Asha Ahmad crouches around a symbolic green tomb of Ali Hamdon, one of the 44 Islamic scholars who arrived in the Ethiopian city of Harar from South Arabia in the 12th century, becoming the founders of this mystical city, which some Ethiopians consider to be Islam’s fourth holiest site.
Ahmad lights frankincense and waves the smoke around the small room containing Hamdon’s shrine, the deep aroma wafting through the dark chamber. These shrines, known as awaachs, are dedicated to the Islamic scholars who were awarded the title of Awliyaa in their lifetime, identifying someone who possesses strong faith and piety and is in a constant state of awareness and remembrance of God.
Today, 438 shrines dedicated to these pious Muslims are located around Harar Jugol – the official name of the ancient walled city, which has earned the nickname Madinat al-Awliyaa, or the “City of Saints.” Most of these shrines are still managed by the descendants of the scholars who are buried there. They are known as murids and serve as the caretakers of the holy shrines and are responsible for preserving the traditions of their forefathers.
Asha became the murid at Hamdon’s shrine 15 years ago when her husband, who was a direct descendant of Hamdon, died. When I ask Asha her age, she squints her face and begins tracing numbers onto her palm with her index finger.
“During the regime of Haile Selassie, I was a teenager,” she says. “Then the Derg came for 17 years, and then the EPRDF [the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front] came for 27 years. Then there was Hailemariam Desalegn. Then, Abiy [the current prime minister] for six years.”
She pauses from taking me through these various political reigns that have formed Ethiopia’s modern history — and which have reshaped Harar in the process. “If I put all of that together, I should be around 70-years-old,” Asha finally concludes, with a wide smile.
“So that you don’t forget”
When Asha wakes up each morning, her first duty is to recite a dua, for Hamdon’s lineage in the shrine chamber, while requesting that God continue to protect the city.
“I was never supposed to be murid here,” says Asha. “But Allah has willed it. No one knows who will take my place here after I die. Perhaps it will be my son, but someone will take over the preservation of this shrine — Allah will ensure this, of course.”
For many centuries, the preservation of these saintly traditions and stories has informed all aspects of Harar’s history and culture. According to Amir Ali Aqil, a Harari historian, it is widely believed in Harar that during the the first hijrah, or migration, when the Sahaba fled persecution in Mecca in the 7th century and sought refuge in the ancient Christian kingdom of Aksum — located in present-day Eritrea and the northern Tigray region of Ethiopia — they passed through Harar.
Residents claim that the area’s inhabitants accepted Islam eight years before the holy city of Madina. According to Aqil, these beliefs are derived from ancient oral histories and folklores, passed down for many generations. However, the Harari Culture Heritage and Tourism Bureau says that the Sahaba journeyed through Harar during the second hijrah to Abyssinia, or the ancient Ethiopian empire, soon after the first migration. Still, others cast doubt on the accuracy of these claims at all.
Most of Harar’s culture and history, however, can be traced back to the arrival of 44 Muslim scholars to Harar more than 700 years ago, travelling from the historic Hadhramaut region of South Arabia — comprising parts of modern-day eastern Yemen, western Oman, and southern Saudi Arabia. These men, considered Sufis, had embarked from Hadhramaut and sailed across the Red Sea to spread knowledge of Islam.
Finding peace in the pleasant and well-watered valley, surrounded by hills, and enchanted by the cool, breezy climate, these men, who became the original saints that founded Harar, decided this was the place God wanted them to stay to spread Islam and strengthen Islamic knowledge for those who had already converted.
According to Harari oral history, these Islamic scholars held a meeting together and decided to disperse themselves throughout various areas to begin preaching Islam. The shrines of these men are erected in the areas they were assigned to centuries ago.
The most famous of these men was Shaykh Abadir, who is considered the political and religious father of Harar. Shaykh Abadir’s real name is Umar al-Ridaa and is said to have originally come from the city of Jeddah in modern-day Saudi Arabia. He is credited with uniting various tribes around Harar under Islam and creating the foundations of the Harari identity, which, unlike other groups in Ethiopia, is based on an individual’s attachment to the city rather than a person’s ethnicity. This means that anyone can become Harari over time.
Harar continued to grow into an important centre for the spread of Islam throughout the Horn of Africa and served as a crossroads for commerce between Africa, India, and the Middle East. It flourished and reached its historical climax when the Adal Sultanate, which was established in the 10th century and at its height controlled large parts of modern-day Somalia, Ethiopia, Djibouti, and Eritrea, moved its capital to Harar in 1520.
Among Harar’s famous emirs, or leaders, was Ahmad ibn Ibrahim al-Ghazi, commonly known as “Ahmed Gragn” — gragn meaning “left-handed” in Amharic — who served as leader in the later stages of the Adal Sultanate. Al-Ghazi succeeded in conquering nearly the entire territory of Christian Abyssinia and defeating multiple Ethiopian emperors during the Ethiopian-Adal war, from 1529 to 1543. However, after the Portuguese intervened in the conflict, al-Ghazi was killed in battle and the Abyssinians were able to restore most of their territory.
Al-Ghazi’s successor was Nur Ibn al-Wazir Mujahid, his nephew. Before becoming Emir, Mujahid married his uncle Al-Ghazi’s widow, Bati del Wambara. According to Girma T. Kassie, co-author of the book Harar – The Brightest City in Ethiopia: A brief historical note, Al-Ghazi’s widow made Mujahid promise to devote himself to avenging her husband before she agreed to marry him. He continued waging jihad, or a holy war, against Abyssinia, with some failures and successes.
It was Mujahid who worked to build Harar’s defensive capabilities and ordered the building of the now famous wall around the Old City to fortify it from attacks by Abyssinian forces, along with Oromo raids that were taking over the countryside, causing most Muslims to flee to the walled city. A severe famine ensued, and Mujahid himself died in 1567 of the pestilence which had spread during the famine. His death marked the beginning of Harar’s steady decline, both in wealth and power. Yet Harar continued to survive as an independent Muslim city-state for more than three centuries.
Harar’s absorption into the Ethiopian empire in the late 19th century served as a nail in the coffin for this once thriving and influential Muslim city. An unpopular Egyptian occupation of Harar lasted for a decade, between 1875-1885. After this, Amir Abdullahi, formally Abd Allah II ibn Ali Abd ash-Shakur, became Harar’s last emir who led the defence of the city from the forces of Menelik II, then Emperor of Ethiopia, who sought to conquer the territory for easier access to the Red Sea and to expand his control over the lucrative trading routes in and around Harar.
After facing an initial defeat by Abdullahi’s army, Menelik personally led a vast army of more than 30,000 men — 10,000 of whom were armed with brand new breech-loading rifles, which made the reloading time of the guns much quicker compared to the muzzleloaders that were mostly used at that time. Abdullahi, meanwhile, had no more than 3,000 men, who were equipped only with a few cannons and obsolete matchlock firearms.
The Battle of Chalanqo, as it became known, is still etched onto the hearts of the Harari people, the fight that cost them their independence. In 1887, near the town of Chalanqo, about 80 kilometers west of the city, Menelik crushed Abdullahi’s men, killing about 1,000. Abdullahi was forced to flee Harar with his wives and children into the desert east of the city. He later, however, returned to Harar and lived as a religious scholar there until he died in 1930.
Out of these men killed during the Battle of Chalanqo, 700 are said to have been newly-wed young Hararis, according to Harari oral history. In memory of this calamity, the Harari people paint the base of their traditional seating arrangements red, to symbolize these bridegrooms killed on this day.
During Harari weddings, the groom is given a fabric called satti baqla, which means “700” in the Harari language. The rectangular cloth woven from white cotton is ornamented with a red stripe along its edges to similarly memorialise these slain bridegrooms. According to residents, when the groom is presented with the cloth, it is customary for the giver to whisper into the groom’s ear: “So that you do not forget.”
“Scared to teach”
After Menelik’s conquest of the city, the emperor turned Harar’s largest mosque, located in the central Faras Magala market, into the Medhane Alem church — signifying the most recent development in Harar’s history: from a Muslim city at the heart of an expansive kingdom to a regional capital in a Christian empire. Arabic street signs were replaced with Amharic ones.
More than 130 years later, this Ethiopian Orthodox Church continues to loom over the bustling square, its bells joining the cacophony of horn-honking taxi drivers in vintage blue Peugeots and the shouts of wide-eyed traders selling khat — a leafy green plant that has a stimulant effect when chewed and is widely used in Harar.
While the memories of the saints in this city continue to preserve Harar’s ancient history into the present, it is khat that fuels the city and gives it life. Considered by some to be “food for the soul,” khat has long been used in Harar for social and religious purposes, according to Aqil.
Traditionally, residents organized berchas, or gatherings of people who chew khat for a few hours. “There was a specific program around chewing khat,” Aqil tells me. “The bercha would begin in the morning from around nine and finish at the maximum, around 11 am. Then people would go about their days — reciting or studying the Quran. If they were farmers they would go till their fields.”
Khat was also used among religious scholars to increase their energy while reciting the Quran during the night, Aqil says. The plant has historical importance for the murids at the shrines and is used to intensify religious ceremonies at the holy sites, with participants believing the plant enhances their connection to God.
During daily khat-chewing sessions at the shrines, the spaces remain open for any visitors who want to join, regardless of religious affiliation. As individuals arrive, they provide gifts of incense or khat to the murid hosting the session. The murid then recites a dua for the giver and divides up the khat and distributes it evenly to those present. Attendees find themselves immersed in discussions around Islamic history and culture, with politics sometimes peppered into the mix.
If an outsider attends one of these khat-chewing sessions, residents often take this time to teach them about Islamic and Harari history. Haile Selassie, the former Ethiopian Emperor who was deposed in 1974, is a name that is often brought up.
“The Haile Selassie regime was the darkest time for Muslims in Ethiopia,” says one resident from the Abadir lineage who was raised in the capital Addis Ababa, during a recent khat session I attended. Another man, with khat nestled deep in his cheeks, interjects: “Haile Selassie saw himself as a prophet. And he saw Muslims as his enemy because we would not bow to him. But for Muslims we cannot bow to anyone but our Creator.” He pauses to pluck leaves off the khat stalk, throwing some to the side and shoveling the rest into his mouth.
According to residents, after their absorption into the Ethiopian empire, their abilities to preserve and continue their culture became threatened. “Everybody was hiding their culture to save their children,” says the man from the Abadir lineage; he stops to gulp down several swigs of water. “When my father asked my grandfather if they had a culture, my grandfather told him: ‘we used to but not anymore.’”
“Many people now have forgotten their culture,” he adds, taking a long drag from a cigarette. “Our ancestors’ time was not an easy time. We lost our independence, then the Haile Selassie regime came. Our parents were scared to teach us who we were. That’s when Hararis started fleeing the country.”
According to Aqil, after Harar was conquered by Menelik, “the purity of the Muslim culture and practices was disrupted.” But life worsened dramatically for Hararis in 1947, when Haile Selassie, suspecting Harari elites of plotting a rebellion against him, imprisoned thousands of Hararis, who remained incarcerated for years without charge, according to Mohammed Hassen Ali, an Ethiopian historian. Many fled Harar to other Ethiopian cities, including Addis Ababa, or to Somalia and Middle Eastern countries.
As Hararis fled, an influx of immigrants from other parts of Ethiopia, mostly Amharic-speaking Christians, settled in Harar. After the Italian occupation of Ethiopia, which lasted from 1936 until 1941, the Ethiopian government extended its administration in the region, Ali says. Soldiers, police, and government employees crowded into Harar and swelled the number of the non-Harari population.
More Hararis fled during the Derg, a Marxist-Leninist military dictatorship which overthrew Haile Selassie in 1974 and ruled Ethiopia, along with present-day Eritrea, until 1991, when it was deposed by the EPRDF, an ethnic federalist political coalition led by the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) which introduced ethnic federalism to the country.
The Derg regime brutally repressed any opposition. Between 1975 and 1977, army lieutenant — and later Ethiopian president — Mengistu Haile Mariam led a campaign known as the “Red Terror,” in which half a million Ethiopians were killed, including Muslims and Christians from all ethnic groups. Thousands more were permanently crippled from facing prolonged torture.
Hararis were particularly impacted by the 1975 Land Reformation Proclamation, which abolished private land ownership. According to Camilla Gibbs, an English-born Canadian writer who has conducted extensive research in Harar, the Harari land-owning class, for whom land was the basis of their wealth, were completely dispossessed of their livelihoods.
Today, Hararis comprise a small minority in the Harari regional state, outnumbered by Amhara Christians who migrated there after Menelik conquered the territory. The majority of Hararis now resides outside of Harar — mostly abroad — after their families fled the country throughout the decades, according to Aqil.
“No other place”
Despite this tumultuous history, Harar’s unique culture and its influential Islamic history still reverberates throughout its narrow alleyways lined with traditional white-washed clay homes, decorated each year with vibrant colours and intricate designs in preparation for Ramadan — a tradition stemming back generations. There are 82 mosques in Harar Jugol alone, located not more than 100 meters from one another.
According to the Harari Culture Heritage and Tourism Bureau, the mosques are small in design — having the capacity to only accommodate about 15 families. Constructing small mosques was not by accident, but is designed to force a person of average height to bow at the mosques’ entranceways, reminding him or her to give respect to the holy sites. Harari women are still revered around the world for their intricate basket-weaving techniques, the uses of which have different social functions in Harari society and continue to decorate the walls of Harari homes.
Aqil says it is Harar’s deep historical connection to Islam and their strong cultural ties to the stories and memories of their saints that have helped Hararis maintain various aspects of their culture throughout the city’s clamorous relationship with the Ethiopian state. “Even the Hararis who went abroad set up cultural institutions to keep the Harari community together,” Aqil tells me. “All of this has helped maintain the Harari identity.” Harar’s unique culture has earned the city the title of a UNESCO World Heritage Site and is often referred to as “the living museum.”
The mystical elements of this city are undeniable to visitors. One knows they are approaching one of the hundreds of holy shrines in the walled city by the lustrous green leaves that protrude from trees planted at each of the sites. In the Quran, God revealed the following in Surah An-Nur:
“Do you not see that Allah is exalted by whomever is within the heavens and the earth and [by] the birds with wings spread [in flight]? Each [of them] has known his [means of] prayer and exalting [Him], and Allah is knowing of what they do.”
To combine their prayers with those of the birds, descendants of the saints planted these trees at the shrines, so that even the surrounding animals are invited to join collective acts of worship.
During the night, the whooping of hyenas traverse through the walled city’s cobble-stoned streets; they take over the dark alleyways and gobble up bones and scraps of meat. Centuries ago, a group of Awliya forged a spiritual peace agreement with the hyenas surrounding the city during a severe drought and famine, which saw the people and hyenas fall into deadly conflicts. According to the agreement, the Harari people would feed the hyenas their leftover bones and allow them free passage through the city in exchange for them cleaning the city’s streets of jinn, invisible spirits inhabiting the earth. While humans cannot see jinn, the Hararis believe that hyenas can.
Some residents have made feeding the hyenas a daily practice, purchasing meat and ritually feeding them each night. This tradition has turned into a popular tourist attraction, bringing in scores of local and international tourists to Harar to witness this unique ancient practice and participate in the ritual feedings.
It is because of all these reasons that 65-year-old Nouria Hamid Salman would never dream of leaving Harar Jugol. “My family has been here for many generations,” she says, graciously inviting me into her traditional Harari home and offering coffee and sweets. “There is an inexplicable peace that I feel here that I have not felt anywhere else. I would never desire to live anywhere else. The fact I was born in Harar and will die in Harar means I have been blessed by Allah.”
The ancient Harari tradition of Zikri, the Harari word for “dhikr,” is still performed at the shrines of the saints, consisting of devotional activities characterised by hymns praising God, the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ, and the saints. In one Zikri ceremony I recently attended at the shrine of Aw Abadir, both men and women clacked wooden blocks together as they chanted “Peace be upon you, oh Master!” ﷺ over and over again. Stalks of khat were piled beside the worshippers and passed between one another. A toothless elderly woman in the corner mashed the khat leaves with a pestle and shovelled the green paste into her mouth.
People from all walks of life, from Islamic scholars to local beggars, trickled into the shrine, joining the hymns and recitations — the khat fuelling their devotion to near ecstasy. The cackling of hyenas quarreling over bones outside punctuated the mystical rhythms of worship.
When I stepped outside to take a break from the hot and incense-filled chamber, I met a young Harari student who recently returned to Harar from studying the Sufi traditions in Turkey for several years. “My family is confused about why I’ve decided to stay in Harar and spend my days chewing khat and worshipping at the shrines,” he tells me, his cheek swollen by khat leaves. “They say I have opportunities to do better things with my life. But when I returned to Harar I realised all the questions I have, it is the city of Harar that answers them.”
“It’s hard to explain,” he continues; the stillness of the night air makes the noise from the shrine seem distant. “But there is something mystical about this place — something almost supernatural. It feels like Allah communicates through the people here. One day, I had a deep philosophical question I posed to Allah. At night, I walked through the streets, pondering on this question. One of the sleeping beggars suddenly awoke and shouted something at me — and his words answered my question.”
“There is no other place like Harar,” he adds. “But it is not the books or specific individuals that teach you here — the city itself becomes your teacher.”
