Murle people

The Murle are a Nilotic ethnic group inhabiting the Pibor County and Boma area in Jonglei State, South Sudan, as well as parts of southwestern Ethiopia. They have also been referred as Beir by the Dinka and as Ajebe by the Luo and Nuer, among others. The Murle speak the Murle language, which is part of the Surmic branch of the Nilo-Saharan family. The language cluster includes some adjoining groups in Sudan, as well as some non-contiguous Nilotic populations in southwestern Ethiopia.

Murle in most cases practice a blend of animism and Christianity. Elders and witches often function as trouble fixers. But they are pastoralists in a country where localized and unpredictable shortages occur in rain, drinking water, bush fruits and cattle grass. This necessitates a partly nomadic lifestyle over large distances. As a result, in times of shortages they have frequently come into conflict with numerically larger groups, including the Dinka and Nuer.

The Murle (like the Dinka and Nuer) have a tradition in which men can only marry when they pay a bride wealth of several dozens of cows. Education and jobs are almost absent and there are very few possibilities to earn money by producing for domestic or foreign markets. As a result, the only way to acquire cows for marriage, quicker than through breeding them, is by stealing. With roads absent and normal policing almost impossible in a vast territory, Murle, Dinka and Nuer raid each other equally, unlike the more widespread notion by the Dinka and Nuer in the Government that only the Murle are the offenders.[no cite, and the contrary has been held true by at least one anthropologist who has studied the Murle]

The Murle have a historical traditional of migrating over the years in a clockwise direction around Lake Turkana (Arensen 1983). In the 1930s, they negotiated small pockets of 'homeland' in Pibor, where they are always allowed to graze their cattle and grow crops, even when in conflict with neighbors. This homeland is far too small for their survival, so they have a common interest in maintaining peace with Dinka and Nuer so that they can graze their cattle over wider areas. But the small size of their homeland and the near absence of police protection make them very vulnerable when conflicts do occur. When doubts arise that there will be peace and sufficient water and grazing rights, survival instincts align with 'bride hunger', sometimes driving the young men into risky cattle rustling adventures against their larger neighbors.

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Wikipedia