‘The facts stated do not seem to be true’: The Contested Process of Repatriation in British Colonial Nigeria

This article will examine requests for repatriation submitted by Nigerian subjects in the last decade of colonial rule in Nigeria. Requests for repatriation from this time provide insights into the motives, outcomes and impact of a growing trend among Nigerians to travel abroad for work, studies, pilgrimages and adventure. This mobility reflected both easier access to the means to travel and the empowerment of Nigerians to realise their economic, social and cultural aspirations beyond the borders of Nigeria. Once abroad, many became destitute and unable to pay for their return back home, and requests for their repatriation were then made to the colonial administration in Nigeria. A review of the files regarding the process of repatriation exposes divergent perceptions between colonisers and colonised of the rights and obligations structuring the colonial relationship. It will be seen that a very limited range of options was available to the British administration in Nigeria in dealing with those who defied, ignored or reinterpreted rules aimed at monitoring and regulating the identities and movement of Africans. Thus, the history of repatriations reveals both the impotence of the colonial regime in imposing limits on the mobility of its African subjects, and the various ways in which Africans imposed their own notions of flexibility and ambiguity in response to colonial policies.     

Guerilla art,social value and absent heritage fabric

There is extensive commentary on the role of unauthorised art, but little on the coincidence of heritage value and guerilla art. This paper analyses the relationship of the two in a 2007 statue which is a monument to a lost place for which there is no surviving historic fabric. The statue functions not just as a place of memory, but of guerilla art; a complex interplay has emerged between an official piece of government art and unsanctioned community performance. Growing heritage emphasis on social value over the previous dominance of original fabric suggests that the delight with which the statue has been greeted illuminates evolving heritage philosophy, monument language and the emergence of the importance of the heritage community especially for its potential performance value at a site. The dramatic contribution that the statue has made to the city has an impact on the fields of landscaping, planning, history and heritage.     

Changes in the size and shape of fallow deer—evidence for the movement and management of a species

The European fallow deer (Dama dama dama) is native to the eastern Mediterranean and whilst it is clear that its dispersion from this region was the result of human transportation, the timing and circumstances of its post‐glacial diffusion are still uncertain. Archaeological fallow deer remains offer perhaps the best opportunity to understand the deep history of the species, with measurements of ancient bones providing important information about an individual's sex and size. Unfortunately, the fragmentary nature of archaeological remains means that metrical samples are usually too small to draw any meaningful conclusions. Biometrical scaling techniques can increase the size of the sample available for comparison and in this paper log ratios are used in combination with traditional metrical analysis to provide new information about archaeological fallow deer populations, in particular highlighting the size variations across time and space and shifts in hunting and management practices. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.