The Cosmological Vision of the Yoruba-Idààcha

of Benin Republic (West Africa): A Light

on Yoruba History and Culture

Aimé Dafon Sègla

Abstract The essay examines Idààcha cosmological vision as a kind of incorpo-

ration of Yoruba cosmology. It shows a process where the two strands, that is to
say, knowledge and belief can not be readily distinguished. The divinatory tradi-
tional calendar is indeed based on a scale of fixed number values whose defini-
tions are drawn from the concepts early traditional people have of the universe.
Thus, the signification of the terms that designate entities such as angle, circle,
center of the circle, midnight, time zone, the number of days in a week, etc., in
the Yoruba dialect Idààcha, mirrors cosmological standards. These words constitute
a landscape of memory shedding light on early Yoruba culture and history. Hence,
Idààcha being a significant western periphery of the Yoruba region, we examine
why its divinatory calendar would preserve an older spatio-temporal logic, beyond
Ifè and Oyo revisionism in Yoruba history. Finally, the article points out that the
translation of spatial and geometrical relations into temporal terms and vice-versa
may suggest a new indexical approach to the study of cosmology in relation to
the human body. As the body is in the mind, we say in relation to the human
mind.

Resume L’article examine la vision cosmologique du groupe dialectal Yoruba-

Idààcha comme un type d’incorporation de la cosmologie Yoruba dans la rationali-
sation de la vie sociale. Il met en exergue le lien à peine dissociable entre croyance
et connaissance. Le calendrier est en effet construit sur la base d’une échelle de
valeurs tirées de la vision cosmologique de l’univers. Ainsi, les significations, dans
le dialecte Yoruba-Idààcha, des termes qui désignent les entités comme l’angle, le
cercle, le centre du cercle, minuit, fuseau horaire, le nombre de jours de la semaine,
etc., renvoient systématiquement à l’échelle des valeurs standardisées inventées
par la cosmologie. Ces mots Idààcha qui  parlent  constituent un paysage de
mémoire qui renseigne sur les symbolismes originels dans l’histoire et la culture

Aimé Dafon Sègla

ORKESTRA Consulting, 16 Place de la Madeleine,
75008 Paris, Tel: 01 44 51 51 53/57, Portable: 06 19 31 87 42
E-mail: a s aime@yahoo.fr, asegla@orkestra.biz, aime.segla@ethnologie.uni-halle.de

J. Holbrook et al. (eds.), African Cultural Astronomy – Current Archaeoastronomy

and Ethnoastronomy Research in Africa.  C Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2008 189
190 A. D. Sègla

Yoruba. Partant, l’article examine soigneusement la question de savoir pourquoi le

calendrier divinatoire du pays Idààcha qui est un pôle significatif de la périphérie
occidentale du pays Yoruba préserve une logique spatio-temporelle très ancienne
par-delà Ifè et le revisionnisme oyo. Finalement, il conclut que la lecture simultanée
des représentations spatiales et géométriques, en même temps comme des données
temporelles, suggère une nouvelle approche de l’étude de la cosmologie en rapport
avec le corps humain. Puisque le corps est dans le cerveau, nous dirons, en rapport
avec l’esprit humain.

Keywords: /Mots-clés: Cosmology in metrology, belief and knowledge, Yoruba his-

tory, spatio-temporal thinking / Cosmologie en métrologie, croyance et connais-
sance, histoire yoruba, représentation spatio-temporelle/.

Introduction
This paper is in honor of and was presented shortly after the 2006 Total Solar Eclipse
in West Africa. In connection with that particular historical and celestial event, one
major theme is developed in this essay: the recovery of layers of historical mem-
ory in Idààcha practices and language forms to shed light, first, on Idààcha-Yoruba
cosmological vision and second, on early Yoruba culture and history – Idààcha is
a western dialect of Yoruba in the center of Benin Republic (Fig. 1). For this anal-
ysis, we use specific techniques of semantic reconstruction in Idààcha dialect of
Yoruba and spatio-temporal encoding based on the mathematical foundations of –
perhaps – an earlier form of Ifa divination. We examine different cases as kinds of
incorporation of Yoruba cosmology into real life. Using Idààcha as a case study,
we try, first, to show the intrinsic character of the human mind. We then give some
epistemological conclusions and lessons to engage young African people and we
suggest the importance of teaching African technology and particularly cultural as-
tronomy in African classrooms. Secondly, we show why, Idààcha being a significant
western periphery of the Yoruba region, its divinatory calendar would preserve an
older spatio-temporal logic, beyond Ifè and Oyo revisionism in Yoruba history.

The Intrinsic Character of the Human Mind from a Case Study

of Yoruba-Idààcha Cosmological Vision

Celestial observations and the associated beliefs and Deities are common to people
around the world. The cosmologies of the Batammaliba from northern Benin and
Togo, the Sotho, the Tswana, the Xhosa and the Zulu of south Africa, the Mursi of
Ethiopia (Holbrook 1998), and of course that of the Dogon of Mali and the Yoruba
of Nigeria, Benin and Togo, are not in anyway envious of that of Western people.
Light on Yoruba History and Culture 191

Fig. 1 Yoruba population area from Igue (1970)

192 A. D. Sègla

Let us take the example of the Yoruba. The 29th March 2006, day of total solar
eclipse in West Africa, the Idààcha people chanted their ritual telling the sun to let
the moon go. The traditional song says: “ojurun (oju orun) mu osupa, bi alele e jo e
[. . .]”, which means: “the eye of the sky (sun) has captured the moon, it will let her
go when comes the evening. . .”. The Idààcha eclipse song considers indeed the sun
like a magnet which captures the moon and lets it go after some time. This sounds
like the heliocentric conception model of the universe developed and defended by
Galileo. From a comparative standpoint, the difference is that traditional Idààcha
people’s knowledge is highly intuitive and oral, while the knowledge of Galileo is
theoretical and highly developed and written.
Again, from the Yoruba Idààcha people, the reading of eight consecutive time
zones from midnight, iwon ri iwon ogun mejo which means “the adding of mea-
surement” (Measurement has seen measurement and so on eight times, the process
giving finally a total accumulation of eight measurements) is reminiscent of the
practice of the Italians who also used to count 24 hours consecutively and not twice
a dozen hours. The practice is also that of the moderns astronomers like Ptolemy
who counted “24 hours consecutively between two middays” (Arago 1854). If mid-
night which is said to be called in Idààcha iwon ri iwon (measurement has seen
measurement eight times) has been taken as the beginning and at the same time as
the finishing point of the whole day, in other words, a time which goes from the
unit time zone iwon (the base of the measurement) to eight units iwon ri iwon ogun
mejo – measurement added eight times (Fig. 2), the modern astronomer Copernicus,
the Egyptians, Hipparcus, the ancient Romans, the French, the English, the Spanish
did the same way in fixing also midnight as the beginning of the civil day (for more
details about iwon ri iwon, see Sègla et Boko 2006).
Let us give again another example: in Europe, it is speculated that the obser-
vation of the seven visible celestial bodies – five visible planets and the sun and
moon – inspired the Gregorian week of seven days. But for all the Yoruba, the
original and founding myth says that the world had four corners at the time of
its creation. This is the bases of their week of four days. It is what the Yoruba
call orita – the crossing road. In Idààcha, the same idea is more mathematically
explicit (Sègla 2003). The conception is indeed unusual. According to the legend
recounted by an Idààcha man in Magoumi in Benin Republic, a Yoruba Idààcha
man, who wanted to avoid having his four sons each hide in a corner of the rect-
angular ogba (hut), preferred to build a hut that was circular agbo, a word associ-
ated with the expression ilé eniyan merin or in a shortened form amerin (Idààcha),

Fig. 2 Iwon ri iwon –

measurement has seen
measurement eight times
consecutively
Light on Yoruba History and Culture 193

meaning house people four. In this way, the father ensures the unity and power of
his family. In fact, for the man from Magoumi, the four corners of a rectangle are
gathered together at the center of the circle. This is also the origin of the name
given to the center of a circle eerin which means four. In traditional Yoruba enu-
meration, the series one, two, three, four, five, six, etc. corresponds to the sequence
of cardinal numbers ookan, eeji, eeta, eerin.. . . The equivalent numeric adjectives
are mokan, meji, meta, merin. . ., which are noun-phrases containing a verb. The
verb that acts in them is mu, which means take or separate. Thus the sequence
is mu ookan (take one), mu eeji (take two), mu eeta (take three), mu eerin (take
four). . .etc. The imagining of the circle in the language system starts from the con-
ception of the rectangle with its four corners. Thus taking these corners away one
by one, the figure of the circle is like four corners dissolved in the center (Fig. 3)
or four corners taken to the center, amu eerin (Idààcha) meaning having taken away
four.
It is this idea that is intuitively present in Yoruba cosmological belief. According
to that belief, the universe is round, and its creation starts with four corners, the
four points of the compass encoded in the language system as igun merin (angles
four). A belief that inspires the Yoruba traditional calendar with the four-day market
cycle and the Yoruba four-day week, each of the four days having been given the
name of the four most important deities in Yoruba history who created the universe,
Orunmila (the supreme God that is in the sky), Obatala (the first Yoruba aborigine
king between 2000 before common era and 500–700 common era), Oduduwa (the
king that founded the dynastic power in Ilé-Ifè between the Vth and the VIIIth cen-
tury CE) and Shango (the king that represent the founding and the power of Oyo).
Moreover, in the expression igun merin, angle four, igun is a noun in which, the
verb gun expresses the idea of meeting or bringing together and so, igun signifying
corner expresses the notion of making two walls meet making a right angle. Thus,
in Yoruba, igun is in principle a right angle, and indeed the traditional Yoruba house
is rectangular ogba, with four right angles. Here we see how the conception of the
circle is obtained starting with the center defining the totality, meaning the circle
and all his other elements in the “powerful” center. The traditional organizations of
a Yoruba village and the family group can serve as a social illustration. The chief
of the family group whose house is situated generally at the center of the family
compound, in a Yoruba town or village, is indeed baale agbo ilé chief circle houses;

Fig. 3 Orita (crossing road)

194 A. D. Sègla

the wives of the chief having their rectangular houses on a perimeter that forms the
circumference of a circle agbo ilé. This shows how the mnemo-technical device of
geometrical and spatial order is also a landscape of memory.
But how came this to be? In fact, these different concepts and representations
of Yoruba people – the Idààcha in particular – have a cosmological origin. It is
that cosmological vision that gives Figures 2, 4 and 8 sacred status placing them in
the center of all Yoruba cognitive activities. A type of priest, Babalawo – owner of
secrets- in Idààcha country speaking old Idààcha – a dialect closed to the original
Yoruba language ‘’Ifè tutu, Icha tutu” – described the rituals sequences before a
divining process (Sègla et Boko 2006): the diviner, before divination, refers to the
air to announce an imagining body in circular movement. This is symbolized by
the divinatory chain that the diviner turns around a vertical axe. He then marks the
center of the imagining circle. The divining chain with 8 cowries, each of them
having a concave and a convex face, is then put down following the vertical axis in
the center of the circle. The diviner recovers the chain with the bag that was used
to contain the chain before. By this way, the diviner looks for heat, in another word
fire. Then, the diviner continues the ritual in putting a little water at the four corners
of the circle, in front, behind, at the right and the left of the divining chain set down
at the center. This manner, he called for water and by referring to the four cardinal
points, he signifies that the body in movement is earth. And finally, the chain being
always at the center, the diviner calls for the cosmos spirit to complete the process
of Eeji-Onilè which means the two that possess the world. The diviner says: “I have
now got the four necessary elements on earth. May God give me the four counterpart
corresponding elements which sit with Orunmila or Olodumaré in the sky.’’ At that
stage, the diviner can throw down the divining chain and identify a configuration for
interpretation (Fig. 4).
The divinatory traditional calendar is so based on two forces – as is also the
divinatory Ifa system: first, there are the earth forces with four (4) signs (fire, earth
material, air and water) and second, there are cosmic environment forces also char-
acterized by symmetric correspondent signs of that of earth counterparts in the sky.
It is the elements of that couple Earth-Sky which interacts with each other and gives
indication to the diviner for predictions. The association of the two gives meaning
to the Yoruba expression Eeji-Onilè, the Two that own the Earth. In comparison,

Fig. 4 The divining chain

Light on Yoruba History and Culture 195

Swerdlow (1998) reported a similar practice among the Chaldean. Swerdlow who
reported Oppenheim (1974) wrote that
The principles of divination from natural phenomena are set out in a text of the Neo-
Assyrian period, [. . .] as “A Babylonian Diviner’s manual”, containing catalogues of two
series of ominous signs on the earth and in the heavens, both astronomical and meteorologi-
cal, that explains the relation of signs in the heavens and on the earth to each other [. . .] The
signs in the sky just as those on the earth give us signals [. . .] their good and evil portents are
in harmony (i.e., confirming each other). The Sky and earth both produce portends; though
appearing separately, they are not separate (because) sky and earth are related. A sign that
portends evil in the sky is (also) evil on earth, one that portends evil on earth is evil in the
sky [. . .]. These are the things you have to consider when you study the two collections.
(Swerdlow 1998: 3–4).

In the Yoruba case, the signs of the sky and that of the earth forming the Eeji Onilè
reflect and clarify the duality inherent in Yoruba system. Four signs on earth and
four signs in the sky interacting is the reason of the presence of eight cowries on the
divining chain. In fact, for all the Yoruba, Morton’Williams (1964) has reported that
The House of the Sky is the domain of the supreme God, Olorun Olodumaré (Olorun means
‘Sky-Owner’) [. . .]. The Earth is the domain of the Godess Onilè, Earth-Owner, who is
sometimes simply called Ile [. . .]. Life in the third cosmic realm, Ilé aiye, the house of the
World, is good only when good relationships are maintained, with the gods and spirits of
the other two [. . .]. (Morton-William 1964: 245–246) (Fig. 5).

This cosmological conception and vision of the Yoruba people – the Idààcha in
particular – is incorporated in real life: we already described before the day and the
night equally divided into four (four time zones) and the whole day divided into
eight parts. The week has four days, the month has seven weeks of four days. A
particular use of this principle in Yoruba-Idààcha country is the mortuary ceremony

Fig. 5 Eeji onilè(the two that own the earth): Cosmological model of the Yoruba, from Morton-
William (1964: 249)
196 A. D. Sègla

which takes place the day of the sixth market after the death of a dead person, oja
mefa (market six), in other words, six weeks of four days after the death (Fig. 6).
More interesting, all the traditional ceremonies in Idààcha [the ikodun (annual
harvest ceremony to celebrate the sufferings of the year), the oja mefa (the mor-
tuary ceremony), the eru gbigba (the acquit-ment ceremony of the dead person)
or the ode gbigbe (the hunter ceremony to acquit the dead person who has been
a hunter in his life)] are regenerative rituals that recreate original time (titi lailai
ati lailai) (lost in the past and deeply lost in the past). This has been also an
observation by Horton (1970) in his work about Africa. Horton has given it the
qualification of “rites of recreation” or the “return to the beginning” (Horton 1970).
Even the most fundamental Yoruba deities and the secondary deities are derived
from the diagram of worldly creation Orita. In other words, they are all derived
from two and four. The most fundamental deities are 42 or 24 = 16, and the sec-
ondary deities are 32, 64, 128, 256 (25 , 26 , 27 et 28 ). The scale of sacred Yoruba
values, 1, 2, 4 and 8 (20 , 21 , 22 et 23 ) and 16, 32, 64, 128, 256 (24 , 25 , 26 , 27 ,
28 ) are the products of the divining chain giving a total of 256 divination chap-
ters which are all coded linguistically in Yoruba language. It is not only an in-
corporation of cosmological standards for the rationalization of life but the sys-
tem affects also the intellectual activity. Indeed, the Yoruba mental model built
from cosmovision is a generative scheme that has founded the twenty base oral
numeration system which was originally a five base system. The five base system
moved then further to twenty base by the incorporation of the cosmological mental
model (Sègla 2004b). It is the same principle that founded the binary and hexadec-
imal code bases in Ifa. Indeed, in Ifa, it is the divining chain as a medium and
form of inscription that gives a place value numeration system. Because the cowry
shells appear on two sides of the divining chain and are aligned, viewed from the
left to right and from bottom to the top, there is a resource for the hexadecimal
system to occur. The 256 Yoruba linguistic codes in Ifa are thus all hexadecimal
and at the same time they are convertible to binary codes (Sègla 2004a). In the
computer machine language, a structurally identical system represents all numbers
and all alphabetic characters that is also the base of high modern computing. Of
course, the US army developed and used the same principle to improve its com-
puter data system and organization in the sixties. It is the same principle which is
nowadays generalized and is at the basis of the Great Computer Data and Audio
revolution.

Fig. 6 Oja mefa (mortuary ceremony: market six), from Sègla et Boko (2006: 23)
Light on Yoruba History and Culture 197

Idààcha Divinatory Calendar – a Spatio-temporal Logic

Beyond Ifè and Oyo Revisionnism: A New Light on Yoruba
History and Culture

Considering several data gathered from Idààcha, we affirm that this essay addresses
earlier pre-colonial constructions in a divination calendar rather than echoes of Eu-
ropean contact. We maintain that study of Idààcha divinatory calendar gives ev-
idence of a pre-Ifa divination system that remained immune from Ifa hegemony,
sharing claims of aboriginal status with a cluster of associated cults; or evidence of
archaic ritual language forms, echoing earlier spoken dialects that resurface in the
voices of possessed devotees in Idààcha land. But, does a simpler divinatory matrix
imply earlier history? Many parts of Yoruba land have nowadays divination with
(obi) (kola nuts) and cowries. Does this imply an earlier form? Indeed, if formal cor-
respondences between 2’s, 4’s and 8’s do not in and of themselves prove anything,
what is a proof is the straight path that Idààcha divinatory calendar draws towards
Yoruba past, reaching the aborigine original Obatala period in going through cosmo-
logical and spiritual sacred Ilé-Ifè. To maintain why Idààcha is a significant western
periphery of the Yoruba region and why its divinatory calendar would preserve an
older spatio-temporal logic, beyond Ifè and Oyo revisionism, we give two series of
arguments: First, we take into account the considerable debate concerning the sacred
status of Ilé-Ifè in relation to the Oduduwa migration or conquest, on the one hand,
and the rise of the Oyo Empire, on the other hand. Robin Horton (1979) covers
a lot of important ground and makes an “elder statesman” argument that we ad-
dress, engaging the positions of Akinjogbin (1980), Atanda (1996), Olomola (1976)
and Shaw (1980) on the fact that a pre-Oduduwa ancient and aborigine period ex-
ists in Yoruba history. Akinjogbin (1980), when reconstructing the oral tradition
of origins (Ikedu) confirms a later Oduduwa conquest of Ilé-Ifè. We also mention
Obayemi (1979), Apter (1987) who cautiously reviewed the historical problematic
of the Pre-Oduduwa Yoruba “base-line”, highly mythic and hypothetical, as is the
Ilé Ifè’s enduring sacred status well illustrating a cosmological and spiritual origin
of Ifè – Oduduwa coming from the sky, from the earth or from the ocean to cre-
ate Yoruba cradle in Ilé-Ifè. We also cite Samuel Johnson’s History of the Yorubas
[1948(1921)] in relation to the rise of the Oyo empire and to colonial discourses
of Yoruba nationhood and imputed migrations from Egypt or Mecca denying the
cosmological origin and therefore the sacred status and spiritual dimension of Ilé-
Ifè. Indeed, Oyo neglected, ignored and contested the ideological and cosmological
text that Ifa represents in Yoruba history and that Ifè was taking care of as well
(Apter 1987). In situating the political and historical contextualization of these three
great Yoruba periods (Sègla et Boko 2006), it appears that Oyo is a revisionist vi-
sion in Yoruba history while Ifè remains its spiritual and ideological virgin version
permanently in opposition to Oyo. Not surprisingly, Oyo empire and colonial Oyo
have been for long dominated by conquerors and looters who were, somehow, very
less interested in intellectual and cultural matters. [For more detailed analysis on
these three periods, see Sègla et Boko (2006) and Apter (1987)]
198 A. D. Sègla

Regarding the frontier line between the ancient period and the Oduduwa period,
we cite Obayemi (1979):
The Oodua-Obatala legends, the Igbo-Ifè rivalries [. . .] answer unequivocally in favour of
the “imposition of a new order from outside”, of Oodua landing from “orun” on Ora Hill
and from there encroaching upon, overthrowing and being resisted by the bearers of the
indigenous culture, the Igbo culture with its artistic fluorescence, under the leadership of
Obatala. Dynastic Ilé-Ifè was the fusion, the compromise of the two. The Oodua-obatala
legend, following the archaeological reconstruction would then be telling us of the pangs of
integration of two systems – an “indigenous” one with its multi-settlement character, with
the new socio-political monolithic dynastic culture, with its idea of a nucleated settlement
(a city wall).

According to Obayemi (1979) and on the basis of archaeological findings around

Ilé-Ifè, the Igbo, from the actual Ile-cha and the Ifè who spoke the same language
(the ancient original language Ifè-tutu or Icha tutu) continued to live together after
the establishment by Oduduwa of the new dynastic political order V-VIIth century at
the latest (Horton 1979). However, dispersions, at the same period, from Ilé-Ifè and
Ilé-Icha to the East and to the West are plausible. To the West, we have in mind here
very ancient Yoruba kingdoms like Igede, Popo, Ketu, Chabe, Iloji and Ifita which
already existed from the X–XIth century at the latest (Dunglas 1957), (Igue and
Yai 1973), (Gayibor 1985), Eades (1980). To take it briefly, giving archaeological
data and glutto-chronological analysis results, Yoruba language differentiation as a
distinct group from that of the Kwa would take place near by 3000 BCE, some-
where in the actual region of Niger-Benoue-Congo (Horton 1979). More ever, some
independent groups developed an original proto-Yoruba language near by 500 BCE
(Horton 1979). These groups were probably those who spoke original language Ifè-
tutu or Icha-tutu. Horton (1979) thinks that dispersions of proto-Yoruba from there
to the south and to the west would have begun already 500 BCE. These dispersions
have continued reaching their highest point at 500 CE – at the time the actual Yoruba
population has been constituted and completed. It is these dispersions that have
been accelerated by the new dynastic political system introduced by the dynastic
king Oduduwa near viiith–ixth century (Obayemi 1979). One can then says that the
Yoruba kingdoms at the West of Ilé-Ifè like Igede, Popo, Ketu, Chabe, Iloji and Ifita
existed already from the ixth century at the latest. Ifita (Ifè ita) which means the Ifè
of abroad, the Ifè of the west has given rise later to the kingsdom of Idààcha from
the XV–XVIth century under the pressure of the Fon raids and invasions (Fig. 7).
Second, we supplement the semantic reconstruction of Idààcha root-morphemes
in divinatory calendar with other linguistic data, that is, oriki (litanies, – erikin in
Idààcha)-, oral histories, hunter’s chants which tell of various migrations to see
how local Idààcha historical consciousness agrees with our claims. And interviews
with diviners illuminate the fact that the spatio-temporal metrics of the divinatory
paradigm Eeji onilè (the two that possess the universe) makes local sense. We
hear for instance from different Olorisha and Aworo and from the Ogboni elders
(adepts of secret cults, secret holders) in Idààcha, and their esoteric well confirms
claims about the earth – the Edan Ogboni captures the pairing of the owners of the
earth very nicely. They all are those who are original owners of the land before the
Light on Yoruba History and Culture 199

Fig. 7 Main migration axis at the origin of the foundation of Idààcha

dynastic Ifè Egba Omojagun immigrants arrived from Ifè – In fact, the Omojagun
are those who rule the dynastic power nowadays in Idààcha country. We also see
the major Orisha cults in Idaacha, and what visions of the past they perpetuate, that
is Obatala orisha cult or localy called Baba n’la or Ocha. Here are below some of
selected linguistic data about such claims:
Leading by a so called Oba Ayaba Oké (Adédiran 1984), the litany (oriki or erikin
in Idààcha dialect) of the first Ifita says they had simply emerged from the earth on
Ifita neighboring mountains. Parts of the Ogoja litanies – one of several Ifè ifita
lineages in nowadays Idààcha – is told and explained by Bara Boko1 (Boko 1997):

“- Tete ase ti wa li eyinode

- Ifita ti wa li itemu li ijemu
- Ifita ti wa li ajiwo li ajite
- Atilese a san li isuyi omo ase mu. . .
- Omo eweka si a ni onia ku
- Omo atilese li Oke Ejofa.”

Which means:

- Before everything, there is the principle of creation out of time and

space
- The Ifita existed long time before at the worldy creation
- The Ifita appeared on at the same moment with the earth and the sky. . .

1 By Bara Boko, 102 years old, Dassa-Zoumé, 16th august 1993.

200 A. D. Sègla

- Descendants of those who came out directly from the earth on Ejofa
mountain. . .

The Ifè and the Icha in nowadays Idààcha country preserv the consciousness of their
oriental origin from Ilé-Ifè by giving the name of Odi Ifè to nowadays Idààcha area, Odi
Ifè meaning the opposit of Ifè, the Ifè of the west, the sunset Ifè. The litany of the Agenu,
one of the Ife pre-Oduduwa lineage still living at Ifita near by the city Igbo-Idààcha
tells it. It is racounted and explaned by Allagbe Ogugara Mathieu Ogija2

“- [. . .]Omo Agenu kee je Ere [. . .]

- Omo a bi ko je gbomsa [. . .]
- Omo Agenu li Iwudu li Odi-Ifè”,

Which means:

- [. . .] Descendants of those who dont eat the boa because it is their

father
- [. . .] Descendants of those who dont eat gbomsa fruits [. . .]
- The Agenu are from the village of Iwudu in Odi-Ife.

Of course, the Ife and Icha lineages in Idààcha name the East as ese ocha, ese baba
n’la, that is to say, the leg of the deity Obatala or Baba n’la. As to the West, they
name it as ese buku, that is to say, the leg of the deity Nana-Buku. It is so surprising
to see that while the pre-Oduduwa people in Idààcha worship Baba n’nla (Ocha,
Obatala), the same are less interested in Oduduwa who is nearly non-existent. They
also ignore Shango and they adopt Nana Buku, the deity they appropriated after
their later contact with the Akan people of the West (Badjagou 1986). How to ex-
plain such jumping in their history from Obatala to Nana-Buku without Shango, the
terrific king and deity of Oyo if not their intimate, considerable and strong links
with the original aborigine Ife. The apparent solid attachment with aborigine pre-Ifè
is locally expressed by the following litany:

“Ilé-Ifè, Ilé Owuro,

Ilé-Ifè Oodaiye, nibiti ojumo ti mo wa,
Ilé-Ifè ori aiye gbogbo”. . .

Which means:

- Ilé-Ifè where the worldy creation took place and from where came the
first light,
- Ilé-Ifè, the country of past times, the house of the beginning (aurora),
- Ilé-Ifè is the place of worldy creation of the whole universe.

2 By Allagbé Ogugara Mathieu Ogija, 69 years old, in the village Itangbé (Dassa-Zoumé), 26th
august 1993.
Light on Yoruba History and Culture 201

Other litanies are chanted by worshipers and devotees of earliest traditional Yoruba
cults in Idààcha like sapata or sanponan, omo-olu, osumare, iji, baba-n’la and ogun.
That is the case of the descendants of the pre-Oduduwa who came from Ile-Icha
through Oyo and living nowadays in the areas of Kamate – that is the Isagule-, in
the areas of Oké n’la – that is the Ayangi of Oké n’la -, in the areas of Chachégun –
that is the Isasiogun (the Icha have avoided the war, have won the war) – and in the
areas of Ichopa with the Omo-Icha d’Ichopa. Morton-William (1964), in his studies
concerning Yoruba cults has given a particular attention to the languages very close
to original Yoruba languages Icha-tutu and Ifè-tutu. Indeed, Morton-William (1964)
believes that the secret Yoruba cult named Oro in Oyo is not under the contrôle of the
Oyo themselves but rather under the leadership of the very old Yoruba community
groups called the Jabata (Sapata). Morton-William (1964) could therefore write that
“Jabata is said to be a community of Sa (Sha) Yoruba origin, a western Yoruba
people now mainly in Dahomey” (Morton-William 1964: 256). The Omo-Icha in
the actual city of Ichopa (Soponta in nowadays Benin Republic) in Idààcha country
are of those people Morton-William is talking about. The litany of the Omo-icha
lineage in Ichopa todays still keeps in mind the memory of their coming from Oyo
under the leaderchip of the great hunter Oba oli Iso Erin, the chief hunter who drove
them out of Oyo where they had been before the main persons in charge of the secret
cult Egungun. Their litany chanted and explaned by Baso Ogunlaye Joseph tells the
story3 :

“- Omo iba liiso, Omo oloke,

- Omo Oba pasan li Eyo
- Omode ekiri meji l’owo
- Omo adara e ba onia gbe
- Omode afunwe tee l’ori oke
- Omo sebusebu ire omi ko dun sa
-Osese omi ko dun pa.
- Omo adara aa je onia aa f’abere ta eyin.”

Which means:

- Descendants of Iba li iso or Baso, descendants of masters of highti-

nesses,
- Descendants of the chief Egungun of Oyo
- Descendants of great hunter, they always have two pieces of dry meat
in their mouth. . .
- Descendants of those who own the deity Majufe and are always white
dressed
- Descendants of those who know that it is not easy to run in water,
even slowly (in slow strides). . .

3 By Baso Ogunlaye Joseph, 72 years old, an Omo Isa, 4th september 1993.
202 A. D. Sègla

The other layers of historical memory in Idààcha are the Ogboni elders. Within the
Ogboni or Oloro in Idààcha, we have the amule or the Oji (the possessors of the
earth), the ile (the earth people) of ilule, the Ikona or the Igangan, the Omo-iroko
and the Omo-ayan or the Mamahun. Members of secret associations and priests of
secret cults, they are omnipotent during king intronisation or king mortuary cere-
monies. The litany of the Oji or the Amule lineage in Idààcha can express that very
nicely:

“- Omo Oji li Kere,

- Omo isa Omo Ikee [. . . ]
- Omo a mu ile fu se odun da,
- Omo oloro ko ro li ile. . .”

Which means:

- Descendants of the Oji in the village of Kere from Iloji,

- Descendants of the Icha from the Ikee group [. . .]
- Descendants of those who know how to use the sand to replace gun-
powder,
- Descendants of secrets priests who never tell their secret. . .

The Igangan or Ikona, the Isesin or Agenu are good hunters very close to spirits,
to nature and to ancestral lands. They have wild life and good habituation to wild
animals, some of which are their totems. Their housing and living conditions remain
nearly unaltered. They live in hamlets somehow. The litany of the Isesin is explicit
on that4 :

“- Bi osan pan ka ma te li ilaju li Isesin Ilagbe

bi o ko ri ejo e ri agema
- Omo a mu ekun digbaro.
- Omo a mu ekun laye se aja. . ..
- Omo Asipa eru li Ijaoku li Ikunu.
- Omo eru meji li ajiba.
- Omo eru li Agalaju li Isesin.
- Omo osan pan ko oja iku li Isesin.”

Which means:

- It is forbiden to enter the Isesin houses at midday,

- Anyone would try it will meet a misfortune, a snake or a chameleon
- Descendants of those who have panthers as guards. . .

4Recounted by Karita Hélène, an Isesin, 65 years old, in the village Kèrè (Dassa-Zoumé), 18th and
26th august 1993. Explained by Obalé Lucien, Chief of the Isesin lineage.
Light on Yoruba History and Culture 203

- Descendants of those who use panthers in place of dogs

- Descendants of Asipa, the terror of Ikunu in Ijaoku.
- Descendants of the two terrors of the wilderness, the hunters Oba Etan
and Soaketedogu.
- Descendants of those who are able to cause death every time they
want. . .

Like all the pre-Oduduwa people in Idààcha, the Igangan or the Ikona work outside
the political order but surrounding and controlling it at the same time. Part of the
Ikona or Igangan litany expresses it5 :

“- [. . .] Omo efan dundun abe ira

- Ikona ko kale kin olu
- Ikona ko dagoo itannan ko wo odi Jagun [. . .]
- Omo aa se awo li iwanriwan ogun mejo
- Omo a je ohun oro maa bu f’aya.”

Which means:

- [. . .] Descendants of the black buffalo under the Ira tree

- The Ikona who worship the divinity Arigbo can not kneel down when
greeting the king Jagun.
- The Ikona enter the palace without submitting themselves to the pro-
tocol [. . .]
- Descendants of those who accomplish rituals and sacred ceremonies
in midnight
- Descendants of those who eat offering sacred meals which can never
be sent to women at home. . .

In summary, we have described and illustrated what Apter (1987), in Yoruba his-
tory, has called the “euphemism of conquest” which consists of a tacit distributing
and sharing role between the dynastic groups and the autochthonous pre-dynastic
groups. About Yoruba “euphemism of conquest”, Apter (1987) citing Lloyd (1955)
wrote the following:
“Yoruba ideas of legitimate authority require a king to rule by virtue of his royal genealogy
and reputable judgment, not by the military power of his ancestors. For this reason, conquest
is rarely mentioned in the founding myth of kingdoms. Instead, a common euphemism of
conquest is that the original ruler of a town invited the conqueror to assume leadership while
he devoted his whole attention to town rituals.” (Apter 1987: 8).

And also the role the Ogboni elders (Oloro) play in Idààcha is the one that was
assigned to the most ancient inhabitants of the lands in order to reward them from

5By Karita Hélène. Explained by Ajasin Josué. Chief of the Ikona (Igangan) lineage, 85 years old,
26th august 1993.
204 A. D. Sègla

losing the political power in Idààcha. Nowadays Idààcha, the power is in the hands
of the Jagun who are Oduduwa lineage descent. The tradition in Yoruba history is
maintained since the conquest at Ilé-Ifè by Oduduwa when the autochthonous Igbo
people set up a secret cult called Ogboni in order to pursue the worship of their
Orisa (deities). These rituals and traditions are still in practice in Idààcha country
in memory of the pre-Oduduwa Yoruba founding myth who is Obatala, Baba n’la
or Ocha. Obviously, the given above answers many questions about Idààcha and
confirms well the essay’s main assumption, that is, why Idààcha and its divinatory
calendar would preserve a spatio-temporal logic beyond Ifè and Oyo revisionism.
Let us look at these important questions, that is: why in the pantheon in Idààcha land,
there is principally the deity Obatala also called locally Baba n’la or Ocha?; why
the Oduduwa cult is less represented while Nana Buku, the deity they appropriated
from their early contact with the Ashanti of the West is more represented?; why in
Idààcha land is there the Ayira cult and not the Shango cult as in Oyo for the same
deity (deity of thunder)? – Shango was a major king of Oyo, was a terrific king and
has been associated with thunder; why the priests of the deity sanctuaries and the
Ogboni elders in Idààcha are the owners of the lands or the first arrived in Idààcha,
the Ifè and the Icha tribes? And why all the rituals, the cults and all the traditions
in Idààcha accord with the symbolism of the crossroads, the diagram of worldly
creation (orita)?

Epistemological Conclusions and Lessons

First of all, on the technical level, the Yoruba-Idààcha idea of reading spatial and
geometric relations as temporal and algebraic terms – and vice-versa may suggest a
new indexical approach to the study of Yoruba cosmology in relation to the human
body and mind. These facts reported from Yoruba-Idààcha case studies demonstrate
the intrinsic character of the human mind and they need to be known by African
people, especially the young people by introducing disciplines such as cosmology
and astronomy in school curricula in Africa south of the Sahara. The young students
and the young researchers must know that they can mine the stock of traditional
knowledge to augment the actual state of science and technology. For example, tak-
ing the Batammaliba of northern Benin and Togo or the Dogon of Mali examples,
cosmovisions are set down – incorporated – in local everyday life. Indeed, they give
inspiration to meticulous and ingenious traditional architecture and ways of local
building techniques – structures, aeration, urbanism, design, etc. It is in these exam-
ples that young researchers should draw references for new technological innovation
to improve housing accommodations for people in villages and in cities. Because,
nobody sleeps very well now in these so called modern cement houses – they are
in fact heating machines – inherited from the colonizers. In the same way, young
philosophers, mathematicians and linguists should consider that African languages
convey the same universal concepts though their particular contextualization – have
Light on Yoruba History and Culture 205

the same ability of conceptualization of new phenomenon – so that, if integrated

in school curricula – the scientific cultural level of African people can be raised to
that of those in the West. Socio-economical success in Africa south of the Sahara
depends partly on how African rationalities will be restored and stabilized. In fact,
like other studies presented at the Solar Eclipse Conference 2006 in Cape Coast,
Ghana, and in light of this Idààcha case study, the cultural perspective on science
and technology, and its development in a traditional society depends on anthropo-
logical research. It illustrates a form of rationality serving as an empirical basis for
theoretical constructions and technological innovations resulting in the stability of
traditional foundations.
On the historical level, study of Idààcha divinatory calendar gives evidence of
a pre-Ifa divination system that remained immune from the current Ifa hegemony,
sharing claims of aboriginal status with a cluster of associated cults; or evidence
of archaic ritual language forms, echoing earlier spoken dialects of Ifè-tutu and
Icha-tutu, that resurface in the voices of possessed devotees in nowadays Idààcha
land.
Idààcha should be regarded as a laboratory for the study of the ancient original
Yoruba languages Ifè-tutu and Icha-tutu to shed light on original Yoruba histori-
cal memory and culture. Obayemi (1976) describes the situation of some Yoruba
peripheral regions like Kaba and Ikale in Nigeria, or Ifè in Togo as something
that reminds the social political organization that has existed at the time before
the establishment in Ilé-Ifè of the dynastic centralized political power. About that,
Horton (1979: 95) exclaimed: “It seems unlikely that the social organization and
culture of this diaspora remained homogenous for very long.” However, it seems to
be the case. The absence of chieftaincy Oba or Oli Ilu (chief, owner of the land)
in Ifè-Togo or in nowadays Icha land in Benin Republic would probably be due to
the fact that “euphemism of conquest” did not take place at these places. And this
would tell us why it is only the pre-Oduduwa lineage tribes who arrange common
social life without any dynastic established political traditional power as is the case
in Kétu, in Igbo-Idààcha or in Chabè. Anyways, the pre-Oduduwa relics or clusters
seem to represent important layers of historical memory and moreover semanti-
cal truthfulness in Yoruba history and culture. More seriously, exploring the three
great historical periods in Yoruba history, we ask which historical layer is the most
important in Yoruba history – it is the pre-Oduduwa cultural baseline that Icha-Tutu
or Ifè-tutu represents, or an Ifè-centric system that survived Oyo revision, or an
Oyo-based system that survived British and French colonialism? Our conclusion
is that, it is the Ifè centrism system that is primary, the pre-Oduduwa period that
is secondary and the Oyo empire and colonial Oyo that is at the bottom. Finally,
a case study concerning Idààcha that uses a technique to reconstruct some impor-
tant elements in Yoruba history may suggest not only a new indexical approach
to the study of Yoruba cosmology in relation to the human body but also may
suggest the interpretation of Yoruba cosmology as a collective generative mental
model.
206 A. D. Sègla

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