Isese

Isese is the traditional religion of the Yoruba, whose kingdoms of Oyo and Ife lay in what is now southwestern Nigeria. Its creation story tells how the supreme god Olodumare sent the orisha Obatala to make the earth; Oduduwa cast the soil on the primeval waters at Ife, so Ife remained the sacred source of Yoruba kingship.

Below Olodumare stand the orisha and the ancestors, who return as Egungun masquerades. Priests called babalawo consulted Orunmila through Ifa divination, drawing on 256 Odu, collections of verses.

Oyo made Shango, god of thunder and traditionally its third Alaafin, a royal cult. After Ilorin broke away and came under Muslim Fulani leaders, it destroyed Oyo-Ile in 1835. Yoruba captives carried across the Atlantic took the orisha to the Americas, where they became the roots of Candomblé and Santería.