The Digital Heritage
Vodun heritage • Benin • memory archives
Ouidah at a glance
- Where: a commune of the Atlantique department, on the coast of south-west Benin, about thirty kilometres from Cotonou. It covers 364 km², between the Atlantic Ocean to the south, Abomey-Calavi to the east, Grand-Popo to the west, and Kpomassè and Tori-Bossito to the north.
- How many people: 162,034 at the 2013 census, in ten arrondissements. The four arrondissements of the town (Ouidah I to IV) have 47,616; Pahou, the most populous, 78,474.
- The name: “Ouidah” is a distortion of “Xwéda”, the name the Fon of Abomey gave the territory's first inhabitants. King Agadja conquered the Xwéda kingdom of Savi and made Ouidah his seaboard in 1727.
- Memory: the Slave Route, a walk of about 3 km, runs from the Auction Square to the Door of No Return on the beach.
Go further: the Slave Route, the Door of No Return, the Python Temple, the sacred forest of Kpassè, the Daagbo Hounon.
Sources: Government of Benin, Destination Bénin: Ouidah (10 December 2020) ; INSAE, RGPH-4 village booklet, Atlantique (2016)
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Ouidah Origins is an independent digital initiative dedicated to documenting heritage. This project is not affiliated with any official governmental or religious body.