₦airaland Forum

In a pomp filled occasion, Nigerians, Ghanians and other guests celebrated the 100 year peaceful legacy of migrant African Chief Brimah the 1st in Accra this weekend. Chief Brimah I who migrated to the Gold coast from Nigeria, passed in 1902.

The occasion was attended by Ghana's high chiefs, the Ga Mantse, a representative of the Nigerian High Commission among others. Addresses were given by the Mayor of Accra, Alfred Oko Vanderpuije the national Chief Imam Sheikh Dr. Osman Nuhu Sharubutu, Chief Brimah VII, other distinguished members of the Brimah family and invited guests.

As with all occasions of the Ghana Yoruba chiefdom, it was a day to celebrate beautiful African culture, integration and harmonious coexistence of interrelated cultures and the peaceful and progressive growth and development.

History

In the early 19th century, pockets of Yoruba’s from the old Oyo Empire and environs, migrated to the Gold coast out of adventure and in search for new habitation. Others went with trade in mind. The first group of Yorubas arrived in the Gold Coast around 1813 and initially settled in such places as Accra, Kumasi and Sekondi before moving to the northern part of the Gold Coast, especially Tamale, Wa, Lawra and Nandom.

There are several prominent families that left different parts of South-west Nigeria and settled in the Gold Coast. The Alawiye’s is one such large family. One of the noted migrations was that of Chief Ibrahim, whose name was later Anglicized to “Brimah.” He set out from Ilorin with a retinue which included Alhaji Girigisu, Alhaji Shaibu, Alawiye’s, and his two first children. They also traveled with a lot of livestock. Along the way they joined up with Nigerians from Kano. These Northerners preferred the north of Ghana and settled there while Chief Brimah I and company continued as a spiritualist had advised them till they got to the sea at Accra.

In the early 19th century, hundreds of Yoruba’s migrated to Ghana and many more are first, second and third generation citizens. The Yoruba’s are an integral positive part of Ghanaian society. Some have lived here so long and have gone through so many generations that the younger ones barely speak Yoruba. Most however are able to speak 3-5 languages, Yoruba, Hausa, Twi, English and Ga. During conversations you find them switching from one language to another.

Chief Brimah I

Chief Brimah I formed the first settlement in British Accra, known as “Zongo,” where strangers who visit Accra settle. Hausa’s Fulani’s and Wangrans all settled in Zongo under this Yoruba king. Chief Brimah I came with his Cattle from Ilorin and where he settled was renamed Cow lane; this was the first settlement in Accra. He built houses and allocated some to friends and foreigners. Engaged in Kola nut trade between Nigeria and Ghana, supported by a wonderful businesswomen wife, he rose to a very wealthy status and was known for his philanthropy and generosity. Appreciating his qualities and for “clearing the forest,” his Royal Highness, the Ga Mantse, Nii (King) Tackie Tawiah I made him a Chief and gave him the “Sword of Office,” in 1888.

The first post office in Ghana was in Accra where Chief Brimah I built his palace on land allocated to him by King Tackie Tawiah I. The street was called Horse road, because Chief Brimah I kept horses and built a stable there. Chief Brimah I built the first Mosque in Accra at Rawlings Park with contributions from other Nigerians. The Mosque was built with Oak wood from a ship wreck. He also set up Arabic literary schools in Accra with the cooperation of the government. He built the first slaughter house in Accra. Now called Salaga market.


When the British came to the Gold Coast and they set-up the first running-water, pipe-borne water with tap. The locals thought this was juju (voodoo) and were afraid to open the tap. Chief Brimah I who was known for his faith and worldly experience was called, and after making prayers he “courageously” opened the tap. In the Ga council which governs Accra, he is one of the few with a seat on the council, which is occupied today by the current Chief in the lineage.

Quoted is a record of him from the Ghana Archives that describes the view of this Yoruba migrant in 1878-1899:

Alhaji Braimah’s position was unique. Not only was he a man of considerable wealth, but he had the advantage of having visited Mecca, an unusual experience for a native of these parts, and it was these conditions coupled no doubt with a certain degree of worldly wisdom that enabled a despised Yoruba to exercise control and influence over the Hausas. I have the honor to be Sir, Your obedient servant.

Signed ACTING COMMISSIONER EASTERN PROVINCE

Tabom Relationship

Tabom are repatriated Yoruba – Brazilian – Ga slaves. The Tabom are also part of the rich Yoruba history of Ghana. The word Tabom is traced to the repatriation of West African slaves from Brazil. The name is believed to be derived from the Portuguese greeting, ‘Es Ta Bon?’, ‘is all well?’ Some say Taa means “tomorrow,” and bom means “good,” the word coming from “good-morning.” Taboms, use Yoruba words in cultural rituals in the Tabon Mantse Palace. These words, which include “Sango,” have been passed on from generation to generation over the past 170 years since the arrival of the slaves.

Revolutionaries

The history of the Tabom who were returned to Lagos and the Gold Coast, entails the historic great “Malê Revolt” in Brazil. “Malê” originates from the Yoruba description of “Islam” as a “tough,” faith, “Imale”. Following the Haitian revolution which led to independence of the Island, the Malê Muslims in Portugal likewise plotted a revolution. Possible sabotage compromised their attempt at freedom; however they fought a brave fight. At the end of it, the colonialists killed some Malê, flogged and imprisoned others and deported many more out of fear of their capacity to revolt. They also instituted forced conversion to Catholicism. The Malê Revolt is considered a major turning point in Slavery in Brazil, contributing to its end. This is the history of the repatriation of Tabom to Ghana and the Aguda to Lagos.

The Taboms brought Gas the well-digging, irrigation, tailoring, shoe-making, masonry and using blocks for structures to Ghana. The Morton Tabom family headed the First Scissors House in Accra, which was the first tailoring shop in the nation’s capital.

The Taa-bon occupied “Engleshi,” now called Brazil Road. One repatriate, Mamman Nasir is said to have arrived in the Gold Coast in 1836 with his cousin Adjuma. His first generation descendant was Fatima Peregrino. The Ga State King had Fatima Peregrino marry Chief Brimah I, the first Head of the Islamic community in the Gold Coast colony as a show of appreciation.

Also Read: Man arrested after taking 'weapon' into Ghanaian leader's church

Fatima’s brother, Francis Zaka (F.Z.S) Peregrino traveled to London and then to South Africa. During Nelson Mandela’s visit to Ghana, in his reply to President Jerry Rawlings’ welcome address, he referred to F.Z.S Peregrino, an editor and publisher in America and South Africa, as one of the singularly courageous Ghanaians who joined forces with South African congress to fight Apartheid.

Descendant Chief Brimahs

A series of Yoruba chiefs have since occupied the throne. Late Chief Brimah VII, Aziz Brimah is well known for his being among the 375,000 Africans who volunteered to fight with the Allied forces in WWII; as part of the “forgotten 14th army.” He was commemorated by the Queen of England memorial gates trust as one of the brave Africans to go fight the Japanese in Burma. Late Chief Aziz Brimah and a hand full of other veterans led a protest for the liberalization of Ghana from Colonial rule. This led to Ghana’s independence in 1956, and subsequently the independence of all West Africa.

Chief Brimah VII

Current Chief, Brimah VII is Nigerian Ambassador (rtd) MBP Brimah, who was coronated in 2009. He served with the Nigerian Ministry of External Affairs till 1985 when he retired at the termination of the then Muhammadu Buhari government. He was a member of the Organization of African Unity (OAU) Commission of seven (7) on Sanctions against Apartheid South Africa which toured the Republic of Zambia, the Republic of Botswana, and the Republic of Lesotho in South Africa. He also served on the OAU Commission of fifteen (15) on Refugees in July 1980, which visited the Ogaden, the Ethiopian War Zone. Later, posted to Geneva, Switzerland, in December 1980, in higher capacity as the Deputy Permanent Representative of Nigeria to the United Nations, he served on the United Nations Committee on Disarmament and on the on the United Nations Commission on the Laws of the Sea. He retired voluntarily in 1985 with rank of a full minister (Ambassador). In 2008 he was appointed by the UN as Honorary adviser on African Human rights and War Refugees.

http://www.news24.com.ng/MyNews24/Ghana-celebrates-legacy-of-Yoruba-Migrant-Chief-Brimah-I-20150813

Smh, why would anyone set fire to their cultures when others are busy promoting their tradition beliefs.

This is a big deal!, congratulation to him and his family.

Watch "Bata Drumming by John Santos" on YouTube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RH5SBktNZK4

scholes0:
^^ The sound of the Bata is just fantastic.....

I know i have heard that song she sang somewhere before.....
Here....


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=odAR0614Cz8

and here:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=clMg33x1_e4

The ibeyi girls are great, went to see their show few months ago and they we also be at cocobar in london on 3rd of november.

Watch "Lisette Santiago on LP Bata Drums" on YouTube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=te9gBDT1J3c

zt:
The work done at Ile-Ife was a success with many materials to analyse. I Can't wait to see the publications from this Work. I trust Gerard Chouin, His analytical mind is Mind Blowing.

great!!, looking forward to the publication aswell...

adexy27:
RIP Afrika

I remember Africa as if it was yesterday. RIP Africa.

Ise oluwa ni....

Watch "Sing For Water - Ise Oluwa.mov" on YouTube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=49-a_Azk5Y0

anonimi:
What lower level can a slave and beggar go to

Continue calling people names on the internet if that make you feel better about yourself.

anonimi:
Where did you get politician from?

Please learn to read before you comment.

Thanks.

Will not bring myself to your level...

Good night.

CURRICULUM VITAE
Emmanuel O. Akala, R.Ph., Ph.D.
1306 Forest Lake Court
Mitchellville, MD 20721
Tel: 301-257-2863 or 301-333-2607 Fax:301-333-2608
e-mail: eakala@howard.edu or eakala@verizon.net
EDUCATIONAL BACKGROUND:
B.Pharm. (Pharmacy) 1980, University of Ife, Ile-Ife, Nigeria. Dissertation title: "Modes of Action of
Some Peptide Antibiotics".
Mentor: E. O. Ogunlana, Ph.D. (Professor).
M.Sc. Pharmaceutics, 1983, University of Ife, Ile-Ife, Nigeria. Thesis title: "Assessment of
Cassava Starch Binder on Granules and Tablets”
Mentor: R.N. Nasipuri, Ph.D. (Professor)
Ph.D. Pharmaceutics, 1986, The University of Manchester, England.
Thesis title: "Studies on Photopolymerized PolyHEMA Hydrogel Systems for Drug Delivery".
Mentor: J.H. Collett, Ph.D., D.Sc. (Professor).
DAAD Fellow: Institute of Biopharmaceutics and Pharmaceutical Technology, University of
Muenster, The Federal Republic of Germany, 1993.
Mentor: R. Groning, Ph.D. (Professor).
Fellow, National Institutes of Health Fogarty International Center, USA and Research Associate,
Department of Pharmaceutics and Pharmaceutical Chemistry/ Center for Controlled Chemical
Delivery, and Department of Bioengineering, University of Utah, USA. (1994 - 1996)
Advisor: Jindrich Kopecek, Ph.D., D.Sc. (Distinguished Professor, Department of Pharmaceutics
and Pharmaceutical Chemistry; Distinguished Professor of Bioengineering, University of Utah).
National Association of Boards of Pharmacy Foreign Graduate Examination (USA)
Dec.3, 1995
Research Associate, Departments of Pharmaceutics and Pharmaceutical Chemistry and
Bioengineering, University of Utah (1996 - 1997).
Registered Pharmacist (Nigeria) 1982
Registered Pharmacist (Utah) November, 1997.
Registered Pharmacist (Maryland) March, 1998.
Registered Pharmacist (Washington, D.C.) August, 1998
Immunization Pharmacist, June 2010

anonimi:
Was he awarded the research grant by Dangote, Otedola, Tinubu, Amaechi, Sanusi or some other Nigerian rich person abi what is the joy in celebrating the fact that we remain BEGGARS to people who are EQUALLY created and endowed as we are

So we should not celebrate hard work again because nigerian politician are not awarding money for research?

papparatzzi2013:
Is he Alao Akala's brother?

Hahahha.....He graduated from OAU.. , forever great IFE.

OREMUSSANCTUS:
Is Akala igbo or Niger delta?
#crying

He is nigerian...shm

WASHINGTON (July 8, 2015) – Emmanuel O. Akala, Ph.D., director of the Center for Drug Research and Development, has been awarded a prestigious NIH/National Cancer Institute grant of $1,132,500 for three years to support innovative breast cancer research. 

Dr. Akala also is professor of pharmaceutics in the Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences in the College of Pharmacy. The project title is “Novel Nanotechnology Platform for Breast Cancer Treatment.”  

The human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) over expression has been reported in 20%–25% of all breast cancers and is associated with a poor prognosis. The grant will assist Dr. Akala to develop multifunctional polymeric nanoparticles to test the hypothesis that tri-modal combination nanoparticles will prove more effective with less toxicity than current standard of care therapies for HER2-positive breast cancers. This nanotechnology platform for breast cancer treatment will, when completed, bring to bear the combined power of a chemotherapeutic agent, molecular targeted therapy and HSP90 inhibitor, to overcome HER2 breast cancer resistance with minimal toxicity. 

A second grant is a collaboration between Dr. Akala and Dr. Oleg Bol'shakov of South Ural State University in Russia. The one-year, $110,000 grant will be funded by CRDF Global, an independent nonprofit organization that promotes international scientific and technical collaboration between international researchers.  Dr. Bol’shakov is a former post-doctoral fellow who trained under Dr. Akala’s supervision.  

Dr. Akala received his Bachelor of Pharmacy degree in 1980 from the University of Ife in Ile-Ife, Nigeria and his Ph.D. degree from the University of Manchester, England. He also served as a DAAD Research Fellow with the German Academic Exchange Program in1993, which gave him the opportunity to conduct research in Germany.He is a registered pharmacist in Nigeria, Utah, Maryland and Washington, D.C.  Dr. Akala has made significant contributions to the College of Pharmacy and was honored as the 2013 Distinguished Faculty Member of the Year” by the Howard University School of Pharmacy Alumni Association. 

About Howard University:

Founded in 1867, Howard University is a private, research university that is comprised of 13 schools and colleges. Students pursue studies in more than 120 areas leading to undergraduate, graduate and professional degrees. Since 1998, the University has produced two Rhodes Scholars, two Truman Scholars, a Marshall Scholar, 30 Fulbright Scholars and 11 Pickering Fellows. Howard also produces more on campus African-American Ph.D. recipients than any other university in the United States. For more information on Howard University, call 202-238-2330, or visit the University's Web site atwww.howard.edu.

Slave trade is nothing to be proud about especially consedering the fact that igbo culture did not survive in the new world (Apart from few people in jamaica that are still practice obean).

[quote author=walexy30 post=35249157][/quote]Religion have great influence on people in general and i still remember many christians changing their eshugbemi, ogunfunmi, ifaseun into oluwaseun e.t.c, so its not just arabic things.

Im not saying people should not give their children yoruba firstname but its not a big deal if anyone want to give their children religion inclined names either especially when all these foreign/religion name have already been yorubanised in one way or the other.

I think its other way around in some degree, yoruba in general usually yorubanised foreign name, for example aisha became aishatu and i never come accross any arab that named there kids wasiu, lamidi or kudirat. However religion is at the core of human existence so a yoruba christian can bear john or simon and a yoruba muslim can also bear Ali or ibrahim as long their surname is not religion/foreign inclined such as jonathan,bonyface, goodluck, fynecountry, george and so on..

Great!!, let the austerity start with the politician.

scholes0:
Stop cooking up tales ..... lol

Hahhahah...dont you know egba are igbo..lol

Watch "Chat with Yeye" on YouTube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3i_otGuA-kE

Mapletraks:
^^^^^^
@Lushore1

I think DNA tests should even be carried out
on the remains of Oduduwa if they can find it
with the aid of a device called ground-penetrating radar. The DNA of the Ife Dynasty
and the Oba of Benin can also be taken to
really settle the rather vexacious claim that
Oduduwa was an Ogiso-era prince who was
exiled from his original homeland before
wandering into Ife. Patrilineal and Matrilineal
DNA tests can be done


The co-founders of www.AfricanAncestry.com
coincidentally had direct maternal DNA showing
that both of them had Yoruba maternal
ancestry despite being Americans.

The Oduduwa original origin can be resolved
via this DNA testing.

I really do not think that is necessary, yoruba and benin are cultural related via oduduwa(depend on which story you believe) and no amount of DNA testing will change that and you have to remember that there were yoruba in ile-ife before oduduwa.

macof:
I just wish The Ooni and his chiefs can give access to certain deep areas

I really don't see why He wouldn't give them access especially considering the impact and how much the discovery of Ori Olokun contributed to Yoruba history and Africa Art in general. I took my my sons to British museum recently and i felt so proud telling him about his ancestor.

I'm equally fascinated and exciting about Sungbo Eredo as well, hopefully we will find out more about it.....

macof:
Back in the good old days Ooni doesn't even show his face outside

A God King right there. ..Arole Oduduwa Jigbinni bi ate Ekun

Really can't wait to see what these archaeologist will find in ife, another sets of ori olokun would be wonderful.

remains for remnants of the plague bacillus. Teeth of individuals dead for 800 years can still contain shreds of plague DNA.
"Basically, the tooth is connected to the bloodstream. And this disease circulates in the bloodstream," he said. "When an individual dies, the tooth enamel forms a kind of a safe, and encloses this evidence in the pulp. We are able to open the safe and extract the DNA that is inside."
Provided by The College of William & Mary

http://phys.org/news/2015-06-yorubaland-drones-trail-plague.html

are still considered as sacred grounds, but there is no very clear of sense of who, what, where, why, it was made in the oral traditions."
Chouin will probe the mysteries of Sungbo's Eredo, using camera-carrying quadcopters to examine stretches of the overgrown earthworks. In the weeks before he left Williamsburg, he had a number of flight-and-software training sessions with Sean Pada, a technology support engineer with William & Mary's Office of Information Technology. Pada and Chouin put the quadcopters through their paces in sessions above the Sunken Garden and the Dillard Complex, switching software modes as required to get ready for GPS mapping and photography of Sungbo's Eredo.
Chouin is returning to Ijebu with his own set of hypotheses. He says that this Nigerian version of the Great Wall of China is probably too big to be a strictly defensive feature.
"I always look at this enclosure as serving several functions," he said. "It's could have been a kind of a prestige monument that was built to show other people outside how powerful the people living inside were."
The first step in cracking the mystery of Sungbo's Eredo is getting a handle on the chronology. Chouin explained that while the Dallas-sized area inside the earthworks includes several settlements, they aren't near the walls. As a consequence, he doesn't expect the earthworks themselves to be artifact-rich.
"In ditches like Ile-Ife, because it's within an urban settlement, you have some kind of cultural material that ends up in these ditches. They throw their garbage," he said. "But when you are very far from settlements, you are left with a great big piece of sand and laterite. How do you date this?"
In an attempt to make sense of what is expected to be an artifact-poor site, Chouin's team will include a geologist, who can evaluate eight centuries of change to the earthworks of Sungbo's Eredo. The geologist, he explained, would study erosion of the
features as well as interpreting anything that the archaeologists dig up.
"You go through it and you might discover some fragments of charcoal," Chouin said, adding that the geologist will help to put such findings in context. "Is this actually part of a layer that was older and accidentally carried in to build this monument? Or does this charcoal actually date this monument?"
Chouin hopes his work in Nigeria this summer will help to advance his understanding of the process of urbanization of African areas. He also has a hypothesis about the Black Death's role in what he calls "deurbanization"—the events that led to the depopulation of the area inside Sungbo's Eredo, and perhaps Ife as well. Scholars working at sites across Africa are working to assemble pieces of similar deurbanization narratives, many of which date to the 14th century.
"We have colleagues working in Ethiopia, others in the Sahara," he said. "I work in western Africa. Other people are looking also at east Africa. We know about it but the problem is to actually demonstrate it—prove it."
Chouin points out that there is copious documentation about the bubonic plague's effects throughout Europe, North Africa and around the Black Sea. Proving that the bubonic plague emptied one or more of the great urbanized areas of Africa requires a different sort of evidence.
"The problem in sub-Saharan Africa is that we have no written sources about the plague," he said. "That's 14th century. That's a period in which there are limited written sources and they often have a religious function, rather than historical."
When written sources are scarce, he said, "then we are left with archaeology, trying to get a better sense of it."
Chouin said only a limited number of mass graves have been found so far. Modern test methods will allow Chouin and his colleagues to test human

abound. He said that one of the most reliable sources on the land and its people is a compendium written by a Yoruba who shares a name with the great 18th century English lexicographer.
"Samuel Johnson was a Yoruba who was trained as an Anglican pastor. He picked up an interest in gathering and writing down the history of the Yoruba," Chouin said. Johnson's British printer misplaced the manuscript, but his brother rewrote the book and A History of the Yorubas from the Earliest Times to the Beginning of the British Protectorate was published in 1921, years after Samuel Johnson's death.
Centuries of urbanization have made much of modern Ile-Ife inaccessible to archaeologists, but some features still figure in everyday life in the town. The ancient Yoruba had developed a solution to at least one aspect of living in a tropical rain forest.
"The public courtyards were actually covered with pavement. They were paved with potshards, which were placed vertically," Chouin explained. "The rainy season is long and it's very ingenious to have this system of pavement, which creates millions of small gutters, because the pottery creates little channels. Basically it was a way to evacuate water and to keep your feet dry."
It takes two to use a quadcopter for research—one to fly the device (using the controller on the case) and a second to work a tablet, used for switching functions and monitoring the on-board camera. Gerard Chouin gives Sean Pada a little shade to get things started. Credit: Joseph McClain
Some of the shard-paved courtyards remain, along with other remnants of ancient Ife. One of Chouin's goals is to map and log these surviving features using GIS technology.
"You can go to Ile-Ife and see nothing, but I know what to look for," Chouin said. "We will be looking at some of the surviving ditches around the medieval city. We are hoping to uncover in the ditches some material that has been deposited from the time of the construction up to the abandonment of the city."
Ditches, wells and other diggings are interesting to archaeologists, he explained, because residents of towns invariably use them as dumps, and such diggings consequently become artifact magnets. A broken, discarded tool or other piece of rubbish from centuries past becomes a valued, important artifact to an archaeologist, once it has been recovered.
Sungbo's Eredo offers a set of mysteries even deeper than those of Ile-Ife. Chouin said that the term describes an ancient and enormous set of earthworks in Ijebu, in southern Nigeria. The earthworks extend over 170 kilometers, encompassing about a thousand square kilometers—an area the size of metropolitan Dallas. Its history and even function have been a matter of speculation.
In fact, Chouin says, not much is known for sure about the earthworks. Such monuments exist in other places in tropical Africa; Chouin himself has investigated similar features in southern Ghana. The working presumption among scholars is that Sungbo's Eredo dates to the 12th century.
"The Ijebu oral traditions are not very clear about the monument. Its functions and its history seem to have been forgotten," he said. "Many sections of it

The city of Ife has been significant to the Yoruba people of West Africa for as long as they can remember. It was briefly abandoned in the 19th century, and Gerard Chouin says the Yoruba repopulated the town, likely drawn back to the deserted site because of its cultural and religious significance.
"It's like Rome," he explained, "Rome in the medieval period, when the pope was not only the religious head, but also like a king."
Ife, now known as Ile-Ife, has been the historic seat of the pope-king of the Yoruba. This individual is known as the Ooni, a venerated position that extends back for centuries, Chouin said. There is an incumbent Ooni in Ile-Ife today; he has a web site.
"A lot of things have changed," Chouin said. "You can meet the Ooni, which you could not do a few centuries ago, even up until the 19th century."
Chouin is an assistant professor in William & Mary's Lyon G. Tyler Department of History. He is a member of an international team of scholars and
scientists returning to Nigeria in June to probe the mysteries of Ife and an even more enigmatic place known as Sungbo's Eredo, using a combination of traditional archaeology and scholarship combined with high-tech tools such as drones and DNA analysis. Both sites were large urbanized places in medieval times. Sungbo's Eredo was abandoned and no one knows why. Chouin hopes to find evidence to support his belief that the bubonic plague was as destructive a force in urban Africa as it was in the cities of Europe.
The two locations present a contrast in challenges for scholarship. The once-deserted Ile-Ife now has a population of more than half a million. The name Ile-Ife, Chouin said, hints at the draw the locality has for the Yoruba.
"'Ile' means 'home' in Yoruba. So it's home of Ife—the ancient town of Ife," he explained. Yorubaland has long attracted the interest of European scholars, but Chouin said even urban IleIfe has seen very little professional archaeology. He said Europeans were intrigued by the artistic works found in the area. Art objects brought 20th-century scholar-explorers, notably the German Leo Frobenius, to Ile-Ife.
"The art baffled the European world, because when they were discovered, they looked in their minds so much like Greek sculptures. They were not at all like what they were expecting from African sculptures," Chouin explained. "So for a very long time in the 20th century, there were all these theories about the art of Ife being actually being brought by foreigners—all kind of stories."
The stories are essentially Eurocentric and often fanciful—Frobenius maintained that he had discovered Atlantis. But Chouin is interested in the real history of Yorubaland, where oral traditions

Ancient African Religion Finds Roots In America


In the suburbs of Seattle, an ancient West-African religion is gaining followers. Yoruba, from the Yoruba people of Nigeria, has been spreading across the U.S. for the last 50 years. The religion is particularly popular with African-Americans who find it offers a spiritual path and a deep sense of cultural belonging.

Looking For Answers

Wesley Hurt's Yoruba story begins the night he met his wife, Cheri Profit. It was nearly eight years ago, not long after a tour in Iraq. He had just gotten off for weekend release from an Army base in Tacoma, Wash.

Hurt was ready to go out and have a good time. He and some friends went to a club, where he saw Profit. She avoided him at first, but eventually he got her attention. Not long after their meeting, they were a couple.

They bonded quickly — over food, politics and religion. These two seekers were constantly rethinking their relationships to the divine.

"With my mother, we were Jehovah's Witness, we were Pentecostals, we were Baptists, we were Seventh-day Adventist," Profit says. "It did not work for me."

Hurt had been a Southern Baptist for most of his life.

"And a lot of things have brought me to try to find my spirit," he says. "So ... of course, you start off in church asking questions, and, you know, I didn't get the answers that I wanted."

So Hurt, a 32-year old Atlanta native, started exploring — first Judaism, then Islam. He was looking for something that spoke to his spirit and to his blackness. About two years ago, he found a home in one of Yoruba's esoteric branches, called Ifa.

"What brought me to Ifa is that how close this tradition is linked to us as African-Americans in this country," he says.

This feeling is familiar to many black Americans who practice Yoruba today, just as it did with those who have been practicing for years. In New York City in the 1950s, African-American Yoruba communities began to grow alongside a surging black nationalist movement.

For several decades, the religious tradition spread down the East Coast and westward, to Chicago, to Oakland and Los Angeles — and to the Seattle area, where Hurt met an Ifa priest named Ifagbemi.

Entering A 'Sacred Relationship'

At a recent gathering, Hurt, Profit and a group of about a dozen other believers worshiped in a circle on the carpeted floor in Ifagbemi's bare dining room. The priest sat with them, shifting between English and the Yoruba language as he lead them through an Ifa ritual.

Ifagbemi's path has been a lot like Hurt and Profit's: a black American, born in Topeka, raised in a Christian home. He embraced Ifa as a young adult and later initiated into the priesthood. For nearly four years, he has headed this small group of devotees.

"When you enter into this stuff, you're enter into a sacred relationship with people that you're working with," Ifagbemi says. "I think it's a privilege."

He runs the group mostly from his apartment, where he has converted one of the carpeted bedrooms into a sacred space full of shrines to the gods of Yoruba's pantheon, spirits called "orisa."

There's a long table covered with pure white cloth and spread with sliced watermelon, bananas and gin — gifts to the divine.

Along with a life of worship, Ifagbemi says part of his job as a full-time priest is to help people adapt this ancient religion to a modern, American reality.

"We're not African anymore," he says. "I need to sort of emphasize to a lot of African-Americans that yes, this is an African tradition, yes, we want to connect with our roots and whatever else. But our roots are here, too."

It's a lesson he's been impressing on Hurt and Profit. Ifa's tenets resonate with them: good character, respect for elders. Plus, there's an element of homecoming in the ways this African faith speaks to them as black people.

But it was different for Profit in the early days, when her husband introduced her to Ifa. "Initially — I'm not gonna lie — I was a little hesitant at first," she says. "It was just the general notion, you know, you shouldn't do that."

With Yoruba's shrines and statues and worshipers going into trance states, some newcomers admit that the African traditions might disturb the folks at church back home.

What helped calm Profit's worries was a ceremony where the faith came alive for her.

"They had the drums going, and the ladies were up dancing, and after a while, I was, 'Hey!' 'Cause I was feeling it! I got up, I danced, I was dancing — me and the other women, and it felt good," she says. "I've never experienced that in church, and I've been to church many, many times."

'Finding Myself'

Tracey Hucks, chairwoman of the religion department at Haverford College, says, "for so many African-Americans, this tradition has been a space of freedom and a space of home."

She says blacks in America have been drawn to Yoruba for more than a half-century because it offers them an ancient spiritual heritage, one that predates slavery in the United States. At the same time, she adds, it helps them affirm their racial identities in this new world.

"And it also allows them to be able to affirm their black physicality, in a place that has said that, 'You represent anti-beauty in this culture,' " she says. "It is this religion that comes and says, 'No, you look like the gods of Africa.' "

Doing rituals for those gods, dancing for them, and finding fellowship with her community, Profit says Ifa just feels right to her.

"It like it gives you a sense of purpose, and when you feel that, there's no other feeling like that, I feel like, in the world," she says. "When you feel that, you know."

Her husband, who had been searching for years for spiritual answers, has found his place, too.

"First, I was looking for God, but then I started finding myself," Hurt explains. "And in finding myself, I started bettering myself."

Ifagbemi's congregants, seated together in the priest's apartment for an intimate ritual, are all on paths a lot like Hurt's. They're trusting Ifagbemi as their guide.

To close the ceremony, he shakes a rattle and calls, and everyone responds with Yoruba's most ubiquitous blessing: ase. It's like saying "amen."

For the young couple with ties down South, for the Ifa priest from Kansas and for his small flock near Seattle — so far away from Ifa's West-African roots — this old tradition has given its followers a new home.

Funding for this story came from a Knight Grant for Reporting on Religion and American Public Life, a program of the University of Southern California.

http://www.npr.org/2013/08/25/215298340/ancient-african-religion-finds-roots-in-america

macof:
Actually there's every reason to keep your ancestral heritage. .. African Americans need to never forget their home, take regularly trips to the motherland but stay in America and do the black race proud

Exactly! and i am glad Yoruba culture/religion is playing important role in this process.......

macof:
wat took you so long to realize?

I initial thought my drink was spiked.. because i read his quote about three times and i still did'nt get it. he is one of the reasons i still visit nairaland though....