Reign of Amda Seyon I: the expansion of Christian Ethiopia

How Amda Seyon came to the throne in 1314 is unknown. A note in a manuscript of the island monastery on Lake Hayq, found by Taddesse Tamrat, records his campaigns of 1316/17 against Damot and the Muslim kingdom of Hadiya; he then crushed the rebellion of Ya’ibika Egzi, governor of Enderta in the north, and installed new officials and a military colony there. In the early 1320s, when the Mamluk sultan al-Nasir Muhammad was persecuting the Copts, he sent envoys to Cairo threatening reprisals against the Muslims of his realm and even the diversion of the Nile. Haqq ad-Din, the sultan of Ifat, seized one of these envoys on his way back and killed him, and Amda Seyon invaded Ifat. In 1332 Sabr ad-Din of Ifat, joined by Hadiya and Dawaro, rose against him — intending, according to the royal chronicle, to rule all of Ethiopia; the emperor attacked the allies one by one, defeated the forces of Adal at the battle of Das and for the first time extended Ethiopian rule across the Awash. G. W. B. Huntingford placed this campaign in 1329, but most scholars, Taddesse Tamrat among them, date it to 1332. He had no fixed capital and spent most of his time on campaign with his troops, holding the conquered lands through military colonies and tribute.

The main source, the Ge’ez chronicle known as the Glorious Victories, presents the king as an invincible champion of the faith. Edward Ullendorff took it for the work of an eyewitness, whereas the historian Chekroun dates its composition to the 15th century and Hirsch argues that it reflects the wars of that later age. Some of the earliest works of medieval Ethiopian literature belong to his reign. The Kebra Nagast, the ‘Glory of the Kings’, which traces the dynasty’s descent from Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, is dated by scholars (Conti Rossini, Littmann, Cerulli), on the evidence of its colophon, to 1314–1321/22; it may have been compiled at the command of Ya’ibika Egzi of Enderta. The Mamluk official and historian al-Umari wrote that the king of Amhara imposed his authority on the other kings of Abyssinia, and around 1350 the Spanish Book of Knowledge of All Kingdoms knew him as ‘Abdeselib’.