The Earliest History of Ethiopia

Ethiopia’s history goes back several thousand years. The country was once one of the first areas inhabited by humans, as a number of important finds by ancient people have proved. In 1974, the skeleton of an ancient man about three million years old was found in the Awash Valley in central Ethiopia. The skeleton turned out to be descended from a woman of the species Australopithecus afarensis, and later became known as “Lucy”. Since then, even older remains of the earth’s first humans have been found, even older than Lucy. The findings of the ancient people, Ethiopia’s very early transition to Christianity, and the fact that the country has almost completely escaped European colonial masters, make Ethiopia’s history completely unique compared to the rest of the continent. Except for a short period during the Italian siege, Ethiopia escaped colonization at a time when Europeans were fighting to turn most of the dark continent’s countries into European colonies. On the other hand, Ethiopians have been in close contact with other cultures for several millennia. Egypt, for example, has been a loyal trading partner since 1,000 BC, and the Roma, Greeks and Arabs have also been in active trade with Ethiopia. Something that has left a clear mark on the country’s culture. Visit smartercomputing for Eastern Africa Trade Unions.

Aksumriket

Immigrant Arabs co-founded the Aksum dynasty, which ruled over a vast area of ​​land from 100 BC. to 700 AD The kingdom’s first ruler was the legendary Menelik I., which according to history was the result of a romantic encounter between King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba. This would mean that he is the ancestor of all subsequent Ethiopian emperors. It is partly due to this high culture that Ethiopia became one of the world’s first Christian countries, when King Ezana 300 AD. made Christianity the official religion of Aksum. The ancient Coptic Church, also known as the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, is still the country’s official religion. Since 1974, it has been associated with Islam. For centuries, Muslim missionaries have been trying to convert Ethiopians, who have refused for almost as long. Neighboring countries quickly converted to Islam. As a result, Ethiopian Christianity has been quite isolated from Christianity in other parts of the world. The most obvious characteristic of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church is that Jesus is considered exclusively divine, and not a mixture of god and man, as in our own version of Christianity. In addition, Ethiopians boast that the very Ark of the Covenant (the casket containing the tablets of Moses) is found in the land. Menelik I. took the ark from King Solomon in Jerusalem, and placed it in a small chapel in Aksum. Although it is not possible to enter the chapel, there are no Christian Ethiopians who doubt that the casket is actually there yet. After a few centuries of a high culture that was fully comparable to the contemporary Roman Empire and the Persian Empire, the Aksum Empire split. The center of power was moved south, to the Zagwe dynasty with its capital in Lalibela. In the Zagwe culture, which flourished between 1150 and 1270, people believed that they descended directly from Moses, and Coptic Christianity continued to be the main religion. A large number of churches were built, in the form of monoliths, directly carved into the rocks.

Ethiopia’s modern history

When Europeans began to explore Africa, a group of Portuguese came past Ethiopia in the 16th century. The guests were initially welcomed as an aid in the fight against Islam, but the Portuguese missionaries eventually became too much for Emperor Fasilides, who expelled them in 1633. A couple of centuries later, the Italians became interested in the East African country, and were the first European the country that succeeded in turning Ethiopia into a colony in 1936. This meant that the emperor, Haile Selassie, eventually had to leave the country. In 1941, Allied forces expelled the Italians, and the emperor returned from exile in England. He resumed the modernizations he had begun during his first imperial period. Selassie’s last imperial year was marked by a violent famine that affected large parts of Africa, killing 200,000 people. The famine was followed by major political and social unrest. In 1974, the emperor was deposed, the monarchy was abolished and an attempt was made to establish a communist state. But the political chaos continued, and so did recurring periods of drought and famine, until the establishment of the Ethiopian Republic with uproar in 1995.