₦airaland Forum

The inquiry into ikwerre names and their meanings is beneficial if used for the sole purpose of informing the readers. It will also serve a good purpose when ikwerre words or names are used alongside igbo names to indicate similarities or none thereof. We can analyze those words and upgrade our vocabularies in the different dialects that constitute ikwerre and igbo languages.

All of igbo and ikwerre dialects can be grouped into one language, namely ikwerre language or igbo language. This may come to you as a shock since no one ever has the the neutral ground. Has it ever occurred to you that the igbos could be descendants of the ikwerres. and that migration may have gone northwards. Now is that a terrible thing to say. All Inquiries into history should start from admission of the individual parts that make up the whole and not the other way round.

I must inform you that what I claim in this little note is not an established fact. I am not a historian and not qualified to inform others on this subject. As an ikwerre son, I am tired of hearing one side of the story expressed everywhere. I agree with most of the voices that claim the ibos and the ikwerres to be one, and that the ikwerres rejection of kinship with the igbos was for geopolitical gain at a time in nigeria when the few ikwerre leaders were asked to choose between having an ikwerre nation or be part of an igbo nation that was losing a war. It was also a result of their historical experience in dealing with the igbos that they arrived at isolation from the ibos.

This is the shock I referred to earlier. THE IGBOS ARE DESCENDANTS OF IKWERRE. How is this remotely possible? We were taught in History that the first settlers stay close to source of water. They will fight for generations to protect their location. the community will continue to expand to less fertile regions. If the ibos who have always claimed to be brave warriors were the original settlers, they would have driven the ikwerres into the atlantic ocean and laid claim to what is presently and has always been and will forever be IKWERRELAND.

My deduction from all of these is that both ikwerre and ibos are one. There is an extensive proof to this in our common language, and that that language could be igbo or ikwerre or even the igbo spoken in Onitsha or asaba. Just because you have a larger population does not mean you are the main tribe and all others are descendants. Check the population of Egypt today and compare that to Nigeria. Let us be happy that we have more that unite us as we continue to travel this path of history. We may not agree to where we came from, please let us agree to where we are going.

THE OPINION EXPRESSED HERE AND THE POSITION TAKEN ARE MINE AND MINE ALONE. THEY ARE ONLY THE OPINION OF AN INDIVIDUAL
MY NAME IS AMEWHULE and igbo variants are AMAEFUNA, AFANAMEFUNA, AHANAMEFUNA, AMAEFULE AHAMEFULE which in both culture signify continuity.
Ask any ibo or ikwerre they will tell that continuity is ultimate objective in these cultures. May we continue to have male children. check out the names; HANACHOR, HANETU, WOKEKORO for ikwerre and IHEANYINACHOR, IFEANYINACHOR are for ibos. I am sure there are more of such names on both sides that signify the continuity of the family.