Contenu du sommaire

H. Brunschwig — ~~Dr. Paul Colin, the Bambuk Gold and 'Modem Colonisation'~~. In his quest for the Bambuk gold, Dr. Paul Colin did not look only for his personal enrichment. He was a believer in the doctrine of 'modem colonisation' developed by the imperialist theoreticians of the 'eighties. This doctrine, however, addressed itself to investors and specialists—engineers, agronomists, businessmen—rather than to common people lacking both in capital and technical training. The collaboration, from 1854 to 1865, between Faidherbe, Maurel and Prom, and the Senegalese traders was quite exceptional — even so the governor had kept a monopoly of political action. Dr. Colin failed because he was not supported by metropolitan business circles, because he had no commercial ability, and because he took political initiatives. His analysis of precolonial trade in the Western Sudan, the opposition he met with from military and administrative omcers indifferent to economie development, remind one of the case of O. Pastre de Sanderval, Paul Soleillet, D. de Rivoyre and other explorers who finally were not integrated into the administration. This cornes as a confirmation of A. S. Kanya-Forstner's thesis on the French conquest of the Western Sudan, to the effect that up to 1914, French imperialism, as against its Belgian, German, and, to a degree, British counterparts, was politically rather than economically motivated.

F. Fuglestad — ~~The Hauka: A Historical Interprétation~~. Description of the genesis of the ~~hauka~~ spirit cuit in the late twenties and comparison with the modem forms of the bori and holey cuits, which use the same kind of mimicry of the colonial and post-colonial institutions. The early ~~hauka~~ movement is seen as a defence mechanism invented by a stable society threatened by a crisis, while the modem forms have rather an integrative function in a disrupted society.

Y. Person — ~~Chronology of the Gun Kingdom of Hogbonu (Porto-Novo)~~. The received chronology of the Hogbonu kingdom. is generally based upon the work of Akindele Akinsomon (1911), which proceeded from Marshall (c. 1880). Yet there is a marked discrepancy between this chronology and the king-list of the Agasuvi dynasty. A careful crosscheck of Hogbonu tradition with the oral history of neighbouring states as well as European documents leads to updating the foundation of the kingdom by about half a century: c. 1724 instead of 1688 for the founder's accession.

P. Videcoq — On Land Occupation and Farm Registration in the Transvaal before the First British Occupation (1835-1877) . The need for more grazing lands played an important part in the genesis of the 1834 Great Trek. After the crossing of the Vaal and the defeat of Msilikazi, the Voortrekkers did not really settled down on strictly delimi-tated estates but went on with their former habits of semi-nomadic pastoralism. Land delimitation always remained rather vague and estates boundaries ill-defined, the official regulations about registration being applied in a haphazard fashion, even after the officiai recognition of the Republic (1852) and the Act Registration Ordinance of 1866. The failure of the Transvaal government in having their own laws efiectively applied was instrumental in the 1877 conflict.

P. Brasseur — ~~In Searchfor a Missionary Absolute: Letters from Mgr. Truffet, Bishop of the Two-Guineas (1812-1847)~~. Mgr. B. Truffet was the second R.C. missionary bishop in French West Africa, from May 1847 to his death, in November of the same year. During this short space he tried to initiate an original missionary policy, setting the Church well apart from the colonial administration and attacking the slave trade.

G. Ganier — ~~Jean Bayol 1849-I905~~. Biography of Dr. J. Bayol (Navy Médical corps), explorer and administrator of French West Africa (today's Guinée, Mali and Dahomey) in the days of the conquest.

M. Michel — ~~A Reform Programme in 1919: Maurice Delafosse's 'Native Policy' for French West Africa~~. An unpublished memorandum submitted by the great administrator and scholar Maurice Delafosse to a French-British colonial conference convened by Union Coloniale Francaise. This text anticipates in many respects some of the political reforms put into efiect three decades later, and even to some extent many aspects of today's 'African authenticity' ideology.