Religion was a key feature of Afro-European exchanges on the Slave Coast. A Catholic mission was sent to the kingdom of Allada in the late 1650s with the goal of converting the kingdom's elites and fostering trade relations (Law, 1991b, pp. 46-9). In an interconnected world, this mission also reflected disputes between Portugal and the Vatican over control of missionary work in Africa. These, in turn, cannot be fully understood without factoring in events taking place in Central Africa, where the kingdom of Kongo was at odds with the Jesuits and seeking to strengthen direct ties to the Vatican (Chouin, 2016, pp. 108-9; Valsecchi, 2013, p. 52). Against this backdrop, an Allada ambassador was baptised and a catechism was published in an Allada language - probably Aïzo (Law, 1991a; Parés, 2016, pp. 99, 100, 374-5, footnote 23).  
To a degree, Allada's diplomatic manoeuvring reflected Portugal's diminished standing on the Slave Coast, as well as the lack of interest on the part of the Dutch in developing trading connections with the kingdom after the loss of Brazil. By the second half of the seventeenth century, however, the arrival of French and British merchants had prompted an increase in Atlantic trade. Accordingly, not only the Dutch but also representatives of British and French trading companies openly courted Allada's rulers, frequently sending luxurious gifts to the kingdom (Brauner, 2016). In response to diplomatic overtures, the Allada king wound up dispatching Afro-Portuguese Matteo Lopes to Paris as an envoy (Brauner, 2013, p. 7; Heijmans, 2018, p. 100)