Yoruba people

=== Traditional art and architecture ===
{{Main|Yoruba art|Yoruba architecture}}
[[File:Yoruba peoples armlet (16th century).jpg|thumb|right|Intricately carved ivory [[bracelet]] from the Yoruba people of [[Owo, Nigeria|Owo]]|179x179px]]
Medieval Yoruba settlements were surrounded with massive mud walls.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=pMjHpEyDqJMC&q=Yoruba+adobe+mud+houses&pg=PA168|title=Traditional Buildings: A Global Survey of Structural Forms and Cultural Functions Volume 11 of International Library of Human Geography|author=Allen G. Noble|publisher=I.B.Tauris|year=2007|isbn=978-1-84511-305-6}}</ref> Yoruba buildings had similar plans to the [[Ashanti people|Ashanti]] shrines, but with [[verandah]]s around the court. The wall materials comprised puddled mud and palm oil<ref name=today>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fwc5AAAAIAAJ&q=Yoruba+roofs&pg=PA40 |title=The Yoruba Today) |author=Jeremy Seymour Eades (Changing cultures) |publisher=Cambridge Latin Texts (CUP Archive) |year=1980 |isbn=978-0-521-22656-1}}</ref> while roofing materials ranged from thatches to corrugated iron sheets.<ref name="today" /> 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.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZPnDBAAAQBAJ&q=Sungbo%27s+Eredo+Yoruba+structure&pg=PA144|title=The History of Africa: The Quest for Eternal Harmony|author-link=Molefi Kete Asante|first=Molefi Kete|last=Asante|publisher=Routledge|year=2014|isbn=978-1-135-01349-3}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_dRnaZS9L3wC&q=Sungbo%27s+Eredo+Africa%27s+largest+monument&pg=PA158|title=Cultural Heritage, Ethics and the Military Volume 4 of Heritage matters series|issn=1756-4832|author=Peter G. Stone|journal=The 'Heritage Matters' Series|publisher=Boydell Press|year=2011|isbn=978-1-84383-538-7|page=158}}</ref>

[[File:British Museum Room 25 Pair of door panels Olowe Yoruba Detail 17022019 4950.jpg|thumb|left|Yoruba door, wood carvings; used to record events {{Circa|1910}}]]
[[File:Anna Hinderer building.jpg|thumb|left|Early 19th century [[Yoruba architecture]] showing their unique inner courtyard layout used as a safe space for storing livestock and a space where children could play<ref>{{cite book |title=Seventeen Years in the Yoruba Country. Memorials of Anna Hinderer |author1=Anna Hinderer |author2=D Hone |author3=C A Hone |publisher=Wentworth Press |date=August 27, 2016 |isbn=978-1-371-18436-0}}</ref>]]

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 its striking realism that, unlike most African art, chose to create human sculptures in vividly realistic and life sized forms. The art history of the nearby Benin empire shows that there was a cross–fertilization of ideas between the neighboring Yoruba and 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 earlier Yoruba sculptures from Ife.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/beni_2/hd_beni_2.htm|title=Origins and Empire: The Benin, Owo, and Ijebu Kingdoms|website=The Metropolitan Museum of Art (Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History)|access-date=9 July 2015}}</ref>

A lot of Yoruba artwork, including staffs, court dress, and beadwork for crowns, are associated with palaces and the royal courts.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UQ1QAAAAMAAJ&q=Yoruba+palace+architecture|title=Yoruba palaces: a study of Afins of Yorubaland|author1=G. J. Afolabi Ojo|publisher=University of Michigan|year=1966}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|title=Risawe's Palace, Ilesa Nigeria: Traditional Yoruba Architecture as Socio-Cultural and Religious Symbols|journal=African Research Review|volume=4|issue=3|author=N Umoru-Oke|doi=10.4314/afrrev.v4i3.60187|year=2010|doi-access=free}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6bW41qkth0EC&q=Yoruba+architecture&pg=PA742 |title=The Sustainable World Volume 142 of WIT transactions on ecology and the environment |issn=1746-448X |author=C. A. Brebbia |journal=Wit Transactions on Ecology and the Environment |publisher=Wessex Institute of Technology (WIT Press) |year=2011 |isbn=978-1-84564-504-5}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9NcVAQAAIAAJ&q=Yoruba+palace+architecture |title=Ornamentation in Yoruba folk architecture: a catalogue of architectural features, ornamental motifs and techniques |author=Cordelia Olatokunbo Osasona |publisher=Bookbuilders Editions Africa |year=2005| isbn=978-978-8088-28-8}}</ref> 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.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fZwVAQAAIAAJ&q=Yoruba+art+and+architecture|title=Yoruba: nine centuries of African art and thought|author1=Henry John Drewal|author2=John Pemberton|author3=Rowland Abiodun|author4=Allen Wardwell|publisher=Center for African Art in Association with H.N. Abrams|year=1989|isbn=978-0-8109-1794-1}}</ref> The shrines dedicated to the said gods are adorned with carvings and house an 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.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zBumTdxwcMAC&pg=PA16|title=The Houses of Buxton: A Legacy of African Influences in Architecture|author=Patricia Lorraine Neely|publisher=P Designs Publishing|page=16|year=2005|isbn=978-0-9738754-1-6}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=G7kzQMytrMoC&q=Yoruba+architecture&pg=PA76|title=Common Places: Readings in American Vernacular Architecture|author1=Dell Upton|author2=John Michael Vlach|publisher=University of Georgia Press, 1986|isbn=978-0-8203-0750-3|year=1986}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zPgsAQAAIAAJ&q=Yoruba+architecture|title=Architectures of Nigeria: Architectures of the Hausa and Yoruba Peoples and of the Many Peoples Between--tradition and Modernization|author=Kevin Carroll|publisher=Society of African Missions|year=1992|isbn=978-0-905788-37-1}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Uk1Tbdsq99gC&q=shotgun+houses+yoruba&pg=PA299|title=The Yoruba Diaspora in the Atlantic World (Blacks in the Diaspora)|author1=Toyin Falola|author2=Matt D. Childs|publisher=Indiana University Press, 2005|isbn=978-0-253-00301-0|date=2 May 2005}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.nps.gov/ethnography/aah/aaheritage/FrenchAm_pop11.htm|website=National Park Service: African American Heritage & Ethnography|title=Shotgun Houses|access-date=3 December 2014}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nyzjBAAAQBAJ&q=Reading+the+Architecture+of+the+Underprivileged+Classes|title=Reading the Architecture of the Underprivileged Classes|author=Nnamdi Elleh|publisher=Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.|year=2014|isbn=978-1-4094-6786-1|pages=86–88}}</ref> Today, however, Yoruba traditional architecture has been greatly influenced by modern trends.

[[File:Brooklyn Museum L54.5 Fragment of a Head (3).jpg|thumb|right|[[Terracotta]] head representing ''oni'' or King of [[Ife]], 12th to 16th century|250x250px]]
Masquerades are an important feature of Yoruba traditional artistry. They are generally known as ''[[Egungun|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]].<ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IIqc3pizziAC&q=Yoruba+gelede+masquerades |title=Gẹlẹdẹ: Art and Female Power Among the Yoruba |series=Indiana University Turkish Studies, Midland books (Traditional arts of Africa) |volume=565 |author1=Henry John Drewal |author2=Margaret Thompson Drewal |publisher=Indiana University Press |year=1983 |isbn=978-0-253-32569-3}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=o3o_-JwBwW4C&q=Yoruba+gelede+masquerades&pg=PA15|page=51|title=Playful Performers: African Children's Masquerades|author1=Simon Ottenberg|author2=David Aaron Binkley|publisher=Transaction Publishers|isbn=978-1-4128-3092-8}}</ref> 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, and the priest 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 or 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 were perpetuated by the descendants of Efe and Gelede. This narrative is one of many stories that explains the origin of Gelede. An old theory stated that the beginning of Gelede might be associated with the change from a [[matriarchal]] to a [[patriarchal]] society among the Yoruba people.<ref name=understand />

The [[Gelede|Gelede spectacle]] and the [[Ifá|Ifa divination system]] represent two of Nigeria's only three pieces on the United Nations' [[UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage Lists|Oral and Intangible Heritages of Humanity]] list, as well as the only such cultural heritage from Benin and Togo.