arrangements where some chiefs and slave dealers supplied slave victims who were dispatched to work for him as hunters, farmers, palm oil and kernel processors. Such victims were deceived by their sellers on the pretense of accompanying them to Okoroji’s compound for message only to abandon them, having collected money or its equivalent on their heads.
The states of Lagos, Bonny and many others were ruled by Chiefs who themselves made fortunes out of the slave transactions. The slaves were produced by an interminable chain of middle men which ramified into all parts of the hinter land. Nigeria was a favourite haunt for European pirates who were not averse to organizing local raids of their own.
The Portuguese traded with Benin by buying pepper, ivory and slaves in exchange for firearms, coral beads and clothes. The king had a virtual monopoly of external trade. No one could trade directly with the foreigners except on the orders of the king. Benin also served as a coastal outlet of Oyo Kingdom.
Much of the early contacts which Oyo had with Europeans was through Benin in the 16th century, up to the first half of the 18th century. According to Afolalu (1969), Benin was an expanding and progressive flourishing kingdom. At its zenith in the 18thcentury, the kingdom reached as far East Bonny and Onitsha, as far West as Lagos and Port Novo on the coastal and Ondo province in the West. By the end of the 18th century, Benin was on decline. Benin kingdom became too aggressive and warlike. There was a great decline in prosperity. This situation was due to the demoralizing effects of the slave trade. The need for slaves to sell to the European slave traders on the coast made incessant raids of the neighboring territories a regular feature of life in the kingdom. As the demand for slaves increased, so also Benin slave raiding was increased.
The slave trade affected all the Niger-Delta states. Calabar which was founded by Efiks in 1600 grew and prospered as a result of trans-Atlantic trade. It was a most important Port for the supply of slaves in the 18th century. The Itsekiri kingdom of Warri, Iboland, Bornu and Hausa states and others were actually engrossed in slave trade. According to Afolalu (1969), there were three principal trade routes through which slaves were taken outside Iboland:
1. The Northern route from Nike to Ogurugu to Iddah in the North
2. The South-Eastern route from Awka to Bende to Arochukwu to Calabar and Bonny. Through this route slaves were sold to middlemen who sold them to slave traders on the coast.
3. The Eastern route across the Cross River.
The Aros were astute and shrewd traders who established their commercial hegemony over the Ibos and Ibibios. They were shielded by the Ebini Ukpabi Oracle, the strongest and long juju which was highly revered. The success of the Europeans in the demolition of the Oracle spelt doom for the area, and exposed them to massive enslavement as they became victims of slave trade.
Fig. 4 Showing slave chain and rings found in Mazi Okoroji’s house at Ujari in Arochukwu.(14-03-16).
Fig. 5 The researcher showing multiple slave rings and chain (14-03-16).
Source: Mr. Okoroji’s compound of Ndiokoroji, Ujari in Arochukwu Abia State.
Fig. 6 The researcher standing in front of Mazi Okoroji Otti’s compound in Ujari Arochukwu, 14th March, 2016
Fig. 7 The researcher standing with Mazi Ezuma Okoronkwo, the son of Okoroji Otti Source: Chief Okoroji”s Compound in Ujari-Arochukwu, 14th March 2016
Fig. 8. Showing the researcher experimenting the slave rings.
Source: Chief Okoroji’s historic Museum in Ndiokoroji village, Ujari-Arochukwu:14th March, 2016
Fig. 9. Showing a slave chain sculpture which is a reminiscence of the old slavery days:
initial chain of bondage has become the bond of communal unity
Source: Nde-owuu village square in Ibom community of Arochukwu, 14 th March,2016
Fig. 10. Showing Nkaanu River, a slave trade route between Arochukwu and Bende criss-crossing Cross Rivers( Pix by the researcher’s companion, Daniel Kanu, 14-03-16).
Source: Bende, Abia State, Nigeria
Fig. 11. Views the Blue River in Azumini,( Abia State) a popular slave trading route to Bonny, Cross River and Rivers States, 15-03-16
Fig.12. The researcher standing near a boat on Azumini Blue River
Source:Azumini in Ukwa East L.G.A., Abia State, Nigeria (Pix by the researcher’s Companion, 13-03-16)
Fig. 13. Shows the calabash that contained medicine used for calming down stubborn Slaves to hypnotize and calm them down to implicit submission
Source: Mazi Okoroji’s house in Ujari, Arochukwu, 14th March 2016
Fig.14. Showing the researcher holding the Medicine calabash for controlling stubborn slaves Source: Chief Okoroji Museum in Ujari-Arochukwu, Abia State, Nigeria-14-03-16
Fig. 15. Showing an Ancient tree standing at Nwaebule market, a former slave market at Azumini Ndoki, Ukwa East LG.A., Abia State, Nigeria (13th Maqrch, 2016)
Fig. 16. Showing the researcher shopping in Ahia Nwaebule, a former slave market at Azumini-Ndoki in Ukwa East L.G.A, Abia State (very close to the Blue Sea, slaves-transporting route) 15- 03- 17
Fig. 17: The Ohambele Ancient Mango Tree near Onwo (river) where captured people were tied before being sold out into slavery.
Source: Ohambele, Onwo River Traders route in Ukwa East L.G.A. (pix by Goodluck Digital Photos, Obohia Ndoki, Abia State, 30th May 2017).
According to Ajayi and Espie (1965), the slave trade provided a lucrative source of wealth that the coastal settlements underwent remarkable political and social developments. City states emerged. The most important were Warri, Sapele (Itsekiri and Urhobo), Brass, Akassa, Twon, Nembe (Ijaw), Buguma, Abonnema, Bakana (Kalabari), Bonny (Ibeno) and Creek Town, Henshaw Town and Duke Town (Efik). “Inter-house rivalry was a constant menace to stability and if there was a weak king, civil war invariably threatened” (p.305).
After the abolition of slave trade in Europe, many Nigerian communities still retained the slaves they captured. In the 1850s, the plantation slaves in Calabar organized themselves under their own leaders to protect their members against the arbitrary exactions of their masters.The slave society was aimed primarily at the Ekpe society which was the instrument at the disposal of the Calabar rulers for keeping their slave population in complete subjugation. As soon as the slaves had organized their own sacred society known as the ‘Order of Blood’, they not only defied the authority of the Ekpe society but threatened to invade Duke Town. Civil war was averted only by the intervention of the British consul, merchants and missionaries.
Isichei (1970) wrote extensively on slave trade and its effects in Igbo country. According to her, Iboland was one of the areas of West Africa most seriously affected by the slave trade asthey were exported as slaves throughout the whole period of the trade. When the Barbot brothers visited the Delta in the late seventeenth century, they described how Bonny and Kalabari had become the main centres of the trade. Their people would go to the inland markets in their great trade canoes, exchanging European goods and fish for slaves, and a certain amount of Ivory.
The eighteenth century has been rated as the period when the largest numbers of slaves were exported to Europe (1701-1810). During this period, the trade was dominated by the English who drew the bulk of their slaves from the Iboland. Ikime (1969) maintained that throughout the period of the slave trade, the vast majority of the slaves purchased at the Delta ports were Ibos, though some were Ibibios, and those sold in the Western Delta were mainly Urhobos. The effect of slave trade in Igbo nation in particular and Nigeria–
Africa as a whole will be discussed in the subsequent sections of this work.