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Traditional Arts
Medieval Yoruba settlements were surrounded with massive mud walls. Yoruba buildings had similar plans to the Ashanti shrines, but with verandas around the court. The wall materials comprised puddled mud and palm oil while roofing materials ranged from thatches to aluminium and corrugated iron sheets. A famous Yoruba fortification, the Sungbo's Eredo was the second largest wall edifice in Africa. The structure was built in the 9th, 10th, and 11th centuries in honour of a traditional aristocrat, the Oloye Bilikisu Sungbo. It was made up of sprawling mud walls and the valleys that surrounded the town of Ijebu-Ode in Ogun State. Sungbo's Eredo is the largest pre-colonial monument in Africa, larger than the Great Pyramid or Great Zimbabwe.
The Yorubas worked with a wide array of materials in their art including bronze, leather, terracotta, ivory, textiles, copper, stone, carved wood, brass, ceramics, and glass. A unique feature of Yoruba art is their striking realism-which unlike most African art, choose to create human sculptures in vivid realistic and life-sized forms. The art history of the nearby Benin empire shows that there was a cross - fertilization of ideas between the neighbouring Yoruba and the Edo. The Benin court's brass casters learned their art from an Ife master named Iguegha, who had been sent from Ife around 1400 at the request of Benin's oba Oguola. Indeed, the earliest dated cast-brass memorial heads from Benin replicate the refined naturalism of the Yoruba sculptures from Ife.
( Insert Image relevant image) with the caption- Intricately carved ivory bracelet from the Yoruba people of Owo
A lot of Yoruba artworks, including staffs, court dress, and beadwork for crowns, are associated with palaces and the royal courts. The courts also commissioned numerous architectural objects such as veranda posts, gates, and doors that are embellished with carvings. Yoruba palaces are usually built with thicker walls, are dedicated to the gods, and play significant spiritual roles. Yoruba art is also manifested in shrines and masking traditions. The shrines dedicated to these gods are adorned with carvings and house and array of altar figures and other ritual paraphernalia. Masking traditions vary by region, and diverse mask types are used in various festivals and celebrations. Aspects of Yoruba traditional architecture has also found its way into the New World in the form of shotgun houses. Today, however the traditional architecture has been greatly influenced by modern trends.
( Insert Image relevant image) with the caption- Gèlèdé costumes from a Yoruba-Nago community in Benin
Masquerades are an important feature of Yoruba traditional artistry. They are generally known as Egúngún, singularly as Egún. The term refers to the Yoruba masquerades connected with ancestor reverence, or to the ancestors themselves as a collective force. There are different types of which one of the most prominent is the Gelede.
An Ese Ifa (oral literature of orunmila divination) explains the origins of Gelede as beginning with Yemoja, The Mother of all the Orisa and all living things. Yemoja could not have children and consulted an Ifa oracle, who advised her to offer sacrifices and to dance with wooden images on her head and metal anklets on her feet. After performing this ritual, she became pregnant. Her first child was a boy, nicknamed "Efe" (the humorist/joker); the Efe mask emphasizes song and jests because of the personality of its namesake. Yemoja's second child was a girl, nicknamed "Gelede" because she was obese like her mother. Also like her mother, Gelede loved dancing.
After getting married themselves, neither Gelede nor Efe's partner could have children. The Ifa oracle suggested they try the same ritual that had worked for their mother. No sooner than Efe and Gelede performed these rituals- dancing with wooden images on their heads and metal anklets on their feet- they started having children. These rituals developed into the Gelede masked dance and was perpetuated by the descendants of Efe and Gelede. This narrative is one of many stories that explains the origin of Gelede. An outdated theory stated that the beginning of Gelede might be associated with the change from a matriarchal to a patriarchal society among the Yoruba people.
The Gelede spectacle and the Ifa divination system represent two of Nigeria's only three pieces on the United Nations Oral and Intangible Heritages of Humanity list, as well as the only such cultural heritage from Benin and Togo