Benin City, the mighty medieval capital now lost without trace • Hacker News Board

Re: Benin City, the mighty medieval capital now lost without trace

#31

Post by themodelplumber » Sat, Mar 19, 2016, 3:37 AM UTC

13of40 wrote: post #28

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #12

Google satellite view of modern-day Benin City shows clear evidence of past earthworks in the countryside surrounding. In particular traces of an earthen structure runs northeast out of the city starting at about St. Savior Rd, through Urhokuosa, Erua and Ethor to Irrua. A distance of 50 miles, and perhaps further. https://www.google.com/maps/@6.3474921,5.747339,27322m/data=...

Wow, that city has one of the best visible-from-sky modern artifact collections I've seen: https://www.google.com/maps/@6.3105913,5.595516,407m/data=!3...

The way those artifacts gradually start to blend with the greenery is fascinating. It'd be fun to play there as a kid I'll bet

Re: Benin City, the mighty medieval capital now lost without trace

#32

Post by Lordarminius » Sat, Mar 19, 2016, 4:02 AM UTC

OoTheNigerian wrote: post #24

Ha! I was born and grew up in Benin City!! In summary, the city definitely exist but we have refused to maintain our historical artifacts. Although it is easy to blame the "evil British" , I think we back home can do better to preserve historical stuff. But the British really messed up a lot of places. But after a while we have to take responsibility. It's really cool to discuss where I grew up in a global platform t…

domo! woyiena?

Re: Benin City, the mighty medieval capital now lost without trace

#33

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Mar 19, 2016, 4:32 AM UTC

adwf wrote: post #4

I wonder whether there should be a word for the feeling you get when reading something like this and thinking "Please don't be the British again..." Dammit :(

[deleted]

Re: Benin City, the mighty medieval capital now lost without trace

#34

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Mar 19, 2016, 4:33 AM UTC

wtbob wrote: post #27

apalmer wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately although the practice is horrid, I dont see much to justify the claim

Back when the Brits were hell-bent on destroying the slave trade, being the capitol of a slave-trading culture was a good way to get destroyed.

[deleted]

Re: Benin City, the mighty medieval capital now lost without trace

#35

Post by kiiski » Sat, Mar 19, 2016, 5:32 AM UTC

Is the word "medieval" commonly used to refer to some African time period? My understanding is that the term refers specifically to the Middle Ages, which is a time period in European history, so it wouldn't make any sense to talk about a "medieval capital" in Africa (especially far away from the Mediterranean). The British only annexed Benin in 1897, long after the Middle Ages.

Re: Benin City, the mighty medieval capital now lost without trace

#36

Post by dalke » Sat, Mar 19, 2016, 7:46 AM UTC

ommunist wrote: post #2

Slave trade kills cities and cultures.

Slave trade helped make Bristol and Liverpool prosperous, so it doesn't kill all cities.

Re: Benin City, the mighty medieval capital now lost without trace

#37

Post by rurban » Sat, Mar 19, 2016, 9:17 AM UTC

Plenty of those early huge capital cities got lost. Angkor Wat, Edo, Vilcabamba, Troy, Helike, Ai, Aztlán, Ys, Shambhala, Xanadu, Carthago, Karakorum, Niniveh, Persepolis, Ur, Samarkand, ...

See e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost_city

Re: Benin City, the mighty medieval capital now lost without trace

#38

Post by hutzlibu » Sat, Mar 19, 2016, 10:22 AM UTC

Never heard of Benin... and after reading the article, I "knew": lost without trace, great culture, great wealth and great security for all its people..., great artists. And in the end - destroyed by the Britains.

Hm ... so after reading Wikipedia, I knew, it is not lost without trace, but the great Kingdom of Benin was also the great capital of slave trade, with human sacrifices(in the end about 23 a day) and all in all a deep despotic society, etc.

But the artists are indeed great.

Re: Benin City, the mighty medieval capital now lost without trace

#39

Post by CPLX » Sat, Mar 19, 2016, 1:59 PM UTC

thechao wrote: post #18

adwf wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh I know. There's always many sides to these stories. I don't feel bad about it other than in an abstract modern moral way, it's history. But the number of times something from the 18th-20th centuries like this comes up and you find out it was our ancestors... I sometimes wonder whether this'll be the same reaction Americans will have in 200 years time. Things always look better when justified in the moral context o…

No, no, don't worry; there's been more than one occasion when I silently repeated to myself: "please not Texas, please not Texas..."

You're in luck, it's Florida again.

Re: Benin City, the mighty medieval capital now lost without trace

#40

Post by OoTheNigerian » Sun, Mar 20, 2016, 12:32 PM UTC

Lordarminius wrote: post #32

OoTheNigerian wrote: post #24

Ha! I was born and grew up in Benin City!! In summary, the city definitely exist but we have refused to maintain our historical artifacts. Although it is easy to blame the "evil British" , I think we back home can do better to preserve historical stuff. But the British really messed up a lot of places. But after a while we have to take responsibility. It's really cool to discuss where I grew up in a global platform t…

domo! woyiena?

Oyese!

But I'm not Bini though. I'm Igbo, from Anambra.