Plot otwistnwa e Luo dress kanyo because the sad reality is: there is no Luo dress.
We Luos were a nudist society and so the closest we came to a ‘traditional’ dressing was the “omethe”, with a variation for women.
ES Atieno Odhiambo has written at length on this issue.
The Luo society that emerged from nudity and nakedness saw themselves as emerging not from a culture, but from an economic pathology. This was thus the historic battle between “jonanga” and “jokoyo”, for the future.
Jonanga were those who wore the loincloth, which progressed as colonialism and christianity tore through Luo society, shaking its core.
Jokoyo were those who maintained a largely nudist lifestyle.
The Yoruba agbada is a bold, flowing wear; it is — sadly — the complete opposite of what a Luo traditional dress would have been.
The amount of fabric used to make/tailor one agbada would knit more than one hundred omethes.
Before you blame the Luo for their nakedness you must understand that by the arrival of colonialism, we occupied one of the warmest places in the hinterland, along a bountiful bank of Nam Lolwe.
How can one wear “omethe” to his in-laws, in 2025? Because the alternative is duk thirith.
Below pics of Luos in the 1900s.
