the rise and fall of President Kwame Nhrumah, and the decline of
the Ghanian economy and political institutions. Throughout this
time, Azzu Mate Kole became a symbol of traditional authority not
only for the Krobo but for all Ghanians. At his Golden Jubilee on
the stool the whole of Ghana celebrated the history of the Krobo.
In his speech, recorded in the newspaper West Africa, he stated:
"We are young eagles. Look up at the rising sun of the twenty-first
century civilization and flap, again flap your wings and soar high
beyond the dark clouds of suspicion, mistrust and envy, and
emerge at the grand dawn where a haven awaits you" (May 21-27,
p. 835).

A comprehensive history of Ghana (formerly the Gold Coast)
has yet to be written. To date, we have only a series of case
histories, primarily of Akan states. But Ghana's history is more than
a collection of stories of Akan chiefdoms or of separate states.
These states, both large and small, engaged in dynamic interaction:
their institutions were constantly changing, their people moving
about, the people's ideas developing and evolving. This book
attempts to present a broad analytical framework for the history of
southeastern Ghana through a representative study of the Krobo,
still one of the region's most important political and economic
forces.

The modern state of Ghana comprises several language
groups, including Akan, Ga, Adangme (Adangbe), Dagomba, Gonja,
Mamprusi, and Ewe. The slightly more than 150,000 Krobo are the
most numerous of the Adangme-speaking peoples and form the
fourth largest ethnic group in Ghana. ¹ Since the middle of the
nineteenth century they have been also economically and
politically the most important group, because of their dominant
role in commercial crop production for export. How their rise to
prominence came about and how it illustrates local responses to
wider forces for change in West Africa form the focus of this study.

Traditionally, historians of West Africa have concentrated on
the study of large political entities. The power and far-ranging
influence of such states in part account for the attention they
attract. So does the availability of considerable written
documentation, especially for those states with access to the coast,

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