The dynamics of Tulama Oromo in the history of continuity and change, ca. 1700-1880s

Abstract

The thesis examines the dynamic and perplexing relations between the Kingdom of Shawa and the Tulama, aka the Shawan Oromo, in central Ethiopia from ca. 1700 to the1880s. A history of the kingdom of Shawa and the Tulama has been inextricably intertwined and punctuated by warfare, resistance, collaboration, economic and cultural intercourses, or in a nutshell dominated by the twin processes of homogenization and hegemonization. Unlike other parts of Oromo inhabited territories as well as the southern half of Ethiopia, which were conquered by the kingdom of Shawa within a short period, the conquest and incorporation of the Tulama, took at least more than a century and a half.This perhaps facilitated a remarkable process of cultural exchange between the Oromo and the Amhara on the Shawan plateau. Yet it is enigmatic that the Shawan kingdom encountered the most protracted and stiff resistance from the Tulama on the one hand and the notables of Oromo extraction like Matakkoo Borjaa, Abbaa Maallee, and Gobana Dachi played a pivotal role in the incorporation of the Shawan Oromo into the Kingdom on the other. The kingdom‘s headquarters from the outset was not based in the renowned Shawan sub-province of Manz as usually perceived by scholars but was based in the territories from where the Oromo had been either evicted or integrated into the kingdom. Hence, it is again enigmatic that by using the Oromo territory as their hotbeds the sovereigns of the kingdom of Shawa made campaigns against the Shawan Oromo starting from the time of Nagasi Krestos up to the time of the last but one of the most prominent and illustrious kings of Shawa, Meniek (1865-1889), who managed to incorporate the whole Tulama into the kingdom. Therefore, following centuries of conflicts and negotiations between the Shawan kingdom and the Tulama, central Shawa / the abode of the latter has been steadily transformed from the fringes of the kingdom to the hub of modern Ethiopia, and this development, in turn, has made the Oromo territory the most important base on which the whole edifice of modern Ethiopia has been constructed.