Ethiopia adopted Christianity in the early fourth century. Today is the Timkat holiday, the most important of the nine major Christian holidays in Ethiopia. It is celebrated on January 19 to commemorate the baptism of Christ. For the celebration in the northern city of Lalibela, priests from different churches carry tabots (or tablets of the law) wrapped in expensive cloth on their heads to the place of blessing.
Epiphany waters
The next morning, crowds of believers gather around a cross-shaped pool that represents the Jordan River where John the Baptist baptized Jesus.
Beth Giyorgis Church, Lalibela
Worshipers head early in the morning to Lalibela's exquisitely carved and best-preserved church, Bet Giorgis (St. George's Church). It is the last of eleven ancient 13th-century monolithic churches in the city of Lalibela. Legend has it that it was dug up after St. George appeared before the local emperor and said that he had been forgotten. The church was hewn in the shape of a Greek cross with sides of equal length. A triple Greek cross was carved into the flat roof. Beth Giorgis is part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Debre Damo Church
Debre Damo stands on a flat-topped mountain in northern Ethiopia and serves as one of the most important centers of Christianity in the country. This small modern church is built in front of the grotto where Aragavi, one of the nine saints (or missionaries) who brought Christianity to Ethiopia, is said to have disappeared. Saints were often attributed to disappearance rather than death. The skeletal remains of monks protruding from the shrouds can be seen in niches in the walls of the grotto.
Abuna Gebre Mikael
To get to the Church of Abune Gebre Mikael in the Geralta Mountains, you will have to jump from one rock slab to another in a mountain ravine. The interior has two aisles and a central nave with intriguing frescoes from the late 18th and early 19th centuries. The color palette here is enriched with stunning blues, purples, oranges and greys. They complement traditional shades of brown and yellow.
Johannes Meikuddy Church
It also stands in the Geralta Mountains. It is the last of the great painted basilicas in the Tigray region. The church is carved out of white sandstone on the top of a mountain, rising 230 meters above the valley floor. In the first part of the church porch, divided in two, there is a small dome with an engraved cross. The interior is decorated with colorful frescoes with biblical scenes, portraits of saints and geometric patterns. They cover not only the walls, but also the ceiling.
Daniel Korkor
Daniel Korkor stands above a dizzying 300-meter abyss. The view from here is stunning. They say that two small chambers served as a refuge for the monk. Only the largest one is decorated. A niche in the wall opposite the entrance is where a hermit or monk sat. From this point he could see the plains from which he came and the heavens where he was going.
Abuna Yemata
Abuna Yemata is one of the nine saints. He chose the peak of Guha in the Geralta ridge as a hermitage and retired from his hustle and bustle life. He later founded a church carved into the rock. To enter it, you need to go up a steep and dangerous climb. In this photo you can see the entrance to the church on the left.
Abuna Yemata
A priest looking out through the only window of the Abuna Yemata Church. Local ministers cheerfully tell visitors that Sunday services are attended by pregnant women, babies and the elderly, and no one falls.
Petros and Paulos, Teka Tesfai
This church, like many others in the Geralta region, is located in a picturesque location: on a narrow ledge under an overhanging cliff. Previously, the only way to it was through a 15-meter climb up a vertical rock. Now there is a rickety staircase. The church is built of wood, stone and mortar, but the sanctuary is carved into the rock. The walls still have beautiful frescoes from the late 17th century in muted colors in the style of the 15th century.
Arbatu Encessa, Axum
The 1960s stone church is dedicated to four apocalyptic creatures, as well as a tetramorph, especially revered in Ethiopia. Four animals became symbols of the four evangelists: Mark - a lion, Luke - a sacrificial calf, John - an eagle, Matthew - a man. The walls and ceiling are covered with liturgical imagery, painted in warm colors but repainted in a riot of primary colors.
Gennet Maryam, Lasta
The church, carved during the reign of Emperor Yekuno Amlak (1270-85), contains the earliest frescoes in Ethiopia, believed to date back to the late 13th century. Here you can see scenes from the Old Testament and images of saints, as well as scenes from the New Testament. This photograph shows the roof of the church, decorated with carved crosses.
By the middle of the 19th century. the country was in decline, torn apart by constant internecine fights between feudal lords. There was a hint of change when, in the early 1850s, Casa from Cuara, the son of a small feudal lord from the North, appeared on the political arena of the country. His actions aimed at creating a strong central government found support among the peasants, who suffered most from feudal fragmentation. A period came in the history of Ethiopia when the policies of the ruler began to largely subordinate to the interests of the people. The threat of external danger that existed on the northern borders of the state also played a certain role in the centralization of the country. Here it was necessary to engage in battles every now and then with the Egyptians, who cherished plans to capture all of Ethiopia.
In the 30s of the XIX century. Three politically autonomous associations emerged in Ethiopia. This is Gondar, where Ras Ali was the ruler. This is Tigre and Simen. And finally, Shoah. Emperor Yohannus III was in fact only the nominal head of Ethiopia. Kasa Hailiu (future emperor) was born in 1818 in northern Ethiopia into the family of a petty feudal lord. He served as a soldier in his uncle's detachment. Leaving his uncle's service a few years later, Casa organized his own detachment. People from all over the region began to flock to him.
Kasa became an increasingly prominent figure in the Amhara political arena. His rise to power involves battles with the vassals of the ruler of the region, increasing his army and ultimately defeating the troops of Ras Ali himself. After defeating one of the most powerful rulers of Ethiopia, Ras Ali, and in June 1853, all of Northern Ethiopia, with the exception of Tigray, came under the control of Kasa. In the decisive battle with the army of the ruler of Tigray, the question of the future emperor of Ethiopia was practically decided. The battle took place on February 10, 1855. Having won, literally the next day after the battle, the coronation ceremony of the new emperor of Ethiopia took place. He adopted a new name - Tewodros, a name that the people ascribed to the expected messiah. During his coronation, Tewodros II (1855-1868) declared his first priority: “I swear by this crown of my ancestors that I will gather under my rule all the provinces that in the past were part of the empire.” Of the large regions of the state that retained their independence from the central government, the Shoa region remained. By this time, the emperor's army numbered about 60 thousand warriors and had no equal. The Shoan army was not ready to fight back. Having conquered the last independent region of Ethiopia, Tewodros completed his primary task. The emperor made the city of Magdala in the center of the country the capital of the united Ethiopia. »
The unification of Ethiopia was carried out through military means. Tewodros used weapons to force individual feudal lords to submit to imperial power. This, however, did not mean that they forever abandoned their struggle for independence. Between 1855 and 1S57 alone, 17 attempts were made on the life of the emperor. This prompted a response from Tewodros - the use of brutal, ruthless measures against riots and conspiracies. He tried, through repression, to preserve the political unity of the state, which was constantly threatened by revolts of the feudal lords.
At a certain stage, the Christian Church also became in opposition to Tewodros. Although from the very beginning the Ethiopian church found in him a zealous preacher of religious dogmas, who throughout his reign defended the “true faith” with word and sword, nevertheless, a conflict between the emperor and the clergy occurred. It was based on purely economic reasons. Tewodros could not come to terms with the fact that no taxes were transferred from church properties to the state treasury. Measures aimed at undermining the economic position of the church aroused fierce resistance from it. Unlike feudal uprisings, which were local in nature, the church acted as a united front. In the process of his reforming society, the peasants also began to move away from Tewodros. Their mood was influenced by church anti-government sermons and speeches against him by their feudal overlords, but most importantly, by the continuing situation of complete lack of rights.
After completing his military campaigns, the emperor began to carry out a series of internal reforms. He reorganized the system of public administration, dividing the country into smaller districts than before and placing loyal people in charge. Taxes now went directly to the imperial treasury, and not as before - to the treasury of the feudal lords. Tewodros tried to deprive large feudal lords of the right to have their own courts and their own armies.
One of the emperor's decrees concerned the abolition of the slave trade. It also contained an order that all people of the state find work for themselves. The decree read: “So that the peasants return to agriculture, the merchants to trade and each person to his work.” According to the emperor, this was supposed to stop the banditry that was spreading in the country.
Innovations also affected the judicial system. Tewodros declared himself supreme judge and every day found time to deal with the complaints of his subjects. In all regions of the country, judicial officials were appointed who administered justice in the name of the emperor, while the right to death penalty was the prerogative of the emperor himself. Attempts were made to reform in the field of morals. Namely, Tewodros opposed the widespread polygamy in the country. He issued a law that every Christian could have only one wife. To set an example, he himself removed all his concubines.
In matters of relations between church and state, he did everything possible to change the previous situation, when the church had a decisive influence on secular power. Now he sought to subordinate her to secular power.
Tewodros paid most serious attention to the army. The attempt to create a national regular army was accompanied by the establishment of salaries for soldiers and the introduction of a system of training troops. With the desire to strengthen the combat power of the army and increase its mobility, he intended to establish the production of his own weapons (in particular, guns) and begin building roads.
The first attempt to make a cannon dates back to 1853. Having become emperor, he attracted European artisans who were in Ethiopia at that time to produce them. Several guns were cast, the largest of which, weighing 70 tons, was named “Sevastopol”.
Overall, Tewodros's reforms did not undermine the foundations of Ethiopian feudalism, but were aimed at revitalizing the traditional bureaucratic structure of the empire, but on a clearer and stronger basis. With the death of Tewodros, many of the reforms he initiated quickly came to naught.
Having strengthened his position within the country, the emperor also made big plans in the field of foreign policy. He considered his primary task to be to ensure Ethiopia's access to the sea, the coast of which was dominated by the Turks and their vassal Egyptians.
Striving to establish contacts with European powers, the reason for which was the desire to get artisans and craftsmen sent from there, at the same time, he was well aware of the goals of the African policy of the West. In a conversation with the French consul Lejean, he stated: “I know the tactics of European rulers: when they want to capture an eastern country, they first send missionaries, then consuls to support the missionaries, and finally battalions to support the consuls. I am not an Indian Raja to allow myself to be fooled in this way. I prefer to deal with battalions at once." Therefore, despite his interest in establishing stronger ties with European countries, he flatly refused to open their consulates in Ethiopia. The diplomatic immunity of consular officers was seen by Tewodros as an infringement on the emperor's sacred right to dispose of the lives of people and land in his domains.
The impetus for its beginning was the conflict with England in 1864, associated with the arrest of the British representative at the imperial court, Charles Cameron, for his anti-Ethiopian activities. England's attempts to resolve this conflict through diplomatic channels led nowhere. The decision to send an expeditionary force was made in August 1867.
The internal political situation in Ethiopia, which had developed by this time, was very favorable for an external invasion. The feudal opposition raised its head again. Speeches by opponents of the central government followed one after another. The successes of the rebel forces led to desertion in parts of the imperial army. If at the beginning of 1866 it numbered about 80 thousand soldiers, then by the decisive battle with foreigners only 15 thousand remained at its disposal. By the time the English corps landed, the emperor’s power extended to an insignificant part of the country.
General Robert Napier, a participant in the suppression of the national uprising in India (1857-1859) and the Taiping uprising in China, was appointed commander of the English corps. On October 21, 1867, a corps of 15 thousand soldiers landed on Ethiopian territory. The advance of British troops through the rebel territories met no resistance. In such a situation, Tewodros's few troops had no chance of victory.
After the defeat, the emperor took refuge in his residence in the Mekdela fortress. Tewodros, seeing that he could not repel the attack, ordered the remnants of his troops to leave the fortress, and he himself shot himself.
This time, the capture of Ethiopia was not part of Great Britain's plans, and the expeditionary force set off on the return journey. Before leaving, the British took from the fortress many priceless monuments of Ethiopian writing, including the imperial "Kibre Negest", the sacred book of the Ethiopian people. It was there that the legend of King Solomon, the Queen of Sheba and Menelik I, the founder of the dynasty of Ethiopian emperors, was recorded. They took with them the regalia of the Ethiopian emperors, the golden crown of Tewodros II, many objects made of gold and silver, and blew up the fortress itself.
After the British left, a fierce struggle broke out between new contenders for the imperial crown. The ruler of Amhara, Gobeze, acted most purposefully and energetically. He managed to turn the tide of events in his favor, and he was crowned under the name Tekle Giyorgis II. The three years of his reign were reminiscent of the period of the “times of princes” with their internal political instability. The ruler of Tigray Kas was preparing for a serious fight with the emperor. On January 21, 1872, he prevailed and was enthroned as Emperor of Ethiopia. In accordance with Ethiopian tradition, he took the royal name Yohannis IV (1872-1889).
Having assumed the imperial crown, Yohannis set himself the task of achieving the political unity of the country. He sought to force all the largest Ethiopian feudal lords to recognize his supreme power. Since the imperial army at that time had no equal, he successfully solved this problem in the early 1870s. Only the ruler of Shoa, Menelik, purely formally recognized the power of the new emperor, in fact remaining the independent ruler of his region.
Yohannis IV, unlike Tewodros, did not strive to create an absolutist state, limiting himself to the task of strengthening what he inherited from his predecessors. He sought to develop a sense of state unity among Ethiopians, eliminating interregional contradictions. To achieve this, the emperor tried to achieve the introduction of a single religion for the entire country. He also waged a consistent struggle against supporters of all other religions. This also affected Protestant and Catholic missionaries, whom he ordered to immediately leave the country. A religious policy was also developed towards the non-Christian population of Ethiopia. A consistent supporter of the introduction of a single faith in the country, Yohannis set a period of three years for Muslims to convert to Christianity and five years for pagans. For those who disagreed, corporal punishment and deportation, especially Muslims, were provided for outside the country.
Unlike Tewodros, who came into conflict with the church, Yohannis was full of the flesh of traditional Ethiopian society with its idealization of the past and insensitivity to everything new. If Tewodros relied entirely on military force in his activities to centralize the country, then Yohannis based the unification of Ethiopia on the achievement of common faith among the Ethiopian population.
The greatest danger to the unity and integrity of the country came from outside. In the specific context of the 1870s, the first threat to Ethiopia's territorial integrity came not from the European powers, but from Egypt, a Turkish vassal. In the early 70s, the entire coast from Zeila to Guardafui was under Egyptian control. The plans of the Egyptian Khedive Ismail also included the expansion of Egyptian possessions at the expense of the northeastern regions of Ethiopia. In 1875, the offensive of Egyptian troops began. Under the command of the emperor there was an army of 70 thousand, consisting mainly of northern warriors, whose areas were directly threatened by Egyptian aggression.
The Egyptian troops moved in three columns from the areas of Massau, Karan and Zeila. At the end of September 1875, they captured Harar. Egyptian troops moving from Massau and Karan were defeated by the Ethiopians in November 1875. In March 1876, a second decisive battle took place, in which the Egyptians suffered a crushing defeat.
Later, Ethiopia's territorial claims to Egyptian possessions on the Red Sea and the Ethiopians' desire to gain access to the sea served as the bargaining chip that England used when it needed to push the peoples of the two countries into war in order to suppress the Mahdist movement in Sudan, which began in 1881, and weaken their resistance. European expansion. Emperor Yohannis, seduced by the promise of England and Egypt, now dependent on it, to return the territories seized from Ethiopia, plunged the country into long, bloody wars with the Mahdist Sudan.
Ethiopian-Italian relations
At a time when the Ethiopians were fighting against the Sudanese to please primarily England, a new and more formidable danger loomed over the country: being enslaved by another European power - Italy. The beginning of Italian expansion in the Red Sea area dates back to the late 60s of the 19th century. In 1869, part of the coastal territory of Assab was purchased from local rulers. In 1881, the Italian government declared this territory a colony. In 1883, Italy occupied the port of Massawa and began to seize other territories.
The seizure by the Italians of the former possessions of the Egyptian Khedive on the Red Sea coast did not initially cause much concern among the ruling circles of Ethiopia. But in June 1885, Italy captured the territory of Saati, already located within the empire. The Ethiopians besieged Saati, and in January 1887 they defeated the Italians, who were coming to the aid of the besieged. This victory created enormous enthusiasm in Ethiopia. But the tense internal political situation in the country did not allow the emperor to develop his success and move to Massawa. The continued invasions of the Mahdists in the west and the disloyalty of the ruling elite of Shoa prompted the emperor to resolve the problem of the Italian invasion through diplomacy.
Italy played a double game. In an effort to turn the separatist-minded ruler of Shoa into her ally, she willingly responded to his requests to send firearms. On October 20, 1887, the rebellious vassal Yohannis Nygus Shoa signed a separate treaty of friendship and alliance with Italy, according to which she promised him “military assistance and other assistance in achieving his goals.” Yohannis moved his army to Shoa. But his army, already battered in numerous battles, as well as the army of Menelik, the ruler of Shoa, who had no combat experience, did not dare to enter into combat contact. Long negotiations began, until the Mahdists again invaded the country. In one of the battles with the Mahdists, Yohannis was mortally wounded.
With his death, the country did not split into separate regions, as happened in the case of Tewodros. The change of the supreme ruler, for the first time since the beginning of the process of unification of Ethiopia, did not entail feudal strife; Yohannis remained in the history of the country as a champion of the unification of Ethiopia, as well as the introduction of all-Ethiopian patriotism into the consciousness of the people. Being of Tigrayan origin, Yohannys, whose mother tongue was Tigrinya, introduced Amharic as the official language of the country, the most widely spoken throughout the country. In this he went beyond local nationalism and considered it his duty to protect any part of the Ethiopian empire.
Upon receiving news of the death of Emperor Yohannis, Nygus Shoa Menelik immediately proclaimed himself the supreme ruler of Ethiopia. At that time, there was no one in the country who could realistically act as his rival in the fight for the royal crown. The most significant achievements in the centralization of Ethiopia, which completed its unification up to the modern borders, are associated with his name (his birth name before his coronation was Sahle-Maryam). The period of his reign dates back to the beginning of the processes of modernization of the country, the formation of bureaucracy, the penetration of foreign capital and the creation of a mercenary army.
By the early 1890s, Shoa, ruled by Menelik, had become an economically more developed and politically more stable region of the country than the others, the system of governance of which was subsequently transferred to the entire Ethiopian empire.
The basis of the foreign policy of the Shoan rulers was territorial expansion within the empire and the establishment of connections with the outside world, primarily with European powers. The expansion of the borders of Shoa occurred due to the southern regions, where there were rich trade routes, and the struggle for the annexation of Harar, which attracted the attention of the strategic location and the commercial nature of the economy.
Emissaries from European countries, taking into account the growth and power of the Shoa, themselves sought to establish contact with it. In 1841, a treaty of friendship and trade was concluded with England, and two years later with France. Menelik also placed great emphasis on establishing profitable relations with European powers. Like many of his predecessors, he did not neglect the opportunity to use the technical knowledge and experience of any visiting European. The 1880s witnessed the strengthening of Italo-Shoan ties.
In 1878-1889 the ruler of Shoa significantly expanded the boundaries of his possessions. Expansion into the interior was complemented by movement towards the Red Sea coast. Bringing the borders of Shoa closer to the sea was supposed to stimulate trade within the region and facilitate contacts between the Nygus and European powers. The achievement of these goals was ensured by the annexation of Harar, which until the summer of 1885 was under Egyptian control, and after the defeat of the Egyptians in the war with the Ethiopians, power here passed to a representative of the local dynasty. Harar was captured in January 1887. In parallel with the expansion of the territory of Shoa, the foundations of an interethnic policy were developed, later extended by Menelik to the whole of Ethiopia. Its main features were religious tolerance and assimilation, which resulted in the formation of a unique Amkha-Roorom (Galla) community.
In terms of the degree of centralization of power, Shoa was far ahead of the rest of Ethiopia. The entire territory of the province was divided into administrative districts, the number of which grew as the Shoah expanded. Each of them was headed by a governor appointed by the nygus. The lack of religious fanaticism in the ethnically heterogeneous Shoan society contributed to the fact that, in the interests of the cause, a Muslim was sometimes appointed to a high post, although the general rule was to force the appointee to a high administrative post from representatives of the local nobility in non-Christian districts to convert to Christianity.
The absence of feudal strife in Shoa led to the development of trade and crafts. A significant part of the Shoan treasury was made up of taxes from trade operations, and customs duties from caravans heading through the territory of Shoa were also significant. The prosperity of the region was facilitated by military booty captured during numerous campaigns against non-Christian neighbors, and tribute received from the population of the annexed areas.
During Menelik's 24 years at the head of Shoah, from 1865 to 1889, the area and its population increased significantly - from 2.5 million people in 1840 to 5 million in the early 80s. Huge funds accumulated in the ruler's treasury, a significant part of which was spent on the purchase of firearms. If, for example, in 1850 the Shoan army had only 1 thousand firearms in service, then by 1889 it already had 60 thousand rifles and shotguns.
Reforms of Menelik II. On November 3, 1889, the coronation of Menelik II took place. It took place not in Axum, the traditional place of coronation of Ethiopian emperors, but in the capital of Shoa, Entoto. It was from here that reforms began to be carried out. When starting to reform society, Menelik already had more than twenty years of experience behind him not only in governing the Shoah, but also in relations with European countries.
First of all, the new emperor began to reorganize the administrative system, using Sho-an experience for this purpose. The essence of the reform was to replace local rulers with officials appointed by the emperor himself. The country was divided into provinces, which were divided into districts, and those, in turn, into districts. The smaller administrative unit was a group of villages (addi), and the smallest was the village, where power belonged to the headman. The province was headed by a governor, appointed from the center and endowed with extensive powers. Overall, the reform played an important role in the process of consolidation of the Ethiopian state.
Having strengthened the central power in the localities, Menelik began to implement military reform. He replaced the previously practiced system of stationery with the introduction of a special tax for the maintenance of the army. In 1892, by his decree, he forbade soldiers to continue to be stationed in peasant houses and to demand food from them. Instead, peasants were taxed at one-tenth of the harvest. The replacement of standing with tithes contributed to the improvement of the economic situation in the country, increased labor productivity in agriculture, which stimulated its expansion. In turn, the transfer of the army, although not completely, to state support made it possible not only to improve discipline in the troops, but also to take a step forward towards creating a permanent, regular army.
For the first time since the time of the Aksumite kings, an attempt was made to carry out monetary reform. The first new Ethiopian coins appeared in 1894. However, the Ethiopian currency, the new thaler, was not easily introduced. The population preferred to accept the usual coin - the Maria Theresa thaler. As for the rural hinterland, here trade exchange continued to be carried out on the basis of old, natural equivalents - salt, skins, etc. And this situation persisted throughout the reign of Menelik.
Menelik should be credited with founding the new permanent capital of the Ethiopian state - Addis Ababa (“New Flower”). The capital also became the place from which Menelik led the process of annexing new regions to the empire. The Ethiopian state included vast areas to the south and southwest. In fact, the empire was restored to its former original borders: slightly south of Massawa in the north, the Fashoda region in the west, Lake Rudolf in the south and Aseba in the east.
Associated with the territorial expansion of Ethiopia is the creation of the gabbar system in the annexed regions, which is an Ethiopian version of serfdom. The essence of this system was the allocation of land for feeding soldiers and officials along with the peasants living on it. Part of the land areas of the conquered regions, about a third, was left in the hands of the local nobility, the rest was divided between the soldiers and the crown. In accordance with this, three social groups were formed: the landless peasantry (gebbars), small landowners (local nobility and conquering soldiers) and the feudal aristocracy.
Six months before his coronation, Menelik II signed a treaty of friendship and trade with Italy in May 1889 in the town of Ucciale. The articles of the treaty concluded the following: eternal peace and friendship between the two countries was declared; exchange of diplomatic representatives; resolution of controversial border issues by a special commission consisting of representatives of both sides; allowing Menelik to carry out free transit of weapons through the port of Massua under the protection of Italian soldiers up to the Ethiopian border; free movement of citizens of both states on one and the other side of the border; guarantees of religious freedoms, extradition of criminals, abolition of the slave trade, as well as trade issues. The agreement contained many beneficial clauses for Italy. One of them recognized for Rome the entire territory captured in the north of the country, including Asmara. This article was like a “birth certificate” of a new Italian colony in Africa.
The most controversial was Article 17 of the treaty, which soon gave rise to serious disputes related to its interpretation. Everything was contained in the non-identity of the Amharic and Italian texts. The Amharic text said: “His Majesty the King of the Kings of Ethiopia may use the services of the Government of His Majesty the King of Italy to negotiate all matters with other powers and governments.” In the Italian text, the word "may" was replaced by the word "agree", which in Rome was interpreted as "shall". It turned out that Menelik transferred issues related to foreign policy into the hands of Italy. This meant that she was establishing a protectorate over Ethiopia, which she notified other European powers. Subsequently, this discrepancy between the texts of the article and their interpretation led to war.
Italo-Ethiopian War and Battle of Adua
On February 12, 1893, Ethiopia denounced the Treaty of Ucchiala. Rome, convinced of the futility of its efforts to impose a protectorate on Ethiopia through diplomatic means, resorted to direct armed intervention. On the eve of the Italian aggression, Menelik managed to equip the army with modern small arms, acquire more than 100 thousand rifles, which with the existing ones amounted to about 200 thousand guns. Simultaneously with preparations for war, the Ethiopian emperor conducted diplomatic negotiations, with the help of which he wanted to strengthen the position of his country in the international arena. Menelik agreed to give the French a concession to build a railway from Djibouti to Addis Ababa. He sent a special embassy to the Russian Tsar in St. Petersburg. As a result, Ethiopia has established very close and intimate relations with Russia.
In December 1894, Italian armed forces crossed the border into Ethiopia. Menelik announced a manifesto in which he called on the people to wage war against the aggressors. The manifesto said: “Enemies have come to us from across the sea; they invaded our land and seek to destroy our faith, our fatherland. I endured everything and negotiated for a long time, trying to save our country. But the enemy is moving forward and, acting deceptively, threatens our country and our people. I am going to speak out in defense of my fatherland and hope to defeat the enemy. Let everyone who is able follow me, and let those of you who are weak to fight pray for the victory of our weapons.”
In October 1895, the emperor, at the head of his vanguard, numbering 25 thousand infantry and 3 thousand horsemen, set out from Addis Ababa and headed towards the enemy. In total, under his command there was an army of more than 100 thousand. In early December 1895, the 15,000-strong vanguard of the Ethiopian army defeated a 2.5-thousand-strong Italian detachment in the battle that took place. The Battle of Amba Alaga had a huge psychological impact on the Ethiopians: the idea of the invincibility of Italian weapons was dispelled. The Ethiopians celebrated their next victory in January 1896, when the 1,500-strong Italian garrison of Mekele surrendered after a long siege. Reinforcements were requested from the metropolis.
The number of colonial troops by the beginning of 1896 reached 17 thousand people. Having concentrated the main forces near Adua, the commander-in-chief of the Italian army, General Oreste Baratieri, chose a wait-and-see tactic. Menelik's army also reached the Adua region. The number of his army exceeded the Italian corps, but there was a lack of modern artillery and combat training of Menelik's soldiers compared to the Italians.
At the end of February 1896, a fierce battle broke out along the entire front near Adua. Poorly oriented in the area, the command of the Italian troops inaccurately determined the disposition of their troops, and the planned general battle turned into uncoordinated battles, which was to the advantage of the Ethiopians. Having fired shells even before the general battle, the Italian artillery turned out to be useless. The Ethiopians contrasted military training and discipline with perseverance and courage. The Battle of Adua was a disaster for the Italian army. In this battle, the enemy lost 11 thousand people killed, about 3.6 thousand were captured. The Ethiopian side also suffered losses - 6 thousand killed and 10 thousand wounded.
On October 26, 1896, the Italo-Ethiopian peace treaty was signed in Addis Ababa. It contained the following articles: ending the state of war between both sides and establishing “for all time” peace and friendship between Italy and Ethiopia. Annulment of the treaty signed at Ucchiala, Italian recognition of Ethiopia's independence "fully and without any restrictions."
Interest in Ethiopia in Russia has existed for a long time: because of the similarity of religions, because of the Ethiopian origin of the Hannibal family, the ancestors of A.S. Pushkin. Since the 1870s, a geopolitical factor has also increased, primarily associated with the opening of the Suez Canal. On the private initiative of the Cossacks, led by Ataman N.I. Ashinov, the village “New Moscow” was founded at the exit from the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden.
Since the mid-1890s, the actions of official Russia have also intensified in Ethiopia. The Russian government announced its support for Ethiopia in its rebuff of Italian aggression. At the same time, her moral support from Russia - in the press and through diplomatic channels - was combined with the provision of military and humanitarian assistance. So, at the beginning of 1896, 30 thousand Berdankas, 5 million cartridges and 5 thousand sabers were transferred to Ethiopia. A fundraiser was launched to help wounded Ethiopians, and a detachment of the Russian Red Cross was sent to the country, setting up a hospital in Addis Ababa. Strengthening Russian-Ethiopian ties at the end of the 19th century. led to the establishment in 1898 of diplomatic relations between both countries at the mission level. Ethiopia became the first country in Africa with which Russia established diplomatic relations.
The lack of direct political and economic interests in Ethiopia allowed Russia to take the place of a benevolent adviser to the Ethiopian emperor. The Russian mission, led by P. M. Vlasov, was tasked with “earning the trust of the Negus and, if possible, protecting him from the machinations of political rivals, especially the British, who are pursuing such ambitious, predatory goals in Africa.”
Russian officers who came to Ethiopia took direct part in the military expeditions of the Ethiopian troops, and also, fulfilling the assignment of the Russian General Staff, explored the country, its nature, population, flora and fauna. Russia then had a clearer and clearer idea of Ethiopia than most Western European states.
We learn materiel. We bring to your attention a brief illustrated history of brotherly Ethiopia according to Lonely Planet (translated, with additions). The turbulent history of the people of Ethiopia is replete with unexpected turns, dramatic dilemmas and bloody wars. Oddly enough, this is somehow reminiscent of the history of the Slavs, seemingly so distant geographically and genetically. But most importantly, both of them continue to develop, tempering in the crucible of global and regional cataclysms.
3.2 million years BC
Lucy meets her end and awaits discovery and glory for more than three million years underground. Ethiopia uses it as the foundation for its claim to be the birthplace of humanity.
3500-2000 BC
The ancient Egyptians traded with the country of Punt, which many scholars place somewhere on the Eritrean or Somali coast.
2000-1500 BC
Somewhere in Northern Ethiopia, the Ge'ez language developed, the predecessor of Arabic and Amfaric - the modern state language of Ethiopia. Surprisingly, Ge'ez is still spoken by priests in Ethiopia and Eritrea.
1500-400 BC
A civilization develops in Northern Ethiopia under strong Arab influence. The first capital of the state, Yeha, is being built. However, its founder remains unknown. Historians still have not figured out who was more important: either Yeha and Africa ruled Arabia, or vice versa.
955-587 BC
The Holy Ark of the Covenant, made by Moses to contain the Ten Commandments, disappears from Jerusalem at some point during this period.
400 BC – 200 AD
The Aksumite kingdom is formed, it flourishes on trade along the Red Sea and rich natural resources. The first mention of it is found in the book “Periplus of the Erythraean Sea” (first century AD).
200-500 gg
The great Aksumite kingdom reaches its apogee, controlling the lands from the Nile to Arabia. It is considered one of the most powerful powers of the Ancient World.
300-325 gg
The Great Obelisk in Axum collapsed. This catastrophic event marks the end of the era of paganism and the emergence of Christianity in Ethiopia.
400-500 years
The famous “Nine Saints” arrived in Northern Ethiopia. This was a group of Christian missionaries who spoke Greek. Christianity is strengthening as the main religion throughout the region.
615 g
The daughter of the Prophet Mohammed and his follower escape from Arabia to avoid execution. They bring Islam to Ethiopia. Some believe that the Christian king allowed them to stay because he thought they were persecuted Christians.
640-750
The Aksumites lose control of trade in the Red Sea, and their kingdom ceases to exist. Ethiopia begins a long period of “time of troubles” about which almost nothing is known.
1137–1270
Out of the “troubled times” of Ethiopia emerges the Zagwe dynasty, which, with the help of divine powers, produces the incredible churches of Lalibela, hewn from a stone monolith.
1165-1670
Rumors are circulating throughout Europe about Prester John, a powerful Christian king ruling Ethiopia. As this rumor heats up, it claims that he will help the Christians of Europe retake the Holy Land.
1270 g
Emperor Yekuno Amlak, declaring himself a descendant of King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, founded the Solomonid dynasty. She will remain in power for the next 500 years. Ethiopia enters the well-documented Middle Ages.
1400 g
The French aristocrat Duke de Berry sends the first embassy to Ethiopia. In turn, the Ethiopians go to Europe, where many remain in churches, especially in Rome. Contacts are being forged in an attempt to counter the increasingly threatening Muslim superpower.
1400-1600
The birth of the national epic of Ethiopia, Kebra Negast. Exactly when this happened remains controversial.
1490-1529
Mahfuz declares jihad against Christian Ethiopia and begins a series of religious wars, the bloodiest in the country's history. His heir, Ahmed Gragn the Left-Handed, ultimately defeats the emperor. The state was on the verge of complete destruction.
1529-1542
Ahmed Gragn Left-Handed continued his military expansion and by 1532 captured most of eastern and southern Ethiopia. In 1542, near Lake Tana, he defeated the allied army of the Ethiopians and Portuguese.
1543-1559
Emperor Galavdevos, with the help of the Portuguese, eventually defeated and destroyed the Muslim invader Ahmed the Left-Handed. Fighting continues until Galavdevos himself is killed in an attack on the city of Harar.
1550 g
Oromo nomads from Kenya begin a wave of migration north. For another 200 years, the country plunges into an era of intermittent armed conflicts. It was during these times that Harar was surrounded by a wall.
1582 g
Most of Christendom adopts the updated Gregorian calendar, but Ethiopia retains the Julian calendar. Today he is seven years behind.
1629 g
Emperor Susenhos converts to Catholicism in order to obtain military assistance from the Portuguese, and tries to force the people to follow his example. His subjects are dissatisfied, a civil war begins, in which about 32,000 people die.
1636 g
Emperor Fasiladas establishes Gondar, the first permanent capital since Lalibela. In addition, he expels all foreigners from the country and closes the borders tightly. The new capital blossoms and Ethiopia enters its new golden age.
1706-1721
The court of Gondar is plunged into turmoil, because intrigues, conspiracies and political assassinations become something of a hobby for the courtiers.
1755-1855
Emperor Iyasu II dies and the central government of Gondar quickly collapses. Ethiopia slides back into a state of disintegration, followed by a century of continuous civil war and robbery.
1855
Kassa Hailu proves to be more cunning, faster, and more unprincipled than his rivals, resulting in him ascending the throne as Emperor Tewodros. He unifies feudal Ethiopia and embarks on ambitious programs to modernize the country.
1855-72
Tewodros builds numerous roads, creates a regular army, and establishes the Ampharian language ahead of Ge'ez as a means of daily communication. But in the end he makes the mistake of sending a group of British subjects who visited his court to prison.
1872-76
Kassa Merch helps the British remove Tewodros, wins the competition with the heir apparent Emperor Tekla Giyorgis and becomes Emperor Johannes.
1875-76
The Egyptian army attempts to invade the country, but Yohannes organizes effective resistance and is victorious.
1888
The Italians import cattle, from which an epizootic plague begins. This is compounded by a severe, prolonged drought and a locust invasion. As a result, a famine begins throughout the country, which lasts four years.
1889
Emperor Menelik, who follows Johannes, signs a treaty of friendship with Italy and transfers to it the region that is now Eritrea. In the same year, the construction of Addis Ababa, which means “New Flower”, begins, and it becomes the capital.
1896
Emperor Menelik amazes the world by defeating the Italian army at the Battle of Adwa. The 1889 Treaty of Friendship is annulled, Italy recognizes the independence of Ethiopia, but holds tightly to Eritrea.
1913-16
Emperor Menelik dies. The reins of power pass to Lij Iyas. But he is soon replaced by Menelik's daughter, Zewditu, who rules with the help of a regent, Ras Tafari Makonnen.
1915
Thanks to two enterprising engineers with shoemaking skills, the construction of the railway from Addis Ababa to Djibouti is completed. Before giving them carte blanche for a strategic construction project, the emperor checked whether these two could make shoes for him in one night while locked up. The guys did not disappoint. As a result, the economy of all of Ethiopia, and especially the capital, benefited greatly from its access to the sea.
1930
After Zewditu's death and years of careful maneuvering, Ras Tafari receives the crown as Emperor Haile Selassie and the title of God's Chosen.
1931
Ethiopia receives its first written Constitution, which gives the emperor almost absolute power. Even the body of Haile Selassie is declared sacred.
1935
Italian invasion of Ethiopia. The use of prohibited chemical weapons - mustard gas, and systematic bombing of civilian targets, including Red Cross hospitals, lead to the death of 275,000 Ethiopians. Italian losses amount to 4,350 people.
1936
The Italians capture Addis Ababa, Selassie flees the country. Mussolini triumphantly declares: “Ethiopia belongs to Italy!” The King of Italy is made Emperor of Ethiopia.
In June, Haile Selassie asked the League of Nations for help, but the League lifted sanctions against Italy.
1937
The 1,700-year-old Aksum obelisk is being dismantled and transported to Italy. In 1998, Italy agreed to return it, but the war between Ethiopia and Eritrea prevented this operation until 2003.
1940-50
Ethiopia has its first national bank, a new national currency (birr), its first university, and its first (and only) national airline, Ethiopian Airlines.
1941-42
The armed forces of the British Commonwealth, together with the Ethiopian army, liberate the country from Italian occupation. Haile Selassie regains his throne and Ethiopia regains its independence. In subsequent years, the country modernized rapidly.
1960
In Ethiopia, dissatisfaction with the autocratic rule of the emperor is growing. His bodyguards prepare a plot, but it is suppressed by the army and air force.
1962
The headquarters of the Organization of the African Union is established in Addis Ababa. Haile Selassie unilaterally annexes Eritrea. Eritrean separatists begin a brutal guerrilla war.
1972-74
A terrible famine hits the country, killing about 200,000 people. This turns the population against the emperor even more, and student protests begin in the streets.
1974
After years of growing discontent and intensifying street protests, Haile Selassie was unceremoniously dethroned from the imperial throne on September 12. On December 20, the communist organization “Derg” (in Amharic - council, committee, namely the temporary military administrative council) announces the creation of a socialist state in Ethiopia.
1975
The last emperor of Ethiopia, Haile Selassie, dies under investigation. The cause of death is unknown, but many believe that he was personally smothered with a pillow by Mengistu, one of the leaders of the Derg. The Tigrayan People's Liberation Front is founded in northern Ethiopia. He begins an armed struggle for autonomy. The objects of the first attacks of his fighters are a prison and a bank, which they robbed.
1976-90
The collectivization of agriculture begins, mass resettlement of tribes is carried out, placing them in villages. One of the declared goals of all this is the fight against hunger. Most experts agree that the effect was the opposite.
1977
Lieutenant Colonel Mengistu Haili Mariam becomes the leader of the Derg. He turns to, among other countries, the Soviet Union and Cuba for help.
1977-78
In the south, the Somali army invades the Ogaden region to support ethnic Somali unrest and seize that part of the country. Ultimately, Somalia is defeated by the Ethiopians, but only thanks to strong military support from the Soviet Union and Cuba. During these same years, the Derg began brutal persecution of dissidents. Thousands of people are dying from this “red terror”.
1984
Israel carries out Operation Moses: in six weeks it secretly evacuates 8,000 Ethiopian Jews to their historical homeland by air.
1984-85
In the hills of Ethiopia, nearly a million people are dying of hunger. The causes of famine are both climatic and political. Various charitable organizations headed by the famous rock musician Bob Geldof (starring in the film “The Wall” Pink Floyd) provide considerable assistance.
1991-93
The USSR ceases to exist. Accordingly, the partisans come out of hiding and defeat the Derg. The experiment with communism in Ethiopia ends, Mengistu Haile Mariam flees to Zimbabwe to another bloody dictator Mugabe, where he remains to this day, enjoying life.
1992
The remains of Haile Selassie are discovered hidden under a concrete slab in the toilet of the royal palace. In the end, eight years later they are reburied in the Cathedral of the Holy Trinity. There are far fewer mourners than the funeral organizers predicted, only a few thousand 
1993
As a result of the referendum, Eritrea gains its long-awaited independence. Relations between neighbors are excellent at first.
1995
The Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia is proclaimed and elections are held. Former guerrilla commander Meles Zenawi becomes prime minister.
1996
The Italian Defense Minister is eventually forced to admit the use of mustard gas during the Abyssinian campaign.
1997
Eritrea abandons its common currency with Ethiopia - the birra - and introduces its own - the nakfa. This leads to aggravation of relations between neighbors.
1998-2000
The leaders of Ethiopia and Eritrea are waging war over a strip of barren, barren land. By the end of hostilities, 70,000 people are dead and tens of thousands are displaced.
2000-01
A peace agreement is signed between Ethiopia and Eritrea and a demilitarized zone is established along the borders under UN supervision.
2001
Two Ethiopian scientists discover fossilized remains believed to be human, 5.8 to 5.2 million years old. They were tentatively named the subspecies Ardipithecus ramidus kadabba.
2002
A monument to Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin is unveiled in Addis Ababa (a bronze bust by sculptor A. Belashov, a gift from the Moscow Government). The poet's poems are read in Russian and Amfaric languages, the monument is consecrated by the Patriarch of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church Abuna Paulos. This is the first and only monument to Pushkin in Africa, but the historical homeland of his ancestors is most likely located in Ethiopia.
2005
After the May 15 elections, the opposition accused the authorities of fraud. Mass protests end tragically when government troops open fire on unarmed protesters. Thousands of people, including opposition politicians, journalists and newspaper editors, are being arrested by the police.
2006
Construction begins on the giant Jibe III Dam, the largest in Africa. Its environmental and social impacts are controversial and debate is raging on this issue.
2006-09
Ethiopia invades Somalia to destroy the Islamist alliance. Its regular units were defeated, but the Ethiopian army became bogged down in guerrilla warfare and was eventually withdrawn in 2009. During these same years, tensions between Ethiopia and Eritrea again reached a boiling point, and both sides began massive troop movements to the border. Fortunately, mutual claims can be resolved peacefully.
2007
In September, Ethiopia officially celebrates the Millennium, the dawn of a new millennium, according to its archaic Julian calendar.
2008
The mandate of UN troops in the demilitarized zone is running out after "disruptive restrictions" imposed by Eritrea. After the peacekeepers leave, the two nations watch each other nervously. At the same time, separatist guerrillas are becoming more active in northern Ethiopia.
2012
Mengistu Haile Mariam announces that he has begun writing his memoirs. In 2012, a preliminary version appeared on the Internet in the form of a leak.
2011
At the end of the year, the Ethiopian army, allied with the African Union coalition and Kenyan troops, again invades Somalia. This is an attempt to support the Somali government in its armed fight against al-Shabaab insurgents.
2012
Prominent Ethiopian journalist Iskander Nega is being jailed for 18 years for violating anti-terrorism laws after he published an article questioning arrests on a similar charge.
Patriarch of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church Abune Paulos died in July. Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, who dominated the political scene throughout the region for more than 20 years, died in August. His successor is Haile Mariam Desalein.
The story continues during our journey around.
Tobias Rupprecht“African brothers in faith”: Russia, the USSR and their “Ethiopian policy” (second half of the 19th – end of the 20th century)
Tobias Rupprecht (b. 1981) - historian, fellow at the University of Exeter (UK), author of the book “Soviet Internationalism after Stalin” (2015).
It is known that Tsarist Russia did not participate in the European scramble for Africa at the end of the 19th century. It is less known that the Russian Empire at that time began a special relationship with Ethiopia, perhaps the only country in Africa that was not captured by any foreign empire. It was possible to maintain the independence of Ethiopia not without some help from St. Petersburg. Ethiopia attracted the attention of Russian politicians and part of the Russian Orthodox clergy. Its proximity to the Red Sea and the Middle East, its position between North and South-East Africa, was a strategic asset in the geopolitical game against the British Empire. In addition, many believers felt a sense of solidarity with those whom they perceived as Orthodox brothers in the distant Horn of Africa.
Religious ideas about the world order of the late 19th century turned out to be surprisingly tenacious in the 20th century, despite serious geopolitical and ideological changes. Ethiopia retained a special place in geopolitical ideas even after the Bolsheviks seized power. Reinterpretation of the Russian Empire's past has often been used to explain and justify Soviet policies in the Third World after Stalin's death. And since the establishment of the communist regime in Ethiopia in the 1970s, the USSR began to actively use the Russian Orthodox Church to strengthen its influence. Throughout the history of modern Russia and Ethiopia, the Orthodox churches of these countries have always readily submitted to state interests. At the international level, they willingly cooperated with their ideological opponents if it was necessary to achieve their own goals.
Russia and Ethiopia - year 1900
The history of missionary activity of the Russian Orthodox Church abroad is much shorter than the similar history of the Roman Catholic or Protestant churches. Nevertheless, the Russian Church actively supported Russian expansion in Central Asia and the colonization of some territories in North America. In the 19th century, the Holy Synod was interested in events in the Holy Land and Mount Athos. The Orthodox Church - together with the imperial authorities - acted as an ardent defender of Orthodox Christians in the Balkans, Syria and Egypt who were under the rule of the Ottoman Empire. This pan-Orthodoxy can be considered the first attempt in modern history to counteract Western European universalism. Some Orthodox clergy and thinkers even tried to present this new comprehensive Eastern Orthodox culture as a counterweight to the materialistic Romano-Germanic Europe.
These anti-Western ideas contributed to the enthusiastic perception of "exotic" fellow believers in East Africa, surrounded by European colonial possessions. Ethiopia was the only country in Africa that had some history of relations with Russia. Back in the 14th century, there were contacts between Russian and Ethiopian monks in Jerusalem. Afanasy Nikitin visited Ethiopia in the 15th century, and almost three centuries later Peter I unsuccessfully attempted to establish a Russian military presence in the Horn of Africa. But it was only at the end of the 19th century that permanent contacts between Russia and Ethiopia began to be established. In both empires, part of the elite linked their (however, different types) nationalist projects with the church and faith. Slavophiles in Russia combined Orthodoxy with anti-Western romantic nationalism; Coptic priests in Ethiopia collected and systematized old religious texts that affirmed the role of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church as the embodiment of the Ethiopian nation.
The Ethiopian Church, autocephalous only since the 1950s, is one of the ancient Eastern Orthodox churches that broke away from European Christianity half a millennium before the founding of the Russian Church. The similarity in ritual and attire between Russian and Ethiopian priests helped hide significant doctrinal differences, and geopolitical interests made it possible to further reduce this gap. In the 1850s, monk Porfiry Uspensky was sent by the Holy Synod to Jerusalem as part of a secret mission to strengthen Russian influence in the Middle East. Initially, his recommendation to establish cooperation with Orthodox Ethiopia found a greater response among the Russian military than among theologians. Ouspensky's ideas laid the foundation for the Russian fascination with Ethiopia in the last years of the Russian Empire, but at that time both the highest bureaucracy and church hierarchs considered them unrealistic. Letters to the king of the Ethiopian Emperor Yohannes IV, who appealed to Orthodox ties and asked for Russian help in the fight against Ottoman Egypt, remained unanswered in the 1870s.
Instead, at the end of the 19th century, several Russian adventurers went to Ethiopia. In 1885, Cossack Nikolai Ashinov received permission from Johannes IV to build a Russian Orthodox monastery and colony "New Moscow" in exchange for supplies of Russian weapons. Four years later he sailed from Odessa to Massawa, but the Italian colonial administration in Eritrea did not allow the settlers' families to disembark. Ashinov went to Sagalla, and then to Djibouti, where he was received by a group of Ethiopian monks. The history of the first Russian settlement in Africa was short-lived. The French authorities soon sent everyone back to Russia, where patriots praised Ashinov’s “feat”, and the authorities denied their involvement in his activities.
The second Russian expedition in 1889 was less large-scale, but this time it was official: the Metropolitan of Kiev sent a delegation to Ethiopia. It included diplomat Viktor Mashkov, who offered military assistance to the new Emperor Menelik II, hoping in exchange for a concession of a Russian harbor in the Red Sea. Mashkov went to Ethiopia again in 1891, officially on a “geographical mission” - but at the same time he brought a shipment of weapons intended to fight against the Italians. The Orthodox Church sent a mission led by Alexander Eliseev and priest Pater Ephraim to explore the possibility of cooperation - or even unification - of both churches. Menelik II, the founder of modern Ethiopia, showed no interest in the religious side of the matter, but became keenly interested in the possibility of Russian assistance in his fight against Italy.
In Eliseev’s group there was another adventurer, Cossack Nikolai Leontyev. Without official permission, upon his return, he brought an entire Ethiopian diplomatic delegation to the king. Talking in St. Petersburg about the imaginary riches of Ethiopia, Leontyev tried to put together a group of settlers and find financial backers for his venture. He defined his goal as follows: to establish a mission of the Russian Orthodox Church in Ethiopia and help this country defend itself from Italian colonialism. In the end, rifles, military advisers and the Russian Red Cross mission arrived only after the Ethiopians themselves defeated the Italians at Adua. However, they helped further expand the Ethiopian empire. Leontyev began calling himself “Count Abai,” irritating Ethiopians in Addis Ababa with his arrogant behavior. To get rid of Leontyev, Menelik appointed him governor of the southwestern provinces, and later expelled him from the country for starting military operations without permission.
Other Russian adventurers, as well as scholars and devout Orthodox Christians, traveled to Ethiopia around 1900. The country was attractive not only as exotic, but also as congenial: it was seen as of great strategic importance. This interweaving of different interests was reflected in the biographies of several people. For example, the Russian officer Yevgeny Senigov remained in Ethiopia as an artist who painted African landscapes. The Russian mission of the Red Cross included Alexander Bulatovich, a high-ranking officer who later became a monk and, under the name of Hieroschemamonk Anthony, founded the heretical movement imislavie. He tried to create a Russian Orthodox monastery on an island in Lake Khoroshal, but he was unable to secure a concession for the land. Another character in the Russian-Ethiopian plot, Cossack Alexei Suchkov, was sent to Ethiopia, where he stayed from 1903 to 1907, after which he returned to Russia, taking with him wild animals for the Moscow zoo. These and other travelers brought to Russia a large collection of Ethiopian artifacts, which to this day are kept in the St. Petersburg Kunstkamera. Ethiopia became increasingly popular in Russia. Money was raised to support Ethiopia in its opposition to Western colonialism. Nikolai Gumilyov visited Ethiopia twice and wrote poems about Africa. It was in this context that the myth about Pushkin’s Ethiopian roots arose. In fact, his great-grandfather Hannibal was a young slave from the southern shores of Lake Chad, given to the king by the Ottoman Sultan.
At the same time, judging by what meager Ethiopian sources show, Menelik II was not so romantic towards the Russians. To maintain Ethiopia's independence, he needed the import of new military and civilian technologies and the help of their carriers. The Ethiopian emperor saw in Russia, firstly, a source of supplies of modern weapons, and secondly, a power not interested in the colonial seizure of African territories. Another important factor: both Russia and Ethiopia were absolute monarchies - unlike other European countries, so Russia seemed to Menelik a more suitable place to send young Ethiopians to study than republican France. The first batch of Ethiopian students arrived in St. Petersburg on the eve of 1900. Among them was Takla Nawaryat, who, after years of studying military science and technology in Russia, became Ethiopia's finance minister. Takla Nawaryat wrote the country's first constitution, and he spoke on behalf of Ethiopia at the League of Nations after Italy re-invaded the country in 1935.
Soviet Union and Ethiopia under Haile Selassie
The Soviet Union was the only major power to support Ethiopia during Mussolini's invasion in 1935 (the USSR even produced the film Abyssinia). However, the presence of a large number of Russian White emigrants as influential advisers at the imperial court in Addis Ababa prevented the establishment of closer contacts at that time. Diplomatic relations were established only in 1943.
As you know, during the war the Moscow Patriarchate was allowed to resume contacts with Christians abroad, which was supposed to help fulfill the diplomatic tasks of the Soviet state. Church dignitaries were sent to the territory of Bulgaria, Iran, Palestine, Egypt and Antioch. These trips also renewed ties between Orthodox churches. For Stalin, the USSR's role as protector of Orthodox Christians was an important geopolitical resource. After the war, the autocephalous church in Poland and the Ukrainian Uniate church were forcibly incorporated into the Russian church. The Soviet state and the Russian Orthodox Church had common interests here. The Kremlin needed the church to strengthen its regime in Eastern Europe. The Russian Orthodox Church benefited from the annexation of the Orthodox churches and the reorientation of the Greek Catholic (Uniate) Church from Rome to Moscow.
In 1946, the Department for External Church Relations was created in the Moscow Patriarchate, which became an effective means of Soviet propaganda and an additional diplomatic channel in countries with an Orthodox population, primarily in Greece (a future NATO member) and in the countries of the Middle East. In May 1946, during the celebration of the thousandth anniversary of St. John of Rila in the Bulgarian Rila Monastery, the former General Secretary of the Comintern Georgi Dimitrov proposed turning Moscow - this once “Third Rome”, and now the capital of world communism - into a semblance of the Orthodox Vatican. Dimitrov explained to believers the framework within which the church could continue to exist in a communist society, presenting the "great Russian Orthodox Church" as a model they were expected to follow. The leaders of the Russian and Bulgarian churches demonstrated their loyalty to Stalin. Not surprisingly, churches outside the reach of the Red Army expressed little interest in the idea of an Orthodox Vatican under communist leadership, so these tactics changed after Stalin's death.
The new First Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee, Khrushchev, did a lot to end the isolationism of the Soviet camp and spread influence beyond its borders. During his reign, ties were established (or normalized) with countries with significant Orthodox minorities - Egypt, India and Yugoslavia. In the USSR itself, under Khrushchev, the new anti-religious campaign of the 1950s-1960s affected believers of all faiths, but not the institutions of the Russian Orthodox Church. On the contrary, the leadership of the church was increasingly attracted to cooperation with the state. Internationally, Orthodox priests became a useful tool in Soviet foreign policy. In Eastern Europe, the Russian Orthodox Church was called upon to weaken the influence of the Catholic Church. In Third World countries, contacts with local clergy were used to spread Soviet influence.
Moscow's position in relations with Ethiopia in the 1950s and 1960s reflected changes in Soviet policy towards Third World countries after the death of Stalin. Heads of state outside Western influence were then seen as potential allies - regardless of their political orientation. Haile Selassie, (considered the modernizer of Ethiopia) declared himself a direct descendant of Solomon. The Ethiopian Orthodox Church owned about a third of the land in the country and showed little interest in the welfare of its extremely poor flock. All this did not prevent the establishment of friendly relations between the USSR and Haile Selassie. In 1956, Haile Selassie visited the USSR, he was awarded the Order of Suvorov and given a considerable loan of 400 million rubles. The Sovinformburo began broadcasting the Radio Moscow program in Amharic and initiated the translation of Russian literature into it. Soviet teachers founded a polytechnic school in Bahir Dar, and Soviet engineers built an oil refinery in Assab.
To a greater extent than in other Third World countries, the USSR used the Orthodox Church in its relations with Ethiopia, thereby continuing the traditions of the Russian Empire. Ethiopian Patriarch Theophilos was invited to the Soviet Union in 1959; High-ranking delegations of the Russian Orthodox Church visited Ethiopia in 1959, 1962, 1966 and 1969. Russian Patriarch Pimen came to Ethiopia in 1974. The World Council of Churches in Geneva provided a platform on which Russian and Ethiopian clergy could communicate with each other. The Eastern and Ancient Orthodox churches were drawing closer together; in the 1960s, at a series of international meetings in Aarhus, Bristol and Geneva, the issue of “common communion” was discussed (the first such attempts were made in the 19th century). After the World Council of Churches in Addis Ababa in January 1971, representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church met with Haile Selassie and some Ethiopian bishops. As a result, it was decided to send Ethiopian students studying theology to the USSR.
The training of Ethiopian theological students in the USSR was organized and financed by the Russian Orthodox Church, under the auspices of Metropolitan Nikodim (Rotov) of Leningrad, who was closely associated with the KGB and later became president of the World Council of Churches. During the reign of Haile Selassie, the Ethiopian Orthodox Church sent about 25 students to the birthplace of scientific communism to receive education in two seminaries - in Leningrad and Zagorsk. For the Russian Orthodox Church, inviting African students made it possible to demonstrate its support for Soviet foreign policy and thus maintain the existence of its own seminaries and academies, which were constantly under threat of closure. According to the recollections of students, there was no visible participation of the Soviet or Ethiopian state in the approval and financing of this program. “No one was indoctrinated there,” recalls one student, who described his experience in the USSR as “completely positive.” Upon returning to Ethiopia, the students assumed certain positions in the church hierarchy - among them Abba Habte Selassie, who studied in Leningrad and became head of the Department of External Relations of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church.
Mirror of Russia: The Ethiopian Orthodox Church and the communist regime of the Derg
Haile Selassie, Ras Tafari, King of Kings of Ethiopia, Lion the Conqueror of the Tribe of Judah, Chosen of God, was overthrown by a popular uprising in 1974. In particular, outrage was caused by the fact that the authorities did nothing when famine began in the country, which claimed the lives of 200 thousand people. Educated citizens, as well as students, many of whom brought Marxist ideas from universities in Europe and the United States, took to the streets. Gradually the military took power. In September, a temporary military-administrative council, the Derg, was created, headed by Tafari Benti (he was Orthodox). Similar to what happened in Russia after the overthrow of the Tsar in February 1917, the new rulers - a coalition of liberals, conservatives and revolutionary communists - announced sweeping land reform and the separation of church and state. Patriarch Theophilos protested against the appointment of new priests, many of whom insisted on greater involvement of the church in social issues, while others, educated in socialist countries, actively participated in the reform of the church after the revolution. Thus, the Ethiopian Church became embroiled in a conflict between the old elites and the reformers, similar to the struggle between Tikhon and the Renovationists that unfolded in Russia half a century earlier.
The Soviet Union did not take part in the early phase of the Ethiopian revolution. The first contact between the Derg and the Kremlin took place with the participation of the Russian Orthodox Church delegation in Addis Ababa. Relations only strengthened when the radical left, grouped around General Mengistu Haile Mariam, cleared their path to power. At the beginning of 1975, a Derg delegation arrived in the Soviet Union to work out the terms of a future union. When Mengistu Haile Mariam established absolute power in the country in 1977, he already had the full support of the Kremlin. The new stage of relations between the USSR and “yellow hot Africa” revived the old Russian fascination with Ethiopia. The publication and republication of books about Russian travelers to these regions fueled imperial romance. However, at the geopolitical level, the USSR faced a dilemma, as it was providing military support also to Ethiopia's main rival in the Horn of Africa, Somalia, in exchange for the opportunity to use the Somali port in the Red Sea.
While the USSR tried to revive the old idea of pan-Orthodox anti-Western solidarity with Ethiopia, the new communist rulers in Addis Ababa drew inspiration from Soviet religious policies. The Place Mescal (Place of the Cross) became the Square of the Revolution, and public schools replaced moral classes (usually taught by Orthodox priests) with Marxism-Leninism. Soon, bookstores throughout Ethiopia began selling translations of the anti-religious works of Georgiy Plekhanov. The persecution of believers did not reach the level of the Soviet 1920s, but many Ethiopian monasteries and temples became museums, and religious literature and church property were confiscated. Believers could be denied ration cards, fired from their jobs, or even killed.
Patriarch Theophilos was arrested in February 1976, convicted of embezzlement, and replaced by Abba Melaku (under the name Abuna Takla Haymanot), an uneducated but social reform-oriented, popular monk from the countryside. An internal Derg document stated:
“The real patriarch of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church comes from the oppressed class. These people are not very educated. Therefore, they can be manipulated into an unwitting tool of an anti-religious campaign. The patriarchy has already declared that Christ himself spread socialism. […] We need to choose priests and church workers who can spread this illusion of the compatibility of Christianity with communism, and promote them into the inner circle of the patriarch’s leadership.”
The situation became uncertain when the World Council of Churches, which included representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church, began to investigate the fate of Theophilos. The Russian Orthodox Church stopped its student scholarship program in protest, but to no avail. Theophilos was executed along with hundreds of members of the old elite of imperial Ethiopia. Arrests of Christians and even executions were the order of the day. Bishop Samuil (the young head of the religious advisory group in the initial period of the Derg, who studied theology in Bulgaria) and many other hierarchs died. Mengistu Haile Mariam publicly supported the massacres, citing the experience of the Russian revolution and the need to respond to the “white terror” with “red terror.” And just as in the Soviet Union of the 1930s, terror destroyed the leaders of the revolution themselves, including Tafari Benti and the popular military man Atnafu Abate.
Ogaden War (1977-1978) - change of course
Although Mengistu Haile Mariam’s political course, including in relation to the church, resembled Lenin’s and Stalin’s, the USSR in the mid-1970s had virtually no influence on the course of events in Ethiopia. The Kremlin signed a secret agreement with Mengistu Haile Mariam in May 1977, but did not intervene in the - it must be said, rather chaotic - developments inside Ethiopia. This changed during the Ogaden War. Initially, opposition uprisings broke out in Tigray, Eritrea and the Ogaden; Mengistu Haile Mariam's regime was on the brink of collapse when the Somali regular army, equipped with Soviet weapons, attacked Ethiopia in the summer of 1977 - part of a plan to create the so-called "Greater Somalia". After unsuccessful attempts to facilitate a ceasefire, the Kremlin stopped supporting Somalia and began large-scale military assistance to Ethiopia.
The USSR sent about a thousand advisers to Ethiopia, supplied about a billion dollars worth of weapons via air bridge, Cuba sent almost 12,000 soldiers and 6,000 advisers; Even a battalion from South Yemen arrived to support the Ethiopian army. Ethiopia managed to stop the Somali offensive. It is difficult to say why Moscow chose Ethiopia as an ally rather than Somalia - after all, the former could not offer the USSR in return absolutely nothing that Somalia had already guaranteed. The tradition of solidarity with Ethiopia and the idea of some kind of cultural closeness between the two countries played a certain role in this. Lieutenant General Pyotr Chaplygin, the chief Soviet military adviser to Mengistu Haile Mariam, recalled: “We were given three tasks: to save the socialist revolution, to preserve the integrity of the state, and to preserve the traditional friendship between our countries.” The Kremlin's successful military intervention in Ethiopia contributed, among other factors, to the end of détente with the United States, but it also strengthened the USSR's position as a world power.
In subsequent years, socialist countries helped Ethiopia a lot. The GDR intelligence services and the North Korean military sent consultants there. Official Soviet-Ethiopian treaties were signed in 1978; major projects in the fields of industry, education and agriculture were implemented with the assistance of the USSR. The largest hydroelectric power station in Ethiopia was built in Melka Wakena. More than twenty thousand Ethiopians came to study in the USSR, so now the times have come when Ethiopian theological students already had to endure weekly political training.
The change in the Ethiopian regime's policy towards the church during the war with Somalia is another striking parallel with the history of the USSR. The Derg, weakened by internal opposition and separatist movements, was in dire need of measures to strengthen the unity of society. Like Stalin after the German attack, Mengistu Haile Mariam had to stop the terror within the country and play the “popular unity” card. And just like Stalin, the Ethiopian dictator strengthened his power by using “traditional values” - the Orthodox Church and national culture - however, subjugating them for himself. Just like the Russian Orthodox Church, the Ethiopian Church saw in changing the state course a chance not only to survive, but also to ensure its control over some provinces. Eritrea, with its own autocephalous tradition, turned out to be for Ethiopia what Western Ukraine was for the Russian Orthodox Church; and now the opportunity has arisen to completely subjugate the Eritrean flock by collaborating with the communist regime.
Testimonies from senior members of the Derg and numerous meetings between Ethiopian and Russian priests indicate that the Russian Orthodox Church advised its African brothers in faith to cooperate with the communist state. Ethiopian priests willingly came to the USSR for meetings of international religious leaders dedicated to the “struggle for peace.” In the summer of 1977 in Moscow, a representative of the Ethiopian Church publicly announced that in the Soviet Union freedom of religion was not under threat from the state. A year later, the new patriarch of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, Takla Haymanot, went to Moscow; speaking there, he called the intra-church opposition “supporters of the old regime.” In 1978, at an interreligious seminar in Addis Ababa, the patriarch approved a nine-point declaration, expressing full support for the government, in particular regarding the war against Somalia and the rebels in the north of the country. An observer from the World Council of Churches noted: “It is obvious that the patriarch came to this position under the strong influence [...] of his stay in Russia and Poland.”
In 1979, while the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, Ges Salomon Gabra Selassie was appointed administrator general of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. As an enthusiastic supporter of the Derg, who studied theology at the Leningrad Academy from 1967 to 1970, he, using quotations from the Bible, praised the construction of socialism in the USSR, and also denied the facts of the persecution of believers in the Soviet Union. Just like the renovationists in the Soviet 1920s, like the hierarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church during the Cold War, the Ethiopian church authorities defended the policies of the communist government. As in the USSR, some priests opposed the official course, but dissenters immediately became victims of “revolutionary justice” (to put it simply, they were killed), while others were removed from the priesthood and thrown into prison.
Metropolitan Paul Mar Gregory of the Syrian Orthodox Church in India reported from Ethiopia in March 1978: “Strangely enough, in secular socialist Ethiopia, at all major public ceremonies, the patriarch [sides] with the head of state. The government still appoints the leader of the church.” And one of the delegates of the World Council of Churches was horrified by Ges Salomon’s activities in Ethiopia:
“Our faith and freedom of belief are at stake. Our brother from the Orthodox Church demonstrated extreme flexibility. Previously, Ge'ez was the sacred language of the church, then Amharic, and now it seems that Russian will soon be canonized."
Tight government control of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church continued until the end of communist rule. Takla Haymanot, who fought for the survival of the church, died in 1988. His successor Abuna Merkorios, who had close ties with the Derg during the “Red Terror” in the province of Gondar, further strengthened the cooperation of the church with the authorities. Merkorios held out until the fall of Mengistu in 1991, after which he fled to the United States.
***
Unlike the Catholic and Protestant churches, the Orthodox churches rarely manifested themselves as an opposition force under the dominance of communist regimes. In the 20th century in Russia and Ethiopia, the Orthodox clergy adhered to statist and “patriotic” views, regardless of the ideological orientation of the authorities. In both multinational empires, Orthodox elites have been bearers of nationalist sentiments since the 19th century. On the basis of this shared (certainly constructed) Orthodox identity, Russia has cultivated friendship with Ethiopia since pre-revolutionary times. Russian clergy and many believers felt solidarity with their “African brothers in faith.” In Soviet times - despite profound changes - “special ties” remained. Like the Russian Empire, the USSR provided military and military-technical assistance to Ethiopia, and also helped to educate specialists in various fields - from theology to medicine and engineering. The justification for this - rather controversial, as we have seen - choice in favor of the Mengistu Haile Mariam regime was partly due to references to these “special ties” between the two countries.
| Parameter name | Meaning |
| Article topic: | Ethiopia in the 19th century. |
| Rubric (thematic category) | Story |
At the beginning of the 19th century. only a pale shadow remained of the central government in Ethiopia. It has been a long time since there was a generally recognized negus negest in the country. There was a constant struggle for dominance between the principalities of Tigre, Shoa, Amhara and Gojjam. Ethiopia was a picture of feudal chaos and military turmoil.
During this period, the capitalist powers of Europe again began to show a keen interest in the sources of the Nile and in Ethiopia. After the unsuccessful experience of the Portuguese, not a single European state tried to interfere in its internal affairs. In the first half of the 19th century. the situation changed dramatically. Scientists, geographers, travelers, and missionaries from France, Great Britain, and Germany appeared on the lands of Africa, foreshadowing the era of new colonial endeavors of capitalism. After the conquest of Aden in 1839 ᴦ. Great Britain was firmly established at the southern outlet of the Red Sea and tried to extend its indirect control to Northern Ethiopia, concluding treaties with individual princes, for example in 1841. with the ruler of Shoa.
At the same time, the plans of the English colonialists were crossed out by the Casa race (later becoming emperor, he took the name Theodore II, 1855-1868), who again subjugated the principalities to a strong central government. Ras Kasa was a minor prince from the province of Gondar.
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Relying on small feudal lords, he achieved that he was crowned emperor in Aksum. Soon he managed to reorganize the army and subordinate to his supreme power the principality of Shoa in the south of the country, Tigray and Amhara in the north. He defeated the warlike Galla nomads and embarked on a broad program of military, administrative and legal reforms aimed at strengthening central authority. The emperor deprived the feudal lords of the right to have their own armed forces. The provinces were divided into districts and subordinated to governors, who were appointed and removed by Theodore II himself. He fought against the dominance of the clergy in economics and politics and limited the vast land holdings owned by the church. The entire tax system was centralized and simplified. Theodore II moved his residence from Gondar to Debra Tabor, and later to the city of Magdala on the eastern edge of the plateau.
The unification of Ethiopia contradicted the colonial plans of England, especially since Theodore II consciously pursued an anti-colonial policy. Great Britain tried to achieve its goal by encouraging the emperor's internal enemies. A significant part of the clergy and feudal lords rebelled against the “tyrant” Theodore II. The emperor was forced to constantly fight against the feudal lords and undertake campaigns to suppress their rebellions. Unrest in the country led to a deterioration in the economic situation of peasants and tenants, and the nobility skillfully directed their discontent against the central government. The arrest of the English consul Cameron and several other Europeans gave Great Britain a long-awaited reason to send a military expedition to Ethiopia. In 1867 ᴦ. 15 thousand soldiers of the British army were waiting in the port of Zeila for a signal to attack Ethiopia. England rejected all attempts by Theodore II to resolve the conflict by peaceful means. In 1868 ᴦ. English troops besieged the fortress and royal residence of Magdala. Theodore II committed suicide.
Four years later, with the support of the British, Ras Tigre (1827-1889) ascended the throne under the name of John IV. During his reign, the influence of the British increased even more. John IV generously exempted English goods from customs and granted the British concessions for the cultivation of cotton, coffee and indigofera. As a loyal ally of Great Britain, John IV even took part in a campaign against the Sudanese Mahdists who had advanced to Gondar. During this military campaign, John IV died (1889).
This sad event ended the conciliation of the ruling house in relation to the machinations of the capitalists in Ethiopia. During these years, the imperialist powers waged a vigorous offensive on the African coast of the Red Sea, on Eritrea and Somalia. The port of Massawa became an Italian possession, and as a result, Ethiopia was cut off from the Red Sea. When in 1895-1896. Italian colonial troops tried to occupy Ethiopia, they met the heroic resistance of Ethiopian troops under the command of the new emperor, Menelik II, and his victory in the Battle of Adua became a symbol for all of Africa of the successful struggle for independence.
Ethiopia in the 19th century. - concept and types. Classification and features of the category "Ethiopia in the 19th century." 2017, 2018.
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