Ile Ife was originated from Nupe

NUPELAND AND THE MANY ILE IFES

A Synopsis of a Journal Article
By Ndagi Abdullahi Amana Nupe

(Both this Synopsis and the original Article written by Ndagi Abdullahi)

INTRODUCTION

The general assumption nowadays is that today’s city of Ile Ife in Osun State is Oduduwa’s Ile Ife mentioned in the Yoruba traditions and is the Ile Ife from which the Yoruba people originated. Any critical analysis of the primary and even some secondary sources, however, readily disproves this assumption. Obviously, Colonial historiography have misinterpreted the primary sources and latter Yoruba ethnic jingoists have cashed in on this.

There is a growing academic reappraisal of the earlier Yoruba belief that Oduduwa’s Ile Ife from which the Yoruba people originated was a Nupe kingdom located in Nupeland.

LITERATURE REVIEW

The earliest references to Nupe – Ibn Battuta’s 14th century ‘Travels in Asia and Africa’; Captain Hugh Clapperton’s 1829 ‘Journal of a Second Expedition’; the Lander brothers’ 1832 ‘Journal of an Expedition…’; Bishop Samuel Ajayi Crowther’ journals, etc. - referred to Nupe as Yufi, Nufe, Nyffe, Ife, etc. – meaning that Nupe used to be known as Ife.

The first White people to arrive Yorubaland recorded that the Ile Ife from which the Yoruba people originated was a Nupe kingdom located in Nupeland. These include Reverend Thomas Bowen’s 1857 ‘Adventures and Missionary Labours…’; Sir Richard Burton’s 1863 ‘Abeokuta and the Camaroons Mountains’; J.O. George’s 1895 ‘Historical Notes…’; etc.

The first set of pioneer Yoruba historians, Bishop Samuel Ajayi Crowther’s journals, etc., also gathered that the Yoruba people originated from a Nupe Ile Ife.

Right unto the first decades of the 20th century the Yoruba people believed that they originated from a Nupe kingdom of Ile Ife located in Nupeland.

But the narrative changed when Reverend Samuel John’s 1921 ‘History of the Yoruba’ was published, claiming that the Yoruba originated from today’s city of Ile Ife in Osun State.

Then at the height of the Colonial Government era some British, and later many Yoruba, professors gave academic authority to Reverend Johnson’s claim.

A contrary school of thought has, however, been gaining momentum. These include Professor Alan Ryder’s 1965 ‘A Reconsideration…’; Professor Frank Willet’s 1971 ‘African Art’; Professor D. William’s 1974 ‘Icon and Image’; Professor Robert Smith’s 1988 ‘Kingdoms of the Yoruba’; Professor Joseph Eboreime’s 1997 ‘Oral Traditions…’; Dr. Frank Aig- Imoukhuede’s 2017 ‘Remapping the inter-twinned histories…’; etc.

FINDINGS

The conventional claim that today’s Ile Ife in Osun State is the Ile Ife said to have been founded by Oduduwa in the Yoruba traditions of origin is besieged by innumerable inconsistencies as to render the claim scientifically untenable. It was people like Reverend Samuel Johnson who wrongly popularized this false claim.

Today’s Ile Ife is not Original Ile Ife Yoruba traditions narrated that today’s city of Ile Ife in Osun State is not the first Ile Ife. The Odu Ifa also stated that the Ile Ife in Osun State is not the Original Ile Ife founded by Oduduwa. Many authorities including Professor Ade Obayemi, Professor F. Sowande, etc., also wrote that there were earlier Ile Ifes.

Nupe was Ile Ife

The First Europeans to arrive in Yorubaland, including the Lander brothers, Reverend T.J. Bowen, Major Richard Burton, etc., were categorically told by the Yoruba people that Ile Ife was a Nupe kingdom located in Nupeland.

Nupe was originally pronounced as Nufe, Nyife or Ife and Ile Ife is a corruption of Ele Nife meaning ‘Nupe Land’. Kakanda was Ile Ife Major Richard Burton was told by the Yoruba people in 1864 that Ile Ife was a Nupe kingdom located in Kakandaland in KinNupe around the place where Muye is located today. The Kakanda were known as the Epa, Apa, Afa, Ifa or Ife and Kakandaland was known as Ile Ife.

Nupe Ile Ifes

Apart from Kakanda, there used to be several Ile Ife settlements in KinNupe including the towns we know as Gbara, Tafian, Fogbe, Lapai, Patigi, Lafiagi, etc., today. The Ile Ife people originated from Old Gbara in Zugurma and migrated over the centuries from Northwestern KinNupe through Central KinNupe to Southwestern KinNupe where they eventually crossed the River Niger into today’s Yorubaland.

Ife Traditions not Peculiar to Yorubas Only Traditions of Ile Ifes are not peculiar to the Yoruba people alone. The Edo-Benin also has traditions of Uhe (Ife). And the Akure had the story of Oduduwa long before the city of Ile Ife in Osun State was founded. In 1864 the Oba of Benin told the visiting Portuguese sailor Joao Affonso d’Aveiro that a supreme emperor called the Ogane ruled over an Ile Ife-like kingdom located in. Yoruba People Did Not Originate from Modern Ile Ife Scholars like Dr. Joseph Eboreime, scientists like Dr. Constanze Weise, and others, have demonstrated, using historical, linguistic and otherwise documentaries, that the Yoruba people originated from the Old Ile Ife which was located in Nupeland and not from today’s Ile Ife in Osun State.

The Ijebu, Egba, Ekiti and others Did Not Originate from Modern Ile Ife Professor David Laitin, David Atolagbe, and many other scholars, wrote that the various Yoruba people, including the Ekiti, the Oyo, Ketu, Ijesha, Ijebu, Egba, Egbado, Yagba, Owo, Ondo, the Akure, etc., etc., did not originate from the modern city of Ile Ife. The Awulaje ruler of Ijebuland insists that the Ijebu people did not originated from today’s Ile Ife in Osun State.

DISCUSSION

There is overwhelming documentary evidence to the effect that today’s Ile Ife in Osun State is not the Original Ile Ife founded by Oduduwa - enough to completely disprove any claim to the contrary.

The journals of the first Europeans are there as documentary evidences to the effect that the Yoruba people initially believed that the Ile Ife from which they originated was a Nupe kingdom located in Nupeland.

The pioneer Yoruba historians were also told by the Yoruba people that many of the Nupe towns we see today – including Patigi, Lafiagi, Leaba, Gbara, etc., - were among the several Ile Ifes listed by the Odu Ifa and the earlier Yoruba traditions as the older Ile Ifes.

The implication here is that, and as late as the first half of the 19th century, the Yoruba people had believed that their ancestors were simply those Nupe people who crossed the River Niger into today’s Yorubaland. This, is corroborated by Sultan Bello who, writing at the beginning of the 19th century, stated that the Yoruba and Nupe people were practically one and the same people.

In fact, Nupe was initially pronounced as Nufe, Nife or Ife and it was the Nupe people that were known as the Ife while Nupeland known as Ile Ife.

There are undercurrent traditions that Yorubaland was originally populated by a prehistoric Nupe people who eventually morphed into the various Yoruba people of today.

Interestingly, this overwhelming documentary has been deliberately overlooked and suppressed by modern Yoruba scholarship that is intent on Colonial epistemology.

But how comes the Yoruba people are today denying their Nupe past? The answer is simple, racial pride and ego.

The problem is that the first doctors and professors to man the first-generation universities of Nigeria were mostly Yoruba academicians who were heavily influenced by Reverend Samuel Johnson’s erroneous claim that today’s Ile Ife was Oduduwa’s the Ile Ife.

Furthermore, British Colonial historians, in their characteristic muddling meddlesomeness, came and improperly gave academic authenticity to Reverend Samuel Johnson’s unfounded claims.

Then, Yoruba politics in the first half of the 20th century, led by Chief Obafemi Awolowo, out of the necessity of uniting the Yoruba people for a bloc vote, harped on the fictitious claim that all Yoruba people originated from today’s Ile Ife in Osun State.

But, as early as 1965 people like Professor Alan Ryder were already pointing remonstrating that the Ile Ife from which the Yoruba people originated was a Nupe kingdom located across the Niger in Nupeland. Many other scholars have confirmed that Original Ile Ife was Nupe.

Soon Nigerian historiography will outgrow the obsolete Colonial epistemology that is still taught in Nigerian universities including the false claim that today’s Ile Ife is the Ile Ife of Oduduwa and the Yoruba traditions.

The history of the Yoruba race needs to be properly rewritten with Nupeland being properly identified as the location of the Old Ile Ife from which all the Yoruba people originated.

CONCLUSION Evidently, the city of Ile Ife in today’s Osun State is not the Original Ile Ife founded by Oduduwa and is not the Ile Ife mentioned in the Yoruba traditions.

Colonial historiography and Yoruba regional politics, aided by Reverend Samuel Johnson’s unfounded claims, are responsible for the wrong assumption today that the Ile Ife in Osun State is the Ile Ife from which the Yoruba people originated. The documentary evidences to the contrary are, however, too overwhelming to be brushed aside.

The academic world is gradually waking up to a stage where it will be impossible to deny or overlook the fact that the Ile Ife founded by Oduduwa, and from which the Yoruba people originated, was a Nupe kingdom located across the River Niger back in Nupeland.

There is no more denying the Nupe origin of the Yoruba race.

© Ndagi Abdullahi Amana Nupe (0813 798 2743 Whatsapp message only)