“Títa ríro là ńko ilà; Tó bá jiná tán, àà doge”
Beauty and Relevance, just like a lot of
other words, are words whose pertinence are quite restricted to
particular persons, environment, location, culture, age, educational
level or even, a particular generation. Over the years, a lot of things
have been considered beautiful and relevant and whose features are not
so appealing to a lay man. A small Nokia phone would be beautiful and
quite relevant to a village kid, but it’s quite unalluring to an urban
youth. Gone were the days when Dansiki, Iro and Buba, Abeti Aja (All
Yoruba traditional attires) were the order of the day, today’s youths
find it uninteresting and unappealing. However, we would have made a
great mistake criticizing those who find these seemingly outdated
cultures pleasurable and satisfactory. We all have our freedom to like
what we like.
According to oral history, the wife of Sango, a great Oyo king, decided
to punish her adulterous slave by giving her scars to make her ugly, but
she turned out more beautiful. Hence, the popularity of the marks. Tell
me, who wouldn’t want to be more beautiful? Though the truthfulness of
the story cannot be ascertained, it sure proves one thing. It was
considered beautiful!
In traditional Yoruba societies, every child is born into a Famillies called idile baba in Yoruba language. They share clan names
(orile), oriki (poetry), taboos (eewo) and facial marks (ila). The
facial marks on the child assigns full membership rights.
The children with facial marks are called Okola.
Each of the ethnic group in the Yoruba Land
had different inscription patterns which appears in different sizes and
shapes at different locations within the face or body. The location and
position of the mark's inscription depends on the tribe and culture.The tribal marks could be inscribed on the breast, arm, lap or buttocks, but they are usually on the face.
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