The ancient city of Axum in Northern Ethiopia is an enchanting place to visit. It has many great sites and artefacts that point to an illustrious past. Among the top attractions are the stelae park, St. Mary of Zion Cathedral, Ethiopian Orthodox Church’s holiest site and Axum Rosetta Stone. OKORIE UGURU recently visited the place and reports.
As the door of the Bombadier plane was opened by Ethiopian Airlines’ cabin crew, the whiff of air that came in was relieving. One may not know whether the altitude of the town was higher than the ancient town of Lalibella (another town in Ethiopia) with its thin air that made breathing difficult for visitors.
Here, obviously the air was richer. Most tourists on the plane were coming from there. For many tourists from Lalibella, their lungs reacted positively, gulping in air rich in oxygen. This is the ancient city of Axum, northern Ethiopia, just about 150 kilometres away from Eritrea. It is also a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The ancient Kingdom of Axum has existed for thousands of years, but was at the peak of its power between 100AD and 10 century AD. Within this period, the Aksumite kingdom, as it is sometimes called, established an empire that covered the large part of northern Ethiopia, Eritrea and some places in the Arabian peninsula.
During this period, the empire controlled trade between the Greco-Roman empires and India, leading to its prosperity and wealth. With the wealth, kings of the kingdom built monuments that have become a source of study and interest.
Driving through the town, the topography is not different from what obtains in the far north Ethiopia, huge rocky hills jutting out and encompassing the space. In most cases the roads have to be literally hewn from the rocky hills.
Axum, though ancient, is somehow sleepy, most of the vehicles in use are buses. There are also carts being dragged by domestic animals. There are not many of individual luxury cars. Driving in, one could see some isolated houses pitched on top of hills. The tour guide, Mengistu, explained that these were monasteries.
Axum exudes the feeling of calmness. Here, life seems to be simple and devoid of the frenetic. Life has been on here unbroken for more than 2000 years and there is the sense that maybe 2000 years from now.
In Axum, the past and the present are intertwined in a continuous stretch of existence. Although modernity has crept in, yet the past is pervasively present in the day-to-day life of the people.
Axum has a kind of enchantment and myth. This was the city where King Haile Selassie had to come down to be crown king. It is also regarded at the holiest site of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. The St. Mary Cathedral complex is one place a lot of activities in Axum revolve around.
Having read so much about the town with its stelae and obelisk, it is a place any historical or adventure tourist would look forward to visiting.
They obelisks or stelae of Axum with their vague symbols and inscriptions mirror an enchanting past. It is ancient towns like Axum that have sustained Africa as a mythical land. The stelae are concrete facts to the sophistication of African civilization thousands of years ago. What one had so much read about and seen in pictures are standing and could even be touched.
The Axum stelae parks are located in the heart of town. Among the stelae, there is the great stele that is 33 metres tall and 520 tonnes. But it has broken into pieces. The belief is that it fell while being mounted. The others are of different and sizes.
The tour guide, Mengistu, gave the history of the stelae: “There are three kinds of stelae: the rough, smooth and richest decorations. The rough one is the simplest. They are the oldest ones. They were erected in 2nd century BC. When they started erecting stellae, the began from the simple ones. After they improve their skill to smooth ones and finally to the richest decorations.
“We have six richest decorations in this compound and the six stelae are arranged in order of size from North East to South West. They represent a chronological sequence. The fallen one, that is the tallest and the youngest one, is 33 metres high and 520 tonnes. They were made of stones from a quarry.
“There have been questions as to whether the decorations were done right there at quarry or here. They were finished here. We still have some unfinished stelae over there. That unfinished stelae show they were cut form the mother rock and transport roughly, using elephants and wooden rollers. Using the elephants to draw the wooden rollers, the finishing is then done here. We also wondered, granite is the hardest stone, what kind of tools did they use to cut the stones? Investigations and excavations are still on.”
The rock obelisks are tall and huge, making one wonder how they were erected. The guide explained: “They also used the elephants to pull and erect it, using a system known as the rolling and pulling system. Generally, we have more 200 stelae registered by the UNESCO. The Scot traveller, James Bruce, came here in 1769. During that time, the city had more than 300 stelae. From that ancient period, the number of stelae became less and less because the local people were using the stelae as stones for building because they did not then recognize the historical value.”
Mengistu explained that the rock stelae were a king of significance as they showed the splendour and affluence of the royalty then: “Generally, those stelae were erected above the tombs for kings and members of the royal families. Those stelae were erected like pagan statues. On top of the stelae is the shape of the crescent, half moon. The holes on the body represent sun. Both represent gods of sun and moon.
“On the body of the richest of the stelae, we have the symbols. At the bottom, we have the symbol of dog and above we have the storey. This is like a skyscraper. Members of the royal families are buried underneath.
“The door symbols are used to create access for their spirits. They go through that to heaven. Every stelae has holes at the base. Those holes are used to offer animal sacrifices to the moon and sun gods. The oldest stelae is about 2200 years.”
The tallest and the newest of the cluster of stelae in the park was the fallen one. It fell during the erection time because at 33 metres high and 520 tonnes of granite, the base was too short. It was not deep enough.
He said: “ So, they were not successful in the process of erection and it fell. That was about 7th century AD. But the local tradition has a different version. It was successfully erected and standing up till 9th century AD when the Aksumite civilization collapsed because internal and external conflicts.
“The internal conflict was the civil war between the Christians and Jewish settlers. The external conflict was the rise of Islam. Because of this, the Aksumite civilization collapsed and shifted to Lallibela.”
The stelae are not the only attraction at the park. Just below the fallen great stelae is one of the royal tombs that the stelae was built upon. Walking down, close to 10 feet deep to enter the tomb was a bit spooky. The tomb is not like the rock hewn tombs that are common.
It is a purpose constructed tomb. It has different chambers. The chambers are facing one another with a kind of walkway in between.
According the guide, there may be other tombs yet to be excavated, considering the number of stelae at the park. Beside the park is the museum. This museum houses some the day-to-day utensils sued in ancient Axum.
They range from the crude to some highest level of craftsmanship. They are from the stone down to the metal age.
•St. Mary of Zion Cathedral built by Emperor Haile Selassie
St. Mary of Zion Cathedral complex
The stelae complex is separate from the famous St. Mary of Zion Cathedral. The church is the holiest site of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. The church was built in 1665 AD by Emperor Falisides.
This old church was replaced by a new cathedral built by Emperor Haile Salesie in thankfulness to Mary for helping him defeat the Italian imperialists.
In between the old and the new cathedrals is the small house said to house the Ark of the Covenant.
According to Ethiopian history, the ark was brought to Ethiopia by the Menelik, the son born to King Solomon, by the legendary Queen of Sheba believed to be from Aksum.
No one is permitted to enter the house where the ark is, except the guardian priest. On this particular day, coming out from a trip of the old church and heading for the new, we saw the guardian of the Ark just by the fence of the church.
The tour guide confirmed it was him. He was holding a discussion with another individual like a priest. But while the guardian of the Ark was inside, the individual was standing outside. They were separated by the fence. According to the guide, the visitor can never go beyond that point to think of entering inside.
The old cathedral could only be entered by men as women are forbidden from entering.
By nature of worship, the Ethiopian Orthodox Church engages so much in chants and singing. The Bible used in the cathedral is made of goat skin and about 1000 years old.
Just outside the old orthodox church is a stone slap said to be the place where Emperor Haile Selasie was crowned king of Ethiopia.
On a normal day at the church, hundreds of worshippers, men and women, flock there for worship. They come in, clutching wooden sticks that are used to support the body and for chants. There is a kind of totem at the door that worshippers pray in front of before heading for the main auditorium of the church.
The complex also houses a monastery for monks who stay there giving themselves to worship of God and work in the cathedrals.
The Rosetta Stone and Queen of Sheba Palace.
Leaving the cathedral and the stelae park, we are heading for what looks like the eastern part of the town. It is up hill. The bus laboured upwards. The first stop was at a house that contains the what has been dubbed the Ethiopian Rosetta Stone.
The Rosetta Stone of Axum was caused to be written by King Ezana of Axum. It is like the original Rosetta stone, written in three languages: Sabean, Ge’ez and ancient Greek. In the stone, King Ezana ruled from 330 to 356 AD.
He ruled for 26 years. In the stone, Ezana recorded his war and victories over Nubians and against the Kush kingdom.
Leaving there and further up, there is another site. It is an excavation of a an expansive house. This, according to Mengistu, our tour guide, was the palace of the Biblical Queen of Sheba based on findings from the excavation.
Leaving Axum, one was thankful for the memories and so much information about African past. Axum is a town that is opening up to become a modern city, but in doing that, they are mindful and proud of the past. To a large extent, modernity has comfortably blended with the past and are existing comfortably.
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