International African Institute

The Yoruba Lineage Author(s): P. C. Lloyd Source: Africa: Journal of the International African Institute, Vol. 25, No. 3 (Jul., 1955), pp. 235-251 Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of the International African Institute Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1157104 . Accessed: 14/01/2014 14:23
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[235]

THE YORUBA LINEAGE

P. C. LLOYD need little introduction.They are almost unique among Africanpeoples in that they live in large settlements,many of which were capitalsof chiefdoms;42 per cent. of them live in towns of over 20,000 people and there are nine towns with more than 5o,ooo inhabitants.'Ibadan,now the capitalof the Western Region of Nigeria, has a population of nearlyhalf a million. Those towns which were capitalswere, in the who exercised past, governed by kings (oba)and councils of chiefs (oloyeor ijoye) the and its titles of these the town territory; kings and sovereign powers throughout chiefs were usuallyvested in lineages,so that a chief held a dualposition as an elected representativeof his lineage and as a member of the council of chiefs in the town. Other towns were governed in a similarmanner,their rulersbeing subordinateto a king. The largesttowns, especiallythose in IbadanProvince, owe their size to the influx of refugeesfrom the crumblingOyo kingdomin the earlyand mid-I9th century; but it would appearthat long before this the capitalsof importantrulerswere towns of Io,ooo or more inhabitants.The origin of Yoruba kingship is obscure; the first rulers may have come as conquerers,but their arrival cannot be less than seven centuriesago and may have been much earlier. The Yoruba aretoday an homogeneouspopulationand their rulersare not an alien aristocracy.The importanceof the lineage structureamong the peoples of the West Africankingdomshas long been known, but little detailedstudy has been devoted to it. I propose here to examine the Yoruba lineage structureand then to show the relation between lineage and town. The Yoruba are divided into many tribal groups and, although a basic culturedisplayed in language, names of deities, titles of chiefs and their installationceremonies, &c.-seems common to all, the political structureof the various groups is most diverse. I shall describethe lineage structurein Oyo and Ekiti towns. These towns are formed of a large numberof lineages, whose elders can give the origin of in lineages. In the their own founders; in them most chieftaincytitles are hereditary but here the councils the is of chiefs include the towns lineage basicallysimilar, Ijebu and the age-set system or titled heads of associations such as the Ofugbo(Ogboni) Ipampa. These associationsencroachon the functions of the lineage structurein the part of Yoruba governmentof the town. In KabbaDivision, the most north-easterly all claim an Ekiti the inhabitants the descentfrom in of town and town, country, Oye, one man, whose sons founded the modern quarters of the town. These people, although unmistakablyYoruba, have a lineage structure which shows marked differencesfrom that which is common to other tribal groups. Since I was able to study it but slightly I will omit referenceto it here. A descriptionof the lineage structureof the Oyo and most Ekiti people will apply to the basic structureof the
I The figures are taken from the Bulletins of the Censusof the Weestern Regionof Nigeria I192, Population 1953-4, for Abeokuta, Ibadan, Ijebu, Ondo, and

a peoplenumbering over 5? million,livingin south-west Nigeria, T HE Yoruba,

Oyo Provinces and the Colony (which includes Lagos).

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THE YORUBA LINEAGE

lineages of almost all Yoruba tribal groups, while the features peculiar to those of Oyo and Ekiti will indicate the range of difference which is found.
THE YORUBACOMPOUND

Almost a century ago the Rev. T. J. Bowen, an American missionary, gave a description of Yoruba towns' (probably in Oyo): In consequence of frequent wars, all the towns, large and small, are surroundedby clay walls about five feet high and sufficientlythick to be a good defence.... At various convenient distancesthe wall is perforatedwith gates eight or ten feet wide which are closed at night with heavy shutters.... The streets of the best and largest cities are generallyvery narrow, crooked and intricate. You pass on with rough solid clay walls close by on each side, and the eaves of the low thatchedroofs almost brushingyou in the face; till at last, weary of monotony and filth you turn about to retraceyour steps and discover that you arelost in a network of interminable alleys... Africantowns have no public buildings except shabbylittle temples, and oboni houses, so rude in appearance as to attractno attention.... The house of the king differsfrom others which areweatherboardedwith grass only in size, and in the high sharpgables called kobbi, thatch. The houses of governors and other nobles, are in the sameunimposing style as those of the common people. Stone, another missionary, later described the Yoruba compound :2 A ' compound ' is an enclosed space (generallyin the form of a square)bounded by a wall about seven feet high. There is but one entrance to this enclosed space. At night and in times of dangerthis is closed by strong double doors well barred.Inside, against this wall, the rooms of the house are built. These rooms are squareand arecovered by a thatchedroof, which rests on the wall on the outside and on posts on the inside so as to give a covering for a piazza extending all around the enclosed space on the inside. In this piazza the inmates mostly live, the rooms being chiefly used for dormitoriesor for storage .... the court of the compound ... is thereforevery secureagainst thieves and beasts of prey prowling about at night. It is for this reason little better than a barnyard.... The compounds of the chiefs are very large sometimes covering several acres of ground. In such cases they are a perfect labyrinth of dwellings. . . . Away back in these recesses, surroundedby the most trustyof theirwives and retainers,the chiefs pass their leisurehours. Today one would have to go to the savanna country of the north of Oyo country to find towns almost completely composed of traditional compounds. In the cocoa belt the old compounds are vanishing and being replaced by modern one- and twostoried, cement-faced residences. Corrugated iron has replaced most of the thatch; the old walls and their gateways have gone, roads now cut through the towns. Yet, away from the new roads, relics of the old compounds remain, and here the descriptions of Bowen and Stone seem quite appropriate even today. There is little difference in the style of the compounds (agboile) in different Yoruba towns. In Ekiti the courtyards are small, often only io ft. square, and the veranda
and MissionaryLabours I T. J. Bowen, Adventures in SeveralCountries in theInterior of Africa from 1849 to i8r6, 1857, pp. 294-6.
2 R. H. Stone, In Afric's Forest and Jungleor Six Yearsamongthe Yorubans,I900, pp. 25-27.

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237 (ode) is open to the courtyard, the roof on its outer side being supported by posts. In Shaki and the surrounding towns, one of the few areas where the traditional compounds are still being built, the courtyards may extend to Ioo ft. square; here the veranda is completely enclosed by an outer wall giving entrance to the courtyard through a few small doorways. But these large courtyards may be a modern innovation. The compounds always lie close together. There may be a few vacant plots between buildings, where maize or tobacco is cultivated, but the farms are far from the town. The boundary of the land of each compound is clearly defined, for the founder of the compound is said to have been given this land by the king when he first arrived in the town. On this land, which would belong to his descendants in perpetuity, he was to build his compound. The head of the compound usually lives opposite the main gate. His quarters consist of an open parlour (in Ekiti, arowa) off the veranda, flanked by his own sleepingrooms. In this parlour he and the other old men sit while visitors sit on the veranda to talk with him. The remaining inhabitants of the compound are close kin of the compound head. A simple example will illustrate this point (see Fig. i). Popoola is the present Onishaki of Shaki in the north of Oyo Province; he built his present compound only four years ago. In it reside not only his own children but also the children of his late elder brother and some more distant kinsmen. It will be seen that each adult man and woman has a separate room; young children sleep with their parents. The children of Popoola and those of his brother live on opposite sides of the compound; those people who are more distantly related live near the entrance. If the population of the compound were to increase the two groups of children would probably establish their own courtyards. Thus all the inhabitants of a compound trace their descent from a common ancestor. No ideal pattern of the residence of kinsmen within a compound exists. The compound is a rigid structure built to last a century, and when it falls it is rebuilt on its old site. The compound head must allocate space to his kinsmen according to the possibilities offered by the building. This is the compound as one meets it when entering a Yoruba town for the first time. The Yoruba is highly conscious of his history and the visitor is soon taken to meet the elders in the compound, who will relate the legends of the migration of their ancestor to the present site of the compound and explain the particular customs observed by the descendants of this ancestor. Yoruba constantly refer to the history of their forebears and in this way construct for themselves a picture of the structure and segmentation of the lineage.
THE FOUNDING OF A LINEAGE

THE YORUBA LINEAGE

The history (itan) of a lineage, the patrilineal descent group whose residence is the compound, must always be related by the lineage head-the oldest man of the lineage (in Oyo, bale, in Ekiti, oloriebi)-or by some other elder acting on his instructions. It is usually given in the presence of younger men, who, together with the old women, may prompt the elders and ensure that the history of their own segments is given accurately and without prejudice. The lineage head will be able to tell from what town his forebears migrated and the reason for their move; he will explain the origin of their deities and their totemic names, and the tabus they observed; he will tell of the

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238

THE YORUBA LINEAGE

and Compound FIG. I. The Genealogy of Popoola, the Onishaki of Shaki

!I

Popoola I A 0 A
I A5 06 I A7 08 I A9

0 Oz 03

04

I AIO
A

I
OII OIz I

i
AI3 OI4 A I15 OI6

'

Ai7

Ai8 OI9

I L/ I I / /
I
O 27
24 25

A
20

A
21

0
22

I A I A I
A
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23

z6

A 28

0 29

0 30

T i
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Deceased males and females

Living ,,
,,

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Divorce

Store I3, 28, 29 I3 I3 Parlour I6, 32, 33 I5

IO II, 26, 27

Chief's parlour Veranda

Store

9 7, 21 7

Courtyard

8, 24, 25 5 6 I7

rs' rooms Strange:

I
I

19, 34, 35

18

I
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Entrance
The genealogy and plan are diagrammatic only, being designed to show the distribution of kinsmen within the compound. Some young children are living with relatives in other compounds. The outer dimensions of the compound are approximately Ioo ft. square.

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THE YORUBA LINEAGE

239

circumstances attending the arrival of these legendary men in the town and how they were given land for their compound and for their farm and perhaps a title by the ruler of the town. Where the ancestors settled in uninhabited forest this too will be explained, for the founder of a Yoruba town becomes its ruler, and the descendants of the founder are the royal lineage. These legends have a dual function: they are the official history of the lineage members but they also serve as a charter which sanctions their present behaviour, their ceremonies, their rights to land and titles. In some cases the legends related clearly cannot be accurate records; some refer to situations which are hardly credible while others conflict with versions of the same story told in neighbouring towns. Among these are claims that the lineage founder came from Ile-Ife. Such stories picture Ile-Ife, the mythical cradle of the Yoruba people, where the first man, Oduduwa, came to earth, as a huge city crowded with royal princes. One day the Oni, or ruler of Ife, told his princes that they should disperse and found their own kingdoms, which they did. These legends are usually told by the members of a royal lineage in a town, for it is important that they should be able to trace their descent direct from Ile-Ife. Embellishments usually describe the position of the lineage founder when he was a prince at Ile-Ife and include an explanation of the origin of his title. Thus the Ewi of Ado Ekiti claims that the first Ewi held the title of Ewi in Ile-Ife because he ' spoke truly '. The original Ewi travelled with his brother, the Oba of Benin, to Benin country but later returned, stopping at several towns before reaching Ado.' At Ado he met some men already settled but they agreed to recognize his sovereignty over them, or, as other versions say, they were conquered. Other legends appear to contain more historical fact. The lineage elders may describe how their ancestor fought for his own father's title but was unsuccessful in winning it; so, together with his kinsmen, this ancestor left the town rather than face the reprisals of the successful candidate. (The successful man is often described as a younger brother to whom the elder could not submit.) In other cases the elders may tell how their original home was destroyed by war, this being common during the nineteenth century. Some lineage founders are described as men with special powers, particularly in magic or medicine, who were invited by a ruler to come and live in his town. Others are said to have moved to the country of the green parrot (i.e. the forest) to become cured of impotence. In some cases the lineage founder is said to have followed the king to the town. Such a claim bestows a certain prestige on the lineage and one strongly suspects that it is often substituted for a more credible origin which has been forgotten. The date of the arrival of a lineage founder in the town is almost impossible to ascertain unless it occurred recently as a result of the Oyo civil wars or Fulani invasions. Lineage elders tend to claim that the event took place ' in the time of the first king '-this establishes the lineage as one of the older ones in the town-or else in the time of one or another of the more famous rulers, to whose reigns most notable events seem to be ascribed. In most legends it is implied that the lineage founder came with his kinsmen. Yet
When compared with similar legends current in the towns through which the first Ewi is supposed to have passed, this version suggests that the original Ewi came from the royal lineage of Idoani, itself an offshoot of the royal lineage of Benin.

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THE YORUBA LINEAGE

only the name of the one man is remembered and all lineage members trace their descent from him; the remaining men apparently had no issue and have passed into oblivion! It is significant, too, that with the exception of royal lineages, where it is important to trace the route by which the founder came from Ile-Ife, lineage elders only recall the history of their most recent move. They do not know how their ancestor and his kin came to the town from which he was driven by war, or fled to avoid punishment, or migrated at the invitation of another ruler, unless, of course, such information is contained in the tribal legends known to all Yoruba. Earlier history would appear to be irrelevant since it does nothing to explain the position of the lineage in the town today. In every town of Oyo and Ekiti it is possible to ascertain the legendary origin of the founder of each lineage in the town. In Iwo the founders of the lineages came from the towns of the old kingdom of Owu, from Ife, and from the destroyed towns of the Oyo kingdom. Some Shaki lineages claim origin from Shabe (now Save, in French Dahomey), from Owu, and from Ekiti. While the first Ewi of Ado Ekiti is said to have come from Ile-Ife via Benin, other lineages in the town trace their origins to towns in Akoko District. In many cases the distances covered by these legendary founders of lineages exceed one hundred miles. These migrations seem to have been deliberately undertaken by men bent on conquest or gain, or else fleeing from destruction, not the slow drift of men seeking new farmland nor yet a small-scale movement caused by incompatibilities of temperament within groups of kinsmen. Movement resulting from succession disputes seems to be inherent in the traditional political system.
MEMBERSHIP OF THE LINEAGE

The Yoruba lineage consists of all persons who claim to trace patrilineal descent from the lineage founder (orisun= spring, source). Marriage is patrilocal. Thus the living male members of the lineage reside in the compound originally built by the lineage founder, perhaps several centuries earlier. With them live their wives and children. A woman of the lineage moves to her husband's compound on marriage, but retains her lineage affiliation; her children, of course, belong to the husband's lineage. The lineage is an exogamous unit; a man may not marry into the lineages of his sixteen great-great-grandparents, but maternal links are rarely traced back beyond four generations. The concept of the lineage appears to be the same in Oyo and in Ekiti, but differences in the terminology used often cause misunderstanding. Oyo use the word idile (root of the house) to indicate the patrilineage. ?bi, to the Oyo man, means one's cognatic kin and is usually used loosely to indicate kinsmen. In Ekiti the word idile is known but seems to be used relatively infrequently: a man will define the patrilineage as idile and immediately start using the word ebi to mean the same thing. The lineage head, or oldest living member, is in Ekiti the olori ebi. Yet ebi is also used to include cognatic kin. A further term, ibatan, commonly used in the phrase o ba mzitan (he is related to me), is used to denote any form of relationship. Whatever the terminology used, however, there is never any confusion over the two ways in which a man

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THE YORUBA LINEAGE

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regards his position in the social structure: firstly, as a lineage member descended in the male line from the lineage founder and entitled to inherit movable property, land, and titles belonging to the lineage members as a group; secondly, as an individual descended from parents and grandparents belonging to other lineages, forming a corporate group only in relation to himself and from whom he has no rights to inheritance (except in so far as they are members of his own lineage) but whose aid he may ultimately seek in certain situations. When a child is born its umbilical cord is carried to the compound of its legal father and buried in the gutter. The father later feasts the child's various relatives and names it, and finally arranges to have his own facial mark cut on its cheeks. These ceremonies constitute the recognition of the lineage membership of the child. An illegitimate child belongs to the lineage of its mother, and the ceremonies are performed by the woman's father. There seems to be no ceremony by which an adult-either a stranger or a freed slave-was admitted to the lineage. A stranger who came alone from another town might lodge with an influential man and perhaps marry a woman from the lineage. If the stranger became wealthy he would found his own lineage. There are indications, however, that strangers and freed slaves often became absorbed into the lineages of their benefactors or former masters. No man will, however, admit that he is a lineage member by adoption, and after three or four generations the descendants of such a man seem to become accepted as lineage members. One can only discover this process when a certain group of people are included in a genealogy as descendants of the lineage founder, yet are tacitly debarred from holding titles belonging to the lineage.' In such cases the adoption is incomplete. When adoption is complete it is impossible to discover it. Thus the immigrant to the Yoruba town either came with a number of kinsmen to establish his rights to land and, perhaps, to a title, or, if he came alone, he lodged with a powerful friend. In the latter case, he might either become powerful himself and leave numerous children who could in time beg the ruler for land, or remain unimportant and eventually become absorbed in his protector's lineage. But in the traditional political system a man could deal with the government of the town only through the elders and chiefs of his lineage and never as an individual. A brief mention of the laws of inheritance is necessary here since it provides the key to the segmentation of the lineage.2 A man's estate, if it was acquired by his own effort, passed on his death to his sons. It was divided equally, not among the sons, but among all the wives with sons. Each wife was given a portion to divide among her own male offspring. Property inherited by a man, and this included cleared farmland, and titles belonging to the lineage, passed not to the sons but to the junior classificatory brothers of the deceased. No man older than, and thus senior to, the deceased might inherit. Property which was not divisible, such as a title, passed from
kinship terminology already adequately described in D. Forde, TheYoruba-speaking Western Nigeria, I95I. The basic Peoples of Southprinciples are that, firstly, one uses the same term for persons of the same generation. Thus males of one's parents' generation are baba,females are iya. Similarly
I See the example in Olukotun lineage, cited below. 2 Yoruba has been

those of the grandparental generation are babaagba and iya agba; all children are omo. Superimposed on this is the principle of seniority by age. Persons of one's own generation are, irrespective of sex, egbon if if younger. Similarly one may distinguish older, aburo between the elder brother of one's father, egbonbaba mi, and his younger brother, aburobabami.

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THE YORUBA LINEAGE

the children of one wife of the original holder to the children of another wife, it being wrong for children of one wife to hold it successively to the exclusion of the children of other wives. Membership of a lineage carries with it certain attributes which distinguish members of one lineage from those of another. Most obvious of these is a facial mark (ila) cut on the cheeks; hardly less obvious are the names (oriki, orile) sometimes used in greetings or in praise-songs. Less obvious but no less important are food tabus (ewo) and the possession of a common deity (orifa), whose shrine is usually within the compound. The Yoruba always claim that a child should possess the same facial marks, lineage names, tabus, and deities as his father, and this would seem to happen in most cases. One would expect to find the marks, names, tabus, and deities grouped together in sets, but one does not. Two lineages may have the same marks but different names, and so on. The reason for this overlapping is obscure; it has almost certainly taken place over a long period. In Shaki the totemic lineage names mentioned by Johnson' are found. Examples are: opo(a post), agbo(a ram), ogun(iron), ji (monkey), ado (a small calabash). In some lineages which have iii as a lineage name the members do not eat monkey, but the food tabu is not always the same as the lineage name even where this is an edible commodity. Myths are usually cited which ' explain ' the origin of the lineage name. Thus the possessors of the name adosay that their founder wore a calabash of this type round his neck. In Shaki most people had facial marks known as gomboand it was not suggested that these should be correlated with lineage names or tabus. Here each lineage possessed a deity which, its elders said, was brought by the lineage founder from their original town and they alone served it. In Iwo the possession of lineage names is much less marked than in Shaki. Worship of the major Yoruba deities was common and many lineages appeared to possess none peculiar to themselves. Some food tabus were associated with lineage membership, their origin being explained by a myth relating to the history of the lineage ancestors in their former town, while others were associated with major deities. Facial marks were more varied and appear to be correlated with the town of origin of the lineage founder. Members of the royal lineage possess a type of mark not seen elsewhere. Facial marks in Ado Ekiti are now found on only the oldest of men and were said to be town marks and not lineage marks. Every lineage has a pair of names, one for men and the other for women, which are used when addressing people. The meaning of some of these is unknown, but others refer to the town from which the lineage founder is believed to have migrated. Similarly some lineage deities are named after the town from which the lineage founder brought them. Most lineages have food tabus-usually articles of everyday diet. The rules of exogamy were generally interpreted as meaning that one could not marry any person with the same lineage names, tabus, or deities (according to the degree to which these were believed, in different towns, to be correlated with lineage), as one's great-great-grandparents. Such an interpretation is now rarely observed, the ability to trace actual relationship being considered a sufficient bar to marriage.
S. Johnson, A Historyof the Yorubas,1937, pp. 85-87.

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THE YORUBA LINEAGE

THE SEGMENTATION OF THE LINEAGE

243

So far I have described the founding of a lineage in a Yoruba town, its membership and the attributes of its members, by which the individuality of each group of lineage members is preserved within the town. Within the lineage there is a division into smaller segments. In a segmentary lineage system new segments may, in theory, be formed with each new generation and one can classify such segments according to their depth; the segmentary lineage systems of the Nuer, Tallensi, and Tiv' are the classic examples. Among the Yoruba, lineages tend to segment thus as a result of disputes concerning marriage, petty theft, or fights. The smallest unit of the polygynous family is the wife and her children. These children are known as omoiya(children of one mother). They are to be distinguished from children of another wife. No father should bestow more favours on the children of one wife than on those of another. The children of one man are known as obakan(born of one father). The same terms are used of the children of common grandparents. Always the children of one man will be divided into groups as the children of each of his wives. When disputes occur between full brothers they will be submitted to the arbitration of the mother; in disputes between half-brothers the respective mothers and the common father will arbitrate. Disputes between descendants of a common grandfather will be settled by the elders of the two segments concerned and the grandfather, if alive, and so on.2 The Yoruba have no word for this type of segmentation, which is completely overshadowed by another, of a different pattern. When a chieftaincy title is vested in a lineage its members possess corporately some property-the title-which is indivisible. Since every lineage member has an equal right to the title some method is needed to prevent the title from becoming hereditary in one narrow line within the lineage. The lineage is accordingly divided into two, three, or four segments through which the title should pass in rotation. These are known as igun or origun(a courtyard) in Oyo, and as idi (a root) in Ekiti. They become apparent whenever the chieftaincy title in the lineage falls vacant for they then come into violent opposition. When, in reciting genealogies, it is mentioned that a lineage founder had three sons who founded new lineages, or segments within the original lineage, it is always presumed that these were sons of different wives, for children born of the same mother would not have acted in opposition to one another. In almost every genealogy the lineage founder is placed from three to five generations earlier than the elders now living, from which one might assume that he lived in the beginning or early part of the nineteenth century. It is said that this man had two, three or, more rarely, four sons, who are the founders of the segments now recognized within the lineage. This is the most simple form of segmentation possible. Where it seems probable that the lineage founder did in fact migrate between a century and a century and a half ago, there seems to be little reason to doubt the accuracy of the genealogy. But in many cases the history of a lineage in the town must
E. E. Evans-Pritchard, The Nuer, 1940, pp. I92248 et passim; M. Fortes, The Dynamicsof Clanship amongthe Tallensi, 1945, pp. 30-38, 39-65, 191-230; Laura and Paul Bohannan, The Tiv of Central
Nigeria, 1953, pp. 15-25.

2 This process often breaks down in practice because people appeal directly to the head of the compound; living in the compound and usually being at home, he is so easily accessible.

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be much older. The king-lists give an indication of the age of a town, and the location of a compound within the town is some evidence of the date when the lineage first occupied it-compounds nearer the centre of the town being presumed to be older. In the Ekiti towns of Otun and Ado, and also in Ijebu Ode, king-lists are given in which all the kings who reigned before the end of the eighteenth century (in Ijebu Ode there were 40, in Otun 1, and in Ado I6) are shown as coming from a unitary and unsegmented royal lineage. Then suddenly, according to the genealogy, the lineage divided into segments (four in the case of Ijebu Ode and Otun, two in Ado) founded by sons of the previous ruler, and the title has rotated between these ever since. A similar phenomenon occurs in non-royal lineages, but in these the names of the more important ancestors, often chieftaincy title-holders, have been forgotten, with the exception of the lineage founder and the men recognized as segment founders. The two, three, or four segments are not always of equal generation depth; it is common to find that a lineage is recorded as having divided into two segments and that one of these has subdivided again. It is more important that the segments, as they now exist, should be of approximately equal membership. A chiefly title should not only rotate between these segments but also should be given to a man who is the popular choice of the majority in the lineage as a whole, and for this reason one segment may retain the title for two successive turns. But chiefs and their sons are wealthy men with many wives, and hence a segment which retains the title in this way becomes large in comparison with the others. At this point rivalry develops within the segment and it divides into two. Conversely, smaller segments, whose members see that on this account their several chances of gaining the title are slight, will fuse into one large segment. There is probably a tendency for the genealogical position of the founders of two segments formed by fission to be raised a generation; for example, in Fig. 2, nos. I I and 12, the segment founders, may in later years be cited as sons of no. 8, thus making the three segments of equal generation depth and giving the genealogical table a regular pattern. But, since fission and fusion are taking place with almost every major dispute, this regularity is rarely achieved. The pattern definitely exists, however, for all genealogies are of approximately equal depth and all the lineage members trace descent from one of the segment founders and hence from the lineage founder. One does not find individuals claiming descent by tortuous lines from other than these few persons.' So far it has been assumed that lineage members continue to live within a single compound. A compound may, however, become overcrowded and the lineage head may advise a number of members to build in another place, preferably near the parent compound, but, if the town is already large, perhaps as much as a mile away. The members of the new compound will have their own compound head-the oldest man among them-and will perhaps erect their own shrine to the lineage deity. The extent to which the members of the new compound participate in the affairs of the parent compound will depend partly on distance and partly on the degree of
I Many of the points made by Laura Bohannan in her article ' A Genealogical Charter', Africa, xxii, I952, pp. 30I-I5, would seem applicable to Yoruba

genealogies, particularly her main thesis that the genealogy is the charter for present social relationships.

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245 harmony with which the separation took place. It frequently happens that such a detached group of lineage members is recognized as a separate segment (see Fig. 2,
FIG. 2. The Segmentation of the YorubaLineage(diagrammatic)

THE YORUBA LINEAGE

AI

Lineage founder founder Az

.....---. .- -*-*---A3

..Lineage A4

Semi-independentlineage 60

I[t~~~~~ ~~Detached A8 7 AMaternallyrelated segment

segment

II
A9 Segment founder AIO

lI

4.I4

*I 30

4.

Segment founder

Segment I z founder .

f
*Au

I
*1*

I
Lj*
X

I
h

A
t^/ Key.

(A A)(AA)
o/ omoiya

A^ ^AA
/ akan

A
J

Time scale foreshortened; names forgotten.

Founder moved to a new town. Founder moved to another part of same town.

The numbers are referredto in the text. no. 5). Sometimes such a detached segment becomes estranged from its parent lineage. As in the case of Olukotun lineage (cited below) there may be rivalry over a title. In Ekiti towns the number of detached segments which become so clearly separated from the parent lineage as to be considered semi-independent is much

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246

THE YORUBA LINEAGE

greater than in Oyo towns. This is perhaps because the towns are small and the number of chieftaincy titles relative to the number of lineages is high; a lineage segment which can claim its independence may obtain a newly created title equal in rank to that of the parent lineage to which it no longer has a right. A further modification of the structure is made when a chieftaincy title passes not to a male lineage member but to the son (Fig. 2, no. 7) of a female lineage member (Fig. 2, no. 6), often the daughter of a deceased chief. This occurs rather more frequently in Ekiti than in Iwo and is resorted to when the lineage cannot produce a suitable candidate for its title from among its own members. The new chief retains his own lineage affiliation but he must perform all the ceremonies of the lineage whose chief he has become. His children will live in the compound to which their father has moved on taking office, but they will retain the lineage name, tabus, marks, and the deity of their father. Thus there grows within the lineage a segment which is maternally related to it, which lives in the lineage compound, is entitled to its chieftaincy title yet retains its own distinctive attributes. In Shaki the lineage of the Okere of Shaki has two such maternally related segments and a third within one of the original two. The title now rotates, in theory, between the parent lineage and its two original maternally related segments. Where a lineage includes a detached segment or a maternally related segment or both, the tendency will be for the parent lineage to act as a single segment. A lineage only occasionally forms four segments and still less often five segments. One example must suffice to illustrate some of these points (see Fig. 3). Olukotun lineage is one of the largest in Iwo and possesses a high-ranking title. Its compound is in the centre of the town and this, as well as its legends, would suggest that Sunmolofa came to the town before the late eighteenth century-the date suggested by the genealogy. Yet all the living members of the lineage (more than 500 persons) trace their descent to Akinlusi, Ogundolu, or Agboye. Agboye built a compound on the edge of the town, nearly two miles from the parent compound. There has been little intercourse between the two and some members of Agboye's segment deny relationship with the Olukotun lineage. They are now considered to have no rights to the title. Soleye, founder of the detached segment, built a compound near another old town gate, but closer to the parent compound, and the members of both these have kept in close contact, the former regularly visiting the parent compound for religious and secular ceremonies. The descendants of Omogbegbe and Ogundolu live in the parent compound. Although Osokunbi was described as a son of Akinlusi, some mystery surrounds him and he may have been a slave; his descendants have never held the title. The detached segment of Soleye now has more members than the remainder of the parent lineage and it is said in the compound that in future the title will rotate between the lineage members of the parent compound and those of the detached segment. This is a good example of a situation where the descendants of one man have become sufficiently numerous to be established as a separate segment, causing the remaining members of the lineage, although rather distantly related, to combine to form the opposing segment. Whether the genealogies will in time change so that Soleye and Akinwumi are described as half-brothers is a matter for speculation. The segmentation of the Yoruba lineage does not, therefore, take place in a regular

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247 of detachment as the fashion. Rather is it determined by a series of events such segments and the attachment of maternally related segments, or the growth in size of one segment of the lineage at the expense of the others. As these events take place, and particularly when a chieftaincy title is contested, groups of lineage members may move from one segment to another, two segments may coalesce while another divides. The pattern of segmentation is the same while segment membership may change.
LINEAGE AND CLANSHIP

THE YORUBA LINEAGE

The term 'lineage' has been used for the Yoruba idile (or ebi), for each member claims to trace his descent from the lineage founder. There exists a wider social grouping, relationship between the members of which might be termed ' clanship ties '. FIG. 3. Olukotunlineage,Iwo ASunmolofa I

I
AAkinwumi 2

...
i

....................

AAgboye 4 1I ?
1 0

AAkinlusi 3
I "' .. ..........................

AOgundolu

lI

iOmogbegbe 5 AOpadele 6 A Oyeymi 9

ASoleye 8 I AOpayele 8

Osok i Osokunbi I *Opatebo

Detached segment The genealogy has been simplifiedby the authorbut all living lineage memberstracetheir descent from Akinlusi, Ogundolu, or Agboye. The numbersreferto the men who held the today. chieftaincytitle vested in the lineage and the order of their successionas remembered Within the town a lineage may have divided, producing a semi-independent lineage the members of which can, if they are willing, trace their descent from the founder of the parent lineage, though they may wish to obscure their common origin (Fig. 2, no. 3). The lineage elders name in their legends the town and the lineage within that town from which their own lineage founder came. Their lineage is thus an offshoot of this older lineage. They can rarely tell how this older lineage itself came to be founded, nor can they name the location of other lineages which have, like their own, broken away from it. Within their own town they may know of other lineages with the same attributes as theirs, suggesting similar origin, or claiming to have come from the same lineage. Very little corporate activity unites the members of these related lineages, and what does take place might be termed activity between clansmen (denoting

4,

Iu Akdowu 7 I n AAkinmoye

Semi-independent lineage . . .~~~~~~~~~ .~~~~~~~~~

. .

4,

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THE YORUBA LINEAGE 248 the recognition of relationship but the inability, in most cases, to trace a definite connexion), although the Yoruba have no specific word for clan. Lineage elders may send gifts to the elders of the lineage from which their own founder came, when the latter are performing their annual ceremonies, but only if the two towns are in the same kingdom. Such exchanges were thus, in the past, most frequent in the large Oyo kingdom. Travellers may lodge in the compounds of clansmen. There seemed to be no rules against fighting a clansman, although informants were uncertain what one should do with a captive whom one discovered to be of this relationship. Within a town, if a prominent elder of a lineage dies, the elders of other lineages having clanship ties will send a cloth as a token of their relationship. These lineages rarely co-operate in serving a common deity and each possesses its own land and titles. There are today no names by which clans are known; men can only say that they are descended from the same line of rulers or possess the same deities, lineage names, tabus, or facial marks. There are no clans ranked in hierarchical order. To claim descent from the Alafin of Oyo gives prestige only when the claimant has as many kinsmen and followers as would befit a prince from such a powerful kingdom. All Yoruba claim descent from Oduduwa, but some legends say that Oduduwa had seven sons, others say sixteen, and all give them different names. Kings must trace their descent from Oduduwa, but the elders of the non-royal lineages in any town are concerned solely with their history in relation to their town. What happened before is irrelevant to them and is unknown.
THE LINEAGE IN THE YORUBA TOWN

The lineage is a feature of social structure; the town is one of territorial structure. The lineage may be divided into segments; it is itself part of a larger unit, held together by clanship ties. The town may be divided into quarters and compounds; it may be part of a kingdom (now usually called a district for administrative purposes). The living male members of a lineage or of its segments live together in a compound or series of compounds which are usually adjacent but may be scattered. The members of related lineages are scattered through many towns and kingdoms. Conversely, the inhabitants of a town come from many lineages of diverse origin. The Ekiti towns are mostly small. Ado, one of the largest, with a population of 25,ooo, is in fact a union of three towns each having its own council of chiefs, but acknowledging the Ewi as its king. Oke Ewi, the largest of these three, has a population of I4,000 people. The royal lineage, numbering over i,ooo persons, has its compounds scattered throughout the town. There are fifteen other lineages,' each with its own compound or adjacent compounds. Five of these are large and have given their name to the quarter which comprises, in addition, two or three smaller compounds of smaller lineages. The larger lineages are those of the senior chiefsthough whether the lineage gained the title because of its size or has grown as a result of its possession of the title one cannot tell. The other towns of the Ado district are smaller, none having a population of more than 6, oo, and the average for the seventeen towns is 2,070 inhabitants. Some of these have no more than five lineages, the compounds of each forming a quarter. From the air the quarters in these towns are
It was difficult to tell whether some were separate lineages or detached segments claiming independence.

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THE YORUBA LINEAGE

249

clearly distinguishable, the compounds of each lying close together and separated slightly from those of the next quarter. At the other extreme, Iwo is a town of 1oo,ooo inhabitants. The tax-rolls list over 500 compounds, several of which number I,ooo persons. The mean size of a compound is approximately 200 persons. There are over 200 lineages in the town, of which the largest is the royal lineage numbering more than Io,ooo persons. The density of the population in the built-up area of the town is high, averaging eighty persons per acre. The compounds of many detached segments are at some distance from the parent compound. The town is divided into four quarters but the boundaries are impossible to recognize from the air. The subordinate towns in the Iwo district are smaller; one such town, Agagase, has a population of 534 and is composed of one lineage only, the five segments living in five adjacent compounds. Another small town, Asa, has one lineage in four compounds, with a smaller lineage of more recent foundation in the fifth compound, a total of I,083 persons. In all these towns the majority, if not all, of the living male members of the lineage live together in the lineage compound. The head of the lineage is also head of the compound. This old man is responsible for discipline within the lineage and within the compound; his authority in the former case extends over scattered persons, since the adult women of the lineage live in their husband's compounds but return to their own for lineage meetings; within the compound the lineage head exercises authority not only over the members of his own lineage but also over their wives and possibly strangers. All minor disputes are taken before him for settlement; certain more serious offences, such as manslaughter or witchcraft, are dealt with by the chiefs from the beginning. Appeals against a lineage head or cases involving members of two lineages are heard by the ruler and his chiefs. The lineage is the land-holding unit and most traditional craft industries were practised by members of one or two lineages.' Cases involving land or the craft were thus discussed in lineage meetings. The government of the towns was based largely on the lineage system. The political system was highly complex and varied from town to town.2 The original founder of the town became its first ruler (a king if he owed no allegiance to any other ruler and if he possessed a beaded crown, otherwise, in Oyo, a bale). The title became hereditary in the lineage founded by him. Titles were bestowed on the leaders of later immigrants when they arrived or when they could demonstrate the solidarity of their group, and these titles became hereditary within the lineage, subsequent holders being elected by the lineage members. In most towns the titles are ranked in several grades; especially is this true of Ekiti. Even in the Ekiti towns it is not possible for more than six lineages to hold senior titles, and in Oyo towns, such as Iwo, only a minority of the lineages can hold titles. Yet an examination of the disposition of the titles in Ekiti towns shows that they are shared among the lineages with a remarkable degree of equality. In another Oyo town, Shaki, the senior chiefs have junior chiefs under them in their own quarters, again giving almost every lineage the ability to hold a title.
I p. C. Lloyd, 'Some Problems of Tenancy in Yoruba Land Tenure', African Studies,xii, 3, 1953, pp. 93-103; 'Craft Organisation in some Yoruba Towns ', Africa, xxiii, 1953, pp. 30-44. S 2 P. C. Lloyd, 'The Traditional Political System of the Yoruba', South-western Journal of Anthropology, x, 4, 1954, pp. 366-384.

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250

THE YORUBA LINEAGE

It would be wrong to view the government of the Yoruba town as a mere committee of elders chosen by each lineage. The ruler is not primus interpares among his chiefs but is in some respects a divine king, a personification of the whole town. The lineages hold their titles not as of right but as a gift from the ruler on the advice of his chiefs. Some titles (in Ibadan town all titles) are bestowed by the king and chiefs according to merit alone; in some towns there are associations, such as the Ogboni society, and the age-grade system, members of which belong to almost all the lineages in the town. Within the town lineages are not ranked in order of seniority.I In towns with a powerful ruler, who uses his authority to advance the claims of his own lineage members, people will occasionally divide the town into commoners and royalty. The prestige of an important chief is reflected on to the other members of his lineage, but this earns them no special privileges. Lineages are equal in the sight of the ruler. There is little corporate activity between members of different lineages excepting ceremonies involving the whole town or a tribal deity. Lineage elders will tell the legends of their own lineage and those of the ruling lineage but will disclaim knowledge of those of other lineages. The aim of every lineage is to preserve its individuality, to recall continually in praise-songs its own legends and the deeds of its ancestors, to retain the deities and customs peculiar to itself. The head of each lineage stresses his political relationship to the ruler and, by inference, the absence of such relationship with other lineage heads.2 The Yoruba say that without a king there could be no town; in many towns it is noticeable that, in the temporary absence of a ruler, the chiefs cannot act together effectively and that chiefs seem incapable of uniting against the autocracy of a ruler.
CONCLUSION

In a society where the people live in large towns, members of kingdoms with a complex political structure, the lineage system will certainly show some peculiarities. The Yoruba lineage structure is simple, consisting of patrilineal descent-groups living in a common residence. The foreshortening of the genealogies has been described by other writers and little can be said of the Yoruba which would elaborate these descriptions. But whereas in some of these societies it is possible to construct a genealogy with the tribal ancestor at the apex and the living members of the tribe at the base, the Yoruba are unable to do this. When a Yoruba migrates from one town to another almost all his ties with his original lineage are cut, to be replaced by political ties with the ruler in the town where he founds his own lineage. The political system of the growing town antedates the growth of the town, for the government of the growing town would assume forms copied from neighbouring towns and familiar to most of the immigrating groups. The immigrant receives from the ruler not only land but also a place in this political system (denoted by a chieftaincy title) which his lineage holds in perpetuity so long as it retains its individuality as a separate lineage.
I W. R. Bascom in ' Social Status among the Yoruba ', AmericanAnthropologist, liii, 195 , p. 498, ranks lineages, but I could not obtain evidence of such ranking in any town in which I worked. 2 This oversimplifies the position, for in some of

the larger Oyo towns a lineage founder received his land not from the king but from a senior chief. His relationship with the king is then through this senior chief.

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THE YORUBA LINEAGE

25I

Hence the political system of the town does not render the lineage insignificant but rather enhances its importance. The lineage remains a compact unit by the process of genealogical adjustment which, by placing the lineage founder only five generations back, reduces the genealogical distance between members, and also by the process of segmentation which seems to ensure that such lineage property as titles are available to all members and are not retained by one group alone.

Resume
LA LIGNITE CHEZ LES YORUBA LESYoruba de la region sud-ouest de la Nigeria, a l'encontre de la plupart des peuples africains,habitent dans des villes d'une importanceconsiderable,dont la plus grande est la ville d'Ibadan,qui a une population de presque 5oo.ooo habitants.Un grand nombre de ces villes etaient des chefs-lieuxde domainesadministrespar des rois et des conseils de chefs. La structurepolitique des Yoruba varie sensiblementde groupe en groupe. Cet article a trait aux villes oyo et ekiti qui sont constituees d'un grand nombre de lignees (groupes de descendancepar la ligne paternelle).Les lignees jouent un role importantdans l'administration de la ville. Chaquelignee habite un 'compound' ou une serie de 'compounds', si la lignee est devenue importanteou s'est divisee en segments. La segmentationpeut avoir lieu si des diff6rendsse produisent, mais elle opere egalement comme moyen d'assurerque le titre devolu a la lignee n'est pas retenu par un seul groupe de descendanceau sein de la lignee. Ainsi, la lignee se divisera, generalementsuivant les enfants de femmes differentes, en deux, trois ou quatresegments, par lesquels le titre doit passer successivement.L'homme le plus age d'une lignee est le chef de la lignee et du ' compound '. I1exerceune autorite sur la lignee et surle 'compound' et statue sur les delits de moindreimportance.I1est a memede faire le recit des legendes de sa lignee, de donner le nom de son fondateuret de la lignee et la ville qu'il a quittee pour venir a la ville ou la lignee habiteactuellement.Certainessuppressions sont evidentes dans les genealogies des lignees actuelles, car des ancetres sans importance, ainsi que les parents et les ancetresdu fondateur, ont apparemmentete oublies. Les legendes forment l'histoire officiellede la lignee et, en meme temps, constituent la sanction pour son comportement actuel, ainsi que pour ses cultes et ses droits aux terrainset aux titres. Chaquelignee a des attributsqui lui sont propres- marquesfaciales, noms, tabous, ainsi que sa propre deite, dont l'autelse trouve dansle ' compound'. On n'attachepas beaucoup d'importanceaux liens avec des lignees apparentees,mais il existe un rapport plus etendu qui s'assimilea celui d'un clan, bien qu'il ne soit pas designe ainsi, et il s'exprimepar des activites qui ont lieu de temps a autre, en commun, entre les membres de lignees apparentees.L'administrationdes villes est basee sur le systeme des lignees. Le fondateur primitif de la ville devint son premierdirigeantet son autoriteest devenue hereditaire parmi sa lignee. Des titres ont ete conferes, et des terres ont ete octroyees par les dirigeantsaux immigrantsulterieurs,et ces titres sont egalement devenus hereditairesau sein de la lignee. L'immigrant yoruba n'a pas maintenu de liens avec sa lignee d'origine, mais il les a remplaces par des attachespolitiques avec le dirigeantde la ville ou il a fonde sa proprelignee. Le dirigeant de la ville, en octroyant un titre de chef a l'immigrantfondateurd'une lignee, lui a confere a tout jamaisune place dans le systeme politique de la ville.

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