Menelik The Great of Adwa

March 1st 1896 is the 117^th anniversary of the
Battle of Adwa. The decisive victory at Adwa is a tale to be told every year on
this day of its commemoration because it worms the heart and lifts the spirit
of every black person in the world. Few places evoke stronger memories than
places of triumphant victory or places of devastating defeat. Napoleon
Bonaparte achieved his greatest fame at the battle of Austerlitz (now in Czech
Republic).

in 1805 where he decisively defeated the combined armies of the kings
of Europe.  Few defeats are as well registered
as the defeat (by then Emperor) Napoleon, at the battle of Waterloo (now in
Belgium, near Brussels) ten years later in 1815, where the Emperor after his
army was defeated declared “flee those who can” and fled from the battlefield
on horseback. Adwa, a dusty little village in Tigre, was put on the map of the
world by the mighty and valiant Emperor Menelik who decidedly defeated the
Italian army there by a brilliant strategy not unlike that of Napoleon at the
battle of Austerlitz. So by that singular victory at ADWA , a place, a history,
a legend and a myth of invincibility was born which throughout succeeding
generations of black people everywhere, and Ethiopian people in particular,
evoked a memory and a  pride of
staggering proportions. The new generation of black people now say “those were
the days” We need not bother the chattering of the magpies who try to erase
this memory emanating from a burning envy and a searing white hatred – an
outcome of a monumental inferiority complex. People also shun and condemn
defeat as could be discerned by the following couplet after the battle of
Maichew and when Emperor Haile Selassie went into exile to Britain.   ያልተገራ
ፈረስ
ጠቅል
ብላችሁ    ሄደ ገሠገሠ
ባህር
ገባላችሁ
    (an unbroken horse you named Tekil; but it galloped into the sea) This
was an unkind comment because the battle of the Maichew front was fought continually
for six months and it was led by the Emperor all the way. Moreover, Italy had
far superior arms this time while Ethiopian armament was still primitive. We
should rather recall the valiant stand the Emperor took  at the League of Nations in Geneva and his
prophetic predictions “today it is us tomorrow it could be you” And that was
exactly what happened

Menelik was born in 1844 and was Emperor from 1889-1913. He
was the greatest military general to emerge from Africa since Hannibal (247-183
B.C.) of Carthege (a place now in modern Tunisia)  The Carthegian military commander moved over
the Alps with elephants, conquered Rome and occupied it for 15 years until he
was recalled back to Africa.  Menelik at
52 was a decade older than Hannibal when he marched to Adwa.  Not only Ethiopians but the whole world associates
Adwa with Menelik and not with the inhabitants who lived there at the time
(much less with those who are living there now.) This is how history is born
and no amount of back peddling or attempt at rewriting of history could ever
change that! What makes Menelik great, besides his other considerable
accomplishments, is his towering achievement at the victory of Adwa, which place
name will forever be associated with him. He was a soldier’s soldier, instinctively
brave, fearless and lion-heated. He was also a brilliant field commander and a
military tactician. As an outstanding general he was able to evoke the absolute
devotion and loyalty of his army.  He did
this by example.  His move from Addis
Ababa to Adwa hundreds of kilometers away is a journey of epic proportions. His
army travelled by foot and the provisions of the army were carried by thousands
of pack animals – mules horses and donkeys. Animal fodder has to be provisioned
and secured, watering holes have to be identified beforehand, and food for the
army has to be supplied endlessly.

Menelik was leading a multiethnic army  which in most cases do not speak the same
language but were tied together by their fervent belief in their overarching
Ethiopian identity and above all, in their absolute confidence  that Menelik was their God appointed leader to
whom they bestowed their total love and devotion. Watching the vast army of
Menelik on the move is like witnessing the whole movement of a town being
created and dismantled overnight, a feat which is impossible to imagine even
now. It is also like the movement of a huge meandering river from a distance. There
were thousands of pack animals like donkeys and sturdy mules that carry food
and drink, tents and firewood. Then there were the horses and mules for the
leaders and commanders of the army. Menelik had thirty well bred horses and
mules at the ready for his personal use and he transferred himself from one
tired horse or mule to a fresh one without breaking a stride.  Another army was led by his wife itege Taitu
and a smaller army led by his young and enthusiastic daughter Zewditu, the
future Empress, a heroine of the war in her own right.
Much has been told about Itege Taitu but almost nothing about Weizero Zewditu
who was beside her step mother every step of the way during the heat of battle.
It is sad that in order to glorify Emperor Haile Selassie her contributions
even during her reign was totally eclipsed, the same way as that of Lij Eyasu
where even his resting place is still unknown. 
 During Eyasu’s reign it was said

             በ ኢያሱ
ዳቦ
ነው
ትራሱ      በዘውዲቱ
ተደፋ
ሌማቱ      በተፈሪ
ጠፋ
ፍርፋሪ  (during Eyasu’s
time bread became  a pillow; during
Zewditu’ time  the charger was
overturned; during Teferi’s  time not even crumps of bread were left)

Even recent writers continue to belittle the reign of Empress
Zewditu. Suffice it to say that Ethiopia joined the League of Nations during
her reign and she was an active partner of Ras Tafari in the modernization of
Ethiopia. After all she was the daughter of Menelik the greatest modernizer of
them all, who has inspired all his followers. The wisdom of Menelik is his
ability to revive the ancient polity of multi-ethnic Ethiopia which was lost
during the dark days of Zemene Mesafint. Atse Tewodros, his mentor and
imprisoner, has tried but failed and Atse Yohannes has partly abandoned the
quest. Menelik chose leaders by their ability and quality of character and NOT
by their pedigree OR tribal origin. Menelik was a Shewan Amara and an Orthodox
Christian. His trusted generals were also Muslims and non Amaras. Menelik was
born in the beautiful village of Angolela and his most illustrious Oromo general, Ras Gobena was born in Mendida a few miles away at
the edge of the escarpment.  He used to
be a loyal follower of King Haile Melekot, the father of Menelik. Menelik has
the uncanny ability to identify talent early and nurture it. Among the army
commanders who went to Adwa there was a small army commanded by the young Ato
Habtegiorgis, who many years later became a Fitawrari and War Minister and
close confident of Menelik. So also was Dejach Balcha who grew up in Menilik’s
court who later became an illustrious warrior and there were many, many more
from all parts of Ethiopia.  Berkley in
his excellent book The Campaign of Adowa
and the Rise of Menelik (1902) written shortly after battle of Adwa, has a
map of battle zones where he puts  Ato
Habtegiorgis and his troops to left of the Emperor’s army. The Emperor had a
secret informant or a spy in the name of the enterprising Awalom who had penetrated
the command post of General Baratrieri, the Italian commander and brought
valuable information to Menelik.  The families
Awalom fled from their village when the Italian army retuned to Ethiopia
following the same route 40 years later. The Fascists had avowed to exact a
revenge on the remnants of the family. During this war, to crown their
achievements, the Fascist built a gigantic bust of Mussolini at Adwa at the
very spot where they were defeated – a bust which was said could be seen from
miles away. This bust has been reproduced in some books written at the time (I
have seen the pictures even though I could not remember which book) Five years
later it was said that the British artillery unit blew it to pieces. This is
how history marches through time. 

The battle of Adwa ended with a decisive victory for
Ethiopia, and due to the exhaustion of the army and dwindling of provisions
Menelik did not push the Italians across the seas. Hundreds of Italian war
prisoners were dispatched post haste to Addis Ababa before him. In a
celebration of the victory of Adwa at Jan Meda, the prisoners were paraded
before him and the conquering army. They were, however, humanely treated, and
returned to Italy after an impassioned appeal by the Vatican. Menelik was humane,
magnanimous and generous to a fault.  We
may recall that JAN MEA (or Janhoy Meda meaning “the Emperors field”) was the first
open space which Menelik designated for the new Addis Ababa. Sadly more than a
century later it remains as the ONLY public space in Addis Ababa. The city
singularly lacks competent city planners and engineers.  A succession of so called “engineers” had
completely cut down the gigantic trees of the city (shoals, zigbas, girars shrubs etc) which had given it an endearing beauty
and which even we knew at a young age) and left it completely bare even
affecting the famous mild climate. They have also built roads with absolutely
no sidewalks to speak of, and this in a city where 90% of the inhabitants have
no car!  A case of supreme
ignorance which is even manifested to this day. The Addis-Djibouti
railway was also was the ONLY one in the country for a hundred years until it
was permanently derailed and abandoned during the time of the Derg In 1986 an
estimated one thousand Ethiopians perished when the trained went into a ravine
at Awash .This the greatest train disaster in Africa
until this day. The insanely criminal and illiterate Derg forbade any news of the accident to leak out or any relatives to
travel to the accident place.  The brutal
Derg controlled the news and only tidbits of it travelled by word of mouth. The
incident came close to me when my neighbor’s son who was in the train during
the accident was lucky to survive but lost part of his left leg.

The victory of Adwa had immediate repercussions around
the World, beginning at the citadel of the Italian Army, Rome. There were
spontaneous demonstration carrying placards which read VIVA MENELIK   and DOWN WITH CRISPI (the Prime Minister of
Italy at the time.) The most spectacular was what happened in far away Brazil
which has the largest Black population outside Africa.  The only black newspaper immediately changed
its name to MENELIK.  In distant South
Africa the new Ethiopiawinnet movement was born.   Later
spin offs were the Abyssinian church in Harlem, US and the Ras Tafarian
movement in Jamaica. Menelik went into battle with a) the Ethiopian tri colored
flag b) a quote from the Bible written on an emblem of the monarch which portrayed  a crowned
lion carrying the Ethiopian flag and read : THE LION OF JUDAH HAS PREVALED (which
in the Bible is a reference to Christ) 
It is not  the later adulteration of
this phrase which became :“Conquering Lion of the Tribe  of Judah.”  And c)  Menelik had
also another emblem with the famous quotation from the Bible, a phrase which
has given comfort to Christian Ethiopians throughout the ages and it read:  “ETHIOPIA STRETCHES HER HANDS UNTO GOD”   With these
three standards he marched onward to victory.  The only monument erected for Menelik by his
grateful daughter was the equestrian statue at Arada in Addis Ababa It is the
FIRST equestrian statue of its kind. The legs of the horse had a connection
with the pedestal. (the second statue of its type is
that of Simon Bolivar)  It was dismantled
and buried by Italian Fascists in the dead of night. They were afraid about the
reaction of the Ethiopian people. The place of burial was later identified  dug out and put in its original  By contrast 
the current Fascists, the TPLF leaders who have a visceral hatred of
Menelik and what he represents want to destroy it forever.  Memories live forever, statues can be
rebuilt. They may melt this statue and make it into ornaments for themselves
and their family thinking that they have got rid of Menelik forever. However, history
never dies.  No other monument exists for
the heroes of Adwa. The only structure, an internationally famous hotel in
Arada  named after Itegue Taitu, called
ITEGUE HOTEL was given another name by the ignorant Derg but when they realized
that it was named after Itegue Taitu and NOT itegue Menen, they renamed it the
mundane  name “Taitu Hotel”.  The original name has to be restored to its
glorious past as ITEGUE HOTEL and not Taitu which can mean anything without the
title. But this hotel as well as Menelik’s palace are
in state of ruin. The palace has leaking ceilings and creaking stairs and floors
and may collapse any day. Neither its former tenant Mengistu
who desecrated the place repeatedly or the late Meles ever cared about Menelik’s
palace except for its symbolism.  Mengistu
in particular has a strange affinity to Menelik. Strange because no two people
could be so further apart.  He also used
the palace as a prison (I was imprisoned there.)

Menelik’s mausoleum is in the Church of
Be”ata. There, within the church compound,  Mengistu and his partner in crime in
the Derg, the notorious henchman Captain Mengistu Gemechu, had two adjacent
villas built for them. – another desecration
of our church by the godless criminals. Why they did so is only known to them
and their close associates. To say the least it was bizarre. The victory of the
battle of Adwa had prompted one anonymous person to write a prophetic couplet
which captures what would have happened had Ethiopia lost the war, and here it
is:

                ምኒልክ
ተወልዶ
ባያነሳ
ጋሻ   ግብሩ እንቁላል
ነበር
ይህን
ጊዜ
አበሻ

[If Menelik has not been born to raise his shield (in
defense of his country); the taxation of the Habesha (Ethiopians) would have been
to supply eggs]

 Forty years later,
when Fascist Italy came to Ethiopia   that
was exactly what they demanded from the occupied people. Deliver eggs and lots
of them!  I may digress here to say that
almost all of our post -Liberation, early entrepreneurs stared their carriers
as supplies of eggs and chicken during the Fascist era. After the victory of Adwa
the British, as was their practice, immediately named Menelik as THE
GREAT.  They have also done so to Shaka
Zulu the great warrior of South Africa. But in Menelik’s case the affix was
withdrawn a few years later with the intense lobbying of Italy which argued
convincingly that calling Menelik “the great” will forever humiliate not only
Italy but the entire White Race.  European
Powers of the time also know the decisive and still secret role played by
Menelik earlier during the debacle at Fashoda in 1987 when British and French
force confronted each other.  The
fascinating story is recounted in a book The
Race to Fashoda: European Colonialism and African Resistance in the Scramble
for Africa by David Levering Lewis, (Weidenfeld&Nicolson, 1987).  When I was in College there were two
professors who had an intensive interest in Ethiopian history. One was
Rubenson, a Swede, who was an admirer of Tewedros and the other was Marcus, an
American, whose obsession was Menelik. Both had subsequently written seminal
studies about their heroes.  Of course
for our young minds Tewedros was the more romantic.  “I have intended to conquer the world if God
has so decreed, and it is my intention to die if my wishes could not be
fulfilled” so declared Tewedros. He forced the few foreigners to build a
foundry from scratch to cast cannon in Gafat which he called “Sevastopol’ The cannon was dragged to this mountain fortress in Mekdela on
the eve of battle. Unfortunately it exploded at its first try when enthusiastic
soldiers fed it two cannon balls instead of one. The cannon is
still there. Pankhurst called Tewedros’s attempt with tongue in cheek as “the
abortive industrial revolution of Ethiopia” Tewedros also resolved to free
Jerusalem from the infidels on any given Friday:  … አርብ  አርብ  ይሸበራል  ኢየሩሳሌም
(every Friday Jerusalem is in a state of agitation)  The anecdotes of Marcus about Menelik were a
wealth of information which delighted us with their inexhaustible wisdom. Menelik’s
sturdy voice is preserved for posterity in the British Museum. It is a message
he sent to Queen Victoria. During my elementary school at TMS our Canadian
Jesuit teachers were admiring Abraham Lincoln and I remember that in my fourth or
fifth grade, myself as well as my classmates, 
committed Lincoln’s  “Gettysburg  Address” to memory and were able recite it by
rote . I still remember part of it so many years later.

So whenever March 1st comes let us celebrate the glory
that is Adwa and the great leader Menelik. Let it be told over and over again
to our children and succeeding generation. He is the pride of the black race.  A gem of a human being who had the ability to
bring all the ancient people of Ethiopia together and to reaffirm the Glory
that was Ethiopia revered both in the Bible and the Koran and all the ancient
manuscripts and artifacts. Menelik grew up in Ankober and became a king there
before became Emperor of Ethiopia. He was an Orthodox Christian and a Shewan
Amara which the TpLF and its Woyane adherents have an undying hatred.  As the famous Iranian poet Omar Khayyam
(b.1048) said ”The
moving finger writes and having Writ moves on; Nor all thy piety nor Wit shall
lure it back to cancel half a line”