cAbiy cAddi

other learning institutions, a hospital, clinics, telephone and electric services.

Estimated population in 1978 was about 7,500, but the construction and demographic boom continues till today. Src: interviews with abba AYYALA TASI'A, age 85, August 2001, 'Abiy cAddi; mamhar GABRA CABIYA 3GZIJ DASTA, age 76; ato QlRQOS GABRA MADHHN, age 71; Gmda 281; CENTRAL STATISTICAL OFFICE (ed.), Ethiopia. Statistical Abstract, Addis Ababa 1978, 31.

Tsegay Berhe G. Libanos

cAbiya 3gzP CA.3. (1(l.f: hlHh) was a 14* cent. Ethiopian saint. According to the fictivc spiritual genealogy (BritLib, Orient. 695, fol. 74v), CA.3. has to be placed between a certain Yahrayanna 3gziJ and /"Arkalados, his second successor as abbot, under whom LA.3.'s hagiography (/' Gddl) was written. Therefore CA.H. must have lived in the first half of the 14th cent. His Acts report that he per­formed miracles in the monasteries of Saq"al and Salamge, in /Waldnbba, where he looked for a "hidden church", K"alsagadu, Mergasa Ayba, where he prevented the ruler (mdk" dnnm) of Amba Sanayti from attacking the sayyum of Tamben. CA.H. died on 19 Gmbot in his monas­tery of Dabra Madhanit. The sayyum of Maratta and his followers, who wanted to plunder it shortly after the saint's death, were forced to flee by miraculous thunder and lightning.

The collection of miracles (only one of them posthumous) attached to the biography of CA.3., appears to reflect a much later period, after ase /7Av\ YaLsqob (since the famous monastery of abba Takla Haymanot is mentioned as /"Dabra Libanos, and not as Dabra Asbo), or even later, after Ahmad b. Ibrahim al-Gazi's invasion. These miracles expand the influence of the saint into southern Ethiopia - into the regions of Amhara, Goggam and Sawa.

The Gddl of CA.3. was copied in the same ms. as that of Arkalados (BritLib, Orient. 695, fol. 1-74, a codex from the 18th cent.). The ms. has been described by Turaiev (1902) and by Conti Ros­sini (1938). The ms. Orient. 700 has a more recent copy of the life, and Conti Rossini found a third ms. in Ethiopia (s. Raineri 1986, no. 176). The G'ddl has not yet been published. Src: WrBriMus 180, ms. 271 [Orient. 695]; 183f., ins. 277 [Orient. 700]; OSVALDO RAINERI, "Libri di uso prevalen-temente liturgico tra i manoseritti 'Cerulli etiopici' della Vaticana", Ephcmendcs Liturgicae 100, 2, 1986, 171-85, here no. 176 [Cerulli Etiopico 68].

Lit.: KinBibl 59f., no. 2; CARLO CONTI-ROSSINI, "Note di agiografia etiopiea. lAbiya KgziJ, Arkaledes e Gabra-lyasus", RSO 17, 1938, 409-52; BORIS TURAIEV, Issledovamya v oblasli agwlogichcskib istochnikov istoni F.fiopii ('Researches in the Held of Ethiopian Hagiologica] Sources'), St. Peters­burg 1902, 100-17.

Michel van Esbroeck

Abraha Between 531 and 542 A.D. A. (under this name known from the Arabic as JBRH in South Ara­bian sources), reportedly an Ethiopian soldier and former slave, deposed the Sabaean aristocrat SMYF1 J§Wl [VSumyafac Aswac], who had been appointed as Ethiopian vassal king in Saba" after 3lla Asboha (^Kaleb) had killed the Jewish king Du Nuwas (/ Yusuf AsJar YatJar). Kaleb's efforts to regain supremacy over South Arabia were in vain, but after his death A. agreed to pay tribute to his successor (Procopius I, 20). He died at an unknown date after 553 A.D. Later Arabic sources expand A.'s story with semi-mythical details, including his construction of a great church at al-Qulays (SancaJ) and his expedition to conquer /"Mecca in the "Year of the Elephant".

A. is attested in four Sabaean inscriptions:

1) In C1H 541 (543 A.D.) T3RH [=A.J put down revolts, repaired the dam and received Aksumite, Byzantine, Sasanian (Persian) and North Arabian embassies. A. held two titles:' zly I mlkn I 'g'zyn I rmhs I zbymn (cf. Kropp 1991; Miiller 1978:65ff.; s. ill.) and the late-Sabacan title: mlk I sb' I w(d)[r]ydn I •whdrmwt I wymnt (/) w"rbhm[ii)} I t(%v)dm I wthm(t) 'king of Saba" and Du-Raydan and Hadramawt and Yamanat and the bedouins of the highland and the coast'. 2) In Ry 506 (547 A.D.) JBRH put down revolts of Central-Arabian tribes and negotiated with cAmr Ibn al-Mundir . 3) An inscription found near Ry 506 of a high official of king A. mentions mlk I brh (cAbdel Monem 1988). 4) Ja 544-547 (553 A.D.) describes repair-work at the dam; in Ja 546/2-4 JBRH is mentioned.

A fragment of inscription CIH41, from Staatliches Museum fur Volkerkunde (ed.) 2000:270.

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Src: PROCOPIUS, De hello Persico, tr. by HENRY BRONSON DEWING, London 1957, I, XX; CIH 541 (ill.); ALBERT JAMME, "Inscriptions des alentours de Mareb I", Cahiers de Byrsa 5, 1955, 275-79, nos. Ja 544-47; GONZAGUE RYCKMANS, "Inscriptions sud-arabes, dixieme serie", Le Museon 66, 1953, 275-84, no. Ry 506; STAATLICHES MUSEUM FUR VOLKERKUNDE (ed.), Im Lande der Konigin von Saba, Miinchen 2000, 270 (ill.). Lit.: ALFRED FELIX LANDON BEESTON, "Notes on the Mureighan Inscription", BSOAS 16, 2, 1954, 391f.; SAYED CABDEL MONEM, "Emendations to the Bir Mu-rayghan Inscription Ry 506 and a New Minor Inscrip­tion from there", Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies 18, 1988, 131-43; MICHAEL KlSTER, "The Cam­paign of Huluban. A New Light on the Expedition of Abraha", Le Museon 78, 1965, 425-36; MANFRED KROPP, "Abreha's Names and Titles", Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies 21, 1991, 135-44; WALTER W. MULLER, "Abessinier und ihre Titel und Namen in vorislamischen siidarabischen Inschriften", Neue Ephe-meris fiir Semitische Epigraphik 3, 1978, 159-68; ID., "Abreha", in: Der Neue Pauly. Enzyklopadie der Antike, Stuttgart - Weimar 1996, 30f. (Lit.).

Alexander Sima

Abraha Tasamma gazmac A.T. (h-ttW- -f-rt"?, b. 1901, d.

1967) was an Eritrean intellectual, businessman and politician. A.T., the first-born son of ra's /"Tasamma, received both the traditional church and Western education in his youth before enrolling in the Italian school of agriculture in /Mandafara. After graduation he continued his church education, which included Amharic, a skill that became useful' at certain points in his career. In 1,918-29 he acted as the secretary and representative of his father while at the same time administering the district of Haddagti. He also governed various districts in his own right. In 1940-41, the Italian colonial administration appointed him counsellor to the governor of Amhara governorate. Returning to Eritrea after the war, he served as district governor until 1948, when he was appointed assistant to the political secretary of the /British Military Ad­ministration in Asmara. He was promoted to the post of-counsellor in the same office in June 1950. In April 1952, he was appointed as secre­tary of internal affairs under the British Ad­ministration of Eritrea.

A.T. was versatile in his interests and skills, and he engaged himself in various activities including experimentation with various imported plants, plumbing, lumbering, etc., particularly in his home district. Since the 1930s, he had also be­come one of the most successful Eritrean busi-

Abraha Tasamma

nessmen. In 1949 he organized the biggest bus company in Eritrea, known as the S.A.T.A.E. (Societa Anonima Trasporti Automobilistici di Eritrea), of which he later became chairman. His interests also extended to painting, which he pursued in the 1920s and 1930s, developing the technique of combining Eritrean themes and style with those of Western art. He was equally engaged in social activities. From 1949 onward, he was an active member (and at one point chairman) of the Eritrean Children Welfare Society. He was also president of the Arbitral Court, which dealt with conflicts between Christian highlanders and Muslim lowlanders. . Furthermore, A.T. was a lucid thinker and an eloquent speaker with a great interest in liberal-, ity, freedom and the improvement of social life. Because of this he entered politics by joining the founding members of the first Eritrean political movement, the /Mahbar faqri hagar,-in 1941. Following dissension among the leading politi­cians in the wa'ala ('convention') at Bet Gargas in 1946, in the next year he founded the /Liberal Progressive Party which eventually coalesced with other small parties to form the Independence Party in 1950. He was elected to the Constituent Assembly in 1952 and subse­quently contested for the highest post of Chief Executive, for which /Tadla Bayru did not forgive him. He was subsequently accused of being involved in an assassination plot and was imprisoned, though there was hardly any evi­dence for such a crime. The unjust treatment he suffered served as a bad omen for the / Eritrean-Ethiopian Federation, which he voiced openly in a speech declaring that it could never function. In 1955, he filed a case of re­dress with the Supreme Court of Eritrea for the injustice he had suffered, but in vain. The Impe­rial Ethiopian government, with which he was unpopular, dominated the political arena, and he withdrew altogether from politics and dedi­cated himself to "business, agriculture, and community improvement" (KilHDic 28).

Lit.: ErDizBio 3ff.; JORDAN GEBRE-MEDHIN, Peasants and Nationalism in Eritrea. A Critique of Ethiopian Studies, Trenton 1989, 83, 93ff., 161f.; EDWARD U.LLENDORFF, From the Bible to Enrico Cerulli. A Miscellany of Ethiopian and Semitic Papers, Stuttgart 1990 (AeF 32), 199; KilHDic 28f.; SHUMET SlSHAGNE, Discord and Fragmentation in Eritrean Politics, 1941-1981, Ph.D. thesis, University of Illinois 1992, 85, 100, 250-55; TEKESTE NEGASH, Eritrea and Ethiopia: the Federal Experience, Uppsala 1997, 84, 86ff., 90, 95, 97,102.

Bairu Tafia

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