CHAPTER XII 



SOME NOTES ON THE SOMALI 



I HAD now reached the heart of the country I was 

 exploring, and found myself amongst a tribe whose 

 customs and character have been influenced by con- 

 tact with Europeans, and who have not yet come 

 into contact with Western civilisation. It would 

 therefore seem not inappropriate that I should give 

 some account of the Jubaland Somali ; I do not 

 propose to deal at any length with their history, for 

 such matters are fully dealt with in certain books on 

 British Somaliland,^ and my own stay in Jubaland 

 was not sufficiently extended to qualify me to speak 

 with authority on the subject. 



In East Africa there are only two main branches 

 of the true Somali, namely, the Ishaak and the 

 Darud, and it is only the latter that is represented in 

 Jubaland. According to the native account, in the 

 75th year of Hejira (692 a.d.) an Arab Sheik, Ismail 

 Juberti by name, was outlawed in his own country 

 and fled from Arabia by night in a dhow. After 

 many vicissitudes of fortune, he landed on the 

 Benadir coast near Hobia (or Obbia), but the inhabi- 

 tants of that country, the Haweyah, refused to shelter 

 him and drove him out ; he was compelled therefore 



1 La valUe du Darror, G. Revoil ; British Somaliland, R. E. Drake- 

 Brockman. 



