UNIT ONE

INTRODUCTION
1.1. The Nature and Uses of History
A. Nature of History
 The term history derived from the Greek word Istoria meaning inquiry.
 The first use of the term is attributed to the ancient Greek historian, Herodotus
(484 - 425 B. C ) who is known as the father of history.
 In ordinary usage, history means all the things that have happened in the
human past.
 Academically, history can be defined as an organized and systematic study of
the past. The study involves the discovery, collection, organization, and
presenta tion of information about past events
 The major concern of history is the study o f human society and its interaction
with the natural environment.
 Because of the longevity of time, historians organize and divide the human
past int o discrete periods.
 history is conventionally divided into ancient, medieval and modern history.
This is what we call periodization in history.

B . Uses of History
 History Helps Better Understand the Present
 History Provides a Sense of Identity
 History Provides the Basic Background for Other Disciplines
 History Teaches Critica l Skills
 History Helps Develop Tolerance and Open Mindedness
 History Supplies Endless Source of Fascination

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.
 Sources are, therefore, key to the study and writing of history.
 Historical sources are broadly classified into two types: Primary and
Secondary.
Primary Sources
 They are original or first hand in their proximity to the event both in time and
in space.
 Examples of primary sources are manuscripts (handwritten materials), diaries,
letters, minutes, c ourt records and administrative files, travel documents,
photographs, maps, video and audi ovisual materials, and artifacts such as
coins, fossils, weapons, utensils, and buildings.

Secondary Sources
 They are secondhand published accounts about past events. They are written
long after the event has occurred.
 Examples of secondary sources are articles, books, textbooks, biographies, and
published stories or movies about historical events.

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Oral Data
 It constitutes the other category of historical sources.
 Oral sources are especially valuable to study and document the history of
nonliterate 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.
 This type of oral data is called oral tradition.
 For the history of Ethiopia and the Horn, historians use a combination of the
sources described above.
 However, whatever the source of informationor oralthe data should be primary
or secondary, written subjected to critical evaluation before used as evidence.
1.3. Historiography of Ethiopi a and the Horn
 Historiography can be defined as the history of historical writing.
 The organized study and narration of the past was introduced by ancient Greek
historians notably Herodotus and Thucydides (c.455-400 B.C.E.).
 The most important early figure in Chinese historical thought and writing was
the Han dynasty figure Sima Qian.
 History emerged as an academic discipline in the second half of the nineteenth
century first in Europe.
 The German historian, Leopold Von Ranke (1795 - 1886), and his colleagues
established history as an independent discipline in Berlin.
 Because of his contribution to the scientific study of the past, Ranke is
considered to be the “father of modern historiography ".
 Historiography of Ethiopia and the Horn has changed enormously during the
past hundred years.
The Earlier form of Ethiopian Historiography
 The earliest known reference that we have on history of Ethiopia and the Horn
is the Periplus of the Erythrean Sea , written in the first century A.D by
unknown author.
 Another document describing Aksum was entitled Christian Topography
written in the 6th C by a Greek sailor named Cosmas Indicopleustes.
 The earliest written Ethiopian material dates from the seventh century A.D
The document was found in Abba Gerima monastery in Yeha.
 A manuscript was discovered in Haiq Istifanos monastery of present day
Wollo in the thirteenth century A.D.
 This manuscript contains the list of medieval kings and their history in brief.
 Muslim communities of Ethiopia also had hagiographical tradition. e.g , a
document that tells about the life of a muslim saint, Shiekh Ja'far Bukko of
Gattira in present day Wollo in the late 19th C.
 Ethiopia had also an indigenous tradition of history writing called chronicles
written in Geez language since the 14th C to the early 20th C.
 earliest and the last of such surviving documents are the Glorious Victories of
AmdeTsion and the Chronicle of Abeto Iyassu and Empress Zewditu
respectively.
 Chronicles incorporate both legends and facts -past and contemporary about
monarch's genealogy, upbringing military exploits, piety and statesmanship.

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Written Accounts of Arabic Speaking Visitors
 provide useful information on various aspects of the region's history.
 For example, al-Masudi and Ibn Battuta described culture, language and
import - export trade in the main central region of east African coast in the
tenth and fourteenth centuries respectively.
 The Yemeni writer, Shihab al-Din had left a document entitled Futuh al -
Habesha that describe the war between the Muslim principalities and the
Christian Kingdom of Ethiopia in the 16th C.
 Another Yemeni writer, al - Haymi who led a Yemeni delegation to the court
of Fasilada's in 1647 had left first-hand document.
 The other document that appeared in the 16th C was Abba Bahrey's Geez
script on Oromo written in 1593. But it has its own limitation.

Contribution of European Missionaries and Travelers to the development of

Ethiopian Historiography

 Catholic and Protestanth missionaries came to Ethiopia from the early 16th to
the late 19th centuries.
 The documents left by those missionaries contain information about religious
and political developments within Ethiopia and the country''s foreign relation.
 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 LebneDengel in 1520.
 One example of travel documents is James Bruce's Travels to Discover Source
of the Nile.

Contribution of Foreign Writers

 The German, JobLudolf (1624 - 1704)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''s source of information was an Ethiopian priest, Abba Gorgorios who
was living at that time in Europe.
 In the 19th C August Dillman published two stories on ancient Ethiopian
history.

Traditional Ethiopian Writers since the early 20th C

 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.
 Taye and Fisseha-Giorgis wrote books on the history of Ethiopia while Asme
produced a similar work on the Oromo people.
 Afework wrote the first Amharic novel, Tobiya, while Gebre-Hiwot wrote
books entitled Atse Menilekna Ityopia (Emperor Menilek and Ethiopia) and
Mengistna Yehizb Astedader (Government and Public Administration).

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  The most prolific writer of the early twentieth century Ethiopia was, however,
Blatten Geta Hiruy Wolde-Selassie.
 Hiruy published four major works namely Ethiopiana Metema (Ethiopia and
Metema), Wazema (Eve), Yehiwot Tarik (A Biographical Dictionary) and
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.

Ethiopian Writers 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 and he made better
evaluation of his sources than his predecessors.
 Tekle-Tsadik made better evaluation of his sources than his predecessors.
 Aonther important work of this period is Yilma Deressa 's Ye Ityopiya Tarik
Be'asra Sidistegnaw Kifle Zemen(A History of Ethiopia in the Sixteenth
Century).
 The book addresses the Oromo population movement and the wars between
the Christian kingdom and the Muslim sultanates as its main subjects.
 Blatten Geta Mahteme-Selassie Wolde-Meskel wrote Zikre Neger.
 .Zikre Neger is a comprehensive account of Ethiopia's prewar land tenure
systems and taxation.
 The work of Gebre-Wold Engidawork specifically dealt with aspects of land
tenure.
 Dejazmach Kebede Tesema wrote his memoir of the imperial period,
published as Yetarik Mastawesha in 1962 E.C.

The Development of Ethiopian Historiography

 The 1960s was a crucial decade in the development of Ethiopian
historiography.
 Because 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.
 Since then researches by faculty (both Et hiopians and expatriates) and
students have been produced on various topics.
 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 was the first Director and founding member of the institute.
 Pankhurst has authored or coauthored twentytwo books and produced several
hundred articles on Ethiopia. Since its foundation, the IES has been publishing
the Journal of Ethiopian Studies fore the dissemination of historical research.

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Professionalization of historiography in other parts of the Horn

 It is a post colonial phenomenon with the establishment of independent

nations.
 The decolonization of African historiography required new methodology to
study the past that involved a critical use of oral data and tapping the percepts
of anci llary disciplines like archeology, anthropology and linguistics.
 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 Angloph ones.
 African universities have trained their own scholars and sent many others
overseas for training who eventually published numerous works on various
aspects of the region's history.

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 region consists chiefly of mountains uplifted through the formation of the
Great Rift Valley.
 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, semiperiphery.
 As with the physical features, people across the region are remarkably diverse:
they speak a vast number of different languages, profess to ma ny distinct
religions, live in a variety types of dwellings, and engage in a wide range of
economic activities.
 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.
 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 Afr ica to the Near and Middle
East, India and the Far East.
 Another element of geography factor that had profound impact on human
history is drainage system.
 Ethiopia and the Horn has five principal drainage systems.
 These are the Nile River, Gibe/Omo Gojeb, Genale/JubbaShebele, the Awash
River,and the Ethiopian Rift Valley Lakesystems.
 The above watersheds are very important in the life and history of the peoples
inhabiting the region.

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  Besides providing people with the source of their livelihood, the drainage
systems facilitated the movement of peoples and goods across diverse
environments, resulting in the exchange of ideas, technology, knowledge,
cultural expressions, and beliefs.
 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.
 Despite the varied physical environments,, 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 cont inuous 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.

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