The
Agaw (
Ge'ezGe'ez , also called Ethiopic, is an abugida script that was originally developed to write Ge'ez, now the liturgical language of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church...
አገው
Agaw, modern
Agew) are a people of
EthiopiaEthiopia , officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country situated in the Horn of Africa. Ethiopia is bordered by Eritrea to the north, Sudan to the west, Kenya to the south, Somalia to the east and Djibouti to the northeast. Its size is 1,100,000 km² with an...
and neighboring
EritreaEritrea , officially the State of Eritrea, is a country in the Horn of Africa. It is bordered by Sudan in the west, Ethiopia in the south, and Djibouti in the southeast. The east and northeast of the country have an extensive coastline on the Red Sea, directly across from Saudi Arabia and Yemen...
. They are primarily bilingual, speaking both Agaw languages (a subgroup of the Cushitic languages), as well as
AmharicAmharic is a Semitic language spoken in North Central Ethiopia by the Amhara. It is the second most-spoken Semitic language in the world, after Arabic, and the official working language of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia. Thus, it has official status and is used nationwide...
,
TigrinyaTigrinya , also spelled Tigrigna, Tigrina, Tigriña, less commonly Tigrinian, Tigrinyan, is a Semitic language spoken by the Tigray-Tigrinya people in central Eritrea , where it is one of the two dominant languages of Eritrea, and in the Tigray Region of Ethiopia Tigrinya ( ትግርኛ, tigriññā), also...
or
TigreFor other uses please see Tigre Tigre is a Semitic language which along with Tigrinya is a direct descendant of the extinct Ge'ez language...
.
The Agaw are perhaps first mentioned in the 3rd c. AD
Aksumite inscriptionThe Monumentum Adulitanum was an ancient Adulite inscription in Greek and Ge'ez depicting the military campaigns of an Adulite king. Though the inscription and the monument have never been located by archaeologists we know about it through the copying of the inscription by Cosmas Indicopleustes, a...
recorded by
Cosmas IndicopleustesCosmas Indicopleustes of Alexandria was a Greek merchant and later monk probably of Nestorian tendencies. He was a 6th century traveller, who made several voyages to India during the reign of emperor Justinian. His Topografia Christiana contained some of the earliest and most famous world maps...
in the 6th century. The inscription refers to a people called "Athagaus" (or Athagaous), perhaps from ʿAd Agaw, meaning "sons of Agaw."
[Herausgegeben von Uhlig, Siegbert.
]
The
Agaw (
Ge'ezGe'ez , also called Ethiopic, is an abugida script that was originally developed to write Ge'ez, now the liturgical language of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church...
አገው
Agaw, modern
Agew) are a people of
EthiopiaEthiopia , officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country situated in the Horn of Africa. Ethiopia is bordered by Eritrea to the north, Sudan to the west, Kenya to the south, Somalia to the east and Djibouti to the northeast. Its size is 1,100,000 km² with an...
and neighboring
EritreaEritrea , officially the State of Eritrea, is a country in the Horn of Africa. It is bordered by Sudan in the west, Ethiopia in the south, and Djibouti in the southeast. The east and northeast of the country have an extensive coastline on the Red Sea, directly across from Saudi Arabia and Yemen...
. They are primarily bilingual, speaking both Agaw languages (a subgroup of the Cushitic languages), as well as
AmharicAmharic is a Semitic language spoken in North Central Ethiopia by the Amhara. It is the second most-spoken Semitic language in the world, after Arabic, and the official working language of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia. Thus, it has official status and is used nationwide...
,
TigrinyaTigrinya , also spelled Tigrigna, Tigrina, Tigriña, less commonly Tigrinian, Tigrinyan, is a Semitic language spoken by the Tigray-Tigrinya people in central Eritrea , where it is one of the two dominant languages of Eritrea, and in the Tigray Region of Ethiopia Tigrinya ( ትግርኛ, tigriññā), also...
or
TigreFor other uses please see Tigre Tigre is a Semitic language which along with Tigrinya is a direct descendant of the extinct Ge'ez language...
.
History
The Agaw are perhaps first mentioned in the 3rd c. AD
Aksumite inscriptionThe Monumentum Adulitanum was an ancient Adulite inscription in Greek and Ge'ez depicting the military campaigns of an Adulite king. Though the inscription and the monument have never been located by archaeologists we know about it through the copying of the inscription by Cosmas Indicopleustes, a...
recorded by
Cosmas IndicopleustesCosmas Indicopleustes of Alexandria was a Greek merchant and later monk probably of Nestorian tendencies. He was a 6th century traveller, who made several voyages to India during the reign of emperor Justinian. His Topografia Christiana contained some of the earliest and most famous world maps...
in the 6th century. The inscription refers to a people called "Athagaus" (or Athagaous), perhaps from ʿAd Agaw, meaning "sons of Agaw."
[Herausgegeben von Uhlig, Siegbert. Encyclopaedia: A-C. pp. 142.] The Athagaous first turn up as one of the peoples conquered the unknown king who inscribed the
Monumentum AdulitanumThe Monumentum Adulitanum was an ancient Adulite inscription in Greek and Ge'ez depicting the military campaigns of an Adulite king. Though the inscription and the monument have never been located by archaeologists we know about it through the copying of the inscription by Cosmas Indicopleustes, a...
. The Agaw are later mentioned in an inscription of the 4th c. Aksumite King Ezana and 6th. c. King
KalebKaleb is perhaps the best-documented, if not best-known, king of Axum. Procopius of Caesarea calls him "Hellestheaeus", a variant of his throne name Ella Atsbeha or Ella Asbeha . On both his coins and inscriptions he left at Axum, as well as Ethiopian hagiographical sources and king lists, he...
. Based on this evidence, a number of experts embrace a theory first stated by
Edward UllendorffEdward Ullendorff is a British academic, and an authority on Semitic languages and Ethiopia. He is now Professor Emeritus at SOAS, where he was Professor of Ethiopian Studies and then of Semitic Languages....
and Carlo Conti-Rossini that they are the original inhabitants of much of the northern
Ethiopian highlandsThe Ethiopian Highlands are a rugged mass of mountains in Ethiopia, Eritrea , and northern Somalia in the Horn of Africa...
, and were either forced out of their original settlements or assimilated by
Semitic-speakingThe Semitic languages are a group of related languages whose living representatives are spoken by more than 467 million people across much of the Middle East, North Africa and the Horn of Africa...
Tigray-TigrinyaThe Tigray-Tigrinya are an ethnic group who live in the southern, central and northern parts of Eritrea and the northern highlands of Ethiopia's Tigray province. A few also live in Ethiopia's former provinces of Begemder and Wollo, which are today mostly part of Amhara Region, though a few regions ...
and
Amhara peopleThe Amhara are an ethnic group in the central highlands of Ethiopia. Numbering about 19.8 million people, they comprise 26 percent of the country's population, according to the 2007 national census...
s . Cosmas Indicopleustes also noted in his
Christian TopographyThe Christian Topography is a 6th century work originally written as five books by an author known as Cosmas Indicopleustes and expanded to ten to twelve books around 550 A.D. It is not known whether the word "Cosmas" is part of the real name of the author or a reference to the main topic of the...
that a major gold trade route passed through the region "Agau". The area referred to seems to be referring to an area "east of the
Tekezé RiverThe Tekezé River is a major river of Ethiopia, and forms a section the westernmost border of Ethiopia and Eritrea for part of its course. The river is also known as the Setit in Eritrea, western Ethiopia, and eastern Sudan. According to the Statistical Abstract of Ethiopia for 1967/68, the Tekezé...
and just south of the
Semien MountainsThe Semien Mountains lie in northern Ethiopia, north east of Gondar. They are a World Heritage Site and include the Semien Mountains National Park. The mountains consist of plateaux separated by valleys and rising to pinnacles...
, perhaps around
Lake TanaLake Tana is the source of the Blue Nile and is the largest lake in Ethiopia...
. They currently exist in a number of scattered enclaves, which include the
BilenThe Bilen, Blin or Bilin are an ethnic group of south-central Eritrea, in and around the city of Keren, and south toward Asmara, the nation's capital....
in and around
KerenKeren is the second largest city in Eritrea, lying north west of Asmara. It is the capital of the Anseba province and home of the Bilen tribe. As of 2005, the population of this city has been estimated to be 86,483.The city is integrated with different types of tribes, Bilen and Tigre are the...
in
EritreaEritrea , officially the State of Eritrea, is a country in the Horn of Africa. It is bordered by Sudan in the west, Ethiopia in the south, and Djibouti in the southeast. The east and northeast of the country have an extensive coastline on the Red Sea, directly across from Saudi Arabia and Yemen...
; the
QemantThe Qemant are a small ethnic group in Ethiopia, who, despite their close historical and ethnic relationship, should not be confused with the Beta Israel....
and the
QwaraQwara may refer to:*Qwara province in Ethiopia*Qwara language*Qwara , a district in the approximate location as the province...
, who live around
GondarGondar or Gonder is a city in Ethiopia, which was once the old imperial capital and capital of the historic Begemder province. As a result, the old province of Begemder is sometimes referred to as Gondar...
in the
Semien Gondar ZoneSemien Gondar is a Zone in the Ethiopian Amhara Region. This Zone is named for the city of Gondar, the capital of Ethiopia until the mid-19th century, which has often been used as a name for the 20th century province of Begemder....
of the
Amhara RegionAmhara is one of the nine ethnic divisions of Ethiopia, containing the homeland of the Amhara people. Previously known as Region 3, its capital is Bahir Dar....
, west of the Tekezé River and north of Lake Tana; a number of Agaw live south of Lake Tana, around
DangilaDangila is a town in northwestern Ethiopia. Located in the Agew Awi Zone of the Amhara Region, this town has a latitude and longitude of with an elevation of 2137 meters above sea level. It is the largest of three towns in Dangila woreda.- History :...
in the
Agew Awi ZoneAgew Awi is one of 10 Zones in the Amhara Region of Ethiopia. Agew Awi is named for the Awi sub-group of the Agaw people, some of whom live in this Zone. Agew Awi is bordered on the south by the Oromia Region, on the west by Benishangul-Gumuz Region, on the north-west by Semien Gondar Zone and on...
of the Amhara Region; and another group live around Sokota in the former province of
WolloWollo was a historical region and province in the northeastern part of Ethiopia, with its capital city at Dessie. The province was named after the Wollo Oromo, who settled in this part of Ethiopia in the 17th century...
, now part of the Amhara province, along its border with the
Tigray RegionTigray Region is the northernmost of the nine ethnic regions of Ethiopia containing the homeland of the Tigray people. It was formerly known as Region 1...
.
The Cushitic speaking Agaw people ruled during the Zagwe dynasty of Ethiopia from about 1137 to 1270. The name of the dynasty itself came from the Ge'ez phrase Ze-Agaw, meaning "of Agaw" and refer to the Agaw people.
Also included in this ethnic grouping are the
Beta IsraelBeta Israel is the Historical name of Jewish community from Ethiopia, but with most now living in Israel. They are also known as Falasha by non-Jewish Ethiopians, but the Jews consider the term derogatory...
, who formerly lived in the northern Amhara region with the Qemant and Qwara, but in the late 1990s nearly all of this group had emigrated to
IsraelIsrael officially the State of Israel , is a developed state in Western Asia located on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea. It borders Lebanon in the north, Syria in the northeast, Jordan in the east, and Egypt on the southwest, and contains geographically diverse features within its...
.
Subgroups
- The Northern Agaw are known as Bilen
The Bilen, Blin or Bilin are an ethnic group of south-central Eritrea, in and around the city of Keren, and south toward Asmara, the nation's capital....
, cap. KerenKeren is the second largest city in Eritrea, lying north west of Asmara. It is the capital of the Anseba province and home of the Bilen tribe. As of 2005, the population of this city has been estimated to be 86,483.The city is integrated with different types of tribes, Bilen and Tigre are the...
- The Western Agaw are known as Qemant
The Qemant are a small ethnic group in Ethiopia, who, despite their close historical and ethnic relationship, should not be confused with the Beta Israel....
, cap. GondarGondar or Gonder is a city in Ethiopia, which was once the old imperial capital and capital of the historic Begemder province. As a result, the old province of Begemder is sometimes referred to as Gondar...
- The Eastern Agaw are known as Xamta, cap. Soqota
Soqota is a town in northern Ethiopia. Located the Wag Hemra Zone of the Amhara Region, Soqota has a latitude and longitude of and an elevation of 2266 meters above sea level...
- The Southern Agaw are known as Awi
The Awi people are an ethnic group in Ethiopia, and are grouped as one of the Agaw people. The Awis live in Agew Awi Zone in Central Gojjam, and have a few communities in the Metekel Zone of the Benishangul-Gumuz Region.- Population :...
, cap. InjibaraInjibara is a town in Ethiopia. It is the administrative center of the Agew Awi Zone in the Amhara Region. Injibara is located at , in Banja Woreda at an elevation of 2560 meters above sea level....