Even the casual reader of African history is struck by the fact that significant shifts in focus and approach have occurred during the past decade. As is presently the common trend in African historiography, contemporary writers focus more upon the role of Africans-their institutions, their attitudes, and their internal forces--than upon the activities of Europeans in Africa. This has become possible because the African past has been more adequately researched and because well-trained African scholars are now writing. The new men of African historiography are devoted to the task of unveiling the past of their own people and are equipped by training and by cultural continuity with their ancestors to use the special tools necessary to reconstruct the past.

One important group of African historians who have emerged as prominent writers and lecturers clusters around the new universities. At Ibadan University Dr. Kenneth Onwuka Dike, formerly Vice Chancellor of the University; Dr. Joseph C. Anene; and Dr. E. A. Ayendele have all made important contributions to Nigeria's histpry. Dr. Jacob Festus Ade Ajayi, professor of history at Ibadan University, is a figure in this group whose work deserves special attention for a variety of reasons.

Not least among such reasons is that he has followed his passion for historical inquiry with energy and thoroughness. By both his vigorous leadership among historians of his university and within the Historical Society of Nigeria and by his publication of the results of his historical research, he has made substantial contributions to the remarkable growth of our knowledge of Nigeria's past.