‘The Way of Our Fathers’: CMS Missionaries and Yorubá Health in the Nineteenth Century

Abstract

This article examines the conflicts between missionaries and the Yorùbá, regarding health and healing in nineteenth- century Yorùbáland. An indepth analysis into missionary interventions in indigenous medical therapy is reconstructed using the journals and letters of CMS missionaries from 1846- 1890. With Abeokuta as a case study, it is argued that pre- colonial CMS missionaries attempted to abolish indigenous Yorùbá medical practices. However, they were unsuccessful. The reasons for this failure constitute the focus of this article.