BEFORE THE EVOLUTION OF "YORUBA" AS IDENTITY, WHAT WERE YORUBA-SPEAKERS CALLED?

BEFORE THE EVOLUTION OF “YORUBA” AS IDENTITY: WHAT WERE YORUBA-SPEAKING PEOPLE CALLED?

By

Dr. Saint

(In support of world historic preservation initiative)

The question of how Ijebus as an ethnic group subsequently nationalized to be called Yoruba in Nigeria is more comprehensive than what will just be answered by just a line of words, but which shall be discussed extensively later! This is because the evolution of the name Ijebu, which shall be discussed comprehensively in different chapter, predated Yoruba’s in consonance with the Nigeria ethnology. However, the question about Yoruba identity asked has turned out, from a broader perspective, to be a very controversial discourse that has engaged lots of scholars in the literary contest of defining who the Yorubas really are. From this perspective, I will objectively go more deeper to answer the question of Yoruba Identity before the evolution of the word, “Yoruba”.

Yoruba, either in the context as ethnic identity or territory is unequivocally a recognized powerful tribe in the entire Africa. They, as ancestrally related, spread all over the continent with their unique cultural identity – the similarity of language and religious ritual. Significant Yoruba populations in West African countries can be found in Ghana, Benin, Ivory Coast, and Sierra Leone. Even, there are more Yoruba communities in Cuba, Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, Venezuela, Saint Lucia, Jamaica, Brazil, Grenada, and Trinidad and Tobago, and other countries.

Fundamentally, the term Yoruba as being predominantly used since late 19th century in Nigeria is imperatively deserves to be critically understood in its right context. This is because, from intensive corroboratory researches emanating from the prominent West African historical scholars, the name “Yoruba” has been expositorily described to be a formative invention use to identify the ethnic groups linked together by commonality in West Africa - specifically the similarity of language and the religious ritual.

As far back to the 18th century, historical records extracted reveal that the early ethnic groups that today constitute Yoruba kingdom in Nigeria were primitively described by their respective languages, like Egbas, Eyeos, Jebus and many others. These spectacular people were extensively studied to have relatively exhibited a remarkable communal quality responsible for their national unification. The inter-communal relationship, as it has been established ever since about 17th century, was described to have been possible by their language similarity, which facilitated the early exchanges of trades among themselves.

However, what makes this subject more literarily controversial is that, all the early literatures of the Atlantic trades up till 18th century never exhibited prospective clues to buttress that all the said ethnic groups who speak similar languages with same religious ritual belief have a unified nationality they were been called then. Referencing available resourceful documents, this argument was made explicit by the research of Prof. Graves on the Yorubas in Nigeria in his book titled: The Split Of the Yoruba Ethnic Group”. The erudite Prof. expositorily explained that:

“there were no Yorubas – that is, no one who would have said “I am Yoruba” – before the early 19th century.” Graves 2014

Unequivocally, the position of the Erudite Prof. of history is that, there was no ethnic group as far back to 17th century nationalized as Yoruba in the entire West Africa. This disposition, however, correlates with the Nupe historian named Idris S. Jimada, in his book titled “The Nupe and the Origins and Evolution of the Yoruba 1275 - 1897”, who inclusively substantiated the fact as follow:

“The name Yoruba was not an identity, for those who came later to be called Yoruba, since the time of creation, or anytime before the mid-nineteenth century…”

Idris S. Jimada explored available resources backward to 13th century to buttress the fact that the nomenclature termed “Yoruba” was not identified as ethnic ancestral identity. Even, searching through all the entire West African ethnological diaries, four African nationalities – (Nupe, Dahomey, Ashanti and Benin) that have some corroborative historiologies referencing the present Nationality called Yoruba, all the expeditions proved no empirical evidence to indicate that the name was in use as nationality before 19th century. This hitherto translates to mean that, the Yoruba as a name has no ancestral root, other than as appellation, which will be comprehensively discussed as it follows.

Then if that is the case, the pertinent questions that needed analytical review are:

(1) What were these native speakers call before the evolution of the word Yoruba?

(2) How did the name, Yoruba evolve?

The Primordial Identity

Having established the fact that there was no any ethnic group nationalized as Yoruba until late 19th century, it is concurrently expedient to reveal what the Europeans called Yoruba-speakers as far back to about 15th century. Geographically, Yoruba-speakers spread through the whole Africa and it is an ethnic identity adorned with a peculiar, political, ethical, artistic and aesthetic connotation. Everywhere Yoruba is being mentioned as a name, it always portrays meaning in different context. That is why before the advent of its adoption as national identity, several international historical scholars have disseminated helpful exhibitions that, the today’s Yoruba speakers were having unique different identities of which they were known for or identified by the foreigners before Yoruba as identity was coined.

Prof. Ayoh’OMIDIRE, Félix, a professor of Afro-Latin-American Studies and also the director of the Department of Foreign Languages, Ọbáfẹmi Awólọ́wọ̀ University, Ilé-Ifẹ̀, Nigeria, who has widely travelled, studied and taught in diverse countries of the three major Atlantic continents: Africa, Europe and the Americas, explained in his 2005 doctorate thesis that before the Christian Missionaries made the name Yoruba popular through written form, the word Anago (Nago) or Aku or Lucumi were been used in Brazil, Benin Republic, Haiti, Togo, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Dahomey, e.t.c to describe the Yoruba-speaking people.

In his judicious presentation, the erudite Prof. OMIDIRE explains that:

…”long before the Ifá and Òrìṣà ethos became widespread in the Americas, the ethnic name ‘Nago’ used in the identification of the Yoruba-speaking peoples in the present-day Nigeria was already widely used by the neighbouring Dahomeans in the late 18th Century to refer to every individual who professed the religion of the Òrìṣà, be they of Fon, Jebu, Adja, Mahi, Ewe, Oyo or Mina ethnic extraction.”

According to Omidire, religious culture was quoted to be the essence of identity construction of many countries such as Cuba, Trinidad and Tobago, Puerto Rico, Haiti, Santo Domingo, Colombia, Venezuela, and the United States of America, especially the New York and the Miami poles.

In corroborating Omidire’s position, Spanish and Portuguese documents had further explicitly expatiated that, the terms "Nago", "Anago", and "Ana", used to describe all speakers of the Yoruba language, and some of these speakers in francophone West Africa are still sometimes known by this ethnonym today. According to Portuguese records, Nago is originally described to Jebusites ancestral dialect derived from the religious ritual practice of the speakers who worship ancestors as their gods. It was said that for this reason biblical reference describes some relative speakers as Nago-Jebu, Nago-ketu and many more.

Referencing migratory myth and the dispersal from the tower of Babel, some prominent African scholars have substantiated that some migrants who migrated westward along the connected water systems of central western Africa and settled at the confluence of the Niger and Benue Rivers in Nigeria speak the languages that are similar to Ijebu but which was called Anago. In their migration, it was narrated that they carried with them various religious customs, including a trance and divination system for communicating with their ancestors and spirits, animal sacrifice, and sacred drumming and dance.

As eloquently demonstrated in the writings of many eminent scholars like Melville Herskovitch, Olabiyi Babalola Yai, Pierre Verger, and many others, the term 'Nago' as used in identifying the Yoruba-speaking peoples before 19th century referred to as an Olórìṣà irrespective of their biological ancestries – be it, Jebu, Fon, Egun, Adja, Mahi, Ewe, Oyo or Mina. That means, the prehistoric people of Yoruba ancestry were identified as Olorisas - idolatry worshipers, which subsequently corrupted to be the ancestral identity.

Even, the prominent historical researcher, James Akeem Osho shared his childhood experience with the originality of the name, Nago as an Ijebu man. He said: “Growing up at Ebute Metta in Lagos, I remember that when my grandmother was talking to us and we were not listening or because we were playing and seem not to pay attention to what she was saying, she would shout at us saying ''Se e o gbo Anago ti mo n ba yin so ni? (Can't you understand the Anago that I am speaking to you). It means don't you understand the language I am speaking?

In this regard, Anago, which was derived from cultural belief and practice, turned out to be the name that was documented in the early Americas diaries as a form of classification to identify the origin of the Yoruba-speaking slaves. So, Anago was the name by which the Yorubas were known, meaning in literary context someone who is very wise or intelligent. The word Nago became very popular during the Slave trade era when many slaves were sold at the Slave port of Lagos. The use of the name continued until the advent of missionary incursion that led to the promotion of “Yoruba” as the new ancestral identity.

…written by Dr. Saint