The Hamer inhabit the territory east of the Omo River and have villages in Turmi and Dimeka. The 2007 national census reported 46,532 people in this ethnic group.
There is a division of labour in terms of sex and age. The women and girls grow crops (the staple is sorghum, alongside beans, maize and pumpkins). They’re also responsible for collecting water, doing the cooking and looking after the children - who start helping the family by herding the goats from around the age of eight. The young men of the village work the crops, defend the herds or go off raiding for livestock from other tribes, while adult men herd the cattle, plough with oxen and raise beehives in acacia trees.
Married women style their hair in a braid bob, made red thanks to a mixture obtained with water, butter and red ocher; these braids are called goscha.
To identify the social status of a woman there is also another element that all Hamer women use and wear: these are heavy metal and leather necklaces that encircle the neck of women: the first wife wears a necklace called bignere that has a large protruding cylinder and, if the husband has married other women, he will also wear another necklace for each other wife.
Turmi region, Ethiopia, 2024