Basket weaving is one of the oldest human crafts. Found throughout the centuries in numerous forms across countless cultures, peoples, and groups, woven baskets rank with pottery and textiles as among the first and most versatile objects to be created by human hands. In many African nations, as in other places around the world, there remain a wide variety of basket weaving traditions.
Just about anyone who's ever enjoyed Ethiopian cuisine at a restaurant specializing in the fare has probably encountered the mesob. This relatively tall, wide-bottomed basket is a mainstay of such establishments, bringing a touch of traditional culture to the dining experience. What makes the mesob unique is that its primary function is not to hold food for storage, but to act as a dining surface for people to eat from. The other outstanding feature of these baskets is the amazing color palettes and mesmerizing patterns woven into each piece. But like most global objects with a long history, the mesob can do so much more than what it shows on the surface. It can also tell you things about the place and time that it comes from, the evolutions that it's gone through and even the ways that people have changed along the way.
Although they are generally described as Ethiopian, Mesob baskets belong to a larger tradition of Harari basket weaving which in turn belongs to a smaller geographical region—the walled city of Harar in eastern Ethiopia.The founding of the city itself is somewhat harder to date. Through it all, the city remained a vital center of commerce, linking trade routes between Ethiopia, the Horn of Africa and the Arabian Peninsula with viable ports promising trade with far more distant locations.
