How 16 become 256

Tradition described: Yorùbá / Ìṣẹ̀ṣe

How 16 become 256

One column of four positions, each single or double, has 2 × 2 × 2 × 2 = 16 possible figures. Those are the sixteen roots: Ogbe, Oyeku, Iwori, Odi, Irosun, Owonrin, Obara, Okanran, Ogunda, Osa, Ika, Oturupon, Otura, Irete, Ose and Ofun, in the southwestern sequence. An Odù has two columns, so 16 × 16 = 256.

When both columns are the same the Odù is a Méjì, and takes the root's principal name — Ogbe on both sides is Eji Ogbe; Ofun on both is Ofun Meji. When they differ, the structural name is the right root followed by the left: Ogbe on the right with Oyeku on the left is Ogbe Oyeku. Traditions also use contracted and honorific forms of these names — the Cuban texts in the archive write that one “Ogbe Yeku” — and those are recorded on each Odù's page as spellings from a named tradition, never invented.

The 256 are generated on this site, not typed: every right root against every left root. What is not generated is any order among the 240 combined Odù. The sixteen have a documented sequence, and even that differs between Ifẹ̀ and the southwest; the 240 are arranged by each lineage in its own way. A table sorted by binary value would look tidy and mean nothing. So the explore page lets you find any of the 256, and refuses to number them.

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