Elmina Castle (1482): Portugal's First Fort in West Africa

Elmina Castle, built by the Portuguese from January 1482 on the coast of present-day Ghana, was the first European fortress in sub-Saharan Africa. Named São Jorge da Mina, it secured Portugal’s control of the rich gold trade of the Gold Coast and later became one of the most notorious centres of the Atlantic slave trade.

Background: Portugal and the gold of Mina

Gold from West Africa had reached Europe for centuries across the Sahara, through Muslim merchants of North Africa. In the 15th century Portuguese navigators, encouraged by Prince Henry and later by the Crown, sailed down the African coast partly in the hope of reaching the sources of that gold directly.

In 1469 King Afonso V granted the Lisbon merchant Fernão Gomes a monopoly on trade along the Guinea coast in return for exploring further south. In 1471 ships financed by Gomes, under João de Santarém and Pêro Escobar, reached the coast of what is now Ghana. There they found Akan traders willing to exchange large quantities of gold. The Portuguese called the region “A Mina”, the mine, and Europeans later named it the Gold Coast.

Other Europeans soon tried to share in the trade. During the War of the Castilian Succession (1475-1479), Castilian ships sailed to Mina. The Treaty of Alcáçovas of 1479 recognised Portugal’s rights over the Guinea coast, but Portugal wanted a permanent base to enforce them.

The expedition of Diogo de Azambuja

King João II, who came to the throne in 1481, made the fortification of Mina a priority. In December 1481 he sent an expedition under the experienced commander Diogo de Azambuja, with around ten caravels and two larger supply ships. Contemporary accounts give a force of roughly 600 men, including soldiers, masons and carpenters.

The fleet carried prepared building materials from Portugal, including cut stone, timber, tiles and lime, so that the fort could be raised quickly. Later tradition held that Bartolomeu Dias commanded one of the ships, but this is not certain.

Meeting Caramansa

The expedition reached the coast near the village of Edina in January 1482. Portuguese chroniclers describe a formal meeting on 20 January between Azambuja and the local ruler they called Caramansa, often identified with a chief of the Akan, who came with musicians and attendants.

According to the Portuguese account by Rui de Pina, Caramansa was reluctant to allow a permanent building, preferring the traders to come and go as before. After negotiations and gifts he agreed, but work soon caused friction: when the builders began quarrying a rock the local people regarded as sacred, fighting broke out and had to be calmed with more presents.

Despite this, the Portuguese raised the first defensible walls and tower within about three weeks. Most of the expedition then sailed home, leaving Azambuja with a garrison of about 60 men.

Life at the fortress

São Jorge da Mina was a royal establishment run by a captain appointed by the king, usually for a term of a few years. Below him were a factor who managed the trade goods and gold, clerks who kept the accounts, a chaplain, soldiers and craftsmen. Life for the Portuguese garrison was hard: tropical diseases such as malaria killed many of the men sent from Europe, and replacements had to be sent regularly.

The fort depended on good relations with the people of the neighbouring town and with the states of the interior. The townspeople supplied food, water, canoemen and labour, and acted as brokers between the Portuguese and inland merchants. The Portuguese paid rents and gifts to local rulers and tried to keep the trade routes to the coast open. When relations broke down, the garrison could be cut off from supplies.

Portugal also tried to keep other Europeans away. Foreign ships found trading on the coast could be seized, and the Portuguese built further posts at Axim and Shama in the early 16th century. Despite this, French, English and later Dutch traders increasingly visited the Gold Coast during the 16th century, eroding the monopoly.

The gold trade

São Jorge da Mina became the centre of Portugal’s West African commerce. Akan merchants brought gold dust from the interior and exchanged it for cloth, brass and copper goods such as bracelets (manillas), beads, horses’ trappings and wine. The trade was a royal monopoly controlled from Lisbon.

Modern estimates suggest that in the early 16th century the Mina trade brought Portugal several hundred kilograms of gold a year, enough to make a significant contribution to the Crown’s income. In 1486 João II granted the settlement the status of a city.

The Portuguese also took part in the African trade in enslaved people at Mina from early on. They bought captives at Benin and other places along the coast and sold them to Akan merchants, who needed labour for gold mining and farming. In this period the castle was not yet a major point of export of enslaved Africans across the Atlantic.

Later history and the slave trade

Portugal held Elmina for more than 150 years. In 1637 forces of the Dutch West India Company captured it, an event described in the article on the Dutch capture of Elmina. The Dutch made it their headquarters on the Gold Coast and greatly enlarged it.

Under Dutch rule Elmina became a major hub of the Atlantic slave trade. Captives were held in dungeons beneath the castle before being forced through the gate later known as the “door of no return” onto ships bound for the Americas, as part of the wider triangular trade. Other forts along the coast, such as Cape Coast Castle, served the same purpose for other European powers.

The Netherlands abolished its slave trade in 1814, and in 1872 Britain took over Elmina along with the rest of the Dutch Gold Coast. Ghana became independent in 1957.

Legacy and remembrance

Elmina Castle is now a museum. In 1979 it was inscribed by UNESCO, together with other forts and castles of the Ghanaian coast, as a World Heritage Site. It is visited by tourists and especially by members of the African diaspora, for whom it is a place of mourning and remembrance.

Very little of the 1482 building survives in its original form. The castle visible today is the result of centuries of rebuilding, particularly by the Dutch, but it still stands on the site chosen by Azambuja.

The town of Elmina also survives as a living community. Its fishing harbour, old merchant houses and traditional companies (asafo) reflect more than five centuries of contact between the Akan peoples of the coast and the Europeans who came to trade, rule and enslave.

Timeline

• 1469: Fernão Gomes receives a monopoly of Guinea trade.
• 1471: Portuguese ships reach the Gold Coast.
• 1479: The Treaty of Alcáçovas recognises Portuguese rights in Guinea.
• December 1481: Diogo de Azambuja’s expedition sails from Lisbon.
• January 1482: Azambuja meets Caramansa; building of São Jorge da Mina begins.
• 1486: Elmina receives city status from João II.
• 1637: The Dutch capture Elmina Castle.
• 1872: Britain takes over the Dutch Gold Coast, including Elmina.
• 1979: The castle becomes part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Why it matters

Elmina marked the start of permanent European fortified settlement on the coasts of sub-Saharan Africa. It redirected West African gold from the Sahara routes to the Atlantic and, under later owners, became a symbol of the Atlantic slave trade and its human cost.