THE MEANING OF YORUBA: A CONSEQUENCE OF AMNESIA

Ya Asantewa
What is in a Name?
What is the meaning of the word, Yoruba? What language is it? What dialect?
Early in the 19th century, Hugh Clapperton isited what is now !igeria, first from 1"##$1"#%&' and
then again in 1"#() When he got to *o+oto, he as+ed his host, *ultan ,uhammed -ello, .1/"1$1"%/0
*ultan 1"1/$1"%/1 what they call their neighbour on the other side of the !iger, whose capital was
2atunga .3ld 3yo1) *ultan -ello told Clapperton that the people on the other side of the 2worra, as the
4ier !iger was then +nown in *o+oto, were the Ya 4iba people) 5he missionaries that came to lay the
ground for the eentual coloni6ation of Africa, both African and European, adopted and corrupted this
to Yoruba) As 7eter Cohen aptly noted in his article, 3risha 8ourneys,
The concept of a single Yorb people and its baptism with the Hausa term for the inhabitants of
y was largely the work of liberated capties and their children returning from !ierra "eone#
particularly as $rotestant missionaries% The terms by which the descendants of Yorb&speakers are
known today in the 'ew (orld ) 'ag* in +ra,il# 'ago in Haiti and -amaica# "ucum. in /uba#
0k1 in !ierra "eone ) emerged as%%% categories%
4eerend .later -ishop1 *amuel A9ayi$Crowther .1":($1"911 enshrined it into law when he translated
the -ible into what is now +nown as ;Cosmopolitan Yoruba< language based largely on his natie 3yo
dialect but with inputs from other dialects)
5his naming and profiling is no limited to only the Yoruba) =t is the unfortunate legacy of the tragedy of
colonisation in which ;tribes< were inented for Africans to ma+e their sub9ugation and colonisation
easier for the inaders and occupying powers) As the inaders with their African collaborators and their
missionaries inented the ;tribes<, they perforce had to inent names for the thus created tribes and to
+eep the ;naties< pliant, they repeated the lie so often, we hae come to beliee it as truth) According
to 2enneth >i+e, right up to 0 some ': years after the inasion of *outh East of what is now !igeria,
the Arochu+wu refused to be called =gbo)
-ut what e?actly does Yarriba mean? =t is 1"" years hence and the @uestion remains unanswered) As
eery true 3mo 3duduwa +nows, 3ru+o ni ro eniyan .Your name determines your destiny1 and hence
if you answer a meaningless name, the chances of a meaningless collectie is enhanced) =t is li+e
wal+ing around with a fa+e identity)
5hose that are called Yoruba today used to refer to themseles as 3mo ile 2Aa ro 39ire .Children of the
land where they greet you ;Bood ,orning, Hope you wo+e up well<1 and eerybody has thus since
then described them based on this their philosophy) =n the !ew World, they were called the A+u people,
a corruption of the E+u Aro o, E+u 3san o, E+u =she o, etc .Bood ,orning, Bood Afternoon, Well
done, etc1 that they constantly say as the outward eidence of their being 3moluabi) 3nly ciilised
people understand courtesy and hae the time for it) Ceo Drobenius describing the art of salutation in
=fe in 191% wroteE
;22+ut the salutations are another pair of shoes% Their many ariations would seem a striking
oddity in 3urope% !ome of the other Yoruban tribes may be taken as patterns of politeness in their
greeting# which may# as we think# be considered oerdone% The 4lifians hae created such an e56uisite
gradation# such a sublimely subtle light and shade in ceremonial manner# as would make the heart of
an e5pert# whether ducal teacher of deportment or royal conductor of the ballet# dance with 7oy% 4 am#
to my regret# e5tremely badly ersed in this department and can only talk of its effect# but not of its
more delicate refinements%
(hen 4lifian men or women salute each other# be it with a plain and easy curtsey 8which is here the
simplest form adopted9# or kneeling down# or throwing oneself upon the ground# no matter which# there
is yet a deliberateness# a ma7esty# a dignity# a deoted earnestness in the manner of its doing# which
brings to light with eery gesture# with eery fold of clothing# the deep significance and essential
import of eery single action% 22%%These people show such an astounding propriety in their manner of
managing a dress# a shawl and a coat# such an art in the display of their moements# that the spectator
rightly draws the conclusion that time is but of little account in their eyes% 0nd once so coninced# the
natural 6uestion arises# what does the life look like which goes on behind this beautiful and unanimous
mas6uerading: This is mostly a difficult 6uestion# but in this case it is easily answered% 4 hae
preiously mentioned the high degree of those 6ualities of intellect and its uses which bear witness to
the ancient ciili,ation once possessed by Yorubans%
Leo Frobenius, Voice of Africa, 1913
Ya Riba
5he name Yarriba that the *ultan of *o+oto gae to Clapperton is 9ust more of the same) 5he people
who identified themseles as 3mo 2Aaro 39ire were well$+nown for their courtesy and cultured
manners) And they had been this cultured for at least F centuries) 5o illustrate the anti@uity of the
description Yarriba, the eminent 5imbu+tu writer, scholar, philosopher, history and 8urist, Ahmed -aba
the -lac+ .1FF($1(#/1 wrote in the 1(th about the neighbours of the Hausas and the -orgus, describing
them in Arabic letters, which literary translates into Y4-) .=n Arabic, owels were not written1
Een today, away from the puleri6ing, hustling degrading energies of the ;modern< cities that reduces
human beings to crabs in a buc+et0 in places where the 3mo 2Aaro 39ire still manage to e?ist, ibrating
with lifeAs natural energies, when they get to the mar+et to buy anything, they start first by greeting,
and e?tending goodwill, E +Aa ro o, GH a9H wAo igbI? meaning ;Bood morning, hope the profits are
pouring in) Hope you are ma+ing profits?<
And so, the people who call themseles Yoruba today, said in Hausa what they usually say when they
go to their own mar+ets, to other merchants) Apparently as far bac+ as the 1(th century and right up to
the 19th, 3mo =le 2Aaro 39ire remembered their manners and when they got to the mar+et places where
they met the Hausa people, they in@uired from them in their usual courteous manner, Ya meaning
;How<, or Yi meaning ;How about< and JKbL, meaning ;profit< .*ee the >ictionary of Hausa$English1)
Ya$JKbL or Yi$JKbL$ How about profit? Hence they were +nown as the people that say Ya$ JKbLE How
7rofit and so Yarriba and its eentual corruption to Yoruba)
Omoluabi
=n Africa, we identified societies by their essence, by their characters and not by material things or
outward appearances) 5hey are identified by their oer$aching philosophy which is displayed in their
character) A thing is only beautiful if its character is beautiful) And hence the 3mo 2Aaro 39ire were
identified by their good character of spreading goodwill amongst their fellow human beings) 5hey were
not perfect, they were en9oined to wor+ towards perfection) 5he fact that the system bro+e down does
not negate the fact that there was a system) 5he Bree+ ciilisation also collapsed oer #,::: years ago,
as did the 4oman ciilisation that succeeded it)
The /hildren of the ;ods hae gone under# because they failed to remember the law their awe&
worthy ancestry be6ueathed them2 Leo Frobenius
5he people who ma+e progress in the world are not the copiers) 5hey are not the people who do not
create anything but are proud to be consumers of eerything) 7eople that ma+e progress in the world
are the ones that are not only proud of their history but continually create new things to ensure a
continuity of that proud history) What do Africans use the +nowledge of their proud heritage to do?
=nstead of inspiring them, it acts on them li+e a drug) As -aba Ayi 2wei Armah e?plains,
You can hae a certain kind of knowledge and it acts on you again like a drug# soothes you% !ays#
(ell# isn<t it nice to know that we are descended from these fantastic people who inented this and
that and that%2(ell they did their work and they<re gone% They did their work so well they left traces
that people hae tried to wipe out and they didn<t succeed% 4t<s not for us to use their work as mattresses
to lie on% (e ought to use their work as spring boards and moe
5he conse@uences of forgetting our name is so destructie and debilitating, yet we are unaware of it)
5he fact that we are unaware, and now lie programmed lies of 6ombies is one conse@uence) 5he fact
that instead of building houses, we now build prisons as houses, complete with iron bars on our
windows and doors to barricade ourseles from the conse@uences of forgetting our name) Een during
the 1:: years of ciil war amongst the Children of 3duduwa, our ancestors still did not need to build
prisons behind which to sleep) !ow we are in the modern world and houses all oer =le 2Aaro 39ire
now hae to hae prison bars on them) WE say it is the ;modern< world but the people we are
following into ;modernity< do not barricade themseles behind bars to sleep at night0 they do not hae
;burglary proof< as a standard on their own windows and doors) And this is 9ust one of the
conse@uences)
5he Chinese +now the meaning and importance of a memory and names0 that is why they are where
they are today) 5hey are always constantly aware of their huge responsibility in restoring the heritage of
their forefathers bac+ to its rightful position in the world) 5his is why although most people outside
China +new -ei9ing as 7e+ing, they hae insisted and it is not -ei9ing) 5hey refused to be distorted and
defined by foreigners)
The Age of Creai!i"
-ecause we hae forgotten our name and our heritage, poerty and its many children now prowl the
land) !o 3mo 2Aa ro 39ire has any business being poor) Archaeologists hae now discoered that there
was trade between ancient =fe, Bao .in present day ,ali1 and =gbo M+wu) =fe was apparently a ma9or
glass manufacturing centre amongst other things) 5he 3balufon mas+ was cast in nearly pure copper)
As *u6anne -lier noted, this was
a feat that artists of ancient ;reece and =ome# the 4talian =enaissance# and /hinese bron,e casters
neer achieed%
5he lost wa? method is now called inestment casting) =t is the used today in industrial processes that
inole comple? metal parts) =t is important today in the aeronautical, power generation, military,
medical, and automotie industries) 5he technology that the artist$engineers of Ancient =fe, -enin and
=gbo$M+wu mastered, is now used to create parts for nuclear power stations as well as space crafts
going to space) =n fact, today, engineers from the most technologically adanced countries and ma+ers
of Dormula one cars send their engineering students to study the =fe and -enin -ron6es to improe their
own casting abilities) 5he only thing that has changed is the materials used and the scale of production)
!ow we trael to foreign lands to go and follow li+e sheep)
!obody taught these African artist$engineers, they did not go to any =y league uniersity, they did not
ac@uire any certificate or titles0 using their brains, building on former +nowledge, they mastered the
chemistry and the engineering of metal casting, combining this with superb artistic talent to produce
these ama6ingly beautiful wor+s of art we are now so proud of) 5hey did all this oer nine centuries,
9:: years, ago) !ow we are modern and apparently our modern brains hae atrophied0 we are now not
able to come up with anything ingenious any longer until we hae been schooled by foreigners) 3ur
African forefathers were innoators) !ow we are importing unsuitable technology and searching for
foreign e?perts to teach us how to farm)
;7roudly Yoruba<
When we say we are 7roudly Yoruba, do we +now what that means? How can we be proudly
something we donAt +now? A peopleAs name defines their purpose and their aspiration) A people with a
meaningless name will hae a meaningless purpose and no direction) 5hey will stumble from confusion
to confusion) A thoughtless people do not progress) 5heir fortunes continue on a downward spiral in
tandem with their thoughtlessness) =f we refuse to thin+ deeply and reflect, then we should not
complain about the situation we find ourseles today, where AfricaAs homeland is seen as the hopeless
continent and een our !obel Caureate was sub9ected to a thorough search at an American airport in
#:1:) Africans landing in their priate 9ets are not speared the indignity of strip searching either)
>?&fi&@&kan&pe&@&kan n. Aba @&kan 7BC%
.=t is failure to count anything as significant that ruins things1
3ur failure to count the meaning of our name as significant results in a brea+ down of our culture and
our ciilisation) =f your identity is not important, then what are you but chaff in the wind flying
whicheer way the wind blows een if that wind is blowing you to your destruction)
>?mDte# E?mDrF# lGmG ?y mBCfE& fi Hk1 sko BgbEafE%
.Cac+ of resourcefulness and lac+ of thoughtfulness cause si? siblings to die as pawns for only twele
thousand cowries)1
3ur lac+ of thoughtfulness is why our children pour out in streams to go and contribute to the
deelopment and progress of other societies who +now e?actly who they are, thin+ and plan for the
future) 5his is why you see 3mo =le 2Aaro o9ire, struggling to leae their land and go and wash cars in
the free6ing cold) 5his is why you see 3mo =le 2Aaro 39ire, moing in streams to go and teach the
children of foreigners the wisdom of their forefathers, while their own children at home in African
wallow in ignorance) 5his is why you see 3mo =le 2Aaro 39ire, instead of turning =le$=fe and its sister
city, -enin City into the =nestment Casting capitals of the world, are instead content and een proud to
be inenting new technologies for the deelopment and adancement of other ciilisations while
unemployment and ignorance supplies thugs for politicians to use to achiee their purposes of further
destruction at home)
3ur lac+ of thoughtfulness is the reason we do not +now that -ra6il has the second highest number of
-lac+ people in one country) =n the 19th century, before the inaders finished the coloni6ation of what
is now !igeria, returning Africans from -ra6il made fortunes e?porting +ola nuts, palm oil, blac+ soap,
pepper, beads, bas+ets, straw, dippers, parrot feathers, beans, s+in cream, mats, cowries, drums, and
ornamental cloth +nown as aso+e in !igeria and pano da Costa in -ahia)
According to one 19th$century shipAs recordE
0 +ra,ilian merchant of 47esha origin# Ielicidade Jaria de !anta 0na# consigned to a certain
"uciano /rispim da !ila in +ahia# the following merchandiseK soap# kola nuts# lengths of traditional
cloth known as panos da /osta# cuias and aguidabs 8strings of beads dedicated to the ori5 'ana
+uruku and her son LbaluayM%<
N9OPgbL ni ti +QRS+QR)
.Croa+ing$in$relays is the mar+ of frogs)1
=t is in the nature of sheep to follow and to lac+ initiatie) 5his is why you see 3mo 2Aaro 39ire
parroting inanely that ;there is no need to re$inent the wheel< and so all we hae to do is to cut and
paste !ew Yor+ straight onto Cagos) Yes, there is no need to re$inent the wheel) =t is old technology)
We should transcend the wheel and inent new technology for which a new name has to be inented)
5his amnesia and its destructie conse@uences is not limited to the ;Yoruba< alone) 5he ;mentacide<
.,entacide is described as a condition in which the brain cells eat themseles1 is democratically
spread all oer Africa including our brothers and sisters in the diaspora) And it is the reason this article
is written in the language of the coloni6ed .what we spea+ is the language of the coloni6ed not that of
the coloni6ers) We canTt eer spea+ their language though we conerse and lie our lies with it1)
=t is time for a change in our consciousness) =t is time for the Children of =nheritance to enter into the
fullness of their estate)
Abo oro lAan so fun 3moluabi, to ba de nie a di odindin) .Half a word is good enough for the wise1

The Viaicum
=f we tell, gently, gently
All that we shall one day hae to tell,
Who then will hear our oices without laughter,
*ad complaining oices of beggars
Who indeed will hear them without laughter?
=f we tell roughly of our torments
Eer increasing from the start of things
What eyes will watch our large mouths
*haped by the laughter of big children
What eyes will watch our large mouth?
What hearts will listen to our clamouring?
What ear to our pitiful anger
Which grows in us li+e a tumour
=n the blac+ depth of our plaintie throats?
When our >ead comes with their >ead
When they hae spo+en to us in their clumsy oices0
8ust as our ears were deaf
5o their cries, to their wild appeals
8ust as our ears were deaf
5hey hae left on the earth their cries,
=n the air, on the water, where they hae traced their signs
Dor us blind deaf and unworthy *ons
Who see nothing of what they hae made
=n the air, on the water, where they hae traced their signs
And since we did not understand the dead
*ince we hae neer listen to their cries
=f we weep, gently, gently
=f we cry roughly to our torments
What heart will listen to our clamoring,
What ear to our sobbing hearts?
#irago $io%
7roerbs translation by >r) 3ye+an 3womoyela, 4yan 7rofessor of African Citerature at the Mniersity
of !ebras+a httpE&&yoruba)unl)edu&)
4eferences from
5urner Coren6o >), U*ome Contacts of -ra6ilian E?$*laes with !igeria, West AfricaV, 8ournal of
!egro History #/ .11, 19'#, pp) FF$(/,
4odrigues 4aymundo !ina, 3s Africanos no -rasil, *Wo 7aulo, Companhia Editora !ational X19:(Y,
19// p) 1:1
Cunha ,anuela Carneiro da, !egros, estrangeirosE os esraos libertos e sua olta L Zfrica, *Wo 7aulo,
Editora -rasiliense, 19/"), pp 1#F
all in Cohen 7eter D), 3risha 8ourneysE 5he 4ole of 5rael in the -irth of Yoruba$Atlantic 4eligions)
Arch) de *c) soc) des 4el), #::#, 11/ .9anier$mars1 1/$%(
Ceo Drobenius, 5he [oice of Africa, 191%