DIFFERENT VIOLENCE, SIMILAR GOAL

HUMAN SACRIFICE,
ANOTHER WAY TO COUNTER THREAT 
FROM RISING COMMERCIAL FORCES 

The king of Dahomey immolates 10 slaves in 1850 and 300 in 1853, 

to keep palm oil growers from obtaining them
(Dahomey: now part of Benin)

• Every year Dahomeyan family heads

sacrifice wealth to the ancestors,

the amount depending on status. 

The king sacrifices what costs most,

slaves

Journals of two missions to the king of Dahomey, in 1849 and 1850 by Frederic E. Forbes

• When the British block the port
to prevent slave-carrying ships from sailing (in 1852), 
the ruler finds himself with a mass of captives
that the oligarchy cannot absorb
and that are costly to maintain  

Dahomey Human sacrifice in 1853, "Le Tour du Monde"

Palm-oil production has increased under European demand, and its producers would gladly buy those slaves.

The king sacrifices them instead. 

• Ritualized destruction emphasizes authority,

as usual

In the first drawing, the king is giving the order to pitch the captives over the wall. The population watches from outside.

In the second, the ruler and crowd participate in the execution together. The people cheer each time the executioner raises a head, while the king sits under the parasol (a symbol of power) in the front row.

There is no comparable ritual in Djimini, 

where the economy is much less developed
and that has no king.

But pillaging caravans and massacring labor
have the same goal,
to protect societies that commercial forces threaten.

End of this chapter.

*      *      *

Next chapter,

IV, 4.
Commercial forces win, then crumble