Benin bronzes are made of metal produced in Germany. An article about it was published on PLoS ONE.
Benin bronzes refer to a collection of thousands of African artworks in the form of heads, tablets, figurines and other objects created by the Edo people of Nigeria between the 16th and 19th centuries AD. The name “Bronze” is misleading because in reality these works of art are made of brass. It is generally accepted that the metal for these statues was obtained from small brass rings, “manillas,” used as currency in European trade in West Africa. However, there was no absolute confidence in this as scientists have few real historical examples of manilla.
Now, German scientists from Georg Agricola Technische Hochschule have chemically analyzed 67 manillas excavated from five shipwrecks in the Atlantic and three landmasses in Europe and Africa. Finds 16.-19. dates back to centuries. There appeared to be a strong similarity between the metal composition of Benin bronze and that of manillas used in Portuguese trade before the 18th century, suggesting that these manillas were the main source of metal for sculptures.
In addition, the composition of these rings shows that they were produced from the ore of the Rhine basin (Germany), an important metallurgical center. The constancy in the composition of the bronzes indicates that African blacksmiths were very selective about which metal to use to make the statuettes.
previous experiment showedThe disappearing balloon trick can’t fool the monkeys.