History of Ethiopia and the Horn (Hist.

1012)

Wolkite University
College of Social Sciences and the Humanities
Concise Notes (PPT)

October, 2022
“A People without the knowledge of their past
history, origin and culture is like a tree without
roots.” Marcus Garvey
 Unit One: The Nature and Uses of History

A. Nature of History
 The term history derived from the Greek word
“Istoria”, meaning “inquiry” or “an account of one’s
inquiries.”
 The first use of the term is attributed to one of the
ancient Greek historians, Herodotus (c. 484–425
B.C.E.), who is often held to be the “father of
history.”
 In ordinary usage, history means all the things that
have happened in the human past.
 Cont’d
• Academically, history can be defined as an organized and
systematic study of the past based on authentic and credible
sources.
• The study involves the discovery, collection, organization,
interpretation, analyzation and presentation of information that
obtained from sources about past events.
• The major concern of history is the study of human society and its
interaction with the natural environment, which is also the subject
of study by many other disciplines, but what
 Cont’d
history differentiates from other disciplines is that while the latter
study the interaction between humans and their environment in
the present state, history studies the interaction between the
two in the past within the framework of the continuous
process of change taking place in time.
• History is conventionally divided into ancient, medieval and
modern history. This is what we call periodization in history;
one of the key characteristics of the discipline.
 B. Uses of History

• Peoples live in the present and plan for and worry about the
future. History, however, is the study of the past.
• Why bother with the past while living in the present and
anticipating what is yet to come?
1. History Helps Better Understand the Present
2. History is the only significant storehouse of information
available for the examination and analysis of how people
behaved and acted in the past.
 Cont’d
• People need to produce some sort of account of their past
because it is difficult to understand problems that face
humanity and society today without tracing their origins in the
past.
• knowledge of relevant historical background is essential for a
balanced and in-depth understanding of many current world
situations.
 3. History prevails a sense of Identity

• Knowledge of history is indispensable (crucial) to

understand who we are and where we fit in the world.
• As memory is to the individual, history is to the society.
• An individual without memory finds great difficulty in
relating to others and making intelligent decisions.
• A society without history would be in similar condition.
4. History Provides the Basic Background for Other
Disciplines

•Historical knowledge is extremely valuable in the pursuit of

other disciplines such as literature, art, philosophy, religion,
sociology, political science, anthropology, economics, etc.
5. History Teaches Critical Skills
Studying history helps students to develop key research skills.
These include how to find and evaluate sources; how to make
coherent arguments based on various kinds of evidence and
present clearly in writing.
 Cont’d
 These analytical and communication skills are highly usable
in other academic pursuits. Gaining skills in sorting through
diverse interpretations is also essential to make informed
decisions in our day-to-day life.
6. History Helps Develop Tolerance and Open-Mindedness
 By studying the past, students of history acquire broad
perspectives that give them the range and flexibility required
in many life situations.
7. History Supplies Endless Source of Fascination

 Exploring the ways people in distant ages constructed their

lives offers a sense of beauty and excitement, and ultimately
another perspective on human life and society.
 To conclude, history should be studied because it is essential
to the individual and the society.
 Only through studying history can we grasp how and why
things change; and only through history
 Cont’d
are we able understand what elements of a society persist despite
change.
 Aesthetic and humanistic goals also inspire people to study the
past, far removed from present-day utility. Nevertheless, just
as history can be useful, it can also be abused. Such abuses
come mainly from deliberate manipulation of the past to fit
current political agenda.
 Cont’d
• A historian is different from a propagandist in that the former
takes care to document his judgment and assertions so that
they can be subjected to independent and external verification.
1.2. Sources and Methods of Historical Study

Historians are not creative writers like novelists.

Therefore, the work of historians must be
supported by evidence arising from sources.
 Cont’d
 Sources are instruments that bring to life what appear to have
been dead. It is said that “where there are no sources, there is
no history”. Sources are, therefore, key to the study and
writing of history.
A. Primary Sources
 Primary sources are surviving traces of the past available to us
in the present. They are original or first hand in their
proximity to the event both in time and in space.
 Cont’d
• Examples of primary sources are manuscripts
(handwritten materials), diaries, letters, minutes,
court records and administrative files, travel
documents, autobiographies, photographs, maps,
video and audiovisual materials, and artifacts such
as coins, fossils, weapons, utensils, and buildings.
B. Secondary Sources
 They are written long after the event has occurred,
providing an interpretation of what happened, why it
happened, and how it happened, often based on
primary sources.
 Examples of Secondary Sources
 Articles, books, textbooks, biographies, and
published stories or movies about historical
events.
 Oral data constitute the other category of historical
sources. It can be primary and secondary sources.
Oral sources are especially valuable to study and
document the history of non-literate societies.
 They can also be used to fill missing gaps and
corroborate written words. In many societies, people
transmit information from one generation to another,
for example, through folk songs and folk sayings.
 Cont’d
 This type of oral data is called oral tradition.
 People can also provide oral testimonies or personal
recollections of lived experience. Such source
material is known as oral history.
Evaluation/Criticism of Historical Sources:
 For the history of Ethiopia and the Horn, historians
use a combination of the sources described above.
 However, whatever the source of information-
primary or secondary, written or oral- the data should
be subjected to critical evaluation before it is used as
evidence.
 Cont’d
• Primary sources have to be verified for their
originality and authenticity because sometimes
primary sources like letters may be forged.
Secondary sources have to be examined for the
reliability of their reconstructions.
• Oral data may lose its originality and
authenticity due to distortion through time.
• Therefore, it should be crosschecked with
other sources such as written documents to
determine its veracity or authenticity.
 Cont’d
• In short, historians (unlike novelists) must find
evidence about the past, ask questions of that
evidence, and come up with explanations and
interpretation that make sense of what the
evidence says about the people, events, places
and time periods they study about.
Class Discussion
1. What does mean source criticism?
2. Why do we need source criticism?
 1.3. Historiography of Ethiopia and the Horn
 Historiography can be defined as the history of
historical writing, studying how knowledge of the
past, either recent or distant, is obtained and
transmitted.
 It is also the selection of authentic material,
writing of history based on critical examination of
sources and synthesis of details in to narration.
 People have had some sense of the past perhaps since
the beginning of humanity.
 Yet historiography as an intentional attempt to
understand and represent descriptions of past events
in writing has rather a briefer career throughout the
The Contributions of Greek and Chinese Historians

 The organized study and narration of the past was

introduced by ancient Greek historians notably
Herodotus (c. 484–425 B.C.E.) and Thucydides (c.455-
400 B.C.E.)
 The other major tradition of thinking and writing about
the past is the Chinese. The most important early figure
in Chinese historical thought and writing was the Han
dynasty figure Sima Qian (145–86 B.C.E.).
 Despite such early historiographical traditions, history
emerged as an academic discipline in the second half of
the nineteenth century first in Europe and subsequently
in other parts of the world including the US.
The Marvelous Contribution made by Leopold Von
Ranke (German Historian)
 Leopold Von Ranke (1795–1886), and his
colleagues established history as an
independent discipline in Berlin with its own
set of methods and concepts by which
historians collect evidence of past events,
evaluate that evidence, and present a
meaningful discussion of the subject.
 Ranke’s greatest contribution to the scientific
study of the past is such that he is considered
as the “father of modern historiography.”
 Sources on History of Ethiopia and the Horn

• Historiography of Ethiopia and the Horn has changed

enormously during the past hundred years in ways that merit
fuller treatment than can be afforded here.
 Periplus of Erythrean Sea
 The earliest known reference that we have on history of
Ethiopia and the Horn. It was Written in the first century A.D
by an anonymous author.
 The Christian Topography
 Described Aksum’s trade and the then Aksumite king’s
campaigns on both sides of the sea. Written in six century by
Cosmas Indicopleustes, a Greek sailor.
 Cont’d
 Manuscripts, Inscriptions, and
Hagiographies
Inscriptions aside, the earliest written
Ethiopian material dates from the seventh
century A.D. was found in Abba Gerima
monastery in Yeha.
This was followed by a manuscript
discovered in Haiq Istifanos monastery of
present day Wollo in the thirteenth century
A.D.
 Cont’d
• The value of manuscripts is essentially religious.
• Yet, for historians, they have the benefit of providing
insights into the country’s past.
• For example, the manuscript cited above contains the
list of medieval kings and their history in brief.
• The largest groups of sources available for medieval
Ethiopian history are hagiographies originating from
Ethiopian Orthodox Church.
• Invariably written in Ge’ez, an important function of
hagiographies is enhancing the prestige of saints.
 Cont’d
• Hagiographies also discussed in detail about the
development of the church and the state including
territorial conquests by reigning monarchs.
• A parallel hagiographical tradition existed among
Muslim communities of the country. One such
account offers tremendous insight into the life of a
Muslim saint, Shaykh Ja’far Bukko of Gattira, in
present day Wollo, in the late nineteenth century.
• Besides the saint’s life, the development of
indigenous Islam and contacts between the region’s
Muslim community and the outside world are some
of the issues discussed in this document.
 Chronicles

 Ethiopia had also an indigenous tradition of history writing

called chronicles.
 Chronicles in the ancient Ethiopian Ge’ez tongue first
appeared in the fourteenth century and continue (sometimes
in Amharic) into the early twentieth century.
 Kings or their successors entrusted the writing of chronicles to
court scribes or clergymen of recognized clerical training and
calligraphic skills.
 The earliest and the last of such surviving documents are the
Glorious Victories of Amde-Tsion and the Chronicle of
Abeto Iyasu and Empress Zewditu respectively.
 Nature, strengths, and weaknesses of Chronicles
 Chronicles incorporate both legends and facts-past
and contemporary about the monarch’s genealogy,
upbringing, military exploits, piety and
statesmanship.
 Are known for their factual detail and strong
chronological framework, even if it would require
considerable labor to convert their relative
chronology to an absolute one.
 They are also averse to quantification. Furthermore,
chronicles explain historical events mainly in
religious terms; they offer little by way of social and
economic developments even in the environs of the
palace.
 Cont’d
 However, in conjunction with other varieties of
written documents, such as hagiographies and
travel accounts by foreign observers, chronicles
can provide us with a glimpse into the character
and lives of kings, their preoccupations and
relations with subordinate officials and, though
inadequately, the evolution of the Ethiopian state
and society.
 Accounts produced by Arab visitors:
 Written accounts of Arabic-speaking visitors to
the coast also provide useful information on
various aspects of the region’s history.
 Cont’d

• For example, al-Masudi and Ibn Battuta described

the culture, language and import-export trade in the
main central region of the east African coast in the
tenth and in the fourteenth centuries respectively.
• For the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries we have
two documents composed by Yemeni writers who
were eyewitnesses to the events they described.
• The first document titled Futuh al Habesha was
composed by Shihab ad-Din, who recorded the
conflict between the Christian kingdom and the
Muslim principalities in the sixteenth century.
 Cont’d
• Besides the operation of the war including the
conquest of northern and central Ethiopia by
Imam Ahmed ibn Ibrahim al-Ghazi, the
document describes major towns and their
inhabitants in the southeastern part of
Ethiopia, although the discussion abruptly
ends in 1535.
• The other first-hand account was left to us by
Al-Haymi, who led a Yemeni delegation in
1647 to the court of Fasiledes (r. 1632-67).
 Abba Bahrey’s Script
 Other materials that appeared in the sixteenth century
include Abba Bahrey’s Geez script on the Oromo
written in 1593.
 Notwithstanding its limitations, the document
provides us with first-hand information about the
Oromo population movement including the Gadaa
System.
Classroom Discussion
1. Explain merits and demerits of Chronicles
2. What are the historical significances of manuscripts?
 The Contributions of Europeans (Missionaries and Travellers)

 The contribution of European missionaries and

travelers to the development of Ethiopian
historiography is also significant.
 From the early sixteenth until the late nineteenth
centuries, missionaries (Catholics and Protestants)
came to the country with the intention of staying, and
who, nevertheless, maintained intimate links with
Europe.
 Thus, the missionaries’ sources provide us with
valuable information covering a considerable period.
Some of the major topics covered by these sources
include religious and political developments within
Ethiopia, and the country’s foreign relations.
 Cont’d
 An example of such account is The Prester John of
the Indies, composed by a Portuguese priest,
Francisco Alvarez who accompanied the Portuguese
mission to the court of Lebne-Dengel in 1520.
 In addition to the missionary sources, travel documents
had important contribution to the development of
Ethiopian historiography.
 One example of travel documents is James Bruce’s
Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile. Like other
sources, however, both the missionaries and travelers’
materials can only be used with considerable
reservations and with care for they are socially and
politically biased.
 The Contributions of European Writers (Hiob Ludolf,
August Dillman)
 Foreign writers also developed interest in Ethiopian
studies.
 One of these figures was a German, Hiob Ludolf
(1624-1704).
 Ludolf was the founder of Ethiopian studies in
Europe in the seventeenth century.
 He wrote Historia Aethiopica (translated into
English as A New History of Ethiopia).
 Ludolf never visited Ethiopia; he wrote the country’s
history largely based on information he collected
from an Ethiopian priest named Abba Gorgorios
(Abba Gregory) who was in Europe at that time.
 Cont’d
In the nineteenth century, August Dillman published
two studies on ancient Ethiopian history. Compared to
Ludolf, Dillman demonstrated all markers of
objectivity in his historical research endeavors. He
was the founder Ethiopian scientific history.
The Emergence of Traditional Ethiopian Writers
(Early 20th Century)
This period saw the emergence of traditional
Ethiopian writers who made conscious efforts to
distance themselves from chroniclers whom they
criticized for adulatory tone when writing about
monarchs.
 Cont’d
 The earliest group of these writers include
Aleqa Taye Gebre- Mariam, Aleqa Asme
Giorgis and Debtera Fisseha-Giorgis
Abyezgi.
 Later, Negadrases Afework Gebre-Iyesus
and Gebre-Hiwot Baykedagn joined them.
 Unlike chroniclers, these writers dealt with a
range of topics from social justice,
administrative reform and economic
analysis to history.
 Prominent Writers and their works
 Taye and Fisseha-Giorgis wrote books on the history
of Ethiopia while Asme produced a similar work on
the Oromo people.
• Notwithstanding his other works, Afework wrote the
first Amharic novel, Tobiya, in Ethiopian history
while Gebre-Hiwot has Atse Menilekna Ityopia
(Emperor Menilek and Ethiopia) and Mengistna
Yehizb Astedader (Government and Public
Administration) to his name.
• The most prolific writer of the early twentieth century
Ethiopia was, however, Blatten Geta Hiruy Wolde-
Selassie.
 Cont’d
 Hiruy W/Selasse published four major works
namely
1. Ethiopiana Metema (Ethiopia and Metema),
2. Wazema (Eve),
3. Yehiwot Tarik (A Biographical Dictionary) and
4. Yeityopia Tarik (A History of Ethiopia).
 In contrast to their predecessors, Gebre-Hiwot and
Hiruy exhibited relative objectivity and
methodological sophistication in their works.
 Unfortunately, the Italian occupation of Ethiopia
interrupted the early experiment in modern history
writing and publications.
 Post-Liberation Developments

• After liberation, Tekle-Tsadik Mekuria formed a

bridge between writers in pre-1935 and Ethiopia
professional historians who came after him.
• Tekle-Tsadik has published about eight historical
works.
• He made better evaluation of his sources than his
predecessors.
• Another work of importance in this period is Yilma
Deressa’s Ye Ityopiya Tarik Be’asra Sidistegnaw
Kifle Zemen (A History of Ethiopia in the Sixteenth
Century).
 Cont’d
 The book addresses the Oromo population movement
and the wars between the Christian kingdom and the
Muslim sultanates as its main subjects.
Classroom Discussion
1. Explain the difference between Amateur and
Professional writers of History.
2. What possible factors spurred the sixteenth century
population movements in Ethiopia and the Horn?
3. Discuss the causes and consequences of the sixteenth
century conflict between the CHK and the Adalite
Sultanate.
 The Year 1960s as a Turning point in the
Development of Ethiopian Historiography
The 1960s was a crucial decade in the
development of Ethiopian historiography for it was
in this period that history emerged as an academic
discipline.
The pursuit of historical studies as a full-time
occupation began with the opening of the
Department of History in 1963 at the then Haile
Selassie I University (HSIU).
The production of BA theses began towards the
end of the decade. The Department launched its
MA and PhD programs in 1979 and 1990
respectively.
 Cont’d
Since then researches by faculty (both Ethiopians
and expatriates) and students have been produced
on various topics.
Although mainly a research organization, the
Institute of Ethiopian Studies (IES) is the other
institutional home of professional historiography
of Ethiopia.
The IES was founded in 1963. Since then the
Institute housed a number of historians of whom
the late Richard Pankhurst, the first Director and
founding member of the Institute is worthy of note
here. Pankhurst’s prolific publication record
remains unmatched.
 Continued…
He has authored or co-authored twenty-two
books and produced several hundred articles on
Ethiopia.
Since its foundation, the IES has been
publishing the Journal of Ethiopian Studies
for the dissemination of historical research.
The Institute’s library contains literary works of
diverse disciplines and has its fair share in the
evolution of professional historiography of
Ethiopia.
The professionalization of history in other parts
of the Horn is a post-colonial phenomenon.
 Decolonization of African Historiography
 With the establishment of independent nations, a deeper
interest in exploring their own past quickly emerged
among African populations, perhaps stimulated by
reactions to decades of education in an alien imperial
historiography.
 With this came an urgent need to recast the historical
record and to recover evidence of many lost pre-
colonial civilizations.
 The decolonization of African historiography required
new methodological approach (tools of investigation)
to the study of the past that involved a critical use of
oral data and tapping the percepts of ancillary
disciplines like archeology, anthropology and
linguistics.
 Cont’d
 At the same time, European intellectuals’ own
discomfort with the Euro-centrism of previous
scholarship provided for the intensive academic study
of African history, an innovation that had spread to
North America by the 1960s.
 Foundational research was done at the School of
Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London
and the Department of History at the University of
Wisconsin-Madison. Francophone scholars have
been as influential as Anglophones.
 Yet African historiography has not been the sole
creation of interested Europeans.
 Cont’d
 African universities have, despite the instabilities of
politics and civil war in many areas, trained their own
scholars and sent many others overseas for training
who eventually published numerous works on
different aspects of the region’s history.
Class Activity
1. Explicate briefly both internal and external
developments credited for the growth of Academic
Ethiopian Historiography.
2. What do we mean by decolonization of African
Historiography?
 1.4. The Geographical Context

 The term “Ethiopia and the Horn” refers to that part

of Northeast Africa, which now contains the countries
of Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Somalia.
 The Rift Valley is a fissure in the Earth’s crust running
down from Syria to Mozambique and marking the
separation of the African and Arabian tectonic
plates.
 The major physiographic features of the region are a
massive highland complex of mountains and
plateaus divided by the Great Rift Valley and
surrounded by lowlands, semi-desert, deserts and
tropical forests along the periphery.
 Cont’d
 As with the physical features, people across
the region are remarkably diverse: they speak
a vast number of different languages, profess
to many distinct religions, live in various types
of dwellings, and engage in a wide range of
economic activities.
 At the same time, however, peoples of the
region were never isolated; they interacted
throughout history from various locations.
 Cont’d
 The history of Ethiopia and the Horn has been
shaped by contacts with others through
commerce, migrations, wars, slavery,
colonialism, and the waxing and waning of
state systems.
 Yet, the evolution of human history owed
much to geographical factors notably location,
landforms, resource endowment, climate
and drainage systems which continue to
impact, as incentives and deterrents, the
movement of people and goods in the region.
 Geographical features –Makers of History
A. Spatial Location
 Location in relationship to other spaces and locations in
the world is one geographical factor that has significant
bearing on the ways in which history unfolds.
 Ethiopia and the Horn lies between the Red Sea, Gulf
of Aden and Indian Ocean on the one hand, and the
present-day eastern frontiers of Sudan and Kenya on the
other.
 Since early times, the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden
linked Northeast Africa to the Eastern Mediterranean,
the Near and Middle East, India, and the Far East.
 Likewise, the Indian Ocean has linked East Africa to the
Near and Middle East, India and the Far East.
 B. Drainage System

 Drainage System had profound impact on human history.

 Ethiopia and the Horn has five principal drainage systems.
 These are the Nile River, Gibe/Omo–Gojeb, Genale/Jubba-
Shebele, the Awash River, and the Ethiopian Rift Valley Lake
systems.
1. Nile drainage system: Flowing from Uganda in the south to
the Sudan in the north, the White Nile meets the Blue Nile (Abay
in Ethiopia that starts from the environs of Tana Lake) in
Khartoum and eventually, drains into the Mediterranean Sea
through Egypt.
 Contd
2. The Awash River System is entirely confined to
Ethiopia and links the cool rich highlands of Central
Ethiopia with the hot, dry lowlands of the Danakil
Depression.
3. The Ethiopian Rift Valley Lakes System is a self-
contained drainage basin, and includes a string of lakes
stretching from Lake Ziway in the north to Lake
Turkana (formerly known as Rudolf) on the
EthioKenyan border.
4. The Gibe /Omo–Gojeb River System links southern
Ethiopia to the semidesert lowlands of northern Kenya.
 Cont’d
5. The Shebele and Genale/Juba/ rivers originate in
the Eastern highlands and flow southeast toward
Somalia and the Indian Ocean.
 Only the Genale (known as the Jubba in Somalia)
makes it to the Indian Ocean; the Shebele disappears
in sand just inside the coastline.
 The above watersheds are very important in the life
and history of the peoples inhabiting the region.
Besides providing people with the source of their
livelihood, the drainage systems facilitated the
movement of peoples and goods across diverse
environments.
 Cont’d
Thus, studying the drainage systems of Ethiopia and
the Horn is crucial for proper understanding of the
relationships of the peoples living within the river
basins mentioned previously.
Environmental Zones
 Ethiopia and the Horn can be divided into three
major distinct environmental zones.
1. The vast Eastern lowland covers the narrow coastal
strip of northeastern Eritrea, widens gradually and
descends southwards to include much of lowland
Eritrea, the Sahel, the Danakil Depression, the lower
Awash Valley,
 Cont’d
…and the arid terrain in northeast of the Republic of
Djibouti.
 It then extends to the Ogaden, the lower parts of
Hararghe, Bale, Borana, Sidamo and the whole
territory of the Republic of Somalia.
 There is no much seasonal variation in climatic
condition in this zone. Hot and dry conditions prevail
year-round along with periodic monsoon winds and
irregular (little) rainfall except in limited areas along
the rivers Awash, Wabe-Shebele and Genale/Jubba
that traverse the region and a few offshore islands in
the Red Sea, Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean.
 Cont’d
2. Highland massif that starts from northern
Eritrea and continues all the way to southern
Ethiopia.
 The eastern extension of the highland massif
consists the Arsi, Bale and Hararghe plateau.
 The major divide between the western and
eastern parts of this zone is the Rift Valley.
 The major physiographic features of the zone
are complex of mountains, deep valleys, and
extensive plateaus.
 Cont’d
3.The Hot Lowland: Along the western
foothills or on the periphery of the
plateau and on border lands of the Sudan
stretching from north to south are hot
lowlands that were characterized with in
earlier time by thick forest chiefly on the
banks of the Nile and its tributaries.
 Cont’d
 Despite the varied physical environments discussed
above, the countries of the Horn of Africa are, for the
most part, linguistically and ethnically linked together
as far back as recorded history goes.
 Population movements had caused a continuous
process of interaction, creating a very complex
picture of settlement patterns. The high degree of
interaction and the long common history of much of
the population had weakened ethnic dividing lines in
large parts of the region.
 Linguistic and cultural affinities are therefore as
important as ethnic origin in the grouping of the
population.
END OF UNIT ONE
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HUMAN
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