(Cushitic) inhabitants — as Po-pa-li.Nagendra Kr Singh, International encyclopaedia of Islamic dynasties, (Anmol Publications PVT. LTD., 2002), p. 524. The first clear written reference of the sobriquet Somali dates back to the early 15th century CE during the reign of Ethiopian Emperor Yeshaq I who had one of his court officials compose a hymn celebrating a military victory over the Sultanate of Ifat. Simur was also an ancient Harari alias for the Somali people. Somalis overwhelmingly prefer the demonym Somali over the incorrect Somalian since the former is an endonym, while the latter is an exonym with double suffixes. The hypernym of the term Somali from a geopolitical sense is Horner and from an ethnic sense, it is Cushite. History The origin of the Somali people which were previously theorized to have been from Southern Ethiopia since 1000 BC or from the Arabian peninsula in the eleventh century has now been overturned by newer archeological and linguistic studies which puts the original homeland of the Somali people in Somaliland, which concludes that the Somalis are the indigenous inhabitants of the Horn of Africa for the last 7000 years. Ancient rock paintings, which date back 5000 years (estimated), have been found in Somaliland. These engravings depict early life in the territory. The most famous of these is the Laas Geel complex. It contains some of the earliest known rock art on the African continent and features many elaborate pastoralist sketches of animal and human figures. In other places, such as the Dhambalin region, a depiction of a man on a horse is postulated as being one of the earliest known examples of a mounted huntsman. Inscriptions have been found beneath many of the rock paintings, but archaeologists have so far been unable to decipher this form of ancient writing. During the Stone Age, the Doian and Hargeisan cultures flourished here with their respective industries and factories. The oldest evidence of burial customs in the Horn of Africa comes from cemeteries in Somalia dating back to 4th millennium BC. The stone implements from the Jalelo site in Somalia are said to be the most important link in evidence of the universality in palaeolithic times between the East and the West. In antiquity, the ancestors of the Somali people were an important link in the Horn of Africa connecting the region's commerce with the rest of the ancient world. Somali sailors and merchants