A History of the Yoruba People

Stephen Adebanji Akintoye

• Publisher: Amalion
• Year: 2010
• ISBN:
  9782359260274
• Topic: Historia
• Subtopic: Historia africana

A History of the Yoruba People is an audacious comprehensive exploration of the founding and growth of one of the most influential groups in Africa. In this commendable book, S. Adebanji Akintoye deploys four decades of historiography research with current interpretation and analyses to present the most complete and authoritative volume on the Yoruba to date. This exceptionally lucid account gathers and imparts a wealth of research and discourses on Yoruba studies for a wider group of readership than ever before. Very few attempts have tried to grapple fully with the historical foundations and development of a group that has contributed to shaping the way African communities are analysed from prehistoric to modern times.
"A wondrous achievement, a profound pioneering breakthrough, a reminder to New World historians of what 'proper history' is all about – a recount which draws the full landed and spiritual portrait of a people from its roots up – A History of the Yoruba People is yet another superlative work of brilliant chronicling and persuasive interpretation by an outstanding scholar and historiographer of Africa.~ Prof Michael Vickers, author of Ethnicity and Sub-Nationalism in Nigeria: Movement for a Mid-West State and Phantom Trail: Discovering Ancient America.
"This book is more than a 21st century attempt to (re)present a comprehensive history of the Yoruba... shifting the focus to a broader and more eclectic account. It is a far more nuanced, evidentially-sensitive, systematic account." ~ Wale Adebanwi, Assist. Prof., African American and African Studies, UC Davis, USA.
"Akintoye links the Yoruba past with the present, broadening and transcending Samuel Johnson in scope and time, and reviving both the passion and agenda that are over a century old, to reveal the long history and definable identity of a people and an ethnicity...Here is an accessible book, with the promise of being ageless, written by the only person who has sustained an academic interest in this subject for nearly half a century, providing the treasures of accumulated knowledge, robust encounters with received wisdom, and mature judgement about the future." ~ Toyin Falola, The Frances Higginbotham Nalle Professor in History, University of Texas at Austin, USA.

1

The Beginnings

The Yoruba have some remarkable graphic myths of creation and of origins. The most widely known Yoruba myth has it that at the beginning of time, when the whole surface of the earth was one watery matter, Olodumare (also known as Olorun, “king of heaven”) sent down some heavenly beings to create solid land, as well as plant life and animal life, on the earth. Bringing with them some quantity of earth, one chicken and one palm nut, they came down by a chain and landed on the spot that is now known as Ife in the heart of Yorubaland. They poured the earth onto the water, and thus created a small piece of solid land. They then set the chicken on the land, and as the chicken scratched at it with its claws, the small piece of dry land spread — and continued to spread until all the continents and islands of the world came into existence. The heavenly beings sowed the palm nut, and it sprouted and grew as the beginning of plant life in the world. The heavenly beings themselves became the progenitors of the human race. The place where all this began was named Ife — that is, “the source of the spreading”. The Yoruba believe, then, that theirs is the first race of humans, and that all human life and civilization originated in their country.

One version of this myth supplies names to the heavenly beings that came down to establish life at Ife. The leader appointed by Olodumare to head the expedition was, according to this version, Obatala. Along the way, however, Obatala got drunk and fell into a stupor, and Oduduwa took over and completed the mission, and thus became the father of the Yoruba people — and of all the people of the world.

This body of myths is very strongly held among the Yoruba people, and its influence pervades all areas of their culture. The historian who embarks on studying, or writing about, the very beginnings of the history of the Yoruba as a people must start with an examination of those myths. The first Europeans to enter Yorubaland in the nineteenth century encountered it everywhere. For instance, the first Christian missionary to visit Ife in the 1850s (David Hinderer) was told, after he had finished preaching the Christian gospel to a large crowd at the palace of Ife, that all religion originated from Ife, and that what he had preached was no more than one of the versions that had evolved later in a distant part of the world. David Hinderer wrote:

Ife is famous as being the seat of idolatry; all the multiple idols of this part of the country are said to emanate from the town; from there the sun and moon rises [sic] where they are buried in the ground, and all people of this country and even white men spring from the town.¹

In 1882, Rev. Samuel Johnson, an Anglican missionary and son of Yoruba freed slaves who had returned to Yorubaland from Sierra Leone, was told by the chiefs of the city of Ibadan that Ife was “the place where all nations of the earth have sprung from.”² In 1886, British agents visiting the Yoruba interior were told by the Alaafin of Oyo that “the Ifes...were the fathers of all and all people came from Ife.”; by the chiefs of Ife, at Isoya where they and their people were camped, outside the ruins of their city, that the Ife people were “the fathers of all tribes”, and that if they continued longer in a camp and unable to resettle their ancient city of Ile-Ife, “the whole world would spoil, as they were the priests of the deities who ruled the world”; and by the Seriki of the Ijebu, Chief Ogunsigun, that “Even the English king can be shown the spot at Ile-Ife from where his ancestors went out”. Henry Higgins, the leading British agent in this 1886 mission, summed up his information about Ife as follows:

There are all manner of legends as to the wonders to be seen at Ile-Ife.... The Ifes call themselves the conservators of the world and the oldest of mankind and boast that all crowned personages in the world, including the white man’s sovereign, went out originally from Ile-Ife, and it was curious the deference with which other tribes treat them although they are at war with them... and as every one was supposed to be a descendant of the Ifes, they looked upon all strangers who visited their town in the light of pilgrims who came, as they put it, “to make their house good”, that is to pay reverence to departed ancestors.³

To the historian, discerning the meanings and implications of these myths is important. Of the implications, the most obvious would seem to be that the Yoruba people believe that they originated in their present homeland and have always lived there. Since, however, it is known from other evidence than myths that the earliest ancestors of all the peoples of West Africa came into that region from other parts of Africa, the Yoruba belief can only mean that the Yoruba have lived so long in their present homeland that they can no longer remember originally coming into it from elsewhere. Indeed, available archaeological evidence strongly indicates that the Yoruba are one of the oldest peoples in the tropical forests of the West African region.

As for the introduction of the names of Obatala and Oduduwa into these creation myths, there seems no doubt that what we have here is a conflation of very ancient myths with later known facts at some point in Yoruba history. As will be seen in subsequent chapters, Obatala and Oduduwa were not mythical, heavenly beings; they were humans — humans who played very significant roles in a great era of Yoruba history. Without doubt, what happened was that the contemporaries or successors of Obatala and Oduduwa added these two names to myths that had existed probably very long before their time, in an attempt to accord Oduduwa in particular the very high position he deserved in the transformation of Yoruba civilization in the most significant era in early Yoruba history.

Furthermore, the myths appear to represent a statement of a very important fact of Yoruba history — namely, the extensive penetration, from quite early times, of Yoruba people and Yoruba culture into the lands of their non-Yoruba neighbors, and the considerable impact of Yoruba culture in much of the West African sub-region. More will be said on this subject of interfertilization of Yoruba and neighboring cultures in subsequent chapters. Suffice it to say here that, as far as is known, Yoruba culture exerted so much influence on, and absorbed such inputs from, so many neighbors (the Edo and related peoples, the Aja, the Bariba, the Nupe, etc.) and drew so many so close to itself (in family structure, trade practices, language, religion, political system and traditions) that the Yoruba people apparently came to perceive their country as the source of civilization — and ultimately of the human societies which created observable variations in civilization — and evolved myths that gave meaning and support to that perception. It is significant that some of the neighbors of the Yoruba in fact subscribed to parts of the Yoruba myths.

The above, then, is the little that a study of Yoruba history can, as at this point in the task, discern from the people’s powerful and influential myths of creation and of origins. From these myths of gods and heavenly beings, the historian, for a reconstruction of the earliest beginnings of Yoruba history, must begin to look into the available evidence of the earliest activities of humans. Thankfully, there is a wealth of such historical data in the oral traditions, institutions, rituals, festivals and folklore of the Yoruba people. Traditional Yoruba family structures, and monarchical and chieftaincy systems, attached enormous importance from early times to the preservation of traditions from generation to generation, since title to political and other significant positions, as well as to land, was based, to an extraordinary degree, on ancestry and history as preserved in the traditions. Reenactment rituals accompany various phases and stages of the Yoruba political system, and old centers and practices of worship preserve treasures of group memory. Yoruba people’s varied and vast culture of poetry, songs, chants and collection of folk wisdom, offer extensive insights into the group’s past. All these have greatly helped — and encouraged — the study of Yoruba history in our times.

Much help has also come from sciences in the course of the twentieth century. One such science is archaeology — the study of prehistoric cultures through the excavation and analysis of their material remains. Another is linguistics — especially its application to the study of the prehistoric origins and development of the languages of peoples.

Since historical information available through archaeology and linguistics goes much farther back in time than the information available through the traditions and other aspects of Yoruba culture, it makes sense to start with the archaeological and linguistic record. Archaeological excavations have been carried out in almost all regions of the Yoruba homeland — at Ife, Ifetedo and Asejire in central Yorubaland, at Iwo Eleru and Itaogbolu (both near Akure) and Owo in the Yoruba eastern provinces, at Apa near Badagry on the southwest coast, at Mejiro near the ruins of Oyo-Ile in the far northwest, at Itaakpe in the Ife-Jumu area in the extreme northeast. Excavations done in other parts of Nigeria, and indeed in other parts of Africa, also help to illuminate the early history of the Yoruba people.⁴

According to available archaeological evidence, the earliest humans lived in the broad country comprising Eastern Africa in an era estimated to be between one and three million years ago. Archaeologists are mostly of the opinion that humans spread out from the area of the Rift Valley in Eastern Africa, to Northern Africa, and from Northern Africa to Western Africa, slowly over hundreds of thousands of years. Evidence of human existence in the area now known as Nigeria dates to about 40,000 years ago — that is, about 38000 BC. By about this date, Middle Stone Age groups of humans roamed parts of the Middle Niger Valley in what is now Nigeria. Using tools and other implements made of stone (and perhaps also wood, bones and shells), these early people made their living by gathering food in the forests, by hunting animals for meat, and by fishing. If food was plentiful in a forest area, a group might stay there for a while, and then move on again.

Archaeologists believe that in those very early times when human groups came gradually into the West African region from the Northern African subcontinent, the region now known as the Sahara Desert was not yet a desert but a country of various types of grassland where many rivers and streams flowed. The total number of humans coming into West Africa was small; and their stone tools were primitive and improved very slowly. By about 10000 BC, humans in West Africa were making greatly improved stone tools and implements, in the era which archaeologists now call the Late Stone Age. While Early Stone Age and Middle Stone Age tools had consisted of crudely trimmed flakes and pebbles as well as bi-facial core-axes and chisels, Late Stone Age tools consisted of microliths (that is, small, finely chipped and finely ground stone tools) and ground axes. Some of the microliths were very probably mounted on wooden or bone handles to produce spears, arrows and other types of tools — all for hunting, cutting, digging and scraping. At some late period in the Late Stone Age, from about 5000 BC, people began to make pots from clay (for fetching and holding water) — a very important technological advance.

But the most important progress made during the Late Stone Age was the discovery, some time starting from roughly 4000 BC, of agriculture — that is, the domestication of crops and animals. With this discovery, people slowly changed from being wanderers to settlers — the first real, solid, steps in the creation of human culture and civilization.

Among archaeologists, there is a debate over how people in West Africa came to the knowledge of agriculture. Did they make the discovery by themselves or was it brought entirely to them by groups of people migrating into West Africa from other parts of Africa where agriculture was already being practiced? Did West Africans domesticate any crops or animals, or were all their crops and animals domesticated in other regions of Africa and then brought to West Africa by generations of early immigrants?⁵

Some archaeologists believe that people in West Africa did not domesticate any crops or animals, but received all their crops (yams, grains, legumes, etc.) and domestic animals (goats, sheep, cows, horses, etc.) from outside sources. But other archaeologists now question that opinion, and suggest that while they did receive some domesticated crops and animals from the outside, some crops were also locally domesticated in West Africa. Since none of the domestic animals (goats, sheep, cows, asses, horses, etc.) were, in their wild state, native to West Africa, it seems certain that they were domesticated in other places and later introduced to West Africa. Similarly, many types of yams were domesticated in other places and then brought to West Africa. Certain types, however, appear to have been native to the area now known as Southern Nigeria in West Africa. These include the yam types known as Diascoria lat folia and Diascoria cayenensis — including the various types that the Yoruba people call ewura. These types of yam would seem to have been domesticated in Southern Nigeria, including Yorubaland, and to have remained more or less restricted to the area. What this suggests is that there was a local yam culture in Yorubaland before, or side by side with, the coming of many other species of yams that were domesticated in other places — some of them across the African continent even from as far as Asia. Also, the two kolanut species — Cola nitida (gooro) and Cola acuminata (obi abata) were domesticated locally in the West African forests. Some grains (such as millets) would seem also to have been native to the West African grasslands and to have been domesticated there. Finally, there is general agreement that the expansion of the oil palm to virtually all parts of West Africa was the result of the growth of agriculture. The oil palm is native to West Africa, but according to available archaeological and other evidence, before the growth of agriculture in West Africa, it formed only a small part of the vegetation. By nature, the oil palm tends to spread quickly only in places where agricultural activity has made the forests less dense — that is, it followed the expansion of farming. West African farmers, therefore, were responsible for creating the conditions that led to the spread of the oil palm until it became the most important tree crop in almost all parts of the West African forest and savannah lands.

In time, yam tubers and the products of the palm tree became the most important food sources for humans in the tropical forest regions of West Africa, supplemented over time with some grains, beans, vegetables and, much later, plantains and coco-yams. Oils and fats from the oil-palm fruit were the most important food items from the palm tree. But it also became the source of many other valuables — edible nuts, an alcoholic beverage now known as palm-wine (emu), various types of domestic fuels, and even materials for building shelters. It is not surprising, therefore, that the palm tree and some of its products became very important in the religion, divination and rituals of many West African peoples (including the Yoruba) from early times.

All over the world, whenever the Agricultural Revolution started in an area, its greatest effect was to transform people from wanderers to settlers. Instead of wandering to collect food from fruits of the wild vegetation and to hunt animals, they gradually settled down to take care of their crops and domestic animals. In that way, humans began to set up their first permanent abodes. In West Africa, the first such homes were no doubt established in no more than caves, rock and the man-made shelters.

During the later stages of the Late Stone Age, as farming turned wandering folks into settlers (from about 4000 BC), the scattered spread of farming people living in the West African region slowly began to get differentiated into related clusters and groups speaking proto-languages consisting of dialects that were related to one another. Available linguistic evidence indicates that many such groups and clusters slowly formed on the banks of the Middle Niger, mostly in the area of the Niger—Benue confluence and above it. This linguistic evidence suggests that the Yoruba, Igala, Edo, Idoma, Ebira, Nupe, Kakanda, Gbagyi and Igbo belonged to a cluster of languages, now called Kwa sub-group of languages by modern scholars, belonging to a larger family of languages now called the Niger-Congo (or Nigritic) family of languages. The small cluster was concentrated roughly around the Niger—Benue confluence. Over thousands of years, the groups in this cluster slowly separated as they developed distinctive characteristics, probably the last language groups to separate being the Igala and Yoruba. One study suggests that the proto-Yoruba and proto-Nupe language sub-families seem to have migrated from a little further up the Niger, slowly expanding towards the confluence, and that during that process each finally became differentiated from a mother language group.⁶

The clear implication of all this is that the origin of the Yoruba people as a linguistic and ethnic group belongs in the process of slow differentiation of proto-groups which occurred in the Middle Niger and around the Niger—Benue confluence, beginning about 4000 BC and continuing for thousands of years. It is, therefore, in this area that we must find the first home of the Yoruba as one people — the area close to the Niger—Benue conflu...