- Type
- Fortress
- Built
- 1784 · 18th century
- Location
- Volta, Ghana
- Heritage
- part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site (an old town or a valley, for example)
- Coordinates
- 5.9107°, 0.9919°
History
The Danes, who had traded on the Gold Coast since the 17th century, built the fort in 1784 after a war with the Anlo Ewe, to secure their influence at the eastern end of the coast. It was named Prinzenstein in honour of the Danish crown prince. Earlier, in the 1730s, the Dutch had briefly kept a trading post called Singelenburgh at Keta. The fort served the slave trade: captives were held in its dungeons before being shipped to the Americas. In 1850 Denmark sold its Gold Coast possessions to Britain, and the British turned the fort into a prison. Since 1979 it has been part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site Forts and Castles of Ghana.
What to see
What survives are the landward walls with the gate, parts of the bastions and the rooms where slaves were held; the seaward buildings were destroyed in the 1980s by coastal erosion, which also swallowed much of old Keta. The ruins stand on a sandy shore between the ocean and the Keta Lagoon, surrounded by beaches and Ewe fishing villages.
Wikipedia article Wikidata Q1438675
Popularity: articles about this site in 15 Wikimedia projects (Wikipedia language editions and others).