Alaketu of ketu kingdom

The History of AlaKetu of Ketu kingdom.

Ketu was the westernmost of the seven historical Yoruba kingdoms. Yoruba tradition says that these kingdoms were formed by the descendants of Oduduwa when they moved west from Ilé-Ife. Oduduwa is credited with creating the Earth, at the command of the supreme deity Olorun.

Sopasan is credited as the first oba (king) in the line of Ketu, even though the city did not exist during his lifetime. Instead, it was he who led forth the people from Ilé-Ife who would eventually inhabit Ketu. Only the seventh king, Ede, would finally found the city.

The town was settled on a plateau with so few sources of water that a saying developed among the Yoruba: “Water becomes honey in Ketu”. To compensate, inhabitants gathered rainwater in cisterns and dry wells. This lack of water-limited the size of the settlement. However, the plateau provided excellent protection–Ketu was conquered only once in all its long history.

The town was built around a sacred Iroko tree. According to custom, a human sacrifice was required to protect the town. A hunchback from a nearby Ewe community was sacrificed at the entrance to the city, which is said to have provided the town’s name. The question “Who straightens the hump?” is “Ke ‘tu ike?” in Yoruba.

The answer: no one can straighten the hump, so no one can destroy the town. The fourteenth oba, Sa, built a massive gate at the same spot. The gate, crafted from Iroko wood, contained two wooden doors, one outside and one inside. It was given the name Idena for “sentry”.

From the gate stretched an immense clay wall that surrounded the city. Outside the wall lay the ditches from which its clay had been dug, providing further protection. As a final defence, a row of thorn bushes was planted outside the ditch.

The Oba of Ketu takes the title Alaketu: “the one who owns Ketu”.

From the twenty-fifth Alaketu on, the position of oba has rotated between five different royal families: Alapini, Magbo, Aro, Mesa, and Me