The History of Teff Cultivation in Eritrea for Injera and the Ethiopian Propaganda Claiming That Injera Is Only Ethiopian Food Not Eritrean

The History of Teff Cultivation in Eritrea for Injera and the Ethiopian Propaganda Claiming That Injera Is Only Ethiopian Food Not Eritrean

Teff has been cultivated for thousands of years in Eritrea. Teff is used to produce injera.

The earliest archaeological evidence of teff (a single domesticated caryopsis) in Eritrea has been found at the Mai Chiot (also spelled Mai Chohot or May Chohot) site near Asmara in a sealed deposit associated with the fourth century BC (Late Pre Aksumite or Ancient Ona culture period).

Injera (or tayta in Tigrinya) has long been part of Eritrean cuisine as teff cultivation and flatbread traditions in the northern Horn of Africa highlands date back well over two millennia. However the precise form of modern fermented injera and associated griddles is more securely attested from later periods (for example possible griddle evidence from around the 6th century AD in Aksumite contexts).

Some Ethiopian nationalists spread the claim that injera is only Ethiopian food and not Eritrean arguing that Ethiopia predates Eritrea (although modern African states including Ethiopia in its present form were shaped by 19th century expansions and colonial era borders). They also sometimes claim Ethiopia has the oldest teff cultivation in Africa.

That claim is highly debated and not supported as exclusive. Eritrea has early secure evidence of domesticated teff at Mai Chiot dating to the 4th century BC. The Amhara region of Ethiopia is also associated with ancient cultivation according to some Ethiopian sources. Sites in the Gulo Makeda area (Eastern Tigray near the Eritrean border) and related Pre Aksumite contexts in northern Ethiopia (such as Mezber) provide evidence of early plant husbandry with microbotanical indications of tef or Chloridoideae grasses possibly from as early as about 1600 BC (though domesticated status is often tentative) and clearer macrobotanical evidence later.

Whatever the precise ranking of the earliest finds teff cultivation sites in Eritrea Tigray and Amhara regions of Ethiopia are more than 2000 years old. This means teff and injera related food traditions have been shared across these highland areas for over two millennia making them equally part of Eritrean and Ethiopian food culture.

Similar vegetation and climate make sense of why the same plants grow in the Eritrean and Ethiopian highlands. It is not reasonable to claim that teff grows only in Ethiopia or that injera is exclusively Ethiopian.

Let us approach each others history accurately: injera is Eritrean food and it is Ethiopian food.

Eritrea has an ancient teff cultivation site at Mai Chiot dating to the 4th century BC (about 2400 years old). Tigray and Amhara regions of Ethiopia also have ancient teff related cultivation evidence from Pre Aksumite and later periods.

Sources and Notes

1. DAndrea et al. (2008b) and subsequent reviews (for example The development of crop production in the northern Horn of Africa 2024): single secure domesticated Eragrostis tef caryopsis from Mai Chiot Asmara region Eritrea associated with 4th century BC deposits. Site dates broadly fall within about 1400 to 200 cal BC range.
2. Mezber site (Gulo Makeda Eastern Tigray Ethiopia) and related Pre Aksumite work (DAndrea and colleagues; Ruiz Giralt et al.): earliest plant husbandry evidence in the northern highlands from about 1600 cal BC onward (mainly Southwest Asian crops initially; microbotanical signals of Chloridoideae or tef type grasses present with domesticated status of early tef often described as tentative).
3. Broader consensus: Teff (Eragrostis tef) is native to the northern highlands of Ethiopia and Eritrea (Northern Highlands of Ethiopia and Eritrea or NHE). Domestication is generally placed between about 4000 to 1000 BC on linguistic or genetic grounds but direct archaeobotanical confirmation of domesticated grains begins in the 1st millennium BC. Genomic studies point to the northern highlands (often emphasizing Tigray) as a key domestication center.
4. Injera is widely recognized as a staple shared by Ethiopian and Eritrean cuisines (Tigrinya: tayta). Griddle (mitad or magogo) evidence appears in Aksumite contexts from roughly the 6th century AD; earlier flatbread traditions likely existed.
5. Modern political borders of both countries are recent relative to the multi millennial shared highland agricultural and culinary history.