Short Stuff: Benin Bronzes | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

[Music]. hey and welcome to the short stuff I'm. Josh Chuck's here too Jerry's here too. Dave's not but you know the jam and this. is short stuff you. go okay I'll go so um we're talking. about the Benin. bronzes and they are a treasure Trove of. artworks that came out of Benin which is. a former Kingdom actually it's still a. current Kingdom in Ido state in the. south of Nigeria right now um but uh.

before Nigeria was Nigeria uh Benin was. a kingdom along West Africa that was a. very powerful Kingdom and one of the. things that they did when a new a king. which they called an Oba OB or a new. Queen Mother ascended to the throne when. there was some sort of um uh important. event or even something that they just. wanted to kind of Chronicle they would. make these plaques these incredibly. intricate well-made um bronze plaques.

and over time over hundreds of years of. creating these things and documenting. the kingdom they ended up with a lot of. these things and and so much so that um. it became essentially considered a. cultural Legacy of of the world but in. particular of benine and in West Africa. yeah absolutely boy what a shup thanks. I've been practicing it for like eight. days you really know what you're doing. uh they also serve as a historical. record of course because like you said. they came along when there were new obas.

and new Queen mothers so it's its art. and its history all wrapped up into one. and one element of uh the historical. part of it is uh how it figures in and. this very much figures in with sort of. the story here is their contact with. Europeans and uh in in Europe in these. countries the first of which was uh the. Portuguese when they started trading and. having diplomatic contacts and relations. with Portugal so they were sort of the. First on board they would uh send.

emissaries back and forth between. Portugal and Benin and they negotiated. their their their deal their trade deal. their sort of uh how they were going to. work together as people and uh that's. where EUR Europe enters the picture. basically as far as banine is concerned. yeah and it was just the Portuguese at. first that was I don't know if you said. it or not but starting in the 15th. century they they made contact and we're. trading with them uh and then shortly. after that D this is like the age of. discovery um where people from Europe.

just started sailing around being like. hey hey who wants to buy our stuff and. whose stuff can we buy so or take yeah. yeah exactly um they were very quickly. followed by the French the Dutch the. English and Bene trading with all of. these European nations and um they were. already a fairly powerful Kingdom from. what I can tell but they became. exponentially powerful because they. positioned themselves as the um the. contact between European Traders and.

countries and kingdoms and states in the. interior you wanted to trade with any. other groups in West Africa you needed. to go through the kingdom of Benin to do. that if you were a European and so they. became very very powerful and that's. kind of how things went for a couple of. centuries um they were they became. really involved in the West African. slave trade they supplied slaves to the. Europeans they traded leopard skins. pepper um Ivory things were really.

valued in Europe they had a lot of stuff. that the Europeans wanted so like I said. they became powerful but as um. industrialization started to really take. hold in the the in Europe particularly. in the UK Great Britain became more and. more powerful and essentially eventually. I should say dominated trade with West. Africa and Benin in particular but they. weren't happy with having a monopoly. they wanted to get rid of benine. altogether and just be able to trade. with people in in the interior why.

should they have a middleman and so they. started to kind of antagonize benine and. things just kind of went South from. there it's a little early but I think we. should take a break because it's such a. good Cliffhanger wow thanks man all. right we'll be right. [Music]. back.

all right so when we left off uh Great. Britain was like hey you know what we. don't need this gatekeeper anymore uh we. don't need a middleman we want to be. able to do what we want in Africa in. central Africa not go through Benin so. in 1897 in January of that year uh they. supposedly a peaceful Mission but it was. a pretty aggressive provocative thing. that they did uh the British trade.

Mission uh went in and um they were. attacked uh when they were on their way. to benine city and and this really. changed everything there were seven. British delegates uh who died in this. attack uh I think. 230 of the African carriers died but as. far as Britain was concerned is it's on. now because seven of us are dead and. that triggered a a a fullscale uh. retaliatory military Salan Expedition M.

uh on Benin which of course was no match. at all for the British forces at the. time yeah no it it was something that. Great Britain could point to and just. could be like oh look we don't have any. moral quandra anymore we we can go take. over Benin now um as as under the guise. of Revenge this this is called the. punitive Expedition and so they sent in. a bunch of a large military contingent. and they just occupied benine killed. awful lot of the Chiefs they exiled the. Oba um they pillaged and this is really.

critical this is kind of the point of. this short stuff they pillaged stuff. they found Treasures they found in Bene. and one of the things they pillaged was. the benine bronzes and in addition to. those plaques that we talked about the. Bene bronze that that term um kind it's. like an umbrella term to describe a. whole group of artworks that were. created in the Kingdom of benine from. about the at least the 15th Cent Cy up.

until the 19th century although there's. they seem to have been creating pretty. great artworks even before that 15th. century like in the Medieval Era um but. this it could be made of ivory it could. be made of brass um it could be made of. bronze all sorts of different media um. and in making jewelry or making busts or. making alra pieces or making those. plaques all of those are encompassed by. this benine bronze term and all of those. were pillaged I think 10,000 pieces of.

Art and cultural um artifacts were. pillaged during this occupation by the. British of Bene yeah and a lot of that. went back to the UK uh you know they. called that Spoils of War which is a. nice way to say things we stole after we. invaded a country right and uh some of. it they distributed among some of the. people of the Expedition like here you. take this you take this I'll be taking. this and they uh basically remove benine. as that GateKeeper.

um and all of a sudden you know central. Africa was open for all of Europe to. trade with uh certainly England and. these artifacts uh ended up you know. where where they always end up in the. hands of uh nobility uh private. Collections and notably museums where a. lot of this stuff are still in these. museums today right yeah the two largest. collections are held by the British. Museum and the ethnographic museum in. Berlin and. um even though that that umbrella term.

Bene bronzes refers to a lot of. different artworks typically you're also. really talking about those plaques that. show different you know different obas. ascending to the throne different um you. know moments in benine history um and. they're they're considered like a a. again I think I said a a cultural Legacy. of humanity but they're also just. treasure I mean they're worth Chuck I. saw an estimated. $130.

billion they are Priceless I guess not. Priceless they're worth 130 billion but. they're incredibly valuable not just um. monetarily but also culturally and. historically and they are outside of. Africa there was a a French report um by. a restitution group um that that was. commissioned by Emanuel macron in 2017. that estimated that 90 to. 95% of Africa cultural heritage is held.

by Major museums outside of Africa yeah. because of the something called the. Scramble for Africa in the late 19th. century when all these European powers. just invaded Africa and started carving. it up and turning it into colonies they. took all the stuff that they liked and. sent it back to Europe and it's still in. these museums yeah but uh and this is. something we've talked about before in. some other art podcasts part of that. 2017 study uh the whole point of that. was uh repatriation was getting this art.

back into the hands of uh the countries. of origin um these stolen artifacts and. Emanuel macron said you know what over. the next 5 years we're going to return. the stuff that we have uh Germany got. involved uh the Smithsonian like. individual museums the Smithsonian and. uh the Met uh all have said like all. right we need to start you know. returning these um these looted art. pieces uh especially these these or not. especially but for this episode you know.

notably these uh bronze plaques from. Nigeria and so Nigeria is getting so. much stuff back that uh next year I. don't know if it's still on track but in. 2025 um they are opening the Edo Museum. of West African art because they finally. have art again yeah there was a sculptor. from uh Nigeria called aan Hao glal uh. he's a sculptor and uh said that there's. an artistic Awakening in Nigeria because.

of the return of these. bronzes yeah but I think this one uh in. particular comes with a little bit of. controversy right because the um what. the current uh Oba is that right yes his. Royal Majesty obah uh uar II I'm going. with uare uare II okay um legally. speaking is the rightful owner of these. bronzes but um in. 2023 uh muhammadu Bahari who was the.

outgoing president said you know any of. this looted stuff that comes back uh to. the obah like belongs to the obah and. the Palace of the obah and no one can do. anything with it unless the obah says so. yeah and if you are in Nigeria and like. benine is still it's just a department. like we said it's it's a not considered. like an independent nation state or even. Kingdom I guess it's part of Nigeria but.

it's like the the obah has like a. government advisory role to the Nigerian. government like they're they're viewed. legitimately in similar lines to the way. the man I'm somebody's going to kill us. for this I'll bet but the royal family. is in Great Britain they don't actually. rule Great Britain but they still have. they're still consulted on things they. still have um some sort of cultural. importance as well that's the impression. that I have there but so the Nigerian. president doing that it makes total. sense in Nigeria like it was the kingdom.

of Benin to begin with the kingdom of. Benin is still there the obah is the. leader of the kingdom of Ben and an. ancestor or descendant of these these. people from whom these plaques were. stolen it makes sense that it's his but. outside of Nigeria if you're a museum. curator you don't like the sound of that. at. all yeah I mean there's definitely been. some complaints from these uh Western. museums who are like you know I don't. know about returning all this stuff and.

having it just be claimed by the palace. and uh you know apparently the museum. director there uh Philip uh iako is how. I'm going to pronounce it although I. have a feeling that I might be silent. said you know what you don't really get. a say in this anymore like you can't. loot this stuff over a you know a long. period of time and then a expect it to. be you know handled like you want or. handled you know perfectly in a very. quick manner right and so yeah the West.

is like okay you know we we agreed like. these are illegitimately taken from. Benin so they need to go back to Benin. um and they're just going to have to. deal with the fact that this this. cultural Legacy of humanity is privately. owned by one person the obah of Benin I. mean is it the complaint that it's not. going to be or not necessarily going to. be on. display I don't know because they built. the the mus Museum of West African art.

so don't know that that's it I think the. idea is in the west if a museum owns. something it belongs to everybody and. the museum is just kind of the keeper of. that they protected they keep it safe. they they show you this this stuff they. put it on display this is like no this. these things belong to the Oba he can do. whatever he wants with them essentially. okay so they're afraid it's just going. to be like decorating the bathroom or. something I guess I think so I'm not. sure I just think that they're a little. skittish about the whole thing and I. think the guy who's like well Wes needs.

to butt out of it and just give us our. plaques back it's tough not to it's. tough to Discount his his thoughts too. you got anything else I got nothing else. if you want to know more about the. benine bronzes go look them up online. they're really fascinating and beautiful. and since I said that short stuff's. out stuff you should know is a. production of iHeart radio for more. podcasts ihart radio visit the iHeart. Radio app Apple podcasts or wherever you.

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