From cairns to cemeteries: medieval Muslim graves in Somaliland, Djibouti and eastern Ethiopia, 1300s–1500s

In short

Burial customs are one of the clearest physical traces of the coming of Islam to the Somali lands. This page follows one study, which brings together 19 cemeteries at 16 medieval sites in Somaliland, Djibouti and the Somali Region of Ethiopia, recorded by the Spanish National Research Council between 2015 and 2023 (Cornax-Gómez and de Torres Rodríguez, "From cairns to graves: funerary transformations in medieval sedentary communities in the Islamic Horn of Africa", Azania 60.1, 2025, pp. 105–139, open access). For the older cairns and standing stones, see Ancient burials, standing stones and towns.

Two traditions

The authors describe two burial traditions (pp. 108–109):

• Nomad cairns. Since the Neolithic, burials in Somaliland and Djibouti had taken the form of cairns of many shapes and sizes, sometimes in fields of hundreds, placed along wadis or at visible places such as mountain passes and gathering grounds.
• Town cemeteries. With the permanent settlements of the Ifat (dated by the authors 1285–1415) and Adal (1415–1573) period came small rectangular graves, laid out by Islamic custom and grouped in cemeteries on the edge of each settlement. The authors call the change "radical", arising with no local forerunner, which they read as a sign of outside origin or at least strong outside influence.

They stress that the two were not opposed. They record "common grounds", places where nomad and town practices sit side by side, "apparently without this being the result of state regulation or imposition" (p. 109).

The sites

The sample runs from hamlets to towns (pp. 109–110):

• Somaliland: Abasa, Aroqolab, Biyo Gure, Fardowsa, Kabab, Maduuna, Qalcadda, Qubuurale and Dameraqad.
• Somali Region of Ethiopia: Aw Boba, Aw Bare, Warabeley, Aiyanle, Qararu and Garba Jiri.
• Djibouti: Handoga, the only medieval town known there.

All but Handoga (12th–16th centuries) and Qubuurale (13th–14th) date mainly to the 14th–16th centuries. The authors note that the graves themselves cannot be dug "for religious reasons", since the local Muslim communities protect them, so the dates come from the settlements (pp. 109–112). Larger towns such as Handoga and Aw Boba have about 250 to 300 graves; villages such as Aroqolab and Qararu 30 to 60 (p. 111).

Seven grave types

The authors propose this typology (pp. 112–116):

• T1, cist graves: one or two rows of half-buried slabs forming a rectangular box. Similar graves are found at Awfat in Ethiopia, which may have been the burial place of the Walashma dynasty of Ifat.
• T2, small stone mounds, sometimes with a slab rectangle on top. The plain mound is the commonest type in the sample.
• T3, a pit marked on the surface: by a ring of stones, by two standing stones at either end, or by a paving of small stones.
• T4, a pit marked by a line of upright slabs along one side. The authors call it specific to the medieval period and found only in western Somaliland and just across the Ethiopian border.
• T5, cairn-like graves showing nomad influence.
• T6, carved rectangular tombstones, found only at Aw Boba. Local people explained a hole at the base of some as an entrance for the angels; the authors suggest it may be for drainage.
• T7, rare forms, such as a cross-shaped grave at Handoga.

Two kinds of addition appear on many types: small standing stones (stelae), at 13 of the 16 sites, and white or red pebbles laid on the grave for contrast of colour, at 7 sites (pp. 115–117).

What the counts suggest to the authors

• Three types dominate: cist graves (10 sites), plain stone mounds (12 sites) and graves marked by two stelae (10 sites) (p. 116).
• Handoga stands apart, with circular graves, walled enclosures with entrances and no cist graves, which the authors link to stronger nomad roots and possibly an earlier start (pp. 119–120, 129–131).
• Mixed types are of one age. Different grave types lie side by side without overlapping, so the authors think they were used at the same time, by different groups in each community, rather than one after another (pp. 121–123).
• Bigger places had more variety, though not without exception (p. 123).

Where the new graves came from

The authors trace two influences (pp. 123–126):

• Nomad customs carried over: the coloured pebbles, the ring of stones round a grave and the use of stelae, all known from pre-Islamic graves.
• The Muslim towns of Ethiopia: cist graves are the usual type at older sites in Shewa, such as Nora and the possible Walashma cemetery at Awfat, and at Harlaa near Harar. Since those sites are older, the authors suggest the Somaliland and Jijiga regions took the style from them. See The Harla and Harlaa.

They also mention Yemenis in the trade and politics of Ifat and Adal, students from the region at al-Azhar in Cairo, and different schools of Islam in towns such as Harar, while noting that these cannot be tied directly to particular grave types (p. 126).

Three case studies

• Aw Boba, in the Somali Region of Ethiopia 8 km from the Somaliland border, named after a holy man whose tomb is there and who is mentioned in the Futuh al-Habasha. Burton passed it in 1854. Its cemetery runs 500 metres along the river over about two hectares and holds the widest range of grave types found in the borderlands, including the carved tombstones found nowhere else, one with a zigzag pattern (pp. 126–129). See Abasa (Darbiyah Kola) for Burton's story of Aw Boba and Abasa.
• Handoga, in western Djibouti, a town of about 16 hectares of round buildings. The cemetery seems to have grown out from a row of mound graves on a cliff above the wadi, visible from far off, unlike the hidden-away cemeteries of the other towns. The authors describe it as "a town that grew from local initiatives and nomadic roots" (pp. 129–131).
• Qararu, a hamlet of three or four houses near Aw Bare, in Ethiopia. Its medieval cemetery of slab graves is surrounded by a later and larger cemetery of nomad graves, stone heaps with stelae on top, in two phases (pp. 131–133).

After the towns

The authors write that after the towns were abandoned in the 16th century, nomads kept coming back to some of them as siyaaro, places of pilgrimage, and buried their dead around the ruins, as at Qararu and Dameraqad, and "finding its maximum expression at Aw Barkhadle", the shrine on top of a medieval town in Somaliland (p. 133). They conclude that the change in belief does not seem to have led to conflict between nomads and townspeople, and that later nomad cemeteries kept the plain, grouped layout of the medieval town cemeteries rather than the visible cairns of earlier times (pp. 134–135).

Related pages

• Ancient burials, standing stones and towns
• Ruined towns of the Somali interior
• The sultanate of Shewa and the founding of Ifat