Fondé en 1958 par un groupe d'universitaires bordelais, le Centre d'étude d'Afrique noire fonctionne dans le cadre de l'Institut d'études politiques de Bordeaux. II est associé depuis 1968 à la Fondation nationale des Sciences politiques et bénéficie depuis 1967 du statut d'équipe de recherche associée au Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS - ERA 70 devenue UA 977). Outre l'équipe de recherche ainsi constituée, le CEAN comprend une unité d'enseignement et un centre de documentation.

Le Centre d'étude d'Afrique noire organise des études de troisième cycle aboutissant à un doctorat “ETUDES AFRICAINES” dont le Diplôme d'études approfondies (DEA) constitue la première année de scolarité. L'enseignement pluridisciplinaire est organisé autour de quatre enseignements principaux: science politique, économie, droit et administration publique, relations internationales.

As the pace of change accelerates in Southern Africa researchers find themselves increasingly dependent upon press sources. Media items are an essential primary source material both for research projects and for carrying out the necessary groundwork for preparing development projects. The volume and complexity of the source material makes the organisation and retrieval of usable information increasingly difficult. One answer to this problem is to store all the media material on computer and then let the computer manipulate, collate and retrieve the information ready for interpretation.

Given the complex interrelationships within the Southern African region, events in one country can have an immediate impact on others. A retrieval system is able to rapidly extract the linkage implications within the region. It is also possible to input the key international dimensions.

As the history of the former Benin Empire is well known to the specialists, there is no need to elaborate on it in this paper. Although sporadic information about Benin was reaching Europe as early as the end of the 15th Century, real interest was aroused only in the wake of the British ‘Punitive Expedition’ to Benin City in 1897. Few had suspected the existence of such a highly developed African culture with a range and volume of works of art which were brought to Europe as booty by the returning army. Initial investigations in Benin left many questions unanswered, and it was the late J.U. Egharevba (1934) who collected and published the surviving oral traditions as a framework for understanding the past. However, despite several attempts to construct a chronology, exact dates for some events, especially before the arrival of the first Europeans, are still uncertain.