Oromo ( / ˈ ɒr ə m oʊ / OR -əm-ow or / ɔː ˈ r oʊ m oʊ / aw- ROW -mow ; Oromo: Afaan Oromoo ), historically also called Galla , which is regarded by the Oromo as pejorative, is an Afroasiatic language that belongs to the Cushitic branch. It is native to the Ethiopian state of Oromia and northern Kenya and is spoken predominantly by the Oromo people and neighboring ethnic groups in the Horn of Africa . It is used as a lingua franca particularly in the Oromia Region and northeastern Kenya.
161-484: With more than 41.7 million speakers making up 33.8% of the total Ethiopian population , Oromo has the largest number of native speakers in Ethiopia, and ranks as the second most widely spoken language in Ethiopia by total number of speakers (including second-language speakers) following Amharic . Forms of Oromo are spoken as a first language by an additional half-million people in parts of northern and eastern Kenya . It
322-499: A reciprocal pronoun wal (English 'each other') that is used like of/if . That is, it is inflected for case but not person, number, or gender: wal jaalatu 'they like each other' (base form of wal ), kennaa walii bitan 'they bought each other gifts' (dative of wal ). Like English, Oromo makes a two-way distinction between proximal ('this, these') and distal ('that, those') demonstrative pronouns and adjectives. Some dialects distinguish masculine and feminine for
483-420: A stem , representing the lexical meaning of the verb, and a suffix , representing tense or aspect and subject agreement. For example, in dhufne 'we came', dhuf- is the stem ('come') and -ne indicates that the tense is past and that the subject of the verb is first person plural. As in many other Afroasiatic languages , Oromo makes a basic two-way distinction in its verb system between
644-454: A " Habesha people ". His record expounded the nature of Ethiopians, including highly proselytizing to neighboring Egypt. He denoted these people locating in the place superimposed by Nubia and Meroë, connected to the Nile river, having distinct rainy season and wonderful lake. The kingdom enlarged its territory by the half of 4th century after conquering neighbor city Meroë in 330, and entered
805-607: A "Golden Age" for the next three centuries. Aksum's power began declining at the time of the Islamic Golden Age , where they frequently countered intrusions by Arab Muslims in the South Arabia protectorate (modern Yemen ), making them to evicted more in the southern of Agaw population. In 10th century, the kingdom ultimately collapsed followed by pillage by Queen Gudit , after execution of Christians and ordered arson in church. While Aksum's existence extinguished,
966-770: A battle for dominance between the Derg, the EPRP, and their rival the All-Ethiopia Socialist Movement (MEISON), which had initially aligned itself with the Derg. While this internal conflict was being fought, Ethiopia was threatened by both the Somali invasion and the guerrilla campaign of the Eritrean People's Liberation Front , who demanded independence for Eritrea , then a province of Ethiopia . The Ogaden War of 1977–1978 with Somalia , fought over
1127-633: A coup , and the Minister of Defense, Haile Giyorgis Habte Mariam , was killed; Mengistu returned within 24 hours and nine generals, including the air force commander and the army chief of staff, died as the coup was crushed. By 1990, the Soviet Union had all but ended its support for Mengistu's regime. In May 1991, the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) forces advanced on Addis Ababa from all sides, and Mengistu fled
1288-541: A disputed border region ( Ogaden ), was notable for the prominent role of Mengistu's Soviet and Cuban allies in securing an Ethiopian victory. The catastrophic famine of 1983–1985 is what brought his government the most international attention. Mengistu fled to Zimbabwe in May 1991 after the PDRE National Shengo dissolved itself and called for a transitional government . His departure brought an abrupt end to
1449-520: A failed assassination attempt by the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Party (EPRP) in September 1976, after it had ignored the Derg's invitation to join the union of socialist parties. The death toll is unknown but is often estimated at between 30,000 and 750,000. Internal rebellion, government repression, and economic mismanagement characterized Mengistu's presidency, the Red Terror period being
1610-475: A key and commendable role during our struggle for independence". According to the spokesman, Mengistu assisted Zimbabwean guerrilla fighters during the Rhodesian Bush War by providing training and arms; after the war, he had provided training for Zimbabwean air force pilots. The spokesman said that "not many countries have shown such commitment to us". Following an appeal on 26 May 2008, Mengistu
1771-483: A life sentence in January 2007. In addition to the genocide conviction, the court found him guilty of imprisonment, illegal homicide, and illegal confiscation of property. Michael Clough, a US attorney and longtime observer of Ethiopia, said in a statement: The biggest problem with prosecuting Mengistu for genocide is that his actions did not necessarily target a particular group. They were directed against anybody who
SECTION 10
#17327728221221932-432: A lot in the details, but the following changes are common. Verbs whose stems end in two consonants and whose suffix begins with a consonant must insert a vowel to break up the consonants since the language does not permit sequences of three consonants. There are two ways this can happen: either the vowel i is inserted between the stem and the suffix, or the final stem consonants are switched (an example of metathesis ) and
2093-453: A major supporter against the EPRP, in what would be called the " White Terror ". The EPRP's efforts to discredit and undermine the Derg and its MEISON collaborators escalated in the fall of 1976. It targeted public buildings and other symbols of state authority for bombings and assassinated numerous Abyot Seded and MEISON members, as well as public officials at all levels. The Derg, which countered with its own counter-terrorism campaign, labeled
2254-583: A number of members of other ethnicities who are in contact with the Oromo speak it as a second language. See, for example, the Omotic -speaking Bambassi and the Nilo-Saharan -speaking Kwama in northwestern Oromia. The Oromo people use a highly developed oral tradition. In the 19th century, scholars began writing in the Oromo language using Latin script . In 1842, Johann Ludwig Krapf began translations of
2415-782: A period of isolation referred to as the Zemene Mesafint or "Age of Princes". The Emperors became figureheads, controlled by regional lords and noblemen like Ras Mikael Sehul of Tigray , Ras Wolde Selassie of Tigray, and by the Yejju Oromo dynasty of the Wara Sheh , such as Ras Gugsa of Yejju . Prior to the Zemene Mesafint, Emperor Iyoas I had introduced the Oromo language ( Afaan Oromo ) at court, instead of Amharic. In 1855, Emperor Tewodros II sought to establish permanent Ethiopian border by solidifying
2576-770: A population closely related to early Neolithic farmers from the Near-East/Anatolia. An entry by Hodgson et al. (2014) found a distinct African ancestral component in Afro-Asiatic populations in the Horn (dubbed "Ethiopic"), as well as a distinct non-African Western Eurasian component (dubbed "Ethio-Somali"), that is most likely pre-agricultural. Their data also revealed Nilo-Saharan ancestry in Afro-Asiatic populations, and "Ethiopic" ancestry in Nilo-Saharan populations, suggesting an intricate history of contact in
2737-455: A process of modernization that continued into successive regimes, resurrecting the empire as a regional power. In the late 19th-century during the reign of Menelik II , against the backdrop of the Scramble for Africa , the notion of Ethiopian national integrity was strengthened by Italian efforts at colonization. The Italian invasion engendered a formidable national resistance, culminating in
2898-715: A third time in 1970, this time as a student at the Combined Arms Center in Fort Leavenworth , Kansas. Returning after his training, he was expected to command the ordnance sub-division in Harar , but was prevented by General Haile Baykedagn who cited his previous insubordination. Years later, Mengistu would murder General Haile Baykedagn along with 60 ministers and generals. Mengistu typically endured derogatory comments about his appearance, rooted in his Konso background. His features were far more "negroid" than
3059-452: A total of 459 males sampled from Ethiopia, approximately 58% of Y-chromosome haplotypes were found to belong to Haplogroup E , of which 71% (41% of total) were characterized by one of its further downstream sub lineage known as E1b1b , while the remainder were mostly characterized by Haplogroup E1b1(x E1b1b,E1b1a) , and to a lesser extent Haplogroup E2 . With respect to E1b1b , some studies have found that it exists at its highest level among
3220-665: A trading or military colony in alliance with the Ethiopian civilization of Dʿmt or some other proto-Axumite state. Politically integrated, the Kingdom of Aksum was emerged independently from at least 100 BC, and its civilization grew from 1st century AD. The kingdom dominated the Red Sea , the Northeast Africa in the present location between northern Ethiopia ( Tigray Region ), eastern Sudan , Eritrea , South Arabia . It
3381-452: A very dangerous young officer. General Haile had actually written a secret report to his superiors to put a close watch on Mengistu and not give him a raise in the military ranks. A few years before his second departure for training to the US he was in conflict with the then Third Division commander General Haile Baykedagn whose policy of strict discipline and order did not sit well with Mengistu. At
SECTION 20
#17327728221223542-436: A vowel (e.g. in word-final environments or as part of consonant clusters). The Arabic script has also been used intermittently in areas with Muslim populations. Like most other Ethiopian languages, whether Semitic, Cushitic, or Omotic, Oromo has a set of ejective consonants , that is, voiceless stops or affricates that are accompanied by glottalization and an explosive burst of air. Oromo has another glottalized phone that
3703-474: A word. This article uses ⟨c⟩ consistently for / tʃʼ / and ⟨ch⟩ for / tʃ / . Only the penultimate or final syllable of a root can have a high tone, and if the penultimate is high, the final must also be high; this implies that Oromo has a pitch-accent system (in which the tone need be specified only on one syllable, the others being predictable) rather than a tone system (in which each syllable must have its tone specified), although
3864-624: Is 16126–16362, which is found not only in the Ethiopian highlands but also in Somalia, lower Egypt and at especially high frequency in the Nubians . The Tihama share some West Eurasian haplotypes with Africans, e.g. J and K with Ethiopians, Somali and Egyptians." Schuenemann V. J et al. (2017) found that when it came to the maternal background of 125 Ethiopians, over >60% was composed of African L lineages, while these lineages were up to 20% for
4025-866: Is Milk) became a hit in Ethiopia. To combat Somali wide-reaching influence, the Ethiopian Government initiated an Oromo language program radio of their own. Within Kenya there has been radio broadcasting in Oromo (in the Borana dialect) on the Voice of Kenya since at least the 1980s. The Borana Bible in Kenya was printed in 1995 using the Latin alphabet, but not using the same spelling rules as in Ethiopian Qubee. The first comprehensive online Oromo dictionary
4186-559: Is a subject pro-drop language . That is, neutral sentences in which the subject is not emphasized do not require independent subject pronouns: kaleessa dhufne 'we came yesterday'. The Oromo word that translates 'we' does not appear in this sentence, though the person and number are marked on the verb dhufne ('we came') by the suffix -ne . When the subject in such sentences needs to be given prominence for some reason, an independent pronoun can be used: ' nuti kaleessa dhufne ' ' we came yesterday'. The table below gives forms of
4347-404: Is a two-way distinction between singular ('I', 'you sg.') and plural ('we', 'you pl.'), whereas for third person, there is a two-way distinction in the singular ('he', 'she') and a single form for the plural ('they'). Because Oromo has only two genders, there is no pronoun corresponding to English it ; the masculine or feminine pronoun is used according to the gender of the noun referred to. Oromo
4508-400: Is also spoken by smaller numbers of emigrants in other African countries such as South Africa , Libya , Egypt and Sudan . Oromo is the most widely spoken Cushitic language and among the five languages of Africa with the largest mother-tongue populations. Oromo serves as one of the official working languages of Ethiopia and is also the working language of several of the states within
4669-585: Is displayed in Table 3. As can be seen graphically in Fig. 3, the mtDNA haplogroup distribution of each region is similar, with all regions displaying similar proportions of African 'L' haplogroups (Addis Ababa: 59%, Arsi: 50%, Shewa: 44%, Other: 57%). No association was found between regional origin of subjects and their mitochondrial type (v2=8.5, 15 df, P=0.9). Similarly, the mtDNA haplogroup distribution of subjects (athletes and controls) speaking languages from each family
4830-417: Is more unusual, an implosive retroflex stop , "dh" in Oromo orthography, a sound that is like an English "d" produced with the tongue curled back slightly and with the air drawn in so that a glottal stop is heard before the following vowel begins. It is retroflex in most dialects, though it is not strongly implosive and may reduce to a flap between vowels. One source describes it as voiceless [ᶑ̥] . Oromo has
4991-462: Is of J2 type. On the other hand, 26% of the individuals sampled in the Arsi control portion by Moran et al. (2004) were also found to belong to Haplogroup J. Another fairly prevalent lineage in Ethiopia belongs to Haplogroup A , occurring at a frequency of about 17% within Ethiopia, it is almost all characterized by its downstream sub lineage of A3b2 (M13). Restricted to Africa, and mostly found along
Oromo language - Misplaced Pages Continue
5152-473: Is quite different from that of the Khoisan. Thus, a portion of the current Ethiopian gene pool may be the product of in situ differentiation from an ancestral gene pool." Scott et al. (2005) similarly observed that the Ethiopian population is almost equally divided between individuals that carry Eurasian maternal lineages, and those that belong to African clades. They describe the presence of Eurasian clades in
5313-408: Is shown in Table 3. Again there was no association between language family and mitochondrial type (v2=5.4, 5 df, P=0.37). As can be seen in Fig. 4, the haplogroup distributions of each language family are again very similar. In addition, Musilová et al. (2011) observed significant maternal ties between its Ethiopian and other Horn African samples with its Western Asian samples; particularly in terms of
5474-566: Is to treat the "singular" form as unspecified for number. When it is important to make the plurality of a referent clear, the plural form of a noun is used. Noun plurals are formed through the addition of suffixes . The most common plural suffix is -oota ; a final vowel is dropped before the suffix, and in the western dialects, the suffix becomes -ota following a syllable with a long vowel: mana 'house', manoota 'houses', hiriyaa 'friend', hiriyoota 'friends', barsiisaa 'teacher', barsiiso(o)ta 'teachers'. Among
5635-484: Is to use the noun meaning 'self': of(i) or if(i) . This noun is inflected for case but, unless it is being emphasized, not for person, number, or gender: isheen of laalti 'she looks at herself' (base form of of ), isheen ofiif makiinaa bitte 'she bought herself a car' (dative of of ). The other possibility is to use the noun meaning 'head', mataa , with possessive suffixes: mataa koo 'myself', mataa kee 'yourself (s.)', etc. Oromo has
5796-766: The Battle of Adwa in 1896 which resulted in a major Ethiopian victory against the Italians. The resulting Treaty of Addis Ababa ended the Italo-Ethiopian War , and along with the nation's contemporaneous territorial expansion, largely established the modern-day boundaries of Ethiopia. Present-day Ethiopia has a diverse population with many different languages and ethnic groups. Ethiopians speak Afro-Asiatic languages ( Semitic , Cushitic , and Omotic ) and Nilo-Saharan languages . The Oromo , Amhara , Somali and Tigrayans make up more than three-quarters (75%) of
5957-526: The Battle of Afabet in March 1989, a defeat at the hands of the Eritrean People's Liberation Front , with 15,000 casualties and the loss of a great deal of equipment. This was followed up less than a year later by another crushing defeat at Shire , with over 20,000 men either killed or captured and the loss of even more equipment. On 16 May 1989, while Mengistu was out of the country for a four-day state visit to East Germany , senior military officials attempted
6118-570: The E1b1b1a (M78) clade, which arose later in northeast Africa (Egypt/Libya) and then subsequently back-migrated to eastern Africa. Haplogroup J has been found at a frequency of approximately 18% in Ethiopians, but with a much higher prevalence among the Amhara, where it has been found to exist at levels as high as 35%, of which about 94% (17% of total) is of the type J1, while 6% (1% of total)
6279-544: The Eritrean secessionists and the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) as well. By the end of the seventies, Mengistu presided over the second-largest army in all of sub-Saharan Africa , as well as a formidable air force and navy. After coming to power, Mengistu embraced the philosophy of Marxism–Leninism , which was increasingly popular among many nationalists and revolutionaries throughout Africa and much of
6440-585: The Ethiopian Civil War . Mengistu Haile Mariam still lives in Harare , Zimbabwe , despite an Ethiopian court verdict which found him guilty of genocide in absentia . Mengistu's government is estimated to be responsible for the deaths of 500,000 to 2,000,000 Ethiopians, mostly during the 1983–1985 famine in Ethiopia . Mengistu Haile Mariam was born on 21 May 1937 in Welayta, Kaffa during
6601-585: The Ethiopian Peoples' Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), which brought Ethiopia to ethnic federalist state since 1995, which was aimed to reduce internal ethnic conflicts and grant freedom of choice within every ethnic groups although, Ethiopia then faced more prolong internal conflicts and ethnic clashes in the 21st-century. Until the fall of the Derg , Amharic served as the sole official language in government administration, courts, church and even in primary school instruction; although in
Oromo language - Misplaced Pages Continue
6762-553: The Gondarine period in 16th and 17th century, but Ethiopia was divided into de facto autonomous regions in the mid-18th century. During this time, Ethiopia was nominally ruled by an Emperor who functioned as a puppet monarch of various regional lords and noblemen. This era was known as the Zemene Mesafint or "Era of the Princes". Emperor Tewodros II managed to unify the decentralized Ethiopian Empire in 1855 and inaugurated
6923-677: The HV1b mtDNA haplogroup. The authors noted: "Detailed phylogeography of HV1 sequences shows that more recent demographic upheavals likely contributed to their spread from West Arabia to East Africa , a finding concordant with archaeological records suggesting intensive maritime trade in the Red Sea from the sixth millennium BC onwards." According to Černý et al. (2008), many Ethiopians also share specific maternal lineages with areas in Yemen and other parts of Northeast Africa. The authors indicate that: "The most frequent haplotype in west coastal Yemen
7084-458: The Italian occupation of Ethiopia. There are conflicting reports about his origins, which are said to be of a slave family from the south. After the Italians were defeated and expelled from the country in 1941, his parents moved to Debre Markos where father Haile Mariam joined Haile Selassie's fledgling army and received the rank of corporal. Corporal Haile Mariam was then transferred to
7245-421: The Kingdom of Aksum ; Semitic , Cushitic , and Nilo-Saharan (ancestors of the modern-day Kunama and Nara ). The Kingdom of Aksum remained a geopolitically influential entity until the decline of its capital — also named Axum — beginning in the 7th century. Nevertheless, the core Aksumite civilization was preserved and continued into the successive Zagwe dynasty . By this time, new ethnic groups emerged –
7406-546: The Near East population migrated to Africa in 3,000 years ago. Other evidence concluded that Eurasian population made significant contribution as a result of back migration between 1,500 and 3,500 years ago. Nilo-Saharan peoples do not exhibit this genetic similarity; instead, their DNA shows evidence of more recent admixture (less than 1200 years ago) with other African peoples. It was thought that Hamitic people from Asia Minor had migrated before Semitic Arabian people in
7567-714: The Rift Valley from Ethiopia to Cape Town , Haplogroup A represents the deepest branch in the Human Y- Chromosome phylogeny. Finally, Haplogroup T was found at approximately 4% and Haplogroup B at approximately 3%, which make up the remainder of the Y-DNA Haplogroups found within Ethiopia. The maternal ancestry of Ethiopians is similarly diverse. About half (52.2%) of Ethiopians belongs to mtdna Haplogroups L0 , L1 , L2 , L3 , L4 , L5 , or L6 . These haplogroups are generally confined to
7728-745: The Third World at the time. In the mid-1970s, under Mengistu's leadership, the Derg regime radicalized and began an aggressive program of changing system of Ethiopia from a mixed feudal-capitalist emergent economy to an Eastern Bloc -style command economy. All rural land was nationalized , stripping the Ethiopian Church, the Imperial family, and the nobility of all their sizable estates and the bulk of their wealth. During this same period, all foreign-owned and locally owned companies were nationalized without compensation in an effort to redistribute
7889-891: The Tigrayans and Amharas . During the Solomonic period , the latter established major political and cultural influence in the Horn of Africa . In the Late Middle Ages , Muslim states were established, including the Sultanate of Ifat , and its successor the Adal Sultanate . Discontent with territory and religious dominance led to intense war between the Ethiopian Empire , the Christian state, (consisting of
8050-588: The kebeles , the neighborhood watch committees which served during Mengistu's reign as the lowest level local government and security surveillance units. Families had to pay the kebeles a tax known as "the wasted bullet" to obtain the bodies of their loved ones. In May 1977, the Swedish general secretary of the Save the Children Fund stated that "1,000 children have been killed, and their bodies are left in
8211-658: The medium of instruction in elementary schools throughout the region, including areas where other ethnic groups live speaking their languages, and as a language of administration within the region. Since the OLF left the transitional Ethiopian government in the early 1990s, the Oromo Peoples' Democratic Organization (OPDO) continued developing Oromo in Ethiopia. Radio broadcasts began in the Oromo language in Somalia in 1960 by Radio Mogadishu . The programme featured music and propaganda. A song Bilisummaan Aannaani (Liberation
SECTION 50
#17327728221228372-461: The mid-1980s Ethiopian famine , which ultimately took over 500,000 lives. Mengistu made seven visits to the Soviet Union between 1977 and 1984, as well as other visits to his political allies Cuba, East Germany, South Yemen, and Mozambique. From 1983 to 1984 Mengistu served as head of the Organization of African Unity . However, the government's military position gradually weakened. First came
8533-433: The ) with suffixes on the noun: -(t)icha for masculine nouns (the ch is geminated though this is not normally indicated in writing) and -(t)ittii for feminine nouns. Vowel endings of nouns are dropped before these suffixes: karaa 'road', karicha 'the road', nama 'man', namicha / namticha 'the man', haroo 'lake', harittii 'the lake'. For animate nouns that can take either gender,
8694-480: The 100 Modern Egyptians. Mengistu Haile Mariam leader of Ethiopia Government Mengistu Haile Mariam ( Amharic : መንግሥቱ ኀይለ ማርያም , pronunciation: [mənɡɨstu haɪlə marjam] ; born 21 May 1937) is an Ethiopian former politician and former military officer who was the head of state of Ethiopia from 1977 to 1991 and General Secretary of the Workers' Party of Ethiopia from 1984 to 1991. He
8855-481: The 13th century. Mengistu purged rivals for power from the Derg and made himself dictator of Ethiopia, attempting to modernize the feudal economy of Ethiopia through Marxist-Leninist -inspired policies such as nationalization and land redistribution . His bloody consolidation of power in 1977–1978 is known as the Ethiopian Red Terror , a brutal crackdown on opposition groups and civilians following
9016-663: The 17th century during the Zemene Mesafint under the rule of the Warasek dynasty , the Oromo language did serve as the official language of the Ethiopian Empire 's royal court . After 1991, Amharic has been replaced in many areas by other official government languages such as Oromo , Somali and Tigrinya . English is the most widely spoken foreign language and is taught in all secondary schools. According to
9177-619: The 2007 Ethiopian census and the CIA World Fact Book, the largest first languages are: Oromo 24,929,567 speakers or 33.8% of the total population; Amharic 21,631,370 or 29.3% (federal working language); Somali 4,609,274 or 6.2%; Tigrinya 4,324,476 or 5.9%; Sidamo 4,981,471 or 4%; Wolaytta 1,627,784 or 2.2%; Gurage 1,481,783 or 2%; and Afar 1,281,278 or 1.7%. Widely-spoken foreign languages include Arabic , English (major foreign language taught in schools), and Italian (spoken by an Italian minority). According to
9338-545: The 7th century BC. In 1933, G.W.B Huntingford proposed a theory of Azanian civilization could existed in Kenya , and northern Tanzania , between the Stone Age and Islamic period . It was supposed that these people evicted from Ethiopia and Somalia by Muslim invasion to southern region in present-day Kenya and Tanzania where perished around 14th- and 15th-century. About 7000 BC, Afro-Asiatic -speaking population namely Cushitic and Omotic-speaking people grouped in
9499-502: The African continent. They also originated either in Ethiopia or very near. The other portion of the population belong to Haplogroup N (31%) and Haplogroup M1 (17%). There is controversy surrounding their origins as either native or a possible ancient back migration into Ethiopia from Asia . Passarino et al. (1998) suggested that: " Caucasoid " gene flow into the Ethiopian gene pool occurred predominantly through males. Conversely,
9660-454: The Amhara, Tigrayan, Soddo Gurage , and Agaw ethnic groups) and the Muslim state Adal Sultanate (consisting of Semitic speaking Harari formally known as the Harla people , and the Argobba ). During the 1600s, there were large-scale migrations of the Oromo from the south into the highlands and also alongside the Somali into Adal or what was known as " Hararghe " (land of the Hararis). A period of stability and peace continued through
9821-462: The CIA Factbook the religious demography of Ethiopia is as follows; Ethiopian Orthodox 43.8%, Muslim 31.3%, Protestant 22.8%, Catholic 0.7%, traditional 0.6%, and other 0.8%. The largest diaspora community is found in the United States. According to the U.S. Census Bureau , 250,000 Ethiopian immigrants lived in the United States as of 2008. An additional 30,000 U.S.-born citizens reported Ethiopian ancestry. According to Aaron Matteo Terrazas, "if
SECTION 60
#17327728221229982-492: The Chabu, Dassanech, and Karo) in the southwest shared more recent ancestry with Bantu and Nilotic speakers, while Afro-Asiatic speakers in the northeast shared more recent ancestry with Egyptians and other West Eurasians. Overall, the study revealed that groups belonging to the Cushitic, Omotic, and Semitic branches of Afro-Asiatic in the region, still showed high genetic similarity to each other on average. A composite look at most YDNA studies done so far reveals that, out of
10143-466: The EPRDF streamed into the capital, precluding the previous leadership's escape. Almost all were promptly arrested and put on trial upon the assumption of power by the EPRDF. Mengistu has claimed that the takeover of his country resulted from the policies of Mikhail Gorbachev , who in his view allowed the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the termination of its aid to Ethiopia. An assassination attempt against Mengistu occurred on 4 November 1995, while he
10304-417: The EPRP!" and then produced three bottles filled with a red liquid that symbolized the blood of the imperialists and the counterrevolutionaries and smashed them to the ground to show what the revolution would do to its enemies. Thousands of young men and women turned up dead in the streets of the capital and other cities in the following months. They were systematically murdered mainly by the militia attached to
10465-456: The EPRP's tactics the White Terror. Mengistu asserted that all "progressives" were given "freedom of action" in helping root out the revolution's enemies, and his wrath was particularly directed toward the EPRP. Peasants, workers, public officials, and even students thought to be loyal to the Mengistu regime were provided with arms to accomplish this task. In a public speech in April 1977, Mengistu shouted "Death to counterrevolutionaries! Death to
10626-417: The Ethiopian federal system including Oromia , Harari and Dire Dawa regional states and of the Oromia Zone in the Amhara Region . It is a language of primary education in Oromia , Harari , Dire Dawa , Benishangul-Gumuz and Addis Ababa and of the Oromia Zone in the Amhara Region . It is used as an internet language for federal websites along with Tigrinya . Under Haile Selassie 's regime, Oromo
10787-478: The Ethnologue also lists 722,000 speakers of Borana and Orma , two languages closely related to Ethiopian Oromo. Within Ethiopia, Oromo is the language with the largest number of native speakers. Within Africa, Oromo is the language with the fourth most speakers, after Arabic (if one counts the mutually unintelligible spoken forms of Arabic as a single language and assumes the same for the varieties of Oromo), Swahili , and Hausa . Besides first language speakers,
10948-548: The Fourth Division headquarters in Addis Ababa, Mengistu exclaimed with emotion: In this country, some aristocratic families automatically categorize persons with dark skin, thick lips, and kinky hair as "Barias" ( Amharic for slave )... let it be clear to everybody that I shall soon make these ignoramuses stoop and grind corn! Bahru Zewde notes that Mengistu was distinguished by a "special ability to size up situations and persons". Although Bahru notes that some observers "rather charitably" equated this ability with intelligence,
11109-424: The Gospels of John and Matthew into Oromo, as well as a first grammar and vocabulary. The first Oromo dictionary and grammar was produced by German scholar Karl Tutschek in 1844. The first printing of a transliteration of Oromo language was in 1846 in a German newspaper in an article on the Oromo in Germany. After Abyssinia annexed Oromo's territory, the language's development into a full-fledged writing instrument
11270-405: The Marxist–Leninist Worker's Party of Ethiopia (WPE) was founded as the country's ruling party, with Mengistu as general secretary. On 10 September 1987, a new Soviet-style constitution was adopted, and the country was renamed the People's Democratic Republic of Ethiopia . Mengistu became president, with sweeping executive and legislative powers. Due to the doctrine of democratic centralism , he
11431-458: The Niger–Congo contribution to the Ethiopian population occurred mainly through females. While there is debate among the scientific community of what exactly constitutes "Caucasoid gene flow", the same study further stated: "Indeed, Ethiopians do not seem to result only from a simple combination of proto-Niger–Congo and Middle Eastern genes. Their African component cannot be completely explained by that of present-day Niger–Congo speakers, and it
11592-419: The Oromo, where it represented 62.8% of the haplotypes, while it was found at 35.4% among the Amhara, other studies however have found an almost equal representation of Haplogroup E1b1b at approximately 57% in both the Oromo and the Amhara. The haplogroup (as its predecessor E1b1) is thought to have originated somewhere in the Horn of Africa . About one half of E1b1b found in Ethiopia is further characterized by
11753-475: The Red Terror as "one of the most systematic uses of mass murder by a state ever witnessed in Africa." During his reign it was not uncommon to see students, suspected government critics, or rebel sympathizers hanging from lampposts each morning. Mengistu himself is alleged to have murdered opponents by garroting or shooting them, saying that he was leading by example. Estimates of the number of deaths for which he
11914-622: The Shewan kingdoms. Tewodros II is often credited with being the preliminary figure of modern Ethiopian history but his reign ended prematurely when he committed suicide during the British Expedition to Abyssinia . Emperor Menelik II done major reformations to the country by the late 1890s: under his reign, Menelik extensively conquered the rest of kingdoms nearby region, while annexing the Tigray Province , ultimately formed
12075-485: The Somali army at Tog Wuchale during the 1964 Ethiopian–Somali Border War . Prime Minister Aklilu Habte Wold removed the general affectionately known to his men as "the desert lion" from army duties and assigned him as a senator, a job he hated very much as he recounted to his author, but could not refuse without arousing the Emperor's ire. Aman's replacement was General Haile Baikedagn, who found Mengistu an intriguer and
12236-504: The USSR. Moscow said it proved that a backward society could become revolutionary by adopting a Leninist system. It was hailed as a model junior ally that Moscow was eager to support. In the 1980s Ethiopia plunged into greater turmoil and the Soviet system itself was collapsing by 1990. Russian commentators had turned scornful of the Ethiopian regime. In early 1984, under Mengistu's direction,
12397-475: The academic believes this skill is more akin to " street smarts ": "it is rather closer to the mark to see it as inner-city smartness (or what in local parlance would be called aradanat )." Emperor Haile Selassie's government, having lost the confidence of the Ethiopian public following a drought and crop failures in Wollo province, was overthrown in the Ethiopian revolution of 1974. As a result, power came into
12558-530: The ammunition's production unit of the imperial army in Addis Ababa . Mengistu was raised in the household of Dejazmatch Kebede Tesemma (the former governor of Gojjam), where Mengistu's mother is said to have worked as a domestic servant and his father became Kebede's house guard. Mengistu was raised partially in Ethiopian Empire Army camps around the country and partly within the compound of
12719-537: The ancestry, Pagani, Luca et al. (2012) noted this non-African component is estimated to have entered the Horn of Africa roughly ~3,000 years ago, and was found to be similar to the populations in the Levant . The paper goes on to say that this coincides with the introduction of Ethio-Semitic languages into the region. Gallego Llorente, M et al. (2015) similarly discovered extensive admixture in Eastern Africa from
12880-523: The ancient Semitic language of Ethiopia, is thought to have developed independently from the Sabaean language , one of the South Semitic languages . As early as 2000 BCE, other Semitic speakers were living in Ethiopia and Eritrea where Ge'ez developed. Sabaean influence is now thought to have been minor, limited to a few localities, and disappearing after a few decades or a century. It may have been
13041-572: The aristocratic family. In Debre Markos, Mengistu attended the Negus Tekle Haimanot School where he was known to be a problematic teenager and not serious with his studies, he was later expelled from high school for misbehavior. Mengistu then joined the army at a very young age. As an ambitious young soldier, he attracted the attention of the Eritrean-born General Aman Andom , who raised him to
13202-421: The autobenefactive; in this case the s of the causative is replaced by f : deebi '- 'return (intransitive)', deebis- 'return (transitive), answer', deebifam- 'be returned, be answered', deebifadh- 'get back for oneself'. Another derived verbal aspect is the frequentative or "intensive," formed by copying the first consonant and vowel of the verb root and geminating the second occurrence of
13363-465: The average highlander Ethiopian, which Paul Henze believes gave him an inferiority complex . Henze also notes that while receiving military training in the United States, Mengistu experienced racial discrimination which led him to develop a strong anti-American sentiment, but Henze was unable to find any evidence of such incidents. When he took power, and attended the meeting of Derg members at
13524-403: The basis for three derived voices, passive, causative, and autobenefactive, each formed with addition of a suffix to the root, yielding the stem that the inflectional suffixes are added to. The voice suffixes can be combined in various ways. Two causative suffixes are possible: ka '- 'go up', kaas- 'pick up', kaasis- 'cause to pick up'. The causative may be followed by the passive or
13685-797: The case in Ethiopia too, where a similar observation has been made for the Gumuz, an Ethiopian Nilotic population that is genetically similar to South Sudan Nilotes. Northeast African Nilotes showed some distinction from an ancient Ethiopian individual (Mota, found in the Mota Cave in the southern Ethiopian highlands), which suggests population structure between northeast and eastern Africa already 4,500 years ago. The modern-day Nilotic groups are likely direct descendants of past populations living in northeast Africa many thousands of years ago." López, Saioa et al. (2021) found that when comparing Ethiopians to external populations only, Nilo-Saharan speakers (as well as
13846-520: The cases, there is a range of forms possible, some covering more than one case, and the differences in meaning among these alternatives may be quite subtle. In most languages, there is a small number of basic distinctions of person , number , and often gender that play a role within the grammar of the language. Oromo and English are such languages. We see these distinctions within the basic set of independent personal pronouns, for example, English I , Oromo ani ; English they , Oromo ' isaani ' and
14007-434: The class is not predictable from the verb stem. It is the forms that precede suffixes beginning with consonants ( t and n ) that differ from the usual pattern. The third person masculine singular, second person singular, and first person plural present forms are shown for an example verb in each class. The common verbs fedh- 'want' and godh- 'do' deviate from the basic conjugation pattern in that long vowels replace
14168-607: The country as sequences that "are thought to be found in high numbers in Ethiopia either as a result of substantial gene flow into Ethiopia from Eurasia (Chen et al., 2000; Richards et al., 2003), or as a result of having undergone several branching events in demic diffusion, acting as founder lineages for non-African populations". The researchers further found no association between regional origin of subjects or language family (Semitic/Cushitic) and their mitochondrial type: The haplogroup distribution amongst all subjects (athletes and controls) from different geographical regions of Ethiopia
14329-514: The country with 50 family and Derg members. He was granted asylum in Zimbabwe as an official guest of Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe . Although Mugabe has since been removed from power in 2017 , no new extradition requests have been submitted. Mengistu left behind almost the entire membership of the original Derg and the WPE leadership. The regime only survived without him for another week before
14490-513: The country's wealth. All undeveloped urban property and all rental property were also nationalized. Private businesses such as banks and insurance companies, large retail businesses, etc. were also taken over by the government. All this nationalized property was brought under the administration of large bureaucracies set up to administer them. Farmers who had once worked on land owned by absentee landlords were now compelled to join collective farms. All agricultural products were no longer to be offered on
14651-472: The definite suffix may indicate the intended gender: qaalluu 'priest', qaallicha 'the priest (m.)', qallittii 'the priest (f.)'. The definite suffixes appear to be used less often than the in English, and they seem not to co-occur with the plural suffixes. Oromo nouns appear in seven grammatical cases , each indicated by a suffix, the lengthening of the noun's final vowel, or both. For some of
14812-625: The descendants of Ethiopian-born migrants (the second generation and up) are included, the estimates range upwards of 460,000 in the United States (of which approximately 350,000 are in the Washington, DC Metropolitan Area ; 96,000 in Los Angeles ; and 10,000 in New York)." A large Ethiopian community is also found in Israel, where Ethiopians make up almost 1.9% of the population. Almost
14973-540: The digraphs ch, dh, ny, ph, sh. Gemination is not obligatorily marked for digraphs, though some writers indicate it by doubling the first element: qopphaa'uu 'be prepared'. In the charts below, the International Phonetic Alphabet symbol for a phoneme is shown in brackets where it differs from the Oromo letter. The phonemes /p v z/ appear in parentheses because they are only found in recently adopted words. There have been minor changes in
15134-587: The early 4th century, construction of stone-fitted palace and public buildings, and erection of large obelisks around the capital Axum. These all are milestones that culminate in the rise of Ethiopian identity where the Greek exonym "Ethiopians" came to use by the kingdom under king Ezana 's reign in the 4th century. The first century BCE Greek historian Diodorus Siculus claimed the Ethiopian nativity as "true natives", "most pious and righteous" in his record. This assertion resonated by locality of declaring themselves
15295-577: The entire community are members of the Beta Israel community. There are also large number of Ethiopian emigrants in Saudi Arabia , Italy , Lebanon , United Kingdom , Canada , Sweden and Australia . . Wilson et al. (2001), conducted a DNA study based on cluster analysis that looked at a combined sample of Amhara and Oromo , examining a single enzyme variant: drug metabolizing enzyme (DME) loci. They found that 62% of Ethiopians fall into
15456-594: The execution without trial of 61 ex-officials of the Imperial government on 23 November 1974, and later of numerous other former nobles and officials including the Patriarch of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church , Abuna Theophilos , in 1977. Mengistu himself has acknowledged that the Derg ordered these deaths but refuses to accept personal responsibility. Members of the Derg have contradicted him in interviews given from prison, saying he conspired and
15617-459: The follow-up kingdom of Zagwe likely of a continuation of its civilization and revival of Christianity, and a new multi-ethnic empire-state was formed in title of "king of kings". The successful integration of Agaw and Semitic groups in the north prolonged over millennium and eventually forms Tigrayans and Amhara people . The Zagwe kingdom capital, relocated to Lalibela , and sparked a new cultural life. The most notable churches in this period
15778-399: The free market but were to be controlled and distributed by the government. Despite progressive agricultural reforms, under the Derg, agricultural output suffered due to civil war , drought and misguided economic policies . There was also a famine in 1984 , which was the 10th anniversary of the Derg. The Soviets hailed Ethiopia for its supposed similar cultural and historical parallels to
15939-462: The geminated consonants that would result when suffixes beginning with t or n are added: fedha 'he wants', feeta 'you (sg.) want', feena 'we want', feetu 'you (pl.) want', hin feene 'didn't want', etc. The verb dhuf- 'come' has the irregular imperatives koottu , koottaa . The verb deem- 'go' has, alongside regular imperative forms, the irregular imperatives deemi , deemaa . An Oromo verb root can be
16100-444: The gender of the modified noun). However, in the western dialects, the masculine forms (those beginning with k- ) are used in all cases. Possessive adjectives may take the case endings for the nouns they modify: ganda kootti 'to my village' ( -tti : locative case). As in languages such as French , Russian , and Turkish , the Oromo second person plural is also used as a polite singular form, for reference to people that
16261-562: The hands of a committee of low-ranking officers and enlisted soldiers led by Atnafu Abate , which came to be known as the Derg. Mengistu was originally one of the lesser members, officially sent to represent the Third Division because his commander, General Nega Tegnegn, considered him a trouble-maker and wanted to get rid of him. Between July and September 1974 through sheer demagoguery and political intrigues, Mengistu succeeded to outmaneuver all officers who stood in his way and climbed
16422-509: The initial consonant. The resulting stem indicates the repetition or intensive performance of the action of the verb. Examples: bul- 'spend the night', bubbul- 'spend several nights', cab- 'break', caccab- 'break to pieces, break completely'; dhiib- 'push, apply pressure', dhiddhiib- 'massage'. The infinitive is formed from a verb stem with the addition of the suffix -uu . Verbs whose stems end in -dh (in particular all autobenefactive verbs) change this to ch before
16583-433: The interests of Ethiopia above the interests of socialism" and undertaken other "counter-revolutionary" activities. Resistance against the Derg ensued, led primarily by the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Party (EPRP). Mengistu cracked down on the EPRP and other revolutionary student organizations in what would become called the " Red Terror ". The Derg subsequently turned against the socialist student movement MEISON ,
16744-653: The late first millennium BC, the Agaws occupied the northern Ethiopian region, as the Sidamo occupied the central and southern parts of Ethiopia, making inaugural historical development of Ethiopia . Afro-Asiatic languages were present in Africa and the Middle East by the eighth to sixth millennium BCE. This language family includes various modern and extinct African and Asian languages such as Oromo, Somali, Egyptian, Berber, Hausa, Hebrew, Arabic, Aramaic, and Akkadian. Ge'ez
16905-666: The modern border of Ethiopia. His reign brought sharp solidification of the current Ethiopian national identity. The Battle of Adwa was a 1896 colonial resistance battle between the Ethiopian Empire led by Menelik and Kingdom of Italy led by General Oreste Baratieri , involving respective 100,000 and 17,700 troops, where Ethiopian armies decisively defeated them and secured sovereignty. The battle became signature national pride among Ethiopians, and beyond for Pan-Africanism . The Treaty of Addis Ababa (1896) settled an end of Italo-Ethiopian War , and modern border of Ethiopia
17066-473: The most important era for Christian and Muslim insight, and the resultant of religious war was in the mid-16th century of Ethiopian–Adal War , involving the Amhara, Tigrayan and Agaw force allied to the Ethiopian Empire (Abyssinia) and the Muslim states composed mostly of Harari and Somali people, together forms the Adal Sultanate . The Oromo people additionally took an advantage of the war and occupied much
17227-459: The native inhabitants of Ethiopia , as well as the global diaspora of Ethiopia. Ethiopians constitute several component ethnic groups , many of which are closely related to ethnic groups in neighboring Eritrea and other parts of the Horn of Africa . The first documented use of the name "Ethiopia" from Greek name Αἰθίοψ , Aithíops was in the 4th century during the reign of Aksumite king Ezana . There were three ethnolinguistic groups in
17388-558: The newspaper Bariisaa , Urjii and many others, were written in the traditional Ethiopic script. Plans to introduce Oromo language instruction in schools, however, were not realized until the government of Mengistu Haile Mariam was overthrown in 1991, except in regions controlled by the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF). With the creation of the regional state of Oromia under the new system of ethnic federalism in Ethiopia, it has been possible to introduce Oromo as
17549-670: The north of the country (Oromo, Amhara, Tigray, and Gurage), estimate approximately 40% of their autosomal ancestry to be derived from an ancient "non-African" back-migration from the Near East and about 60% to be of native African origin (from a population indigenous or "autochthonous" to the Horn of Africa). Pickrell et al. (2014) found that the West Eurasian ancestry peaks in the Amhara and Tigrayans at 49% and 50%, respectively. Walsh, Sandra et al. (2020) which sampled 119 genome-wide-samples of Ethiopian populations similarly outlined
17710-415: The northern highland zone of the Amhara empire in the Oromo migrations . The Oromo remained predominantly pastoral life who dominated the Amhara empire of Abyssinia for the rest of era. A blossom life continued throughout early modern period with the founding of capital Gondar in the early 18th century, by Emperor Fasilides , commencing a "Gondarine period". Between 1769 and 1855, Ethiopia experienced
17871-473: The orthography since it was first adopted: ⟨x⟩ ( [ tʼ ] ) was originally rendered ⟨th⟩ , and there has been some confusion among authors in the use of ⟨c⟩ and ⟨ch⟩ in representing the phonemes / tʃʼ / and / tʃ / , with some early works using ⟨c⟩ for / tʃ / and ⟨ch⟩ for / tʃʼ / and even ⟨c⟩ for different phonemes depending on where it appears in
18032-422: The other common plural suffixes are -(w)wan , -een , and -(a)an ; the latter two may cause a preceding consonant to be doubled: waggaa 'year', waggaawwan 'years', laga 'river', laggeen 'rivers', ilma 'son', ilmaan 'sons'. Oromo has no indefinite articles (corresponding to English a , some ), but (except in the southern dialects) it indicates definiteness (English
18193-1190: The other. Grammatical gender in Oromo enters into the grammar in the following ways: Except in some southern dialects, there is nothing in the form of most nouns that indicates their gender. A small number of nouns pairs for people, however, end in -eessa (m.) and -eettii (f.), as do adjectives when they are used as nouns: obboleessa 'brother', obboleettii 'sister', dureessa 'the rich one (m.)', hiyyeettii 'the poor one (f.)'. Grammatical gender normally agrees with natural gender for people and animals; thus nouns such as Abbaa 'father', Ilma 'son', and sangaa 'ox' are masculine, while nouns such as haadha 'mother' and intala 'girl, daughter' are feminine. However, most names for animals do not specify biological gender. Names of astronomical bodies are feminine: aduu 'sun', urjii 'star'. The gender of other inanimate nouns varies somewhat among dialects. Oromo displays singular and plural number , but nouns that refer to multiple entities are not obligatorily plural: nama 'man' namoota 'people', nama shan 'five men' namoota shan 'five people'. Another way of looking at this
18354-412: The particle hin ). For example, deemne 'we went', deemna 'we go', akka deemnu 'that we go', haa deemnu 'let's go', hin deemnu 'we don't go'. There is also a separate imperative form: deemi 'go (sg.)!'. The table below shows the conjugation in the affirmative and negative of the verb beek- 'know'. The first person singular present and past affirmative forms require
18515-400: The particular verb tense / aspect / mood , they are normally not considered to be pronouns and are discussed elsewhere in this article under verb conjugation . In all of these areas of the grammar—independent pronouns, possessive adjectives, possessive pronouns, and subject–verb agreement—Oromo distinguishes seven combinations of person, number, and gender. For first and second persons, there
18676-495: The personal pronouns in the different cases, as well as the possessive adjectives. For the first person plural and third person singular feminine categories, there is considerable variation across dialects; only some of the possibilities are shown. The possessive adjectives, treated as separate words here, are sometimes written as noun suffixes. In most dialects there is a distinction between masculine and feminine possessive adjectives for first and second person (the form agreeing with
18837-409: The political ladder. Mengistu and Atnafu Abate were the deputy chairmen of Derg from March 1975 to February 1977. Haile Selassie died in 1975. It is rumored that Mengistu smothered the Emperor using a pillowcase, but Mengistu has denied these rumors. Though several groups were involved in the overthrow, the Derg succeeded to power. There is no doubt that the Derg under Mengistu's leadership ordered
18998-423: The population, but there are more than 80 different ethnic groups within Ethiopia. Some of these have as few as 10,000 members. Archaeologist found remains of early hominins, one of the most specimen was Australopithecus afarensis , also called "Lucy", which was discovered in the country's Awash Valley , so-called Hadar in 1974. It is estimated to be 3.5 million years old. In October 2015, scientists discovered
19159-515: The present day of Ethiopia after which diversification thrived in the area and allowed the other local groups, the Agaws , Somali , Oromo , and numerous Omotic-speaking groups to unify. Originally a hunter gatherers, those people began domesticating indigenous plants thereafter, including the grasses teff , eleusine , enset , root crop, and domestication of cattles and other animals to fill agricultural livelihoods that still contemporary followed. By
19320-422: The proportion of West Asian ancestry , their data showed that: “The masked West Asian component measures the proportion of West Asian ancestry in each population. The Amhara and Oromo populations have the highest amount (54 and 51%, respectively), Wolayta and Somali show 43 and 44%, respectively, while in contrast the Gumuz show the low amount of 0.7%. These values agree with previous estimates." In characterizing
19481-499: The proximal pronouns; in the western dialects the masculine forms (beginning with k- ) are used for both genders. Unlike in English, singular and plural demonstratives are not distinguished, but, as for nouns and personal pronouns in the language, case is distinguished. Only the base and nominative forms are shown in the table below; the other cases are formed from the base form as for nouns, for example, sanatti 'at/on/in that' (locative case). An Oromo verb consists minimally of
19642-525: The publication of his memoirs. In early 2012, a manuscript of the memoir, entitled Tiglatchin ("Our Struggle" in Amharic ), was leaked onto the internet. Some months later the first leaked volume was published in the United States, and in 2016 the second volume followed. This time it was published in Ethiopia. Mengistu accused the remnants of the EPRP of leaking the first volume to sabotage his publication. Mengistu married Wubanchi Bishaw in 1968. They have
19803-591: The rank of sergeant and assigned him duties as an errand boy in his office. Aman then recommended him to the Holetta Military Academy, one of the two important military academies of Ethiopia. After Mengistu graduated from the Holetta Military Academy in 1957, he received the rank of Second Lieutenant. General Aman then became his mentor, and when the General was assigned to the commander of the Third Division took Mengistu with him to Harar , and later
19964-573: The region. However, the Ethiopian Nilo-Saharan groups and the endogamous Aari blacksmith caste were found to have little to no Eurasian admixture. Aari blacksmiths may descend from the "Ethiopic" hunter-gatherers who were assimilated as other populations expanded into the region, or they may be a subset of a single population recently marginalized for their occupation. According to Hollfelder et al. (2017): "The Nilotic populations have stayed largely un-admixed, which appears to be
20125-546: The remains of a man called "Mota" in a cave in south-central Ethiopia, he lived 4,500 years ago. Atypical of Euroasians, who were believed to have reached the region after him, Mota's genetic variants did not include traits such as "light-colored eyes or skin," resembling the modern Aari tribes that live in the southern area of the country. Other research suggests Euroasians that arrived in the region resemble modern-day Sardinians , or likely LBK culture of antiquity. By proofing Mota has no European genome, archeologist theorized
20286-473: The rules are complex (each morpheme can contribute its own tone pattern to the word), so that "one can call Oromo a pitch-accent system in terms of the basic lexical representation of pitch, and a tone system in terms of its surface realization." The stressed syllable is perceived as the first syllable of a word with high pitch. Like most other Afroasiatic languages , Oromo has two grammatical genders , masculine and feminine, and all nouns belong to either one or
20447-423: The same cluster of Ashkenazi Jews , Norwegians and Armenians based on that gene, and only 24% of Ethiopians cluster with Bantus and Afro-Caribbeans, 8% with Papua New Guineans , and 6% with Chinese . An investigation by Tishkoff et al. (2009) identified fourteen ancestral population clusters which correlate with self-described ethnicity and shared cultural and/or linguistic properties within Africa, in what
20608-444: The set of possessive adjectives and pronouns , for example, English my , Oromo koo ; English mine , Oromo kan koo . In Oromo, the same distinctions are also reflected in subject–verb agreement: Oromo verbs (with a few exceptions) agree with their subjects ; that is, the person, number, and (singular third person) gender of the subject of the verb are marked by suffixes on the verb. Because these suffixes vary greatly with
20769-498: The speaker wishes to show respect towards. This usage is an example of the so-called T-V distinction that is made in many languages. In addition, the third person plural may be used for polite reference to a single third person (either 'he' or 'she'). For possessive pronouns ('mine', 'yours', etc.), Oromo adds the possessive adjectives to kan 'of': kan koo 'mine', kan kee 'yours', etc. Oromo has two ways of expressing reflexive pronouns ('myself', 'yourself', etc.). One
20930-566: The streets and are being eaten by wild hyenas . You can see the heaped-up bodies of murdered children, most of them aged eleven to thirteen, lying in the gutter, as you drive out of Addis Ababa." Amnesty International estimates that up to 500,000 people were killed during the Ethiopian Red Terror. Military gains made by the monarchist Ethiopian Democratic Union in Begemder were rolled back when that party split just as it
21091-431: The suffix -n to appear on the word preceding the verb or the word nan before the verb. The negative particle hin , shown as a separate word in the table, is sometimes written as a prefix on the verb. For verbs with stems ending in certain consonants and suffixes beginning with consonants (that is, t or n ), there are predictable changes to one or the other of the consonants. The dialects vary
21252-601: The suffix. Examples: dhug- 'drink', dhuguu 'to drink'; ga '- 'reach', ga ' uu 'to reach'; jedh- 'say', jechu 'to say'. The verb fedh- is exceptional; its infinitive is fedhuu rather than the expected fechuu . The infinitive behaves like a noun; that is, it can take any of the case suffixes. Examples: ga ' uu 'to reach', ga ' uuf 'in order to reach' (dative case); dhug- 'drink', dhugam- 'be drunk', dhugamuu to be drunk', dhugamuudhaan 'by being drunk' (instrumental case). Ethiopians Ethiopians are
21413-608: The time, the ordnance group was offered military technical training support in the US. Despite his disapproval of Mengistu's insubordination and disrespect, the General was obliged to release him and Mengistu went for an 18-month training program at the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland, United States. He also took some night classes at the University of Maryland , making him fluent in English. He returned for
21574-410: The trial. The attacker was sentenced to ten years in prison, while his accomplice Abraham Goletom Joseph, who had been arrested in a police raid, was sentenced to five years. They said that they had been tortured under Mengistu, and on appeal, their sentences were reduced to two years each due to "mitigatory circumstances". The Ethiopian ambassador to Zimbabwe, Fantahun Haile Michael, said his government
21735-417: The two tensed forms, past (or "perfect") and present (or "imperfect" or "non-past"). Each of these has its own set of tense/agreement suffixes. There is a third conjugation based on the present which has three functions: it is used in place of the present in subordinate clauses , for the jussive ('let me/us/him, etc. V', together with the particle haa ), and for the negative of the present (together with
21896-483: The typical Eastern Cushitic set of five short and five long vowels, indicated in the orthography by doubling the five vowel letters. The difference in length is contrastive, for example, hara 'lake', haaraa 'new'. Gemination is also significant in Oromo. That is, consonant length can distinguish words from one another, for example, badaa 'bad', baddaa 'highland'. In the Qubee alphabet, letters include
22057-411: The vowel a is inserted between them. For example, arg- 'see', arga 'he sees', argina or agarra (from agar-na ) 'we see'; kolf- 'laugh', kolfe 'he laughed', kolfite or kofalte 'you (sg.) laughed'. Verbs whose stems end in the consonant ' (which may appear as h , w , or y in some words, depending on the dialect) belong to three different conjugation classes;
22218-717: Was an indigenous Oromo script invented by Sheikh Bakri Sapalo (1895–1980; also known by his birth name, Abubaker Usman Odaa) in the late 1950s, and used underground afterwards. Despite structural and organizational influences from Ge'ez and the Arabic script , it is a graphically independent creation designed specifically for Oromo phonology. It is largely an Abugida in nature, but lacks the inherent vowel present in many such systems; in actual use, all consonant characters are obligatorily marked either with vowel signs (producing CV syllables) or with separate marks used to denote geminated consonants or pure/standalone consonants not followed by
22379-522: Was assigned as an ordnance officer in the Third Division. He was subsequently sent to the US for the first time in 1964 to the Savanna Army Depot in Illinois for an Ordnance testing course for six months. Aman was abruptly transferred to Addis Ababa . The imperial regime found him too popular with the soldiers especially after his commendable military exploits in the engagement against
22540-589: Was banned in education, in conversation, and in administrative matters. Ethnologue (2015) assigns five ISO codes to Oromo: Blench (2006) divides Oromo into four languages: Some of the varieties of Oromo have been examined and classified. About 85 percent of Oromo speakers live in Ethiopia , mainly in the Oromia Region . In addition, in Somalia there are also some speakers of the language. In Kenya ,
22701-520: Was by far powerful empire and trading nation between Roman Empire and India . The Aksumite lingua franca was Greek evolved from Hellenistic period in 330–305 BC and officially adopted in the first century. It was soon replaced by Ge'ez in the 4th century. Politically and culturally influenced partially with Byzantine Empire , the Aksumite achieved major historical grounds, Orthodox Tewahedo Christianity introduced and has been state religion in
22862-423: Was charged by the Ethiopian government led by Meles Zenawi , in absentia , for the killing of nearly 2,000 people. The charge sheet and evidence list for his crimes were 8,000 pages long. The evidence against him included signed execution orders, videos of torture sessions, and personal testimony. The trial began in 1994 and ended in 2006. The court found Mengistu guilty as charged on 12 December 2006, and imposed
23023-399: Was constructed with unique rock-hewn architecture . A dominant group, Amhara, continues to expand its territory in so-called Solomonic period after the downfall of Zagwe in 1270, and by the late 13th century, they reached to southern Shewa. Since then, centralized military unit was buildup while frequently engaged war with Sidama kingdom in the west and Muslim population to the east. One of
23184-645: Was created as a background of ceased foreign external pressure against the sovereignty of Ethiopia. Ethiopia, along with Liberia , became the only independent African survivors against the European colonization . An Italian occupation of Ethiopia following Second Italo-Ethiopian War brought legacy of ethnic marginalization of major ethnic groups: the Oromos, Amharas, Tigrayans, and Somalis. Ethiopia underwent series civil clashes under communist military junta Derg . Ethnic nationalism and similar policies implemented by
23345-489: Was developed around sixth century BCE and evident by inscriptions of contemporary kingdom of D'mt. The language dominance was eclipsed by 1000 AD, but the highland inhabitants used it as written scholar and liturgical language between 300s and 1800s. In 980 BCE, Dʿmt was established in present-day Eritrea and the Tigray Region of Ethiopia, straddling South Arabia in present-day of Yemen . This polity's capital
23506-517: Was developed by the Jimma Times Oromiffa Group (JTOG) in cooperation with SelamSoft. Voice of America also broadcasts in Oromo alongside its other horn of Africa programs. In May 2022, Google Translate added Afaan Oromo as translation. Oromo and Qubee are currently utilized by the Ethiopian government's state radios, TV stations and regional government newspaper. Oromo is written with a Latin alphabet called Qubee which
23667-497: Was distributed among the remnant (9) Associated Ancestral Clusters (AAC's) found in Sub-Saharan Africa. The "Cushitic" cluster was also deemed "closest to the non-African AACs, consistent with an East African migration of modern humans out of Africa or a back-migration of non-Africans into Saharan areas and Eastern Africa." Other studies conducted on Ethiopians belonging to Semitic and Cushitic ethnic groups mostly from
23828-490: Was effectively a dictator. He and the other surviving members of the Derg all retired from the military. However, even as civilians, they dominated the Politburo of the WPE. In the late 1980s, some Western critics of Mengistu, including Michael Johns of The Heritage Foundation , charged that Mengistu's economic, military and political policies, along with the Soviet Union's support for Mengistu, were key contributing factors to
23989-548: Was formally adopted in 1991. Various versions of the Latin-based orthography had been used previously, mostly by Oromos outside of Ethiopia and by the OLF by the late 1970s (Heine 1986). With the adoption of Qubee, it is believed more texts were written in the Oromo language between 1991 and 1997 than in the previous 100 years. In Kenya, the Borana and Waata also use Roman letters but with different systems. The Sapalo script
24150-585: Was implemented as Operation Murambatsvina in 2005, and chaired meetings at which the operation was planned. However, the State Security Minister Didymus Mutasa strongly denied that Mengistu was involved in Operation Murambatsvina. In 2018, the former prime minister of Ethiopia Hailemariam Desalegn published a photo of himself meeting with Mengistu. He withdrew the photo after criticism. Mengistu
24311-607: Was in full agreement with their decisions. Mengistu did not emerge as the leader of the Derg until after the 3 February 1977 shootout, in which Chairman Tafari Benti was killed. The vice-chairman of the Derg, Atnafu Abate, clashed with Mengistu over the issue of how to handle the war in Eritrea and lost, leading to his execution with 40 other officers, clearing the way for Mengistu to assume control. He formally assumed power as head of state, and justified his execution of Abate (on 13 November of that year) by claiming that he had "placed
24472-537: Was interrupted. The few works that had been published, most notably Onesimos Nesib 's and Aster Ganno 's translations of the Bible from the late 19th century, were written in the Ge'ez alphabet . Following the 1974 Revolution , the government undertook a literacy campaign in several languages, including Oromo, and publishing and radio broadcasts began in the language. All Oromo materials printed in Ethiopia at that time, such as
24633-573: Was located at Yeha , in what is now northern Ethiopia. Most modern historians consider this civilization to be a native Ethiopian one, although in earlier times many suggested it was Sabaean -influenced because of the latter's hegemony of the Red Sea. Other scholars regard Dʿmt as the result of a union of Afroasiatic-speaking cultures of the Cushitic and Semitic branches; namely, local Agaw peoples and Sabaeans from Southern Arabia. However, Ge'ez ,
24794-474: Was not involved in the assassination attempt, and that he heard about the incident from the media. As of 2018 , Mengistu still resided in Zimbabwe, despite the Ethiopian government's desire that he be extradited. He is said to live in luxurious circumstances, and it is claimed that he advised Mugabe on security matters; according to Zimbabwean intelligence sources, he proposed the idea of clearing slums, which
24955-682: Was on the verge of capturing the old capital of Gondar . The army of the Somali Democratic Republic invaded Ethiopia , having overrun the Ogaden region, and was on the verge of capturing Harar and Dire Dawa , when Somalia's erstwhile allies, the Soviets and the Cubans, launched an unprecedented arms and personnel airlift to come to rescue of Ethiopia. The Derg government turned back the Somali invasion and made deep strides against
25116-435: Was opposing his government, and they were generally much more political than based on any ethnic targeting. Some experts believe hundreds of thousands of university students, intellectuals, and politicians (including Emperor Haile Selassie) were killed during Mengistu's rule. Amnesty International estimates that a total of half a million people were killed during the Red Terror of 1977 and 1978. Human Rights Watch describes
25277-492: Was out walking with his wife, Wubanchi Bishaw, near his home in the Gunhill suburb of Harare . While Mengistu was unharmed, his alleged attacker, Solomon Haile Ghebre Michael, an Eritrean, was shot and arrested by Mengistu's bodyguards. He was later tried for this assassination attempt, pleading not guilty in a Zimbabwean court on 8 July 1996. The Eritrean Ambassador to South Africa, Tsegaye Tesfa Tsion, flew to Harare to attend
25438-585: Was responsible range from 500,000 to over 2,000,000. 106 Derg officials were accused of genocide during the trials, but only 36 of them were present in the court. Several former members of the Derg have been sentenced to death . After Mengistu's conviction in December 2006, the Zimbabwean government said that he still enjoyed asylum and would not be extradited. A Zimbabwean government spokesman explained this by saying that "Mengistu and his government played
25599-453: Was sentenced to death in absentia by Ethiopia's High Court, overturning his previous sentence of life imprisonment. Twenty-three of his most senior aides also received death sentences that were commuted on 1 June 2011. As of 4 October 2011, 16 former Mengistu officials have been released from prison on parole, due to their old age and good behavior while incarcerated. However, Mengistu's sentence remained unchanged. In 2010, Mengistu announced
25760-639: Was the chairman of the Derg , the Marxist-Leninist military junta that governed Ethiopia, from 1977 to 1987, and the president of the People's Democratic Republic of Ethiopia (PDRE) from 1987 to 1991. The Derg took power in the Ethiopian Revolution following the overthrow of Emperor Haile Selassie I in 1974, marking the end of the Solomonic dynasty which had ruled Ethiopia since
25921-424: Was the largest autosomal study of the continent at the time. The Burji, Konso and Beta Israel were sampled from Ethiopia. The Afroasiatic speaking Ethiopians sampled were cumulatively (Fig.5B) found to belong to: 71% in the "Cushitic" cluster, 6% in the "Saharan/Dogon" cluster, 5% in the "Niger Kordofanian" cluster, 3% each in the "Nilo-Saharan" and "Chadic Saharan" cluster, while the balance (12%) of their assignment
#121878