UROMI TRADITIONS OF ORIGIN: A MULTIDISCIPLINARY APPROACH

Abstract

The problem of the historical origin of Uromi people has generated debates among historians and even other interested non-professional writers.  A diversity of wide range speculation as a result has endeared on Uromi and even Esan history.  Popular literatures on Esan history tends undisputable in their claims that Uromi people originated from Benin during the reign of Oba Ewuare in the 15^th century.  Quite a few scholars were bold enough to suggest the possibility of aborigine origins let alone a multiple sources of origins.  This paper is a departure from both the Benin migration myth of origin and the aborigine myth of origin.  Through a multidisciplinary approach, this study questions the existing accounts of the traditions of Origin of Uromi people from Benin. This is on the ground that the task of interrogating the origins of a people is not the exclusive privilege of the historian, as the geographer, archaeologist, and the linguist are also eminently involved.  Therefore, the claim of this paper is that we must deviate from the widely accepted belief of Benin myth of origin and the aborigine myth of origin as the only traditions of origin of Uromi people of Edo State, Nigeria.