The unique traditions of Africa’s best known ethnic group

THE MAASAI ARE A SEMI-nomadic ethnic group found in Kenya and northern Tanzania.

Due to their distinctive customs and dress and the fact that their rangelands border many game parks in East Africa, they are among the best known of African ethnic groups.

Tanzanian and Kenyan governments have instituted programmes to encourage the Maasai to abandon their traditional semi-nomadic lifestyle, but to little avail.

Maasai society is strongly patriarchal in nature with elder men, sometimes joined by retired elders, deciding most major matters for each maasai group. A full body of oral law covers many aspects of behaviour.

The traditional Maasai lifestyle revolves around their cattle, which constitute the primary source of food.

A Maasai myth relates that God gave them all the cattle on earth, leading to the belief that rustling cattle from other tribes is a matter of taking back what is rightfully theirs.

In this community, the measure of a man’s wealth is his cattle and children. A herd of 50 cattle is respectable, and the more children the better. A man who has plenty of one but not the other is considered poor.

The central unit of the Maasai society is the age-set.

Although young boys are sent out with the calves and lambs as soon as they can walk, childhood for boys is mostly playtime, with the exception of ritual beatings to test courage and endurance.

GIRLS ARE RESPONSIBLE for chores such as cooking and milking, skills which they learn from their mothers at an early age. Every 15 years or so, a new and individually named generation of morans (warriors) will be initiated. This involves most boys between 12 and 25, who have reached puberty and are not part of the previous age-set.

The warriors are in charge of the society’s security, and spend most of their time on walkabout throughout Maasai lands, beyond the confines of their sectional boundaries. They are also more involved in cattle trading than they used to be, developing and improving basic stock through trade and barter.

Boys are responsible for herding small livestock. During the drought season, both warriors and boys assume responsibility for herding livestock.

Elders are directors and advisors for day-to-day activities. Women are responsible for making the houses as well as supplying water, collecting fire wood, milking cattle and cooking for the family.