1.
Ethiopia
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Ethiopia, officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a country located in the Horn of Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the north and northeast, Djibouti and Somalia to the east, Sudan and South Sudan to the west, and Kenya to the south. With nearly 100 million inhabitants, Ethiopia is the most populous landlocked country in the world and it occupies a total area of 1,100,000 square kilometres, and its capital and largest city is Addis Ababa. Some of the oldest evidence for modern humans has been found in Ethiopia. It is widely considered as the region from modern humans first set out for the Middle East. According to linguists, the first Afroasiatic-speaking populations settled in the Horn region during the ensuing Neolithic era, tracing its roots to the 2nd millennium BC, Ethiopia was a monarchy for most of its history. During the first centuries AD, the Kingdom of Aksum maintained a unified civilization in the region, subsequently, many African nations adopted the colors of Ethiopias flag following their independence. It was the first independent African member of the 20th-century League of Nations, Ethiopias ancient Geez script, also known as Ethiopic, is one of the oldest alphabets still in use in the world. The Ethiopian calendar, which is seven years and three months behind the Gregorian calendar, co-exists alongside the Borana calendar. A slight majority of the population adheres to Christianity, while around a third follows Islam, the country is the site of the Migration to Abyssinia and the oldest Muslim settlement in Africa at Negash. A substantial population of Ethiopian Jews, known as Bete Israel, resided in Ethiopia until the 1980s, Ethiopia is a multilingual nation with around 80 ethnolinguistic groups, the four largest of which are the Oromiffa, Amhara, Somali, and Tigrayans. Most people in the country speak Afroasiatic languages of the Cushitic or Semitic branches, additionally, Omotic languages are spoken by ethnic minority groups inhabiting the southern regions. Nilo-Saharan languages are spoken by the nations Nilotic ethnic minorities. Ethiopia is the place of origin for the coffee bean which originated from the place called Kefa and it is a land of natural contrasts, with its vast fertile West, jungles, and numerous rivers, and the worlds hottest settlement of Dallol in its north. The Ethiopian Highlands are Africas largest continuous mountain ranges, and Sof Omar Caves contain Africas largest cave, Ethiopia has the most UNESCO World Heritage Sites in Africa. Ethiopia is one of the members of the UN, the Group of 24, the Non-Aligned Movement, G-77. In the 1970s and 1980s, Ethiopia suffered from civil wars, the country has begun to recover recently however, and now has the largest economy in East Africa and Central Africa. According to Global Fire Power, Ethiopia has the 42nd most powerful military in the world, the origin of the word Ethiopia is uncertain
2.
Somalia
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Somalia, officially the Federal Republic of Somalia, is a country located in the Horn of Africa. It is bordered by Ethiopia to the west, Djibouti to the northwest, the Gulf of Aden to the north, the Indian Ocean to the east, Somalia has the longest coastline on Africas mainland, and its terrain consists mainly of plateaus, plains and highlands. Climatically, hot conditions prevail year-round, with monsoon winds. Somalia has an population of around 12.3 million. Around 85% of its residents are ethnic Somalis, who have inhabited the northern part of the country. Ethnic minorities are largely concentrated in the southern regions, the official languages of Somalia are Somali and Arabic, both of which belong to the Afroasiatic family. Most people in the country are Muslim, with the majority being Sunni, in antiquity, Somalia was an important commercial centre. It is among the most probable locations of the fabled ancient Land of Punt, during the Middle Ages, several powerful Somali empires dominated the regional trade, including the Ajuran Empire, the Adal Sultanate, the Warsangali Sultanate, and the Geledi Sultanate. The toponym Somalia was coined by the Italian explorer Luigi Robecchi Bricchetti, Italian occupation lasted until 1941, yielding to British military administration. British Somaliland would remain a protectorate, while Italian Somaliland in 1949 became a United Nations Trusteeship under Italian administration, in 1960, the two regions united to form the independent Somali Republic under a civilian government. The Supreme Revolutionary Council seized power in 1969 and established the Somali Democratic Republic, led by Mohamed Siad Barre, this government later collapsed in 1991 as the Somali Civil War broke out. Various armed factions began competing for influence in the power vacuum, during this period, due to the absence of a central government, Somalia was a failed state, and residents returned to customary and religious law in most regions. A few autonomous regions, including the Somaliland and Puntland administrations emerged in the north, the early 2000s saw the creation of fledgling interim federal administrations. The Transitional National Government was established in 2000, followed by the formation of the Transitional Federal Government in 2004, in 2006, the TFG, assisted by Ethiopian troops, assumed control of most of the nations southern conflict zones from the newly formed Islamic Courts Union. The ICU subsequently splintered into more radical groups such as Al-Shabaab, by mid-2012, the insurgents had lost most of the territory that they had seized. In 2011–2012, a political process providing benchmarks for the establishment of permanent democratic institutions was launched, within this administrative framework a new provisional constitution was passed in August 2012, which reformed Somalia as a federation. Somalia has maintained an informal economy, mainly based on livestock, remittances from Somalis working abroad, Somalia has been inhabited since at least the Paleolithic. During the Stone Age, the Doian and Hargeisan cultures flourished here, the oldest evidence of burial customs in the Horn of Africa comes from cemeteries in Somalia dating back to the 4th millennium BCE
3.
Ethiopian Highlands
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The Ethiopian Highlands is a rugged mass of mountains in Ethiopia, situated in the Horn region in Northeast Africa. It forms the largest continuous area of its altitude in the continent, with little of its surface falling below 1500 m and it is sometimes called the Roof of Africa due to its height and large area. Most of the Ethiopian Highlands are part of central and northern Ethiopia, in the southern parts of the Ethiopian Highlands once was located the Kingdom of Kaffa, a medieval early modern state, whence the coffee plant was exported to the Arabian peninsula. The land of the kingdom is mountainous with stretches of forest. The land is fertile, capable of three harvests a year. The term coffee derives from the Arabic qahwah and is traced to Kaffa, the Highlands are divided into northwestern and southeastern portions by the Main Ethiopian Rift, which contains a number of salt lakes. The northwestern portion, which covers the Tigray and Amhara Regions, includes the Semien Mountains and its highest peak, Ras Dashan, is the highest peak in Ethiopia. Lake Tana, the source of the Blue Nile, also lies in the portion of the Ethiopian Highlands. The southeastern portions highest peaks are located in the Bale Zone of Ethiopias Oromia Region, the Bale Mountains, also designated a national park, are nearly as high as those of Semien. The range includes peaks of over 4000 m, among these are Mount Tullu Demtu, which is the second-highest peak in Ethiopia, and Mount Batu. Most of the major cities are located at elevations of around 2, 000–2,500 m above sea level, including historic capitals such as Gondar. The Ethiopian Highlands began to rise 75 million years ago, as magma from the Earths mantle uplifted a broad dome of the ancient rocks of the Arabian-Nubian Shield. Around 30 million years ago, a basalt plateau began to form. Most of the flows were tholeiitic, save for a layer of alkali basalts and minor amounts of felsic volcanic rocks. In the waning stages of the flood basalt episode, large explosive caldera-forming eruptions also occurred, the Ethiopian Highlands were eventually bisected by the Great Rift Valley as the African continental crust pulled apart. This rifting gave rise to large alkaline basalt shield volcanoes beginning about 30–31 million years ago, the predominant climate type of the Ethiopian Highlands is tropical monsoon, and have a climate which is generally considerably cooler than other regions at similar proximity to the Equator. Because the highlands elevate Ethiopia, located close to the equator, further, these mountains catch the precipitation of the monsoon winds of the Indian Ocean, resulting in a rainy season that lasts from June until mid-September. These heavy rains cause the Nile to flood in the summer, the habitats are somewhat different on either side of the Great Rift Valley that splits the highlands
4.
Mogadishu
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Mogadishu, known locally as Hamar, is the capital and most populous city of Somalia. Located in the coastal Banaadir region on the Indian Ocean, the city has served as an important port for millennia, tradition and old records assert that southern Somalia, including the Mogadishu area, was historically inhabited by hunter-gatherers. These were later joined by Cushitic-speaking agro-pastoralists, who would go on to establish local aristocracies, during its medieval Golden Age, Mogadishu was ruled by the Muzaffar dynasty, a vassal of the Ajuran Sultanate. It subsequently fell under the control of an assortment of local Sultanates and polities, the city later became the capital of Italian Somaliland in the colonial period. After the Somali Republic became independent in 1960, Mogadishu became known, the ICU thereafter splintered into more radical groups, notably al-Shabaab, which fought the Transitional Federal Government and its African Union Mission to Somalia allies. With a change in administration in late 2010, government troops, Mogadishu has subsequently experienced a period of intense reconstruction. As Somalias capital city, many important national institutions are based in Mogadishu and it is the seat of the Federal Government of Somalia established in August 2012, with the Somalia Federal Parliament serving as the governments legislative branch. Yusuf Hussein Jimaale has been the Mayor of Mogadishu since October 2015, villa Somalia is the official residential palace and principal workplace of the President of Somalia, Hassan Sheikh Mohamud. In May 2012, the First Somali Bank was established in the capital, the establishment of a local construction yard has also galvanized the citys real-estate sector. Arbaa Rukun Mosque is one of the oldest Islamic places of worship in the capital, the Mosque of Islamic Solidarity in Mogadishu is the largest masjid in the Horn region. Mogadishu Cathedral was built in 1928 by the authorities in Italian Somaliland in a Norman Gothic style. The National Museum of Somalia is based in Mogadishu and holds many important artefacts. The National Library of Somalia is undergoing a $1 million Somali federal government funded renovation, Mogadishu is home to a number of scholastic and media institutions. As part of the urban renewal program,100 schools across the capital are scheduled to be refurbished and reopened. The Somali National University was established in the 1950s, and professors from the university founded the non-governmental Mogadishu University. Benadir University was established in 2002 with the intention of training doctors, various national sporting bodies have their headquarters in Mogadishu, including the Somali Football Federation and the Somali Olympic Committee. Mogadishu Stadium was constructed in 1978 during the Siad Barre administration and it hosts football matches with teams from the Somali First Division and the Somalia Cup. Additionally, the Port of Mogadishu serves as a national seaport and is the largest harbour in Somalia
5.
Tributary
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A tributary or affluent is a stream or river that flows into a larger stream or main stem river or a lake. A tributary does not flow directly into a sea or ocean, tributaries and the main stem river drain the surrounding drainage basin of its surface water and groundwater, leading the water out into an ocean. A confluence, where two or more bodies of water together, usually refers to the joining of tributaries. The opposite to a tributary is a distributary, a river or stream that branches off from, distributaries are most often found in river deltas. Right tributary and left tributary are terms stating the orientation of the relative to the flow of the main stem river. These terms are defined from the perspective of looking downstream, where tributaries have the same name as the river into which they feed, they are called forks. These are typically designated by compass direction, for example, the American River receives flow from its North, Middle, and South forks. The Chicago Rivers North Branch has the East, West, and Middle Fork, the South Branch has its South Fork, forks are sometimes designated as right or left. Here, the handedness is from the point of view of an observer facing upstream, for instance, Steer Creek has a left tributary which is called Right Fork Steer Creek. Tributaries are sometimes listed starting with those nearest to the source of the river, the Strahler Stream Order examines the arrangement of tributaries in a hierarchy of first, second, third, and higher orders, with the first-order tributary being typically the least in size. For example, a second-order tributary would be the result of two or more first-order tributaries combining to form the second-order tributary, another method is to list tributaries from mouth to source, in the form of a tree structure, stored as a tree data structure
6.
Somalis
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Somalis are an ethnic group inhabiting the Horn of Africa. The overwhelming majority of Somalis speak the Somali language, which is part of the Cushitic branch of the Afro-Asiatic family, ethnic Somalis number around 16-20 million and are principally concentrated in Somalia, Ethiopia, Kenya, and Djibouti. Expatriate Somalis are also found in parts of the Middle East, North America, Oceania, Samaale, the oldest common ancestor of several Somali clans, is generally regarded as the source of the ethnonym Somali. The name Somali is, in turn, held to be derived from the words soo and maal, another plausible etymology proposes that the term Somali is derived from the Arabic for wealthy, again referring to Somali riches in livestock. The first clear reference of the sobriquet Somali, however. Simur was also an ancient Harari alias for the Somali people, Ancient rock paintings, which date back 5000 years, have been found in the northern part of Somalia, these depict early life in the territory. In other places, such as the northern Dhambalin region, a depiction of a man on a horse is postulated as being one of the earliest known examples of a mounted huntsman. Inscriptions have been found many of the rock paintings. During the Stone age, the Doian and Hargeisan cultures flourished here with their industries and factories. The oldest evidence of burial customs in the Horn of Africa comes from cemeteries in Somalia dating back to 4th millennium BC. The stone implements from the Jalelo site in northern Somalia are said to be the most important link in evidence of the universality in palaeolithic times between the East and the West. In antiquity, the ancestors of the Somali people were an important link in the Horn of Africa connecting the regions commerce with the rest of the ancient world. According to most scholars, the ancient Land of Punt and its inhabitants formed part of the ethnogenesis of the Somali people, the ancient Puntites were a nation of people that had close relations with Pharaonic Egypt during the times of Pharaoh Sahure and Queen Hatshepsut. The pyramidal structures, temples and ancient houses of dressed stone littered around Somalia are said to date from this period, the city of Mogadishu came to be known as the City of Islam, and controlled the East African gold trade for several centuries. The Sultanate of Ifat, led by the Walashma dynasty with its capital at Zeila, ruled parts of what is now eastern Ethiopia, Djibouti. The historian al-Umari records that Ifat was situated near the Red Sea coast and its army numbered 15,000 horsemen and 20,000 foot soldiers. Al-Umari also credits Ifat with seven cities, Belqulzar, Kuljura, Shimi, Shewa, Adal, Jamme. The Harla, an early Hamitic group of tall stature who inhabited parts of Somalia, Tchertcher and other areas in the Horn and these masons are believed to have been ancestral to the Somalis
