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CHAPTER IV.
THE SOMAL, THEIR ORIGIN AND PECULIARITIES.
Before leaving Zayla, I must not neglect a short description of its inhabitants,
and the remarkable Somal races around it.
Eastern Africa, like Arabia, presents a population composed of three markedly
distinct races.
1. The Aborigines or Hamites, such as the Negro Sawahili, the Bushmen,
Hottentots, and other races, having such physiological peculiarities as the
steatopyge, the tablier, and other developments described, in 1815, by the great
Cuvier.
2. The almost pure Caucasian of the northern regions, west of Egypt: their
immigration comes within the range of comparatively modern history.
3. The half-castes in Eastern Africa are represented principally by the
Abyssinians, Gallas, Somals, and Kafirs. The first-named people derive their
descent from Menelek, son of Solomon by the Queen of Sheba: it is evident from
their features and figures,—too well known to require description,—that they are
descended from Semitic as well as Hamitic progenitors. 1 About the origin of the
Gallas there is a diversity of opinion.2 Some declare them to be Meccan Arabs,
who settled on the western coast of the Red Sea at a remote epoch: according to
the Abyssinians, however, and there is little to find fault with in their
theory, the Gallas are descended from a princess of their nation, who was given
in marriage to a slave from the country south of Gurague. She bare seven sons,
who became mighty robbers and founders of tribes: their progenitors obtained the
name of Gallas, after the river Gala, in Gurague, where they gained a decisive
victory our their kinsmen the Abyssins.3 A variety of ethnologic and
physiological reasons,—into which space and subject prevent my entering,—argue
the Kafirs of the Cape to be a northern people, pushed southwards by some, to
us, as yet, unknown cause. The origin of the Somal is a matter of modern
history.
“Barbarah” (Berberah)4, according to the Kamus, is “a well known town in El
Maghrib, and a race located between El Zanj—Zanzibar and the Negrotic coast—and
El Habash5: they are descended from the Himyar chiefs Sanhaj ([Arabic]) and
Sumamah ([Arabic]), and they arrived at the epoch of the conquest of Africa by
the king Afrikus (Scipio Africanus?).” A few details upon the subject of
mutilation and excision prove these to have been the progenitors of the Somal6,
who are nothing but a slice of the great Galla nation Islamised and Semiticised
by repeated immigrations from Arabia. In the Kamus we also read that Samal
([Arabic]) is the name of the father of a tribe, so called because he thrust out
([Arabic], samala) his brother’s eye.7 The Shaykh Jami, a celebrated
genealogist, informed me that in A.H. 666 = A.D. 1266-7, the Sayyid Yusuf el
Baghdadi visited the port of Siyaro near Berberah, then occupied by an infidel
magician, who passed through mountains by the power of his gramarye: the saint
summoned to his aid Mohammed bin Tunis el Siddiki, of Bayt el Fakih in Arabia,
and by their united prayers a hill closed upon the pagan. Deformed by fable, the
foundation of the tale is fact: the numerous descendants of the holy men still
pay an annual fine, by way of blood-money to the family of the infidel chief.
The last and most important Arab immigration took place about fifteen
generations or 450 years ago, when the Sherif Ishak bin Ahmed8 left his native
country Hazramaut, and, with forty-four saints, before mentioned, landed on
Makhar,—the windward coast extending from Karam Harbour to Cape Guardafui. At
the town of Met, near Burnt Island, where his tomb still exists, he became the
father of all the gentle blood and the only certain descent in the Somali
country: by Magaden, a free woman, he had Gerhajis, Awal, and Arab; and by a
slave or slaves, Jailah, Sambur, and Rambad. Hence the great clans, Habr
Gerhajis and Awal, who prefer the matronymic— Habr signifying a mother,—since,
according to their dictum, no man knows who may be his sire.9 These increased
and multiplied by connection and affiliation to such an extent that about 300
years ago they drove their progenitors, the Galla, from Berberah, and gradually
encroached upon them, till they intrenched themselves in the Highlands of Harar.
The old and pagan genealogies still known to the Somal, are Dirr, Aydur, Darud,
and, according to some, Hawiyah. Dirr and Aydur, of whom nothing is certainly
known but the name10, are the progenitors of the northern Somal, the Eesa,
Gudabirsi, Ishak, and Bursuk tribes. Darud Jabarti 11 bin Ismail bin Akil (or
Ukayl) is supposed by his descendants to have been a noble Arab from El Hejaz,
who, obliged to flee his country, was wrecked on the north-east coast of Africa,
where he married a daughter of the Hawiyah tribe: rival races declare him to
have been a Galla slave, who, stealing the Prophet’s slippers12, was dismissed
with the words, Inna-tarad-na-hu (verily we have rejected him): hence his name
Tarud ([Arabic]) or Darud, the Rejected.13 The etymological part of the story
is, doubtless, fabulous; it expresses, however, the popular belief that the
founder of the eastward or windward tribes, now extending over the seaboard from
Bunder Jedid to Ras Hafun, and southward from the sea to the Webbes14, was a man
of ignoble origin. The children of Darud are now divided into two great bodies:
“Harti” is the family name of the Dulbahanta, Ogadayn, Warsangali and
Mijjarthayn, who call themselves sons of Harti bin Kombo bin Kabl Ullah bin
Darud: the other Darud tribes not included under that appellation are the Girhi,
Berteri, Marayhan, and Bahabr Ali. The Hawiyah are doubtless of ancient and
pagan origin; they call all Somal except themselves Hashiyah, and thus claim to
be equivalent to the rest of the nation. Some attempt, as usual, to establish a
holy origin, deriving themselves like the Shaykhash from the Caliph Abubekr: the
antiquity, and consequently the Pagan origin of the Hawiyah are proved by its
present widely scattered state; it is a powerful tribe in the Mijjarthayn
country, and yet is found in the hills of Harar.
The Somal, therefore, by their own traditions, as well as their strongly marked
physical peculiarities, their customs, and their geographical position, may be
determined to be a half-caste tribe, an offshoot of the great Galla race,
approximated, like the originally Negro-Egyptian, to the Caucasian type by a
steady influx of pure Asiatic blood.
In personal appearance the race is not unprepossessing. The crinal hair is hard
and wiry, growing, like that of a half-caste West Indian, in stiff ringlets
which sprout in tufts from the scalp, and, attaining a moderate length, which
they rarely surpass, bang down. A few elders, savans, and the wealthy, who can
afford the luxury of a turban, shave the head. More generally, each filament is
duly picked out with the comb or a wooden scratcher like a knitting-needle, and
the mass made to resemble a child’s “pudding,” an old bob-wig, a mop, a
counsellor’s peruke, or an old-fashioned coachman’s wig,—there are a hundred
ways of dressing the head. The Bedouins, true specimens of the “greasy African
race,” wear locks dripping with rancid butter, and accuse their citizen brethren
of being more like birds than men. The colouring matter of the hair, naturally a
bluish-black, is removed by a mixture of quicklime and water, or in the desert
by a lessive of ashes15: this makes it a dull yellowish-white, which is
converted into red permanently by henna, temporarily by ochreish earth kneaded
with water. The ridiculous Somali peruke of crimsoned sheepskin,—almost as
barbarous an article as the Welsh,—is apparently a foreign invention: I rarely
saw one in the low country, although the hill tribes about Harar sometimes wear
a black or white “scratch-wig.” The head is rather long than round, and
generally of the amiable variety, it is gracefully put on the shoulders, belongs
equally to Africa and Arabia, and would be exceedingly weak but for the beauty
of the brow. As far as the mouth, the face, with the exception of high
cheek-bones, is good; the contour of the forehead ennobles it; the eyes are
large and well-formed, and the upper features are frequently handsome and
expressive. The jaw, however, is almost invariably prognathous and African; the
broad, turned-out lips betray approximation to the Negro; and the chin projects
to the detriment of the facial angle. The beard is represented by a few tufts;
it is rare to see anything equal to even the Arab development: the long and
ample eyebrows admired by the people are uncommon, and the mustachios are short
and thin, often twisted outwards in two dwarf curls. The mouth is coarse as well
as thick-lipped; the teeth rarely project as in the Negro, but they are not
good; the habit of perpetually chewing coarse Surat tobacco stains them16, the
gums become black and mottled, and the use of ashes with the quid discolours the
lips. The skin, amongst the tribes inhabiting the hot regions, is smooth, black,
and glossy; as the altitude increases it becomes lighter, and about Harar it is
generally of a cafe au lait colour. The Bedouins are fond of raising beauty
marks in the shape of ghastly seams, and the thickness of the epidermis favours
the size of these stigmates. The male figure is tall and somewhat ungainly. In
only one instance I observed an approach to the steatopyge, making the shape to
resemble the letter S; but the shoulders are high, the trunk is straight, the
thighs fall off, the shin bones bow slightly forwards, and the feet, like the
hands, are coarse, large, and flat. Yet with their hair, of a light straw
colour, decked with the light waving feather, and their coal-black complexions
set off by that most graceful of garments the clean white Tobe17, the contrasts
are decidedly effective.
In mind the Somal are peculiar as in body. They are a people of most susceptible
character, and withal uncommonly hard to please. They dislike the Arabs, fear
and abhor the Turks, have a horror of Franks, and despise all other Asiatics who
with them come under the general name of Hindi (Indians). The latter are abused
on all occasions for cowardice, and a want of generosity, which has given rise
to the following piquant epigram:
“Ask not from the Hindi thy want:
Impossible that the Hindi can be generous!
Had there been one liberal man in El Hind,
Allah had raised up a prophet in El Hind!”
They have all the levity and instability of the Negro character; light-minded as
the Abyssinians,—described by Gobat as constant in nothing but
inconstancy,—soft, merry, and affectionate souls, they pass without any apparent
transition into a state of fury, when they are capable of terrible atrocities.
At Aden they appear happier than in their native country. There I have often
seen a man clapping his hands and dancing, childlike, alone to relieve the
exuberance of his spirits: here they become, as the Mongols and other pastoral
people, a melancholy race, who will sit for hours upon a bank gazing at the
moon, or croning some old ditty under the trees. This state is doubtless
increased by the perpetual presence of danger and the uncertainty of life, which
make them think of other things but dancing and singing. Much learning seems to
make them mad; like the half-crazy Fakihs of the Sahara in Northern Africa, the
Widad, or priest, is generally unfitted for the affairs of this world, and the
Hafiz or Koran-reciter, is almost idiotic. As regards courage, they are no
exception to the generality of savage races. They have none of the recklessness
standing in lieu of creed which characterises the civilised man. In their great
battles a score is considered a heavy loss; usually they will run after the fall
of half a dozen: amongst a Kraal full of braves who boast a hundred murders, not
a single maimed or wounded man will be seen, whereas in an Arabian camp half the
male population will bear the marks of lead and steel. The bravest will shirk
fighting if he has forgotten his shield: the sight of a lion and the sound of a
gun elicit screams of terror, and their Kaum or forays much resemble the style
of tactics rendered obsolete by the Great Turenne, when the tactician’s chief
aim was not to fall in with his enemy. Yet they are by no means deficient in the
wily valour of wild men: two or three will murder a sleeper bravely enough; and
when the passions of rival tribes, between whom there has been a blood feud for
ages, are violently excited, they will use with asperity the dagger and spear.
Their massacres are fearful. In February, 1847, a small sept, the Ayyal Tunis,
being expelled from Berberah, settled at the roadstead of Bulhar, where a few
merchants, principally Indian and Arab, joined them. The men were in the habit
of leaving their women and children, sick and aged, at the encampment inland,
whilst, descending to the beach, they carried on their trade. One day, as they
were thus employed, unsuspicious of danger, a foraging party of about 2500 Eesas
attacked the camp: men, women, and children were indiscriminately put to the
spear, and the plunderers returned to their villages in safety, laden with an
immense amount of booty. At present, a man armed with a revolver would be a
terror to the country; the day, however, will come when the matchlock will
supersede the assegai, and then the harmless spearman in his strong mountains
will become, like the Arab, a formidable foe. Travelling among the Bedouins, I
found them kind and hospitable. A pinch of snuff or a handful of tobacco
sufficed to win every heart, and a few yards of coarse cotton cloth supplied all
our wants, I was petted like a child, forced to drink milk and to eat mutton;
girls were offered to me in marriage; the people begged me to settle amongst
them, to head their predatory expeditions, free them from lions, and kill their
elephants; and often a man has exclaimed in pitying accents, “What hath brought
thee, delicate as thou art, to sit with us on the cowhide in this cold under a
tree?” Of course they were beggars, princes and paupers, lairds and loons, being
all equally unfortunate; the Arabs have named the country Bilad Wa Issi,—the
“Land of Give me Something;”—but their wants were easily satisfied, and the open
hand always made a friend.
The Somal hold mainly to the Shafei school of El Islam: their principal
peculiarity is that of not reciting prayers over the dead even in the towns. The
marriage ceremony is simple: the price of the bride and the feast being duly
arranged, the formula is recited by some priest or pilgrim. I have often been
requested to officiate on these occasions, and the End of Time has done it by
irreverently reciting the Fatihah over the happy pair.18 The Somal, as usual
amongst the heterogeneous mass amalgamated by El Islam, have a diversity of
superstitions attesting their Pagan origin. Such for instance are their oaths by
stones, their reverence of cairns and holy trees, and their ordeals of fire and
water, the Bolungo of Western Africa. A man accused of murder or theft walks
down a trench full of live charcoal and about a spear’s length, or he draws out
of the flames a smith’s anvil heated to redness: some prefer picking four or
five cowries from a large pot full of boiling water. The member used is at once
rolled up in the intestines of a sheep and not inspected for a whole day. They
have traditionary seers called Tawuli, like the Greegree-men of Western Africa,
who, by inspecting the fat and bones of slaughtered cattle, “do medicine,”
predict rains, battles, and diseases of animals. This class is of both sexes:
they never pray or bathe, and are therefore considered always impure; thus,
being feared, they are greatly respected by the vulgar. Their predictions are
delivered in a rude rhyme, often put for importance into the mouth of some
deceased seer. During the three months called Rajalo19 the Koran is not read
over graves, and no marriage ever takes place. The reason of this peculiarity is
stated to be imitation of their ancestor Ishak, who happened not to contract a
matrimonial alliance at such epoch: it is, however, a manifest remnant of the
Pagan’s auspicious and inauspicious months. Thus they sacrifice she-camels in
the month Sabuh, and keep holy with feasts and bonfires the Dubshid or New
Year’s Day.20 At certain unlucky periods when the moon is in ill-omened
Asterisms those who die are placed in bundles of matting upon a tree, the idea
being that if buried a loss would result to the tribe. 21
Though superstitious, the Somal are not bigoted like the Arabs, with the
exception of those who, wishing to become learned, visit Yemen or El Hejaz, and
catch the complaint. Nominal Mohammedans, El Islam hangs so lightly upon them,
that apparently they care little for making it binding upon others.
The Somali language is no longer unknown to Europe. It is strange that a dialect
which has no written character should so abound in poetry and eloquence. There
are thousands of songs, some local, others general, upon all conceivable
subjects, such as camel loading, drawing water, and elephant hunting; every man
of education knows a variety of them. The rhyme is imperfect, being generally
formed by the syllable “ay” (pronounced as in our word “hay”), which gives the
verse a monotonous regularity; but, assisted by a tolerably regular alliteration
and cadence, it can never be mistaken for prose, even without the song which
invariably accompanies it. The country teems with “poets, poetasters, poetitos,
and poetaccios:” every man has his recognised position in literature as
accurately defined as though he had been reviewed in a century of magazines,—the
fine ear of this people22 causing them to take the greatest pleasure in
harmonious sounds and poetical expressions, whereas a false quantity or a
prosaic phrase excite their violent indignation. Many of these compositions are
so idiomatic that Arabs settled for years amongst the Somal cannot understand
them, though perfectly acquainted with the conversational style. Every chief in
the country must have a panegyric to be sung by his clan, and the great
patronise light literature by keeping a poet. The amatory is of course the
favourite theme: sometimes it appears in dialogue, the rudest form, we are told,
of the Drama. The subjects are frequently pastoral: the lover for instance
invites his mistress to walk with him towards the well in Lahelo, the Arcadia of
the land; he compares her legs to the tall straight Libi tree, and imprecates
the direst curses on her head if she refuse to drink with him the milk of his
favourite camel. There are a few celebrated ethical compositions, in which the
father lavishes upon his son all the treasures of Somali good advice, long as
the somniferous sermons of Mentor to the insipid son of Ulysses. Sometimes a
black Tyrtaeus breaks into a wild lament for the loss of warriors or territory;
he taunts the clan with cowardice, reminds them of their slain kindred, better
men than themselves, whose spirits cannot rest unavenged in their gory graves,
and urges a furious onslaught upon the exulting victor.
And now, dear L., I will attempt to gratify your just curiosity concerning the
sex in Eastern Africa.
The Somali matron is distinguished—externally—from the maiden by a fillet of
blue network or indigo-dyed cotton, which, covering the head and containing the
hair, hangs down to the neck. Virgins wear their locks long, parted in the
middle, and plaited in a multitude of hard thin pigtails: on certain festivals
they twine flowers and plaster the head like Kafir women with a red ochre,—the
coiffure has the merit of originality. With massive rounded features, large flat
craniums, long big eyes, broad brows, heavy chins, rich brown complexions, and
round faces, they greatly resemble the stony beauties of Egypt—the models of the
land ere Persia, Greece, and Rome reformed the profile and bleached the skin.
They are of the Venus Kallipyga order of beauty: the feature is scarcely ever
seen amongst young girls, but after the first child it becomes remarkable to a
stranger. The Arabs have not failed to make it a matter of jibe.
“’Tis a wonderful fact that your hips swell
Like boiled rice or a skin blown out,”
sings a satirical Yemeni: the Somal retort by comparing the lank haunches of
their neighbours to those of tadpoles or young frogs. One of their peculiar
charms is a soft, low, and plaintive voice, derived from their African
progenitors. Always an excellent thing in woman, here it has an undefinable
charm. I have often lain awake for hours listening to the conversation of the
Bedouin girls, whose accents sounded in my ears rather like music than mere
utterance.
In muscular strength and endurance the women of the Somal are far superior to
their lords: at home they are engaged all day in domestic affairs, and tending
the cattle; on journeys their manifold duties are to load and drive the camels,
to look after the ropes, and, if necessary, to make them; to pitch the hut, to
bring water and firewood, and to cook. Both sexes are equally temperate from
necessity; the mead and the millet-beer, so common among the Abyssinians and the
Danakil, are entirely unknown to the Somal of the plains. As regards their
morals, I regret to say that the traveller does not find them in the golden
state which Teetotal doctrines lead him to expect. After much wandering, we are
almost tempted to believe the bad doctrine that morality is a matter of
geography; that nations and races have, like individuals, a pet vice, and that
by restraining one you only exasperate another. As a general rule Somali women
prefer amourettes with strangers, following the well-known Arab proverb, “The
new comer filleth the eye.” In cases of scandal, the woman’s tribe revenges its
honour upon the man. Should a wife disappear with a fellow-clansman, and her
husband accord divorce, no penal measures are taken, but she suffers in
reputation, and her female friends do not spare her. Generally, the Somali women
are of cold temperament, the result of artificial as well as natural causes:
like the Kafirs, they are very prolific, but peculiarly bad mothers, neither
loved nor respected by their children. The fair sex lasts longer in Eastern
Africa than in India and Arabia: at thirty, however, charms are on the wane, and
when old age comes on they are no exceptions to the hideous decrepitude of the
East.
The Somal, when they can afford it, marry between the ages of fifteen and
twenty. Connections between tribes are common, and entitle the stranger to
immunity from the blood-feud: men of family refuse, however, to ally themselves
with the servile castes. Contrary to the Arab custom, none of these people will
marry cousins; at the same time a man will give his daughter to his uncle, and
take to wife, like the Jews and Gallas, a brother’s relict. Some clans, the Habr
Yunis for instance, refuse maidens of the same or even of a consanguineous
family. This is probably a political device to preserve nationality and provide
against a common enemy. The bride, as usual in the East, is rarely consulted,
but frequent tete a tetes at the well and in the bush when tending cattle
effectually obviate this inconvenience: her relatives settle the marriage
portion, which varies from a cloth and a bead necklace to fifty sheep or thirty
dollars, and dowries are unknown. In the towns marriage ceremonies are
celebrated with feasting and music. On first entering the nuptial hut, the
bridegroom draws forth his horsewhip and inflicts memorable chastisement upon
the fair person of his bride, with the view of taming any lurking propensity to
shrewishness.23 This is carrying out with a will the Arab proverb,
“The slave girl from her capture, the wife from her wedding.”
During the space of a week the spouse remains with his espoused, scarcely ever
venturing out of the hut; his friends avoid him, and no lesser event than a
plundering party or dollars to gain, would justify any intrusion. If the
correctness of the wife be doubted, the husband on the morning after marriage
digs a hole before his door and veils it with matting, or he rends the skirt of
his Tobe, or he tears open some new hut-covering: this disgraces the woman’s
family. Polygamy is indispensable in a country where children are the principal
wealth.24 The chiefs, arrived at manhood, immediately marry four wives: they
divorce the old and unfruitful, and, as amongst the Kafirs, allow themselves an
unlimited number in peculiar cases, especially when many of the sons have
fallen. Daughters, as usual in Oriental countries, do not “count” as part of the
family: they are, however, utilised by the father, who disposes of them to those
who can increase his wealth and importance. Divorce is exceedingly common, for
the men are liable to sudden fits of disgust. There is little ceremony in
contracting marriage with any but maidens. I have heard a man propose after half
an hour’s acquaintance, and the fair one’s reply was generally the question
direct concerning “settlements.” Old men frequently marry young girls, but then
the portion is high and the menage a trois common.
The Somal know none of the exaggerated and chivalrous ideas by which passion
becomes refined affection amongst the Arab Bedouins and the sons of
civilisation, nor did I ever hear of an African abandoning the spear and the sex
to become a Darwaysh. Their “Hudhudu,” however, reminds the traveller of the
Abyssinian “eye-love,” the Afghan’s “Namzad-bazi,” and the Semite’s “Ishkuzri,”
which for want of a better expression we translate “Platonic love.”25 This
meeting of the sexes, however, is allowed in Africa by male relatives; in Arabia
and Central Asia it provokes their direst indignation. Curious to say,
throughout the Somali country, kissing is entirely unknown.
Children are carried on their mothers’ backs or laid sprawling upon the ground
for the first two years26: they are circumcised at the age of seven or eight,
provided with a small spear, and allowed to run about naked till the age of
puberty. They learn by conversation, not books, eat as much as they can beg,
borrow and steal, and grow up healthy, strong, and well proportioned according
to their race.
As in El Islam generally, so here, a man cannot make a will. The property of the
deceased is divided amongst his children,—the daughters receiving a small
portion, if any of it. When a man dies without issue, his goods and chattels are
seized upon by his nearest male relatives; one of them generally marries the
widow, or she is sent back to her family. Relicts, as a rule, receive no
legacies.
You will have remarked, dear L., that the people of Zayla are by no means
industrious. They depend for support upon the Desert: the Bedouin becomes the
Nazil or guest of the townsman, and he is bound to receive a little tobacco, a
few beads, a bit of coarse cotton cloth, or, on great occasions, a penny
looking-glass and a cheap German razor, in return for his slaves, ivories,
hides, gums, milk, and grain. Any violation of the tie is severely punished by
the Governor, and it can be dissolved only by the formula of triple divorce: of
course the wild men are hopelessly cheated27, and their citizen brethren live in
plenty and indolence. After the early breakfast, the male portion of the
community leave their houses on business, that is to say, to chat, visit, and
flaner about the streets and mosques. 28 They return to dinner and the siesta,
after which they issue forth again, and do not come home till night. Friday is
always an idle day, festivals are frequent, and there is no work during weddings
and mournings. The women begin after dawn to plait mats and superintend the
slaves, who are sprinkling the house with water, grinding grain for breakfast,
cooking, and breaking up firewood: to judge, however, from the amount of
chatting and laughter, there appears to be far less work than play.
In these small places it is easy to observe the mechanism of a government which,
en grand, becomes that of Delhi, Teheran, and Constantinople. The Governor farms
the place from the Porte: he may do what he pleases as long as he pays his rent
with punctuality and provides presents and douceurs for the Pasha of Mocha. He
punishes the petty offences of theft, quarrels, and arson by fines, the
bastinado, the stocks, or confinement in an Arish or thatch-hut: the latter is a
severe penalty, as the prisoner must provide himself with food. In cases of
murder, he either refers to Mocha or he carries out the Kisas—lex talionis—by
delivering the slayer to the relatives of the slain. The Kazi has the
administration of the Shariat or religious law: he cannot, however, pronounce
sentence without the Governor’s permission; and generally his powers are
confined to questions of divorce, alimony, manumission, the wound-mulct, and
similar cases which come within Koranic jurisdiction. Thus the religious code is
ancillary and often opposed to “El Jabr,”—“the tyranny,”—the popular designation
of what we call Civil Law.29 Yet is El Jabr, despite its name, generally
preferred by the worldly wise. The Governor contents himself with a moderate
bribe, the Kazi is insatiable: the former may possibly allow you to escape
unplundered, the latter assuredly will not. This I believe to be the history of
religious jurisdiction in most parts of the world.
1 Eusebius declares that the Abyssinians migrated from Asia to Africa whilst the
Hebrews were in Egypt (circ. A. M. 2345); and Syncellus places the event about
the age of the Judges.
2 Moslems, ever fond of philological fable, thus derive the word Galla. When
Ullabu, the chief, was summoned by Mohammed to Islamise, the messenger returned
to report that “he said no,”—Kal la pronounced Gal la,—which impious refusal,
said the Prophet, should from that time become the name of the race.
3 Others have derived them from Metcha, Karaiyo, and Tulema, three sons of an
AEthiopian Emperor by a female slave. They have, according to some travellers, a
prophecy that one day they will march to the east and north, and conquer the
inheritance of their Jewish ancestors. Mr. Johnston asserts that the word Galla
is “merely another form of Calla, which in the ancient Persian, Sanscrit,
Celtic, and their modern derivative languages, under modified, but not changed
terms, is expressive of blackness.” The Gallas, however, are not a black people.
4 The Aden stone has been supposed to name the “Berbers,” who must have been
Gallas from the vicinity of Berberah. A certain amount of doubt still hangs on
the interpretation: the Rev. Mr. Forster and Dr. Bird being the principal
contrasts.
Rev. Mr. Forster.Dr. Bird
“We assailed with cries of hatred and rage the Abyssinians and Berbers.
“We rode forth wrathfully against this refuse of mankind.” “He, the Syrian
philosopher in Abadan, Bishop of Cape Aden, who inscribed this in the
desert, blesses the institution of the faith.”
5 This word is generally translated Abyssinia; oriental geographers, however,
use it in a more extended sense. The Turks have held possessions in “Habash,” in
Abyssinia never.
6 The same words are repeated in the Infak el Maysur fl Tarikh bilad el Takrur
(Appendix to Denham and Clapperton’s Travels, No. xii.), again confounding the
Berbers and the Somal. Afrikus, according to that author, was a king of Yemen
who expelled the Berbers from Syria!
7 The learned Somal invariably spell their national name with an initial Sin,
and disregard the derivation from Saumal ([Arabic]), which would allude to the
hardihood of the wild people. An intelligent modern traveller derives “Somali”
from the Abyssinian “Soumahe” or heathens, and asserts that it corresponds with
the Arabic word Kafir or unbeliever, the name by which Edrisi, the Arabian
geographer, knew and described the inhabitants of the Affah (Afar) coast, to the
east of the Straits of Bab el Mandeb. Such derivation is, however, unadvisable.
8 According to others he was the son of Abdullah. The written genealogies of the
Somal were, it is said, stolen by the Sherifs of Yemen, who feared to leave with
the wild people documents that prove the nobility of their descent.
9 The salient doubt suggested by this genealogy is the barbarous nature of the
names. A noble Arab would not call his children Gerhajis, Awal, and Rambad.
10 Lieut. Cruttenden applies the term Edoor (Aydur) to the descendants of Ishak,
the children of Gerhajis, Awal, and Jailah. His informants and mine differ,
therefore, toto coelo. According to some, Dirr was the father of Aydur; others
make Dirr (it has been written Tir and Durr) to have been the name of the Galla
family into which Shaykh Ishak married.
11 Some travellers make Jabarti or Ghiberti to signify “slaves” from the
Abyssinian Guebra; others “Strong in the Faith” (El Islam). Bruce applies it to
the Moslems of Abyssinia: it is still used, though rarely, by the Somal, who in
these times generally designate by it the Sawahili or Negro Moslems.
12 The same scandalous story is told of the venerable patron saint of Aden, the
Sherif Haydrus.
13 Darud bin Ismail’s tomb is near the Yubbay Tug in the windward mountains; an
account of it will be found in Lieut. Speke’s diary.
14 The two rivers Shebayli and Juba.
15 Curious to any this mixture does not destroy the hair; it would soon render a
European bald. Some of the Somal have applied it to their beards; the result has
been the breaking and falling off of the filaments.
16 Few Somal except the citizens smoke, on account of the expense, all, however,
use the Takhzinah or quid.
17 The best description of the dress is that of Fenelon: “Leurs habits sont
aises a faire, car en ce doux climat on ne porte qu’une piece d’etoffe fine et
legere, qui n’est point taillee, et que chacun met a longs plis autour de son
corps pour la modestie; lui donnant la forme qu’il veut.”
18 Equivalent to reading out the Church Catechism at an English wedding.
19 Certain months of the lunar year. In 1854, the third Rajalo, corresponding
with Rabia the Second, began on the 21st of December.
20 The word literally means, “lighting of fire.” It corresponds with the Nayruz
of Yemen, a palpable derivation, as the word itself proves, from the old Guebre
conquerors. In Arabia New Year’s Day is called Ras el Sanah, and is not
celebrated by any peculiar solemnities. The ancient religion of the Afar coast
was Sabaeism, probably derived from the Berbers or shepherds,—according to Bruce
the first faith of the East, and the only religion of Eastern Africa. The Somal
still retain a tradition that the “Furs,” or ancient Guebres, once ruled the
land.
21 Their names also are generally derived from their Pagan ancestors: a list of
the most common may be interesting to ethnologists. Men are called Rirash, Igah,
Beuh, Fahi, Samattar, Farih, Madar, Raghe, Dubayr, Irik, Diddar, Awalah, and
Alyan. Women’s names are Aybla, Ayyo, Aurala, Ambar, Zahabo, Ashkaro, Alka,
Asoba, Gelo, Gobe, Mayran and Samaweda.
22 It is proved by the facility with which they pick up languages, Western us
well as Eastern, by mere ear and memory.
23 So the old Muscovites, we are told, always began married life with a sound
flogging.
24 I would not advise polygamy amongst highly civilised races, where the sexes
are nearly equal, and where reproduction becomes a minor duty. Monogamy is the
growth of civilisation: a plurality of wives is the natural condition of man in
thinly populated countries, where he who has the largest family is the greatest
benefactor of his kind.
25 The old French term “la petite oie” explains it better. Some trace of the
custom may be found in the Kafir’s Slambuka or Schlabonka, for a description of
which I must refer to the traveller Delegorgue.
26 The Somal ignore the Kafir custom during lactation.
27 The citizens have learned the Asiatic art of bargaining under a cloth. Both
parties sit opposite each other, holding hands: if the little finger for
instance be clasped, it means 6, 60, or 600 dollars, according to the value of
the article for sale; if the ring finger, 7, 70, or 700, and so on.
28 So, according to M. Krapf, the Suaheli of Eastern Africa wastes his morning
hours in running from house to house, to his friends or superiors, ku amkia (as
he calls it), to make his morning salutations. A worse than Asiatic idleness is
the curse of this part of the world.
29 Diwan el Jabr, for instance, is a civil court, opposed to the Mahkamah or the
Kazi’s tribunal.
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