Oba, Nigeria

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Oba (correctly Ọ̀bà, but also written as Òbà ), is an ancient Igbomina town in northeastern Yorubaland of Nigeria. Ọ̀bà was capital of an ancient Ọ̀bà kingdom, reputed in oral history of the region as a center of great wealth and enterprise.

British colonial records indicate that the ancient Ọ̀bà kingdom uses the "iron crown and rod" (perhaps brass or bronze crown and rod), as the insignia of the king, perhaps as a result of their early invlovement with iron-smelting and iron-working technology. Subsequent Yoruba kingdoms used beaded "crown and rod" insignia, (possibly because precious stones and glassware replaced metalware as the symbol of high rank and wealth). Oratures makes references to "idẹ" which is brass not iron.

Recent archeological research of the region's contemporary and later settlements suggest that Ọ̀bà was founded between the 9th and 10th centuries. The cyclic conflicts with the neighbouring Nupe resulted in cycles of abandonment and reoccupation of the Òbà mother city.

The ancient Ọ̀bà kingdom produced a series of diasporas which influenced several other Igbomina and non-Igbomina Yoruba kingdoms and towns.

Several of the clans that migrated away from the ancient Òbà kingdom retained oratures which refer to their ancestry from the ancient Ọ̀bà. One of such Ọ̀bà-diaspora clans is that of the royal Oba'lumo lineage whose ancestor Oba'lumo founded a new city-state called Isedo.

Examples of Igbomina and non-Igbomina towns (in Kwara and Osun states of Nigeria) with large concentrations of people from Ọ̀bà diasporas include the following: Oke-Ila Orangun, Ila Orangun, Ora-Igbomina, Ipoti-Ekiti, Isanlu-Isin, Oke-Onigbin, Omu-Aran, Rore, Oyan, Inisha, Ipee, Oke-Ode, Babanla, Ajase-Ipo, Omupo, Esie, Oro, Ijomu-Oro, Iddo-Oro, Idofin, Ado-Eku, Oreke, Sanmora, and Pamo.