Previous page | New search |
The free AfricaBib App for Android is available here
Periodical article | Leiden University catalogue | WorldCat |
Title: | The Evolution of the Cultigen Repertoire of the Nupe of West-Central Nigeria |
Author: | Blench, Roger |
Year: | 1989 |
Periodical: | Azania: Archaeological Research in Africa |
Volume: | 24 |
Pages: | 51-63 |
Language: | English |
Notes: | biblio. refs. |
Geographic terms: | Nigeria West Africa |
Subjects: | Nupe food crops agricultural history Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups) Anthropology and Archaeology Agriculture, Agronomy, Forestry Cultivation practices cultivation systems |
External link: | https://doi.org/10.1080/00672708909511397 |
Abstract: | This paper examines the process of adoption of food crops among a single ethnic group by looking at the development of domesticated plants among the Nupe of west-central Nigeria. It combines linguistics, historical sources and present-day participant information (derived from fieldwork in 1979-1982 and subsequent shorter visits up to 1987) in order to illustrate the dynamics of traditional African farming systems and the factors relevant to changes in cropping patterns. After summarizing the ethnography of the Nupe, a comparative table of crops at different historical periods (from the early 19th century onward) illustrates the evolution of the repertoire. This is linked to an explanatory framework that examines the farming systems, political stuctures and marketing networks that affect the choices made by farmers. The argument of this paper is that a simple techno-environmental determinism is an inadequate explanatory framework for changes in cultigen repertoires. Soils, rainfall, market opportunities and labour availability are linked with the development of internal differentiation within the society, in terms of both hierarchy and specialized subgroups. Once foods are defined as markers of specific status then their production and importation begins to ramify. During the early period of centralization of the Nupe State, large numbers of vegetable foods were introduced, but with greater wealth stratification, livestock products and imported foods replaced them in prestige. Bibliogr., notes. |