Kings with limits
Yoruba towns were ruled by an oba together with a council of chiefs. Kings were chosen from royal lineages by kingmakers rather than by strict succession, and an oba who abused power could be rejected. In Oyo, rejection could mean ritual suicide; elsewhere it could mean exile or deposition.
Councils and societies
Power was spread across several bodies. Councils of chiefs represented lineages and quarters. The Ogboni, or Osugbo in Ijebu and Egba areas, combined religious, judicial and political roles. Age groups, guilds and market associations, often led by women chiefs such as the Iyalode, gave other groups a voice.
Ritual as constraint
The oba was sacred, often secluded and rarely seen in public. That sacredness made him powerful, but it also bound him to rules, taboos and the judgement of those who managed the rituals. Authority was legitimate only while it stayed within those limits.
Further reading
- Peter C. Lloyd, The Political Development of Yoruba Kingdoms in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries (1971)
- Robert S. Smith, Kingdoms of the Yoruba (3rd ed., 1988)
- Toyin Falola and Akintunde Akinyemi (eds.), Encyclopedia of the Yoruba (2016)