Thresholds of Architectural Morphology of Yoruba Buildings in Southwest Nigeria till the Millenia

Abstract

The literary materials on Yoruba architecture that are more common are descriptive. They dwell mostly on the massing of units, individual configurations within buildings and cultural patterns in ornamentation. The direct links between the living spaces and their socio-cultural implications are emphasized to explain the origin of the forms. The morphological chronology in the building patterns is regarded as vernacularisation processes especially from the traditional patterns to the vernacular traditions. There are hardly any publications of Yoruba architectural buildings beyond the later vernacular patterns like the Afro-Brazilian style. While these volumes of literature are mostly limited to the traditional and vernacular styles, the ethno-acculturation of more contemporary and foreign building patterns like the "international" and the "postmodern" styles into the body of indigenous architectural building patterns of the Yoruba of Southwest Nigeria are not being investigated and published. The culture of a people is preserved in their architecture. If the culture of the Yoruba is preserved in their buildings, the cross-pollination of the Yoruba culture with different inputs from foreign cultures should be evident in the new indigenous buildings that are evolving up till the end of the twentieth century. This chapter material has organized the different lines of thought in the morphology of indigenous architectural building patterns of the Yoruba into a continuum that extends beyond the limits of the current body of literature on the topic. It attempts to decipher the new forms and elements of the buildings of later Yoruba indigenous architecture up till the turn of the twentieth century. The emphasis is on the definition of newer building patterns that can be termed as "indigenous" to the Yoruba culture in Southwest Nigeria. Having increased the ambit of the Yoruba architecture concerning the building patterns beyond the exposition of the previous publications, the current surcease on the morphology of Yoruba architecture in print can be broken to open up more research and publications on contemporary thresholds of the indigenous Yoruba architecture. The chapter is concluded with a guide on the identity of buildings of indigenous architecture of the Yoruba even within the morass of foreign building patterns that crowd the Yoruba towns in Southwest Nigeria.