opa oranmiyan

ktravula – a travelogue!

On Language, Writing, Travel and Other things

Morning in Ife

I’m on a quasi-field trip around some rural cities in Nigeria along with two linguists from the School of Oriental and African Studies in London. I have been out of internet access for a few days now and might be for a little while more. I will do all I can to keep updating this blog as often as I can, but I can’t promise that it will be every day. I do have my own internet connection but this trip is proving to be a new adventure in discovering just how much “national coverage” the so-called internet service providers have.
I’ve been in Ife for a few days now, and I will be in Akungba tomorrow. I’m heading northwards and northwards until I reach whoknowswhere

, or I get tired and decide to head back. Thanks to all who asked after me, and those who never left the blog even for one day. This is heart-warming. Greetings from Ife, the acclaimed source of the Yoruba nation. See you around.
Picture of Opa Oranmiyan, taken yesterday

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So Where Are We From Then?

(Photo credit: RAJESH JANTILAL/AFP/Getty Images)

The most famous story about the origin of the Yoruba people is that we all descended from one man called Oduduwa. It is also the most misleading of stories because the man called Oduduwa who was said to have come from a place called Mecca (or, as historians have agreed, somewhere in the Middle East) most possibly found some indigenous people already living in the area now called Yorubaland when he landed with his travelling party from Mecca, and could not have been the sole progenitor of the now over thirty million people. In any case, he was said to have had only one son, who later had seven. So, for all intent and purposes, it was a conquest, kind of like the Founding Fathers arriving on the American continent from Europe, or Christopher Columbus “discovering” America after a long ride on the ocean, or Mungo Park “discovering” the Niger river. If that is the case, then when as citizens we use the now famous self reference “Omo Oduduwa” to refer to ourselves, we engage in a kind of deceit, or self-disservice, or at least a subservient acceptance of the prehistoric conquest. The verifiable children of the man Oduduwa were the original seven kings who descended from his son Okanbi, and their own living descendants who now occupy the kingship thrones in Oyo, Benin, Popo, Sabe, Ife and two other Yoruba towns. That said, we are all Yorubas, just like the occupants of Britain are now all Brits, not Normans, or Romans, or Celts just because they were once occupied by those forces.

Image from http://www.agalu.com/biography.html

But where did we come from, the Yorubas? Going by the Oduduwa story, we (at least those Yoruba citizens that have “royal” blood) are all descendants of Oduduwa, who in turn is a descendant of Lamurudu. Lamurudu interestingly is the Yoruba’s corruption of the name Nimrod from the bible, according to the Reverend Johnson in his book The History of the Yoruba. So there it is! We’re confirmed descendants of the Jews. Yet history does not rule out the possibility that Lamurudu/Nimrod was not even the immediate ancestor of the man Oduduwa, or that Oduduwa himself was not the immediate ancestor of Okanbi, so it is fair to take liberties with the fact. It is possible, almost certain by these accounts, that we were descendants of Nimrod the son of Cush, grandson of Ham, great-grandson of Noah. Now, even to me, that’s far removed. Why? Because Nimrod’s personality has never been fully established, and every once powerful civilization from Egypt to Greece to Jewish cultures have their own written perception of him that are not always complimentary.

Image from http://obatalashrine.org/000004.php

So where did we come from then? A literal mecca? Quite possibly. The islamic civilization has it recorded that many years before/after Mohammed the prophet, many so called idolators were expelled from the city into the world outside. The man Oduduwa and his entourage who later settled South West of the Niger river were believed to have arrived there not only with magic and graven images (which were markers of idolatory for which they were said to have been expelled from the religious middle eastern city in the first place), they also came with peculiar forms of dressing, communication and way of life that marks them as from that part of the world. They worshipped man-made gods, they made sacrifices to them through priests, they wore long robes, greeted each other in a particular way, and their women covered their heads as part of their cultural identity. The staff of Oranmiyan in Ile-Ife today still has the words “Oranmiyan” engraved on it in Jewish letters, and it was erected before the coming of the Europeans to that side of the world. Have you ever wondered why the Yorubas name their children on the eighth day of the birth of the child? I have. Could it be, as suggested to my surprise by an American student in my Yoruba class on Wednesday, that we are following the tradition of the old Hebrews who always circumcised their children on the eight day after birth, as ordained by their God? I don’t know, but I won’t bet against it. There is so much that I don’t know, that I wish I knew. There is so much more we need to know about ourselves.
The real wonder for me is where we are from, we Yorubas who are not descendants of kings or the patriarch Oduduwa. Any takers?
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Of Townships and Ownerships

I was not too surprised when a fellow FLTA from France said to me two weeks ago over dinner at the Union Station in Washington DC that the city was developed by a French person. Then, as she said so, everything had just fallen along the line of positive French stereotypes. They designed the Eiffel Tower and the Statue of Liberty, they must also be the big brilliant brain behind the planning and beautiful layout of the country’s capital. It was my first time of hearing the story, and though she didn’t have the name of the said designer, I believed it.
Today, I had a different conversation with Papa Rudy who says the city was developed by a black man. Now I’m confused. I told him of my discussion with the French girl, and he insisted that a black man did the city’s design. And somewhere in the conversation, the name Du Pont came up. Now I am familiar with a DuPont Circle in Washington DC, and reading more on it this afternoon showed me that it was named after a man Samuel Francis Du Pont (from the famous Du Pont family who really were originally from France). However, he is neither black, not an architect. He was a rear admiral during the civil war. The wikipedia article on the beautiful Paris-like city does not say much about the “designers” of the city, so I’m giving up.

Or not. I now have my own theory, that the person who conceived the brilliant layout of the city with the Washington Monument obelisk standing almost in its centre, could only have been the son of Oduduwa (the fabled progenitor of the Yoruba people). That’s the only explanation that can suffice to clear the air on the similarity between the Opa Oranmiyan obelisk in Ilé-Ifè and this Washington Monument obelisk. The Opa Oranmiyan was erected at a spot once believed to have been the burial site of Oranmiyan, a grandson of Oduduwa. Archeological evidence has now shown it not to be standing on any burial spot at all, but to be just a visible memorial to the fabled progenitor whose name it bears on it’s body. On the Opa Oranmiyan, as has been since its (undated) erection is an inscription in middle-eastern letters that archeologists have accepted as corresponding in sound to “Oranmiyan”.
It’s not the same in height and size to the Washington Monument, but that’s beside the point. Sue me if you like, but the muse behind that American capital city came from Ilé-Ifè in Yorubaland. Deal with it, will you?

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