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Abeokuta

  (ä'bē-ō-kū') pronunciation
Abeokuta
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A city of southwest Nigeria north of Lagos. It is a trade center in an agricultural region. Population: 593,000.

 

 
 

City (pop., 2002 est.: 529,700), southwestern Nigeria. Located about 50 mi (80 km) north of Lagos, Abeokuta was established c. 1830 as a refuge from intertribal wars. It was the chief town of the Egba, who long maintained a working relationship with the British; not until 1914 was it incorporated into British Nigeria. The modern town is an agricultural and exporting centre.

For more information on Abeokuta, visit Britannica.com.

 
(ä'bēōkū'tə, ăb') , city (1991 est. pop. 377,000), SW Nigeria. It is the trade center for an agricultural region producing rice, yams, cassava, cotton, fruit, vegetables, and palm products. Manufactures of the city include beer, cement, dyed textiles, and canned foods. There are granite quarries nearby that provide building materials for S Nigeria. Abeokuta was founded in the 1830s by Egba refugees from the Yoruba civil wars.


 
Wikipedia: Abeokuta
Location of Abeokuta in Nigeria
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Location of Abeokuta in Nigeria
Abeokuta as seen from Olumo Rock
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Abeokuta as seen from Olumo Rock

Abeokuta is a city in Ogun State in southwest Nigeria and is situated at 7°9′39″N, 3°20′54″ECoordinates: 7°9′39″N, 3°20′54″E, on the Ogun River; 64 miles north of Lagos by railway, or 81 miles by water. As of 2002, the Abeokuta proper had an estimated population of about 230,000, while the figure for the city and outlying environs was approximately 500,000 individuals.

Geography and agriculture

Abeokuta lies in fertile country, the surface of which is broken by masses of grey granite. It is spread over an extensive area, being surrounded by mud walls 18 miles in extent. Palm-oil, timber, rubber, yams and shea-butter are the chief articles of trade. It lies below the Olumo Rock, home to several caves and shrines.

History

Abeokuta (a word meaning under the rocks), dating from 1825, owes its origin to the inroads of the slavehunters from Dahomey and Ibadan, which compelled the village populations scattered over the open country to take refuge in among the rocks surrounding the city. Here they constituted themselves a free confederacy of many distinct groups, each preserving the traditional customs, religious rites and even the very names of their original villages.

Notable natives

The city is the birthplace of several famous Nigerians, including:

References

Wikisource has an original article from the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica about:

 
 

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Copyrights:

Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2007. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.  Read more
Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. © 2006 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. All rights reserved.  Read more
Columbia Encyclopedia. The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition Copyright © 2003, Columbia University Press. Licensed from Columbia University Press. All rights reserved. www.cc.columbia.edu/cu/cup/  Read more
Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Abeokuta" Read more

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