Amda Seyon I

For other people with the name Amda Seyon, see Amda Seyon (disambiguation).
See also: Amda Seyon I's expansions
Amda Seyon I
ቀዳማዊ ዓፄ ዐምደ ጽዮን
Negus Nagast
Amda Seyon I depicted on a 15th century manuscript
Emperor of Ethiopia
Reign1314–1344[1]
PredecessorWedem Arad
SuccessorNewaya Krestos
Died1344
SpouseDjan Mangasha[2]
Regnal name
Gebre Mesqel
Ge'ez/Amharicዐምደ ፡ ጽዮን
Amharicአምደ ፅዮን
DynastyHouse of Solomon
FatherWedem Arad
ReligionEthiopian Orthodox Church

Amda Seyon I, also known as Amda Tsiyon I[note 1] (Ge'ez: ዐምደ ፡ ጽዮን ʿamda ṣiyōn, Amharic: አምደ ፅዮን āmde ṣiyōn, "Pillar of Zion"),[6] throne name Gebre Mesqel (ገብረ መስቀል gäbrä mäsḳal, "Servant of the Cross"), was Emperor of Ethiopia from 1314 to 1344 and a member of the Solomonic dynasty.[1]

He is best known in the so called chronicles as a heroic warrior against the Muslims, and is sometimes considered to have been the founder of the Ethiopian Empire. Amda Seyon's chronicles however appear to be highly unreliable as it was written a hundred years after his reign and conflates conflicts involving successive Ethiopian emperors.[7] Nonetheless the text state most of his wars were against the Muslim sultanates to the southeast, which he was able to fight and always defeat, and substantially enlarge his kingdom by gradually incorporating a number of neighboring states.[1]

His supposed conquests of Muslim borderlands were said to have greatly expanded Christian territory and power in the region, which were maintained for centuries after his death. Amda Seyon asserted the strength of the new Solomonic dynasty and therefore legitimized it. These expansions further provided for the spread of Christianity to frontier areas, sparking a long era of proselytization, Christianization, and integration of previously peripheral areas.[8]

According to British historian Edward Ullendorff, "Amda Seyon was one of the most outstanding Ethiopian kings of any age and a singular figure dominating the Horn of Africa in the fourteenth century."[9]

  1. ^ a b c "Amda Tseyon" in The New Encyclopædia Britannica. Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica Inc., 15th edn., 1992, Vol. 1, p. 321.
  2. ^ Budge, E. A. Wallis (1928). A History of Ethiopia: Nubia and Abyssinia (Volume 1). London: Methuen & Co. p. 290.
  3. ^ Vingograd, A.G (2020). King Solomon: Rome and Ethiopia. WP IPGEB. p. 117.
  4. ^ Bahru Zewde (2001). A History of Modern Ethiopia (second ed.). Oxford: James Currey. p. 8. ISBN 0-85255-786-8.
  5. ^ Reid, Richard J. (2012). Warfare in African History. Cambridge University Press. p. 53. ISBN 9780521195102.
  6. ^ "Amda Seyon I | Biography & Facts | Britannica".
  7. ^ Chekroun, Amélie (2022). "Harar as the capital city of the Barr Saʿd ad-Dīn (first half of the 16th century): from its emergence to its fortification". Annales d'Éthiopie. 34: 26. doi:10.3406/ethio.2022.1710.
  8. ^ Joanna Mantel-Niećko and Denis Nosnitsin, "cAmdä Ṣəyon I" in Siegbert Uhlig, Encyclopaedia Aethiopica: A-C (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2003), p. 228.
  9. ^ Edward Ullendorff, his review of Huntingford's translation of The Glorious Victories of Amda Ṣeyon, King of Ethiopia, Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, 29 (1966), p. 600


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