- Collection type
- Object
- Description
- Pot sherd.
- Cultural groups
- Hausa
- Date / Period
- Date made: Circa 1300
- Date collected
- By 1939
- Acquisition information
- Donated: 1939
- Dimensions
- Length: max 48 mm
- Object numbers
- Accession number: 1939.6.11.2
- Research and responses
These donations from R.H.Hide were considered by Dr Paul Lane, University of York, as part of the Fell funded project Characterizing the World Archaeology Collections. He found a report on an ecological survey undertaken in 1938-1939 and 1947-1948 which notes that "When the Forest Rest House … was being built in 1936, two very nearly complete pots (now in the Pitt Rivers Museum, Oxford) and a curved iron knife were found, and it seems probable that they were associated with one of these mounds, though the evidence is not quite conclusive. The knife was unlike anything now in use in the district; the nearest match was a Hausa reaping-knife from northern Nigeria (R.H. Hide and T.N. Wardrop – in litt. and verbatim)." See JONES, E.W. 1956: Ecological studies on the rain forest of Southern Nigeria: IV (Continued). The Plateau Forest of the Okomu Forest Reserve. Journal of Ecology 44 (1), 83–117.
These mounds are referred to in Jones (1955, 570): " Fragments of pot were recorded in seventeen pits, and may have been overlooked in others, as they were sometimes present in very small amounts. Usually only small fragments were found, but some large pieces were recovered; they have been deposited with the Department of Antiquities at Lagos. Except in one pit (0.31) which is unique in other respects, it was never nearer the surface than 10 in. (15 cm), and it extended down to 24 in. (61 cm.); it was thus in the lower part of or below the compacted horizon II". JONES, E.W. 1955: Ecological studies on the rain forest of Southern Nigeria: IV the Plateau Forest of the Okomu Reserve. Journal of Ecology 43 (2), 564–94. It is clear from these reports that the Forest Rest House is situated c.40km west of Benin City in the south-western part of what was Benin Province and is now Edo State, Nigeria. I have therefore changed the country from 'Benin Republic' to 'Nigeria'. These mounds have been recently dated to around AD 1300. See WHITE, L.J.T. and OATES, J.F. 1999: New data on the history of the Plateau Forest of Okomu, Southern Nigeria: an insight into how human disturbance has shaped the African Rain Forest. Global Ecology and Biogeography 8 (5), 355–61. [AS 24/08/2010]
1939.6.11.2
Pot sherd.
1939.6.11.2
Digital asset copyright: Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford
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