Читать книгу Children of Hope - Sandra Rowoldt Shell - Страница 14

CHAPTER 4

Topography, Domicile, and Ethnicity of the Oromo Captives

Scholarly research on Oromo slavery suggests that slaves were drawn from a broad area to the south and southwest of Ethiopia, roughly the area of today’s Oromia. Mekuria Bulcha, Timothy Fernyhough, and the authors of localized studies of slavery among the Oromo in the late nineteenth century have drawn their information largely from the accounts of travelers and other commentators.¹ The eyewitness narratives of the Oromo children provide the names not only of their countries of origin but of their regions, towns, and villages. Using data drawn from the narratives, the use of geographical information systems (GIS) methodologies made it possible to generate data-specific maps. In addition, variables derived from the narratives have made it possible to pinpoint and analyze their places of domicile and ethnicity against the topography of the country.²

The Topography

Elevated plateaus, escarpments, tablelands, and mountains dominate the dramatic topography of central Ethiopia that frames the journeys of the Oromo captives. The country of Ethiopia boasts as many as half of the highest peaks in Africa—including Badda, a volcanic peak in the Bale mountain range soaring to 4,200 meters (13,650 feet). The country also lays claim to some of the lowest-lying land on earth, including the below–sea level desert on the edge of the Afar or Danakil Depression, through which all the children passed on their way to the entrepôts. The Bale Mountains are separated from the former Abyssinian highlands by the Great Rift Valley. The land of the central plateau, intersected diagonally by the Great Rift Valley, falls away—in places sharply—to the lowlands of the north, west, south, and east.

The lateral escarpments of the rift drop down and diverge to the northeast and northwest, where they transect the Afar or Danakil Depression toward the Red Sea coastal regions, including the children’s destination entrepôts of Araito (Rahayta) and Tajurrah (Tadjoura).³ The Danakil Depression constitutes one of the hottest and driest places on earth and is Ethiopia’s lowest point at 120 meters (393.70 feet) below sea level. Archaeologists consider the entire rift area one of the cradles of humankind.

Mapping the captives’ places of origin against the topography of Ethiopia shows that an overwhelming majority came from highland regions, with their homes dotted along the ridges of the mountain ranges (see map 4.1).

Symbols have been attached to the girls’ homes to highlight gender differences in the children’s geographic and orographic distribution. Note that with only two exceptions, the girls’ homes lie to the west of the escarpment, whereas the boys’ homes for the most part follow the mountain ridges on either side of the main Ethiopian rift. These mountain ridges, with their rugged terrain, provided a degree of natural protection from all comers, but they were not sufficient to deter the invading cavalry from the north. Only the homes of Isho Karabe (see appendix B; narrative 23), who lived in the village of Imo in the southeast; Hawe Sukute (narrative 56), from the village of Gani in Garjeja country in the west; and Turungo Tinno (narrative 62), from Saate, a village in the Kaffa country in the south, lay at altitudes of less than 1,000 meters (3,281 feet). Two boys (Amaye Tiksa [narrative 4] and Badassa Wulli [narrative 6]), came from the village of Badda, standing at 3,820 meters (12,415 feet) on the slopes of Mount Badda, a volcanic mountain peaking at 4,200 meters (13,650 feet).

An unanticipated finding was the pronounced gender difference that emerged in respect to altitude. While the average altitude of the boys’ homes was 2,156.52 meters (7,008.69 feet), the girls’ average was almost 400 meters (1,290 feet) lower, at 1,759.33 meters (5,717.82 feet). The boys had a wider altitude range, from a low of 441.36 meters (1,434.42 feet) to a high of 3,819.97 meters (12,414.90 feet). The girls, on the other hand, ranged from 653.83 meters (2,145 feet) to 2,745.22 meters (9,006 feet). The full explanation of this gender difference related to altitude remains obscure.

There may be virtue in remembering that young Oromo girls realized the highest prices in the external slave markets, so traders might have sought out girl children in places that were easier to access than those living in the higher mountainous regions of the highlands. Ease of access meant a quicker journey to the Red Sea. The children’s evidence shows that fewer girls than boys were sold into local servitude initially. Nearly three-quarters (73.8 percent) of the boys were enslaved locally, compared with only half of the girls (50 percent). Some boys spent years—one as long as nine years—in local servitude before being sold into the external network headed for the coast (see pages 84–94 for further discussion).

Graphs 4.1 and 4.2 are based on two different measures of central tendency. The first, a bar graph, is based on the mean, or average, altitude; while the second, a box and whisker plot, is based on the median, or midpoint. The bar graph shows the descending altitude at which each child was captured. This view, not possible with the otherwise effective box plot, provides a statistical cross section of the topography of capture in which the statistically significant gender differentiation is clear.

GRAPH 4.1. Altitude at which each child was captured (source: Sandra Rowoldt Shell).

The complementary box and whisker plots (graph 4.2) give a better idea of the gender differences in altitude range. Here, the median, as the midpoint, is unaffected by the outliers at either end of the boys’ range.

Note that 50 percent of the girls fall within a discernibly lower second and third quartile range than the boys, with no extreme measures at either high or low altitudes. Using both graphs allows us to visualize the altitude range in two different ways and to appreciate the gender discrepancies more clearly.

The Homelands of the Oromo Children

Most of the children (84.88 percent) remembered some details of where they had been living at the time of their capture. The remaining 15.12 percent could not give the name of their village, town, region, or even their country of origin. The linked pie diagram (graph 4.3) represents the home countries of the Oromo children.

As the diagram illustrates, the children originated in twenty-six different principalities. The majority of the children were concentrated in six of these “countries” (as they termed them). The rest of the children were sparsely distributed at a rate of one or two per principality. For clarity, these have been aggregated in the pie within the category of “Other” principalities, which compose a significant geographic spread, as the map showing the children’s places of origin and domicile demonstrates (see map 4.1). This multiplicity of principalities is indicative of the extent of subinfeudation in the region. Some of the monarchies were more prominent and powerful than others; the kingdoms of Jimma, Enarya, Goma, and Guma coexisted, often uncomfortably, in what some might regard as a retrospective federation of principalities.

MAP 4.1. Places of domicile of the Oromo captives (source: Sandra Rowoldt Shell and GIS Laboratory, University of Cape Town).

Further, while there was a limited amount of country-level congruence, with small numbers of children coming from each of six countries, the same congruence was not reflected at the more localized level. With only two exceptions, the children all came from different towns and villages. However, in one case, Amaye Tiksa (see appendix B; narrative 4) was carried off by marauding raiders after a battle with his people in November 1887; while Badassa Wulli (narrative 6) was kidnapped from his home in Badda three years earlier, in May 1884. Similarly, two girls and one boy came from Sayo. Kintiso Bulcha (narrative 25) was snatched from his home after Sidama raiders emerged victorious after having invaded his country and engaged in battle against his chief in October 1888. The two girls, Asho Sayo (narrative 44) and Soye Sanyacha (narrative 60), were both taken as spoils of war by invading Sidama raiders in November 1887. This is possibly the same raid, but each child had a different captor and followed a different route thereafter. The Oromo children had no group experience as captives until they neared the coast.

GRAPH 4.2. Altitudes of places of origin by gender of child (source: Sandra Rowoldt Shell).

Ethnicity

The multiplicity of locales might suggest a multiplicity of ethnicities. This is not the case, as a detailed examination by experts has revealed.⁴ The graph (4.4) gives a breakdown of ethnicity by gender of child, showing that the overwhelming majority of the boys (81 percent), and an even greater majority of the girls (86.4 percent), were Oromo, giving an overall Oromo majority among the entire group of 83.7 percent, an astonishing homogeneity considering the chaotic process of slave raiding.

This convincing ethnic homogeneity among the children is borne out further in examining the handful of children whose ethnicity could not be attributed as directly Oromo. Of those who were not classified as Oromo, 7 percent were Kafficho (4.8 percent of the boys and 9.1 percent of the girls); and 2.4 percent of the boys were Shangalla, Gurage, and Yambo. The ethnicity of 7.1 percent of the boys and 4.5 percent of the girls could not be determined. These few who could be classified other than Oromo were all from groups cognate with the Oromo or with strong genealogical or political links to the Oromo. The graph shows the Oromo positioned within modern Oromia with the cognate ethnicities placed in the adjacent regions. The girls had a simpler ethnic profile than the boys, with only a single exception (Kafficho) to their high Oromo majority.

GRAPH 4.3. Home countries of the Oromo children (source: Sandra Rowoldt Shell).

Why Were These Regions Targeted?

Having delineated the areas in which slave raiding was focused, the question arises, Why were these particular areas targeted for enslavement? One possible approach to answering this question is through the prism of Immanuel Wallerstein’s model of modernization, specifically his concept of the core and the periphery of empires or political systems.⁵ Wallerstein, who began his scholarship as an African sociologist, proposed that the modernization of any state required a core area with a powerful central government, developed bureaucratic structure, and extensive military capability. Surrounding the core were the peripheral areas, which lacked strong government as well as well-trained and well-equipped armies. Though conceived initially to explain the history of Western Europe, Wallerstein’s model may be used on the micro as well as the macro level and is applicable to any society.

In the history of Ethiopia, we can locate Wallerstein’s core area as that defined as Abyssinia, comprising Menelik’s core kingdom. The heavily subinfeudated Oromo regions lay south of Menelik’s core area, straddling the main Ethiopian rift. While demographically speaking this area had a high population density, the interfeuding and subinfeudation within the region made it a perfect periphery in Wallerstein’s terms.

In his discussion of state machinery, Wallerstein pointed to the juxtaposition of two tipping mechanisms—one where strength created still more strength; and, conversely, one where weakness could lead to further weakness. Expanding on this, Wallerstein explained that in states where the state machinery was weak, those in charge did not control the whole but simply became one set of landlords among others without any real claim to legitimate authority over the whole.⁶ The views of Jack Goody, noted social anthropologist, would support Wallerstein’s tipping mechanisms, pointing out that Ethiopia, which had early on adopted the plow, was the only country in Africa where there was a system of landlordism. Where there were landlords, he notes, there would also be tenants and serfs. Goody adds that where there was shifting cultivation, slavery (in which slaves were acquired mostly as war captives or through purchase) rather than serfdom would be likely to emerge.⁷ There were, in addition, what Goody referred to as “lords of the land,” local chiefs who had power over people rather than land and lived largely off the labor of their people.⁸

GRAPH 4.4. Ethnicities of the children (source: Sandra Rowoldt Shell).

Using status and the promise of wealth, Menelik succeeded in enlisting the services of the Shewa-born Gobana Dacche, who was both Oromo and Christian. Menelik promoted Gobana to commander of the armed forces with the rank of Dajazmach and later awarded him the title of Ras (head) with the hint of future promotion to the title of Negus, or king. In return, Gobana worked tirelessly toward the conquest of the Oromo territories and succeeded in bringing the Oromo territories of Illubabor, Wallaga, and the Gibe region under Menelik’s control. As these three regions constituted the wealthiest of all the Oromo territories, they considerably strengthened and consolidated Menelik’s power and economic superiority. It was Gobana, for example, who won the critical battle of Embabo for Menelik in 1882, thus creating one of the most important watershed moments in Oromo history, and marking the beginning of the collapse of Oromo power and sovereignty. Among the Oromo, of course, Gobana would have been regarded as a traitor. At lesser levels than the powerful Gobana (whom Menelik regarded—for as long as he still needed him—as his most powerful and competent general), local and regional chiefs in the conquered Oromo territories and in the neighboring regions also gradually fell under Menelik’s authority. With that co-option came the obligation to collect additional tithes and taxes from local peasant farmers and villagers. Again, in these terms the Oromo regions sit firmly in Wallerstein’s periphery.

Sociologist Solomon Gashaw endorses Wallerstein’s core-periphery dichotomy in Ethiopia in his work on nationalism and ethnic conflict. In his words:

The survival of Ethiopia has required that all—the Amhara core culture and groups at the periphery—consider themselves as belonging to one Ethiopian nation. The basic resources of nationalism, however, will erode away if a nation is engaged in a continual political conflict. The ongoing political impasse of recent years has created a crisis of hegemony for Ethiopian nationalism.⁹

The area of the Oromo at this time comprised a proliferation of small principalities, each vying for power. One of the Oromo teenagers, Gutama Tarafo, in his Lovedale schoolboy essay on his homeland, wrote wryly of the constant regional squabbling:

Each part of the country has got a king or a chief of its own. For instance, let us take the Jimma country. That country has got a king or a chief of its own. These Kings are always wanting to fight each other, and everyone wants to be the greatest of all the kings. If he conquers one of these kings, first of all he asks for a tax; and if that king won’t pay it, he just comes and destroys him. Sometime that king wants about 200 oxen or he wants some horses, and the other king has to give, because if he won’t he knows that his life will be taken from him, and what he has too. (appendix D)

Gutama’s firsthand evidence graphically describes the proliferation of subinfeudation that threaded through the region and provides the best evidence for Immanuel Wallerstein’s subinfeudation concept in the context of this study.

What we see in this period as Menelik rose to power is that the Oromo people increasingly became en prise. They lacked the strength of Menelik’s wealth and firearms. They had few guns and weak defenses.¹⁰ According to Mekuria Bulcha, the Oromo were prevented from purchasing guns through a system of strategic blockades and because rulers did not have the necessary arms dealer contacts in the north.¹¹ Menelik’s biographer, Harold Marcus, cites a letter by Pietro Antonelli written in 1882, in which Antonelli alludes to the superior numbers of Menelik’s invading Amhara forces, who were armed with thousands of rifles and pistols and even the occasional cannon. The vulnerability of the Oromo was exacerbated by not having any weapons except “a lance, a knife and a shield.”¹² Their potential for an effective rebuttal of the raiding forces from the north using firepower was minimal. Instead, the Oromo used the natural fastnesses of their country’s topography as their first line of defense against all comers. However, even nature’s fortification of their high-altitude homesteads did not protect the male captives from the determination of slave-raiding invaders.

No people can be enslaved without there arising a reciprocal attitude of defiance—what Wallerstein refers to as the “counter-assertiveness of the oppressed”¹³—which may lead to a growth in proto-nationalist thinking. Thus, as Menelik’s power grew, the Oromo became more unified. The ethnic homogeneity of the group resulted in a reciprocal proto-nationalism over time. This gradually coalesced in the names of the administrative regions of the emergent country of Ethiopia, more specifically the delineation and naming of the modern administrative region of Oromia and even the emergence of the Oromo Liberation Front and calls for independence.

The ethnicity of the children was overwhelmingly Oromo, with only a handful of other ethnicities with strong genetic and political ties with the Oromo. Homogeneity characterized the captivity. The children came from towns and villages dispersed across a wide stretch of Oromo territory, primarily following the lines of the mountainous regions along the rim of the escarpment. A statistically significant gender difference emerged, with the boys coming mostly from homes in the highland regions, while the girls came from areas as much as 400 meters lower in altitude on average. The full significance of this disparity is unclear. Perhaps the girls, highly sought after for the external slave trade, were easier to capture in the lower altitude regions, making for a speedier passage to the coastal entrepôts. The children’s evidence, opening up the geographic and topographic range of slave raiding among the Oromo in the late nineteenth century, allowed for a full and precise placement.

If we can consider the Oromo captives of this study as a snapshot of the process of enslavement of vulnerable people in that territory, we see that the captives were remarkably homogeneous in terms of their ethnicity, and this is reflected in the profile of modern Ethiopia. The secular effect of this core and periphery was to establish a reciprocal nationalism in the south, which we can recognize in the contemporary demand for Oromo liberation and independence. This was an ancient reaction evident in the Greek and Roman Empires and in such a familiar biblical example as the Jews—the original peripheral people—fleeing their Egyptian slavers. In considering the Jews and their potent ideas of nationhood, who could deny that this was a response to their enslavement? The model of the core and the periphery helps explain the particular case of Abyssinia and the emergent Oromo nation.