Asante

The Ashanti.... (also Asante) are a major ethnic group from Africa who speak a dialect of Akan. Prior to European colonization, the Ashanti Confederacy/Kingdom was a major state, particularly during the period from 1570 to 1900. Ashanti wealth was based on the region's substantial deposits of gold. These luscious gold deposits led to many people who started metal-working. From these gold deposits came a golden stool. The stool was sacred, so that no one could sit, touch, or even get within a few of it: the Stool was a religious item. An attempt by British Gold Coast governor Frederick Hodgson in 1900 to take the Golden Stool led to an uprising by the Ashanti. There were eleven major wars in this conflict. The Ashanti won ALL of them, except the last. In these wars, Ashanti generals stopped the inland encroachment of the British. It took the British nearly a century of fighting with the Ashanti before they gained total control of the region. The territory occupied by the Kingdom of Ashanti is now part of what is now known as Ghana...