The Masai are a people in the border regions of Kenya and Tanzania. The number is over 0.5 million people (1983, estimate). According to modern estimates, the Maasai number about 900 thousand people, of which 350-450 thousand are in Kenya. The language belongs to the southeastern group of Nilotic (Nile) languages.
The Maasai probably migrated to their modern lands (southwestern Kenya) from the Nile Valley in Sudan already after 1500, bringing their domesticated cattle. Traditional occupations - nomadic pastoralism, crafts (spears, musical instruments). Traditional cults are preserved.
The Masai are perhaps one of the most famous tribes in East Africa. Despite the development of modern civilization, they have almost completely preserved their traditional way of life, although this becomes more difficult every year. They move freely across the savannah from place to place, from country to country, regardless of customs regulations and state borders.
The Masai consider themselves the highest people in Africa. They are not concerned with the affairs of the lower tribes - the Luo, the Kikuyu, or some kind of newcomer Europeans. Since ancient times, they respected only those tribes that could offer them worthy resistance.
They live off livestock. They do not know agriculture or crafts, but they are sure that the Supreme God Engai gave them all the animals in the world. Therefore, the theft of livestock from other tribes for the Maasai is a common thing.
At temporary sites, they build dwellings, smearing a rounded frame of branches with manure. Their huts have no windows, and the hearth is located inside, next to the beds made of animal skins. These houses are mostly built by women. They, during the transitions, when there are not enough pack animals, carry on their backs a simple belongings and frames of huts.
Around the village, in which five to seven families usually live, the Masai build a fence of poles or thorn bushes - kraal, to protect themselves from attacks by lions, leopards or hyenas. Maasai feed on the milk or blood of animals. Meat - in exceptional cases. In times of famine, they pierce the carotid artery of cows with a short arrow and drink the still warm blood. Then they cover the wound with fresh manure in order to use the animal again.
Starting from the age of 3, their children graze cattle, and at the age of 7-8 years, their earlobes are pierced with a fragment of a horn. Then the hole is expanded with pieces of wood. Over time, heavy jewelry made of beads or beads pulls the lobes to the shoulders. And the more the Masai's earlobes are drawn, the more beautiful and respected he is.
The number of wives a Masai man has depends on the size of his herd. There should be enough wives to look after all the animals and children, to carry water and firewood for the hearth. This is probably why women live much less than their husbands, who, being warriors in peacetime, spend their days talking and wandering around the savannah ...
Since ancient times, the Masai owned lands in the Serengeti Valley, in the vicinity of the Ngorongoro Crater and the Great African Rift - Rift Valley. In ancient times, a young man in a tribe could be considered a man only after he managed to kill a lion with a spear. The British and German colonialists in East Africa feared most of all clashes with this tribe. The Masai have always offered them fierce resistance. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, they managed to survive and prove to Europeans the rights to the ancestral lands of their ancestors. But they failed to withstand the onslaught of civilization at the end of the 20th century...
Over the past 30 years, the Maasai have been evicted from much of their land. White people forbade cattle to graze there, declaring their lands "reserved". Wealthy white tourists who came to Tanzania on safari wished to "see animals, not half-wild ragamuffins." The evicted Maasai who returned without permission were destroyed or imprisoned.
Here and there, bungalows and lodges began to appear in the savannah. And the Maasai realized that lions, antelopes, gazelles and tourists are much more important than themselves. Left without a livelihood, many took up poaching.
For thousands of years, the Maasai tribes coexisted with nature, and now they have begun to violently destroy it. Their own cattle are almost extinct, but elephant tusks and rhinoceros horns sell well on the black market. And now the rhinos on the lands of the Maasai have been exterminated, and the number of elephants has decreased hundreds of times.
Throughout the country, the Maasai are hired as guards in expensive hotels or arrange performances in the evenings with traditional dances. Increasingly, here you can see people dressed in red clothes, guarding the perimeters of expensive hotels with spears at the ready…
And only in the remote corners of the savannah in the north-west of Tanzania are there still separate nomad camps where sun-burnt white tourists do not reach and where the ancient way of life of the once formidable and most famous tribe of East Africa, the Maasai tribe, is still preserved in its original form.
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Masaev without exaggeration can be called the "titular nation" of Kenya. An interesting fact is that not all Kenyans, of course, are ethnic Maasai, but many prefer to present themselves as such. Even though, with the development of the structure of national parks in Kenya, the Maasai have lost a fair amount of their lands and are obliged to follow the inevitable restrictions of civilization, they still have the glory of desperate and harsh warriors, which was greatly facilitated by the uprising of the 1960s that brought Kenya to independence. About a million Maasai live in Kenya today.
Maasai - beautiful and unsuitable for slavery
famous Karen Blixen, a writer who lived for 20 years in the vicinity of Nairobi, and known for the bestseller "Out of Africa", testified that the Masai occupy a special position among the tribes of Kenya, they are distinguished by their own "style" in behavior, even some arrogance and audacity, and at the same time very faithful, decent and persistent. Karen Blixen noted that the Maasai are grateful and long remember goodness, but also resentment. She mentioned that the Maasai are warriors to the very core of their being, and weapons are an integral part of the Maasai. The writer generally emphasized the beauty of the Maasai - “... faces with high cheekbones and sharply defined jaws, smooth, without a single wrinkle. They have strong muscular necks that give them a menacing look - such a neck is found in an angry cobra, leopard or bull. She also testified that the Masai were never slaves: even if one of these people fell into captivity, he died very quickly, unsuitable for the yoke.
Karen Blixen said that morani- young Maasai, recently initiated into warriors, "feed only on blood and milk." This is an exaggeration - but both are really included in their diet. The fact is that cows are not just “sacred animals”, they are the meaning and basis of life for the Maasai.
Life and life of the Maasai
God's gift - cows
Indeed, the most important thing for the Maasai is their cows. By and large, the entire combat experience of this people is aimed at protecting their livestock from encroachment and trying to take possession of someone else's. The Maasai quite seriously (and to this day) believe that Ngai, the lord of the rain and the main deity, created cows specifically for the Maasai. Therefore, all the cows in the world that do not belong to them are considered stolen from the Maasai!
Cows near the Masai, Kenya
Cows (to be fair, it must be clarified that the local breed looks more like a zebu) are the basis of Maasai life. Dry manure holds the walls of their huts together, and children and teenagers really drink the blood of animals - bottles of long gourds are adapted by the Maasai for this, just like milk bottles. In order for the animal to live and be healthy, because the Maasai take care of their livestock, a special “milking” has been developed: with the help of an arrow from a bow at close range, a hole is made in the animal’s neck vein, the blood is collected, and the hole is then sealed with a special dung cake.
Maasai cow blood food
The Maasai also use milk, but they rarely eat meat (although they love it) - cows are not at all to kill them. This is a source of food, and a monetary unit, and a dowry, and an indicator of wealth in the community.
House on the back or Semi-nomadic life of the Maasai
Making tours to Kenya, travelers are convinced that the Maasai have preserved their age-old way of life, despite the arrival of European colonialists. The Masai are considered a semi-nomadic people, they move when their herds need new pastures.
Actually, the Maasai also moved to the territory of modern Kenya - scientists are sure that they were from Sudan. Of course, they brought cows with them. Interestingly, although other Africans built cities in the neighborhood, the Maasai never changed their way of life. Today it has become more difficult for them to live up to tradition - after all, protected areas are now located in the places of their original nomads, such as Serengeti in Tanzania and a reserve in Kenya continuing this park. But the Maasai are stubborn.
Tours to Kenya will introduce guests to the country with huts made of branches fastened with manure (this is generally the most popular building material among nomads in all corners of the world). The Maasai build their huts in a ring, and around them they make a palisade to protect themselves from predators.
Maasai house, Kenya
Maasai village- This is a small tribal association, up to five families. Entering the house, you can see the hearth in the center and the animal skins that serve as beds for the Masai. Interestingly, although the Maasai are very tall people, it is difficult to find someone below 170 cm tall, the ceilings of their huts are a maximum of one and a half meters. When the village wanders, the frame of the hut is disassembled and carried with it, often just on the back.
From childhood to maturity
Like our distant ancestors, the age group is very important for the representative of the Maasai people. Rights and obligations depend on this. Baby boys, as soon as they start walking, begin to shepherd duties, and girls do all the housework with their mothers and learn to milk cows. The Maasai have special rituals during which children are beaten quite hard - this should increase courage and patience. Both boys and girls undergo a circumcision procedure upon reaching the teenage milestone, which is very painful (you can’t scream at the same time - a big shame). Subsequently, they are considered full-fledged adult members of the community.
Maasai children, Kenya
Boys who wait for the wound to heal after circumcision, which takes several months, wear special black clothes and live separately in the so-called. " manyatte". When this period ends, they become " morani”- the young warriors who so admired Karen Blixen.
From this point on, the young Maasai can begin to accumulate property (mostly cows, of course!) and trade. Uninitiated children, according to Masai laws, cannot have their own property - and they are allowed to steal what they need!
Another tradition is connected with the ceremony of initiation of the Maasai into warriors - killing a lion. Now this is much more difficult than before, since wild animals in Kenya are protected everywhere. In addition, the elders complain that with the advent of firearms, it has become, so to speak, unsportsmanlike. And, nevertheless, the tradition of killing a lion in the process of initiation has not gone away and will obviously not go away among the Maasai soon.
Although killing a lion is illegal in Kenya today, the Maasai must be able to do so. And they really are not even afraid of lions! Masai warriors are not scary in the savannah, so they are often hired to guard camps with tourists.
Kenya. Maasai - good guard
Traditionally, the Maasai - a man can carry 4 items with him (often one of them, but there is always something in his hands):
- Wand - staff
- Spear (less common, wand much more common)
- Large knife in a red leather sheath
- A special stick with a knob resembling a human femur
Warriors - Maasai, Kenya
It's interesting that funeral rite among the Maasai it is used only for uninitiated children. When a circumcised adult dies, whether male or female, his body is carried into the savannah and left to the wild beasts. It is believed that this is how the cycle of life is maintained.
Maasai marriage traditions
Since the Maasai are desperate warriors, the mortality rate among their men is high. Naturally, the people came to polygamy (polygamy). If a Masai has enough cows that determine his well-being, he can take several wives (the more, the more shelter). At the same time, polyandry among the Maasai is also a normal phenomenon. In fact, a woman who marries marries not only her husband, but also his brothers-in-arms, who simultaneously passed the ceremony of initiation into warriors. But this does not mean that they can take it when they want: Maasai women choose their own time and partner. However, children are still considered descendants of the official husband. The Maasai also know the procedure for divorce - it is called "kitala" and may include the return of the ransom paid for the bride before the wedding.
Masai wedding
By the way, the Maasai have a rather spectacular wedding, and in recent years they have agreed to organize a wedding according to their own ritual for guests traveling to Kenya.
Tourist wedding in Masai
Masai - tribes living in southern Kenya and northern Tanzania, leading a semi-nomadic lifestyle and mainly engaged in cattle breeding. In total, about a million Maasai live in the savannahs, a significant part of which still retain their indigenous way of life and zealously observe their ancient traditions. With the advent of mass tourism in Kenya and Tanzania, the Masai tribes have become widely known among travelers - thanks to their memorable appearance and red capes, the traditional dress of this tribe. During a safari, tourists often visit Masai villages located near campsites, where they get acquainted with the life of the tribe, their rituals, customs, traditional dances, and buy souvenirs.
In general, when traveling through Kenya and Tanzania, you meet the Maasai everywhere - in the fields, in villages, in markets, on the sides of the road and even in noisy cities - wherever their capes flicker! The Masai see interest in themselves and are happy with tourists, for a small fee they willingly pose for those who want to take an exotic photo, although many experts in Africa are not sure whether such wild popularity is good or bad for the Maasai living their traditional way of life. One way or another, on the second evening in the Masai Mara, Natasha and I decided to also go see the Masai village - it's interesting! :))
1. Having agreed in advance about the meeting, accompanied by three Masai, we go to a village located not far from our campsite.
2. The Masai live in small huts made of special branches and rods, fastened together with mixtures based on dung - the main "building material" of the pastoral tribe. :)
3. Even with the advent of mass tourism, the Maasai live apart and keep their traditions. Recently, in addition to cattle breeding, Masai tribes are often engaged in the protection of tourist campsites. And they, as a historical tribe of these places, are allowed to graze their cattle and hunt in small quantities in the reserves and national parks - using traditional tools.
Masaev are easily recognizable by their tall stature, thin build, and slender posture in both men and women. In childhood, boys graze cattle and, like future warriors, live very independently, while girls from childhood have been doing housework, milking cattle, and cooking. After the initiation ceremony, the boys receive the status of young warriors - Morans. Adult Maasai love to decorate their body and face with scars, tattoos, each pattern of which is characteristic only of one tribe, and the main chic of the Maasai is cutting the ears - the more holes in the ears, the better. The Maasai religion is traditional beliefs: worship of gods and natural forces. Part of the Maasai adopted Christianity, and often there is a bizarre mixture of Christianity and traditional religions. Among the Maasai, polygamy is common in the tribe - but for each wife, a man must build his own separate hut and pay a good ransom from cows and other livestock. So, as a rule, the first wife of a Masai man starts quite early, but the second and subsequent ones are already at a much more mature, respectable and wealthy age. Maasai tribes live in harmony with the surrounding nature - capes are dyed in bright colors using natural dyes from special herbs; from mosquitoes, and indeed, remedies from local plants are also used as medicines. For Africa, the Maasai have a very high life expectancy - more than 70 years (the Masai who gave us the tour announced an average figure of 105 years, but he, of course, greatly exaggerated this). Of course, now, with the advent of civilization, many of these traditions no longer have such a mandatory and widespread distribution, more and more Masai are leaving for cities and leading a "secular" lifestyle, some of the rites and rituals are carried out, which is called "for tourists" - but also to this day, these tribes are the hallmark of East Africa and there are still a lot of those for whom nomadism, cattle breeding and strange, but well-established centuries-old traditions are not an ostentatious image, but the most ordinary life.
5. For tourists visiting their villages, the Maasai like to arrange performances, the crown of which are national tribal dances - with characteristic jumps, songs and sounds made. :)
7. Many Maasai men like to pull out a few of their front teeth - this is from a series of cut ears and decorating the body with scars and tattoos.
9. In the process of dancing... The lion's hat is the symbol of the leader.
10. A joint photo for memory. :))
11. Children walk along with adults in the village. The face of the boy in the yellow T-shirt is completely covered with flies, but he does not pay any attention to them.
12. Another peanut... Judging by the elegant beads, this is a girl.
13. This middle-aged warrior with huge holes in his ears will now show you how to twist the fire with the help of friction.
14. We take a magic wand and .....
17. ....Starts to smoke.
18. As soon as the light appeared, the Masai put down the straw and fanned the flame quite smartly.
19. Now let's go to one of the houses.
21. The hut is rather cramped, dark, but it looks quite habitable and even cozy in its own way. This room on the side, for example, is intended for guests from neighboring tribes. And the Maasai sleep on straw bedding.
25. It was getting dark... Cattle were brought from somewhere in the mountains. I have already said that the Maasai build their huts from manure - this "building material" is enough underfoot. At first, you look under your feet, and then you get used to it - it's good that the "building material" is thoroughly dried by the hot sun. :)))
26. Now let's see the traditional female dance. Masai women for the most part cut their hair almost bald, wear earrings, colorful beads and other jewelry, and, like men, they like to cut their ears. Some portraits of Masai beauties. :))
30. Women's dance resembles a round dance. :)
31. In conclusion, we go to see the Masai village high school. Not all Maasai are educated - but I still don’t understand how the distribution takes place, who is to study and who is not. However, quite a few study - and the Masai also teach at the school, who themselves learned and then received higher education in the city.
32. Pupils return from lessons.
36. Accompanied by the director, they went to see the class.
37. Board and teacher's table.
38. Photographed for memory with the director of the school.
39. And they were noted in the guest book. :))
It's been an interesting walk! I fully admit that near national parks and large campsites in the Masai tribes there is a lot of what is called "tourist" - nevertheless, I saw how many not "ostentatious", but real Masai live everywhere in the provincial regions of Kenya and Tanzania, and I am very glad that I managed to get acquainted with their strange and unusual, but interesting culture.
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Great Rift Valley
(Republic of Kenya)Rift - a linear depression in the earth's crust, formed during its extension. The Great (or Great) Rift Valley is a huge tectonic fault at the junction of the African and Arabian continental plates, which extends from the Dead Sea through the territory of Israel, Jordan, Syria, the Red Sea and further along East Africa through Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania to Mozambique. The total length of the fault is almost ten thousand kilometers.
Maasai village
(Republic of Kenya)Masai - tribes living in southern Kenya and northern Tanzania, leading a semi-nomadic lifestyle and mainly engaged in cattle breeding. In total, about a million Maasai live in the savannahs, a significant part of which still retain their indigenous way of life and zealously observe their ancient traditions. With the advent of mass tourism in Kenya and Tanzania, the Masai tribes have received a wide ...
The capital of Kenya, Nairobi, is a typical African metropolis with a population of more than 3 million people, a pronounced colonial core, diluted with concrete skyscrapers of international corporations, noisy bustling streets, colossal traffic jams, poor ecology, high crime, separate wealthy neighborhoods where the urban elite lives, and adjacent to they are terrible slums, in which a total of about a third lives ...
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African tribes are very diverse, they differ in their appearance and special temper. If quite friendly, then the representatives of the Maasai are warriors.
The Maasai tribe lives in the eastern sub-region of Africa, being the most colorful among the locals there, because their representatives are usually tall and physically developed. In this regard, they are better known than other indigenous peoples in these lands.
Maasai inhabit some territories in Kenya and Tanzania. They are located near the legendary Kilimanjaro, which is a very important place for them. This mountain has long appeared in their myths as the home of the higher Gods who created the Masai.
The peculiarity of these natives is that their modern life is almost the same as many years ago - their way of life corresponds to ancient traditions. They do not even pay attention to legal laws and established borders - in Kenya they move freely, as before.
African Masai tribe
Masai are a semi-nomadic numerous people living in the Great African Rift region. It is difficult to name the exact number of representatives, because they do not have official documents, approximate figures are from 600 to 900 thousand Maasai.
Their historical homeland is the Upper Nile, because they are the same as the Nile peoples:
- pull out their two front teeth at the bottom;
- women shave their heads.
Once upon a time, the Romans also lived in the same lands, the African tribe of the Masai also adopted something from them:
- red togas for men (a symbol of courage);
- blue togas for women;
- short swords;
- footwear - sandals.
They migrated to somewhere at the beginning of the 16th century, bringing their cattle with them. They are prod 
They were supposed to lead a semi-nomad lifestyle, ignoring the civilizations and cities that were being created everywhere. They developed pastures on all available lands, which only decreased over time due to the growth of cities and national parks.
Even at the beginning of the 19th century, the tribe was so strong that they could control the situation in the savannas and not negotiate with the Europeans. This state of affairs changed after an extensive epidemic, which greatly weakened the Maasai.
One of the features of this tribe is that in all spheres of their life the most important thing is cattle. They believe that all animals are given to their tribe by the revered rain god Ngai.
In this regard, they often stole cattle from other nations, which led to numerous scandals and conflicts. Such a legalized crime became the cause of the notoriety of the Masai, which in past centuries was known both among African peoples and among Europeans.
However, they were able to realize their right to all animals in national parks, because they got the opportunity not only to live in protected areas, but also to protect wild inhabitants.
And yet this situation did not lead to an improvement in their lives, because tourist safaris were run by other tribes. As a result, the Maasai periodically attack tourists, trying to beg them for at least some alms, not even counting on a part of the numerous incomes from visitors.
When someone tries to photograph the representatives of the Maasai, they always ask for a fee, because they want to profit somehow.
Even now, this tribe grazes their own herds on the plains near Mount Kilimanjaro, as they did several hundred years ago. Being nomads in blood, they do not respect those who live a settled life. Engaged only in cattle breeding, they do not know how to cultivate the land and do not know crafts.
The peculiarity of the way of life is also displayed in the dwellings - they are temporary in those parking lots, where it is currently profitable to graze cattle. Huts are built round, from branches and dung, without windows and with a hearth. All construction work is carried out by women, they also help to carry things when moving.
Depletion of pastures usually occurs after 3-4 years, and then the Masai are removed from their place and go to new meadows, driving cattle and taking their things, and there they form new villages. .jpg)
In each such settlement there are from five to seven families, the main food for which is the milk of cows and goats. Men mix bull's blood into milk, which allows them to maintain their strength, necessary to protect settlements and families.
Children have been taking care of the livestock since the age of three. At the age of seven, they expect a ritual of piercing their ears, for this they use part of the horn. The lobes are pulled off with massive jewelry over time, while the larger the lobule becomes, the more beautiful the Masai is considered. Also, on this basis, his status is judged.
The number of wives depends on the number of animals in the man's herd. Maasai women take care not only of children, but also of animals, in addition, they perform all the work in the settlement, including heavy ones:
- carry water;
- chop wood;
- build huts.
As a result, the representatives of the weaker sex in this tribe live less than men, who remain strong warriors until old age.
Of course, modern Maasai have remained true to their traditions only where there is no civilization - in the untouched savannas. Where people live and where tourists come, these ancient warriors are most often hired as guards or participate in theatrical performances of stories from the real life of the tribe.
The Masai are one of the most famous and numerous tribes in Africa. The exact number is not known, since the inhabitants of the tribe are far from bureaucracy and do not have passports, but according to approximate estimates, there are about a million people.
Despite the abundance of tourists and urbanization, the tribe has almost completely preserved its primitive way of life. The Masai lead a semi-nomadic lifestyle, but, after the creation of the Serengeti and Masai Mara national reserves, the area of \u200b\u200bterritories available for nomadism has become much smaller. In the 19th century, the tribe had much more influence and controlled the savannas, but an epidemic of sleeping sickness caused by tsetse flies greatly weakened the Maasai.
The main occupation of the tribe is cattle breeding. The Maasai scripture says: "The rain god Ngai gave all the cattle to the Maasai people, and therefore everyone who also owns cattle must have once stolen it from the Maasai" - therefore conflicts with other tribes due to "legal return of property" are not rarity. The main diet is cow's blood and milk, rarely meat.
The Maasai live in huts made of bushes smeared with dried manure.
The Masai men are warriors, but, due to the fact that it is peaceful time, they are mainly engaged in grazing cattle, and then, until the children grow up, then it is not customary to work.
Women do everything else - they look after children and animals, chop wood and carry water, and also build houses. Perhaps that is why the life expectancy of women is less than that of men.
Polygamy flourishes in the Masai tribe, a man can take as many wives as he has enough cows and strength. The Maasai redeem their brides for cows, a pretty girl will cost an average of three cows. But polygamy is common not only among men, but also among women. Hospitable husbands may leave their wife for the night with guests from the same age group, but the woman is free to refuse.
Age groups play a big role in the way of life of the Maasai. Both boys and girls of the tribe undergo a painful circumcision procedure upon reaching maturity. After circumcision, boys wear black clothes for 4-8 months.
At the age of seven, children's ears are pierced with a fragment of a horn, later the hole is expanded with pieces of wood. Jewelry made of heavy beads over time pulls the lobes to the shoulders, the more they are pulled - the more beautiful.
The Masai sing beautifully and dance no less beautifully, although the dance consists mainly of one movement - a high jump, but it still looks very spectacular.
Funeral rites in the tribe are used only for children, while the rest of the dead are left in the savannah as an offering to predators.
