Owan people occupy northern part of Edo State, Nigeria (edo north senatorial district), they belong to the Edo-speaking sub-ethnic group. Owanland is divided into eleven clans namely. Emai, Ivbiadaobi, Ivbimion,Igue, Ikao, Iuleha, Ora, Otua, Ozalla and Uokha, all of which except Ikao claim to have migrated from Benin . Some of their founders are said to have been expelled from Benin at one time or another. These force migrations were neither organized nor led by leaders appointed by the Oba. This fact partly explains why there is complete absence of a hereditary chieftaincy stool in the entire Owan.
The area lies along longitude 6°E of the the Greenwich Meridian and Lantitude 7°N of the Eguator, It is bounded in the north by Akoko- Edo sub-ethnic group, in the South by The Bini and Esan sub-ethnic groups, and in the east by Etsako sub-ethnic group and in the west by the yorubaland.
The Owan people derives their name from River Onwan/Owan .This is the largest and longest river in the area. A hand down has it that the name Onwan is the abbreviation of Onwanvbua, a name which means one who makes merry in affluence. The hand down goes on to say that this was the name of an Ora woman who got married ¡n Otuo, became quite rich due to her hard work and industry, but died childless after a period of protracted illness and painful abandonment her corpse was not retured as was the custom in the culture. As the corpse decomposed, it turned into a spring spiritually cleansed and patriotically moved, beginning as Usobua stream at Iyen Otuo and finding its way through appropriate lowlands before arriving Uhonmora village (Ora) its “homeland” in great volume where-after it bade farewell and flowed to join river Osse. The people of Uhonmora village deified her and all inhabitants of the village were forbidden to eat any type of fish from the Owan river. Whenever the people confront a problem, they offer sacrifices to the goddess of the Owan Rive. The people of Uhonmora regard her as their mother and they depend on her for protection, one suspects she stood for more than what she is remembered for today particulary because she is revered by both males and females in Uhonmora,That tradition of Onwanvbua (omouwa) has survived in ora community is indeed quite remarkable. Be that as it may, we may not fully lose sight of the probability that the river, a geographical phenomenon, could pre-date both Ora and Otuo, which are respectively under 600 and 500 year old. The fact that other screams or rivers have no such history in their origin and that streams or rivers do not necessarily spring up- at the creation of planet-earth need not rubbish the myth about Onwanvbua.
