Suri / Surma of - Ethiopia Amazing Stick fighting - Part 6

The Suri

The Suri, also known as the Surma is a population numbering around 20 thousand that live in Southwestern Ethiopian by the Sudanese Border.
The Suri, along with the Mursi and Meen all speak languages that belong to the Surmic language family under the larger Nilo-Saharan language phylum. The Suri, Mursi, and Meen are sometimes all referred to collectively as Surma numbering collectively around 80 Thousand.

Cattle Culture

Cattle are enormously important to the Suri. They bring status; when two Suri meet they'll ask each other how many cows they have. Cows are a store of wealth to be traded, and a source of milk and blood. Bleeding a cow is more efficient than slaughtering it for meat, and blood can be drawn during the dry season when there's less milk. An animal can be bled once a month, from the jugular.
The animals aren't generally sold or killed for meat, though they are slaughtered for certain ceremonies. They are treated with reverence. Fires are lit to keep them warm and to protect against insect bites, they are covered with ash. Every boy is given a young bull to look after, and his friends call him the name of his bull. The Suri sing songs in praise of their cattle, and mourn them when they die.

Stick Fighting

A sport and ritual the Suri take extremely seriously is stick fighting. In many cases, its a way for young men to prove themselves to the young women. The fights are held between Suri villages and the fights begin with 20 to 30 people on each side. Of these 20 to 30 people, all get a chance to fight one on one against someone from the other side. During these fights there are referees present to make sure all rules are being followed. Many stick fights end within the first couple of hits.

Sociolinguistic Survey Report
on Tirma, Chai, Baale, and Mursi.
http://www.sil.org/silesr/2002/033/SILESR2002-033.pdf

Language Family Trees
Nilo-Saharan
http://www.ethnologue.com/show_family.asp?subid=90116

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Category:

Education

Tags:

• Ethiopia
• Omo Valley
• Omo River
• Sudanese
• Nile
• Nilotic
• Tropical
• Stick
• Stick fighting
• Cattle
• Culture
• Nilo-Saharan
• Afro-Asiatic
• Sudan
• Ethiopian
• Mursi
• Suri
• Surma
• Meen
• Plate Lip
• Africa
• African Culture
• East Africa
• Southern Ethiopia
• SNNPR

[mredstriumph]

Driveby in a stick fight.. man.. aint nowhere safe

[thoostorm4]

@fitzrapid kendo is a completely different sporti taught weaponry the staff nunchakas i was a warded a third degree black belt by a seventh degree

[fitzrapid]

Totally agree, its like KENDO....only difference is they do not wear protective gear and their weapons are longer.

[0102106kls]

@mazmal1988 this sport is alot older then kendo

[WMBMIA]

Why is it that whenever there is a video about black people white people, or any other group of people, people have to respond to them with racist remarks???? Just sad, ignorance, stupidity, and I'm sick of it!!!!

[Snalk2]

@Schildschmied It actually does not matter how violent each sport is... wat matters is if you really know how to use what u actually learn :D

[Schildschmied]

What violence is he telling about?

These guys didnt even hurt each other.

Simple europian boxing is much more violent.

[hitthedeck245]

I wonder if this is where sword fighting originated from ?

[mazmal1988]

the japanese version of this is Kendo

[RQuintero624]

By the way thanks for posting I really enjoyed watching this documentary I think that's why we really should appreciate the way we live all what I saw this people never complaint about the way they live...