yoruba religion& medicine inIbadan& /iirtn.-av - f a i M ^S -2*%* A 1f - S ,? >,* ***GEORGE E. SIMPSONIBADAN UNIVERSITY PRESS/ &C O N T E N T SPageList of Tables . . . . . . . . . viiPreface . . . . . . . . . . jxt. TRADITIONAL RELIGIONS IN THE IBADAN AREAOldumar and the Leading ris: Beliefs and Ri tual s. . . 1Oldmar . . . . . . . . . 2Qbtl . . . . . . . . . 3Ornmil . . . . . . . . . 7l . . . . . . . . . . 16$u . . . . . . . . . . 17Sng . . . . . . . . 210sun . . . . . . . . . . 27gn . . . . . . . . . . 29Snppnn . . . . . . . . . 37Osanyin . . . . . . . . . 42beji . . . . . . . . 44P g b .......................................................................................................47Egngn . . . . . . . . 49Or . . . . . . . . . . 53kbdn . . . . . . . . 56Qbalgun . . . . . . . . . 57Edan . . . . . . . . . . 59The gbni Cult . . . . . . . . 60The Ancestors . . . . . . . . 63Soul Concepts . . . . . . . . 63Priesthood . . . . . . . . 64Shrines and Temples . . . . . . . 65II MAGIC AND WITCHCRAFTDivination . . . . . . . . 73Dreams . . . . . . . . . 74Witchcraft . . . . . . . . . 75Sorcery and Conjury . . . . . . . 81The Curse and the Blessing . . . . . . 82Invocation of the Soul . . . . . . . 82Defences against Witchcraft; Curses; Invocation . . . 83Charms . . . . . . . . . 85Magical Protection used by 272 Rank-and-File Informants . 88vrPageTraditional Healers . . . . . . . . 93Native Doctors Associations . . . . . . 94Diagnoses, Causes and Treatment of Illnesses . . . 97Discussion . . . . . . . . . 1 0 8IV. RELIGIOUS, MAGICAL, AND MEDICAL BELIEFSFamily . . . . . . . . . 1 1 7Education . . . . . . . . . 1 1 9Occupation . . . . . . . . . 121Religion . . . . . . . . . 1 2 3Magic and Divination . . . . . . . 1 2 4Medicine . . . . . . . . . 1 2 7Summary and Discussion . . . . . . . 1 3 1V. CHANGES IN YORUBA RELIGIONS AND MEDICINEReligion in 1964 . . . . . . . . 143Conversion to Islam and Christian Faiths . . . . 1 4 3Traditional Cults Declining, but Traditional Beliefs Persist . . 143Compromises, Concessions, and Rationalizations . . . 147Syncretisms found in Religious Movements inSouth-Western Nigeria . . . . . . 1 4 7Medicine in 1964 . . . . . . . . 1 5 0Patent Medicines and Drugs . . . . . . 1 5 0Favourable Attitudes Toward Modern Medicine . . . 153Interaction Between Traditional and Modern Medicine . . 154Hospitals and Health Centers in the Ibadan Area . . . 160New Emphases and Programmes at the Medical School, Universityof Ibadan . . . . . . . . 163A Pilot Experiment in Community Psychiatry . . . 1 6 4Differing Points of View on the Use of Traditional Healers . 165Other Changes . . . . . 1 6 6Attitudes Toward the Retention of Traditional Customs . . 166Schooling Desired for Own Children . . . . 1 6 6Summary . . . - . 1 6 7Appendix A . . . . 1 7 0Forms Used in This Study . - . 1 7 0Demographic Data on 272 Yoruba . . . . . 1 8 7Appendix B 188Additional Tables . . 1 8 8Bibliography 194Index 197in. TRADI TI ONAL MEDI CI NEvi1234567891011121314151617181920212223Page119119120120121121122123124124125126126126127128129129130131145154155LIST OF TABLESReligion now and Number of Wives of 172 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964Place of Residence and School Attendance of 267 Yoruba, IbadanArea, 1964 . . . . . . . . .Age and School Attendance of 267 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964 . .Residence and Migration and Education of 268 Yoruba, Ibadan Area,1964 .......................................................................................................Religion Now and School Attendance of 266 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964Religion and Education of 268 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964 . .Age and Occupation of 272 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964 . . .Religion Now and Occupation of 271 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964 .Residence and Migration and Religion of 272 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964Place of Residence and Being Troubled by Witchcraft of 260 Yoruba,Ibadan Area, 1964 . . . . . . . .Residence and Migration and Supernatural Trouble or Experience of270 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964 . . . . . .Supernatural Trouble or Experience and Supernatural Guidance orProtection of 261 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964 . . . .Religion and Supernatural Guidance or Protection of 262 Yoruba,Ibadan Area, 1964 . . . . . . . .Education and Supernatural Guidance or Protection of 259 Yoruba,Ibadan Area, 1964 . . . . . . . .Age and Treatment Sought When Seriously 111of 241 Yoruba, IbadanArea, 1964 . . . . . . . . .Religion Now and Treatment Sought When Seriously 111of 241 YorubaIbadan Area, 1964 . . . . . . . .Religion and Illness Practices of 272 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964 . .Education and Illness Practices of268 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964 .Illness Experience and Supernatural Trouble or Experience of 231Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964 . . . . . . .Illness Practices and Supernatural Guidance or Protection of262 Yoruba,Ibadan Area, 1964 . . . . . . . .Place of Residence and Attitude Toward Retention of TraditionalReligion of 219 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964 . . . .Illness Practices and Attitudes Toward Modem Medical Treatment of245 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964 . . . . . .Place of Residence and Belief That There Are Illnesses That ModernMedicine Will Never Be Able to Cure of 246 Yoruba, Ibadan Area,1964 . . . . ..............................................vii242526272829303132333435363738394041Page166167188188188189189189190I SO191191191192192192193193Place of Residence and Attitude Toward Retention of TraditionalCustoms of 269 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964 . . . .Schooling Desired for Own Children, Ibadan Area, 1964 . .Place of Residence of 272 Yoruba Men and Women, Ibadan Area, 1964Place of Residence and Age of 272 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964 . .Place of Residence and Marital Status of270 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964Place of Res idence and Number of Wives of 172 Married Yoruba,Ibadan Area, 1964 . . . . . . . .Age and Marital Status of 270 Yoruba, Ibadan Ar i 1964 . .Age and Number of Wives of 172 Marrii d Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964Place of Residence and Number of Children of 181 Married Yomba,Ibadan Area, 1964 . . . . . . . .Place of Residence and Occupation of 272 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964School Attendance and Occupation of 267 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964Place of Residence and Religion Now of 271 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964Age and Religion Now of 271 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964 . .Sex and Religion Now of 271 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964 . .Sex and Consultations W th Diviners of 260 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964Experience With and Attitudes Toward Dispensaries and Hospitals of272 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964 . . . . . .Attitudes Toward Patients of Doctors and Nurses in Dispensaries andHospitals According to Patients, 272 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964Experience of 272 Yoruba, Ibadan Area, 1964- with Bribing Attendantsand Waiting for Service at Dispensaries and Hospitals . .vinPREFACEOf t en the Yoruba people are thought of as a definite tribal or ethnic group.Dr S. O. Biobaku has shown that the use of the term Y oruba to refer to the peoplesin Western Nigeria is largely the result of the influence of the Anglican missionin Abeokuta in the nineteenth century. Wallerstein says that the standard Yorubalanguage evolved by the mission was the new unifying factor, and he quotes Hodgkinsremark: (T. Hodgkin, Letter to Dr Biobaku, in Odu, No. 4, 1957, p. 42): Everyonerecognizes that the notion of being a Nigerian is a new kind of conception. Butit would seem that the notion of being a Yoruba is not very much older.1AndLloyd points out that originally the term Yoruba applied only to the peopleofthe Qyo ki gdom.2Descent is traced through the male line, and, traditionally, residence is patrilocal.The lineage has not ceased to be a corporate group, even in the towns and cities, butsome of its functions have been taken over by voluntary associations of onekindor another. No reliable figures exist of the extent of polygyny among the Yoruba.Lloyd cites one survey which suggests that Yoruba men who have reached the stateof marriage have an average of two wives each; one-third have only onewife atany given time, one-third have two, and one third have three or more wives.In Ibadan, as well as in Ijaye and in Lalupon, the chief political officer, theBalis assisted by a council of chiefs. (In Ibadan, since 1935, this officer has been knownas the Olbdn.) Unlike other Yoruba towns, Ibadan has no sacred king or pba.In the 1950s, administrative machinery of the Regional Government grew rapidlyand government became much more highly centralized than it was in theearlierpart of the colonial period.3 Between 1953 and 1955 local government councilswere started by the government of the Western Region, and these units have becomeintegral parts of a modem independent state.Farming is the predominant occupation of the Yoruba. According to Lloyd,a typical Yoruba town has 70 per cent of its adult men engaged in farming, andten per cent each as craftsmen and traders. Farmlands extend for twenty miles aroundI badan; in smaller towns they go out four or five miles. Where farms are some distancefrom the town, small hamlets are built and many people commute from town tofarm. A complex marketing pattern moves agricultural products from producertoconsumer and imported goods from Ibadan merchants and wholesalers to purchasersin the city, villages, and farms.4 Thus far, there has been little industrialization1Immanuel Wallerstein, Ethnicity and National Integration in West Africa, Cahitrs d EtudesAfricaines No. 3-1, October, 1960,pp. 129-39. Reprinted in P. L. Van den Berghe, Africa SocialProblems of Change and Conflict, Chandler Publishing Company, 1965, pp. 472- 82.2P. C Lloyd, The Yoruba of Nigeria, in J . L. Gibbs, Peoples of Africa, Holt, Rinehart, andWinston, Inc., 1965, pp. 549-82. This is an excellent summary of Yoruba historyand culture.3P. C. Lloyd, Introduction n P. C. Lloyd, A. L. Mabogunje. and B. Awe, eds.,The Cit ofIbadan, Cambridge University Press, 1967, pp. 6-7. See G. J enkins, Governmentand Politicsin Ibadan," in ibid, ch. 11.ixfm Nigeria, and Ibadan has much less than Lagos. Ibadan, Lagos and other citiesnow have some modern department stores, hotels, office buildings and residences.Free primary education was started in Western Nigeria in 1955 and resulted ina massive expansion of instruction at this level up to 1960. Since that time thegovernment has e icouraged consolidation to raise the standards and to reduce unnecessaryexpenses. Callaway says that the city of Ibadan leads Nigeria and even West Africaas a thriving centre of education at all levels.4 5The University cf Ibadan,an outstanding modern university founded in 1948, provided undergraduate and graduateinstruction for nearly three thousand students in 1964. In recent years, unemployedschool leavers have constituted a serious social problem in Ibadan.During the past two decades the growth of a prosperous and educated elite hasbeen an important development, but this group makes up less than onehalf ofone per cent of the population in Western Nigeria. Since the present study dealslargely with traditional beliefs and practices, we arc concerned here only indirectlywith the new elite.Yoruba life is undergoing considerable change. New patterns are developinginfamily life, government, education, the economy, religion, medicine, artand inother areas. Old ways, however, have not disappeared entirely, and the purpose of thisstudy is to give some indication of the extent both of the continuation and ofthechanging of traditional religions and traditional medicine in the Ibadan areain1964.The sentiments, defined as combinations of perception, belief, and feeling whicheach person carries in his mind as guides for conduct and for the definition ofreality,found by the team responsible for the Cornell-Aro Mental Health Research Projectin the Western Region is valuable in understanding The Yoruba World. Thesesentiments pertain especially to the Rgba Yoruba who live in the Abeokuta area,but in the main, they are characteristic of Yoruba who reside in the Western Region.We give below thirteen of the seventeen sentiments on the Cornell-Aro list. Referenceto these sentiments will be helpful in examining the findings of the present studyon Yoruba religions and medicine.SELECTED SENTIMENTS OF THE YORUPA PEOPLE1 The world is made up of many unseen forcessome malevolent, some potentially malevolent. We must piotect ourselves by every possible means.2 One of the main ways to protect ourselves and our children and to ensure thebenevolence of the spirits is sacrifice, the killing of a living being.3 Success is counted in children, wives, houses, money, land, titlesand goodstanding with ones neighbours. All of usadherents to traditional beliefs,YORUBA RELIGION AND MEDICINE IN IBADAN4P. C. Lloyd, The Yoruba of Nigeria, pp. 555- -6. See A. Callaway, From Traditional Craftsto Modern Industries, in Lloyd, Mabogunje, and Awe, op. cit., ch. 8; B.W. Hodder, TheMarkets of Ibadan, ibid., ch. 9; and H. A. Oluwasanmi, The Agricultural Environmentibid., ch. 3.5Archibald Callaway, *Educational Expansion and the Rise of Youth Unemployment, inLloydMabogunje, and Aw,, eds., op. cit., ch. 10. A. H. Leighton, T A. Lambo, C. C. Hughes, D. C. Leighton, J . M. Murphy, and D.B. Macklin,Psychiatric Disorder among the Yoruba, Cornell University Press, 1963, ch. 3.XPREFACEMoslems, and Christians- -believe in an after-life in which people are judgedas good or bad. The here and now is, however, important in ;ts own right.4 There are many changes coming which promise a better life for us.But wehad better not become so enchanted with the new as to depart radically fromthe old customs and beliefs.5 People have it within their power to bring harm and misfortune to others throughmagical means. Therefore, we must be careful in the way we treat each other.6 Education is the golden key to success in lifeif not for me at least for mychildren.7 There is nothing that money cannot do.8 Everyone belongs somewhere in a group, but all people are not equal. Age,sex and vested authority determine every situation, and we must respect thepeople above us.9 .. .the most important ties are those in marriage and between parents and children.10 Since our world as women is centered on children, it focuses on the future,but we believe we can help them by continuing to practice many of our old ways.11 Marriage is the normal and natural state for adults, and polygyny is the normaland natural form of marriage.12 All of us belong in a variety of groupsfamily, village compound, lineage,or tribebut except for the face-to-face relations of immediate families, loyalties are now confused.13 Health is precious to all of us. We have heard about germs and nutrition, butif someone is after you with magic, it is mainly sickness or death that he willbe able to send.The data in this study were obtained mainly from two sets of informants in theIbadan area: 275 rank-and-file informants and 35 persons who were reputedto be especially well informed about traditional Yoruba religion, or medicine, orboth. The larger sample was reduced to 272 when it was found that three of theseindividuals were non-Yoruba. Of the 272, 54 were residents of the village of Ijaye,108 of Laluppn, and 110 of Ibadan. In Ibadan, 32 informants lived in the Oje section,36 in Oke Qfa, and 42 in Isale Ij?bu. Data concerning the age, sex, marital status,migration, education, occupation, religion of these informants are givenin tablesin Chapter V and in the Appendix.Of the 35 persons who were healers or leaders in traditional religions orboth,31 were identified with Ibadan sub-tribe, 2 were Ilesa, 1was Ekiti, and 1was QtanAiyegbaju. Thirty-two of these informants were male and 3 were female, andthelatter three were healers. None of these informants was under 30 years of age,11were between 30 and 49, and 24 were from 50 to 90. Of these 35 experts, 18 livedin Lalupon (8 healers, 6 traditional religious leaders, and 4 persons who were activein both areas), and 17 resided