A little less than a thousand years before Christ, Ethiopians say, the Queen of Sheba came to visit King Solomon of the Jews. That much is in the Bible. But they go on to say that she had a son by him, named Menelik, who became king of Ethiopia, ruling from the city of Axum. He brought the Ark of the Covenant with him.
However much of that is true, we do know that people crossed the Red Sea from Sheba in Arabia and founded what we know as Ethiopia. And Axum did become the seat of an empire, one that grew rich from trade going through the Red Sea between India and the Mediterranean. As for the Ark, they say it is still there in Axum.
Axum reached the height of its power between the years 300 and 600. In 330 King Ezana became an Orthodox Christian and made it the religion of Axum. In the 600s Axum held out against the Arab Empire and the spread of Islam. But right after that Ethiopia sank into a dark age for 500 years.
In 1137 the Zagwe kings came to power. One of them, Lalibela, built 11 churches cut right into the rock at his capital.
In 1270 Yekuno Amlak overthrew the Zagwe kings and made himself king. He said his family goes back to King Solomon, so his line of kings is called the Solomonid. It ruled Ethiopia till 1974.
In the 1500s the Portuguese tried to bring Ethiopia over to Roman Catholicism. In 1622 the emperor himself, Susenyos, became Catholic. That led to a civil war between Catholics and the Orthodox. When his son Fasilidas took over he shut the country off from Westerners. He moved the capital to Gondar. There he built his palace and a beautiful church.
In the late 1800s Menelik II brought in Western inventions and took over neighbouring countries to bring Ethiopia to its present size. In 1896 he defeated the Italians at the Battle of Adowa. It saved Ethiopia from becoming a European colony during the Scramble for Africa.
The Italians came back and won in 1936, with the help of poison gas, but were thrown out in 1941.
In 1974 Marxists called the Derg overthrew Haile Sellasie, the last emperor. They killed thousands in the Red Terror soon after. The country sank into civil war and famine. Over a million died. The Derg hung on to power with help from the Russians and Cubans. They were overthrown at last in 1991 by the freedom fighters of Tigray, who still rule the country.
Eritrea broke away at that time, but without agreeing on its border with Ethiopia. That led to war in 1998 in which 80,000 died. Peace was made in 2000 but still without a clear border.
In 2006 Ethiopia sent troops into Somalia to overthrow the Islamists there who threatend a holy war. In 2009 they completed pulling out their troops, but now they seem to be back there again.
– Abagond, 2009.
See also:
Agabond, thanks for this series of very interesting posts.
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Thanks for your comment. Sometimes I feel like I am boring people, but then sometimes I just have to write what I write, like it has to get out for some reason.
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Here is a short history of Islam in Ethiopia, might be of interest to the readers:
http://loga-abdullah.blogspot.com/2010/04/ethiopia-abyssinia-or-al-habasha.html
All the best.
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I was having a conversation with a friend, discussing the Horn of Africa. Some years ago, I worked in a department that was very diverse and multicultural. I observed that the Ethiopians,and Somalians and Eritrians seemed to all stick together. They did not socialize outside of their group. I also was reading about African nations that resisted Europeans, Only one African nation successfully resisted the Europeans, that was Ethiopia. They smashed the invading Italian army of 17,000 at the baBattle of Adowa in 1896. Ethiopia was the only independent native African nation left.
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There is a beautiful Ethiopian restautrant in my city called the “Queen of Sheba” it is very elegant. They use some type of bread for eating utensils, I perused the menu. I think I will treat myself to different cultures and observe. I always admired the grace and beauty of these people. Of all the people in the African diaspora, and there are many beautiful people. But the Ethiopian people have beautiful physical features.
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“There is a beautiful Ethiopian restautrant in my city called the “Queen of Sheba” it is very elegant. They use some type of bread for eating utensils, I perused the menu.”
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That bread is called “injera”. The most favored type of flour for making injera comes from a tiny grain called ‘teff’.
I’ve only had it once, and that was some years ago. As I recall, it was a flatbread, spongy in texture and a bit sour in taste. I remember not caring for the sour aspect of it, but YMMV.
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” In 1896 he defeated the Italians at the Battle of Adwa. It was the first time a black army had defeated a white one. It saved Ethiopia from becoming a European colony.”
Nonsense, the battle of Vertières resulted in the defeat of Napoleon’s army 92 years, 3 months, 12 days before Adwa. The British invasion of St-Domingue was forced to quit the island in 1798 and the Spanish side taken over by T. Louverture and slavery abolished there in 1801. Prior to Adwa, three white armies were defeated by a black one.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Verti%C3%A8res
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Adwa
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The wikipedia articles are full of nonsense such as calling the forces under Louverture “Haitians” or a “slave army” because slavery had been abolished 10 years prior to the event and “Haiti” was created after the event. The struggle was over the re-establishment of slavery.
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@ gro jo
I updated the post. Thank you. I do not know what possessed me to write that.
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Very interesting summary on Ethiopian history. Sometimes I feel that this particular piece of history is often overlooked and underrated in the West. When it comes to civilisations or precolonial African history I am often surprised that Ethiopia barely gets a mention or any detailed analysis. The excuse often used for why precolonial civilisations don’t get enough study is that there are few written records or the infrastructure was destroyed leaving very little material history to go on. But Ethiopia has many written records and a huge material culture to work from in terms of historical analysis. Yet suspiciously enough (not surprising though), the country and its people are left out of the mainstream of significant civilisations/empires…
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“…I do not know what possessed me to write that.” Maybe you meant to write that it was the first time a white army surrendered to a black one. When the French lost at Vertières they were allowed to surrender to the British who evacuated and interned them.
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https://herneith.d.pr/61flqe
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@ Herneith
Wow! We will “loan” you your stolen goods if you ask nicely.
And Black people are labeled thieves by this bunch…..
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That’s about it.
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https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/ethiopia-artefacts-uk-victoria-albert-museum-tristram-hunt-battle-of-maqdala-a8320121.html?S2ref=1908758
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