In Yoruba Land, tribal marks are usually connected with a tribe or tribes; tribal art of people. If we check the cheeks of the vast majority of the people in this country (Nigeria), especially among the Yorubas ,we would observe that a great variety of tribal marks consisting of a number of scars on the cheeks are arranged in different patterns. Quite, a lot of people do not know the reasons for the tribal marks. What are the reasons why people wear tribal marks? The answers are not far fetched; the reasons are in two ways; without doubt, Yorubas belief that in those days, war was rampant in Nigeria. It was during this period that children would be missing. The strong folks sold into slavery the children of the powerless / less privileged folks, and along with their wives. Not only that, several adults were also missing. They were been sold into slavery to other countries. Those sold to slavery usually finds it very difficult to recognize one another, if by any means they met else where, even if they are from the same family or from the same town. It was then, the elders thought that there should be an identity or means of identification when they see or meet one another else where. This would make them know from which family or town the other person is from as soon as they sight the tribal marks.

This issue of tribal marks was not a general issue throughout this country (Nigeria), from the beginning, but it was inherited from the West from where it all started.The second reason for this was that, probably those people from the West from which this culture originated thought it would add more to their beauty by doing so. In Yoruba land if you see some men or women wearing tribal marks, you would notice that it looks good on majority of them. Definitely, those one regard wearing tribal marks as an act of beautifying themselves. With close examination, one would observe that these tribal marks differs from one area to the other, one community to the other. Meanwhile, as this tradition is waning away in some families, so also are other several families, or towns, who still engage seriously in this tradition of wearing tribal marks. As mentioned earlier, it is a tradition among the Yorubas to wear tribal marks on their faces, we then have to examine some types of tribal marks they wear. This will serve as evidence that these tribal marks differs from one family to the other within the same town; such as “Abaja, abaja merin, abaja alagbele, pele, ture, pele ife, ila ondo, abaja ekiti”.