced
by the first Ineh n’Igun Eronmwon for Esigie
emphasize both Esigie’s and Ozolua’s successes
while downplaying their mistakes. The feared
Benin warriors feature prominently in this first
installation, underscoring the military power
that gained Ozolua new vassal states and Esigie
victory against the Idah. The two conflicts early
in Esigie’s reign may have physically decimated
the Benin militias, but the bronze plaques created
an enduring monument to his martial valor.
When Orhogbua succeeded to rule, his control
of the court was sufficiently assured, so he
was able to spend long periods away from Benin
City. In this fairly stable period of court politics,
I propose that Orhogbua completed the decorative
program of the audience court with plaques
111
of the extant corpus, it is possible to consider
the political context and diplomatic goals of
the sixteenth-century court.
During the period of British occupation in
1897, Ernest Roupell, the British District Administrator,
interviewed elders and remaining
court officials about the history of the kingdom.
Roupell’s informants stated that the plaques
were commissioned by Oba Esigie (reigned c.
1517–1550s) and his son, Orhogbua (reigned
1550s–1570s).13 After Oba Orhogbua’s accession
to the throne, he killed a neighboring ruler,
the ata of the Kingdom of Idah, in retaliation
for killing Benin messengers. According to the
courtiers, the new oba specifically commissioned
a commemoration of the event in bronze so that
he could hang the depiction on the “walls of his
house.”14 Roupell’s interviews are often disregarded
in the literature on Benin,15 but they rep-