Blier Cosmic References In Ancient Ife

THIS ESSAY CONSIDERS one of the most important Yoruba cosmological referents, the plan of the capital Ile- Ife and its palace (fig 11.1), and examines a number of artworks associated with this urban center, especially at its height around 1300 CE.1 The Yoruba cosmos has often been compared to a gourd or calabash cut horizontally so as to form a separate base and cover, with the upper half identified with the sky- linked creator god, Oba tala, the lower half with the earth god and new dynasty founder, Odudua (see Lawal, this volume). The form of the gourd sometimes is used in scholarly diagrams that seek to show the Yoruba cosmos as a well- ordered layering of human and supernatural actors (sEE fig. 12.6). In my view, however, this neatly delimited model reflects in part a Western taxonomic conception, since to the Yoruba, religious forces and persona are continually moving, intersecting, cross- pollinating, challenging, and energizing one another (and humans) across a myriad of celestial and earthly spheres. Human and sacral worlds, in short, are conjoined here.