Kaduna State

Kaduna State contains some of the oldest evidence of complex society in West Africa: the Nok culture, known for its terracotta sculptures and early iron-working, takes its name from the village of Nok in Jaba Local Government Area, where the first figures were found in the 1940s. In the later medieval period the northern part of the state was home to the Hausa kingdom of Zazzau (Zaria), associated in tradition with the warrior queen Amina, which became an emirate of the Sokoto Caliphate after the jihad of the early nineteenth century. Southern Kaduna is home to many distinct peoples with their own chiefdoms.

Kaduna city was founded by the British colonial administration under Frederick Lugard and became the capital of the Northern Provinces in 1917, and later of the Northern Region. Lugard Hall housed the regional legislature, and the city became the political base of Premier Ahmadu Bello. The region's leading institutions, including Ahmadu Bello University in Zaria (founded 1962), helped earn the state its reputation as a centre of learning.

When Nigeria's regions were replaced by 12 states in May 1967, the area became North-Central State, with Kaduna as capital; it was renamed Kaduna State in 1976. On 23 September 1987 the northern emirates of Katsina and Daura were split off to form Katsina State. Kaduna remains a major administrative, military, educational and industrial centre, though its recent history has also been marked by ethno-religious tensions and, in rural areas, insecurity.