TAO11:


We're discussing facts here not opinions. Anyone can have any opinion. You may choose to opine that the present Oba of Benin is a woman. That you have that opinion doesn't mean you're stating a fact. So, dont get those two mixed up.

The issues are simple:

Do the Edos use the word "Oba" for royalty prior to the intervention of the Yorubas in their polity?

The fact backed answer is simply No. And your present Oba also agrees with the earliest and extant Bini materials on this issue where he said:

The FIRST OBA of BENIN is Oranmiyan from Ile-Ife.

This in effect means that the monarchs or kings used to be addressed differently as something else before Oranmiyan, certainly not "Oba".



Regarding whether or not Ekaladerhan is one and the same person as Oduduwa.

The fact backed answer is also simply No, considering that the earliest materials on Bini history and even by a prominent Bini historian identifies them as two separate entities.

So, coming with a Wikipedia narration which contradicts that will beg the question of when your Wikipedia narration first emerged; a question which experts have long answered as I have already pointed out earlier.

Your narration emerged according to experts, for the first time ever, some 44 years after the first ever indeginous Bini historian on Benin penned down and published a history of Benin in his classic "Ekhere vb Itan Edo".

The questions you should honestly be asking yourself when you're alone are:

Why is it that your Wikipedia version is not known prior to the 1978-9 coronation?

Why is it that the earliest known Bini source on Benin history by Benin's foremost and earliest historian contains the information it contains which is to the effect that Oduduwa is not one and the same person as Ekaladerhan?

Why should I discard the information in the earliest known indeginous Benin historical documentation, and go with an unknown account which emerged for the first time ever more than four decades later?

Do experts discard accounts closest to the event as passed down by the earliest informants from generation to generation in favour of an unknown but convinient account that emerged for the first time some over four decades later?

Your honest answers to the foregoing questions will guide you to realize that the account I have provided backed by the sources is more than sufficient to overrule your Wikipedia account which has been shown to be unknown and absent in Benin's historical narration prior to the 1978-9 coronation; and which has also been shown to be contradictory to the account widely known by Binis from the earliest times as contained in Chief Egharevba's indigenous collections also corroborated by Earlier European sources such as Talbot among others.

And if you insist on this particular imaginary Wikipedia Benin account of yours (a free online encyclopedia which I have contributed to before) even in the face of facts, then you have the obligation to put forward the sources of your Wikipedia account earlier than Egharevba's 1934 publication, or at least earlier than 1978 which is the date noted by Roger Blench and Matthew Spriggs in "Archaeology and Language I: Theoretical and Methodological Orientations" to mark the first ever emergence of your account.

Can you kindly share the source to this claim below

"Why is it that the earliest known Bini source on Benin history by Benin's foremost and earliest historian contains the information it contains which is to the effect that Oduduwa is not one and the same person as Ekaladerhan?"

Secondly, it's not wise to quote this bias historian named "Egharevba's" because it is alleged he's not credible especially because he's half Akure and half Edo. He schooled in the western part of Nigeria and while writing this thesis he got majority of his assistance from yoruba professors who were his mentor and obviously this professors influenced the final outcome of his research in relation to the heads of the bini obas buried in ile-ife.
There's no substantial proof to claim such an event ever happened. The only proof yorubas have is a picture of a tomb stone with words inscribed on the stone "orun oba ado". To me that is total nonsense because as far as I'm concerned that tomb is completely empty. But if you have well documented proof of names of the obas who's heads were buried in ile-ife then I will reconsider looking into the case. But until then it's all fake news.