Northeast African Studies, 4, 1 (1982): 65-67 REVIEW OF Peter Koehn and Sidney R. Waldron-Maxwell , Afooha : A Link between Community and Administration in Harar 3 Ethiopia. Syracuse, New York: School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, Syracuse University. Pp. 120, 6 maps. Mohamed Hassen School of Oriental and African Studies University of London
Harar, the present provincial capital of Hararghe administrative region, used to be a unique center in North East Africa. Before the Addis Abeba- Djibouti railway road by-passed the city and made the old caravan route obsolete at the beginning of this century (thus undermining the mercantile economy of the city), Harar was a major commercial entrepot whose fame spread far and wide and led to prosperity for its citizens. Located 175 miles southwest of the port of Zeila and 219 miles from the port of Berbera, Harar was the center at which a number of major and minor caravan routes met. Along the caravan routes that linked ports of the northern Somali coast with Southern Ethiopia there were a number of commercial centers (settlements). Today there are no less than twenty-one ruined commercial settlements between Zeila and Harar. Some still dot the Ogaden region, while others are found in the region between Harar and Bale.
Traditional medicines remained as the most affordable and easily accessible source of treatment inthe primary health care system among diverse communities in Ethiopia. The Oromo community living in theprehistoric Harla and Dengego valleys has long history of ethnomedicinal know-how and practice against humanand livestock ailments. However, this rich ethnomedicinal knowledge had been remained unexplored hitherto.This study focus on the comprehensive ethnomedicinal investigation in an attempt to safeguard the deterioratingethnomedicinal knowledge that can be used as a steppingstone for phytochemical and pharmacological analysis.
Traditional medicine (TM) has been part of man’s survival for long time. Harar is an ancient trade route and has a close proximity to the red sea. The use of TM is common and the majority of its habitants use TM. This study was conducted to assess why Harar households continued to prefer and depend on the utilization of TM as part of their healthcare system. Community based cross sectional study was conducted to select head of 423 households. Data was collected using face to face interview with a semi structured questionnaires and descriptive statistics including mean, standard deviations, frequencies and percentages were performed to examine the outcomes and associated factors. The result shown that 60.50% of the households preferred to use TM as their primary health care services and used TM for curative of ailments because TM had minimal side effects compared to modern medications. Socio demographic factors had no significant association to TM use; however, other associated factors had strong association with TM use. Personal experience such as minimal side effect of TM, attitudes towards TM use such as cost effectiveness, effective for specific diseases and quality service such as ready availability of TM had strong association to TM utilization. It was concluded that TM is still continued to play a significant role in healthcare of many households of Harar town because TM is dependable, affordable, safe and cost effective.
From Google Translator
The Mäläsay must, at least according to the testimony of modern historians, have a
have been a capable group. J. Doresse (1971: 205) counts the troops of the Gran
and calls them: les Malasay, musulmans convertis de tout leur coeur à la défense de leur
foi et conduits par l'Imam (Gran). A little later (Doresse 1971: 209) they stand next to one another
irregular religious fighters (gazú) as "absolument des soldat musulmans – les Malasay"
Around 1570 AD. it is then "chefs des malasay, troupes régulières musulmanes, fidèles à
l'Ethiopia, "which the Emir of Harar has destroyed and with it an offensive on the part
Särsä-Dengels (Doresse 1971: 231). R. Ferry (1962: 30) describes the mäläsay as
one of the peoples in Gran's army, which of course is difficult to match with today's ethnic groups.
to conclude: "gens analogues aux Somalis, mais plus intéressés à la guerre sainte." These
Interpretations of the term mäläsay refer to its use in Arabic history
about the first conquests of the Gran of 'Abdal-Qadir' Arabfaqih and its mention in
two Ethiopian chronicles – in the so-called "Short Chronicle" and the Chronicle of the
Särsä-Dengel – back. R. Basset (1897: 84 n.4) in his French adaptation of
'Arabfaqih tried an etymological interpretation. Starting from an Amharic
Verb mälläsä with the special meaning "convert" or a Tigrinya verb mäläsä "to-
return "one could perhaps explain the name; he suspects that it is
"Converts," notes that the common word in Ge'ez for Muslims is tänbälat (cf.
Dillmann, 1865: 562) is and refers to Portugal cited by Pereira (1887: 799 η. 17)
Giesian reports from the 16th century, where this name is freely associated with the Amalekites
is adorned. In his adaptation of the
"Short Chronicle", in which the word mäläsay also appears in the report on the Gran Wars.
, Basset (1883) abstained from any comment. F. Béguinot (1901: 18 η.
6) adopts Basset's conjecture in his Italian revision of the “Short
Chronicle "and adds the note that the mäläsay….
In April-May of 2008, a team led by François-Xavier Fauvelle and Bertrand Hirsch carried out excavations on the Muslim site of Nora (Fauvelle and Hirsch, 2008: 339-376). The author of the article was in charge of the excavation of the great mosque and the study of the others mosques on the site. Apart from Aksum, Nora was the first town ever excavated extensively in Ethiopia. Located 20km to the north-east of the current town of Shewa Robit (in the Shewa Region) near to the village of Wässiso, the Nora site is located midway between the high plateau and the flood plain of the River Awash at an depth of approximately 1300m (Fig. 1). The site was discovered in January 2007 during some surveys to recognize the evidence of hitherto medieval settlements only known in primary sources (Fauvelle and Hirsch, 2011). It was a ruined town which extended over several hectares (Fig. 2). The elevation of many of the walls, particularly those of the Great Mosque, has been preserved. The town also provides evidence of street networks and access routes, town walls, necropolis compounds and possibly hydraulic facilities……
This paper focuses on Arabic scribal practices in a corpus of Ethiopian Islamic manuscripts from the region of Harar ascribed to the period from the eighteenth to the early nineteenth century. Two different aspects will be considered, namely the characteristic realization of specific graphemes and the methods for the justification of the text. The observations take into account the perceived sacred dimension of the texts, from copies of the Qurʾān to ʿAjamī works, and the different level of standardization of their written manifestations. This approach is intended to highlight the results of the cultural interplay between the scribal models acquired and their local reinterpretation in order to identify reference models and determine the criteria at the base of the processes of ʿAjamization of these scribal practices. I hope that the characteristics described in this article will represent the starting point for comparative studies of scribal practices between different Ethiopian regions and with other regions of the Islamic world....
The earliest Arabic historian literature of Abyssinia and the Muslim sultanates in the 14th Century
Ibn Fadlallah Al Umri had gathered his information on Abyssinia and the Muslim sultanates in the region first hand. During the years 1332 to 1338 ad he interviewed an Ethiopian jurisprudent from Zaila by ‘Abdallah ibn Yusuf az-Zailaiy. A resident in Cairo for a long time, he died in the sixties of the fourteenth century. Another informant of Al Umri was the Coptic Patriarch Benjamin who transmitted a report of a merchant named ‘Izzaddin on climate conditions and mineral resources in Abyssinia, mainly on mines of iron and gold, or silver. He also utilized the reports of a Nubian slave-trader on the very unpleasant practices on the castration of eunuch slaves, called Hawashiya, in Hadiya and the town of Washal or Washelo . The result is a detailed and vivid account of Abyssinia, its nature, vegetation, climate conditions and way of living of the inhabitants. The data so provided were extensively quarried by the great compilers of the next generation, the Egyptian encyclopedist al Qalqashand.
Ib Fadlallah Al Umri is the first Arab historian to write the details of the Seven Muslim Sultanates within near the boundary of Abyssinia, or within today's Ethiopia, ie; Awfat, Dwaro, Arabini, Hadiya, Sharha, Bali & Darah.
His work is referenced by renown World Historians and academic researchers when dealing with Medieval Abyssinia and their surrounding Muslim principalities in the Horn of Africa.
Excavations at three urban sites, Harlaa, Harar, and Ganda Harla, in eastern Ethiopia have recovered substantial assemblages of faunal remains. These, the first to be analysed from Islamic contexts in the country, were studied to reconstruct animal economies, and to assess if it was possible to identify Islamic conversion or the presence of Muslims in archaeological contexts through examining butchery practices and diet via the species present. Differences in animal economies between the sites in, for example, management strategies, use of animals for traction, and presence of imported marine fish, infers the development of different traditions......
