Starting from the observation in Gabonese rituals of the recurrent image of the White Man, this article focuses on accounts of the first encounters between the explorer Paul du Chaillu and the people of the Gabonese hinterland in the mid-xixth century. These narratives of first contact reveal a primal scene or originary matrix out of which the White Man emerged as an enchanted being. Du Chaillu was greeted as a kind of spirit of commodities, and he deliberately encouraged such a perception. The article shows how this working misunderstanding stemmed from the structure and history of trade between Europeans and Africans and from the material culture and ideology of colonial exploration.
