¹ Goody, J., Technology, Tradition and the State in Africa (London, 1971).Google Scholar

² Fisher, H. J., ‘“He swalloweth the ground with fierceness and rage”: The horse in the Central Sudan’, 2 parts, J. Afr. Hist. XIII, 3 (1972), 360–88, and XIV, 3 (1973), 355–79.Google Scholar

³ The equation of horses with status, and with arrogance, is clear in a number of Yoruba proverbs. For example, a kì í kí ‘Yàgò’ fun elesin àná, we do not say ‘Make way’ for a man who rode a horse yesterday; eni gun esin, ilè l'ó m´bò, one who mounts a horse has to come down. See Ajibola, J. O., Owe Yoruba (2nd ed.Ibadan, 1971), nos 130, 434.Google Scholar

⁴ See, e.g. Johnson, S., The History of the Yorubas (London, 1921), 50.Google Scholar

⁵ For examples, see Johnson, , History, 44, 45, 55. Johnson suggests that the sacrifice of horses in Oyo was a recent development, replacing earlier human sacrifices.Google Scholar

⁶ Frobenius, L., The Voice of Africa (trans. Blind, R., London, 1913), 1, 183. This official, the Olokun Esin, was a senior palace slave.Google Scholar

⁷ For this practice in Benin, see de Marees, P., Beschryvinghe ende Historische Verhael van het Gout Koninckrijck van Gunea (ed. L'Honoré, S. P.Naber, The Hague, 1912), 239.Google Scholar For Dahomey, see, e.g. Robertson, G. A., Notes on Africa (London, 1819), 265;Google ScholarDuncan, J., Travels in Western Africa (London 1847), 1, 119, 222–3, 230, 301–2.Google Scholar

⁸ Afigbo, A. E., ‘Trade and Trade-Routes in Nineteenth Century Nsukka’, J. Hist. Soc. Nigeria, VII (1973), 81–2.Google Scholar

⁹ The northern origin of Yoruba equestrianism is illustrated by the northern derivation of a number of items in Yoruba equine vocabulary: for example, kùùrú (pony), àlùkémbù (stirrups), and kóbitá (riding boots fitted with spurs), from Hausa kuru, likafa, and kubutai.

¹⁰ Fage, J. D., A History of West Africa (Cambridge, 1969), 421.Google Scholar

¹¹ Fisher, , ‘He swalloweth the ground’, part 1, 375.Google Scholar But note the reservations expressed, ibid. 377–8.

¹² However, the terracotta sculptures excavated at Owo, in eastern Yorubaland, in 1971 by Ekpo Eyo, do include fragments of a sculpture of a horse: Ekpo Eyo, personal communication. These sculptures may date to about the fifteenth century: cf. Flight, C., ‘A survey of recent results in the radiocarbon chronology of Northern and Western Africa’, J. Afr. Hist, xiv, 4 (1973), 549.Google Scholar

¹³ Egharevba, J. U., A Short History of Benin (3rd ed, Ibadan, 1960), 8.Google Scholar

¹⁴ For example, one traditional explanation of the name Oyo is that the site was selected for settlement because Oranmiyan's horse slipped (yò) there: cf. Smith, R., Kingdoms of the Yoruba (London, 1969), 33.Google Scholar

¹⁵ An example is illustrated in Willett, F., African Art (London, 1971), 107, ill. 94.Google Scholar

¹⁶ Frobenius, , Voice of Africa, 1, 210–12, 11, 629.Google Scholar

¹⁷ Johnson, , History, 161.Google Scholar

¹⁸ Ajayi, J. F. A. and Smith, R., Yoruba Warfare in the Nineteenth Century (2nd ed, Cambridge, 1971), 3–4;Google ScholarSmith, , Kingdoms, 39–40.Google Scholar

¹⁹ For these events, see Smith, R., ‘The Alafin in Exile: A Study of the Igboho Period in Oyo History’, J. Afr. Hist. VI, (1965), 57–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

²⁰ The ‘Kano Chronicle’, in Palmer, H. R., Sudanese Memoirs (Lagos, 1928), III, IIIGoogle Scholar, indicates that the Nupe had begun to import horses from Hausaland by the fifteenth century. Tsoede, the creator of the unified Nupe kingdom in the sixteenth century, is said to have had no less than 5,555 horses: Nadel, S. F., A Black Byzantium: The Kingdom of Nupe in Nigeria (London, 1942), 74.Google Scholar The introduction of horses into Borgu is less easy to date. It is associated by tradition with the migration of Kisra, the dynastic ancestor, from Bornu: Hermon-Hodge, H. B., Gazetteer of llorin Province (London, 1929), 119.Google Scholar

²¹ Cf. Vansina, J., Oral Tradition: A Study in Historical Methodology (trans. Wright, H. M., London, 1965), 74.Google Scholar

²² Bosman, W., A New and Accurate Description of the Coast of Guinea (London, 1705), 397.Google Scholar

²³ Snelgrave, W., A New Account of Some Parts of Guinea (London, 1734), 55–8, 121–2.Google Scholar

²⁴ See esp. Adams, J., Remarks on the Country extending from Cape Palmas to the River Congo (London, 1823), 92;Google ScholarRobertson, , Notes on Africa, 208.Google Scholar Cf. the tall story reported by de Pommegorge, Pruneau, Description de la Nigritie (Paris, 1789), 235–6, that the Oyo put their war captives to death by dragging them from the tails of their horses.Google Scholar

²⁵ Oral evidence on horses in Oyo was collected during fieldwork in 1973, the writer's principal informants being senior palace officials, notably the Kudefu and the Olokun Esin. Financial support for this fieldwork was provided by the British Academy, the Sir Ernest Cassel Educational Trust, and the University of Stirling.

²⁶ R. Smith, personal communication. See also Smith, Kingdoms, 204. For the commercial importance of Ogodo, cf. Johnson, , History, 217.Google Scholar

²⁷ Europeans occasionally brought horses as gifts or in trade to Benin: Ryder, A. F. C., Benin and the Europeans 1485–1897 (London, 1969), 41, 85–6.Google Scholar For Yorubaland, evidence of the importation of horses from the coast is lacking until the mid-nineteenth century: Bowen, T. J., Central Africa: Adventures and Missionary Labours (Charleston, 1857), 263.Google Scholar Earlier, we hear rather of European traders purchasing horses from the interior, for use at the coast: Bosman, , New and Accurate Description, 389;Google ScholarRobertson, , Notes on Africa, 207–8.Google Scholar

²⁸ E.g. Adams, , Remarks, 186;Google ScholarClapperton, H., Journal of a Second Expediti¯on into the Interior of Africa (London, 1829), 56.Google Scholar The horses of Benin, Whydah and Dahomey (probably imports from Oyo) are similarly described as ‘small’: de Marees, , Beschryvinghe, 239;Google ScholarBarbot, J., ‘Description des Côtes d'Affrique’ (unpublished manuscript of 1688, in Ministry of Defence Navy Library, London, ms. 63), IIIème Partie, 133;Google ScholarMcLeod, J., A Voyage to Africa (London 1820), 29.Google Scholar

²⁹ Robertson, , Notes on Africa, 208, 284–5.Google Scholar

³⁰ Snelgrave, , New Account, 26, 55.Google Scholar

³¹ Clapperton, , Journal, 73, 93;Google ScholarLander, R., Records of Captain Clapperton's Last Expedition to Africa (London 1830), 1, 140, 11, 13.Google Scholar For the Bornu breed of horses, cf. Fisher, , ‘He swalloweth the ground’, part 1, 381 and n. 79.Google Scholar

³² Oral evidence; cf. Webster, J. B. and Boahen, A. A., The Revolutionary Years: West Africa since 1800 (London, 1967), 73;Google ScholarAjayi, J. F. A., ‘The aftermath of the fall of Old Oyo’, in Ajayi, J. F. A. and Crowder, M. (eds), History of West Africa, II (London, 1974), 143.Google Scholar

³³ Robertson, , Notes on Africa, 208.Google Scholar

³⁴ Snelgrave, , New Account, 121–2.Google Scholar

³⁵ The Oyo used for this purpose soap mixed with scrapings from the roots of the violet tree (ìpèta): oral evidence. In Northern Nigeria, a mixture containing tobacco was used: de F. Daniel, F., ‘The Horse in Native Hands’, The Nigerian Field, v (1936), no. 2, 56.Google Scholar

³⁶ Webster, and Boahen, , West Africa since 1800, 92. Oral evidence given to the present writer does not suggest that mortality was quite as severe as this.Google Scholar

³⁷ Fisher, , ‘He swalloweth the ground’, part 11, 357–60, 378.Google Scholar

³⁸ Cf. Smith, R., ‘Yoruba Armament’, J. Afr. Hist. VIII, 1 (1967), 101–3.Google Scholar

³⁹ Lander, R., Records, II, 153Google Scholar, alludes to the importation into Oyo of iron bits and stirrups from Nupe; Lander, R. and Lander, J., Journal of an Expedition to Explore the Course and Termination of the Niger (London, 1832), 1, 172Google Scholar, refer to a saddle of Hausa manufacture.

⁴⁰ Oral evidence.

⁴¹ Robertson, , Notes on Africa, 282.Google Scholar

⁴² E.g. Clapperton, , Journal, 2, 34.Google Scholar

⁴³ Despite the examples of the Turks and the Mamluks, mounted archers were rarely employed in West Africa. Cf. Barth, H., Travels and Discoveries in North and Central Africa (centenary ed., London, 1965), 1, 581:Google Scholar ‘An archer on horseback is an unheard of thing, not only in Bornu, but in almost all Negroland, except with the [nomadic] Fulbe, but even among them it is rare.’

⁴⁴ See the lucid account of the confrontation between Alexander's cavalry, armed with thrusting-spears, and the Persian cavalry, armed with javelins, at the battle of the Granicus in 334 B.c., in Arrian, , Anabasis Alexandri, 1, 15.Google Scholar

⁴⁵ White, L., Medieval Technology and Social Change (Oxford, 1962), chapter 1.Google Scholar

⁴⁶ As pointed out by Goody, , Technology, 47.Google Scholar

⁴⁷ Ellis, A. B., The Yoruba-Speaking Peoples of the Slave Coast of West Africa (London, 1894), 173;Google Scholar cf. Smith, R., ‘A Note on Two Shirts of Chain Mail from the Palace at Owo in South-western Nigeria’, Odu, new series, 5 (1971), 93–8.Google Scholar

⁴⁸ For lifidi, see Muffett, D. J. M., ‘Nigeria—Sokoto Caliphate’, in Crowder, M. (ed.), West African Resistance (London, 1971), 278.Google Scholar

⁴⁹ See, e.g. Ajayi, and Smith, , Yoruba Warfare, 3–4;Google ScholarSmith, , Kingdoms, 122–3;Google ScholarWebster, and Boahen, , West Africa since 1800, 92.Google Scholar

⁵⁰ Fisher, , ‘He swalloweth the ground’, part 11, 357–66, 378.Google Scholar

⁵¹ Snelgrave, , New Account, 56, 121.Google Scholar The (Oyo?) army which invaded Allada in 1698 is similarly said to have been ‘all Horsed’: Bosman, , New and Accurate Description, 397.Google Scholar

⁵² Cf. Fisher, , ‘He swalloweth the ground’, part 11, 362.Google Scholar

⁵³ Snelgrave, , New Account, 56.Google Scholar

⁵⁴ Cf. above, n. 43.

⁵⁵ Clapperton, , Journal, 34;Google ScholarLander, R., Records, 1, 103;Google Scholar, R. and Lander, J., Journal, 1, 154.Google Scholar Yoruba equestrian sculptures show horsemen armed with spears, swords, and pistols, but never with bows and arrows.

⁵⁶ Robertson, , Notes on Africa, 208.Google Scholar

⁵⁷ The use of horses as a means of transport to the battlefield rather than in battle is, however, difficult to parallel in West Africa: cf. Fisher, , ‘He swalloweth the ground’, part 11, 361.Google Scholar

⁵⁸ Cf. Smith, , ‘Yoruba Armament’, 94–5.Google ScholarSnelgrave, , New Account, 56Google Scholar, credits the Oyo cavalry with the use of javelins, but he also (ibid. 57) refers to shock tactics—‘a homeCharge against the Enemies Foot’.

⁵⁹ Clapperton, , Journal, 34.Google Scholar

⁶⁰ Note also that the account of the Oyo invasions of Dahomey between 1739 and 1748 given by Norris, R., Memoirs of the Reign of Bossa Ahadee, King of Dahomy (London, 1789), 12–16, does not mention cavalry.Google Scholar

⁶¹ Francisco Pereyra Mendes to Viceroy of Brazil, 22 May 1726 (Archivo Publico, Bahia: 20, doc. 61), quoted in Verger, P., Flux et Reflux de la Traite des Nègres entre le Golfe de Bénin et Bahia (Paris, 1968), 144.Google Scholar

⁶² Snelgrave, , New Account, 58.Google Scholar

⁶³ Ibid. 122.

⁶⁴ Cf. Fisher, , ‘He swalloweth the ground’, part 11, 361.Google Scholar The problems of feeding horses in the field are also mentioned at several points in Ibn Fartuwa's account of the campaigns of Mai Idris Alooma of Bornu: e.g. ‘The Kanem Wars’, in Palmer, , Sudanese Memoirs, 1, 28, 40.Google Scholar

⁶⁵ Oral evidence.

⁶⁶ Snelgrave, , New Account, 56.Google Scholar

⁶⁷ Johnson, , History, 168.Google Scholar The use of cavalry is not explicitly mentioned in this account, but the assumption that cavalry were used makes best sense of the reference to ‘bush fighting’.

⁶⁸ Fisher, , ‘He swalloweth the ground’, part 11, 364–5.Google Scholar

⁶⁹ Oral evidence.

⁷⁰ Robertson, , Notes on Africa, 282Google Scholar, reports of the Oyo traders bringing slaves to the coast: ‘As they are generally in fear of being attacked by the Dahomians, they travel in caravans, and frequently have from two to three hundred horses with them’. This is probably a reference to a cavalry escort, but since Robertson elsewhere (ibid. 207–8, 284) refers to Oyo traders bringing horses to the coast to sell this is not altogether certain.

⁷¹ This problem of securing cavalry mounts was not, of course, peculiar to Oyo. It was also important, for example, in Samori's empire: see Legassick, M., ‘Firearms, Horses and Samorian Army Organization 1870–98’, J. Afr. Hist, vii, 1 (1966), 106–7.Google Scholar Parallels can also be found in the Indian sub-continent: cf. Digby, S., War-Horse and Elephant in the Dehli Sultanate: A Study of Military Supplies (Oxford, 1971), chapter 11.Google Scholar

⁷² Robertson, , Notes on Africa, 284.Google Scholar

⁷³ Clapperton, , Journal, 59.Google Scholar

⁷⁴ Millson, A., ‘The Yoruba Country, West Africa’, Proc. Roy. Geog. Soc. xiii (1891), 578;Google Scholar cf. Clarke, W. H., Travels and Discoveries in Yorubaland 1854–1858 (ed. Atanda, J. A., Ibadan, 1972), 229.Google Scholar

⁷⁵ For the cases of Kwararafa and Nupe, see the ‘Kano Chronicle’, in Palmer, , Sudanese Memoirs, III, 107, III.Google Scholar

⁷⁶ For the trans-Saharan trade, see, e.g. Africanus, Leo, Description de l'Afrique (trans. Epaulard, A., Paris 1956), 11, 480, 482;Google ScholarLyon, G. F., A Narrative of Travels in Northern Africa (London, 1821), 115, 121, 154.Google Scholar The Portuguese in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries also sold horses for slaves in the Senegambia area: see, e.g. Fernandes, V., Description de la Cìte Occidentale d'Afrique (trans. Monod, T., da Mota, A. Texeira, and Mauny, R., Bissau, 1951), 21, 43;Google ScholarPereira, Duarte Pacheco, Esmeraldo de Situ Orbis (trans. Mauny, R., Bissau, 1956), 47, 53, 59, 61, 73.Google Scholar

⁷⁷ Cf. Fisher, , ‘He swalloweth the ground’, part 11, 365.Google Scholar

⁷⁸ For the sale of Hausa slaves at the coast by the Oyo, see esp. Adams, , Remarks, 221–2.Google Scholar

⁷⁹ This is no more than a hypothesis. But it is known that Oyo purchased slaves from the north with re-exported European manufactures: cf. Denham, D. and Clapperton, H., Narrative of Travels and Discoveries in Northern and Central Africa (London, 1826), Clapperton's Narrative, 42.Google Scholar

⁸⁰ Oral evidence. It was generally stated that one or two slaves were required for each horse, though one informant offered an extravagant estimate of ten slaves per horse.

⁸¹ Aristotle, , Politics, 1289b, 1321a.Google Scholar

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⁸³ Goody, Technology, chapter 3. Similar arguments about the political effects of cavalry and firearms are put forward by Morton-Williams, P., ‘The influence of habitat and trade on the polities of Oyo and Ashanti’, in Douglas, M. and Kaberry, P. M. (eds), Man In Africa (London, 1969)Google Scholar, and by Smaldone, J. P., ‘Firearms in the Central Sudan: A Revaluation’, J. Afr. Hist. XIII (1972), 591–607.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁸⁴ Law, R. C. C., ‘The Constitutional Troubles of Oyo in the Eighteenth Century’, J. Afr. Hist. XII (1971), 25–44.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁸⁵ Morton-Williams, , ‘The influence of habitat and trade’, 91, 96;Google ScholarAjayi, , ‘The aftermath of the fall of Old Oyo’, 139–140.Google Scholar

⁸⁶ Johnson, , History, 62.Google Scholar

⁸⁷ For the military role of the Osi Iwefa, see Johnson, , History, 59.Google Scholar The military importance of the Osi Iwefa dates back at least to the 1820s: cf. Clapperton, , Journal, 52.Google Scholar

⁸⁸ For the Eso, see esp. Morton-Williams, , ‘The influence of habitat and trade’, 91.Google Scholar

⁸⁹ The grounds for this suggestion are exiguous. Apart from ambiguous oral testimony, note that Clapperton, , Journal, 2–3Google Scholar, refers to two mounted attendants of an Oyo war-chief who were Muslims from Bornu.

⁹⁰ For the subordination of the Eso to the Oyo Mesi, see Johnson, , History, 73.Google Scholar For the military role of the Basorun: ibid. 159, 169, 174; Dalzel, A., A History of Dahomy (London, 1793), 175.Google ScholarSimpson, J. Macrae, ‘An Intelligence Report on the Oyo Division of the Oyo Province’, 1938 (Rhodes House Library, Oxford: MSS Afr. s. 526), sections 54–5Google Scholar, states that only thirty of the Eso were subordinate to the Oyo Mesi, the other forty being under the palace eunuchs: this probably represents a nineteenth-century reorganization.

⁹¹ The armed forces of the provincial towns were controlled by the Alafin rather than by the Oyo Mesi, their commander (the Are Ona Kakamfo) being an appointee of the Alafin and in status a palace slave: Johnson, , History, 74.Google Scholar

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⁹⁵ Oral evidence. The supply of horses by the ruler to his chiefs is also recorded in some other West African states: Adamu, Mahdi, ‘A Hausa Government in Decline: Yawuri in the Nineteenth Century’ (M.A. Thesis, Ahmadu Bello University, Zana, 1968), 119, 128, 153;Google ScholarAlkali, Muhammad Bello, ‘A Hausa Community in Crisis: Kebbi in the Nineteenth Century’ (M.A. Thesis, Ahmadu Bello University, 1969), 103, 117.Google Scholar

⁹⁶ For these events, see Smith, Kingdoms, chapter x.

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¹⁰¹ Atiba, who became the first Alafin at the new capital, had been a pioneer of the use of firearms in the 1830s; cf. Johnson, , History, 260, 266.Google Scholar The replacement of cavalry by musketeers in Oyo might be connected, following Goody, with the increased military importance of the palace slaves in the nineteenth century.

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¹⁰³ Ajayi, ibid, suggests that the embargo was imposed by Ilorin. An alternative view would blame the Nupe and Borgu: Akinjogbin, I. A., ‘The Prelude to the Yoruba Civil Wars of the Nineteenth Century’, Odu, 1, 2 (1965), 30;Google ScholarSmith, , Kingdoms, 137.Google Scholar

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