The purpose of this study is to reconsider the characteristics of the society of coastal Benin, contrasting the self-generating reproduction of the regional system with the transformative influences of external linkages. The coastal society of Benin has sustained a remarkable continuity over the centuries of its recorded history. The source of this continuity lies primarily in the environment of the region – its fertile lands and connected waterways – and in the culture which has developed in close interaction with that environment. The first four centuries of contact with the Atlantic economy brought substantial changes to coastal Benin, yet these did not break the framework of the regional economy or the regional culture. The French conquest of 1892-1894 opened up another era, more significant at first for its political changes than for any economic transformations. Some changes of the 20th century have fundamentally restructured the conditions of southern Benin. Most notably, the political structure of colonial Dahomey brought the coast into an intimate relationship with what is now northern Benin. Yet this and other changes have not gone so far as to erase the significance of the environment of coastal Benin or of the culture based on it. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum. in French.
