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SUMMARY
The foregoing has been a brief historical account of a particular origin of Igbanke in Edo State and the problems of personal, socio-cultural and political identity posed by the fact of this origin. The identity (personal, polemical and socio-cultural) of the Igbanke people has been determined in the main by the fluctuations of political power. The origins of the people of Igbanke and her neighbours have been examined in the preceding chapters, and also, the various forms of relations that existed between them have been looked at. Igbanke claimed their ancestry from different sources, yet there were still points of connection. In finding out their origins, different schools of thoughts have been employed.
For Igbanke, there is the view that the people there were actually migrants from Benin, while some of the villages there claim their ancestry from Agbor. There was the view that Igbanke was founded by indigenes of Benin who migrated to the place currently known as Igbanke5. There was also another view that points to the Ika communities to be the source of Igbanke people. According to tradition, the area was founded by a man called Akee, a warlord who at that time was sent by the king of Agbor to defend the Northern fringes of Agbor kingdom against Northern marauders like the Nupe and others from Northern Edo. After the war years, he decided to stay permanently in the area. However valid these claims may appear, it could be concluded that the people of Igbanke were made up of migrants from both Agbor and Benin. The migration of people from Agbor to Igbanke was possible, probably because of the proximity between the two communities. The area (Igbanke) could therefore be said to have constituted people from both Agbor and Benin and with their interaction and cooperation, they were able to establish a formidable community.
