“You are black.” Pot says to Kettle.
Picture this:
Ubini Kings (kings of Benin) recorded their history perfectly
well through use of their bronze plaques and through their cultural and oral traditions.
The elders ensured that their ways of life were passed on from
generation to generation through their oral traditions. Achievements of notable
sons and daughters were recorded and told through their oral history and narratives.
The kings recorded important events and achievements through the
bronze plaques. The plaques recorded a full and varied narratives which showed
all the characters and people involved in the events e.g. some plaques show
hunters, some show palace dwarfs, some show the chiefs, some show the chiefs and
their attendants, some show the king and his attendants, some show animals and plants
which were important to the people at the time and most important of,
foreigners were also depicted on the plaques.
These plaques (from 14th century and onwards) which
recorded the Great Kingdom of Benin history and which adorned and decorated the
palace showed varied people and events as agreed by everyone who has ever seen
them.
Yet some historians influenced by accounts of the holier than
thou members of the British Punitive Expedition of 1897 claimed that the
plaques show only the kings and Royal Court events.
Turning to the British
grand palaces, the tapestries and paintings which were used to record their own
history and which adorn them show only their Kings and their queens, their princes
and princesses. No one of them shows the
achievements of their notable sons and daughters or indeed of the poor who made
up most of their population.
Pot called Kettle 'Black'. Hmmm.
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