Olu Erejuwa I

Erejuwa I was the fifteenth Olu of Warri in the traditional dynastic sequence and ruled the Itsekiri kingdom of Warri in the late 18th century. The modern palace chronology assigns him a reign of 1760–1795, but surviving European accounts establish only that the ruler identified by historians as Erejuwa was on the throne during the 1780s and 1790s. Contemporary and near-contemporary sources call him Sebastian Otobia and King Otoo, while recent scholarship also gives his Christian name as Sebastião Manuel Octobia.

Erejuwa's reign is principally documented through its connections with Atlantic commerce. He developed a partnership with the French slave trader Jean-François Landolphe, sent his nephew Marc Boudakan to Saint-Domingue and France, and in 1786 authorised a fortified French trading station in the lower Benin River area. His reign also coincided with an important movement of Itsekiri settlement from Ode-Itsekiri towards the Benin River, where commercial and political houses that became prominent in the 19th century were established. Recent scholarship nevertheless identifies Erejuwa by the combined Christian name Sebastião Manuel Octobia.

On Landolphe's return in 1786, he and Erejuwa formalised a commercial partnership. Landolphe presented the Olu with a staff that was to signify the king's requests, while Erejuwa granted land for a trading station. A European-style house was surrounded by eight houses built in the Warri manner, and the settlement was fortified with 32 cannon under a French flag. The purpose of the venture was the export of enslaved people; Liao and her co-authors describe the arrangement as a mutually beneficial commercial partnership.

The station operated for six years and faced attacks from British commercial rivals. An earlier assault supported by a neighbouring ruler was defeated by Warri forces, but in 1792 British merchants attacked again and burned the French establishment. When Landolphe later returned to the Niger Delta, royal canoes still carried French flags. Liao and her co-authors interpret them as a sign of the former enterprise and possibly of hopes for renewed commercial gains. Lloyd located Landolphe's establishment at Bobi and identified Ologbotsere Eyinmisaren as the senior chief who settled him there.

Settlement towards the Benin River

Itsekiri traditions collected by Moore place a substantial movement away from Ode-Itsekiri towards the Benin River during Erejuwa's reign. People from the royal capital established new settlements along the river's banks and creeks. Moore associates settlements including Bobi and Olobe with ikpi, the manufacture of salt in the river creeks, and says that Ologbotsere Eyinmisaren established Bobi while the Oshodi established Olobe. This formed part of a longer movement towards the lower river, where traditions recorded by Lloyd place the founding of some villages during Atogbuwa's reign.

Lloyd agreed that settlement of the lower Benin River accelerated under Erejuwa but did not reduce it to the salt industry alone. He connected the movement both to the desire to remain close to European ships, which increasingly anchored in the Benin River rather than sailing to Ode-Itsekiri, and to the departure of powerful chiefs after conflicts at court. Eyinmisaren's settlement at Bobi helped establish the House of the Ologbotsere on the river's north bank, one of the trading and political houses that later became influential during the 19th century.

Family and succession

Moore's account names numerous children of Erejuwa, including Eyolusan, Uwala and Udorolusan, better known as Iye. According to the tradition he recorded, Eyolusan's mother Idumigen had first been a wife of Atogbuwa and became Erejuwa's wife after Atogbuwa's death. Eyolusan spent much of his early life at Eghoroke and Bobi and succeeded Erejuwa under the regnal name Akengbuwa.

Another wife, Emaye, was the daughter of an Ijo woman married to Iyatsere Egharegbemi. She bore Erejuwa two daughters, Uwala and Idolorusan, and subsequently became a wife of Akengbuwa, to whom she bore Omateye, Ejo and another daughter. The close relationship among these children formed the basis of the House of Emaye, which became a major royal and commercial faction in the 19th century.

The palace chronology dates Akengbuwa's accession to 1795. Documentary evidence does not fix the year so precisely: Ryder considered it possible that Erejuwa was still ruling when Landolphe made his final visit in 1799, while the Portuguese correspondence establishes that Akengbuwa had succeeded by 1807.