Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-gtxcr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-18T15:04:30.769Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Bantu, Galla and Somali migrations in the Horn of africa: a reassessment of the Juba/Tana area*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 January 2009

E. R. Turton
Affiliation:
School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London

Extract

This article offers a new reconstruction of Bantu, Galla and Somali migrations in the Horn of Africa, with particular reference to the area between the Juba and the Tana rivers. It is suggested that Garre or proto-Garre Somali gained control of the area between the Juba and the Tana rivers before the Galla arrived in this area, and that in the process the Garre were responsible for pushing Bantu-speaking peoples back to the river Tana. However, it is also argued that the area initially controlled by Bantu-speaking peoples in the Horn of Africa was much more limited than is generally assumed. It is then suggested that around the sixteenth century the Orma Galla migrated to the coast from southern Ethiopia via the Lorian Swamp and the river Tana and not by the river Juba as is generally argued. The arrival of the Orma led to a further retreat of Bantu-speaking peoples towards the Sabaki river, and then to a retreat of the Somali northwards in the direction of the Juba river. In this way the nineteenth-century Somali drive southwards can be seen to some extent as a reconquest of land occupied earlier by them.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1975

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 This is used in preference to the Swahili term Nyika which has pejorative overtones. Both terms refer collectively to the Digo, Duruma, Chonyi, Giriama, Jibana, Kauma, Rabat and Ribe.

2 The term pre-Hawiya was coined by Colucci, M. in his Principi di Diretto Consuetudinario della Società Italiana Meridionale (Florence, 1924), 91.Google Scholar It was designed to describe a Somali clan-family that traced its descent from an ancestor collateral of Irir and to distinguish them from the Hawiya who claim to be descended from Irir himself. The most important of the pre-Hawiya clans are the Garre. See also Lewis, I. M., Peoples of the Horn of Africa (London, 1955), 26–7.Google Scholar

3 Lewis, I. M., ‘The Galla in Northern Somaliland’, Rassegna di Studi Etiopici, XV (19501960), 2138.Google Scholar See also by the same author, ‘The Somali conquest of the Horn of Africa’, J. Afr. Hist., 1 (1960), ii, 213–30.Google Scholar

4 Barker, Lieut, ‘On Eastern Africa’, J.R.G.S., XVIII (1848), 134.Google Scholar

5 Léon des Avanchers, ‘Esquisse géographique du pays Oromo ou Galla, du pays Soomali et de la côte orientale d'Afrique’, Bulletin de la Société de Géographie, XVII (1859)Google Scholar; Paulitschke, P., ‘Die Wanderungen der Oromo oder Galla Ost-Afrikas’, Mitteilungen der Anthropologischen Gesellschaft, IX (1889).Google Scholar

6 ‘The origins of the Galla and Somali’, J. Afr. Hist., VII (1966), 2746.Google Scholar

7 This was based partly on the work of Fleming, H. C., ‘Baiso & Rendille: Somali outliers’, Rassegna di Studi Etiopici, xx (1964).Google Scholar See also Murdock, G. P., Africa: its peoples and their culture history (New York, 1959)Google Scholar where the same conclusion is arrived at by other means.

8 Both Hawiya and Hawiye are spellings which have long been used interchangeably to describe the same people and they accurately reflect small differences between Somali dialects. I am grateful to Dr Andrzejewski for this information.

9 Munro, J. Forbes, ‘Migrations of the Bantu-speaking peoples of the Eastern Kenya highlands: a reappraisal’Google Scholar and Saberwal, Satish C., ‘Historical Notes on the Embu of Central Kenya’, J. Afr. Hist., VIII (1967), 2938.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

10 Fadiman, Jeffrey A., ‘The “Proto Meru” and the island of “Mbwa”’, Mila, I no. 2 (1970).Google Scholar

11 Morton, R. F., ‘The Shungwaya myth of Miji Kenda origins: a problem of late nineteenth century Kenya coastal history’, The International Journal of African Historical Studies, v (1972). iii.Google Scholar

12 Attempts have been made to reconstruct a chronology of Miji Kenda history from the surviving names of supposed Agiriama age-sets: see Cashmore, T. H. R., ‘A note on the chronology of the Wanyika’, T.N.R., LVII (09 1961).Google Scholar But according to Morton, R. F., ‘the structure of the age-system … is still an unknown factor and of little value for chronological purposes’ (‘Shungwaya Myth’, 404).Google Scholar

13 I.e. the Nyika cluster. Murdock, G. P., Africa, 308.Google Scholar

14 Cerulli, E., ‘Gruppi Etnici negri nella Somalia’, Archivio per l'Antropologia e la Etnologia, LXIV (1934), 182Google Scholar; Puccioni, N., Le Popolazioni indigene della Somalia Italiana (Bologna, 1937), 12Google Scholar; Prins, A. H. J., ‘The Somaliland Bantu’, Bulletin of the International Committee on urgent Anthropological and Ethnological Research, no. 3 (1960).Google Scholar

15 Lewis, I. M., Peoples, 41.Google Scholar

16 Chittick, N., ‘An Archaeological reconnaissance of the Southern Somali coast’, Azania, IV (1969).Google Scholar

17 Most scholars have accepted the identification of the early East African iron age with Bantu-speaking peoples, but the evidence for this remains circumstantial. Soper, R. C., ‘A general review of the early iron age for the southern half of Africa’, Azania, VI (1971), 32–3Google Scholar; and by the same author, ‘Kwale: an early iron-age site in south-eastern Kenya’, Azania, II (1967).Google Scholar

18 Lewis, I. M., Peoples, 42–3Google Scholar; Carcoforo, Enrico, Elementi di Somâlo e Ki-Swahili parlati al Benadir (Milan, 1912).Google Scholar

19 Nevertheless, this seems to be the argument of Cerulli, , ‘Noterelle Somale ad Al-Dimasqi ed Ibn Arabi’, Somalia: scritti vari editi ed inediti, I (Rome, 1957), 44–6.Google Scholar

20 Krumm, B., Words of Oriental origin in Swahili (London, 1940), 107–12Google Scholar; Knappert, J., ‘Some notes on Swahili words and names in Mas‘udi’, SOAS Language/History Seminar paper, 1968.Google Scholar

21 MacKenzie, D. N., ‘Zangis in early Persian’, SOAS History/Language Seminar paper 1968Google Scholar; Saeed, Maulana S., Rizvi, Akhtar, ‘“Zenj”: its first known use in Arabic literature’, Azania, II (1967), 200–1.Google Scholar

22 Freeman-Grenville, G., ‘A Note on Zanj in the Greek authors’, SOAS Language/ History Seminar Paper, 01 1968.Google Scholar

23 Wansbrough, J. E., ‘Africa and the Arab Geographers’, in Dalby, D.. (ed.), Language and History in Africa (London, 1970).Google Scholar

24 Murdock, G. P., Africa, 307, 324Google Scholar; Oliver, R., ‘The problem of the Bantu expansion’, J. Afr. Hist., VII no. 3 (1966), 368Google Scholar; Freeman-Grenville, G. S. P., The East African Coast (Oxford, 1962), 15.Google Scholar

25 Devic, L. Marcel, commenting on this description in Yaqut, writes: ‘ces brèves paroles … ne peuvent évidemment servir de base à aucune conjecture sérieuse’, Le Pays des Zendjs ou la côte orientale d'Afrique au moyen-age (Paris, 1883), 70.Google Scholar

26 The same can be said of Sulaiman al-Mahri who in the first half of the sixteenth century was writing of a place called al-Jubh, see: Tibbetts, G. R., Arab Navigation in the Indian Ocean before the coming of the Portuguese (London, 1971), 428.Google Scholar

27 Wansbrough, , ‘Africa’, 93 ff.Google Scholar

28 I have consulted two translations: Cerulli, E., ‘Libro degli Zengi’, Somalia (1957), 253 ff.Google Scholar; and the Kitab al-Zanuj, 1966 MSS translated by E. Ritchie.

29 Morton, R. F., ‘Shungwaya Myth’.Google Scholar

30 This is not to deny the presence of escaped slave settlements of Bantu-speakers on the river Juba from the end of the eighteenth century. See: Grottanelli, V. L., ‘Il Bantu del Giuba nella tradizione dei Wazegua’, Geographica Helvetica, VIII (1953).Google Scholar

31 Morton, R. F., op. cit.Google Scholar

32 Grottanelli, V. L., ‘Il Bantu’, 251Google Scholar; Werner, A., ‘The Bantu Coast Tribes of the East Africa Protectorate’, J.R.A.I., XLV (1915), 327Google Scholar; Cerulli, E., ‘Le Popolazioni della Somalia nella tradizione storica locale’, Somalia, I (1957).Google Scholar

33 Osborne, G. H., ‘Wadigo of Vanga District’, KNA/KWA/IGoogle Scholar; Weaving, L. A., ‘Brief notes on the origin and movements of the Wachonyi and Wajibani’, 1926, KNA/DC/KFI/ 3/1.Google Scholar

34 Prins, A. H. J., ‘Shungwaya, die Urheimat der nordost Bantu’, Anthropos, L (1955)Google Scholar; Grottanelli, V. L., Pescatori del Oceano Indiano (Rome, 1955)Google Scholar; Cerulli, E., Somalia, I, 54.Google Scholar

35 Freeman-Grenville, G. S. P., ‘The Coast 1488–1840’, The History of East Africa, ed. Oliver, R. and Mathew, G. (Oxford, 1963), I, 130.Google Scholar

36 Unfortunately, Baker identified the Muhammad Gara as Galla but this has been convincingly refuted by Grottanelli. Baker, E. C., ‘History of the Wasegeju’, T.N.R., XXVII (1949)Google Scholar; Grottanelli, V. L., Pescatori, 204–5.Google Scholar

37 Thompson, C. B., ‘Notes on the Wasegeju of Vanga District, 1918’Google Scholar, KNA/KWA/I. However, there are also some Segeju traditions which refer solely to Galla aggression: Dickson, T. A., ‘Notes on the Wassegeju’, Journal of the East Africa and Uganda Natural History Society, VI, no. II (1917), 167Google Scholar; Krapf, L., ‘Journal of a Journey to Usambara, July to Sept. 1848’Google Scholar, C.M.S. CA5/106 (I am grateful to R. F. Morton for this latter reference). Other traditions refer to joint Galla and Somali aggression: Berg, F. J., ‘The Swahili community of Mombasa 1500–1900’, University of Nairobi History Dept. Seminar Paper, 13 10 1966.Google Scholar

38 Also spelt Gare, Gera, Gurra, Gurreh, Gherra, Gherri.

39 Lewis, I. M., Peoples, 27.Google Scholar

40 Carlo della Valle, ‘Giuba: osservatorio sul Giuba e sulla Coscia ed Enrico Perducci suo primo presidente’, ASMAI Cartella, no. 2 fase. 7–10; Salkeld, ‘Notes on the Province of Jubaland, 1908’, KNA/PC/NFD/4/6/I; Elliot, J. A. G., ‘A visit to the Bajun Islands’, J.A.S., xxv (1925/1926), 148.Google Scholar

41 Mahoney, M. R., ‘Koreh’, KNA/DC/GRA/3/4.Google Scholar For the connexion between Koreh, Garre and Rendille see: Zaphiro, to Hamilton, , 10 12 1912, C.O. 533/28Google Scholar; Maud, P., ‘Mr. Butter's expedition, contents of Report’, F.O. 1/48.Google Scholar Cf. Prins, A. H. J., ‘Shungwaya’, 275.Google Scholar

42 Turnbull, R., ‘The Warden’, The Kenya Police Review (07 1957).Google Scholar This account corresponds closely to material in the Provincial and District Records. Since Turnbull is convinced that the Galla came from central Somaliland he assumes that they attacked Afmadu from the north, but there is no evidence to support this.

43 Ferrari, G., ‘Il basso Giubo Italiano e le possessioni agricole nella Goscia’, Bolletino della Società Geografica Italiana, XI, 4th series (1910), 1226Google Scholar; Maud, P., ‘Exploration in the southern borderland of Abyssinia’, Geog. J., XLIII (1904), 570.Google Scholar Ali Abdi, one of the greatest leaders of the Garre, was Maud's main informant.

44 Giuba, Residenza di, Monografie 1907, ASMAI 87/1–7.Google Scholar

45 Sharpe, H. B., ‘Further Notes on the Koreh’, 1932, KNA/PC/NFD/4/6/1Google Scholar; French, P. R. and Capt. Barrett, ‘History of Jubaland’, 1913, KNA/PC/NFD/4/6/1Google Scholar; Turnbull, R., ‘The Tribes of Kenya’, Kenya Police Review (03 1961), 17.Google Scholar

46 Gelib, Monografie su, 1911, ASMAI 87/2–20Google Scholar; Thomas, T. S., Jubaland and the Northern Frontier District (Nairobi, 1917), 8Google Scholar; Parenti, G., ‘Gli Uaboni’, Rivista di Biologia Coloniale, IX (1948), 89.Google Scholar

47 Fleming, H. C. (1964), 71.Google Scholar Also Mahoney, M. R., ‘Koreh’, KNA/DC/GRA/34.Google Scholar

48 Sharpe, H. B., Political Record Book, KNA/PC/NFD/4/1/1.Google Scholar

49 Guillain was one of the first explorers to notice a Somali element amongst the Bajun in his Documents sur l'Histoire, la Géographie et le Commerce de l'Afrique Orientale, III (Paris, 1857), 238, n. 2Google Scholar; ‘Le Isole dei Bajiuni e le loro popolazioni’, 1926, ASMAI 87/2–28Google Scholar; Elliot, J. A. G., Report on the Bajun and the coast, 1916, KNA/DC/KISM/1/2Google Scholar; Barton, J. T. J., ‘The Bajun Islands’, J. of the E. Africa and Uganda Nat. Hist. Soc. (03 1922), 28Google Scholar; Puccioni, N., Giuba e Oltre Giuba (Florence, 1937), 114.Google Scholar

50 British Museum: King's Topographical Collection, vol. 117Google Scholar; Giuba, Residenza di, Monografie, 12 1907, ASMAI 81/1–7.Google Scholar

51 Salkeld, , ‘Notes on the Province of Jubaland’, 02 1908, KNA/PC/NFD/4/6/1Google Scholar; Sharpe, H B., ‘Ethnological Notes’ 1918, KNA/PC/NFD/4/1/2.Google Scholar

52 Prins, A. H. J., ‘The Shungwaya problem: traditional history and cultural likeness in Bantu north-east Africa’, Anthropos, LXVII (1972), 1112.Google Scholar

53 V. Glenday, however, thought that the similarity of camel brands had some other explanation, but failed to reveal what it might be: ‘Some further notes on tribes’, KNA/PC/NFD/4/1/2; Sharpe, H. B., ‘Ethnological Notes’ 1918, KNA/PC/NFD/4/1/2.Google Scholar

54 The linguistic relationship between Rendille and Somali was noted at the beginning of the century by Stigand, C. H., To Abyssinia through an unknown land (London, 1910), 93–4Google Scholar; Howard, H. A. C., ‘Notes on Rendille customs’, 09 1949, KNA/PC/NFD/4/1/1Google Scholar; Bryan, M. A., The Distribution of the Cushitic and Semitic Languages of Africa (London, 1947), 21.Google Scholar

55 P. Zaphiro, ‘Notes on the Muslim-Pagan Tribes from the junction of the Ganale Dawa river to lake Rudolf’, C.O. 533/69; Maud, P., ‘Exploration’, 546Google Scholar; W. Keir, ‘Notes on the traditional history of Wajir tribes’, KNA/WAJ/2.

56 Oldfield, , ‘Notes on a portion of Kipini District’ 1928, KNA/PC/NFD/4/2/2Google Scholar; Mahoney, M. R., ‘Notes on the Galla’ 1929, KNA/DC/GRA/3/4Google Scholar; Léon des Avanchers, ‘Esquisse’, 166Google Scholar; Ravenstein, E. G., ‘Somal and Gallaland’, P.R.G.S., VI n.s. (1884), 268 ff.Google Scholar

57 Smee and Hardy's Journals 1810–11, B. M. Add. MSS 8958; Rigby, C. T., ‘Remarks on the north-east coast of Africa and various tribes by which it is inhabited’, Transactions of the Bombay Geographical Society VI (03 1843), 72Google Scholar; Cerulli, E., Folk Literature of the Galla of Southern Abyssinia, Harvard African Studies, III (1922), 13Google Scholar; Moreno, M. M., Grammatica della lingua Galla (reprinted Gregg, 1964), 20Google Scholar; Fischer, G. A., ‘Die Sprache des Sud Galla land’, Zeitschrift für Ethnologie, x (Berlin, 1878), 141.Google Scholar

58 Subsections of one of the Wardai phratries are named by M. R. Mahoney, supra, as: Uta, Meta, Denu, Goji, Karayu, Mandoin. All except Goji and Mandoin can be identified with sections of the Boran Galla, and Mandoin may be identified with Manda which means ‘junior-born’ and is a Boran clan-name. Baxter, P. T. W., personal communication, 14 03 1967.Google Scholar

59 MacDougall, K., ‘Notes on the Decline and extermination of the Galla’, 1914, KNA/DC/MAL/2/3Google Scholar; Brenner, R., ‘Originalkarte des Gebietes der südlichen Galla & Waboni nebst den angrenzenden Somalilanden 1866–7 in Forschungen in Ost Afrika’, Petermanns Mitteilungen (1868)Google Scholar; Craufurd, C. H., ‘Journeys in Wagosha and Beyond the Deshek Warna’, G.J., IX (1897), 57 n.Google Scholar; Werner, A., ‘The Galla of the East Africa Protectorate’, J.A.S., XIII (1914), 136.Google Scholar

60 See Baxter, P. T. W., ‘Repetition in certain Boran ceremonies’, African Systems of Thought, ed. Fortes, M. and Dieterlen, G. (London, 1965), 66.Google Scholar

61 Mahoney, M. R., ‘Notes on the Galla’ 1929Google Scholar, and Sharpe, H. B., ‘Galla further Notes’ 1932, KNA/DC/GRA/3/4Google Scholar; J. S. S. Rowlands, ‘An outline of Tana River History’, KNA/DC/TRD/4/1; Anon, ‘Boran and Sakuye, Social organization’, KNA/DC/ISO/5/1; Phillipson, J. M., ‘Notes on the Galla’, Man, XVI (1916), 178.Google Scholar Ana Akr's grave is a place of pilgrimage and is eighteen miles from Hola.

62 Rossini, Conti, ‘Appunti e commenti’, Rassegna di Studi Etiopici, II (1942), 99101.Google Scholar Grottanelli concludes from this article that ‘a Portuguese document proves that the Galla were already on the Juba by 1550’. But the Portuguese document referred to is nowhere nearly so precise and C. Rossini himself interpreted it in much less categorical manner. See Grottanelli, V. L., ‘The Peopling of the Horn of Africa’, Africa, XXVII, no. 3 (Rome, 1972), 384.Google Scholar

63 Lobo, J., Itinerario e outros escritos ineditos (Ediçao Critica pelo Pe. M. Gonçalves da Costa) (Barcelos, 1971), 225.Google Scholar

64 P. Ionnas de Velasco ad P. Andream Palmeiro, Visitatorem Indiarum, 25 07 1624Google Scholar, Renan Aethiopicarum Scriptores Occidentales Inediti, XII, ed. Beccari (Rome, 1912), 76 ff.Google Scholar; Lobo, , Itinerario, 225 ff.Google Scholar

65 Johnson, S., A Dissertation on the Eastern side of Africa from Malindi to the Strait of Babel Mandel (London 1735), 3.Google Scholar

66 Lobo, , Itinerario, 230, 238, 772, 773.Google Scholar

67 de Sandoval, Alonso, Naturaleza, Policia, Sacrada i Profana (Seville, 1627), 101.Google Scholar

68 Axelson, Eric, Portuguese in South-East Africa 1600–1700 (Johannesburg, 1960), 94.Google Scholar

69 Axelson, , Portuguese, 127.Google Scholar

70 Strandes, J., The Portuguese period in East Africa (Nairobi, 1961), 214Google Scholar; Axelson, , Portuguese, 152, 158.Google Scholar

71 Axelson, , Portuguese, 155.Google Scholar

72 Warner, A. and Hichens, W. (ed.), The advice of Mwana Kupona (Medstead, 1934), 17Google Scholar; C. 8683, Report on the condition and progress of the East Africa Protectorate by Sir A. Hardinge (1898), 14.Google Scholar

73 Stigand, C. H., The land of the Zinj (London, 1966), 56Google Scholar; Prins, A. H. J., Swahili speaking peoples of Zanzibar and the East African coast (London, 1961), 82.Google Scholar

74 Kirkman, J. S., ‘Topographical Notes, Appendix II’Google Scholar to Strandes, J., The Portuguese Period in East Africa (Nairobi, 1968 edn.), 298.Google Scholar

75 Prins, A. H. J., ‘Problems of traditional history and cultural likeness in Bantu north-east Africa’, Anthropos, LXVII (1972).Google Scholar