Can anyone recognize this language or what it means

[Sharyn]

I bought this scarf as part of a lot in an online estate auction. The previous owner was a minister and had a number of items from Africa. He was of African decent as well.

I’ve tried Google translate, googled different African languages, checked with Arabic as well, and I can’t figure it out. Does anyone have any ideas?

https://imgur.com/a/mYJxnRc

[Ryanne]

Uganda or Angola are African countries with those colors in their flags.
https://www.joaoleitao.com/geography/flags-africa/

[Ryanne]

although those are also Pan African colors, so could be any number of nations–

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pan-African_colours

[Antique Frog]

The script’s probably Amharic, though the colours aren’t in the flags of Eritrea or Ethiopia.

[almasty]

It looks similar to the Ge’ez script? Ethiopian?

[Sharyn]

Thanks for all these ideas. I have some work to do.

[Antique Frog]

First part says “Fitejomi” according to the chart on the Wiki page. It appears Ge’ez script is a way of writing Amharic. At least you know how old the scarf is!

[Sharyn]

I tried working with Google Translate using Amharic to English. Their little keyboard didn’t have all the letters shown on the scarf. Using the closest that I could figure out, I came up with this:

አትድዊኢንግም 2000

maybe this link will work as well:
https://translate.google.com/#view=home&op=translate&sl=am&tl=en&text=%E1%8A%A0%E1%89%B5%E1%8B%B5%E1%8B%8A%E1%8A%A2%E1%8A%95%E1%8C%8D%E1%88%9D%202000

What it translated to was “Adjustment 2000”. I don’t think that I would use this translation in my listing, but I think I can at least say that it is Amharic or similar. It probably is related to the year 2000.

[Antique Frog]

Using the Wiki table and Google translate, it gave “Ethiominimian” (don’t know how I came up with “fitejoni”!) Anyway, the first part [ኢትዮሚ] is “Ethioc” (checked against Ethiomedia’s name on their web page) as in ‘being Ethiopian’. No idea about the second part- Google suggests “Kenyan”.

[Antique Frog]

Whole phrase is ኢትዮሚኪኒየም.

[Sharyn]

Looks like the Wiki table had more of the letters than the Google translate keyboard. A number of the letters look similar, so there might be one or two that aren’t exactly correct.

I’ll use “Ethiopia 2000” as key words. The buyer will need to know what it means.

I really appreciate your help with this!

[Sharyn]

I listed it using what descriptive words I could. Picked a price of $22 out of thin air.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/183817675545

[Antique Frog]

Oh, it’s green, yellow and red! Looked black on my monitor. The colours of Rastafarianism, which has a settlement in Shashamane Ethiopia since 1948. That’ll sell!

Used to be a Rasta house at the end of my street. The men wore long robes, carried long staffs and had their dreadlocks in two-foot high woolly hats.

[Sharyn]

Those are also the color of Ethiopia’s flag, and I think many other African countries.

Rastafarians certainly have a unique look!

[Author]

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