Did The Older Generation Of Somali Fail to Authorize and Legitimate Somali History?

[Idilinaa]

@Step a side heres evidence of the exporting and cultivation way before italian contact.

@Hilmaam This the nonsense i’m referring to. If your specific family tree didn’t do anything productive or significant, keep you langaabnimo to yourself and stop projecting it to the rest of us.

Does it say they exported it? Or does it say they re-planted seeds they got from there?

Because i am not sure if fruits like Bananas were export crops before the modern era , as they were more consumed domestically as luxury foods. Aside from dates, dried, candied fruits , it was impossible to export fresh fruits due to lack of preservation technology, as the fruit would go bad during the journey.

In the Harar uplands people grew gardens with oranges, grapes, sugar canes, pomegranates among other things during the 1800s but they didn't export any of it

Agriculture in the area was wide array of products, the principal food was Sorghum(Durra). Fruits were grown. Cash crops were Wheat, Maize, lentils, beans, cotton, aniseed, barley and sesame , but coffee was the principal cash crop and was said to be superior to that of Mocha.

 

[olore]

The idea that Somalis were "nomads" is false. All Somali clans practiced a mix of agricultural and pastoralist lifestyles, arguable the former more so since Somaliweyn has the largest concentration of stone towns and urban centers than anywhere else in East Africa which strongly suggests farming being widely practiced.

some were just nomads tho my family did no farming just herding

 

[Zak12]

some were just nomads tho my family did no farming just herding

Some were of course but many were still connected to trade from urban centers.

 

[Hilmaam]

You can see the Dir clan has a tmrca of 1600. Yfull is of course not 100% accurate with the age estimates so plus or minus it by 200-300 years. So we are looking at an age estimate of roughly 1300~ years for the Dir clan. Not to mention 800+ year ago Hawiye was already a large clan stretching from Merca to Ras Xaafuun according to several early medieval Muslim cartographers. You also have the people of Hobat (Old Hawiye kingdom) appearing in Ethiopian historical records as early as the 1300s fighting Amda Seyon. This means the clan founder was born much earlier in time.

View attachment 349021

Yfull all it shows is relations to each other. Isaaq have T haplogroup Geri sample has an ancient E haplogroup doesn’t mean those clans that old. Somali and clans exist within Islam before Islam who knows what we worshiped and what we called ourselves. Look at some of the earliest abtiris names and clan founders it’s Islamic. No where in our clan tree is there non Muslims. So how can somali clans predate prophet Mohamed doesn’t make sense

We all are bini Adam and trace back to original 1 man, but somali identity is Muslim one that happened recently. 1325 is around 900 years ago cam belive clans and Islam wide spread then in horn couple hundred years after prophet death. 1400 years ago we existed but not as clans names today which all originate with sheiks and Islamic ancestors

 

[Hilmaam]

Different Somali clans farmed a variety of crops between Juba and Shabelle river and upper shabelle river tributaries around harar uplands and this historically extend into awash and northwest Somaliland. In Puntland they planted date farms. Pastoralism was still viewed as superior and more sustainable in the semi-arid climate, so often times Somalis would combine both herding and farming.

If Italians introduced Banana , how do you explain it being widely consumed in Mogadishu in year 1700?, This is more than a century before the Italians arrived.

They had banana and rice for breakfast and dinner. So it was pretty much a staple in their diet
A description of Magadoxa
View attachment 349022
View attachment 349023

Different Somali clans farmed a variety of crops between Juba and Shabelle river and upper shabelle river tributaries around harar uplands and this historically extend into awash and northwest Somaliland. In Puntland they planted date farms. Pastoralism was still viewed as superior and more sustainable in the semi-arid climate, so often times Somalis would combine both herding and farming.

If Italians introduced Banana , how do you explain it being widely consumed in Mogadishu in year 1700?, This is more than a century before the Italians arrived.

They had banana and rice for breakfast and dinner. So it was pretty much a staple in their diet
A description of Magadoxa
View attachment 349022
View attachment 349023

Does that mean rice was grown in Somalia or any of the other stuff listed in this page being eaten. There were trade networks in region if something was consumed could easily been imported

If bananas were grown in Somalia there would be poems, stories , specifics on location and methods. Not some vague documents about people’s diet . 1920 was not that long ago the sayid was born 1856 and we know so much about him. There should be detailed sources if these banana farms existed

 

[CABDULWALI XASAN.]

Finding sources like that is a skill

Different Somali clans farmed a variety of crops between Juba and Shabelle river and upper shabelle river tributaries around harar uplands and this historically extend into awash and northwest Somaliland. In Puntland they planted date farms. Pastoralism was still viewed as superior and more sustainable in the semi-arid climate, so often times Somalis would combine both herding and farming.

If Italians introduced Banana , how do you explain it being widely consumed in Mogadishu in year 1700?, This is more than a century before the Italians arrived.

They had banana and rice for breakfast and dinner. So it was pretty much a staple in their diet
A description of Magadoxa
View attachment 349022
View attachment 349023

Like how do you even find a mention of muqdisho about a book talking about pirates written in the 1700s in old english. Next level research

@Step a side heres evidence of the exporting and cultivation way before italian contact.

@Hilmaam This the nonsense i’m referring to. If your specific family tree didn’t do anything productive or significant, keep you langaabnimo to yourself and stop projecting it to the rest of us.

Wow... finding a 15th century manuscript written in arabic, and they were able to find a mention of bananas being cultivated in Somalia. Just astonishing, like this is a skill I wonder what type of process these people go thru to find sources... must be very hard and time consuming to sift through potential sources.

Big respect to anyone involved in finding sources, next is making it mainstream.
also how I found out how a bananas without seeds are propagated

 

[NidarNidar]

Does it say they exported it? Or does it say they re-planted seeds they got from there?

Because i am not sure if fruits like Bananas were export crops before the modern era , as they were more consumed domestically as luxury foods. Aside from dates, dried, candied fruits , it was impossible to export fresh fruits due to lack of preservation technology, as the fruit would go bad during the journey.

In the Harar uplands people grew gardens with oranges, grapes, sugar canes, pomegranates among other things during the 1800s but they didn't export any of it

My family owns extensive mangos and other fruit barring trees, they can grow in the Awdal region, most of the fields are used to grow sorghum, the stalks are feed to our camels and goats, most of the arable land in the north is owned by Gadabuursi and Habar Awal in the north, usually between Borama all the way to Awbarre -Gabiley to outskirts of Hargeisa.

Most of the clans within Sr region are agro pastoralists since it be idiotic not to take advantage, being primarily nomadic is a disadvantage.

 

[Aseer]

I wouldn't exactly call them failed generation, because alot of them partook in the country before it's collapse and published stuff during and some time after it. What happened is that people were displaced a lot of them had to take on new jobs and found themselves switchin careers

For example Mohamed Hussein Ma'alim i shared earlier, he studied in univeristy of Mecca, Somalia and Sudan during the 70s/80s/90s awarded PHD in Islamic history, published books through Mogadishu state press and now he is teacher in Norwegian Universities and also part of intellectual organizations scattered around the world.


Put yeah we are starting to see new revival happening lately with book fairs and new publishing houses,

What i hope to see more than anything with the new is to see the past work being reintegrated with present and future work.

Atleast we arent denying that a brain drain plummeted in somalia and intellectual activity became near non existent especially in the period of 1990s-early 2000s.

Different Somali clans farmed a variety of crops between Juba and Shabelle river and upper shabelle river tributaries around harar uplands and this historically extend into awash and northwest Somaliland. In Puntland they planted date farms. Pastoralism was still viewed as superior and more sustainable in the semi-arid climate, so often times Somalis would combine both herding and farming.

If Italians introduced Banana , how do you explain it being widely consumed in Mogadishu in year 1700?, This is more than a century before the Italians arrived.

They had banana and rice for breakfast and dinner. So it was pretty much a staple in their diet
A description of Magadoxa
View attachment 349022
View attachment 349023

In the source they call it "Pafida" and the dish they call "Kaja" do you know what those words mean? I have never heard of it in the somali language.

 

[Hilmaam]

I agree farming is something people picked up over the last century if we’re being real honest.

farming working with your hands and doing trade work. That’s how discriminated against clans formed. Even during barre time people in south were resisting to do the backbreaking farm work and a lot of it was Bantus. It’s backwards way to think but it was true for a lot of Somalia. Even eating fish was looked down upon in some places. A lot of clans nomadic lifestyle was everything. Wealth freedom wives they had what they needed . Twitter historians make up stuff easy to do online vs college professors who have to provide real sources and get stuff peer reviewed. Guy trying to say maqdisi attributed to Mogadishu instead of qudus kind of ass pull u see from twitter historians

 

[Internet Nomad]

Somalispot and to a lesser extent the predecessor somnet has done great things for somali history. For a place where somalis can congregate and learn about our shared history.

May Allah bless somalispot and make it better inshallah.

 

[NidarNidar]

I agree farming is something people picked up over the last century if we’re being real honest.

Most of Somalia isnt suitable for farming which is why only select few areas in the South, SR and North have decent land, Zeila had extensive grain production not that far from the city, and it has very poor soil and harsh conditions, there are even ancient storags silos dug into the earth, more archeology is needed in all of Somalia.

 

[Midas]

Most of Somalia isnt suitable for farming which is why only select few areas in the South, SR and North have decent land, Zeila had extensive grain production not that far from the city, and it has very poor soil and harsh conditions, there are even ancient storags silos dug into the earth, more archeology is needed in all of Somalia.

I think with some agricultural technology even the drier parts of somalia can be irrigated. It not yemen or saudi levels of desert land .

 

[Midas]

Somalias geography is honestly pretty decent the more I think about it. Even moving beyond the obvious advantage of the coastline. The fact that are land is mostly flat and not Saharan levels of dry means future infrastructure projects won't be that diffcult. Look at our neighbors ethiopia or yemen. They will always have to deal with the fact that the mountainous terrains will increase the cost of any infrastructure projects massively. And will also serve as basis for insurgency amd rebel groups.

 

[Grimmer]

farming working with your hands and doing trade work. That’s how discriminated against clans formed. Even during barre time people in south were resisting to do the backbreaking farm work and a lot of it was Bantus. It’s backwards way to think but it was true for a lot of Somalia. Even eating fish was looked down upon in some places. A lot of clans nomadic lifestyle was everything. Wealth freedom wives they had what they needed . Twitter historians make up stuff easy to do online vs college professors who have to provide real sources and get stuff peer reviewed. Guy trying to say maqdisi attributed to Mogadishu instead of qudus kind of ass pull u see from twitter historians

My family and I are originally from a very fertile place. When I visited, they had Bantus and other d&m working on the farms. Every person was a geeljire. It is 2024, if I told them this was the way to make money they would laugh at me whilst drinking caano geel. But in 2021 they used to have a geel contest, tallest camel wins.

 

[El Nino]

Its this site specifically and to some extent, somnet who have done a lot of research that the future generations will appreciate.

These twitter historians got everything from sspot. They are doing booto, guaranteed they lurk the culture section.

 

[Rayaale]

Its this site specifically and to some extent, somnet who have done a lot of research that the future generations will appreciate.

These twitter historians got everything from sspot. They are doing booto, guaranteed they lurk the culture section.

Same with r/somalia on Reddit they get everything from here and posit it over there

 

[NidarNidar]

I think with some agricultural technology even the drier parts of somalia can be irrigated. It not yemen or saudi levels of desert land .

We can use our aquifers or improve trapping water within the soil, by using drought resistant trees and implementing dams to slow down the water enough for it to be actually absorb in the raining season.

 

[Idilinaa]

Does that mean rice was grown in Somalia or any of the other stuff listed in this page being eaten. There were trade networks in region if something was consumed could easily been imported

If bananas were grown in Somalia there would be poems, stories , specifics on location and methods. Not some vague documents about people’s diet . 1920 was not that long ago the sayid was born 1856 and we know so much about him. There should be detailed sources if these banana farms existed

Rice was imported but fruit was grown domestically , you can't import Bananas so if they ate it through 1300-1700(when there was no modern preservation technology) means it was grown domestically and consumed.

It's mentioned specifically that Somalis cultivated not only a variety of fruits, but also barley, tobaco, millet, wheat, durra, maize, sesame , beans, cotton, aniseed, and coffee

Somali poetry is pretty diverse they do include farming and other stuff. They talk about farming and planting fruits as well and locations of those farms and hamlets, villages

Some examples from the late 1800s

'Heelloy'

This is a completely new edition of the only scholarly work on the poetry of popular and mass culture among a people who are renowned for their passion for poetry. Johnson traces the heello movement from its origins as a youth culture which in its early days was concerned with themes of love and...

www.google.co.uk

The documents i have shown are not from 1920s and they are not vague they directly describe what people cultivate and eat.

Also in that other thread i made you can see Arabic writings by Somali scholars discussing how to implement better yield and improve on agriculture and cotton production among other things.

Also if they didn't farm how do they have a farming calendar and other systems? Which btw has stayed consistent. As well as agricultural implements and tools? You can also just see in the Somali language it just filled with farming related terminologies alongside ones related to herding.

The early agro-pastoralism is not only reflected in descriptions from the middle ages, but you see cattle/camel herding vocabulary but also extensive cultivation/farming related vocabulary in both Northern and Southern dialects

 

[Idilinaa]

I agree farming is something people picked up over the last century if we’re being real honest.

Thats incorrect.

There is direct medieval references to Hawiye farming villages along the banks of Shabelle river from the 1200s into the 1500s.

The southern coastal towns depended on the agricultural production from shabelle, it would impossible for them to exist or grow in size if Somalis didn't farm.

There is not many immediate resources in Mogadishu or on the Benadiri coast in general, early on no one except producers from far interior or the hinterland would settle there and use it as an exchange center for their products. Whether they be agro-cultivators or camel herders.

People who lived in the hinterland of Mogadishu weren't all simple camel herding nomads either, a lot of them were settled agro-pastoralists living in a number of farming villages near/along the banks of the shabelle river. Each village inhabited by 200 people.

The earliest mentions of Mogadishu/Merca in medieval sources paints the same picture, connecting it to it's hinterland and describing the 50 villages along the banks of the river.

This is also supported by archeological excavations in Afgoye, that shows that the agricultural town pre-dates Mogadishu. The economic developments in the hinterland directly led to the formation, settlement and development of the urban towns on the coast.

Note that there other interior commercial urban towns(most now abandoned) along caravan routes, the oldest surviving of them being the walled city of Lugh. Benadiri Reer Shaykh Mumin clan is one example that is interspersed between the camel caravan trade routes that links to Lugh(Interior city) and Bur Hakaba(Agricultural center) from the coast of Mogadishu(Coastal City) and commanded it.
''The town depended on the grain brought by camels from the Galadi(Shabelle) River''

Basically large parts of Galbeed and northwest Somaliland people were described as farming in the late 1600s while describing the landscape and the archeological evidence pretty much backs it up that they was farming throughout the middle ages.

Cover it in this thread

Somali Agricultural Revolution( 900-1600s) ?

I have been looking at various historical trends and linkages and came across. The Arab Agricultural Revolution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_Agricultural_Revolution which took places through the entirety of the medieval period. Which made me think that Somalia might have been connected to...

www.somalispot.com

Richard Burton describes farming villages of several clans like Gadabursi, Aboskul, Gerri, Usbahayan , Bartirri , Hawiye etc on his way to Harar in the mid 1800s

This is exactly the same way in which Richard Burton explains the distinction between Sedentary Somali clans and Nomadic/Bedouin clans in the same area nearly 400 years later.

Those same clans brought their produce like wheat, coffee and durra(Jowarry) for export through Berbera .

Early 1800s of Geri clan growing wheat but also coffee for export from around Harar

and early 1800s report of Bartirri cultivating Coffee trees near Harar

Whats noteworthy is that they didn't outsource the farm labor like what happened in the Southern Somalia.

That's the only change that took place in 1800s , the last century. Somalis didn't use slaves for farming prior to that point. There was no plantation slavery pre-1800s.

 

[Idilinaa]

My family owns extensive mangos and other fruit barring trees, they can grow in the Awdal region, most of the fields are used to grow sorghum, the stalks are feed to our camels and goats, most of the arable land in the north is owned by Gadabuursi and Habar Awal in the north, usually between Borama all the way to Awbarre -Gabiley to outskirts of Hargeisa.

Most of the clans within Sr region are agro pastoralists since it be idiotic not to take advantage, being primarily nomadic is a disadvantage.

It's pretty much consistent historically with descriptions of inland arable regions behind berbera and zeila.

The inland, which is almost contiguous to the continent, is very fertile, and produces plenty of corn, fruit, and cattle, great part of which is exported into other countries.

Cultivated areas near Hargeisa and Gabile in the Northwest