By Oghoberuo DaniLucifer Saturday Credit to Wikipedia.
*An Urhobo lad dressed in the traditional attire of the Okpe-dialect of the Urhobo people.
Food: The very popular Banga Soup also known as Amiedi originated from the Urhobo tribe. It is a soup made from palm kernel. This prestigious soup can be eaten with Starch (Usi), made from the cassava plant. It is heated and stirred into a thick mound with added palm oil to give the starch its unique orange-yellow colour. Banga soup and starch have gone on to become a continental favourite.
Other notable delicacies from the Urhobo tribe are Ukhodo (a yam and unripe plantain dish prepared with either beef, poultry, or fish, and spiced with lemon grass and potash), Oghwevwri (Oghwo soup), and starch (Usi) also have their origins from the Urhobotribe. Oghwevwri (Oghwo Soup) is composed of smoked or dried fish, bush meat, unique spices, potash and oil palm juice.
Other culinary delicacies include Iriboto, Iriboerhanrhe,Ugbagba and Okpariku.
Religion: The main focus of Urhobo traditional religion is the adoration of “Ọghẹnẹ” (Almighty God), the supreme deity, and recognition of Edjo and Erhan (divinities). Some of these divinities could be regarded as personified attributes of Ọghẹnẹ.
The Urhobo also worship God with Orhen(white chalk). If an Urhobo feels oppressed by someone, he appeals to Ọghẹnẹ, who he believes to be an impartial judge, to adjudicate between him and his opponent.
Oghene is the fundamental factor and manifestation of all divinities.
Urhobo divinities can be classified into four main categories, which probably coincide with historical development. These categories are Guardian divinities, War divinities, Prosperity divinities and Fertility and Ethical divinities.
Erivwin, which is the cult of ancestors and predecessors (Esemo and Iniemo), is another important element.
The dead are believed to be living, and looked upon as active members who watch over the affairs of their family. Urhobos believe in the duality of man, i.e., that man consists of two beings:
1. The physical body (Ugboma) and
2. The spiritual body (Erhi).
It is the Erhi that declares man’s destiny and controls the self realization of man’s destiny before he incarnates into the world. Erhi also controls the overall well- being (Ufuoma) of the man.
Ọghẹnẹ is like a monarch who sets his seal on the path of destiny.
In the spirit world, Erivwin, man’s destiny is ratified and sealed. In the final journey of the Erhi, after transition, the Urhobo believe the physical body, Ugboma, decays while the Ehri is indestructible and joins the ancestors in Erivwin.
The elaborate and symbolic burial rites are meant to prepare the departed Erhi for happy re-union with the ancestors. Despite this age-old and complex belief system, the influence of western civilization and Christianity is fast becoming an acceptable religion in most Urhobo communities.
Many belong toCatholic and new evangelical denominations. Epha divination, similar to the Yoruba Ifá and practiced by many West African ethnic groups, is practiced with strings of cowries.
There are 1,261 ejo (deities), including the one-handed, one-legged mirror-holding whirlwind-god Aziza.
Ooni Lúwòó Gbàgìdá was the 18th Ooni. She was a paramount ruler of Ile Ife, the ancestral home and dispersal point of Yoruba ruling dynasties and civilization. She was a descendant of Ooni Otaataa the 15th Ooni from Owode compound, Okerewe.
According to oral traditions from Ife, it was under Luwoo that much of the inner streets of Ife was tiled and paved with potsherd pavements, hence these pavements are called ‘Apaadi Luwoo’ in Ife. According to the story, she was very concerned about detail and cleanliness.
During Ife’s classical period of development, she went out on an official royal outing in full regalia one day in the rainy season and her robes and coral accessories became soiled with mud and dirt with her feet getting stuck in it. Because she was a fastidious queen, this made her order the paving of all the most important roads in the ancient town.
The occurrence of potsherd pavements in virtually every part of the area within the Inner to Outer Walls of Ife and beyond indicate that the city was densely populated. It is estimated that the city of Ilé-Ifè had a population of 70,000–105,000 during the mid-fourteenth century.
Luwoo was married to one of the high chiefs of Ife known as Obaloran and the marriage was blessed with a son named Adekola Telu who went on to found the Yoruba town if Iwo.
She was the first and the only female paramount ruler of Ile-ife known to be the origin of Yoruba civilization, succeeding Ooni Giesi.
Ooni Luwoo’s reign remains the only one by a female in Ife to date.
Archaeological work is still being carried out in Ife and surroundings till today to find out more about the size and extent of ‘Apaadi Luwo’ and the legacies of this charismatic Oba.
In Yoruba history, several kingdoms are recorded to have had female Obas, including but not limited to; Ife, Ondo, Ijebu, Oyo.
The Ibibio people are a coastal people in southern Nigeria. They are mostly found in Akwa Ibom, Cross River, and in the Eastern Part of Abia State. The Ibibio are the 4th largest ethnic group in Nigeria. Their language is probably one of the mother languages of the ancient proto-Bantu nation.
They are related to the Annang, Eket, Oron, Igbo, Efik and a cluster of some notable ethnic factions. During the colonial era in Nigeria, the Ibibio Union envisaged the need to unite as one nation thus the request for recognition by the British as a sovereign nation (Noah, 1988). The Annang, Efik, Eket, Oron and Ibeno and many others do share personal names, culture, cuisine and traditions with the Ibibio, and speak closely related (dialects) of Ibibio which are more or less mutually intelligible.
As observed by G.I. Jones and Darryl Ford the word Ibibio is both an ethnic and a linguistic term. All the Ibibio people speak and understand the Ibibio language. The dialectal differences among the various Ibibio groups can be attributed largely to the long period of territorial isolation over a long period of time. Linguistic homogeneity decreases with the rise in population and with the expansion of the occupied area. With reduced interaction, the speakers of Ibibio tend to form variants of their language.
ORIGIN As the saying goes, a people without the knowledge of their past history, origin and culture is like a tree without roots. First, It is imperative that I draft an open memoir on the origin of the Ibibio nation since only a handful of text was available.
Second, I longed to create an enabling environment that promotes enlightenment, debates and discussions on our heritage.
It follows therefore, that early records of Ibibio history were documented by the British colonial administrators and anthropologists. In their thesis, they vividly described various plausibility that best describes the origin of the Ibibio as we shall consider below.
The Ibibio origin is highly speculative and varied. They are speculated to be amongst the earliest inhabitants of Nigeria. It is estimated that they arrived at their present home around 7000 B.C. In spite of the historical account, it is not clear when the Ibibio arrived at their current location.
According to some scholars, they might have hailed from the central Benue valley; east of the River Niger, as they share cultural affinity with the ancient Jukun people.
Another seeming factor is the wide-spread use of the manila, a popular currency used by the Jukun during their subsequent southern drive towards the littoral, South-south of Akwa Ibom State.
Other available traditional sources suggest that the earliest stock of the Ibibio is the Afaha clan whose ancestral home is claimed to be Usak Edet (Isangele, Isanguele) in South western Cameroon. According to (Ford and Jones), the Ibibio settlement of Isangele remnants (The Bakoko people) now forms a small tribe in the Ndian department who share strong cultural affinity with the Ibibio. (Noah, 1980a).
In pursuance of the hypothesis, field workers who frequented this part of the country speculatively attested to a similar school of thought that the core Ibibio people hail from Afaha lineage; whose original home is Usak Edet or “Edet Afaha” (Afaha’s Creek) as fondly ascribed by the Ibibio.
Before long, upon emigrating from Cameroon, the Ibibio arrived at their present location following two major directions.
One major group reached Nigeria by an overland route and settled at Ibom in Arochukwu. Here, they erected a shrine dedicated to the worship of the famous Ibritam or Ibin okpabi (long juju) god. Some sources, however, point that they actually arrived in observance of their host worshiping the said god. This form of adoration however did stir resentment amongst the Ibibio which resulted in conflict and their eventual expulsion from Aro Dynasty.
Some sources point out that religious and social rifts between the host and their arrivals widened; as the latter celebrated (Ndok) festivity hence the provocation and subsequent expulsion from Ibom. The aftermath was the Ibibio emigrating to Abak, Uyo, Ikot Ekpene, Itu and part of Cross River. While the second group of Ibibios set ashore via sea; which constitutes Uruan, Oron, Eket, and Ibeno people.
The split of the sub-group (now called the Efik) from their kinfolk the (Uruan), seem to have commenced around the sixteenth century. After an exit from Ikoneto, the greater part advanced to Mbiabo and Adiabo and while others to Creek Town.
Talbot, who for many years conducted anthropological research among the Ibibio, suggested that the Efik started to claim a separate identity by about 1600 AD.
The final settlement of the Efik, according to some sources seems to have occurred in 1670. At about this time some of the Efik chiefs from Creek Town who were cut off from their kin at Obutong by European traders, moved to a new site now called Duke Town. This is about four kilometers south of 0butong, at a strategic location just across the anchorage of the European trading ships.
OPPOSITION TO THE THEORY Jeffreys (1927) in his publication contradicted the hypothesis that the Ibibio had migrated from far-off-lands in Africa to their present homelands. Adding that there are no legends nor tradition to support this theory. He postulated that they must have settled in the Forest belt for centuries to have forgotten their history.
The migratory assumption has become a subject of debate amongst Ibibio intellects, however speculative and varied it may recur.
As earlier mentioned, Traditional sources suggest that the earliest family of the Ibibio which constitutes the Afaha clan ancestral home is Usak Edet (Isangele) in South-western Cameroon. The theory is in addition, supported by substantial similarities between the Ibibio and the former (bakoko people of southern Cameroon) as stated by Noah, (1980).
It was further suggested that the Ibibio people migrated from the eastern axis of their current homeland in two major directions. One group may have arrived at the Ibibio Mainland by an overland route and settled at Ibom in Arochukwu formerly an Ibibio territory (Noah 1980b).
This was supported by Jeffreys (1927) who stated that the Ibibio lived in Arochukwu probably between A.D. 1300 and 1400 and for a long time maintained a famous shrine called Long Juju of Arochukwu (Ibritam). But this latter suggestion is discounted by Aye as he postulated that the Ibibio have no such tradition nor practice of such a cult. Meanwhile, most scholars continue to sustain the theory of Ibom in Arochukwu as the cradle of Ibibio expansion.
It is thought that the people of present-day Abak, Uyo and Ikot Ekpene who are described as Eastern Ibibio or Ibibio proper might have migrated from that part of the country, although as we shall see later, the structural layout of their clans today barely supports this viewpoint.
The migration pattern of the Ibibio from the south-western highlands of Cameroon to the Lower Cross River Basin is assumed by most scholars to have occurred in two phases.
The first passages are natural ravine namely the Benue and Mamfe Troughs while the second is via Niger-Benue credited for being a domain of great historical and cultural melting pot of the proto-bantu people.
The geological history of the south-eastern lowlands however shows that only the Oban Massifs and Adamawa Highlands stood above the sea. during those periods. This suggests that the Lower Cross River basin might have remained under the sea for ‘a long time’ (Dessau and Whiteman, (1972). Coupled with a dense forest which at its primeval era would have been a very difficult terrain to surmount. In other respects, as the Ibibio migrated from Ibom and adjusted to their riverine environment, the Cross River and its numerous tributaries would have certainly posed a formidable barrier some suggest.
Another school of thought assert that the Ikono Centre of Dispersion Hypothesis is key to understanding the origin of the Ibibio nation. It speculates that the cradle of the Ibibio people lies somewhere between the Abak and Uyo axis of Akwa Ibom State. How about the “Ibom center” hypothesis?
A theory that suggests a migratory pattern (resembling a fan or beam from a torchlight) as opposed to a fan-like shape layout of clans as some Ibibio scholars might have assumed? Peradventure, the “Ikono center theory”, which suggests that the Ibibios might have occupied this stretch of land for centuries thus, no basis to support the Ibom and Isanguele hypothesis.
It suggests a settlement resembling a diffusion of pattern in ripples, which mimics a stone dropped into a pond or the spokes of a wheel.
The Ikono center theory findings demonstrate that at least sixteen major clans are speculating to have evolved from a common epicenter namely Ikono. It further embodies a perfect shape which significantly incorporates sub-clan from the western, eastern, northern and southern stock.
Finally, it is apparent to reckon that the narrative in this sense is inconclusive. Thus, I would to admonish that the appropriate office in Akwa Ibom State take charge to sponsor, promote and support initiatives geared towards acquisition of knowledge in this domain. It could be achieved by setting up a committee in charge of drafting, conducting and publication of works devoted on our heritage. It is recommended that this publication be distributed to all educational institutions in the state both in hard and soft copy. BBC News Igbo Igbo history.TV
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