LAYERS OF TIME PAUL B. HENZE first visited Ethiopia in 1962, as an officer of the U.S. Foreign Service. He was designated Political Counsellor of the American Embassy in Addis Ababa in 1968, and served there till August 1972. In 1977 he was appointed as a senior staff member of the National Security Council under Zbigniew Brzezinski in the Carter administration and was involved firsthand in the dramatic events of 1977 -80 in the Horn of Africa, undertaking three official missions. On retiring from government service at the end of 1980, Henze became a Wilson Fellow at the Smithsonian Institution. He joined the RAND Corporation as a Resident Consultant in 1982. PAUL B. HENZE Layers of Time A History o.f Ethiopia palgrave LAYERS OF TIME Copyright © 2000 by Paul B. Henze Softcover reprint of the hardcover 18t edition 2000 978-0-312-22719-7 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address: PALGRAVE, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010 Companies and representatives throughout the world. PALGRAVE is the new global imprint of St. Martin's Press LLC Scholarly and Reference Division and Palgrave Publishers Ltd. (formerly Macmillan Press Ltd.) First published in the United States of America, 2000 2nd impression, 2001 ISBN 978-1-4039-6743-5 ISBN 978-1-137-11786-1 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-137-11786-1 Library of Congress Catologing-in-Publication Data Henze, Paul B., 1924- Layers of time: a history of Ethiopia / by Paul B. Henze. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references (p.) and index. ISBN 978-1-4039-6743-5 1. Ethiopia-History. I. Title DT381.H465 2000 963-dc21 99-33311 CIP Transferred to Digital Printing 2012 CONTENTS Preface and Acknowledgements page xi Note on Dates and Names xv Glossm), XVI Acronyms xviii Chapters 1. Layers of Time: The Geological and Human Foundations of Ethiopia: 1 The Rift Valley and the Mediterranean 1 Early man in Ethiopia 4 The beginnings of civilization 10 Trade and travel from the Mediterranean world 15 South Arabia and Ethiopia 19 2. The Aksumite Empire: Ethiopia as a World Power 22 The rediscovery of Aksum 22 From city states to Empire 26 Coinage and Christianity 30 Architecture and artifacts 34 Language, writing, and evangelization 37 The final flowering of Aksum 39 The rise of Islam 42 30 Medieval Ethiopia: Isolation and Expansion 44 The decline of Aksum 44 The Zagwe Dynasty 49 The Beta Israel (Falashas) and the Kebra Negast 53 The Solomonic restoration 56 Iyasus Mo'a and Tekle Haymanot 60 From Amde Tseyon to Zara Yakob 63 The Christianization of Lake Tana and Gojjam 72 Language, art, and culture 76 4. Ordeal, Recovery, Decline: Ethiopia and the World around it on the Threshold of Modern Times 83 The growth of Muslim power in the Horn of Africa 83 Turks and Portuguese 85 Ahmad Gragn's assault on the Christian kingdom 86 v vi Contents The advance of the Oromo 90 Portuguese success and failure 92 The Gondarine era 100 Europeans and Ethiopia 107 Ref:ions and borderlands 110 5. The Empire from Atrophy to Revival: The Era of the Princes and Tewodros II 119 The era of the Princes 119 Missionaries 125 The rise of Shoa 127 Tewodros II: from victory to disaster 133 6. Yohannes IV and Menelik II: The Empire Restored, Expanded, and Defended 144 Menelik, King of Shoa 144 Menelik and Yohannes IV: competition and accommodation 146 The challenge ofItaly 154 The end of Yohannes IV 159 Emperor Menelik II and the Powers 160 The prelude and the Battle of Adwa 167 Menelik's triumphal decade 171 Trade and diplomatic relations with America 176 The significance of Adwa 180 Menelik 's final years 185 7. The Rise of Haile Selassie: Time of Troubles, Regent, Emperor, Exile 188 Tafari's early years 189 Time of troubles 191 Ras Tafari and Empress Zewditu 198 Tafari and the outside world 199 Reform and opposition 202 Emperor Haile Selassie I 205 Economic development 209 Eritrea under Italy 210 Mussolini prepares to absorb Ethiopia 214 The Italian invasion 216 Europe, America, and the Ethiopian crisis 220 Africa Orientale Italiana (AOI) 223 Resistance 227 Contents VII 8. Ethiopia in the Modern World: Haile Selassie from Triumph to Tragedy 229 Liberation 229 Ethiopia, Britain and the United States 235 Imperial consolidation 237 The "disposal" ofEritrea 240 Formalization of the American relationship 245 The Wryane rebellion 248 The Constitution of 1955 252 The Bodyguard Coup of 1960 253 Aftermath of the coup: education 256 Aftermath of the coup: government and foreign affairs 258 The legacy of the coup 259 Insurgency in Bale 260 Intellectual life, literature and art in the 1960s 265 A quarter century of economic development 269 The end of the Eritrean Federation 273 Ethiopia's international position at the beginning of the 1970s 279 9. Revolution, War, and "Socialism": The First Decade of the Derg 282 Prelude to revolution 282 Ferment tums into revolution 284 The Derg and Eritrea 287 The proclamation ofEthiopian "Socialism" 290 Moscow's dilemma 295 The United States and the Derg 297 The Ethio-Somali war and Soviet intervention 300 The struggle in Eritrea 303 Consolidation of the Soviet relationship 304 10. The End of the Derg: The Victory of the Northern Guerrilla Movements 308 The Great Famine and its consequences 308 The revolution unravelling 311 A surprising Israeli initiative 315 Reform and aftermath - too little too late 316 Relations among guerrilla groups - positioning for victory 320 United States involvement becomes decisive 323 viii Contents The dog days of the Derg 327 The Derg disintegrates and EPRDF forces enter the capital 329 The rebel movements become governments 330 11. Ethiopia Resurgent: on the Threshold of the 21st Century 334 From the TGE to the FDRE and independent Eritrea 334 Looking backward 338 Looking forward 341 Bibliographic Guide to Further Reading 344 Index 361 ILLUSTRATIONS between pages 46 and 47 The High Semien, the "Roof of Mrica" Rock carvings near Kersa, Arsi Sabaean temple at Yeha, Tigray, 7th century BC Stela Park, Aksum Fallen monolithic Aksum stela Church of Abba Libanos, Lalibela 6th-century monastery atop Debre Damo, Tigray 16th-century mosque, Massawa New mosque at Negash, Tigray Pages from Tullu Gudo Book of Saints (14th century) Castles at Gondar Peasant farmer plowing between pages 146 and 147 Sahle Selassie, King of Shoa, receiving gifts from the Harris expedi- tion, Ankober, 1841 Slaves being led to the coast, 19th century Church of St Michael, Ankober Magdala burning, 17th April 1868 Emperor Yohannes IV Emperor Menelik II Empress Taitu Betul Church of Enda Giyorgis, Adwa Ras Tafari and Princess Menen Asfaw at the time of their marriage, 3 August 1911 Emperor Haile Selassie, Bath, 1937 between pages 288 and 289 Haile Selassie with Mao Zedong, Beijing, October 1971 Painting of Mengistu Haile Mariam Revolution Square, Addis Ababa, 1980 Kiros and Ali, Kishe resettlement site, 1987-an example of the Derg's policy of ethnic mixing Derg soldiers expelled from Eritrea, July 1991 Lenin's statue: in place; painting of it being pulled down by the crowd; fallen and dumped at the edge of the city Bullet-ridden portrait of Mengistu, June 1991 Classical Arab street architecture, Massawa Oromo farmer in Arsi with his 12 children, 1989 IX MAPS Ancient Ethiopia xx Medieval Ethiopia xxi Modern Ethiopia xxii Provinces, 1946-1980 XXlll Federal Ethiopia (since 1994) xxiv x PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Since the fall of the Derg in 1991, Ethiopia has once again become open to the world. Officials, businessmen, scholars, students and tourists visit it in increasing numbers. Exhibitions, new archaeo­ logical discoveries, reports and articles in journals and even news­ papers (many of them available on the Internet) now draw attention to the country's long history, its culture, its art, and the immense variety of peoples and ways of life that exist there. How did it all happen? Time and again I have been asked to recommend a com­ prehensive history of the country, one extending from very ancient times to the modern era. I decided three years ago to write one myself. Like many Americans, I became aware of Ethiopia as a boy of eleven when news of Mussolini' s invasion shocked the world. As a young adult I read several of the classic travel accounts - Nesbitt's Desert and Forest, e.g. - well before I had an opportunity to set foot in the country in 1962 when I spent a week there at the end of a long official visit to Africa. I resolved to go back as soon as I had the opportunity. In 1968 I requested assignment to the American Embassy in Addis Ababa and had the good fortune to be selected. These were the last years of the imperial era when the whole coun­ try was open. It was easy to make friends with Ethiopians at all levels of society. Compared to the developed world, Ethiopia was still backward, but it was enjoying a level of peace and prosperity it had never attained before in its long history. It was also beginning to outstrip the capacity of the last Lion ofJudah to lead it onward, but when I said good-bye to him in August 1972, I found him alert and abreast of developments in the world. I described impressions of some of the people and places I encountered in travels during those years in Ethiopian Journeys, 1969- 1972, I a book written in 1973 but not published until four years later when the military junta that seized power in 1974 had plunged the country into chaos.