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Ugwuele is an Igbo community in Uturu, Isuikwuato Local Government Area, Abia State in Nigeria which houses a stone age site that provides evidence that humans inhabited the region as far back as 250,000 years ago. It was the largest handaxe factory in Nigeria, and possibly in the world. Anthropologists at the University of Benin discovered fossils and use of monoliths dating back to 4500 BC at Ugwelle-Uturu in the Okigwe area. There are three layers of occupation. The oldest…

Dufuna Canoe is a canoe discovered in 1987 by a Fulani cattle herdsman a few kilometers from the village of Dufuna in the Fune Local Government Area, not far from the Komadugu Gana River, in Yobe State, Nigeria. Radiocarbon dating of a sample of charcoal found near the site dates the canoe at 8500 to 8000 years old, linking the site to Lake Mega Chad. It is the oldest boat to be discovered in Africa, and the second oldest known worldwide. The canoe is currently in Damaturu…

Lejja is a community comprising 33 villages in Enugu State of South-Eastern Nigeria. It is populated by the Igbo people and located about 14 Kilometers from Nsukka. It is the location of a prehistoric archaeological site which contains iron smelting furnaces and slag dated to 2000 BC. The village square contains over 800 blocks of slag with an average weight of between 34 and 57 kg. Geophysical investigations have Located buried iron slag in several other locations in the…

The Nok culture is an early Iron Age population whose material remains are named after the Ham village of Nok in Kaduna State of Nigeria, where their famous terracotta sculptures were first discovered in 1928. The Nok Culture appeared in northern Nigeria around 1500 BC and vanished under unknown circumstances around 500 AD. Iron use, in smelting and forging for tools, appears in Nok culture by at least 550 BC and possibly earlier. Data from historical linguistics suggest that…

Opi is a community in Enugu State of South-Eastern Nigeria. It is populated by the Igbo people and located in Nsukka region. It is the location of a prehistoric archaeological site which contains iron smelting furnaces and slag dated to 750 BC. Iron ore was smelted in natural draft furnaces and molten slag was drained through shallow conduits to collecting pits forming huge slag blocks weighing up to 47 kg. The operating temperatures are estimated to have varied between 1,15…

The Sao civilisation flourished in Central Africa from the sixth century BC to as late as the sixteenth century AD after which the Sao were absorbed into the Bornu Empire. The Sao lived by the Chari River Around Lake Chad in territory that later became part of Cameroon and Chad. They were made up of several patrilineal clans who were united into a single polity. The polity were organized into ranked and centralized societies. Sao artifacts show that they were skilled workers…

Ile-Ife was a powerful Yoruba kingdom dated to the 4th century BC. Yorubaland is the cultural region of the Yoruba people in West Africa. It spans the modern-day countries of Nigeria, Togo, and Benin. From the 12th to the 15th centuries, Ife flourished as a powerful, cosmopolitan and wealthy city-state in West Africa. The cities were fortresses, with high walls and gates. Ife was an influential centre of trade connected to extensive local and long-distance trade networks…

Gaya is a Local Government Area in Kano State, Nigeria. Its headquarters are in the town of Gaya in the north of the area. Gaya is believed to be the origin of a man named Kano who first settled in the present Kano State on his search for ironstone. Gaya served as an important terminus of a migratory corridor through which there was an influx of immigrating peoples especially from Eastern Sudan, the Maghrib and the Middle East. The traditional ruler of Gaya is known as the…

Kano is the state capital of Kano State in North West, Nigeria. It is situated in the Sahelian geographic region, south of the Sahara. Kano is the commercial nerve centre of Northern Nigeria and is the second largest city in Nigeria. The principal inhabitants of the city are the Hausa people. However, there are many who speak Fulani language. As in most parts of northern Nigeria, the Hausa language is widely spoken in Kano. The city is the capital of the Kano Emirate. In…

The Kanem–Bornu Empire was an empire that existed in modern Chad and Nigeria. It was known to the Arabian geographers as the Kanem Empire from the 9th century AD onward and lasted as the independent kingdom of Bornu (the Bornu Empire) until 1900. The Kanem Empire (c. 700–1380) was located in the present countries of Chad, Nigeria and Libya. The empire of Kanem formed under the nomadic Tebu-speaking Kanembu, who eventually abandoned their nomadic lifestyle and founded a…

Sungbo's Eredo is an earth wall and ditch that is 160 kilometres (99 mi) long, rises 20 metres (66 ft) in places and encloses an area 40 kilometres (25 mi) wide in north-south, with the walls flanked by trees and other vegetation, turning the ditch into a green tunnel. According to legends of the contemporary Ijebu clan, Eredo was built in honour of a noblewoman of the Ijebu clan called Oloye Bilikisu Sungbo. According to them, the monument was built as her personal memorial…

Igbo-Ukwu (Igbo: Great Igbo) is a town in the Nigerian state of Anambra in the southeastern part of the country. Igbo-Ukwu is notable for three archaeological sites, where excavations have found bronze artifacts from a highly sophisticated bronze metal-working culture dating to 9th century AD. The bronze artifacts were initially discovered by Isiah Anozie in 1939 while digging a well in his compound in Igbo-Ukwu, an Igbo town in Anambra State, Nigeria. As a result of three…

The Kingdom of Nri (also known as Igbo) was a medieval religio-polity within the Igbo area of Nigeria administered by a priest-king called an Eze Nri. The Eze Nri managed trade and diplomacy on behalf of the Nri people, a subgroup of the Igbo-speaking people, and possessed divine authority in religious matters. The kingdom was a haven for all those who had been rejected in their communities and also a place where slaves were set free from their bondage. Nri expanded through…

The Kingdom of Kano was a Hausa kingdom in the north of what is now Northern Nigeria that dates back before 1000 AD, and lasted until the proclamation of the Sultanate of Kano by King Ali Yaji Dan Tsamiya in 1349. The kingdom was then replaced by the Sultanate of Kano, under the suzerainty of a Muslim Sultan The capital is now the modern city of Kano in Kano State. Our knowledge of the early history of Kano comes largely from the Kano Chronicle, a compilation of oral…

The Hausa Kingdom, also known as Hausaland, was a collection of states started by the Hausa people, situated between the Niger River and Lake Chad (modern day northern Nigeria). Hausaland lay between the Western Sudanic kingdoms of Ancient Ghana and Mali and the Eastern Sudanic kingdoms of Kanem-Bornu. Hausaland took shape as a political and cultural region during the first millennium CE as a result of the westward expansion of Hausa peoples. They arrived to Hausaland when…

The kingdom of Benin was a pre-colonial kingdom in what is now southern Nigeria. It began in the 900s when the Edo people settled in the rainforests of West Africa. The rulers, known as the Oba were established through hereditary succession. Under these obas Benin became a highly organized state. Its numerous craftsmen were organized into guilds, and the kingdom became famous for its ivory and wood carvers. Its brass smiths and bronze casters excelled at making naturalistic…

Ife (/ee-fay/, Yoruba: Ifè, also Ilé-Ifẹ̀) is an ancient Yoruba city in south-western Nigeria. According to theYoruba religion Ife was founded by the order of the Supreme God Olodumare to Obatala and then fell into the hands of his brother Oduduwa, which created turmoil between the two. Oduduwa created his own dynasty through his sons and daughters that became different rulers of many kingdoms. According to Yoruba religion, Olodumare, the Supreme God, ordered Obatala to…

The Oyo Empire was a Yoruba empire established in the 15th century in what is today Benin and North central Nigeria. It rose through the outstanding organizational and administrative skills of the Yoruba people, wealth gained from trade and its powerful cavalry. Its foundation myth draws upon Yoruba religious beliefs and holds sacred the original settlement of Ile-Ife, which continues to be upheld as the creation site for the Yoruba people with significance to local…

Owo is a city in Ondo State of Nigeria. Between 1400 and 1600 AD, it was the capital of a Yoruba city-state. In their oral tradition, Owo traces its origins back to the ancient city of Ile-Ife, the cradle of Yoruba culture. Oral tradition also claims that the founders were the sons of the Yoruba deity Odudua, who was the first ruler of Ile-Ife. The early art-historical and archaeological records reinforce these strong affiliations with Ife culture. Owo was able to maintain…

The Songhai Empire (also transliterated as Songhay) was a state that dominated the western Sahel in the 15th and 16th century. At its peak, it was one of the largest states in African history. The state is known by its historiographical name, derived from its leading ethnic group and ruling elite, the Songhai. Sonni Ali established Gao as the capital of the empire, although a Songhai state had existed in and around Gao since the 11th century. Other important cities in the…

The Kotoko kingdom was an African monarchy in what is today northern Cameroon and Nigeria, and southwestern Chad. Its inhabitants and their modern descendants are known as the Kotoko people. The rise of Kotoko coincided with the decline of the Sao civilisation in northern Cameroon. A king headed the nascent state, which came to assimilate several smaller kingdoms. Among these were Kousséri, Logone-Birni, Makari, and Mara. Kotoko spread to parts of what is today northern…