page_title: Feud
section_title: Feuds in modern times
hierarchical_section_title: Feud / Blood feuds / Feuds in modern times
caption_attribution_description: Shots depicting the Lower Valley of the Omo River, UNESCO World Heritage Site, and inhabitants of Southern Ethiopia.
context_page_description: A feud, referred to in more extreme cases as a blood feud, vendetta, faida, clan war, gang war, or private war, is a long-running argument or fight, often between social groups of people, especially families or clans. Feuds begin because one party perceives itself to have been attacked, insulted, wronged, or otherwise injured by another. Intense feelings of resentment trigger the initial retribution, which causes the other party to feel equally aggrieved and vengeful. The dispute is subsequently fuelled by a long-running cycle of retaliatory violence. This continual cycle of provocation and retaliation makes it extremely difficult to end the feud peacefully. Feuds frequently involve the original parties' family members or associates, can last for generations, and may result in extreme acts of violence. They can be interpreted as an extreme outgrowth of social relations based in family honor.
  Until the early modern period, feuds were considered legitimate legal instruments and were regulated to some degree. For example, Montenegrin culture calls this krvna osveta, meaning "blood revenge", which had unspoken but highly valued rules.
context_section_description: Blood feuds are still practised in some areas in:
  France (especially Corsica and within Manush communities)
  in Sardinia where a blood feud is called in the local language "Disamistade".
  Ireland (especially Dublin and Limerick)
  In Northern Ireland between Irish republican and Ulster loyalism communities; particularly during The Troubles
  Southern Italy (especially Sicily, Campania, Calabria, Apulia and other areas of the same territory)
  Greece (Mani and Crete)
  Between White British, British Asian or Black British working-class families, crime groups and clans throughout the British Isles. Feuds amongst Traveller clans are also relatively common throughout the British Isles. Multiple diaspora communities also partake in feuding, such as Turkish and Kurdish communities.
  Between rival crime families in Galicia, Spain
  Between so-called woonwagenbewoners (ethnic Dutch people who live in mobile homes) in the Netherlands
  Among Kurdish and Turkish clans in Turkey (as well as between Kurdish clans in Iraq and Iran)
  Between Turkish Cypriots
  Between rival clans in northern Albania and Kosovo
  Between Canadian Aboriginal tribes
  Among Pashtuns in Afghanistan
  Among Tribes of Montenegro
  Among Somali clans
  Among the Berbers of Algeria and Morocco
  Between Yoruba and Igbo clans over land in Nigeria
  Between clans in India and between rival tribes in the north-east Indian state of Assam
  Among Sikh clans in Punjab
  Between Mirpuri clans in Azad Kashmir (as well as between British Pakistanis of Mirpuri descent in England)
  Among rival clans in China, and especially in Fujian and Guangdong provinces
  In the Philippines (especially in Mindanao between Muslim Moro and Christian Cebuano clans)
  Between Burakumin clans in Japan
  In the lawless Wa territories of northern Burma
  Among the Arab Bedouins and other Arab tribes inhabiting the mountains of Yemen
  Between Shiites and Sunnis in Iraq
  Among Palestinian clans in Gaza
  Between Maronite clans, and between Shiites and Sunnis, in Lebanon
  Between Mhallami clans in Lebanon
  In southern Ethiopia
  Among the highland tribes of New Guinea
  In Svaneti, in Georgia (especially between Svan clans)
  In the mountainous areas of Dagestan
  Between Kyrgyz and Uzbek clans
  Between Yazidi clans in Armenia and Azerbaijan
  In republics of the northern Caucasus such as Chechnya and Ingushetia
  Among Chechen teips where those seeking retribution do not accept or respect the local law enforcement authority
  Blood feuds within Russian communities do exist (mostly related to criminal gangs), but are neither as common nor as pervasive as they are in the Caucasus. In the United States, blood feuds are also not as pervasive or common, but do exist within the African-American and Chicano communities (sometimes gang-related, but not necessarily). 
  Gang warfare also often takes the form of blood feuds. African-American, Cambodian, Cuban Marielito, Dominican, Guatemalan, Haitian, Hmong, Sino-Vietnamese Hoa, Jamaican, Korean, Laotian, Puerto Rican, Salvadoran and Vietnamese gang fights in the United States, as well as Colombian, Mexican and Brazilian gang and paramilitary wars, Cape Coloured turf wars in South Africa, Dutch Antillean, Surinamese and Moluccan gang fights in the Netherlands, and Scottish, White British, Black and Mixed British criminal feuds in the UK, very often have taken the form of blood feuds where a family member in the gang is killed and a relative takes revenge by killing the murderer as well as other members of the rival gang. This has resulted in gun violence and murders in cities like Chicago, Detroit, Los Angeles, Miami, Ciudad Juarez, Medellin, Rio de Janeiro, Cape Town, Amsterdam, London, Liverpool, and Glasgow, to name just a few.
  Blood feuds also have a long history within the White Southern population of the U.S., where it is called the "culture of honor", and still exists to the present day.
caption: An armed man of the Karo tribe of Ethiopia
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