Somali people are mainly Muslims who originate from the Horn of Africa region. They are estimated to number around 15-17 million total, with the largest populations living in Somalia, Ethiopia, Kenya, and Djibouti. Somali society is organized around a clan system, with the four main clan families being Darod, Hawiye, Dir, and Isaaq. The clan system is extremely important and defines social and political relationships through customary laws known as xeer. Clans provide protection for their members and resolve disputes through a system of compensation payments between clans.

1. SOMALI PEOPLE
CULTURE
Mustafe Mohamed Elmi
(Mustafe Daad)
November, 2017

2. Background
• Somali people are mainly Muslims of Cushitic Afro-Asiatic
Family. They are mainly of Arab group and occupy the
Horn of Africa countries. It is estimated there are 15-17
million Somalis living in the Horn of Africa. About 14.32
million lives Somalia, 5.3 million in Ethiopia, 2 million in
Kenya and million Djabouti.

4. Anthropological and demographic
information
• The origin of the Somali people is uncertain. Current
theory suggests that the Somali originated in the southern
Ethiopian highlands and migrated into northern Kenya
during the first millennium B.C. They then gradually
migrated northward to populate the Horn of Africa by 100
A.D.
• The ancient Egyptians knew Somalia as the Land of Punt
(the Land of the gods). They valued its trees, which
produced the aromatic gum resins frankincense and
myrrh. Too often, the Somali people have been
represented as homogeneous.

5. Clan system and ethnic groups
• The clan system is the most important constituent social
factor among the nomadic-pastoralist Somalis’. The clan
system matters for all functions of society, even for the
structure of the governments.
The four ‘clan families are the following:
• The Darod mainly live in East Somalia and Somaliland.
• The Hawiye mainly live in South/Central Somalia.
• The Dir settle mainly in both in Somaliland and bordering
regions of Ethiopia and Djibouti)
• The Isaaq are the main clan family in Somaliland.
Furthermore, members of majority clans can be considered
minorities where they live in an area mainly populated by
another majority clan

7. Clan protection and Mag-paying group
• Clan protection/support
• The term ‘clan protection’ means the ‘facility of an
individual to be protected by his clan against violence’ by
an aggressor from outside the clan. The rights of a group
are protected by
• Mag-paying group
• The most basic and functional lineage unit is the mag-
paying group or diya-paying group force, or the threat of
force.
• all men are defined by their belonging to a mag-paying
group, and their social and political relations are defined
by contracts called xeer – the Somali customary laws –
that are entered within and between mag-paying groups.

8. Customary laws (xeer)
•
• The Somali traditional ‘political contract’ consists of
customary laws – referred to in Somali as xeer – through
which “members of a mag-paying group are obliged to
support each other in political and jural responsibilities,
especially in paying and receiving compensation for acts
committed by members of one group against another -
even over vast distances, since it is the kinship that bonds
them.