Aigbofa:


Did ibos even call themselves ibo or Igbo before the white man? Why would ibos call the white man onye ibo which translates to ibo man in their own language?
"Oyinbo" was most likely introduced to the ibos through the missionaries who were already being called oyinbo inYorubaland.

bokohalal:
The peoples of the Niger delta who developed the Nigerian Pidgin (not creole) invented the word OYIBO, OYINBO, OIBO,EBO AND EBOH.
The first people to come in touch with Europeans were the Itsekiris, Edos, Izons and the Urhobos (in no particular order.) Their history and language is replete with contact with Europe.
Edos, for example, have been adorning themselves in beads for centuries. Many fruits and vegetables are variation of the original European word. Trade and diplomatic relations were established. Christianity first tried to get a foothold in modern Nigeria through Benin and later, Warri.
Since a people's history could also be gleaned through songs, an Edo send about beads and it's relationship to OIBO, is enough to answer the origin of the word OYIBO, and in its various forms, today.
Ivie ne OYIBO du mwun rre
Ivie ne OYIBO du mwun rre......
is popular and timeless in Edo music.
In religion, music, history and language, OYIBO ,in its many forms, conclusively, is a Niger delta word with the Binis using their vast influence to spread it.

kaorama:


I did not intend to make this a trinal issue. The fact that we call the whites oyibo could be a subtle way people responded to their penchant for adulterating such words as Onyi Ibo. It is like when someone mis pronounces ur name, instead of picking offence, u call the person back the way the person called ur name.

macof:

Lmao bigfrancis pls help us answer this

Will a cat call a dog "cat"?

safarigirl:
stop trying to make silly claims

Yoruba people call it oyinbo. The rest of us who far outnumber south west call it oyibo. They both mean the same thing. Everyone but Yorubas know that.


Now stop quoting me and use google, sheesh!

NigerMan1:


@ GentleToks

What you said above actually is a complete TRAGEDY of immense proportion. Generation twisting histories to suit their tribal and ethnic ego, and handing over useless habits to younger ones.

However it was wrong of you to solely accused the Igbos of this. Am already in my mid-40s and I can tell you is the same (perhaps stronger) among the Yorubas.

Vast majority of Yoruba will rather re-echo tribal stories and beliefs instead of investigating same. No they will never because such fallacies favours them. Even on this thread a Yoruba fellow said his 'grand mother told him something...' and he came to public to use his granny ethnic folklore to debunk others belief.

Also have you observed many Yorubas denigrate the Edos and their cultural value? Have you observed many so-called history the Yorubas spurn about Benin/Edo just to obliterate and subjugate the Edo values to the black race? Please tell me did you ever investigate any of those 'histories' to ascertain the truth or you also swallow book, line and sinker?

Just a while ago I responded to a Yoruba guy describing the Great Benin Empire as 'landlocked' and claiming Itsekiris are Ijebus. My friend did you believe such folklore as truths or research further?

I will like to hear from you...

bokohalal:
The peoples of the Niger delta who developed the Nigerian Pidgin (not creole) invented the word OYIBO, OYINBO, OIBO,EBO AND EBOH.
The first people to come in touch with Europeans were the Itsekiris, Edos, Izons and the Urhobos (in no particular order.) Their history and language is replete with contact with Europe.
Edos, for example, have been adorning themselves in beads for centuries. Many fruits and vegetables are variation of the original European word. Trade and diplomatic relations were established. Christianity first tried to get a foothold in modern Nigeria through Benin and later, Warri.
Since a people's history could also be gleaned through songs, an Edo song about beads and it's relationship to OIBO, is enough to answer the origin of the word OYIBO, and in its various forms, today.
Ivie ne OYIBO du mwun rre
Ivie ne OYIBO du mwun rre......
is popular and timeless in Edo music.
In religion, music, history and language, OYIBO ,in its many forms, conclusively, is a Niger delta word with the Binis using their vast influence to spread it.

bigfrancis21:


Yes, some Igbo people did refer to themselves Igbo, and that is how the identity of Igbo slaves taken to the Americas long before Nigeria's colonization was recorded. Town names in Igboland bearing 'Igbo' i.e. Igborere, Igbo-Ukwu, Umuigbo etc all attest to this fact. Till today, many Igbo families bear surnames with 'Igbo' attached to them i.e. Igbokwe, Igboamaeze, etc.

SirShymexx:


Lol. Cool story, bruh.

You lot are slowly but surely turning to Igbos with hyperbole lol.

I heard Republic du Benin also took permission from ya king (according to him lol) before changing the name from Dahomey to Benin - and Bini folks also own Olokun (despite being landlocked); started terracotta; and the Bini empire extended all the way to Ghana lol. Ogisiso, the great gods of the sky - we hail thee looool.

macof:


Oh the lies u get from edoworld and many edo websites

bokohalal:
The first recorded contact of Europeans and West Africans, was with Benin!
What did the Binis call the Europeans?
OYIBO!

macof:


These Towns u mentioned have little to do with the western Igbos that use Oyibo "onye ibo" like u say
They didn't refer themselves as Igbo

Have u ever considered that since mostly Igbos under Bini use Oyibo then it must have been a result of Bini influence

ezeagu:
"We have also markets, at which I have been frequently with my mother. These are sometimes visited by stout mahogany-coloured men from the south west of us: we call them Oye-Eboe, which term signifies red men living at a distance."

Olaudah Equiano, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, 1789. [Link]

"John Taylor and Ajai Crowther, were called by the people of Onitsha black Europeans, oyibo ojii, or native foreigners."

Augustine Okwu, Igbo Culture and the Christian Missions, 1857-1957, 2010. [Link]

"Other words, phonetically closer to 'ebo' (e.g.ibo,oyibo), also had classificatory meanings. In 1832, R. A. K. Oldfield recorded that on the middle reaches of the Niger near 'Eboe' (Aboh), locals hid in the bushes and called out to them what he heard as 'Oh, Eboe! Oh, Eboe!' (meaning 'White man, white man!'); in the 1850s at Onitsha another such 'stranger', Revd J.C. Taylor, was called by the people oibo, to mean 'whiteman'."

Paul E. Lovejoy, Identity in the Shadow of Slavery, 2009 [Link]

!!!

Adeyinka12:
Eeeeeeh shi oo, no be igbo's
later they will claim they own the word's
ogo
oya
agbada
gele
ejo
egbon
ogede
egusi
garii e.t.c
the worst part of it is when they borrow yoruba language with bad pronounciation like;
yoruba igbo
tolotolo torotoro
akuko okuko
imu imi e.t.c

aim5:


IBO-White man in Esan/Edo. The Yoruba origin of the word Oyinbo is very plausible, but God dam.n you people need to get off that false sense of superiority.. it's quite nauseating.

Justfollowit:


You can lie

SirShymexx:


Lol. Cool story, bruh.

You lot are slowly but surely turning to Igbos with hyperbole lol.

I heard Republic du Benin also took permission from ya king (according to him lol) before changing the name from Dahomey to Benin - and Bini folks also own Olokun (despite being landlocked); started terracotta; and the Bini empire extended all the way to Ghana lol. Ogisiso, the great gods of the sky - we hail thee looool.

bokohalal:

I am lost.

bigfrancis21:


Lmao. Egusi and Garri are not Yoruba words. Egusi in Igbo is Egwusi. Rather, I think it is the other way round. I think you are not educated well-enough to know that Igbo people are an ancient people and the Nri civilization started at about 10AD and Ife 200 years later at 12AD. Igbo civilization is older than Yoruba civilization.

aim5:

First, I stated how Ibo means white person in Esan/Edo, which supports your claim. Then, I went on a tangent, saying that the Yoruba origin of the word Oyinbo also seems plausible, but that they stop with their false sense of superiority. Now you're not lost.

bokohalal:

Better. But it is EBO not IBO, in Esan.

aim5:


It's both.

bigfrancis21:


Lmao. Egusi and Garri are not Yoruba words. Egusi in Igbo is Egwusi. Rather, I think it is the other way round. I think you are not educated well-enough to know that Igbo people are an ancient people and the Nri civilization started at about 10AD and Ife 200 years later at 12AD. Igbo civilization is older than Yoruba civilization.

ladionline:
Something is wrong with your chronology at the bolded. It is evidence-in-chief that you are careless with your assumptions and dates, it means you date desire outcome without timeline. Were you dating the creation of Ife/Nri civilization or artifact?

The archaeology of Igbo-Ukwu revealed bronze artifacts dated to the 9th century A.D. which were initially discovered by Isiah Anozie in 1939 while digging a well in his compound in Igbo-Ukwu, an Igbo town in Anambra State, Nigeria. As a result of these finds, three archaeological sites were excavated in 1959 and 1964 by Thurstan Shaw which revealed more than 700 high quality artifacts of copper, bronze and iron, as well as about 165000 glass, carnelian and stone beads, pottery, textiles and ivory. They are the oldest bronze artifacts known in West African and were manufactured centuries before the emergence of other known bronze producing centers such as those of Ife and Benin. The bronzes include numerous ritual vessels, pendants, crowns, breastplates, staff ornaments, swords, and fly-whisk handles.[1]

The Igbo-Ukwu bronzes amazed the world with a very high level of technical and artistic proficiency and sophistication which was at this time distinctly more advanced than bronze casting in Europe.[2] Peter Garlake compares the Igbo-Ukwu bronzes "to the finest jewelry of rococo Europe or of Carl Faberge,"[3] and William Buller Fagg states they were created with "a strange rococo almost Faberge type virtuosity."[4] Frank Willett says that the Igbo-Ukwu bronzes portray a standard that is comparable to that established by Benvenuto Cellini five hundred years later in Europe.[5] Denis Williams calls them "an exquisite explosion without antecedent or issue."[6] One of the objects found, a water pot set in a mesh of simulated rope is described by Hugh Honour and John Fleming as

A virtuoso feat of cire perdue (lost wax) casting. Its elegant design and refined detailing are matched by a level of technical accomplishment that is notably more advanced than European bronze casting of this period.[2]

The high technical proficiency and lack of known prototypes of the Igbo-Ukwu bronzes led to initial speculation in the academic community that they must have been created after European contact and phantom voyagers were postulated. However research and isotope analysis has established that the source of the metals is of local origin and radio carbon dating has confirmed a 9th-century date, long before the earliest contact with Europe. The Igbo-Ukwu artifacts did away with the hitherto existing colonial era opinions in archeological circles that such magnificent works of art and technical proficiency could only originate in areas with contact to the outside world, or that they could not be crafted in an acephalous or egalitarian society such as that of the Igbo.[3] Some of the glass and carnelian beads have been found to be produced in Old Cairo at the workshops of Fustat thus establishing that trade contacts did exist between Igbo-Ukwu and ancient Egypt.[7][8][9][10] Archaeological sites containing iron smelting furnaces and slag have been excavated dating to 2000BC in Lejja and 750BC in Opi both in Nsukka region about 100 Kilometers east of Igbo-Ukwu.[11][12]

macof:


These Towns u mentioned have little to do with the western Igbos that use Oyibo "onye ibo" like u say
They didn't refer themselves as Igbo

Have u ever considered that since mostly Igbos under Bini use Oyibo then it must have been a result of Bini influence

SirShymexx:


Loool.

Those folks are a lost cause. You shouldn't even be telling that much lies when ya king is called "Oba" - a pure Yoruba name with no meaning in Bini language looool.

Anyway, I love Bini folks but their lies can be overbearing sometimes.

The same Bini folks who employed Itsekiri middlemen to trade with Europeans - the landlocked empire - allegedly met Europeans before everyone loool. Utter tosh. In that region, the Itsekiris and Ijos had contact with them before anyone else. And that was around 15th/16th century or so.

GentleToks:


You are .

bigfrancis21:


You are ignorant of Igbo issues. Anambra (maybe Onitsha which I doubt), Enugu and Ebonyi states (Northern Igboland) were not under Bini kingdom. The areas under Bini Kingdom are the areas closer to Bini i.e. Ika/Agbor.

It still baffles me when you have no academic proof whatsoever to prove the origin of 'oyinbo' yet there's much evidence to prove the usage of 'oyibo' in Igboland dating back to the 18th century or more.