Various expeditions had been sent to find him. Pero da Covilha arrived on such a mission in He remained until when the Regent Queen Eleni sent a request to the King of Portugal for military support against the Muslim armies to the east. Father Francisco Alvares - was a member of this delegation. He travelled widely and wrote the first western accounts of Ethiopia. From — Muslim armies from the Sultanate of Adal in the southeast over ran three quarters of the Abyssinian kingdom.
Their leader was known as Mohammed Gran Mohammed the left handed. From hiding, the Ethiopian emperor appealed to the Portuguese for help. A Portuguese fleet arrived from India in with musketeers.
About two years later Mohammed Gran was killed in battle and his forces were routed. The Portuguese then put pressure on the Ethiopian king to publicly profess allegiance to the Pope in Rome. The emperor refused. In the years that followed the defeat of Mohammed Gran, the Portuguese steadily increased their influence and power until the conversion to Roman Catholicism of Emperor Susenyos — in This resulted in a period of violence and open rebellion against the new religion.
Susenyos eventually abdicated in favour of his son Fasilides who reinstated the Orthodox faith as the state religion and expelled the Portuguese Jesuit priests. A wall with 12 gates surrounds this Royal Enclosure. Gondar was the capital for the next two centuries until, upon his coronation, Emperor Tewedros II moved the capital to his fortress at Maqdala in This was a period of great instability and division when a succession of 23 Emperors held the throne.
There was no powerful central authority uniting and controlling the warring princes and provincial kings who continuously fought each other. This period ended in with the coronation of Tewedros II b. Full imperial power was once again in the hands of one leader and the history of modern Ethiopia began.
Despite resistance from some provincial leaders, Tewedros II started to modernise and centralise imperial administration. After writing to Queen Victoria and other European imperial leaders but not receiving a reply Tewedros felt insulted and took some Europeans hostage.
This ended very badly in when the British sent a huge military expedition of 13, soldiers, 26, men for logistical support and 40, animals including war elephants from India. This expedition was led by General Napier — Their sail and steam ships landed on the Red Sea coast and a road was built into the interior.
Elephants hauled heavy artillery up into the mountains from the coastal plain. It took 3 months to trek the km to the mountain top fortress at Maqdala. When all was obviously lost, rather than surrender to the British who had been secretly supported along the expedition route by rebellious princes who sought his throne, Tewedros shot himself with a pistol given to him by Queen Victoria.
Maqdala was looted and Tewedros son was taken by the British to London. There, he was known as Prince Alemayu of Abyssinia and he came under the protection of Queen Victoria. He was sent to the prestigious Rugby public school and even enrolled at Royal Sandhurst Military Academy but died, aged 18, in To this day there is a brass plaque in his memory at the royal chapel in Windsor.
The reign of Emperor Yohannes IV b. It was also a time of increasing engagement with European powers especially Italy who, through a series of land purchases and treaties, established a colony on the Red Sea coast in what is now Eritrea. Yohannes was killed by a stray bullet in a battle in which his forces were victorious against the Mahdists in In he signed the Treaty of Wuchale with the Italians but the Italians secretly changed the Italian language version. On discovering this trickery, Menelik demanded the Italians change the key clauses.
The Italians refused and invaded Ethiopia from their coastal colony in Eritrea. The Italian army was destroyed at the Battle of Adwa in Victory at Adwa Day is a national holiday celebrated on 2 March European calendar.
It was the first time an African army had defeated a European colonial invasion in open battle. He built diplomatic relations with European powers including, notably, Russia. He encouraged modernisation and development including the Djibouti to Addis Ababa railway line built by the French.
He established the first bank and postal system and brought electricity to the new capital which he founded and named Addis Ababa, meaning New Flower. Under his reign the first telephone and telegraph service was set up and the first cars were seen in Ethiopia. Ras can translate as head, Duke or Lord. Having been regent from , Haile Selassie b. He went into exile after the initially successful fascist Italian invasion of In , Haile Selassie returned from exile after the Italians had been expelled with the support of the British army now at war with Germany and Italy.
The Ethiopian resistance had been continuously active during the occupation. After the war Haile Selassie set about modernising Ethiopia. He invited ordinary Italian soldiers to remain and contribute to rebuilding Ethiopia. Many did, building respected families and businesses with their Ethiopian wives. Haile Selassie was a feudal monarch and most Ethiopians were peasant farmers living under the power of local, landed aristocrats.
His was the final word on major decisions but he did face significant resistance to some of his reforms from the nobles and clergy especially on tax and land matters.
He took a special interest in education and appointed himself Minister of Education establishing the first university and many schools.
Haile Selassie helped start the Organisation of African Unity in now known as the African Union and was its first official chair person. The African Union headquarters continues to be in Addis Ababa leading to Ethiopia being known as the diplomatic capital of Africa. In an attempted coup was crushed by the military and lacked popular support. However, there was sympathy for change amongst students and some members of the educated elite. The increased advocacy for the rights of the peasantry and poor, especially from students, spurred Haile Selassie to speed up his reforms.
Increasingly, Haile Selassie focused on foreign affairs and left national affairs to his prime ministers. While his prestige grew internationally, there were growing problems at home. A major famine in that killed up to , people was, at first, denied by the imperial government.
There was widespread outrage at this delay in asking the world for help. Buerk's initial reports are credited with stimulating the international community to respond on a massive scale including Band Aid and Live Aid. The military coup on 22 September saw the aging emperor publicly humiliated by being escorted from the Imperial Palace in a VW Beetle car.
He was not initially harmed. A military council known as the Derg took power and summarily executed 59 members of the former imperial government. Haile Selassie died in Many believe he was strangled in the basement of his palace by, or at the orders of, Lt Col Mengistu Haile Mariam who then systematically murdered his rivals on the military council and established himself as undisputed head of state by The new Marxist government made social reforms and nationalized the assets of the church, aristocracy and landowners.
Financially supported by the Soviet Union, Ethiopia became a totalitarian state and greatly increased the size of its military. Cuban soldiers came and fought alongside Ethiopian soldiers against some of the regional rebellions that followed this upheaval.
Ties with the USA were cut. Faitlovitch J. Fumagalli G. Gleichen Count , With the Mission to Menelik. Gilmour T.
Gwynn C. Hayes A. Hertslet Sir E. Holland J. Jennings J. Cambridge, Keltie J. Kulmer F. Im Reiche Kaiser Meneliks. Leipzig, Lauribar P. Milan, — Montandon G. Ortroz F. Brussels, Portal Sir G.
Rohlfs G. Skinner R. London, Google Scholar. Vannutelli L. Vivian H. Wellby M. Wylde , Modern Abyssinia. Scott Keltie 1 M. Epstein 1. Personalised recommendations. Cite chapter How to cite? ENW EndNote. Buy options.