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Some Source Books for West African History

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 January 2009

A. W. Lawrence
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Extract

In his recent book on the Royal African Company, K. G. Davies remarked that he had found himself obliged to conduct his research as though he were working on Ancient History. I have since experienced the same feeling when dealing with a more varied range of material, and this article is a plea for subjecting the sources for African history to that kind of critical appraisal which has customarily been applied to Greek and Roman authors. In my case I was concerned only with the old European forts in West Africa, and from an antiquarian viewpoint, but the same considerations must apply more generally, and the examples that follow will, I trust, stimulate investigation of the writers where they deal with other topics.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of African History , Volume 2 , Issue 2 , July 1961 , pp. 227 - 234
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1961

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References

1 Naukeurige Beschrijvinghe der Afrikaensche Gewesten.

2 Reprinted and edited by Naber, S. P. L'Honoré, Linschoten-Vereeniging, v (1912), chapter 50.Google Scholar

3 I regret that in this context I am obliged to state conclusions without explaining the reasoning upon which they are based, because the evidence for structural alterations demands more space than can be afforded in an article. The architectural development of both Elmina Castle and Dixcove Fort, and the historical events which affected the latter especially, are discussed at length in a book, Trade Castles of West Africa, which I expect to publish early in 1962.

4 Reprinted and edited by Naber, S. P. L'Honoré, Reisebeschreibungen von Deutschen Beamten (Hague, 1930).Google Scholar

5 At Somerset House, A.A.1713, f. 13.

6 T.70/5, f. II v.

7 T.70/68, f. 46; cf. T.70/ 1443, f. 41 r.

8 T.70/II, ff. 125, 127.

9 T.70/II, f. 114; cf. f. 120.

10 Astley's Voyages, II, 398.

11 T.70/5, f. 81; Grosser Generaistab, Kriegsgeschichcliche Einze1schrften, Heft 6 (Berlin 1885), 131, 133.

12 T.70/II, ff. 120, 121.

13 de Marrée, J. A., Reizen op en Beschrijving van de Goudkust van Guinea, I (1817), 100 (after residence, 1802–4).Google Scholar

14 T.70/1467, a very full account with the Anglo–Dutch correspondence.

15 T.70/152, f. 90; cf. T.70/153, f. 23.

16 Africanus Horton, Letters written on the Gold Coast–by a Dixcove-born medical officer who was an eye-witness.

17 Brondsted, J., Vore gamle Tropekolonier, 1, 492.Google Scholar