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Customs
Throughout history there have been many European travelers such as Jeronimo Lobo, James Bruce and Mansfield Parkyns who have travelled to Abyssinia and later written accounts about their experiences which also include observations and descriptions of the Abyssinian customs and manners.

Food

Jeronimo Lobo who went to Abyssinia in 1624 and later called it “a land of honey and butter” because of the number of bees and cows Abyssinians kept. The author also described how meat was served for a guest. After they killed an animal, for example, an ox, they immediately put it raw upon a table. Lobo claimed that a raw newly killed beef with pepper and salt was the nicest dish and most elegant treat in Abyssinia. As common drinks for Abyssinians in Lobo’s account were mentioned mead and beer.

James Bruce who went to Abyssinia between the years 1769- 1772 also described some of the Abyssinian customs and manners of eating. One of Bruce’s most popular described customs in Britain became a story in which Bruce told how he witnessed the barbarous Abyssinian custom of eating a raw meat cut from a living animal.

Bruce wrote “I have said in the course of the narrative of my journey from Masuah, that at a small distance from Axum, I overtook on the way three travelers, who seemed to be soldiers, driving a cow before them. They halted at a brook, threw down the beast, and one of them cut a pretty large collop of flesh from its buttocks, after which they drove the cow gently on as before” (Bruce, p.477).

Later Mansfield Parkyns, who lived in Abyssinia between the years 1843 - 1846 confirmed that Bruce really wrote what he had witnessed. Although, during his time in Abyssinia Parkyns did not see this practice of eating a raw meat from a living animal with his own eyes, he did hear a similar story from some Abyssinians. However, Parkyns claimed that this practice was performed only occasionally and only among certain Abyssinian tribes, for instance, Gallas.

Dress

Jeronimo Lobo described an average Abyssinian dressed very plainly. He wrote that only pieces of clothing they wore were drawers and a thick garment of cotton wrapped around their bodies. However, Abyssinians from a higher-class differed. They did not wear cotton clothes but all sorts of silks and the fine velvets of Turkey. The author wrote that their clothes were very costly and “their robes are always full of gold and silver embroidery”(Lobo, p.73). Lobo emphasized their love for bright and glaring colors in their clothing. The author also did not forget to mention Abyssinian long and twisted hair which they took a really good care of. He wrote that “they go bare-headed whilst they are young for fear of spoiling it; but afterwards they wear red caps and sometimes turbants after the Turkish fashion” (Lobo, p.73). In his account, Lobo also made a comment that the Abyssinian women clothes were more expensive than men because women wore big robes and a lot of gold and silver earrings and necklaces.

Mansfield Parkyns, who travelled to Abyssinia almost two hundred years later than Lobo, observed similar ways to dress. He wrote that the Abyssinian men seldom wore any ornaments except some strings of silver and red morocco amulets or silver chains around their necks only as a mark if they have ever killed an elephant. In detail Parkyns analyzed looks of the sword, shield and spear which were the weapons of the Abyssinian. Similarly as Lobo, Parkyns also described the Abyssinian women wearing a piece of cotton to cover their bodies. He added that “a fine lady wears a different material clothes – not cotton but silk in diverse colours and various patterns” (Parkyns,p.243) Another interesting Abyssinian fashion Parkyns observed was that many women from Tigrean tribe tattooed themselves. Some of their bodies were covered by tatooed ornaments, stars, lines, and crosses.