Yibir

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The Yibir (also Ibro) are a numerically small tribe of Somalia. They have traditionally been kept on the lower rungs of Somali society. Some believe that the Yibir are descendants of Hebrews who arrived in the area long ago and that the word "Yibir" means "Hebrew." Some view Yibirs with contempt yet fear their alleged supernatural powers and consider it unwise to provoke members of the tribe.

Yibirs are said to be descendants of King Mohammed Bin Haniif of Hargeysa, also known as Boqor Bur Ba'ayr. It is said that he was a herbalist, priest, and astrologer who predicted many natural disasters. Folklore has it that newly wed women had to spend a week in his castle while he "ensured they were free of sexual disease", before they were released to their husbands. Nomad Somalis objected to this practice and overthrew the king. Legend has it that Bur Ba'ayr used witchcraft to make people believe that he could pass through a mountain. A popular story is that Sheikh Yussuf-ul-Kownein (also known as Aw Barqadle) went to see the event and as soon as the act started, he read verses of the Qur'an and Bur Ba'ayr was trapped in the mountain. Nomad Somalis agreed to settle the death of the king by giving money and other gifts to the Yibir tribe every time a male child was born. The custom of Yibirs visiting families with newborn children to be given money still continues in most of Somalia. It is still believed that if a pregnant woman does not pay the tax she will give birth to a stillborn or deformed baby. Yibirs are believed to know by witchcraft where there is a woman pregnant with a male child, and so go to seek the "compensation", he (always a male) is supposed to prove his identity by placing on his horizontally extended arm a forked staff which on its own begins to oscillate in convoluted movements along his arm. After he is given the money he gives a piece of knotted string as a "receipt" so if another Yibir visits the homes he knows he is too late for the baksheesh (though apparently his "witchcraft" cannot tell him that).
Some modern Somalis believe that this is nonsense.
Yibirs may be pre-Somali inhabitants of Somalia. Most Yibirs today are Muslims though that does not prevent them from being despised and feared for their alleged witchcraft. The Yibir community live in Somaliland, parts of Puntland and a minority of them live among other Somali clans. Somalis do not intermarry with the Yibirs but the Yibirs have intermarried with other communities despised by Somalis of nomadic tradition (mad-dibaans, Boon, Midgaans). Yibir do not practise any of the post-First Temple traditions but share customs with the Hebraic-pagan Qemant of Ethiopia. The Yibir practise masonry and are good blacksmiths (both trades considered menial by Somalis).

[edit] References

• Somalia's 'Hebrews'
• Schneider, R. "Deux inscriptions subaribiques du Tigre" Leiden, Netherlands: Bibliotecheca Orientalis, 30, 1973, 385-387 (quoted with explanation in Bernard Leeman "Queen of Sheba and Biblical Scholarship" Queensland Academic Press 2005, pages 95-97 ISBN 0-9758022-0-8)
• Kirk, John William Carnegie "A grammar of the Somali language with examples in prose and verse; and an account of the Yibir and Midgan dialects." Cambridge: University Press, 1905