This article is about the extinct group in Ethiopia. For the settlement in Kenya, see
Gaturi.
Ethnic group
Gaturi
Regions with significant populations
Languages
Gaturi
Religion
Pagan?, Islam
The Gaturi (
Harari: ጋቱሪ), also spelled as Gatouri are an extinct ethnic group that once inhabited present-day eastern
Ethiopia.[1]
History
According to
Mohammed Hassen, the Gaturi were a Semitic-speaking people who resided in the region of mount
Kundudo and
Babile, the region that formed part of the little principality of
Dawaro.[2] Historian
Merid Wolde Aregay deduced that the Gaturi state language was
Harari.[3]
The Harari chronicle states
Abadir arrived at an Islamic region called Balad Gatur known later as
Harar in the tenth or thirteenth century.[4][5] In Harar, Abadir encountered the Gaturi alongside the
Harla and
Argobba people.[6] Gaturi is claimed by one source to be a Harla sub clan.[7] According to another Harari tradition seven clans and villages united against a common adversary, including Gaturi, to form Harar city state.[8]
In the middle ages during the
Ethiopian-Adal war, one of the leaders of the Muslim forces of
Malassay was Amir Husain bin Abubaker al-Gaturi.[9]Ahmad ibn Ibrahim al-Ghazi designated Amir Husain al-Gaturi as governor of
Dawaro region which was a border province of Abyssinia.[10]
Gaturi ceased to be mentioned in texts after the sixteenth century. Gaturi is today represented as a sub group of the
Harari people and remains a Harari surname.[11][12]