Bini, a language spoken by a million horticulturists in and around Benin City, Nigeria, belongs genealogically to the Edo branch of the Kwa family of the Niger-Congo phylum. Bini dialects differ in their tonemic inventory, which ranges from four to six tonemes per dialect. But all dialects exhibit two morphotonemes--high and low--which perhaps correspond to the ideophones of other Niger-Congo languages. Over 95 percent of Bini adverbs and 75 percent of the nouns exhibit obvious tonal iconicity. Examples include high tone for things representing height-literally and metaphorically--and the converse for low tone. Other contrasts include tall-short and hard-soft, though not all examples are easily contrasted, nor is a consistent semantic feature always apparent. The evidence for iconism is strongly suggestive, however. (Author/RCT)