Holy War

Ian Campbell

• Publisher: Hurst Publishers
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN: 9781787384774
• eBook ISBN: 9781787386310
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: African History
• Index: History

In 1935, Fascist Italy invaded the sovereign state of Ethiopia—a war of conquest that triggered a chain of events culminating in the Second World War. In this stunning and highly original tale of two Churches, historian Ian Campbell brings a whole new perspective to the story, revealing that bishops of the Italian Catholic Church facilitated the invasion by sanctifying it as a crusade against the world’s second-oldest national Church. Cardinals and archbishops rallied the support of Catholic Italy for Il Duce’s invading armies by denouncing Ethiopian Christians as heretics and schismatics, and announcing that the onslaught was an assignment from God.

Campbell marshalls evidence from three decades of research to expose the martyrdom of thousands of clergy of the venerable Ethiopian Church, the burning and looting of hundreds of Ethiopia’s ancient monasteries and churches, and the instigation and arming of a jihad against Ethiopian Christendom, the likes of which had not been seen since the Middle Ages. 

Finally, Holy War traces how, after Italy’s surrender to the Allies, the horrors of this pogrom were swept under the carpet of history, and the leading culprits put on the road to sainthood.

PART ONE

PRELUDE

1

A MOST ANCIENT CHURCH

‘We who profess Christianity ought to be ashamed of ourselves,
since the Ethiopians seem to surpass us in regard to the cult and
observance of the religion.’

Adamus Carolus to Domião de Góis of the
Imperial Portuguese court, 1540

In 2016 the American Pew Research Center found that Ethiopians, consisting overwhelmingly of Christians and Muslims, are the most religious people in the world.¹ This is not altogether surprising, given that it is generally agreed by scholars that by the year 340 the emperor of Ethiopia had declared Christianity the state religion, making Ethiopia the second country in the world to do so, after Armenia.² It would be almost another half-century before the Roman Empire followed suit.³ Moreover, Ethiopia was the first country in the world to mint coins bearing the Christian cross, and with an unbroken record of continuity to the present day, the Ethiopian Church remains one of the world’s most ancient and venerable national Churches.⁴ Ethiopia also traces its encounters with Islam back to the earliest times; the Prophet Muhammad advised his followers to escape persecution at Mecca by going to Ethiopia, where there was ‘a king under whom none are persecuted. It is a land of righteousness where God will give you relief from what you are suffering.’⁵

The practices and doctrines of the Ethiopian Church incorporate unchanging traditions dating back to the earliest Christian Church, one of the most fundamental being the institution of monasticism rooted in the traditions of Pachomius, as practised by the Desert Fathers of Egypt. Ethiopia is today one of the few countries in the world in which Christian monasticism, which is widespread and strongly associated with the national spirit, is still to be found in its original, highly ascetic form.

When Christianity was declared the state religion, the state capital was the city of Aksum in today’s northern province of Tigray. Soon churches and monasteries had been constructed, or carved into the mountains and high pinnacles of that province, while several Ethiopian monks ventured as pilgrims to the Holy Land.

By the 6th century the monastery of Debre Damo, built on a steep-sided, flat-topped mountain known as an amba, had been founded, and soon became one of Ethiopia’s principal centres of theological learning.

When the Prophet advised his followers to take refuge in Ethiopia, they did so. In the year 615 or thereabouts the first group of twelve arrived in the holy city of Aksum, including the Prophet’s daughter and her husband. They were hospitably received and lived happily in Aksum. Many more followed in due course, including Umm Habibah, who in due course was betrothed to Muhammad, and left a vivid description of the 4th-century church of Aksum St Mary of Zion and its interior adorned with pictures of the saints.⁶

From the inception of monasticism, the establishment of a monastery in Ethiopia required a royal charter, and a combination of the monasteries and the royal court provided Ethiopia’s principal socio-cultural and socio-economic infrastructure, as would in due course be the case in medieval Europe. The monastic settlements, which were permanent while the royal court was often on the move, also contributed to the expansion of the Ethiopian polity and the incorporation in it of different ethnic groups.⁷

The Jewel in the Crown

By the time of the Italian invasion of 1935 there were hundreds of monasteries in Ethiopia, but the greatest Christian centre was the monastery of Debre Libanos. Christianity had been the state religion for more than eight hundred years when the monastery was founded, at the northern boundary of the plateau of Shewa, some 460 km due south of Aksum (see Map 1), by an Ethiopian monk named Tekle Haymanot (pronounced ‘Teck-leh High-ma-nought’), meaning ‘Plant of Faith’. Born in 1214, Tekle Haymanot was descended from a community that had migrated down from the north of Ethiopia centuries before. As a young man he travelled widely and studied in some of the great and ancient monasteries of Ethiopia, including Debre Damo. He also became a disciple of one of 13th-century Ethiopia’s most revered holy fathers, Iyasus Mo’a (‘Jesus Has Conquered’), abbot of the monastery of Istifanos in the Lake Hayq area.

By this time the capital of Ethiopia had been re-established at the site known today as Lalibela (Map 1), where, during Tekle Haymanot’s lifetime, a complex of rock-hewn churches—now a Unesco World Heritage site—was being completed under the Zagwé dynasty of kings.

Eventually Tekle Haymanot returned as a learned ascetic to the Shewan plateau and set about establishing a community of monks and nuns in a cave set in the wall of a great canyon of the Siga Wedem River, a tributary of the Blue Nile.

Tekle Haymanot and his followers were pioneers, in that, instead of withdrawing from the world as ascetics, their objective was apostolic—to reach out and evangelise in frontier districts where the Church was weak. The areas in which they would work were dangerous, but fortunately the site for their retreat was well chosen. Tucked away inside the wall of the gorge, the cave, which overlooked a terrace, not only provided ready access to the plateau above, but also preserved the secrecy and seclusion necessary for protection of the community from marauding bands serving local chiefs and warlords intent on maintaining their control over the plateau and its inhabitants.⁸

The indomitable Tekle Haymanot named his monastery Debre Asbo (‘Mount of the Rock’), and partitioned off part of the cave as a church, which he dedicated to the Virgin Mary, known in Ethiopia as Maryam.

The founder of Debre Asbo is said to have retired in his old age to a solitary existence as a lone anchorite in a cave near his church, engaged in prayer and self-denial until his death in 1313. After several years in a shrine, his remains were moved in 1370 to a site in the cliff face above Debre Asbo, eventually being ceremoniously relocated to the terrace below.⁹

Debre Asbo came to particular prominence under the renowned Emperor Amda Siyon (r. 1314–44), when the monks, preferring to maintain their ascetic life, refused royal jurisdiction and denounced royal excesses.¹⁰ By the early 15th century, under Téwodros (Theodore), the fourth abbot, the monks had moved their monastery onto the terrace below the cave of Debre Asbo and had made their peace with the imperial court. Under Yohannis Kama, the highly revered seventh abbot, the monks built a new church and had it well endowed by Emperor Yeshaq (r. 1412–27).

Debre Asbo achieved its apogee under Emperor Zer’a Ya’iqob (‘The Seed of Jacob’, r. 1434–68), who bestowed great wealth and prestige on the monastery, elevating it to the most influential position in both Church and state. In 1450 he renamed it Debre Libanos, thereby symbolising the rebirth of a renowned 5th–6th-century monastery of the same name that had wielded considerable influence when the capital was at Aksum.¹¹ For the Ethiopian Church, in which the monastic tradition plays such a central role, Debre Libanos became the jewel in the crown. This was the monastery’s golden age. Sacred books were written praising the earthly struggle of St Tekle Haymanot, and the first church of St Tekle Haymanot was built over a crypt containing the saint’s mortal remains. The abbot of Debre Libanos was made an ex officio high-ranking member of the imperial court and was raised to the illustrious level of ichegé, the head monk of Ethiopia and the second-highest official of the Ethiopian Church below the archbishop, who, by agreement with the Alexandrian Patriarchate, was a Copt (i.e. an Egyptian Christian).¹² In practice, the abbot being obliged to spend much of his time at the imperial court, Debre Libanos was, and still is, actually run not by the abbot, but by an official known as the tsebaté, with the assistance of his deputy, the meggabi, who presides over a council of twelve monks.¹³

The rules of the monastery of Debre Libanos can be traced back to those of the 3rd-century St Anthony, who is generally considered to be the founder of monasticism, and is venerated in Ethiopian Christianity. At various times several ‘daughter’ monasteries following the same order were established in Ethiopia, creating a ‘House’ of St Tekle Haymanot.

Ethiopians Abroad

Ethiopian monks often travelled to religious centres such as Alexandria, Jerusalem and Rome. Egyptian monasticism being highly revered by the Ethiopians, Ethiopian Christian pilgrims en route to the Holy Land frequently visited Egypt. By the end of the 12th century there was an Ethiopian community at Scetis, where the Ethiopian monastery of St Elija was located. By the beginning of the 15th century the Ethiopians had also established a church of St George near Cairo, following which they developed more monasteries in Egypt.¹⁴

Letters written by notables such as the 4th-century St Jerome mention Ethiopian Christian pilgrims in Jerusalem, and later manuscripts record contacts between the Ethiopian emperors and the basilica of the Holy Sepulchre. By the 14th–15th centuries the Ethiopian community in Jerusalem was flourishing; it possessed four chapels within the church of the Holy Sepulchre, and a monastery on Mount Zion.¹⁵

Some scholars suggest that as early as 1310 there were Ethiopian pilgrims at the complex of St Stephen Protomartyr in Rome. It is certain that an embassy of the Ethiopian emperor Widim Re’ad (r. 1299–1314)¹⁶ was in Rome to visit the tombs of the Apostles. In 1402 Ambassador Antonio Bartoli was in Venice on a diplomatic mission for Emperor David II (r. c.1379/80–1413), who is credited with bringing to Ethiopia a piece of the True Cross, in addition to icons of the Virgin Mary reputedly painted by St Luke.¹⁷ This visit was followed up in 1404, when a delegation of Ethiopians arrived in Rome to find out whether the pontiff had received gifts sent earlier by the Ethiopian sovereign.¹⁸

In all, between 1403 and the Council of Florence in 1441, the Vatican archives registered twelve pilgrimages of Ethiopians to Rome. They were given hospitality by four popes, namely Boniface IX (r. 1389–1404), Gregory XI (r. 1406–15), Martin V (r. 1417–31) and Eugene IV (r. 1431–47).¹⁹

In 1439 the Ethiopian Church sent a delegation to the Council of Florence convoked by Pope Eugene IV,²⁰ and in the mid-15th century Emperor Zer’a Ya’iqob dispatched an embassy that met with Pope Nicholas V (r. 1447–55). The historic meeting was reciprocated in 1451, when the pontiff sent his representative to Ethiopia.

In November 1481 a more formal and momentous meeting between the Roman Church and the Ethiopian Church occurred, when an imposing Ethiopian delegation arrived in Rome. Pope Sixtus IV (r. 1471–84) then decided to assign the church of St Stephen Protomartyr in Rome to the Ethiopian monastic community, and renamed it St Stephen of the Abyssinians.²¹ Four of the Ethiopian delegates are believed to have been subsequently immortalised by Botticelli and Tucci in frescoes on the walls of the newly built Sistine Chapel, where they can be seen today.²² By the early 1500s St Stephen’s monastery hosted the largest Ethiopian community in Europe.²³

Under a succession of notable abbots, the monastery of Debre Libanos maintained a prominent position and a high profile in the affairs of the Ethiopian empire. When a Portuguese delegation arrived at Debre Libanos to meet Emperor Libne Dingil (r. 1508–40) in October 1520, the Catholic mission chaplain, Father Francisco Alvares, found he could discuss matters of faith with the Ethiopian clergy in an atmosphere of mutual respect and admiration.²⁴ He also remarked upon their level of scholarship and the asceticism of the monks. He found the abbot to be ‘a man of holy life conversant with Latin and also with Portuguese and an accomplished scribe … he wrote in his own handwriting the Gloria of the Mass, and the Creed and Paternoster, and Ave Maria, and the Apostles’ Creed and the Salve Regina, and he knew it in Latin as well as I did. He also wrote out the gospel of St John and all very well ornamented.’²⁵

A Devastating Jihad

However, the golden years at Debre Libanos came to an end when disaster struck the monastery. Deploying soldiers armed with matchlock guns—both provided by the expanding Ottoman Empire—Imam Ahmed bin Ibrahim (now popularly known as Ahmed Grañ) from the Muslim city of Harar in what was then known as the state of Adal, to the east of Ethiopia, overcame the emperor’s less well-armed forces. Then in 1529 the imam went on to launch a devastating jihad throughout the Christian highlands, burning and pillaging the churches and putting the clergy to the sword. In July 1531 soldiers of Ahmed Grañ’s cavalry arrived at the edge of the plateau above the monastery of Debre Libanos. Looking down on the magnificently endowed church of St Tekle Haymanot, they ‘watched it from the edge of the precipice and were amazed at its golden dome and golden cross’.²⁶

Grañ’s army descended on the monastery, massacred 450 priests and monks, looted the premises of its gold and silver, and razed the church to the ground. The imam’s Muslim chronicler, who was embedded with the army and witnessed the onslaught, was moved to write that so terrible was the grief of the monks at the sight of the destruction of the church, they ‘plunged into the fire, as moths dive into the wick of a lamp; all but a few of them’.²⁷

Ahmed Grañ’s jihad burned and pillaged numerous churches and massacred their clergy, including the royal church of Mekane Sillassé (‘Place of the Trinity’), a church affiliated to Debre Libanos and situated about 125 km to the north-east (see Map 11). Father Alvares and his delegation had earlier visited the emperor at this same church, describing in his memoirs a welcoming throng of twenty thousand, and a very large three-aisled basilica with walls of white stone, curtains of rich brocade, the principal door decorated with metal plates inlaid with stones, and above it icons of the Blessed Virgin and angels.²⁸ In 1531 Ahmed Grañ accompanied his soldiers in their onslaught on the church, his chronicler recording the event at the time in Arabic:

His close friends entered with him. When he saw it, he was about to be blinded by its dazzling brilliance. The church was embellished with gold and silver plates, encrusted with pearls … The church was one hundred cubits long … They were stupefied by the workmanship … So they set to work with a thousand axes, ripping out the gold and the precious stones … Each took as much gold as he could carry … The Imam asked all the Arabs who were with him, ‘Is there the like of this church, with its images and its gold, in Byzantium, or in India, or in any other place?’ They replied, ‘We never saw or heard its like in Byzantium or India or anywhere in the world.’²⁹

In 1540, Emperor Libne Dingil died, a somewhat forlorn figure, at...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Holy War Photos
• List of Maps
• List of Tables
• List of Illustrations
• List of Abbreviations
• Notes on Transliteration
• Glossary and Explanatory Notes
• Preface
• Prologue
• Part One Prelude
• Part Two A Holy War
• Part Three A Strike at the Heart
• Part Four Onward, Christian Soldiers
• Epilogue
• Reflections
• Appendix I: The Final Toll
• Appendix II: Spoils of War
• Appendix III: Major Quercia’s Report of 14 March 1937 (page 1)
• Appendix IV: Telegram No. 35049, Pietro Maletti to Rodolfo Graziani, 22 May 1937
• Appendix V: Telegram No. 9325, Rodolfo Graziani to Pietro Maletti, 24 May 1937
• Appendix VI: Telegram, Graziani to the Residente at Fiché, 27 October 1937
• Appendix VII: The Italian Inventory of Items Removed from Debre Libanos
• Acknowledgements
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index
• Back Cover