Over time, as managing resources, population, and conflicts presented opportunities for new organizational structures, several of the mega-houses started organizing themselves into confederacy-like associations.

[2] During said conflicts, a group of people led by a leader named Odùduwà emerged, who most likely came from Oke Ora, a hilltop settlement to the east, and built a large perimeter wall between the 10th to 11th centuries.

According to oral traditions, a conference was soon held at Ita Ijero, a town in Ilé-Ifè following the triumph of the Odùduwà group in the Obatálá-Odùduwà conflict.

[5] As the population grew, a second wall was built in the capital city Ilé-Ife during the thirteenth century and the construction and pavement of several major roads began as well.

[6] Dichroic glass beads from Ilé-Ifè have been found at Tié in Chad,[8] Kissi in Burkina Faso, Diouboye in Senegal, Gao Ancien, Essouk in Mali, and Koumbi Saleh in Mauritania, all in twelfth- to fourteenth-century contexts.

Moreover, on linguistic grounds, Yufi is a Mandé or an Arabic transliteration of “Ufè,” the proper name for “Ifè” in a central Yorùbá dialect.

[2] The Bead Road is the name given by Akinwumi Ogundiran of the trade route which stretched from Ilé-Ifè to the Moshi-Niger area and as far as the Niger Bend in present-day Mali.

[2] Another possible mention of Ife are the records of 11th to 14th century Arab scholars that reveal trade in blue dichroic West African glass beads.

[10] Items traded to Ife were Saharan copper and salt, Mediterranean and Chinese silk and other clothing materials, they entering the region from across the Niger by the eleventh or twelfth century.

Evidence for this are coptic cross motifs found on objects, burial sites, and statues in the Ife Empire region.

Historic Ife ritual contexts also suggest possible early Coptic Christian contact through long-distance trade.

There is also likely Ife regalia modeled on an ancient Nubian shield ring that probably reached the area between the twelfth through fourteenth Century era through trade.

[11] Recent archaeological findings have provided new insights into the crops cultivated and the trade networks that influenced agricultural practices in the region.

The primary crops identified include Cowpea, Okra, Palm oil, Pearl millet, Sorghum, Cotton, and Wheat.

[2] It appears that between the 13th and 14th centuries, potsherd pavements had become a pan-regional architectural style and nearly every state in the Ife Empire had Paved flooring, even as far as modern-day Togo.

[14] Leo Frobenius, a 20th-century archeologist who visited Nigeria, also noted that the foundations of historical buildings at Ile-Ife were built of burnt bricks.

[17] Ife wasn't as imperialistic as many other empires and spread influence primarily through its cultural, religious, and economic superiority over other Yoruba states.

With control of the trade and profit they began buying horses from the Wasangari, Mossi, Mandé, and Songhai in the early 14th century, and became the first cavalry state in Ife.

Since the carving shows Obatala linked animals and a Muslim prayer board it likely implies that the battle that took place involved people from local and foreign religions (Islam).

The Muslim prayer board offers evidence that the wars that were taking place in the Ife area, as with regions to the north and east in this era (from modern Chad to Mali), involved local populations in contestation with Islamic troops.

This may relate to oral traditions that say the forces of Oranmiyan that gave rise to his new dynasty may have employed new weaponry forms such as long-bladed metal battle knives.