Bale (Ethiopia)

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The provinces of Ethiopia after World War II until 1987

Bale or Bali ( Ethiopian script ባሌ) is the name of a medieval Muslim state and a former province in southern Ethiopia , between the Shabelle and Ganale rivers .

The state of Bale, which existed from the 11th to the 13th centuries, was incorporated as a province in Ethiopia in the 14th century and perished in the 16th century, was limited to the southern Ethiopian highlands between the upper reaches of the two rivers. The province of Bale in the 19th and 20th centuries, however, also included lowland areas on the lower reaches of these rivers.

history

State of Bale until the 16th century

The name Bale goes back to a Muslim state that - like the surrounding states Dewaro , Hadiyya , Wag , Sharkha , Harar , Adal , Ifat and Fatajar - was likely to have emerged between the 11th and 13th centuries. At that time, Islam came to the region through traders and preachers. Sheikh Nur Hussein in particular - who was probably of Somali-Arab origin and came from Merka on the Somali coast - excelled as a missionary in southern Ethiopia, probably in the 13th century.

The state of Bale comprised the northwestern part of the later province. In the north, the Shabelle Bale river delimited Dewaro, the Ganale formed the southern border . To the south, Bale bordered a vast area used by Oromo shepherds as grazing land. The Oromo calendar system and the qaalluu institution developed in Bale, possibly under Islamic and Christian influence . The residents of Bale themselves probably belonged to highland Eastern Kushite-speaking groups ("Hadiyya-Sidama"). By the 14th century at least part of the population had converted to Islam. Bale was ruled by a Muslim ruler who, according to Shihāb al-Dīn al-Umarī, unlike in the other states, did not come from a dynasty, but was of simple origin.

Bale was known for cotton weaving and was u. a. Visited by Arab and Persian traders. As it was far to the south, it was less involved in trade than the other Muslim states, but also more fertile due to higher rainfall.

Under Amda Seyon I (1314-1344), Bale, like other Muslim states, was conquered by the Christian Empire of Ethiopia and incorporated as a province. It formed the southernmost part of the Ethiopian Empire and was administered by a governor with the title of gärad . The residents were Christianized, albeit only superficially. During the reign of Emperor Dawit and again in the time of Yeshaq , troops of the Sultanate Ifat invaded Bale and are said to have returned with rich spoils of war. After another conquest, the Sultan of Ifat settled 1,000 Muslim families in Bale. However, the province remained part of the Christian Empire for most of Yeshaq's reign.

Bale was one of the first provinces to be affected by the wars against the Sultanate of Adal under Ahmed Grañ in the 16th century. Again there were very costly fighting, looting and slave raids. Under the leadership of a nobleman named 'Addalu or ' Adälih , Christian residents loyal to the emperor offered resistance until 1532. The province was then Islamized. After the death of Ahmed Grañ in 1543, his nephew declared himself ruler of Bale, Fatajar and Dewaro, but he was defeated by Emperor Gelawdewos the following year .

Due to its location, Bale was also the first Ethiopian province to be affected by the expansion of the Oromo at the beginning of the 16th century. At the end of the 16th century, Sarsa Dengel tried to defend the province against the Oromo. Eventually, however, the advance of the Oromo could not be stopped, and the area, whose previous population had been decimated in the war, was oromized. For the centuries that followed, there was no longer a political entity called Bale.

Somali and Oromo from the 18th century

In the 18th century the Somali began to expand inland, displacing the Oromo from parts of the Ogaden . In the middle of the 19th century the Somali crossed the central reaches of the Shabelle, and in the 1870s Somali nomads from the Aulihan-Ogadeni- Darod clan reached the eastern edge of the former Bale. They mostly waged war against the Arsi-Oromo and pushed them back, but there were also mixed marriages and a Somalization of the easternmost Oromo groups. In the outskirts of the former Bale, groups of mixed Somali and Oromo ancestry formed, mostly bilingual and known as Gurra . Somali nomads did not penetrate further into the highlands, as the camel keeping they prefer is not possible there. Black African Somali-speaking groups who make a living from agriculture and fishing, on the other hand, have spread to the upper reaches of the Shabelle. They are called Adone or - by the Oromo - Warra Dubba and are probably descended from Somali slaves (cf. Somali Bantu ). Missionary Somali sheikhs also successfully Islamized the eastern Oromo since the middle of the 18th century.

19th and 20th centuries

With the conquest of the southern areas under Menelik II at the end of the 19th century, a province of Bale was re-established under Ethiopian rule. This now included both the highlands in the west, densely populated by Oromo farmers - the core area of ​​the former Bale - and the plains in the east, which were rather sparsely populated by Somali nomads, and which form part of the Ogaden . The provincial capital was Goba in the highlands. In the highland areas, the farmers became taxable subordinates who were subordinated to Amharic settlers (Neftegna). The lowlands, however, were only effectively administered by Ethiopia after the Second World War.

During the Italian occupation 1936-1941, the northern part of the province was administered as part of the Harar Governorate, while the southern part was annexed to Italian Somaliland . 1942–1960 the area was part of Harerge (Hararghe), 1960–1987 it was separated again as a separate province.

1963–1970, Waqoo Gutu led the Bale Revolt , which was predominantly carried out by Oromo farmers and directed against the land ownership and tax system. Somalia , which became independent in 1960, claimed Bale, including the Oromo highland areas, as part of a greater Somalia and supported both Oromo rebels and the Western Somali Liberation Front (WSLF), which led an uprising in the lowlands in 1963/64. In the Ogaden War of 1977/78, the Bale lowlands were occupied by Somali troops with practically no resistance from the Ethiopian side, and fighting was largely confined to the north of Ogaden (in Harerge). In the highlands, the Somali Abo Liberation Front founded by Somalia was active, which was supposed to mobilize the Oromo for the fight for Greater Somalia, but it received significantly less support from the Oromo than the WSLF from the Somali.

1979 began an offensive against the Oromo Liberation Front in the highlands of Harerge, Bale, Sidamo and Arsi and at the same time against the WSLF, which was still active in the lowlands. This phase of the conflict had more serious consequences for the population than the actual Ogaden war. In Bale 1979–1982, the vast majority of the population, especially in the highlands, were forcibly relocated to government-controlled villages.

In 1987 the eastern part of Bale was split off and combined with the eastern part of Harerge to form the Ogaden Autonomous Region .

present

With the new administrative structure of Ethiopia after 1991, which is based on an "ethnic federalism", the area of ​​the former Bale was divided into the new regional states Somali and Oromia . The highlands populated by Oromo farmers in the west with the Batu and the Bale Mountains National Park now form the Bale zone of Oromia, while the plain in the east, inhabited by Somali nomads, belongs to Somali as an Afder zone .

The relationship between Oromo and Somali remains complex. Partial intermingling, belonging to the Kushitic language group , common rejection of the predominance of the highland Ethiopians and especially Islam connects both groups, so that the eastern Oromo are culturally closer to the Somali than the western Oromo. Sheikh Nur Hussein is considered the patron saint of the Muslim Oromo, and his grave in Annajina / Sheikh Hussein is visited as a pilgrimage site by Oromo and Somali. At the same time, a feeling of togetherness with the other Oromo has developed among the eastern Oromo. The regional division based on ethnicity has contributed to greater polarization between Somali and Oromo.

swell

  1. ↑ a b c d e f Mohammed Hassen: Bale history and Alain Gascon: Bale geography , in: Siegbert Uhlig (Hrsg.): Encyclopaedia Aethiopica , Volume 1, Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2003, ISBN 3-447-04746-1
  2. ^ Ulrich Braukämper: Islamic History and Culture in Southern Ethiopia. Collected Essays , Göttinger Studien zur Ethnologie 9, 2003, ISBN 9783825856717 (pp. 83, 134)
  3. ↑ a b c d e f Richard Pankhurst: The Ethiopian Borderlands. Essays in Regional History from Ancient Times to the End of the 18th Century , Red Sea Press 1997, ISBN 9780932415196 (pp. 71f., 135-137, 196-201, 282, 324)
  4. ↑ a b Braukämper 2003 (p. 15f., 135, 151)
  5. ^ Paul B. Henze: Layers of Time. A History of Ethiopia , 2000, ISBN 9781850655220 (pp. 89, 91)
  6. ↑ Braukämper 2003, p. 15, 136f.
  7. ↑ a b c Alex de Waal, Africa Watch: Evil Days. 30 Years of War and Famine in Ethiopia , 1991 (PDF; 3.3 MB), pp. 23f., 65-67, 70, 74f., 80-84, 86f., 90
  8. ↑ Braukämper 2003 (145f.)
  9. ↑ Tobias Hagmann, Mohamud H. Khalif: State and Politics in Ethiopia's Somali Region since 1991 ( Memento of the original dated August 31, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , in: Bildhaan. An International Journal of Somali Studies 6, 2006, pp. 25–49 (PDF; 121 kB) @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / tobiashagmann.freeflux.net