War and Art in Pre-Colonial West Africa: Edged Weapons from the Kingdom of Dahomey

This book is intended as a reference guide for aspiring researchers and postgraduate students of West African history, as well as anyone fascinated by the region’s material culture.Rarely encountered or studied, edged weapons from the Kingdom of Dahomey on West Africa’s Guinea Coast are often misidentified, despite their striking morphological characteristics.This book collates the features and characteristics that identify these unique weapons, which date from the kingdom’s rise in the early 18th century to its demise against France in 1894.The result is an exploration of the remarkable creativity and improvisational quality of these swords and the role they once played as items of regalia, as well as instruments of war and execution, in the kingdom’s highly centralized military bureaucracy.The primary tool used in this study is morphological analysis, drawing on an investigation of sword forms from around the world.However, other research techniques have also been employed.These span