The term
Habesha (
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...
ሐበሻ
ḥabaśā,
Amh.Amharic 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...
hābešā,
Tgn.Tigrinya , 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...
,
ḥābešā; sometimes Amh.
Abesha, አበሻ
`ābešā;
Arabic.Arabic is a Central Semitic language, thus related to and classified alongside other Semitic languages such as Hebrew and the Neo-Aramaic languages. In terms of speakers, the Arabic macrolanguage is the largest member of the Semitic language family. It is spoken by more than 280 million people as...
al-ḥabašah الحبشة) refers to a
South Semitic-speakingSouth Semitic is one of the three macro-classifications in Semitic linguistics, the other two being East Semitic and West Semitic . Semitic itself is considered a branch of the larger Afro-Asiatic language family found, as indicated in the name, both in Africa and Asia...
group of people whose cultural, linguistic, and in certain cases, ancestral origins trace back to the tribes of the Axumite (Habasha) and the Da'amat kingdom. Today they include the
AmharaThe 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...
and
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 ...
ethnic groups 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
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...
who are predominantly Orthodox Christians, and
have been since AD 332Tewahedo Church may refer to any of the following:* The Eritrean Orthodox Tewahdo Church* The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church...
. The Amhara and Tigray ethnicities combined make up about 36% of Ethiopia's population (ca. 23 million Amhara, 4.5 million Tigray) while Tigrinyas make up about half of Eritrea's population (ca. 2.25 of 4.5 million). However, a broader definition of this term may include some segments of the Semitic-speaking
GurageGurage is an ethnic group in Ethiopia. According to the 2007 national census, they number 1,867,377 people , of whom 792,659 are urban dwellers. The Gurage people inhabit a semi-fertile, semi-mountainous region in southwest Ethiopia, about 150 miles southwest of Addis Ababa...
groups (in the southwest) and the
HarariHarari may refer to:* The city of Harar in Ethiopia; "Harari" is an adjectival form of the noun .** Harari people of Ethiopia** Harari language* Harari Region in Ethiopia* Harari Rishon Model, named after Haim Harari...
(in the east/southeast), as well, because of their strong historical links to the Amhara and Tigray.
In the broadest sense, the word "Habesha" may refer to anyone from Ethiopia or Eritrea, while some would exclude themselves from this association.
Etymology
The modern term derives from the vocalized
Ge'ezGe'ez is an ancient South Semitic language that developed in the current region of Eritrea and northern Ethiopia in the Horn of Africa...
ሐበሣ (
ḥabaśā), first written unvocalized as ሐበሠ (
ḥbś, but probably pronounced
ḥbs) or the "pseudo-Sabaic
ḥbštm". The earliest known use of the term dates to the second or third century AD
South ArabianThe Sabaeans or Sabæans were an ancient people speaking an Old South Arabian language who lived in what is today Yemen, in south west Arabian Peninsula. Some Sabaeans also lived in D'mt, located in northern Ethiopia and Eritrea, due to their hegemony over the Red Sea.-History:The ancient Sabaean...
inscriptionThe ancient South Arabian alphabet branched from the Proto-Sinaitic alphabet in about the 9th century BC. It was used for writing the Yemeni Old South Arabic languages of the Sabaean, Qatabanian, Hadrami , Minaean, Himyarite, and proto-Ge'ez in Dʿmt...
, recounting to the defeat of the Aksumite
king- Kings during the zenith of the Kingdom of Axum :The following based on S.C. Munro-Hay, Aksum , pp. 67f- Later Kings :...
(
negus)
GDRTGDRT was a king of the Ethiopian Kingdom of Aksum , known for being the first king to involve Axum in the affairs of what is now Yemen. He is known primarily from inscriptions in South Arabia that mention him and his son BYGT...
(vocalized
Gadarat or
Gedara) of Aksum and HBSHT. The term "Habashat" seems to refer to a group of peoples, however, rather than a specific ethnicity, as evidenced by a Sabaean inscription about the alliance between the
HimyarThe Himyarite Kingdom or Himyar , anciently called Homerite Kingdom by the Greeks and the Romans, was a state in ancient Yemen dating from 110 BC Taking the modern date city of Sanaa as its capital after the ancient city of Zafar...
ite king Shamir Yuhahmid and Aksum under King
`DBH`DBH [vocalized as `Azaba or `Adhebah] was a king of Axum, on the territory of modern-day Ethiopia, who ruled c. 230–240...
in the first quarter of the 3rd century AD. They have been living alongside the Sabaeans who lived across the Red Sea from them for many centuries:
Shamir of Dhu-Raydan and Himyar had called in the help of the clans of Habashat for war against the kings of Saba; but Ilmuqah granted... the submission of Shamir of Dhu-Raydan and the clans of Habashat.
The term "Habesha" was formerly thought by some to be of
ArabicArabic is a Central Semitic language, thus related to and classified alongside other Semitic languages such as Hebrew and the Neo-Aramaic languages. In terms of speakers, the Arabic macrolanguage is the largest member of the Semitic language family. It is spoken by more than 280 million people as...
descent (who used the word
Habash, also the name of an Ottoman province comprising parts of modern-day Eritrea and Ethiopia), because the English name
AbyssiniaAbyssinia may refer to the Ethiopian Empire that consisted of modern Ethiopia and Eritrea.Abyssinia may also refer to:* SS Abyssinia, 1870 Canadian Pacific steamship* HMS Abyssinia , British armoured ship...
comes from the Arabic form. South Arabian expert Eduard Glaser claimed that the hieroglyphic
ḫbstjw, used in reference to "a foreign people from the incense-producing regions" (i.e.
PuntThe Land of Punt, also called Pwenet, or Pwene by the ancient Egyptians, was a trading partner known for producing and exporting gold, aromatic resins, African blackwood, ebony, ivory, slaves and wild animals...
, probably located around southern Eritrea, northern Ethiopia, and the
SudanSudan is a country in northeastern Africa. It is the largest country in Africa and in the Arab World, and tenth largest in the world by area...
ese border) used by Queen
HatshepsutHatshepsut , meaning Foremost of Noble Ladies, was the fifth pharaoh of the eighteenth dynasty of Ancient Egypt...
ca. 1460 BC, was the first usage of the term or somehow connected, a claim repeated by others; however, this etymology is not at all certain, given the large time difference in the usage of the terms.
The term "Habesha" or Ge'ez language word
ḥabaśā is also source of the term "Habasi" in many Indian languages such as,
GujaratiGujarati is an Indo-Aryan language, and part of the greater Indo-European language family...
. In
IndianThe languages of India belong to several major linguistic families, the two largest being the Indo-European languages—Indo-Aryan —and the Dravidian languages...
languages, the word "Habasi" is used to describe all African people. This word may have come into use in India from the time when
AxumAxum or Aksum is a city in northern Ethiopia which was the original capital of the eponymous kingdom of Axum. Axum was a naval and trading power that ruled the region from ca. 400 BC into the 10th century...
empire from Ethiopia began trade relations with India.
History
Historically, the
province of TigrayTigray was a province of Ethiopia. The Tigray Region superseded the province with the adoption of the new constitution in 1995. By the time of its demise, Tigray had absorbed a number of its neighboring provinces, including Semien, Tembien, Agame and Enderta province.- History :Proto-Tigrayans and...
and central Eritrea was where Ethiopian and Eritrean Habesha civilization had its origins. The first kingdom to arise was that of D`mt in the
8th century BCThe 8th century BC started the first day of 800 BC and ended the last day of 701 BC.- Overview :The 8th century BC was a period of great changes in civilizations. In Egypt, the 23rd and 24th dynasties led to rule from Nubia in the 25 Dynasty...
. The Aksumite Kingdom, one of the powerful civilizations of the ancient world, was centered there from at least 400 BC to the 10th century AD. Spreading far beyond Tigray and Eritrea, it molded the earliest culture of Ethiopia and left many historical treasures: towering finely carved stelae, the remains of extensive palaces, and the ancient places of worship still vibrant with culture and pageantry.
Ancient Period
Throughout history, indigenous peoples had been interacting through population movement, warfare, trade, and intermarriage in the Horn of Africa region, resulting in a predominance of peoples speaking languages of the Afro-Asiatic family. The main branches represented were the Cushitic and the Semitic. As early as the third millennium BCE, the pre-Aksumites had begun trading along the Red Sea. They mainly traded with Egypt. Earlier trade expeditions were taken by foot along the Nile Valley. The Egyptians main object in the trade from the Ethiopian region was to acquire myrrh, which the northern Horn of Africa region had much of, especially Somalia (which they referred to the land of punt).
The foundation of the Kingdom of Aksum is suggested to be as early as 300 BCE. Very little is known of the time period between the mid-first millennium BCE to the beginning of Aksum's flourish around the first century CE. Aksum is thought to be a successor kingdom of D'mt (usually vocalized Da`amat), a kingdom in the early 1st millennium BC most likely centered at nearby
YehaYeha is a village in northern Ethiopia, located in the Mehakelegnaw Zone of the Tigray Region. The Central Statistical Agency has not published an estimate for this village's 2005 population.- Archeology :...
.
The Aksumite kingdom was located in the northern Ethiopian province of Tigray and Eritrea and it Aksum remained the capital until the seventh century CE. Aksum owes its prosperity to its location. The Blue Nile basin and the Afar depression are both within a close proximity of Aksum. The former is rich in gold and the latter of salt: both materials having a highly important use to the Aksumites. Aksum was also within an accessible distance to the port of Adulis, on the coast of the Red Sea, hence maintaining trade relations with other nations, such as Egypt, India, and Arabia. Aksum’s ‘fertile’ and ‘well-watered’ location produced enough food for its population as well as its exotic animals, such as elephants and rhinoceros (Pankhurst 1998, 22-3).
From its capital on the Tigray Plateau, Aksum was in command of the trade of ivory with Sudan. It also dominated the trade route leading south and the port of Adulis on the Gulf of Zola. Its success depended on resourceful techniques, production of coins, steady migrations of Greco-Roman merchants and ships landing on the port of Adulis. In exchange for Aksum’s goods, traders bid many kinds of cloth, jewelry, metals and steel for weapons.
At its peak, Aksum controlled territories as far as southern Egypt, east to the Gulf of Aden, south to the Omo River, and west to the Nubian Kingdom of Meroe. The South Arabian kingdom of the Himyarites and also a portion of Western Saudi Arabia was also under the power of Aksum. At this point in time the majority of the citizens of Aksum were one of the ancestors of the present day Amhara and Tigray peoples, the Biher-Tigrigna (also Tigrinya speakers) and Tigre of Eritrea.
Medieval Period
Some time in the early Middle Ages, the
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...
and
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...
languages began to be differentiated, and Ge'ez eventually became extinct (except in churches). Amhara warlords often competed for dominance of the realm with Tigrayan warlords. While many branches of the Imperial dynasty were from the Amharic speaking area, a substantial amount were from Tigray. The Amharas seemed to gain the upper hand with the accession of the so-called
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...
line of the Imperial dynasty in the beginning of the 17th century. However, it soon lapsed into the semi-anarchic era of
Zemene MesafintThe Zemene Mesafint was a period in Ethiopian history when the country was rent by conflicts between warlords, the Emperor was reduced to little more than a figurehead confined to the capital city of Gondar,...
("Era of the Princes"), in which rival warlords fought for power and the
Yejju OromoYejju Oromo is a sub-group of the Barentu branch of Oromo people. They are one of the northernmost located people of the Oromo ethnic group, which is the largest ethnicity in Ethiopia...
inderases (or regents) had effective control, while
emperorsThe Emperor of Ethiopia was the hereditary ruler of Ethiopia until the abolition of the monarchy in 1974. The Emperor was the head of state and head of government, with ultimate executive, judicial and legislative power in that country...
were just considered to be figureheads. The Tigrayans only made a brief return to the throne in the person of Yohannes IV, whose death in 1889 allowed the base to return to the Amharic speaking province of
ShewaShewa is a historical region of Ethiopia. Formerly an autonomous kingdom within the Ethiopian Empire, the Ethiopian modern capital Addis Ababa is located at its center....
.
Some consider the Amhara to have been Ethiopia's ruling elite for centuries, represented by the line of Emperors ending in
Haile SelassieH.I.M. Emperor Haile Selassie I , born Tafari Makonnen, was Ethiopia's regent from 1916 to 1930 and Emperor of Ethiopia from 1930 to 1974...
. Many commentators, including Marcos Lemma, however, dispute the accuracy of such a statement, arguing that other ethnic groups have always been active in the country's politics. One possible source of confusion for this stems from the mislabeling of all
Amharic-speakersAmharic 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...
as "Amhara", and the fact that many people from other ethnic groups have Amharic
namesOnomastics or onomatology is the study of proper names of all kinds and the origins of names. The word is Greek: ὀνοματολογία . Toponymy or toponomastics, the study of place names, is one of the principal branches of onomastics...
. Another is the fact that most Ethiopians can trace their ancestry to multiple ethnic groups. In fact, the last Emperor, Haile Selassie I, often counted himself a member of the
GurageGurage is an ethnic group in Ethiopia. According to the 2007 national census, they number 1,867,377 people , of whom 792,659 are urban dwellers. The Gurage people inhabit a semi-fertile, semi-mountainous region in southwest Ethiopia, about 150 miles southwest of Addis Ababa...
ethnicity on account of his ancestry, and his Empress, Itege
Menen AsfawEmpress Menen Asfaw was the wife and consort of Emperor Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia. Empress Menen was the daughter of Asfaw, Jantirar of Ambassel...
of
AmbasselAmbassel is one of the 105 woredas of the Amhara Region in Ethiopia, and an amba, or mountain fortress, located in the woreda; the woreda is named for this feature...
, was in large part of Oromo descent. The expanded use of Amharic language results mostly from its being the language of the court, and was gradually adopted out of usefulness by many unrelated groups, who then became known as "Amhara" no matter what their ethnic origin.
Modern Period
The Eritreans began their war for independence against Ethiopia in 1961, which culminated in the defeat of the Derg in 1991 and independence by referendum in 1993. During the 1980s, the TPLF (Tigray People Liberation Front) joined the Eritreans in the war against the Derg, and come to rule Ethiopia and remain the ruling party. The Eritreans define themselves as a separate people from the Ethiopians, who subjugated and oppressed the former before independence in 1991. Because of historical assimilation and diffusion of customs from central Eritrea in the 17th and 18th centuries, the Biher-Tirgrinya of Eritrea are often confused with Tigray of Ethiopia, who speak Tigrinya but are of a different nation than the former.
Origins
The Imperial family of Ethiopia (which is currently in exile) claims its origin directly from the offspring of King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba (
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...
: ንግሥተ ሣብአ
nigiśta Śab'a, who is named Makeda (Ge`ez: ማክዳ) in the Ethiopian account. The Ethiopian narraive 'Glory of Kings', the
Kebra Negast, contains an account of Makeda and her descendants. King Solomon is said in this account to have seduced the Queen, and sired a son by her, who would eventually become
Menelik IMenelik I , first Jewish Emperor of Ethiopia, is traditionally believed to be the son of King Solomon of ancient Israel and Makeda, Queen of Sheba and ruled around 950 BC, according to traditional sources...
, the first Emperor of Ethiopia. The tradition that the biblical Queen of Sheba was a ruler of Ethiopia who visited King Solomon in Jerusalem in ancient Israel is supported by the 1st century AD Jewish historian Flavius Josephus, who identified Solomon’s visitor as a queen of Egypt and Ethiopia.
In the past, scholars like
Hiob LudolfHiob Ludolf was a German orientalist, and born at Erfurt. Edward Ullendorff rates Ludolf as having "the most illustrious name in Ethiopic scholarship".-Life:...
and Carlo Conti Rossini postulated that the ancient communities that evolved into the modern Ethiopian state were formed by a migration across the Red Sea of Semitic-speaking South Arabians around 1000 BC who intermarried with local non-Semitic-speaking peoples. Indeed, the ancient Ethiopian kingdom of Aksum ruled much of Southern Arabia including
YemenYemen , officially the Republic of Yemen is a country located on the Arabian Peninsula in Southwest Asia...
until the rise of
IslamIslam Islam Islam ( al-’islām,
[There are ten pronunciations of Islam in English, differing in whether the first or second syllable has the stress, whether the s is or , and whether the a is pronounced as in father, as in cat, or (when the stress is on the i) as in the a of sofa...]
in the 7th century, and both the indigenous languages of Southern Arabia and the Amharic and Tigrinya languages of Ethiopia are
South SemiticSouth Semitic is one of the three macro-classifications in Semitic linguistics, the other two being East Semitic and West Semitic . Semitic itself is considered a branch of the larger Afro-Asiatic language family found, as indicated in the name, both in Africa and Asia...
languages. However, the ancient Semitic language of Ethiopia, is now known to not have derived from
SabaeanThe Sabaean language was an Old South Arabian language spoken in Yemen from c. 1000 BC to the 6th century AD, by the Sabaeans; it was used as a written language by some other peoples of Ancient Yemen, including the Hashidites, Sirwahites, Humlanites, Ghaymanites, Himyarites, Radmanites etc....
, and there is evidence of a Semitic speaking presence in Ethiopia and Eritrea at least as early as 2000 BC. There is also evidence of ancient Southern Arabian communities in modern day Ethiopia and Eritrea in certain localities, attested by some archaeological artifacts and ancient Sabaean inscriptions in the old
South Arabian alphabetThe ancient South Arabian alphabet branched from the Proto-Sinaitic alphabet in about the 9th century BC. It was used for writing the Yemeni Old South Arabic languages of the Sabaean, Qatabanian, Hadrami , Minaean, Himyarite, and proto-Ge'ez in Dʿmt...
. However, scholars like Stuart Munro-Hay point to the existence of an older D’mt or Da'amot kingdom, prior to any Sabaean migration ca. 4th or 5th c. BC, as well as evidence of to Sabaean immigrants having resided in Ethiopia for little more than a few decades Furthermore, there is archeological evidence of a region in Northern Ethiopia and Eritrea also called Saba, now referred to as Ethiopian Saba to avoid confusion.
There is little archaeological evidence to verify the story of the Queen of Sheba — and the longstanding presumption that Sabaean migrants had played a direct role in Ethiopian civilization has recently come under attack. Sabaean influence is speculated by some recent authors to have been minor, limited to a few localities, and disappearing after a few decades or a century, perhaps representing a trading or military colony in some sort of symbiosis or military alliance with the Ethiopian civilization of D`mt.
In the reign of King
EzanaEzana of Axum , was ruler of the Axumite Kingdom located in present-day Tigray, northern Ethiopia, Eritrea, Yemen, he himself employed the style "king of Saba and Salhen, Himyar and Dhu-Raydan."...
(ca. early 4th c. AD, the term is listed as one of the nine regions under his domain, translated in the
GreekGreek , an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages, is the language of the Greeks. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. In its ancient form, it is the language of classical...
version of his inscription as
ΑἰθιοπίαEthiopia , 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...
(
Aithiopia, i.e. "Ethiopia"), the first known use of this term to specifically describe the region known today as Ethiopia (and not
KushThe Kingdom of Kush or Cush was an ancient African state centered on the confluences of the Blue Nile, White Nile and River Atbara in what is now the Republic of Sudan. It was one of the earliest civilizations to develop in the Nile River Valley...
or the entire African and Indian region outside of Egypt). The 6th c. author
Stephanus of ByzantiumStephen of Byzantium, also known as Stephanus Byzantinus was the author of an important geographical dictionary entitled Ethnica...
later used the term "Αβασηγοί" (i.e. Abasēnoi) in reference to:
an Arabian people living next to the SabaeansThe Sabaeans or Sabæans were an ancient people speaking an Old South Arabian language who lived in what is today Yemen, in south west Arabian Peninsula. Some Sabaeans also lived in D'mt, located in northern Ethiopia and Eritrea, due to their hegemony over the Red Sea.-History:The ancient Sabaean...
together with the Ḥaḍramites. The region of the Abasēnoi produce[d] myrrh, incense and cotton and they cultivate[d] a plant which yields a purple dye (probably wars, i.e. Fleminga Grahamiana). It lies on a route which leads from ZabīdZabid is a town with an urban population of around 23,000 persons on Yemen's western coastal plain. The town, named after Wadi Zabid, the wadi to its south, is one of the oldest towns in Yemen...
on the coastal plain to the Ḥimyarite capital ẒafārZafar may refer to:*The ancient city of Dhafar in Old South Arabian and modern Arabic) in Yemen, see Zafar, Yemen.*The boy's name Zafar is of Arabic origin, and its meaning is "victory." . Zafar and variations Zafer, Zhafar, Thafar, Dhafar, Dafar [Urdu, Arabic, Persian] is a popular name in...
.
The Abasēnoi spoken of by Stephanus was located by Hermann von Wissman as a region in the Jabal Hubaysh (perhaps related in etymology with the ḥbš
rootThe roots of verbs and most nouns in the Semitic languages are characterized as a sequence of consonants or "radicals"...
). Other places names in Yemen contain the ḥbš root, such as the Jabal Habashi (Ḥabaši), whose residents are still called al-Ahbuš (pl. of Ḥabaš). The location of the Abasēnoi in Yemen may perhaps be explained by remnant Aksumite populations from the 520s conquest by
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...
;
King Ezana'sEzana of Axum , was ruler of the Axumite Kingdom located in present-day Tigray, northern Ethiopia, Eritrea, Yemen, he himself employed the style "king of Saba and Salhen, Himyar and Dhu-Raydan."...
claims to Sahlen (Saba) and Dhu-Raydan (Himyar) during a time when such control was unlikely may indicate an Aksumite presence or coastal foothold. Traditional scholarship has assumed that the Habashat were a tribe from modern-day Yemen that migrated to Ethiopia. However, the
SabaicThe ancient South Arabian alphabet branched from the Proto-Sinaitic alphabet in about the 9th century BC. It was used for writing the Yemeni Old South Arabic languages of the Sabaean, Qatabanian, Hadrami , Minaean, Himyarite, and proto-Ge'ez in Dʿmt...
inscriptions only use the term ḥbšt to the refer to the Kingdom of Aksum and its inhabitants, especially during the 3rd c., when the ḥbšt (Aksumites) were often at war with the Sabaeans and Himyraites.
South Arabian/Sabean Origin theory
The Sabean theory was the most common one explaining the origins of the "Habashat" (Habesha) before the 20th century. It was first suggested by Hiob Ludolf and revived by early 20th century Italian scholar Conti Rossini. The theory states that at an early epoch South Arabian tribes, including one called the "Habashat" emigrated to the opposite African coast. According to this theory, Sabaeans brought with them South Arabian letters and language, which gradually evolved into the Ge'ez language and
Ge'ez alphabetGe'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...
. However, though the Ge'ez alphabet did develop from
Epigraphic South ArabianThe ancient South Arabian alphabet branched from the Proto-Sinaitic alphabet in about the 9th century BC. It was used for writing the Yemeni Old South Arabic languages of the Sabaean, Qatabanian, Hadrami , Minaean, Himyarite, and proto-Ge'ez in Dʿmt...
(whose oldest inscriptions are found in both Ethiopia and Eritrea and Yemen), it is now known that Ge'ez is not descended from any of the Old South Arabian languages.
In the large corpus of South Arabian inscriptions, however, there has never been mention of migration to the west coast of the Red Sea, nor of a tribe called "Habashat." All uses of the term date to the 3rd century AD and later, where they are always used in reference to the people of the Kingdom of Aksum. In recent times, this theory has largely been abandoned.
Culture
The way of life among the Habesha evokes images of Biblical times.
CamelCamels are even-toed ungulates within the genus Camelus. The dromedary or Arabian camel has a single hump, and the Bactrian camel has two humps. They are native to the dry desert areas of western Asia, and central and east Asia, respectively...
s,
donkeyThe donkey or ass, Equus africanus asinus, is a domesticated member of the Equidae or horse family, and an odd-toed ungulate. The wild ancestor of the donkey is the African Wild Ass, E. africanus. Traditionally, the scientific name for the donkey is Equus asinus asinus based on the principle of...
s, and sheep are everywhere. Fields are plowed using oxen. The Orthodox Church is a large part of the culture. The church buildings are built on hills. Major celebrations during the year are held around the church, where people gather from villages all around to sing, play games, and observe the unique mass of the church, which includes a procession through the church grounds and environs.
CoffeeCoffee is a brewed beverage prepared from roasted seeds, commonly called coffee beans, of the coffee plant. They are seeds of "coffee cherries" that grow on trees in over 70 countries. It has been said that green coffee is the second most traded commodity in the world behind crude oil. Due to its...
is a very important ceremonial drink. The "coffee ceremony" is common to the Tigrinya and the Amhara. Beans are roasted on the spot, ground and served thick and rich in tiny ceramic cups with no handles. This amount of coffee can be finished in one gulp if drunk cold, however, it is traditionally drunk very slowly as conversation takes place. When the beans are roasted to smoking, they are passed around the table, where the smoke becomes a blessing on the diners. The traditional food served at these meals, consists of
injeraInjera or taita is a pancake-like bread made out of teff flour. It is traditionally eaten in Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somalia , Yemen, and by the Nuer people of Sudan.In making injera, teff flour is mixed with water and allowed to ferment for several days, as with sourdough...
a spongy flat bread, served with tsebhi or
wotWot or WOT may refer to:* Wot , a circular panpipe used in the music of Isan, Thailand* Wot, Nepal* Currie Wot, a 1930s British single-seat aerobatic biplane aircraft...
(a spicy meat sauce).
The country houses are built mostly from rock, dirt, and a few timber poles. The houses blend in easily with the natural surroundings. Many times the nearest water source is more than a kilometer away from the house. In addition, people must search for fuel for the fire throughout the surrounding area.
The Habesha people have a rich heritage of music and dance, using drums and stringed instruments tuned to a
pentatonic scaleA pentatonic scale is a musical scale with five pitches per octave in contrast to a heptatonic scale such as the major scale. Pentatonic scales are very common and are found all over the world, including Celtic folk music, Hungarian folk music, West African music, African-American spirituals,...
. Arts and crafts and secular music are performed mostly by artisans who are regarded with suspicion. Sacred music and iconic art is performed by monastically trained men.
Language and Literature
All Habesha people speak Semitic languages, which originate from the Ancient language of Ge'ez. The Ge'ez language is classified as a South Semitic language. It evolved from an earlier proto-
Ethio-SemiticEthiopian Semitic is a language group, which together with Old South Arabian, forms the Western branch of the South Semitic languages...
ancestor used to write royal inscriptions of the kingdom of Dʿmt in
Epigraphic South ArabianThe ancient South Arabian alphabet branched from the Proto-Sinaitic alphabet in about the 9th century BC. It was used for writing the Yemeni Old South Arabic languages of the Sabaean, Qatabanian, Hadrami , Minaean, Himyarite, and proto-Ge'ez in Dʿmt...
. As a member of South Semitic, it is closely related to
SabaeanThe Sabaean language was an Old South Arabian language spoken in Yemen from c. 1000 BC to the 6th century AD, by the Sabaeans; it was used as a written language by some other peoples of Ancient Yemen, including the Hashidites, Sirwahites, Humlanites, Ghaymanites, Himyarites, Radmanites etc....
, and the Ge'ez alphabet later replaced Epigraphic South Arabian in the Kingdom of Aksum (although Epigraphic South Arabian was used for a few inscriptions into the 8th century, though not any South Arabian language since Dʿmt). Early inscriptions in Ge'ez and Ge'ez alphabet have been dated
2 to as early as the
5th century BCThe 5th century BC started the first day of 500 BC and ended the last day of 401 BC.-Overview:This century saw the beginning of a period of philosophical brilliance among Western civilizations, particularly the Greeks which would continue all the way through the 4th century until the time of...
, and in a sort of proto-Ge'ez written in ESA since the
9th century BCThe 9th century BC started the first day of 900 BC and ended the last day of 801 BC.- Overview :The 9th century BC was a period of great changes in civilizations. In Africa, Carthage is founded by the Phoenicians...
. Ge'ez literature properly begins with the Christianization of Ethiopia (and the civilization of Axum) in the 4th century, during the reign of Ezana of Axum. While Ge'ez is an extinct language that is only used in churches, the three languages that have branched off from it are Tigre, Tigrinya and Amharic. Tigre is a direct descedant of Ge'ez while Tigrinya has a small and Amharic a large Cushitic influence.
Christianity
Many people think of
Christianity in AfricaChristians in Africa form one of the largest religious groups. The presence of Christianity in Africa began by the end of the first century in Egypt, and by the end of the second century in the region around Carthage...
as a European import that arrived with colonialism, but this is not the case with the Habesha. The empire centered in Axum and Adowa was part of the Mediterranean world in which Christianity grew. The arrival of Christianity in Tigrayan lands happened about the same time that it arrived in
IrelandIreland is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island in the world. It lies to the north-west of continental Europe and is surrounded by hundreds of islands and islets. To the east of Ireland, separated by the Irish Sea, is the island of Great Britain...
. The Tigrayans, in fact, had been converted to Christianity hundreds of years before most of Europe. Many Tigrayan churches were cut into cliffs or from single blocks of stone, as they were in
TurkeyTurkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey
, is a Eurasian country that stretches across the Anatolian peninsula in Western Asia and Thrace in the Balkan region of southeastern Europe...
and in parts of
GreeceGreece , officially the Hellenic Republic , is a country in southeastern Europe, situated on the southern end of the Balkan Peninsula....
, where Christianity had existed from its earliest years. The church is a central feature of communities and of each family's daily life. Each community has a church with a
patron saintA patron saint is a saint who is regarded as the intercessor and advocate in heaven of a nation, place, craft, activity, class, or person. Patron saints, because they have already transcended to the metaphysical, are able to intercede effectively for the needs of their special charges...
.
Ethiopia has often been mentioned in the
BibleThe Bible contains the central religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. Modern Judaism generally recognizes a single set of canonical books known as the Tanakh, or Hebrew Bible, as it is written almost entirely in the Hebrew language, with some small portions in Aramaic...
. A well-known example of this is the story of the Ethiopian Eunuch as written in
ActsThe Acts of the Apostles is the fifth book of the New Testament. It is commonly referred to as Acts and outlines the history of the Apostolic Age...
(8: 27): "Then the angel of the Lord said to Philip, Start out and go south to the road that leads down from Jerusalem to Gaza. So he set out and was on his way when he caught sight of an Ethiopian. This man was a eunuch, a high official of the Kandake (Candace) Queen of Ethiopia in charge of all her treasure." The passage continues by describing how Philip helped the Ethiopian understand one passage of
IsaiahThe Book of Isaiah is a book of the Bible traditionally attributed to the Prophet Isaiah, who lived in the second half of the 8th century BC. In the first 39 chapters, Isaiah prophesies doom for a sinful Judah and for all the nations of the world that oppose God. The last 27 chapters prophesy the...
that the Ethiopian was reading. After the Ethiopian received an explanation of the passage, he requested that Philip baptize him, which Philip obliged. Queen Gersamot Hendeke VII (very similar to Kandake) was the Queen of Ethiopia from the year 42 to 52. The Ethiopian Orthodox Church was founded in the fourth century by
SyriaSyria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south and Israel to the southwest....
n monks. Historically, the Ethiopian and Eritrean churches have had strong ties with the Egyptian Coptic Church, the Egyptian Church appointing the archbishop for the Eritrean Church. They gained independence from the Coptic church in the 1950s, although the Eritrean Orthodox Church has recently reforged the link.
Over 5 million of these people are Coptic Orthodox, with one priest for every 92 members—the highest concentration in Ethiopia. The remainder are
Muslim:A Muslim , , is an adherent of the religion of Islam. The feminine form is Muslimah . Literally, the word means "one who submits ". Muslim is the participle of the same verb of which Islam is the infinitive. Muslims believe that there is only one God, translated in Arabic as Allah...
s. There are many Muslims in Tigray Province, but they generally belong to other ethnic groups. The Tigray are reported to have fewer than 500 evangelical believers. There are more believers among the Tigrinya in Eritrea.
The faith of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church is very intimately woven into the culture of the Tigrinya people and is central to their way of life. A number of unique beliefs and practices distinguish Ethiopian Orthodox Christianity from other Christian groups; for example, the
Ark of the CovenantThe Ark of the Covenant is a container described in the Bible as containing the Tablets of Stone on which were inscribed the Ten Commandments as well as Aaron's rod and manna. According to the Pentateuch, the Ark was built at the command of God, in accord with Moses' prophetic vision on Mount Sinai...
is very important. Every Ethiopian church has a replica of the Ark. Also, the Ethiopian Church has a larger biblical canon than other churches.
Church services are conducted in Ge´ez, the ancient language of Ethiopia and Eritrea. Ge´ez is no longer a living language, its use now confined to religious contexts, occupying a similar place in Ethiopian church life to Latin in the
Roman Catholic ChurchThe Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the world's largest Christian church. With more than a billion members, over half of all Christians and more than one-sixth of the world's population, the Catholic Church is a communion of the Western, or Latin Rite Church, and...
.
Other Ethiopian Orthodox practices include such things as fasting, prescribed prayers, and devotion to saints and angels. A child is never left alone until baptism and cleansing rituals are performed. Boys are baptized forty days after birth, whereas girls are baptized eighty days after birth.
Defrocked priests and deacons commonly function as diviners, who are the main healers. Spirit possession is common, affecting primarily women. Women are also the normal spirit mediums.
A number of Ethiopian Christians adhere to various forms of
PentecostalismPentecostalism is a renewal movement within Christianity that places special emphasis on a direct personal experience of God through the baptism in the Holy Spirit which is evidenced by speaking in tongues. The term Pentecostal is derived from Pentecost, a Greek term describing the Jewish Feast of...
or Anabaptism, collectively referred to as
P'ent'ayP'ent'ay or Pentay is a slang term widely used in modern Ethiopia, and among Ethiopians living abroad, to describe Ethiopian Christians who are not members of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo, Ethiopian Orthodox Tehadeso, Roman Catholic or Ethiopian Catholic churches...
.
Similarities to Judaism and Islam
The Ethiopian church places a heavier emphasis on Old Testament teachings than one might find in the Roman Catholic or Protestant churches, and its followers adhere to certain practices that one finds in Orthodox or Conservative
JudaismJudaism is a set of beliefs and practices originating in the Hebrew Bible , as later further explored and explained in the Talmud and other texts...
. Ethiopian Christians, like some other
Eastern ChristiansEastern Christianity refers collectively to the Christian traditions and churches which developed in the Balkans, Eastern Europe, Asia Minor, the Middle East, Northeastern Africa and southern India over several centuries of religious antiquity. The term is generally used in Western Christianity to...
, traditionally follow dietary rules that are similar to Jewish
KashrutKashrut is the set of Jewish dietary laws. Food in accord with halakha is termed kosher in English, from the Ashkenazi pronunciation of the Hebrew term kashér , meaning "fit"...
, specifically with regard to how an animal is slaughtered. Similarly,
porkPork is the culinary name for meat from the domestic pig . The word pork often denotes specifically the fresh meat of the pig, but can be used as an all-inclusive term which includes cured, smoked, or processed meats It is one of the most-commonly consumed meats worldwide, with evidence of pig...
is prohibited, though unlike Kashrut, Ethiopian cuisine does mix
dairyA dairy is a facility for the extraction and processing of animal milk—mostly from cows or goats, but also from buffalo, sheep, horses or camels —for human consumption. Typically it is a farm or section of a farm that is concerned with the production of milk, butter and...
products with
meatMeat is animal flesh that is used as food. Most often, this means the skeletal muscle and associated fat, but it may also describe other edible tissues such as organs, livers, skin, brains, bone marrow, kidneys, or lungs...
- which in turn makes it even closer to
Islamic dietary lawsIslamic dietary laws provide a set of rules as to what Muslims eat in their diet and other areas.-Overview:Islamic jurisprudence specifies which foods are halāl and which are harām . This is based on rules found in the Qur'an, the holy book of Islam...
(see
HalalHalal is an Arabic term designating any object or an action which is permissible to use or engage in, according to Islamic law. It is the opposite of haraam. The term is widely used to designate food seen as permissible according to Islamic law...
). Women are prohibited from entering the church during their menses; they are also expected to cover their hair with a large scarf (or
shash) while in church, but contrary to popular belief and the actual practice of most other Christian denominations, it is not in the Old Testament that this is commanded, but rather in the New (1 Cor. 11). As with Orthodox
synagogueA synagogue is a Jewish house of prayer....
s, men and women are seated separately in the Ethiopian church, with men on the left and women on the right (when facing the altar). However, women covering their heads and separation of the sexes in the Church building officially is common to many Oriental Orthodox, Eastern Orthodox and Catholic Christians and not unique to Judaism. Ethiopian Orthodox worshippers remove their shoes when entering a church, in accordance with Exodus 3:5 (in which
MosesMoses was, according to biblical texts, a religious leader, lawgiver, and prophet, to whom the authorship of the Torah is traditionally attributed. Also called Moshe Rabbeinu in Hebrew Moses was, according to biblical texts, a...
, while viewing the
burning bushThe burning bush is an object described by the Book of Exodus as being located on Mount Horeb; according to the narrative, the bush was on fire, but was not consumed by the flames, hence the name...
, is commanded to remove his shoes while standing on holy ground). Furthermore, both the
SabbathShabbat is the seventh day of the Jewish week and a day of rest in Judaism. Shabbat is observed from sundown Friday until the appearance of three stars in the sky on Saturday night...
(Saturday), and the Lord's Day (Sunday) are observed as holy, although more emphasis, because of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, is laid upon the Holy Sunday.
Judaism
Judaism in Ethiopia is believed to date from very ancient times. Precisely what its early history was, however, remains obscure. The now dominant Coptic Ethiopian Church claims it originated from the visit of the Queen of Sheba to King Solomon back in the Tenth Century BCE. This visit is mentioned in the Hebrew Scriptures (I Kings 10:1),
ShebaSheba was a kingdom mentioned in the Jewish scriptures and the Qur'an...
was a kingdom that stretched from Ethiopia to the south of the Yemen. Yemen is very close to Ethiopia across the Red Sea, and it has been recorded that modern Ethiopia has been heavily influenced by the ancient Sabean kingdom. Moreover, the details of the queen's visit, including the alleged theft of the Holy Ark as well as Solomon getting her pregnant with a child who established the "Solomonic" lineage in Ethiopia, as given in Christian Ethiopian tradition, were written in the
Kebra NagastThe Kebra Nagast , or the Book of the Glory of Kings, is an account written in Ge'ez of the origins of the Solomonic line of the Emperors of Ethiopia...
the Ethiopian chronicle of it's early history. The oldest known existing copies of which date from as far back as 13th century. Jewish Ethiopians are mentioned in both the Torah
Old TestamentIn Christianity, the Old Testament is the collection of books that form the first of the two-part Christian Biblical canon. These works correspond to the Hebrew Bible , with some variations and additions. In the Eastern Orthodox Church the comparable texts are known as the Septuagint, from the...
as well as the Christian
New TestamentThe New Testament is the name given to the second major division of the Christian Bible, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament, both terms being associated with Supersessionism...
. It is clear that the Jewish presence in Ethiopia dates back at least 2500 years.
The Jewish Pre-settlement Theory essentially states that starting around the 8th century BCE until about the 5th century BCE, there was an influx of Jewish settlers both from Egypt & Sudan in the north, and southern Arabia in the east. Whether these settlers arrived in great numbers is yet a matter of debate. What is certain, however, is that these settlers must have preceded the arrival of Christianity. Evidence for their presence exists not only in historical books, but also in material artifacts depicting ancient Jewish ceremonies. For instance the temple at Yeha (in Tigray province), which is said to have been erected in the 8th century BCE, is believed to be an architectural copy of other Jewish temples found in Israel and Egypt during the pre-Babylonian era (before 606 BCE). Another example is found on the monastery islands of Lake Tana (northern Gojjam), where several archaic stone altars, fashioned in the manner of Jewish sacrificial alters of pre-8th century BCE Israel, have been found not only preserved in good condition but also containing blood residue. The manner of the blood placed on the stone altars was found to be typical of a culture that strongly adhered to Mosaic Law.
The chief Semitic languages of Ethiopia also suggest an antiquity of Judaism in Ethiopia. "There still remains the curious circumstance that a number of Abyssinian words connected with religion --
HellIn many religious traditions, Hell is a place of suffering and punishment in the afterlife, often in the underworld. Religions with a linear divine history often depict Hell as endless...
,
idolIn the practice of religion, a cult image is a man-made object that is venerated for the deity, spirit or daemon that it embodies or represents. Cultus, the outward religious formulas of "cult", often centers upon the treatment of cult images, which may be dressed, fed or paraded, etc...
,
EasterEaster is the most important annual religious feast in the Christian liturgical year. According to Christian scripture, Jesus was resurrected from the dead on the third day from his crucifixion...
,
purificationPurification is the process of rendering something pure, i.e. clean of foreign elements and/or pollution, and may refer to:* List of purification methods in chemistry* Organisms used in water purification...
,
almsAlms or almsgiving is a religious rite which, in general, involves giving materially to another as an act of religious virtue.It exists in a number of religions. In Philippine regions, alms are given as charity to benefit the poor. In Buddhism, alms are given by lay people to monks and nuns to...
-- are of Hebrew origin. These words must have been derived directly from a Jewish source, for the Abyssinian Church knows the scriptures only in a Ge'ez version made from the Septuagint"
Beta Israel traditions claim that the Ethiopian Jews are descended from the lineage of Moses himself, some of whose children and relatives are said to have separated from the other Children of Israel after the Exodus and gone southwards, or, alternatively or together with this, that they are descended from the tribe of Dan, which fled southwards down the Arabian coastal lands from Judaea at the time of the breakup of the Kingdom of Israel into two kingdoms in the 10th century B.C.E. (precipitated by the oppressive demands of
RehoboamAccording to the Hebrew Bible, Rehoboam was a king of ancient Israel and later king of the Kingdom of Judah after the ten northern tribes of Israel rebelled in 932/931 BC to form the independent Kingdom of Israel....
, King Solomon's heir), or at the time of the destruction of the northern kingdom of Israel in the 8th century BCE. Certainly there was trade as early as the time of King Solomon down along the Red Sea to the Yemen and even as far as India, according to the Bible, and there would therefore have been Jewish settlements at various points along the trade routes. There is definite archaeological evidence of Jewish settlements and of their cultural influence on both sides of the Red Sea well at least 2,500 years ago, both along the Arabian coast and in the Yemen, on the eastern side, and along the southern Egyptian and Sudanese coastal regions.
Islam
Islam in Ethiopia dates to
615-Europe:* The Edict of Paris grants extensive rights to the Frankish nobility.* Pippin of Landen becomes Mayor of the Austrasian Palace.* Edwin of Northumbria takes refuge in East Anglia; he marries Cwenburga, daughter of Cearl of Mercia.-Religion:...
. During that year, a group of Muslims were counseled by the Prophet Muhammad to escape persecution in Mecca and
migrate to AbyssiniaAccording to Islamic tradition, twelve male and twelve female Sahaba, the Muslims who originally converged in Mecca, sought refuge from Quraysh persecution in the Kingdom of Aksum in of . This act is known as the First migration to Abyssinia; Abyssinia in this incident because of the Arabic...
, which was ruled by, in the Prophet Muhammad's estimation, a pious Christian king ( Alnajashi).The Prophet Muhammad's followers crossed the Red Sea and sought refuge in the Kingdom of Aksum, possibly settling at Negash, a place in present-day Northern Ethiopia, Tigray region. Moreover, Islamic tradition states that Bilal, one of the foremost companions of the Prophet Muhammad, was from Ethiopia. Ethiopia was thus the earliest home outside of Arabia for the dispersal of the Islamic world faith. Ethiopia is almost evenly split between Orthodox Christians and Sunni Muslims.
Most of Ethiopia and Eritrea's Muslims are Sunni Muslims and much as the rest of the
Muslim worldThe term Muslim world has several meanings. In a cultural sense it refers to the worldwide community of Muslims, adherents of Islam. This community numbers about 1.3-1.5 billion people, roughly one-fifth of the world population. This community is spread across many different nations and ethnic...
, the beliefs and practices of the Muslims of Ethiopia and Eritrea are basically the same: embodied in the
Qur'anThe Qur’an is the central religious text of Islam...
and the
SunnahSunnah is an Arabic word that means habit or usual practice. The Muslim usage of this term refers to the sayings and living habits of Muhammad, the main prophet of Islam....
. There are also Sufi Orders present in Ethiopia. According to the 1994 census of Ethiopia (with similar numbers for the 1984 census), about half of its population is adherent of Islam and members of the Muslim community can be found throughout the country. Islam in Ethiopia is in the Oromo and Ogaden region.
The most important Islamic religious practices, such as the daily ritual prayers (
SalatṢalāt is the name given to the formal prayer of Islam. The prayer is one of the obligatory rites of the religion, to be performed five times a day by a practising Muslim...
) and Fasting (Arabic صوم,
SawmSawm is an Arabic word for fasting regulated by Islamic jurisprudence. In the terminology of Islamic law, Sawm means "to abstain from eating, drinking and sexual intercourse". The observance of sawm during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan is one of the Five Pillars of Islam, but is not confined...
,
EthiopicEthiopian Semitic is a language group, which together with Old South Arabian, forms the Western branch of the South Semitic languages...
ጾም,
S.om or
Tsom - used by local Christians as well) during the holy month of
RamadanRamadan is the ninth month of the Islamic calendar. It is the Islamic month of fasting, in which participating Muslims refrain from eating, drinking, smoking, and indulging in anything that is in excess or ill-natured; from dawn until sunset...
, are observed both in urban centers as well as in rural areas, among both settled peoples and nomads. Numerous Ethiopian Muslims perform the pilgrimage to
MeccaMecca , sometimes spelled Makkah is the holiest meeting site of the Islamic religion. The city is modern, cosmopolitan and whilst being closed to non-Muslims is nonetheless ethnically diverse.Islamic tradition attributes the beginning of Mecca to Ishmael's descendants...
every year.
Literature
- Eduard Glaser: Die Abessinier in Arabien und Afrika. München 1895, S. 8 f.
- Wilhelm Max Müller: Asien und Europa nach altägyptischen Denkmälern. Leipzig 1893, S. 116.
- Wolbert Smidt: Selbstbezeichnung von Təgrəñña-Sprechern (Habäša, Tägaru, Təgrəñña); in: Bogdan Burtea / Josef Tropper / Helen Younansardaroud, Studia Semitica et Semitohamitica [Festschrift für Rainer Voigt], Münster 2005, S. 385 ff., 391 f.
- Hatem Elliesie: Der zweite Band der Encyclopaedia Aethiopica im Vergleich; in: Orientalistische Literaturzeitung, Band 102, Heft 4-5, Berlin 2007, S. 397 ff. (398-401).
See also
- Amhara people
The 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...
- Beta Israel
Beta 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...
- Ethiopian Orthodox Church
- History of Ethiopia
Ethiopia is the oldest independent country in Africa, with the one of the longest recorded histories in the world.- Earliest history :Ethiopia has seen human habitation for longer than almost anywhere else in the world, possibly being the location where humans evolved.Evidence of Naqadan contacts...
- Semitic
In linguistics and ethnology, Semitic was first used to refer to a language family of largely Middle Eastern origin, now called the Semitic languages....
- Sheba
Sheba was a kingdom mentioned in the Jewish scriptures and the Qur'an...
- Solomonic Dynasty
The Solomonic dynasty is the traditional Imperial House of Ethiopia, claiming descent from King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, who is said to have given birth to the traditional first king Menelik I after her Biblically described visit to Solomon in Jerusalem...
- Tigray-Tigrinya people
The 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 ...