Copper and its alloys were for centuries staples of the import trade of West Africa, first across the Sahara, then by sea after the opening up of the Guinea Coast. However, little attention has been paid to the reasons behind this ancient and sustained demand. Although the uses of copper were many and changed from time to time and from place to place, the evidence of written, archaeological and artistic sources suggests that they fall largely into four broad and overlapping categories: a medium or standard of exchange, ornamentation, insignia of rank and power, and objects of cult and magic in a narrower sense. The preference for copper and brass over other metals for many purposes appears to have been determined by magic and the ritual properties ascribed to it, as well as by scarcity and practical and aesthetic considerations. Myth and legend may help to elucidate the uses of copper and brass by fitting them into a cosmological framework: thus along the Middle Niger copper is explicitly linked with the génie de l'eau and with myths of creation, while in the Niger Delta brass is frequently associated with the water spirits.

For over a century scholars have been attempting to locate the area and, if possible, the actual site of the capital of the Mali empire in its period of greatness. Since the 1920S attention has been focused on an area near the Sankararni river, a tributary entering the Niger from the south, upstream from Bamako. Over recent years a Polish-Guinean archaeological expedition has been digging a site there, but with inconclusive results so far.

A close reading of the few descriptions we have of the capital of Mali, and in particular of the route taken by Ibn Battūta, who visited the capital in 1352, suggests that the city lay on the left bank of the river Niger somewhere between Segu and Bamako. This is in fact a ‘logical] site for the capital of an empire whose tributaries lay mainly in the savannah and Sahel belts, and in whose armies cavalry played a significant role. For this reason, and a number of others, the recent hypothesis of Claude Meillassoux, suggesting a location for the capital south of the R. Falémé (and perhaps also of the R. Gambia), seems doubtful. The proper name for the capital is also discussed.

According to Yoruba traditions, the royal dynasties of all the principal kingdoms in the area were descended from the children of Oduduwa, the founder and first king of Lle Ife. This tradition implied, or could be represented as implying, that the various kingdoms formed a political unit, a ‘family’ of related dynasties. The article considers the political implicatins of the Yoruba traditions of origin, and seeks to relate the existence of certain variants of the tradition to the use of it for purposes of political propaganda. In particular, it is suggested that the tradition was manipulated and modified in an attempt to support the claims to paramountcy of the king of Oyo, when this kingdom became the most powerful state in the Yoruba area during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The case illustrates, it is argued, the intellectual problems involved in altering received traditions, and suggests the inadequacy of those views which see the process of the modification of traditions as a simple and unobtrusive response to changing political needs.

Little attention has been devoted to the uncritical and almost reflexive incorporation of available printed information into allegedly oral historical materials. This inclination is particularly strong when oral traditions attempt to cope with material more than a century old. The present paper discusses the mechanisms by which such ‘feedback’ materials were incorporated into the traditional accounts of four coastal Fante stools, and the ambiences which encouraged such processes.

Stool, succession, and land disputes were concomitants of Fante political activity, and the imposition by the British of an indirect form of rule allowed Fante traditional historians ample scope for manipulating and creating traditions to fit every contingency. The high level of literacy among the Fante and the relatively large number of early printed works which touched upon the history of the area only served to encourage these propensities. For various reasons many of these barnacles failed to become entrenched, but others were accepted by the British at the time that they were advanced and have since become the accepted and orthodox versions of traditional accounts.

While in degree the responses of the Fante were not representative of other African societies, in kind their responses were wholly typical of the development of oral historical materials almost everywhere. The historian must consider a given tradition as having been dynamic over time, and must concern himself not only with its content, but with the circumstances of its development as well.

It has become accepted by historians and social scientists alike that African workers in Rhodesia were slow to demonstrate resistance in the industrial setting of the economy. This tardiness is attributed to the dominance of the migrant labour system or the achievements of the settler administration. This view is challenged by a detailed study of African responses in the mining industry. Here geological factors led to profitability constraints which led to extensive exploitation of African labour. This in turn manifested itself in the appalling conditions in the mine compounds. In these circumstances, the choice of employer was of vital importance to Africans, and they developed a rapid and efficient system of market intelligence about employment prospects throughout southern Africa. African worker consciousness was evident in patterns of avoidance of, selective participation in, and desertion from, mines. In addition, worker consciousness and resistance manifested themselves in day-to-day work situations, and in strike action. All of these activities suggest a well-developed worker consciousness which pre-dates the more familiar organizations of the 1920s such as the Dance Societies, the Watch Tower Society and the I.C.U. These patterns further suggest that worker strategy in Rhodesia can best be understood within the context of the functioning of a regional economic system embracing all of southern Africa.

From a close analysis of African activities and actions in the Kenyan town of Nakuru from the 19205 to the 1960s, it is argued that living in towns tended to consolidate the identities of tribal groups and to exacerbate their differences. Contrasts between the urban responses of the Kikuyu, on the one hand, and the Western Kenyan tribes, the Luo and the Abaluhya, on the other, are analysed, and are related to differences in the tribal structures and in the political, economic and social changes that were taking place in their rural areas. By the early 1960s, the stage was set for open political competition between tribal groups.

The absence of popular participation in the political process of post-independent Kenya should be seen as the outcome of a political tension, which has its roots in the colonial period. The growth of Nairobi, a colonial urban centre par excellence, provided unequal opportunities for its African population. The majority of the Nairobi Africans came to constitute the African crowd—domestic servants, the majority of workers in private and public employment, and petty traders. This group should be distinguished from the Nairobi African middle class which formed the ‘political élite’. The African middle class possessed a fairly high level of education and had remunerative positions with government or were wealthy traders. By the mid-'forties, this group had become well integrated within the colonial system.

The different, and often contradictory, interests of these two groups of people was strikingly manifested on the level of political action. The ‘popular movements’ of the African crowd were direct and often extra-constitutional. Their organizations, e.g. the 40 Group, were characteristically militant, and were often based on mass support. The ‘élite politics’ of the African middle class were strictly constitutional and moderate. Their goal—to consolidate their position within the colonial system—had obviously only limited appeal. The conflict between these two social groups was resolved by the elimination of the African crowd as a political force.

The ‘three-party system’ of Dahomey consists of a trio of regional fiefs, created by MM. Apithy, Maga, and Ahomadegbe in the early fifties. The development and persistence of regionalism can be attributed to a low level of economic change, an unusually high level of educational provision, a considerable diversity of ethnic groupings, and an exceptionally rapid process of enfranchisement.

Formal political organizations appeared in 1945 and 1946 in response to the constitutional innovations brought about by the Constituent Assemblies in Paris. Between 1946 and 1951 territorial politics were dominated by the Union Progressiste Dahoménne, a loosely structured body which, while claiming ‘mass’ membership, had many of the same leaders as pre-war élite associations and adopted a similar philosophy with regard to colonial reform. There was little attempt to ‘mobilize’ the hinterland or to get the support of the unenfranchised. The institutional arrangements of the period did not compel politicians to strive in either direction. They did encourage the consolidation of the personal authority of the deputy, over both his political associates and the voting public.

Regional parties were set up in and after 1951. Their creation was occasioned by a sudden, fivefold increase in the electorate, the granting of a second National Assembly seat to the territory, and a split within the U.P.D. leadership over the renomination of Apithy, deputy from 1946 to 1951.

Northern politicians, led by Hubert Maga, exploited the division within the U.P.D. and exploited also northern resentment over the party's indifference to the region. The northern component of the regional system came into existence (the G.E.N.D.—later M.D.D.), and was quickly followed by a south-eastern ‘bloc’, the undisputed property of Apithy. In the mid-fifties a third party, the U.D.D., appeared, to absorb the residual elements of regional (and urban) support left outside the Maga and Apithy fiefs.

This article concentrates on the events of 1958 in Niger. It tries to show that Djibo Bakary's power-base was a very weak one. This could be the reason why Djibo decided to opt for ‘No’ at the Referendum, namely that he needed command of the whole state machinery in order to crush his enemies, especially the chiefs. The French were bent on thwarting Djibo for geo-political reasons (e.g. the nearness of Algeria), but did so in a rather lighthanded way. In fact, Djibo brought about his own downfall through a number of miscalculations and blunders.