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Boka Botuom and the Decorated Stones of the Cross River Region, Eastern Nigeria

  • Chapter
African Historical Archaeologies

Part of the book series: Contributions to Global Historical Archaeology ((CGHA))

Abstract

This chapter discusses some aspects of the archaeology of the Cross River area of Nigeria, close to the Cameroon border. This is an area that has long been known to contain monoliths, often decorated and arranged in groups, in locations sometimes close to the Cross River itself. The only detailed account of the stones is that published at around the time of Independence by a colonial service forester, Philip Allison. At the invitation of staff of Calabar Museum, archaeologists from the University of Nigeria at Nsukka made a study visit to the sites of newly reported discoveries of decorated stones, in 1982. This paper arose out of reflection on the significance of what was observed during that visit, with regard to both the definition of ‘historical’ archaeology and the practice of research in a specific Nigerian context.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Herefordshire County Council, UK

    Keith Ray

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  1. Keith Ray
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Archaeology, University College London, London, UK

    Andrew M. Reid

  2. The British Institute in Eastern Africa, Nairobi, Kenya

    Paul J. Lane

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© 2004 Springer Science+Business Media New York

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Ray, K. (2004). Boka Botuom and the Decorated Stones of the Cross River Region, Eastern Nigeria. In: Reid, A.M., Lane, P.J. (eds) African Historical Archaeologies. Contributions to Global Historical Archaeology. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-8863-8_7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-8863-8_7

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Boston, MA

  • Print ISBN: 978-0-306-47996-0

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4419-8863-8

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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