Editing Dahomey (section)

==Name==
The Kingdom of Dahomey was referred to by many different names and has been written in a variety of ways, including ''Danxome'', ''Danhome'', and ''Fon''. The name ''Fon'' relates to the dominant ethnic and language group, the [[Fon people]], of the royal families of the kingdom and is how the kingdom first became known to Europeans.  The names ''Dahomey'', ''Danxome'', and ''Danhome'' share an origin story, which historian Edna Bay says may be a [[false etymology]].<ref name=Bay-1998>{{cite book|last=Bay|first=Edna|title=Wives of the Leopard: Gender, Politics, and Culture in the Kingdom of Dahomey|year=1998|publisher=University of Virginia Press}}</ref>

The story goes that [[Dakodonu]], considered the second king in modern kings lists, was granted permission by the Gedevi chiefs, the local rulers, to settle in the Abomey Plateau.  Dakodonu requested additional land from a prominent chief named Dan (or Da) to which the chief responded sarcastically, "Should I open up my belly and build you a house in it?" For this insult, Dakodonu killed Dan and began the construction of his palace on the spot. The name of the kingdom was derived from the incident: ''Dan'' meaning "chief", ''xo'' meaning "belly", and ''me'' meaning "inside of", in the [[Fon language]].<ref name=Monroe>{{cite journal|last=Monroe|first=J. Cameron|title=In the Belly of Dan: Space, History, and Power in Precolonial Dahomey|journal=Current Anthropology|year=2011|volume=52|issue=6|pages=769–798|doi=10.1086/662678|s2cid=142318205}}</ref>