Ajan

The Ajan, commonly written Aja or Adja, are a Gbe-speaking people of the Kwa branch, native to south-western Benin and south-eastern Togo, around Tado, Allada and Ouidah, regarded by the Ewe and Fon as their mother tribe, their rites among the roots of West African vodun. Ancestors came from the Niger-Benue confluence before the 1000s and built walled Tado on the Mono River, which between the 1400s and 1600s led a loose confederacy under kings titled Anyigbãfio.

Around 1600 three princely brothers divided Aja lands: Kokpon kept Great Ardra, or Allada, Do-Aklin founded Abomey, whose settlers blended with the Gedevi to become the Fon of Dahomey, and Te-Agbanlin set up Little Ardra, the future Porto-Novo.

In 1724 Dahomey overran Allada and sold some eight thousand Aja captives across the Atlantic, among them forebears of Toussaint Louverture.