Kumasi is the cultural heart of Ghana and the capital of one of the most fascinating and powerful kingdoms in African history: the Ashanti kingdom. Here, among green hills in the centre of the country, the Asantehene ruled for centuries. His symbolic throne, the Golden Stool, which according to tradition holds the soul of the Ashanti nation, has never been sat on by a human being and never fell into the hands of the British colonisers. Kumasi is still the seat of the king and the centre of a living, proud culture.
It is also a city of trade and craftsmanship in its purest form. Its Kejetia market, a sea of tens of thousands of stalls, is one of the largest in West Africa; in the neighbouring villages people weave kente, the continent's most famous royal cloth with its colourful stripes, stamp adinkra with its proverb-laden symbols, and carve stools and masks. Kumasi is the best place to immerse yourself in Akan traditions, gold craftsmanship, drumming and royal ceremonies.
This guide takes a practical look at Kumasi: what to see between Manhyia Palace, the big markets and the museums, how to visit the craft villages and sacred Lake Bosumtwi, how to get around, where to stay and eat, and how to make the most of the royal ceremonies if your trip coincides with one. Less touristy than the coast but incredibly rich in culture, Kumasi is an essential stop for understanding the soul of Ghana.
Kumasi was founded in the late 17th century as the capital of the Ashanti (Asante) kingdom, created by Osei Tutu and his spiritual adviser Okomfo Anokye, who, according to tradition, called down from the sky the Golden Stool that united the Akan peoples under a single king, the Asantehene. From Kumasi, the Ashanti built a gold-rich empire that dominated the interior and held off the British advance for almost a century in the Anglo-Ashanti wars, until King Prempeh I was deported and the kingdom annexed in 1901-1902, after the famous uprising led by the queen mother Yaa Asantewaa. Today Kumasi is a modern city that remains the cultural capital of the Ashanti and the seat of the king. Its story is told on our history page.
Read the full history ↓The heart of the Ashanti Empire: Kumasi and its Golden Stool, the kente looms of Bonwire and the sacred lake of Bosumtwi, born from a meteorite.
Read the history of Ashanti Region: the kingdom of kente →They depart from Magné, 126 km away. If you book from this link we earn a commission and you pay no more.
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Origins, formation and what the sources say.
Kumasi was born in the late 17th century as the capital of a new state destined to become one of the most powerful in African history: the Ashanti (Asante) kingdom. The Ashanti were an Akan people who lived in small clans and chiefdoms in the forests of what is now central Ghana, at the time subject to the neighbouring kingdom of Denkyira. In the late 17th century, a leader named Osei Tutu united these Akan clans into a confederation under his command, with its capital at Kumasi, and became the first Asantehene, the king of all the Ashanti.
The kingdom's founding act is wrapped in a powerful tradition. According to the Ashanti account, Osei Tutu's spiritual adviser, the priest Okomfo Anokye, brought down from the sky, amid thunder, a golden stool — the Golden Stool or 'Sika Dwa Kofi' — which came to rest on the king's knees. That stool, it is said, holds the soul (sunsum) of the whole Ashanti nation: as long as it exists, the Ashanti people exist. The Golden Stool is not for sitting on: it is the kingdom's supreme sacred symbol, and no king has ever sat on it.
Under Osei Tutu and his successors, the Ashanti defeated Denkyira (around 1701) and other rivals, and from Kumasi they built an expanding empire. The city was organised around the royal palace, and the kingdom developed a sophisticated system of government, with the Asantehene, the chiefs (amanhene), the queen mother (Asantehemaa) and a complex web of symbols, laws and ceremonies that bound the different Akan peoples under the authority of Kumasi and the Golden Stool.
During the 18th century, the Ashanti kingdom became one of the great powers of West Africa. From Kumasi, the Asantehenes extended their rule over a vast territory covering much of present-day Ghana and neighbouring areas, subduing many peoples and states. The basis of their power was gold: the Ashanti region was extremely rich in the metal, and the kingdom controlled its mining and trade, which flowed both north, along the trans-Saharan routes, and south to the coast, towards the Europeans.
Gold was not just economic wealth but the foundation of Ashanti prestige and art. The Kumasi court dazzled with regalia of solid gold, jewellery, ceremonial swords, staffs and gold weights (used to weigh the gold dust that served as currency), true masterpieces of Akan goldsmithing. The kingdom also developed kente, the striped, colourful cloth woven in strips and originally reserved for royalty, and adinkra, symbols loaded with proverbs. Kumasi was the centre of this splendid material culture.
Ashanti trade, like that of the whole region, became intertwined with the Atlantic slave trade: the kingdom sold gold, ivory and also captives — often prisoners from its wars of expansion — to the Europeans on the coast, and in return obtained firearms, which strengthened its military might. This trade, and control of the routes to the coast, were a source of wealth but also of growing friction with the Europeans, and especially with the British, who increasingly dominated the coastline.
The clash between the Ashanti kingdom and the British Empire shaped the entire 19th century. As Britain tightened its grip on the coast (the future Gold Coast colony), it came up against the inland power, which wanted to keep its access to the sea and its independence. The result was the Anglo-Ashanti wars, a series of conflicts spread across the century. The Ashanti, fearsome and well-organised warriors, inflicted some humiliating defeats on the British, but British technological and military superiority gradually prevailed.
In 1874, during one of these wars, British troops reached Kumasi, looted the city and the royal palace and burned much of the capital, a crushing blow for the kingdom. British pressure did not let up. In 1896, the British occupied Kumasi again and, to behead the resistance, arrested and deported the Asantehene Prempeh I along with other members of the royal family, first to the coast and then to the distant Seychelles, where he would remain for almost three decades. The kingdom was left without its head, but not entirely defeated.
The most famous episode of the resistance came in 1900. The British governor Frederick Hodgson publicly demanded that the Golden Stool be handed over so he could sit on it, an unbearable insult to the Ashanti, since the stool is the sacred soul of the nation. As the chiefs hesitated, it was a woman, the queen mother Yaa Asantewaa, who led the uprising: she rallied the Ashanti for war — the 'War of the Golden Stool' — and laid siege to the British in the Kumasi fort. The revolt was eventually crushed and Yaa Asantewaa was also deported to the Seychelles, but the Ashanti achieved their symbolic goal: the Golden Stool never fell into British hands and was never desecrated.
After crushing the 1900 revolt, Britain formally annexed the Ashanti kingdom and in 1902 made it part of its Gold Coast possessions, ending centuries of independence. Kumasi came under colonial administration. However, the strength of Ashanti identity led the British, years later, to a more conciliatory policy: in 1924 they allowed the elderly Asantehene Prempeh I to return from his long exile in the Seychelles, first as a local chief and then, in 1926, restored to the throne. In 1935 the Ashanti confederation was officially restored, giving the monarchy back much of its traditional role under the colonial umbrella.
Throughout the 20th century, Kumasi grew into a major commercial and transport hub for inland Ghana, driven by the cocoa boom — the Ashanti region was a leading producer — as well as the railway and roads. The city modernised and its population swelled, while always keeping its role as the cultural and spiritual capital of the Ashanti people and seat of the Asantehene. When Ghana gained independence in 1957, the Ashanti region and Kumasi were a political player of the first rank, with their own tensions with Nkrumah's central government.
The Ashanti monarchy survived colonisation and independence and is still alive today: the Asantehene remains a figure of enormous cultural, moral and social weight in Ghana, and the Golden Stool endures as the sacred symbol of the nation. Kumasi celebrates its history at the Manhyia Palace, at the fort where Yaa Asantewaa held out, and in royal ceremonies that remain intact.
Today Kumasi is Ghana's second city, a metropolis of more than two million people that combines its role as the Ashanti cultural capital with that of a major commercial, industrial and university centre in the heart of the country. Known as the 'Garden City' for its greenery, it is a vital hub for northern Ghana and neighbouring countries, and its economy revolves around trade — led by the colossal Kejetia market — crafts, gold, timber and cocoa from the surrounding region.
The city proudly holds on to its identity. The Asantehene still lives at the Manhyia Palace and presides over traditional ceremonies such as Akwasidae, held every six weeks, when the court displays all the splendour of its gold regalia, kente and drums. The villages around the city — Bonwire and its kente, Ntonso and its adinkra, Ahwiaa and its woodcarving — keep alive the crafts that made Ashanti culture famous, and which today draw travellers and buyers from all over the world.
For visitors, Kumasi is the gateway to the traditional soul of Ghana: less geared to tourism than the castle coast, but incredibly rich in living history, art and ceremony. From the Golden Stool brought down from the sky to the weavers' workshops, from the wars against the British Empire to the bustle of Kejetia, the city sums up the extraordinary story of an African kingdom that resisted, survived and still beats at the heart of the nation.
