Ometo

The Ometo are a cluster of Omotic-speaking peoples of the Afro-Asiatic family who farm the highlands and river valleys of southern Ethiopia. They include the Wolayta, Gamo and others, whose closely related speech forms the Ometo dialect cluster, the largest group within Omotic.

Their medieval political tradition centres on the kingdom later remembered as Damot and then Wolaita, whose kings bore the title Kawo and whose Malla dynasties ruled from the thirteenth century. Adal forces briefly occupied Wolaita in the sixteenth century, after which Oromo expansion pressed the Ometo polities into smaller highland territories.

King Gazenja won several victories over the Oromo in the seventeenth century, and by 1830 Wolaita had become a tributary of the Kingdom of Kaffa. The Gamo highlanders kept a strict caste order of farmers and artisan clans and were known for weaving and enset cultivation.