linguistic:voice_change
Genetics

Genetic studies have shown the Yoruba to cluster most closely with West African peoples, followed by Central and Eastern African groups speaking Niger-Congo languages.

Yoruba people belong largely to the E1b1a1 subclade of the E-M2 haplogroup along with the Ewe, Ga, and Bamileke peoples of West Africa and Cameroon. Genetic studies have also found evidence of some archaic West-Eurasian admixture in Yoruba populations at very low frequencies, with signals which speak to such estimated at 0.18% among modern samples. The occurrence is largely assumed to be from up to 8.6% archaic West Eurasian ancestry among Yorubas. This admixture may have been introduced 7,500–10,500 years ago from North Africa during the Green Saharan period. Another full genome study on African populations found that the Yoruba (Yoruba/Esen cluster of West Africa) received varying degrees of West-Eurasian admixture, although generally at low frequency, indirectly through contact with Northern African pastoralists.