Ethiopian evil eye belief and the magical symbolism of iron working

Whilst undertaking an archaeological survey in the area around the northern Ethiopian town of Aksum in late 1995 I spotted what appeared to be an obvious short cut on our map. Suggesting to my Ethiopian colleague that we could take this route, he dismissed me with the statement: “we cannot go through that village. They are all Buda there.” What, I asked, was the Buda? The answer came back that these people were variously mad, dangerous, strange, outcast and had the power of the evil eye; they would be liable to curse us. This was not the first time that I had come across such a belief; it was well known in the town itself that many of the artisans engaged in metalworking possessed the power of the evil eye, and walking past green pea fields, what I had mistaken to be simple scarecrows (pieces of rag and plastic tied to poles) actually turned out to be amulets protecting the crop from those with the power to blast it.