MEANING AND RELEVANCE IN NIGERIAN TRADITIONAL ARCHITECTURE: THE DIALECTICS OF GROWTH AND CHANGE

Aside from the brief descriptions of some traditional dwelling types and settlements gleaned from the notes of early Europeans explorers and missionaries, few and scattered efforts exist to provide information on the African Traditional Architecture. The early assumption that the Africans lived in unstructured, isolated bush communities with little appreciation of the aesthetics in town design may have restricted enquiry into indigenous African Architecture. This lack in information would appear compounded as architectural history and the theory of Architecture have traditionally emphasized the study of monuments. The monumental work in Sir Bannister Fletcher's History of Architecture left out the rest of Africa after elaborating on the Architecture of Egypt which featured the pyramids and the temple