The Yoruba Lineage

Abstract

Opening Paragraph: The Yoruba, a people numbering over 5½ million, living in south-west Nigeria, need little introduction. They are almost unique among African peoples in that they live in large settlements, many of which were capitals of chiefdoms; 42 per cent, of them live in towns of over 20,000 people and there are nine towns with more than 50,000 inhabitants. Ibadan, now the capital of the Western Region of Nigeria, has a population of nearly half a million. Those towns which were capitals were, in the past, governed by kings (ɔba) and councils of chiefs (oloye or ijoye) who exercised sovereign powers throughout the town and its territory; the titles of these kings and chiefs were usually vested in lineages, so that a chief held a dual position as an elected representative of his lineage and as a member of the council of chiefs in the town. Other towns were governed in a similar manner, their rulers being subordinate to a king. The largest towns, especially those in Ibadan Province, owe their size to the influx of refugees from the crumbling Oyo kingdom in the early and mid-19th century; but it would appear that long before this the capitals of important rulers were towns of 10,000 or more inhabitants. The origin of Yoruba kingship is obscure; the first rulers may have come as conquerers, but their arrival cannot be less than seven centuries ago and may have been much earlier.