Igi Ose in Yoruba History reaches beyond the remarkable appearance and longevity of the African baobab. Historical ethnobotanical records identify Adansonia digitata as the tree known in Yoruba as ose or igi-ose, while research into sacred natural sites in south-western Nigeria shows that particular baobabs became centres of worship, fertility rites and community memory. The history of the tree also intersects with the traditions of Isheri, an important settlement in Awori accounts of the early history of the Lagos region.
The story brings together several connected histories: the natural history of an exceptionally long-lived African tree, the medicinal knowledge attached to it, the religious significance of particular baobabs and the oral traditions through which Awori communities remembered migration and settlement. Together, they show why Igi Ose occupies a distinctive place in the historical landscape of Yorubaland.
Igi Ose in Yoruba History and Sacred Practice
The African baobab is botanically known as Adansonia digitata. The species occurs naturally across much of tropical and southern Africa, including Nigeria. Its enormous trunk, broad crown and ability to withstand seasonally dry environments have made it one of Africa’s most recognisable trees.
The Yoruba name has a long documentary history. J. R. Ainslie’s A List of Plants Used in Native Medicine in Nigeria, published in 1937 by the Imperial Forestry Institute at the University of Oxford, records ose and igi-ose as Yoruba names for Adansonia digitata. The same work records kuka as a Hausa name.
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The tree occupied an important place in indigenous botanical and medicinal knowledge. In some communities, particular baobabs also acquired religious significance and became associated with worship, fertility, protection and communal identity.
Iya-Olomo, the Sacred Baobab Near Ibadan
One of the best recorded examples comes from Idi-Ose, near Ibadan, whose name itself is associated with the baobab.
In a 2016 study of sacred natural sites in southern Nigeria, Nigerian researcher Temitope Israel Borokini recorded a baobab at Idi-Ose known as Iya-Olomo, translated as “mother of children”.
The tree was associated particularly with fertility and served as a centre of worship. Borokini recorded that broken ritual pots and bottles of local gin could still be found beneath it into the 1960s. Goats were sacrificed there, and local tradition associated the tree with the protection of the community during outbreaks of smallpox.
Another baobab shrine was documented along the Ede-Iwo road, where white cloth had been tied around the trunk.
These sacred trees formed part of a wider Yoruba landscape in which particular natural features could acquire spiritual meaning. Trees might become places of prayer, sacrifice or community gathering, while their longevity allowed generations to attach memories and traditions to the same physical landmark.
The religious significance of Igi Ose therefore varied from place to place. Some baobabs became shrines, while others remained valued chiefly as landmarks, medicinal resources or features of the local environment.
Medicine Beneath the Baobab
The importance of Igi Ose extended beyond religion.
Ainslie’s 1937 Nigerian medicinal plant record described the use of different parts of Adansonia digitata, including its bark, leaves and fruit pulp. Such uses formed part of broader indigenous systems of plant knowledge developed and transmitted across generations.
In 2008, University of Lagos researchers J. D. Olowokudejo, A. B. Kadiri and V. A. Travih published an ethnobotanical survey of herbal markets and medicinal plants in Lagos State. Their research documented medicinal plants known to herbal traders and traditional practitioners and included Adansonia digitata, or ose, among the species recorded.
Baobab leaves, bark, fruit and other plant materials have consequently occupied a recognised place in traditional medicinal practice. The history of these uses provides an important window into the botanical knowledge of Yoruba communities and the ways in which plants were incorporated into everyday approaches to health and wellbeing.
Isheri and the Awori Settlement Tradition
The history of Igi Ose also sits within a wider cultural landscape shaped by old settlements and migration traditions.
Isheri occupies an important place in Awori accounts of the early settlement of the region around Lagos.
Historian Liora Bigon’s study of the former names of Lagos discusses traditions earlier collected by John B. Losi, an early Lagos historian. Losi related an account of Ogunfunminire, a hunter associated with the royal family of Ile-Ife, who settled at Isheri.
Losi placed the settlement at about 1699. Other historical reconstructions of Awori movements around the Lagos lagoon have placed important stages of settlement earlier, including movements towards Ebute Metta, Iddo and Lagos Island.
These traditions preserve Isheri as an important point in the remembered sequence of Awori migration and settlement.
The Awori are a Yoruba-speaking people whose historical communities extend across areas now divided between Lagos and Ogun States. Their traditions preserve connections with Ile-Ife and describe movements through settlements north of the lagoon before the development of communities nearer Lagos Island.
Isheri therefore belongs to the broader history of migration, settlement and political development that shaped the Lagos region before colonial rule.
Ogunfunminire and the Memory of Origins
Ogunfunminire occupies a central position in traditions concerning Isheri and early Awori settlement.
Accounts collected during the early twentieth century placed him among ancestral figures associated with migration from Ile-Ife and the establishment of settlements in the region. These traditions became part of the written historical literature as historians recorded and compared oral accounts preserved by Awori communities.
Such narratives were important ways of remembering founders, royal lineages, migrations and relationships between settlements.
Ogunfunminire’s association with Isheri consequently forms part of a wider Awori historical memory linking ancestral origins to Ile-Ife and to the gradual settlement of the Lagos area.
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The Aje Olofin Festival and Awori Heritage
The continuing importance of Isheri’s history can be seen in the Aje Olofin Festival, an annual cultural celebration associated with the traditional institution of Isheri.
In May 2025, Oba Sulaimon Bamgbade, Ayodele III, the Olofin of Isheri, appealed to the Lagos and Ogun State Governments and the Federal Government for greater support in preserving and promoting Awori history and cultural heritage.
His appeal accompanied celebrations surrounding the Aje Olofin Festival and included calls for greater investment in cultural tourism, historical sites and programmes that could introduce younger generations to Awori history.
Palace accounts associated the origins of the festival with 1425, a date preserved within contemporary traditional narratives surrounding the celebration.
The festival continues to provide an important public expression of Awori identity. Through royal institutions, cultural performances and community participation, memories of ancestry and settlement remain part of contemporary life.
How Old Can an African Baobab Become?
The extraordinary longevity of African baobabs helps explain why the trees have become powerful symbols of ancestry and continuity.
Scientific studies have shown that individual African baobabs can survive for more than a thousand years.
In 2007, Adrian Patrut and fellow researchers published radiocarbon results from Grootboom, a giant baobab in Namibia that collapsed in 2004. Samples taken from the tree were analysed using accelerator mass spectrometry. The oldest sampled material produced an age of approximately 1,275 years, with an uncertainty of about 50 years.
Research into ancient baobabs has also revealed their unusual structure. Large specimens may consist of several stems joined together while remaining genetically part of the same individual tree.
Their extraordinary lifespan allows some baobabs to remain rooted in the same landscape while many generations of people live and die around them. This natural longevity makes the trees especially suited to becoming landmarks of memory.
A baobab known to grandparents may still stand before their descendants generations later, accumulating stories, ceremonies and associations as time passes.
Trees as Keepers of Community Memory
The relationship between trees and historical memory extends beyond Igi Ose.
Across south-western Nigeria, significant trees have sometimes contributed to the names of settlements, streets and neighbourhoods. Idi-Ose itself reflects the importance of the baobab within the identity of a particular place.
Before modern road signs, official street names and detailed maps became commonplace, conspicuous natural landmarks offered communities easily recognised points of orientation. A large tree might identify a meeting place, market, shrine or boundary.
When spiritual meaning became attached to such a landmark, the tree could acquire an even deeper place within community life.
It might become associated with ancestors, fertility, protection, ritual obligations or remembered events. Over generations, these meanings could transform a tree from a natural object into a symbol of collective identity.
This connection between landscape and memory helps explain the enduring place of Igi Ose in Yoruba cultural history.
Conclusion
Igi Ose in Yoruba History represents the meeting of botany, traditional medicine, religion and community memory.
The African baobab, Adansonia digitata, is native to Nigeria, and ose and igi-ose are historically recorded Yoruba names for the species. Nigerian ethnobotanical records demonstrate its importance within traditional medicinal knowledge, while scholarly field research documents particular Yoruba baobabs that served as sacred sites.
The Iya-Olomo tree at Idi-Ose near Ibadan provides a particularly striking example. Associated with fertility, sacrifice and worship, it illustrates how an individual baobab could become a centre of ritual life and local identity.
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Isheri adds another dimension to this history. Its place in Awori settlement traditions, together with the remembered figure of Ogunfunminire, connects the landscape north of Lagos with narratives of migration, ancestry and settlement. The continuing Aje Olofin Festival shows that this historical memory remains meaningful in the twenty-first century.
The deeper story of Igi Ose is therefore not simply about an unusual African tree. It is about how communities used living landscapes to remember ancestors, organise sacred space, preserve medicinal knowledge and connect one generation with another.
Author’s Note
Igi Ose offers a powerful reminder that Nigerian history survives not only in palaces, written chronicles and archaeological remains, but also in landscapes that communities have invested with meaning. The sacred baobabs of Yorubaland reveal how religion, medicine and memory could converge around a single living landmark, while Awori traditions surrounding Isheri illustrate the importance of oral history in understanding the early settlement of the Lagos region. Together, these traditions show how trees can become enduring symbols of ancestry, identity and the relationship between people and place.
References
Ainslie, J. R. A List of Plants Used in Native Medicine in Nigeria. Imperial Forestry Institute, University of Oxford, Institute Paper No. 7, 1937.
Bigon, Liora. “The Former Names of Lagos (Nigeria) in Historical Perspective.” Names: A Journal of Onomastics, Vol. 59, No. 4, 2011, pp. 229–240.
Borokini, Temitope Israel. “Sanctuary of the Spirits: Okwu-muo, Ori Oke and ‘Mammy Water’ in the Veneration of Sacred Natural Sites in Southern Nigeria.” International Journal of Intangible Heritage, Vol. 11, 2016.
Olowokudejo, J. D., A. B. Kadiri and V. A. Travih. “An Ethnobotanical Survey of Herbal Markets and Medicinal Plants in Lagos State of Nigeria.” Ethnobotanical Leaflets, Vol. 12, 2008, pp. 851–865.
Patrut, Adrian, et al. “Radiocarbon Dating of a Very Large African Baobab.” Tree Physiology, Vol. 27, No. 11, 2007, pp. 1569–1574.
Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. Plants of the World Online: Adansonia digitata L.
Sobowale, Adetutu. “Monarch Seeks Lagos, Ogun Govts’ Support for Awori History Preservation.” PUNCH, 24 May 2025.
