Of Obelisks and Empire Royal monuments and ancients accounts recall the lost glory of an African kingdom BY MARK ROSE N THE FIRST CENTURY A.D., an unknown he had uncovered remains of Sheba’s 10th-century Imerchant recorded details of the Red Sea trade, B.C. palace and possibly where Menelik placed the and mentioned Adulis, the harbor of “the city of the Ark. Headline writers produced breathless, Indiana people called Aksumites” to which “all the ivory is Jones—inspired copy: “German ‘raiders’ on trail of brought from the country beyond the Nile.” The the Ark.” But other German scholars, from the same ruler of Aksum, he wrote, was Zoskales, who was university, quickly poured cold water on the story. “miserly in his ways and always striving for more, Their terse statement noted, “The members and the but otherwise upright, and acquainted with Greek head of the Ethiopian Studies Research Unit of literature.” Just two centuries later, the philosopher Hamburg University consider the published identi- Mani (ca. A.D. 210–276) included Aksum as one of fication as not scientifically proven.” the four great empires, along with Rome, Persia, and Sileos (possibly China). And in 274, envoys The site of these controversial excavations is from Aksum took part in the triumphal procession on the western side of Aksum, where in the 1960s a staged by the emperor Aurelian when he paraded French team dug a large residential complex dating the captured Queen Zenobia of Palmyra fettered to around A.D. 600–640. It has traditionally been with gold chains, through Rome. called the Palace of the Queen of Sheba, who is identified in Ethiopian accounts as Kandake Today, Aksum is a dusty, regional market town Makeda. But there is no reason to believe that it— of about 50,000 in northern Ethiopia. If people have or the ancient reservoir at Aksum known locally as heard of it, perhaps it is on account of another Sheba’s Bath—was in any way related to her. And queen: the Biblical Sheba. According to the Kebra the evidence for a 10th-century B.C. palace below it Nagast (Book of the Glory of the Kings), an early- is less than compelling. l4th century compilation that chronicles Ethiopia’s rulers, Solomon and Sheba had a son, Menelik, who KSUMS RAPID RISE TO POWER—a millen- brought the Ark of the Covenant from Jerusalem to Anium after the time of Sheba—owes much to its Aksum. The Ethiopian Orthodox Church maintains location. Not only was it in a position to dominate that the Ark is still kept within the precinct walls of the ivory trade from the African interior, it also the Church of Tsion (Mary of Zion) in Aksum. could control the sea route by which ships carried goods from the Mediterranean to markets along the But there is more to Aksum than legends of Red Sea coast and beyond to India. Aksum’s grow- Sheba and the Ark. In 1980, it was added to ing economic power was matched by a flexing of its UNESCO’S list of World Heritage Sites because of military might. An inscription set up at Adulis by an the vestiges of its past, scattered throughout and unknown Aksumite king, possibly Sembrouthes around the town: ancient cemeteries with royal (A.D. 240—270), catalogues his conquests and the tombs, villa-like residential complexes, inscrip- expansion of his realm across the Red Sea into tions, and monolithic stelae and obelisks. southwestern Arabia: At times, tradition and belief mix uneasily with Having after this with a strong hand compelled the archaeology in Aksum. A year ago, a retired nations bordering on my kingdom to live in peace, I University of Hamburg archaeologist claimed that made war upon the following nations, and by force “Of Obelisks and Empire” by Mark Rose. Reprinted with permission of ARCHAEOLOGY magazine, Vol. 62 , #3, www.archaeology.org. Copyright, ©The Archaeological Institute of America, May/June 2009. 1 2 Of Obelisks and Empire of arms reduced them to subjection. I warred ORE THAN 1,000 STELAE AND first with the nation of Gazê, then with Agamê Mobelisks remain in and around Aksum today. and Sigyê, and having conquered them I exacted the Early stelae were small, rough uncarved monoliths half of all that they possessed. I next reduced Aua up to 10 feet in height and marked simple pit graves. and Tiamô, called Tziamô, and the Gambêla, and In the first centuries A.D., the pit graves were the tribes near them, and Zingabênê and Angabe replaced by shaft tombs marked by carefully and Tiama and Athagaûs and Kalaa, and the smoothed stelae as tall as 33 feet with carved, Semênoi—a people who lived beyond the Nile on rounded tops. The trend continued, with multicham- mountains difficult of access and covered with bered tombs and even larger and more elaborate snow.… And I sent a fleet and land forces against markers in the third and fourth centuries. the Arabitae and Cinaedocolpitae who dwelt on the Dominating the royal and elite cemetery of Mai other side of the Red Sea, and having reduced the Hejja (Stele Park), near the Church of Tsion, are sovereigns of both, I imposed on them a land tribute three colossal obelisks. Numbered by archaeolo- and charged them to make traveling safe both by gists simply as Stelae 1–3, they were intended to sea and by land. form a single alignment, but only one remained standing into modern times. That one (Stele 3), Acting now on the global stage, Aksum contin- about 75 feet tall and traditionally associated with ued to extended its reach in the fourth century, jus- King Ezana, was likely the first of the three to be tifying its inclusion in Mani’s list of world powers. erected. It was followed by Stele 2, which was Already in control of the Red Sea coast of Africa slightly larger. Both of these, however, were and its hinterland, as well as part of Arabia, the dwarfed by Stele 1, a behemoth at about 108 feet empire thrust decisively into Nubia during the reign and some 550 tons. Despite having successfully of Ezana (A.D. 320–350). The kings inscriptions quarried this monolith and transported it about 2.5 found in Aksum relate his campaigns and betray no miles to the site, erecting it proved too great a chal- hint of mercy: lenge for the Aksumite architects and engineers. At some point in the process, the stele toppled, crash- Through the might of the Lord of All I took the field ing to the around and breaking in pieces, which still against the Noba [Nubians].… And thereupon they lie there. Stele 2 fell as well, but perhaps only in the fled and stood not still, and I pursued the fugitives seventh century, when the city of Aksum had been 23 days, slaying them and capturing others and tak- abandoned. ing plunder from them, where I came; while prison- ers and plunder were brought back by my own peo- Known simply as the Aksum Obelisk, Stele 2 ple who marched out; while I burnt their towns, was reerected on its original location last year. those of masonry and those of straw, and seized Taken to Rome as a war trophy by Mussolini’s their grain and their bronze and the dried meat and forces in 1937, it was returned to Ethiopia in 2005, the images in their temples and destroyed the stocks flown to Aksum in three sections weighing up to of grain and cotton; and the enemy plunged into the 57.5 tons, and then trucked to the site. After years of river Seda, and many perished in the water, the studies—determining how to proceed in terms of number I know not, and as their vessels foundered a both engineering and archaeology—a steel tower multitude of people, men and women, were and crane were set up for the reinstallation. In drowned.… August, the steel tower was dismantled and scaf- folding erected around the stele to permit restora- Inscriptions from the second half of Ezana’s tion work on its surfaces. At the end of 2008, the reign, as well as surviving correspondence from the scaffolding was removed, ending the stele’s 50-year Roman emperor Constantius II, indicate that the exile. (The Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs pro- king converted to Christianity from a hybrid reli- vided most of the funds for the multimillion-dollar gion based on local and Greco-Roman deities. Over endeavor, with UNESCO overseeing the work.) the succeeding centuries, Christianity became the state religion. Under Ezana and his successors, from KSUM’S ROLE IN GEOPOLITICS AND the fourth through sixth centuries, the Aksumite Atrade continued into the sixth century, as attest- Empire reached its height, covering a territory the ed by sources such as Cosmas Indicopleustes size of Spain. And it was in this period that the mon- (“India-voyager”), a Greek trader, probably from umental granite stelae, Aksum’s greatest and most Alexandria, who later in life became a monk and distinctive works, were created. wrote Christian Topography, in which he argued the Of Obelisks and Empire 3 world was flat. The book, composed about 550, is asked them, “Which of your kings is the greater and interspersed with Cosmas’s reminiscences of his the more powerful?” The Greek trader wins in a merchant days. His writings give a sense of the rich- clever manner, pointing out that the coins bearing ness of the court in Aksum, which he had seen 25 his ruler’s portrait are made of gold and better years earlier, and the breadth and scale of trade in struck than the silver coins with the Persian king’s which the Aksumite Empire was involved.