Portrait of a Hamar woman near Turmi, Omo valley, southwest Ethiopia. Photograph by Luisa Puccini.

Portrait of a Hamar woman near Turmi, Omo valley, southwest Ethiopia. Photograph by Luisa Puccini.

"The Hamar (or Hamer) Tribe - population about 50,000 - in the Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples Region are pastoral semi-nomadic people living in the Omo River Valley. The rites of passage to adulthood of the Hamar Tribe Rituals include cattle leaping and young Hamar women getting whipped to prove their love for their kinsmen.

The entire life of the Hamar turns around their cattle, which marks the wealth of its owner-family, provides food during times of hardship and plays an important role in the tribal rituals, like dowry for weddings.

The women cultivate sorghum, beans, maize and pumpkins, fetch water, cooking and looking after the children - who start herding the goats by age eight. Men herd the cattle, plough the fields and keep bees. Young men live in grazing camps near the Omo River plains. When bush food runs out, they survive on cow’s milk and blood taken from its neck. If a man loses a family’s cattle herd his reputation will be ruined.

Appearance is extremely important to the Hamar People, having spectacular hairstyles, for both men and women, and grooming ones hair is essential to the Hamar's sense of beauty. Women paint their locks with fat and red ochre and then twist them into dreads, while often ostrich feathers and other ornaments are attached. Men who have killed an enemy or dangerous animal wear a mud cap that lasts for months. To protect their hairdos, the men always carry a borkoto, a wooden headrest for a pillow. Married women wear iron rings around their necks and they also decorate themselves with shells, glass, seed and metal beads, and they wear beaded goat skins that cover their bodies.

Iron rings, necklaces, tools, weapons, and ritual objects are made by the blacksmith (gito), who are shaman-like figures believed to have the power of the evil eye. They also are the “makers” of men and women through the scarification tools and ornaments they make."

-Worqamba Tour