Tigrigna is considered to be the correct spelling, and is the common choice by people who know Italian or who have been exposed to Italian language and cultural influences in Ethiopia and Eritrea. Tigrinya is considered also to be an accepted spelling, and is the common choice by people who do not have the Italian language influence, but rather an English influence. Call themselves Tigraway singular and Tigrawot plural by Tigrinya-speaking people. Are commonly called Tigre singular and Tigroch plural by Amharic-speaking people from Ethiopia.
Other Clarifications Tigrinian is sometimes seen but is not a correct term , and should not be used as a name of the language nor of the people and culture. Tigre , as mentioned above, is the name commonly used by Amharic-speaking people from Ethiopia to describe people from Tigray Province, Ethiopia.
But I hope they return the treasures they had stolen from Eritrea during the reign of the midget "emperor" Tafari "Fara" Mekonnen. It is dumb because you can't read. The irony is your mind is programmed to only believe fairy tales.
For you real Ethiopian history is in the Children fiction section at your local library. I personlay from Adwa, i never used these words. Therefore, i dont know what is ur aim to write this article but ur information is inaccurate. Anyway, i want to tell u this, we tigray beieve that eritrea is a country. I don't understand why the agames are not proud on who they are??? Could it be: 1, their history is full of lies, back-stabbing to ERITREANS, and Ethiopians 2, agames are just evils by nature 3, agames are the most hated sub-human 4, agames have the lowest selfesteeme ever!!
When M. We are two different people, no more, no less. Well, I hail my roots from Belew people now living in Keren area who r few in number there, as majority r in Massawa n surrounding area. And I never knew about this great history!
I was always feeling bad whenever people tell me my Tigrinya brothers r same with these sub-human Tigray people. Now Dr. I don't want these "Libi tigray road" people have any association in our beautiful Eritrea. We the Eritreans are unique people. And hence the reason the agames want to associate them selves with us or with every thing of ours is because they are so stupid of assuming Eritrea is only constituted by Tigrigna speaking Eritreans.
Willingly they refuse to accept that Eritrea is blessed with 9 different languages and are cherry picking the one language they could understand out of the other 8 and pray and wish it sticks. First of all, I do not even believe that the two tigrignas are similar. I mean come on now. How come they understand us perfectly and we can not. At least I can not understand their agamigna. But be that may, the whole world is made up of some similarities like the South Americans Spanish speaking or the Middle east Arab speaking or some of the eastern Africans who speak Swahili.
But we do not see or hear all the above ethnic groups begging the others that they are the same people. Well if the agames are are not full of inferiority complex then I do not know what? Ok, ok some of you agames are going to tell me, that you are not begging to be part of us, even though we know it to be otherwise but are just implying that we are similar, right? So, if that is the case, why can't you just drop the lame excuses you apply day in day out to tell us that we are the same people?
What part of leave us alone and be proud of your ethiopianism is that you are not understanding? PS: If you are proud of your identity, please talk in your own language agamigna and stop using the clean Eritrean tigrigna in public so that we can respect you. Stop acting like you are unique Eritreans. The only way you will be unique is when you start to be yourselves. You all are very pathetic and people with no dignity or pride at all.
Come on now, we know that there might be people in the world who hate to hear the Eritrean version of Tigrigna, but we could care or less and we are very proud to speak it any where. So, again be yourselves, say what you say' Enqwa endamatna aikena" "kabakatkum enqwa terekebna" "eway atum meterkesha uiyu".
Gosh, man, the agamigna language is invented to make a joke butt to the Eritreans. Hey sorry, I was advising you to be yourselves and here I am putting you down to the lowest level of humanity which is to be you. May be we are the cause of your inferiority complexes by us looking down to you? Noooooooooo that can not be. It is in your blood already. We are Eritreans and you are ethiopians and let's stay that way. Because there is not a single Eritrean who tries to imitate some other nation's people let along to imitate you.
Oh God have mercy!!!!! To be an Eritrean is a blessing and you must know it more than us that you go out of your way to pass as us. A propaganda piece masquerading as a "academic paper. Keep preaching to the choir, though. The only people who buy this flimsy ethnocentric rubbish are PFDJites. This reminds me of PIA speech. He critized those who try to politize identity, and religion back Keep crying Ethiopians, your reign of terror is over.
You are just left to sulk while we Eritreans move on and restore what was has been taken for us. Very well written and thnak you for your time and effort. To some of the comments Why are some of you offended by this?
Even the person who said that he is Ethiopian and Ertitrean mix? It does not take anyting away from you the fact that these two people are were different.
Just celebrate your diversity. So the writer, so are many historians, found the two people to be different? Do you just have to deny everything or be against it? There is nothing wrong to be different than an Eritrean or an Oromo. What should bring you together is your value. Perhaps over-time it evolves and becomes one with another. I think this dicovery of Eritrean ethnic identity is going to change the world.
It is impressive how people leave in hallucination. If the author has left any intellect, I would suggest to him to think who Eritreans are in real world sense. After travelling to Asmera, Eritreans look for me people who badly copied Italian manners and culture. Nothing further. Jealous are we.
Why do you find it threatening??? Look dude, Eritreans find it a serious offense if you call them Ethiopians and to say they are the same people with Tigray is outrageous. We never were or will be in the future. Deal with it. Absolutly unblievable deception and fabrication and lies, lies and endless lies. What a shame. Infact I'm being soft.
These people have serious ID crisis. I have never thought people on this planet could have such a disturbing confused and insane mentality. I'm realy saddened by the extreme ignorance and denial and of I'm not my mother's son attitude in Asmera. Your outburst of anger can not be a substitute for evidence to disapprove the facts on the article.
The writers have provided amples proof to back up their writing, on the other hand, you proved your total ignorace of Eritrean history. The Eritrean people have been telling you with certainty that we wore never same people, ever. The majestic Eritreans can not be anything like Agames, the curse people and land. Eritreans do not aspire to be part of such terrible primitive hasadat, evil, Uncle Tome with no dignity or self respects subhumans.
I hope this sidelight a littel more on the subject. To the Ethiopians, your whole history is based on a lie, even worse you think God gave you authority to know what Eritrean is? How can that be when most of your population is illiterate. Bottom, line nobody knows Eritrean history better than Eritrean people. It doesn't really matter what the Agames say, they can believe what ever but as of the reality this very people has bled the eritrean people for so long, and our great grand fathers has adviced us not to trust this people, but we ignored the fathers advice and helped this very people of tigray to come to power in ethiopia, but guess what they did, they stub us in the back so hard we lost 19, lives and billions worth of damages.
So it doesn't matter what they believe or think, what we know for sure is this people are not trustworthy period.
God bless Eritrea. Everyone is a scholar,this is the problem with the internet. People can say anything that they want and there will be droves of fools to follow. It really is unfortunate that people have allowed politcs to prevent any legitimate rational thought in the horn, especially for those living in the comfort of western countries. A word of advise to all backward peoples: The differences are in your head! And, they ALL speak English.
Eritreans are Eritreans, Ethiopians are Ethiopians, period. Therefore, Try something else. I'm Ethiopian and I know for certain that we are not the same people. But if the people wasn't related to eachother how come we even speak the same language in the first place??
And if you guys say that Ethiopian people are so dumb, we got where we are on our own. We didn't need any silly italians to "modernise" our country. How come everytime i try to speak tigringa to an eritrean person there's always italian in it? But ofcourse nobody knew that. If the eritrean people are soooo great how come you guys have only been indipendent for 20 years while Ethiopia is one of the oldest countries in the world.
I do not indicate that we are the same people but i dont indicate that we are so different. This whole shit is political and our governments wants us to hate eachother for their own good. The word habesha was used by other people, mostly to indicate the people beyond the read sea. Which at that time was the Axum Kingdom ethiopian kingdom which had eritrean land in it at that time there were the ge'ez people. I dont feel like writing more, my conclusion is.
We are not one ethnical group, there are major diffrences between the tigrinja speakers in both languages.
Like i said I posted few questions that Agame Can not answer till this day: 1 why was Tigrigna spoken by the kebessa people since the 8th century but By the tigryans since the 16th century after the fall of Gragn and death of King isaac of Midri bahri 2 Why was Geez Not spoken or written In any part of Ethiopia prior to the 4th-5th century Official language of Tigray was sabean prior to that While Geez was spoken In eritrea from b.
Unless the belew kelew Created it in the 8th century. It took them almost hundred Years to Adopt the language as the kebessa People shortly Created a language called Tigrigna today. Many early geez artifacts found in tigray shows a mix of sabean and Geez mixtures of words, whats worst is the Tigrayan habesh tried to firstly use the sabean Letters to write Geez but had to adopt the Geez scriptures "Fidal Lita" to Reflect the pronounciation of the ge'ez words.
Most of Yeha historic sites like the so claimed sheba palace is closed for any public visit after the deciphering of many of what was written there 7 and finally My favourite Why did the ethiopian army tried to destroy the stele Of matara in with c4 and wipe its existence, leaving 's of other artifacts,stele's and historic sites with less attention???
Thank god its restored for every one to see its magical words, It mentions who Eritreans are and what's their descandent and who are the people from the south who they crushed are. Agazians Vs Habesh. I am proud to be eritrean.
I hate Ethiopians. My comment is not on the substance of the report research? Do the majority of Tigrigna-speaking Eritreans perceive that they are different from the Tigrigna speaking Ethiopians?
If yes, why? Do the other Ethnic groups in Eritrea perceive like 1? Do the majority of Tigrigna-speaking Ethiopians perceive that they are the same with the Tigrigna speaking Eritreans? Do other ethnic groups in Ethiopia perceive like 3? Are there reliable evidences or sufficient research to support or reject the above questions? Are there historical turning points for that? But, I would like to comment on the following points.
The table about the Asmara and Tigray dialect is totally trash. You will get more than 10 different words to express the same thing among the Tirgigna-speaking Ethiopians and I also think the same is true among the Tigrigna-speaking Eritreans though it may not be to the extent found in Ethiopia.
The words under the Asmara dialect are also found among majority of Tigrigna speaking Ethiopians unless you claim they copied that too from Asmara : 2.
I think It is always important to present scientific evidence not reports of travelers, colonizers, etc. I also think It is also important to consider the extent of blood relationships inter-marriage , etc. Therefore, creating similarities or differences among the Tigrigna-speaking people shouldn't be a political or emotional decision. It is what it is. But, It is a grave mistake to force others accept the idea that we are similar or different.
The two sides of this article the good and the bad. The Good It shows the untold stories of both Alula and Minilik that they invited the Italians to conquer Eritrea for their own political gains. It shows also how political, colonial, historical mistakes and economic changes widen the very similar if not same ethic group in to two different ones. On the other side during the Drought and war in Tigray where the EPLF refused to give humanitarian corridor which lead to deaths of tenths of thousands of Tigray Tegaru which widened the gap.
First cite your sources on this dates and events unless your are trying to express your wishes. Its a very well explained article but It still attempts to divide the people of Horn of Africa instead of focusing on the shared attributes that could lead to unity! Home About Sitemap Contact. Trending random. Biher-Tigrinya and Tigray people: The war of Identities. Written by Hassan Adem, M.
This article examines the problematic relationship between Eritrea's Biher-Tigrinya and Ethiopia's Tigray people. It focuses on the recent western concept of "ethnic identity" and how it can be mobilized for political gains.
It also focuses on the deep animosity that runs between both ethnic groups and tries to shed some light on how they may have originated. This piece does not assume a certain degree of prior knowledge of the horn region's ancient and recent history among its readers, so a great deal of information in this paper is dedicated to the historical aspect of these groups.
When Eritrean civilians of the Biher-Tigrinya ethnic group were asked on their feelings of Tigray people, many responded with: "Tigray" or "Agame", as Eritreans sometimes contemptuously refer to them — cannot be trusted and never could" , Africa, volume 73, p.
While one informant, who was an EPLF veteran told professor Richard Reid, how in , upon the winning of Eritrean independence, 'our grandparents' had warned against trying to improve the relationship with Tigray, saying, "Be careful, these people are dangerous, we know them well!
For starters, many Tigrayans regard the Biher-Tigrinya to be part of the same ethnicity as them, while as innocent as this may sound, this seems to be at the root of the problem. It is clear the Biher-Tigrinya do not regard the Tigray people to be the same ethnicity and go out of their way to make this clear.
But before we begin, we must try to understand the concept of ethnic identity. What is Ethnic Identity? There is yet no acceptable single word in English for the phrase "ethnic group", no one word equivalent to "class," "caste," or "family" to describe a group self-consciously united around particular cultural traditions.
Ethnicity or ethnic group is relatively a new 20th century concept brought upon by Europeans. There are many factors involved in the concept of "ethnicity.
Among the first to bring the term "ethnic group" into social studies was the great German sociologist Max Weber, who defined it as:. On the other hand it is primarily the political community, no matter how artificially organized, that inspires the belief in common ethnicity. Some questions asked by one enquirer on my website bring some factors into view.
Why did the Tigrinya people fight for decades among themselves, those from Eritrea called separatists or secessionists against those from Ethiopia called loyalists or unionists? Why does it seem that the Tigrinya people from Eritrea are not very interested in the other part of their same nation, if they all feel they are members of one nation? The ethnic lines of loyalty are more complex than most Western concepts of ethnicity allow for.
All heritages in the area are ancient, going back before the time of Christ. Different factors that have occurred over the centuries affect the subtle differences in the sense of identity of small family and clan groupings.
After the deterioration of the ancient Axum Empire centred in the mountains of what is now northern Ethiopia, local lines of ethnicity and nationhood developed around continual overlays of immigration, war, assimilation, infighting and various cultural processes.
These were complicated by the invasion of Muslim cultures, initially by peaceful settlement, but also at times with cultural-ethnic subjugation. Having the same name or Sharing same language with another group of people is in many cases insufficient to form a broader unity. Hundreds of European languages are found in a few political nation-states. Many languages cross borders of those nation-states. The same is true in Africa. Further specification may be needed to answer the addtional question following on the previous: Why didn't Ethiopian Tigrinyas join their actual regional state with Eritrea when it was possible in the beginning of the s , if they felt that they have something in common with Eritrean Tigrinyas.
Tension over the border line goes back some centuries, and I do not understand all the dynamics. The politics of the region are complex. Political allegiances and boundaries do not always coincide with ethnic lines. In fact, I wonder if it is so in even half the cases? Ethnicities developed somewhat differently across the various highland ridges and lowland slopes among the various peoples that spoke related forms of language known as Tigrinya meaning "speech of the Tigre people".
Varieties of the related languages are broadly categorized in three current groupings of dialects: Tigre, Tigrinya and Amharic. Political, social and land matters and local ethnicity all are factors affecting the shifting sense of loyalty and identity over the decades in modern times. Numerous factors lead to a different sense of identity south of the border, including the preference for English as the international language, in contrast to the use of Italian in Eritrea.
Levels of education also come into play. The specific border as we know it today is set largely by the period of separate development of what was called "Eritrea" meaning Red under Italian Colonialisation.
The main area of the highlands was never successfully colonized by any European or asian power since the ancient Sabeans Cushites, perhaps already mixed by that time with Southern Arabians established themselves about years before Christ. After their kingdom, Axum, deteriorated, various powers held various parts of the broader "Cush" land area. It is interesting how unable European observers are to see their own situation as they would situations like that of the Tigrinya, with a border running through their tribe, with a portion of the tribe choosing identity with unrelated ethnicities on their respective sides of the border, even to the point of bitter war.
One needs only to look at virtually any border in Europe for a similar situation. I found this view interesting, since the writer was from a Scandinavian country. The countries of Norway, Denmark and Sweden are three neighbouring kingdoms of Vikings. Why don't they just unite into one? They are so similar they can understand each other's form of speech to a large extent; they all have the Lutheran Church as the state church. They all share the same cultural heritage. I just can't believe they are really happy being separated!
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