Nomadic Tribe

The Banna tribe have their own king. He is looked up to for leadership, health or even for rain during a drought. Some of the tribe’s elders serve beneath him to help solve other small problems in the villages. This tribe’s society consists of a system of age groups where its people may pass from one group to another by undergoing complex rituals.

Most of the Banna people follow the Muslim religion but a few thousand follow Christianity.

The African Banna people have many rituals. They paint their bodies with white chalk mixed with yellow rock, red iron ore and charcoal before performing their traditional ceremonies. Women of this tribe also wear beads in their hair, held together by a composition of butter and red soil.

The community speaks the Banna dialect of the Hamar language, one of the Omotic idioms.

This artistic tribe produces many coloured beads bracelets, necklaces and earrings to embellish themselves and to use for trade. They also make remarkable jars using dry butternut squash.

Much like their neighbours, the Hamar, this tribe also performs the bull-leaping ceremony: a ritual for boys to pass into adulthood. In it, each boy, fully naked, must jump over a number of cows lined up in a row, without falling. With success, comes the right to marry and own cattle. Women also participate in this rite by dancing and singing, encouraging the boys.