The Economic Foundation of Nupe Kingdom to 1800 A.D: A Survey of the Facilitating Factors.

Abstract

The importance of a virile and viable economic system in the evolution and sustenance of states, whether modern or ancient, cannot be overemphasized. It can be argued that the political ideological superstructure of a society has its origin in the character and development of that society’s economic base. The economic processes in conjunction with environmental, political and cultural processes work together to make ‘society and history’. The economic system and activities of the Nupe of old and the emergence of a formidable Nupe Kingdom in the past, can be said to have hinged on a number of facilitating factors. This paper attempts to examine such factors, which include, geographical location, natural endowments favourable for agriculture, industrial trade and commercial activities and practices as basic for the transformation of the hitherto independent polities, into a united centralized polity called Nupe Kingdom.