Keta Market in 1853 - EweGhana

Keta Market  in 1853 - EweGhana The Keta Market was not just a place for trading, it was an establishment that attracted people from towns ...

Keta Market  in 1853 - EweGhana

The Keta Market was not just a place for trading, it was an establishment that attracted people from towns allover. It was synonymous with the town , which would not exist without it.

The market is presumably as old as Keta itself and would have, as such, experienced all the changes of its host.

When the Bremen missionaries first arrived at Keta in 1853, they found just a few huts and a lone shop lining a single street – no mention was made of a market.

This is because previous houses and market would have been blown up and set ablaze by the cannons of Fort Prinzenstein during one of the last of the many ‘wars’ that the Danes waged with the Êʋês, then known as Agudzeawo (1844-1847) 

However, by the late 1940s and early 1950s, the market had redeveloped into a major regional distribution and trading hub.

All activities were dictated by and centred around the market day; when one could perform a wedding ceremony, find transportation to distant destinations, pay a visit to friends and relatives all depended on the days market was held.

Aside from the normal names for the days of the week, there were also unique names for the four- day market cycle: asiḍinki (day-after), domegbe (day-between), asimloegbe (day-before) and asigbe (market-day).

Traders from towns and villages like Anyako, Atiavi, Alakple, Seva and Tsiame brought farm produce and artisanal products (dried tobacco leaves, dried or smoked or fried lagoon fish, mats and baskets, local confections and delicacies) in exchange for imported and ‘luxurious’ European wax prints, sugar, Ovaltine and Horlicks beverages, Exeter corned beef and canned sardines, Maggi seasoning cubes, perfumed toilet soap.

Two types of specially processed lagoon fish that the area was famous for and which traders from afar came specifically to purchase were the salted-dried lagoon tilapia (akpatogui), a delicacy among connoisseurs and the dried fermented fish (lãƒiƒi) which was used in kitchens around the region in small amounts to add flavour to soups and stews, the local organic condiment that the imported artificial Maggi cube threatened to replace.