Documentary unpacks looting of Benin’s treasures

In her award-winning documentary Dahomey, director Mati Diop imagines the voice of royal treasures looted from West Africa by European colonisers and only recently sent back to their homeland in present-day Benin. She tells RFI she hopes it will prompt reflection on displacement, exile and return – not just of objects, but of people. Dahomey, released in France last week, tells the story of 26 artefacts stolen by 19th-century French troops from the former African kingdom of the same name. It includes a throne and sculptures representing the dynasty's warrior kings. In 2021, the collection was returned from the Quai Branly museum in Paris to Cotonou in Benin. ‘From the moment they were removed from the display cases in Paris to being packed in crates, right up to arriving in Cotonou, I absolutely wanted to follow everything,’ she said. She describes the journey as a shared experience and ‘an odyssey’.

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