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Somalia Digil and Rahanwayn
Some texts refer to these two mainly agriculturist clans of
Digil and Rahanwayn as Sab. However, members of the Digil
and Rahanwayn and most Somalis consider the appellation
Sab derogatory. Used as a common noun meaning "ignoble,"
the term sab was applied by the Samaal to groups that
pursued certain disdained occupations. The Samaal felt that the
Sab had lowered themselves by their reliance on agriculture and
their readiness to assimilate foreign elements into their clans.
Traditionally, the Rahanwayn are considered a Digil offshoot that
became larger than the parent group.
The social structure of the Sab resembled that of the Samaal
in that it was based on descent groups. However, there were
significant differences. Sab clans were confederations of
lineages and included persons originating in all-Somali clanfamilies as well as assimilated peoples. They came into being
through a pact between the original founding segments, one of
which, of Sab origin, was dominant; the name of the Sab segment
became the name of the clan. By the twentieth century, the
descendants of that dominant lineage often constituted only a
relatively small core of the clan. The constituent lineages of
the clan tended to have much shallower genealogies than the
Samaal. Another important difference between the nomadic Samaal
societies and the sedentary Sab was in the significance accorded
to territoriality. Sab clans lived within distinct borders. The
entire clan (or large subclan) often constituted the diya-
paying group in relation to other clans. The term reer,
which the Samaal used in connection with descent, was used by the
Sab with a place name, e.g., reer barawa ("children of
Baraawe").
Many clans were segmented into three subclans, called
gember, although some, such as the Jiddu clans of the
Digil clan-family, had only two subclans. Clans and subclans
usually had single heads. In some cases, however, as among the
Helai clans of the Rahanwayn, there were no clan heads. Clan
affairs were handled by leading elders called gobweyn, who
had assistants called gobyar.
Clans and subclans were subdivided into lineages that
reckoned three to five generations from ancestor to youngest
member. The lineage traditionally owned land and water rights,
which the head men distributed to individual lineage members.
The manner in which Sab clans were formed led to recognized
social inequalities, sometimes marked by differences in physical
appearance owing to intermarriage within a stratum. Each stratum
in a community consisted of one or more lineages. The basic
distinction was between nobles (free clansmen) and habash,
a group made up of pre-Somali cultivators and freed slaves
(see
Riverine and Coastal People of Non-Somali Origin
, this ch.).
In some Rahanwayn and Digil communities, there was a further
distinction between two sets of nobles. Within the Geledi clan
(located in Afgooye, just north of Mogadishu, and its environs)
studied by anthropologist Virginia Luling, the nobles were
divided into Darkskin and Lightskin categories, designations
corresponding to the physical appearance of their members. The
Darkskins were descendants of the core or founding group of the
Geledi; the Lightskins had a separate line of descent, claimed
partly Arab origin, and resembled the Arab populations of the old
coastal towns. They had been completely Somalized, however. The
wealth and position of the Lightskins were similar to that of the
Darkskins, but the latter had precedence in certain traditional
rites.
Each lineage (which consisted of perhaps 300 to 400 persons),
or Darkskins, Lightskins, and habash, had its own set of
elders and constituted a diya-paying group vis-à-vis the
others, but was bound in a common contract concerning rates of
compensation for injuries. In principle, habash lineages
had equal rights under this system. Each lineage controlled
specific segments of the land and allocated to an individual male
as much as his family could cultivate. However, only the
habash were subsistence cultivators in the nineteenth and
the early twentieth centuries. The nobles, whether Darkskins or
Lightskins, cultivated much larger areas by means of slave labor
and exported surpluses via the coastal ports to Arab lands. In
the case of the Geledi, wealth accrued to the nobles and to the
sultan not only from market cultivation but also from involvement
in the slave trade and other enterprises, such as commerce in
ivory, cotton, and iron. The Geledi also raised cattle.
The sultan of the Geledi (a member of the Darkskin stratum)
had a political and religious role. He also wielded somewhat
greater authority than the sultans of the Samaal clans, but this
authority was by no means absolute.
The sociopolitical organization and processes of the Geledi
resembled those of many Digil and Rahanwayn communities. Not all
such communities had a Lightskin component, and many were not
located as auspiciously as the Geledi, for whom trade developed
as a major economic factor. Most, however, had slaves who worked
the land of the nobles.
The sedentary Somali communities in the coastal and
interriverine areas, some of which were of Samaal origin, were
more strongly affected by the advent of European colonization
than the nomadic pastoralists were. Clans, and occasionally large
lineages, came to have government chiefs appointed by colonial
authorities, sometimes where there had been no chiefs of any
kind. For the Geledi, the most important such chief was the
sultan. Whatever his origin, the government-appointed chief was
expected to be the intermediary between the colonial government
and the people.
The abolition of the slave trade and the outlawing of slavery
by 1920 changed not only the lives of the slaves but also the
position of the nobles whose economic and political power
depended on the slave economy. In Geledi areas and elsewhere,
many slaves left to take up other land as subsistence
cultivators. A few remained, and their descendants maintained a
quasi-dependent relationship as clients of their former masters.
By the second decade of the twentieth century, nobles were faced
for the first time with having to cultivate their own land. None
of the groups--nobles, habash, or ex-slaves--worked
voluntarily for wages on the Italian plantations established at
that time; colonial authorities usually made such labor
mandatory.
Despite the radical social, political, and economic changes
brought about by colonization, the nobles retained their superior
position in Geledi (and probably in other Rahanwayn and Digil)
communities. The nobles' status positioned them to profit from
new income opportunities such as paid employment with the
Italians or trade in the growing Afgooye market. They benefited
from such business opportunities throughout the colonial period,
as well as from educational and political opportunities,
particularly during the trusteeship period (1950-60).
Independence introduced still other changes to which the nobles
responded
(see Social Change
, this ch.).
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