Brief History

The Department of History was established in 1962, the same year ABU was founded. Hence, it is one of the pioneering academic departments in the University. The Late Professor Henry Fredrick Charles Smith (later Abdullahi Smith), who joined the services of the University from the University of Ibadan in 1962, was the founding Head of Department. Initially, a combined honours degree programme in which students were required to take three subjects throughout their three-year study programme was offered. This was expanded to single and combined honours degree programme in 1966. The combined honours could then be with any of the disciplines in the Faculty of Arts (later, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences). In the early 1970s, however the combined honours degree was restricted to History/Government (later, History/Political Science) alone. In 1978, the Archaeology Unit was established as a sub-division within the Department offering single and combined honours degrees in Archaeology and History/Archaeology respectively. From 1962 to date, the number and range of courses offered by the Department, expanded from 8 in 1962-1964 to 36 in 1989/190 for History courses alone, covering all parts of the World and from the earliest times to date. Currently the Department has over 80 History courses out of which 43 are being taught. The Archaeology programme began in 1978 with 19 courses and since 1989/90 this programme has expanded to 32 courses out of which 28 are currently being taught. A separate Archaeology Department was created on Friday 22nd June, 2006.

Academic Programmes

Staff List