The Yoruba culture was originally an oral tradition, and the majority of Yoruba people are native speakers of the Yoruba language. The number of speakers is roughly estimated at about 30 million in 2010. Yoruba is classified within the Edekiri languages, which together with the isolate Igala, form the Yoruboid group of languages within what we now have as West Africa. Igala and Yoruba have important historical and cultural relationships. The languages of the two ethnic groups bear such a close resemblance that researchers such as Forde (1951) and Westermann and Bryan (1952) regarded Igala as a dialect of Yoruba.
As of the 7th century BCE the African peoples who lived in Yorubaland were not initially known as the Yoruba, although they shared a common ethnicity and language group. By the 8th century, a powerful Yoruba kingdom already existed in Ile-Ife, one of the earliest in Africa.
The historical Yoruba develop in situ, out of earlier Mesolithic Volta-Niger populations, by the 1st millennium BCE.
Oral history recorded under the Oyo Empire derives the Yoruba as an ethnic group from the population of the older kingdom of Ile-Ife. The Yoruba were the dominant cultural force in southern Nigeria as far back as the 11th century.
The Yoruba are among the most urbanized people in Africa. For centuries before the arrival of the British colonial administration most Yoruba already lived in well structured urban centres organized around powerful city-states (Ìlú) centred around the residence of the Oba. In ancient times, most of these cities were fortresses, with high walls and gates. Yoruba cities have always been among the most populous in Africa. Archaeological findings indicate that Òyó-Ilé or Katunga, capital of the Yoruba empire of Oyo (fl. between the 11th and 19th centuries CE), had a population of over 100,000 people (the largest single population of any African settlement at that time in history). For a long time also, Ibadan, one of the major Yoruba cities which was founded in the 1800s, was the largest city in the whole of Sub Saharan Africa. Today, Lagos (Yoruba: Èkó) founded by Portuguese sailors, another major Yoruba city, with a population of over twenty million, remains the largest on the African continent.
The Oyo Empire under its oba, known as the Alaafin of Oyo, was active in the African slave trade during the 18th century. The Yoruba often demanded slaves as a form of tribute of subject populations, who in turn sometimes made war on other peoples to capture the required slaves. Part of the slaves sold by the Oyo Empire entered the Atlantic slave trade.
In the city-states and many of their neighbours, a reserved way of life remains, with the school of thought of their people serving as a major influence in West Africa and elsewhere.
Today, most contemporary Yoruba are Christians and Muslims. Be that as it may, many of the principles of the traditional faith of their ancestors are either knowingly or unknowingly upheld by a significant proportion of the populations of Nigeria, Benin and Togo.
The Yorùbá religion comprises the traditional religious and spiritual concepts and practices of the Yoruba people. Its homeland is in Southwestern Nigeria and the adjoining parts of Benin and Togo, a region that has come to be known as Yorubaland. Yorùbá religion is formed of diverse traditions and has no single founder. Yoruba religious beliefs are part of itan, the total complex of songs, histories, stories and other cultural concepts which make up the Yorùbá society.
Olorun is one of the principal manifestations of the Supreme God of the Yoruba pantheon, the owner of the heavens, and is associated with the Sun known as Oòrùn in the Yoruba language. The two other principal forms of the supreme God are Olodumare—the supreme creator—and Olofin, who is the conduit between Òrunn (Heaven) and Ayé (Earth). Oshumare is a God that manifests in the form of a rainbow, also known as Òsùmàrè in Yorùbá, while Obatala is the God of clarity and creativity. This religion has found its way throughout the world and is now expressed in practices as varied as Candomblé in Brazil, Lucumí/Santería in Cuba and North America, orisha or ifa in Trinidad (Trinidad Orisha), Kélé in Saint Lucia and Oyotunji in North America, as well as in some aspects of Umbanda, Winti, Obeah, Vodun and a host of others. These varieties, or spiritual lineages as they are called, are practiced throughout areas of Nigeria, the Republic of Benin, Togo, Brazil, Cuba, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Puerto Rico, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, the United States, Uruguay, Argentina and Venezuela, among others.
The Yoruba are traditionally a very religious people, and are today pluralistic in their religious convictions. The Yoruba are one of the more religiously diversified ethnic groups in Africa. Many Yorubas can be found in different types of Christian denominations. Many others are Muslims, as well as practitioners of the traditional Yoruba religion. Yoruba religious practices such as the Eyo and Osun-Osogbo festivals are witnessing a resurgence in popularity in contemporary Yorubaland.
Marriage is looked upon as the means to childbearing, as children are important to the Yoruba. There are 7 steps considered necessary in the traditional rite of marriage. The first step being the outlook, which is the means to acquiring a suitable bride. The outlook is done in either of two parts. The first part is done by which the parents of a male child as young as five years secure a suitable bride for him. The second part of the outlook is carried out by the male showing interest in a female and secures a mediator to investigate the suitability of the young girl to be a good wife.After the outlook has been completed, the bride and groom follow the series of two to seven steps. Step two is the parental investigation in which the parents conduct their own investigation of the suitability of the couple and often consult deities to help with the investigation. Step three is the consent giving in which the mediator, having completed his investigations, throws the couple a consent giving party where the young man announces his intentions to marry the young woman and pays his consent fee. Step 4 is the borrowing stage in which the family of the young man go the the home of the young woman to inform them and to bring gifts. Step 5 is the engagement ceremony in which the young man’s family goes to the young woman’s family bearing gifts and paying fees. After the engagement ceremony is step 6 which is the preparation where the groom to be consults an herbalist to obtain a suitable date for the wedding and makes money available for the wedding expenses. The final step, step 6 is wedding ceremony, which is a glamorous affair with lots of food and music.
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