The Historic Museum of Abomey: Exhibiting Colonial Power and Post‐colonial Identity.

This paper delineates the political and aesthetic implications of the formation of West Africa's Historic Museum of Abomey by examining underlying colonial motives, display practices of the museum objects, the altering of architecture and reception by the Fon people. Secularising a once exclusive and religious royal space and the mode of display of the museum artefacts bolstered the colonial agenda of the French West African administration. The Historic Museum of Abomey was created, bolstered, and transformed by colonial public policy. Despite these problematic issues, the Historic Museum of Abomey became an important historic and cultural centre for the people of the colonial Dahomey, today the Republic of Benin. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]