Ijaw

The Ijaw or Ijo languages are a cluster of nine closely related tongues of the Niger Delta, split between Eastern and Western Ijo, with Izon the largest; the varieties are not mutually intelligible.

Their word order and lack of noun classes are unusual for Niger-Congo, leading Joseph Greenberg to treat them as an early branch and some linguists to class Ijoid as an independent family. By the fifteenth century the Ijaw were tied into delta sea routes, and eastern clans such as Bonny, Okrika and Kalabari grew into kingdoms.

Before 1699 Kalabari had become a center of the Atlantic slave trade, exchanging captives from the Igbo interior for European hardware, guns and gunpowder. Under Amachree I, who died around 1800, its trading houses expanded in rivalry with neighboring delta states.