Keeping the record
Yoruba societies kept their history through spoken and performed forms. Oriki, praise poetry, records the deeds and character of people, lineages and towns. At the Oyo court, hereditary historians known as arokin recited royal genealogies, often with drummers.
From voice to page
Samuel Johnson, a Yoruba clergyman of the Church Missionary Society, gathered these traditions into The History of the Yorubas. He finished the manuscript in 1897. After the original was lost, his brother Obadiah rebuilt it from his notes, and it was published in 1921. It remains a foundation of the field.
Memory as politics
What is remembered is not neutral. Rival towns told different versions of their origins to support claims of seniority, and colonial rule later fixed some versions in law and administration. Studying Yoruba memory means asking who kept the story, and for what purpose.
Further reading
- Samuel Johnson, The History of the Yorubas (CMS Bookshop, Lagos, 1921)
- Karin Barber, I Could Speak Until Tomorrow: Oriki, Women and the Past in a Yoruba Town (1991)