1 Introduction
Much has been written over the years about foreign, specifically western, colonialism in sub-Saharan Africa, as well as about the foreign peoples, western and non-western alike, who have settled in sub-Saharan Africa during the modern period. However, although many large-scale states rose and fell in sub-Saharan Africa throughout pre-colonial times, the history of African imperial expansion into non-African lands is to a large degree the history of Egyptian invasions of Syria-Palestine during Pharaonic and Ptolemaic times, Carthaginian (effectively Phoenician) expansion into Sicily and Spain in the second half of the first millennium b.c.e, and the Almoravid and Almohad invasions of the Iberian Peninsula during the Middle Ages. However, none of this history involved sub-Saharan Africans to any appreciable degree. Yet during Late Antiquity,
1
Aksum, a sub-Saharan African kingdom based in the northern Ethiopian highlands, invaded its neighbors across the Red Sea on several occasions. Aksum, named after its capital city, was during this time an active participant in the long-distance sea trade linking the Mediterranean with India via the Red Sea. It was a literate kingdom with a tradition of monumental art and architecture and already a long history of contact with South Arabia. The history of Aksumite expansion into, and settlement in, South Arabia can be divided into two main periods. The first lasts from the late 2nd to the late 3rd century
In addition to their military and political activities in South Arabia, the Aksumites were also active in the region as merchants. Of such commercial activities South Arabian inscriptions have nothing to say, though it must be stressed that direct references to commerce are relatively rare in such inscriptions during all periods. As we shall see, 3 ceramic evidence from Qāniʾ, located on the southern coast of Yemen, indicates an Aksumite presence there. Apart from Qāniʾ, however, archaeology has until now brought to light little data pertaining to the Aksumite presence in South Arabia at large. Even Ẓafār, the capital of Ḥimyar and a town at which the Aksumites are known to have established a significant presence, has yielded no more than a single potsherd of (possible) Aksumite origin. 4
Before proceeding, a few words about the terms used for the Aksumites and their settlements in South Arabia are in order. Inscriptions in the Sabaic language, left by both Sabaeans and Ḥimyarites, refer to the African subjects of Aksum as either “Aksumites” ʾks
1
m
n
(*ʾAksūm
ān
) or as “Ethiopians” ʾḥbs
2n
(*ʾAḥbūsh
ān
), Ḥbs
2n
(*Ḥabash
ān
), and Ḥbs
2
t
n
(*Ḥabashat
ān
). The nisba Ḥbs
2
y (*Ḥabashī) “Ethiopian” is also attested.
5
It is likely that the former ethnonym designates specifically the Geʿez-speaking inhabitants of the city of Aksum and its environs, while the latter refers to the various other groups dwelling in the northern highlands of Ethiopia who were subject to Aksum. In addition, armed divisions of Aksumites are designated in Sabaic by the term ʾḥzb (*ʾaḥzāb), which is derived from Geʿez ḥəzb “people, tribe, crowd, nation” but is attested in Sabaic only in the plural form (cf. Geʿez pl. ʾaḥzāb). The singular form is, however, used in a 6th century Syriac text, the Letter of Pseudo-Simeon of Bēth Arsham, which in one instance seems to refer to the Aksumite residents in South Arabia as ḥezbā.
6
A number of Sabaic inscriptions allude to the
2 Historical Background: Pre-Aksumite and Early Aksumite Times
The African and Arabian sides of the Red Sea have been in contact since prehistory. One of the most significant long-term results of this contact was the diffusion of Semitic speech from South Arabia to the Horn of Africa. Attempting to determine a precise date for this development is all but impossible and, since the diffusion of Semitic speech was undoubtedly a long process, inappropriate. Whatever the case, a turning point in relations between the two sides of the Red Sea came in the first half of the first millennium B.C. when South Arabia, in particular the kingdom of Sabaʾ, began exerting a significant cultural impact on northern Ethiopia, one aspect of which was the use of the Sabaic language and the South Arabian musnad script in inscriptions. That a pre-Sabaean Semitic language or group of languages already existed in Ethiopia at this time is evident from the lexical and morphological idiosyncrasies which occur in Sabaic inscriptions from Ethiopia but are absent in the ancient inscriptions from South Arabia. 14 Likewise, the Ethiopian branch of Semitic, which includes such languages as Geʿez, Amharic, Tigrinya, and Tigre, is characterized by numerous morphological features not attested in any of the written languages of ancient South Arabia, which strongly suggests that an older form of Semitic was introduced to the Horn of Africa well before the first millennium b.c.
The Sabaic inscriptions that have come to light in northern Ethiopia preserve the names of several kings who reigned during the first half of the 1st millennium B.C. What their polity was called is unknown, and while scholars have long assumed that this early Ethiopian kingdom was called Diʿmat, this name, while attested in some Sabaic inscriptions from Ethiopia, does not occur in all of the attested royal titles. The same corpus of inscriptions indicates that several South Arabian deities were worshipped in Ethiopia during this period, namely ʾĪlmuquh, ʿAthtar, Hawbas, and Dhāt-Ḥimāyim, together with such local deities as Yāfiʿum, Naraw, ʿAybas, Shayḥān, and Ṣādiqān. From these inscriptions, we also learn of the presence in Ethiopia of a community of South Arabian expatriates hailing from the Sabaean capital of Mārib and from the town of Ḥadaqān, the capital of the small kingdom of Samʿī based in the Yemeni highlands. A number of these resident South Arabians bear the title of grby, which translates as “stonemason” but which also designates a cadre of specialist who at times, at least in South Arabia, occupied ministerial positions at the royal court.
15
In Ethiopia, such individuals were effectively agents of
In the second half of the 1st millennium B.C., northern Ethiopia entered an obscure period during which the South Arabian cultural influence gradually diminished. Although it is impossible to discern any semblance of a coherent history during this period, it is likely that the region became divided between several small-scale polities. The picture becomes clearer when Aksum emerged as the dominant polity sometime around the turn of the Common Era, a development that led to a revival—indeed an expansion—of Ethiopian contact with the outside world. The Periplus of the Erythraean Sea, a Greek text dating from the mid-1st century which served as a guide for merchants conducting business in the Red Sea and the western Indian Ocean, describes the Aksumite town of Adulis, located near the Red Sea coast in what is now Eritrea, as a bustling center of trade at which ivory, tortoise shell, and rhinoceros horn were exchanged for cloth, garments, tools, weapons, and iron from places as far afield as the Roman Empire and northwestern India. 16 According to the Periplus, the Aksumite king of the time was literate in Greek, 17 and indeed Greek continued to be used in royal inscriptions, side by side with Geʿez, down to the 4th century. Thus, far from being barbarian marauders, the Aksumites who intervened militarily—and at times settled—in South Arabia hailed from an affluent, cosmopolitan kingdom that engaged in long-distance trade. Material evidence of this affluence survives in the form of large-scale elite residences and tombs at Aksum, 18 as well as archaeological and numismatic evidence for trade with the Roman Empire and India. 19
3 The Aksumite Presence in South Arabia, ca. 170–270
Although Aksumite merchants were undoubtedly present in South Arabia from at least the 1st century, it is not until the second half of the 2nd century that the Aksumites make an appearance in South Arabian inscriptions. They entered the South Arabian political arena during a period of intense warfare between the kingdoms of Sabaʾ, Ḥimyar, Qatabān, and Ḥaḍramawt. Of these,
Exactly why the Aksumites chose to involve themselves in the political affairs of South Arabia at the time they did is not a question that can be easily answered. There are, however, indications that the Romans established some sort of sphere of influence in South Arabia at the end of the 1st century b.c.e, and even posted troops there.
23
From two Latin inscriptions in the Farasān Archipelago, one dating from ca. 120, the other from 143–144, it is known that a Roman legionary detachment was stationed there during the 2nd century, most likely to protect shipping lanes against pirates.
24
What exactly happened after the mid-2nd century is not clear, owing to lack of evidence. Not long after the record of the Roman presence in the southern Red Sea falls silent, we find the earliest known reference to the Aksumites in South Arabia in Robin-Umm Laylā 1, a Sabaic inscription dating from ca. 160–190.
25
By this time, so the inscription tells us, the Aksumites already penetrated the Yemeni highlands and had started threatening the local tribes, who in response formed an alliance for mutual protection. If it is true that the Romans withdrew their military forces
3.1 Sabaean Relations with Aksum under ʾĪlsharaḥ Yaḥḍub and Yaʾzil Bayyin
A number of important Sabaic inscriptions documenting the Aksumite conflict with Sabaʾ date from the coregency of the Sabaean king ʾĪlsharaḥ Yaḥḍub and his brother Yaʾzil Bayyin (r. ca. 245–260). Of these, several allude to Aksumite settlements in the Tihāma region (ʾʿṣd). The relevant inscriptions all come from the Sabaean capital of Mārib.
3.1.1 Ir 69
One of the inscriptions in question, Ir 69, was dedicated at the Barʾ ān Temple by three officers of the royal brothers, Wahabʾawwām Yiʾdhaf, and Khadhwat and Karibʿathat ʾAsʿad. According to the text:
ḍbʾ mrʾy-hmw ʾls2rḥ Yḥḍb w-ʾḫy-hw Yʾzl Byn mlky S1bʾ w-Ḏ-Rydn b-ʿly ʾʿṣd Ḥbs2t w-Ḏ-S1hrtm w-wkb-hmw b-ws1ṭ S1hrtn b-ʾkdn ʿrn ḏ-Wḥdt. 26
Their two lords, ʾĪlsharaḥ Yaḥḍub and his brother Yaʾzil Bayyin, the two kings of Sabaʾ and Dhū-Raydān, waged war against the villages of the Ethiopians and Dhū-Saharatim, and they came upon them in the middle of Sahratān in the foothills of the mountain of Waḥdat.
A few lines later in the same inscription, we read that:
s1bʾ w-ḍbʾ mrʾ-hmw ʾls2rḥ Yḥḍb mlk S1bʾ w-Ḏ-Rydn drm ṯntm ʿdy S1hrtm b-ʿly ʾʿṣd Ḥbs2t w-Ḏ-S1hrtm w-s2wʿ-hw ḫms1-hw ḫms1 S1bʾ w-ḏ-bn ʾqwl w-ʾs2ʿb Ḥmyrm w-wkbw ʾʿṣd-hmw b-Mqrfm b-s1flt ʾrḍ ʿkm. 27
Their lord, ʾĪlsharaḥ Yaḥḍub, king of Sabaʾ and Dhū-Raydān, campaigned and waged war a second time against the villages of the Ethiopians and
Two points are worthy of note here. One is that no distinction is made between the villages inhabited by the Ethiopians (Ḥbs 2 t) and those inhabited by the indigenous Tihāma tribe of Dhū-Sahratim. Whether this means that both groups inhabited the same settlements is difficult to say for lack of further details, though the fact that the term used for village is of Geʿez derivation suggests that those settlements designated as ʾʿṣd were established by the Aksumites, even if they came in time to attract indigenous peoples. Significantly, when the origins of the inhabitants of the ʾʿṣd are given, Ethiopians are invariably among said inhabitants, and in fact Ja 574, another inscription, which we shall examine in greater detail shortly, 28 links one group of ʾʿṣd exclusively with the Ethiopians, with no reference to tribes from the Tihāma. Contrasted with villages of this type are settlements designated qr, ʾdwr, and ʾdyr in Sabaic. Although such settlements, as we shall see below, are at times associated with Aksumites together with local tribes, the terms used to designate them, while absent from Geʿez, are attested in Arabic, e.g. qarya “village” and dār “territory, domain”. Perhaps, then, those settlements designated qr, ʾdwr, or ʾdyr were villages established by the indigenous peoples of the Tihāma at which Aksumites later took up residence.
3.1.2 Ja 575
The attack on the Ethiopians at the mountain of Waḥdat is documented another inscription, Ja 575, dedicated at the ʾAwwām Temple by several members of the tribe of Sukhaymum, the names of whom are not preserved. In this inscription, we are told that:
wrdw S1hrtn b-ʿly ʾʿṣd dllw l-hmw w-hḏrw hmt ʾʿṣdn bn kfl ʿrn Wḥdt w-ẓʿnw l-bḥrn w-hdrk-hmw b-ʾṯr-hmw w-ḥrbw h[mt … … h]mt ʾḥbs2n w-ʿkm w-ḏ-kwn kwn-hmw Ḏ-S1hrtm mwṯbtm bʿd ʾwld-hmw w-qny-hmw w-yʾttmw w-tqdmn w-rtḍḥn b-ʿm hmt ʾḥbs2n w-[… … w-ʾ]wld-hmw w-ʾʾnṯ-hmw f-hrgw w-s1byw w-bn-hw f-tʾwlw w-ḥrbw b-ʿynm w-hʿn l-ḏ-mḫrm b-ʿly-hmw ḏ-s1ʾr bn hmt ʾḥbs2n w-ʿkm w-ḏ-s1tṣrw b[n … …]ʾwm b-ḥs1m w-hrg w-hs1ḥtn ʿnt hmt ʾḥbs2n w-ʿkm w-kl ḏ-kwn kwn-hmw bn ḏ-ʾs2ʿb Ḏ-S1hrtm. 29
They (i.e. members of Sukhaymum) descended upon Sahratān, against the villages about which they had been informed. And they threatened those villages from the flank of the mountain of Waḥdat. And they shifted their position to the seacoast and followed them (i.e. the enemy) by their tracks. And they made war on th[ose … … th]ose Ethiopians and ʿAkkum and those who supported them among Dhū-Sahratim, the sedentary folk, after their children and their possessions. And they regrouped and fought and did battle with those Ethiopians and [… … And] their children and their wives were killed or taken prisoner. And from there they returned. And they made war at ʿAynum and those who remained of those Ethiopians and ʿAkkum and those who had sought help fr[om … …] mounted an attack against them on the following day […] with a decisive defeat and a killing and a routing of a contingent of those Ethiopians and ʿAkkum and all those who supported them among Dhū-Sahratim.
Although Ja 575 provides a few details not given in Ir 69, it sheds no light on the question of Aksumite settlement patterns in South Arabia. Once again, the Aksumites are said to have operated in concert with the local tribes of ʿAkkum and Dhū-Sahratim. Perhaps significantly, each time the coalition is mentioned, the lists of its constituent elements are invariably headed by the Ethiopians (ʾḥbs
2n
), while Dhū-Sahratim—and even then, so it appears, only some of them—merely provided support of an undisclosed nature. This suggests that the resistance movement in the Tihāma was led by the Aksumites, perhaps attracted to the region because local tribes had sought out their aid in the struggle against the Sabaean state. In the 6th century, disenfranchised elements in South Arabian society would again seek military aid from Aksum,
30
and while they were prompted to do so by primarily religious—rather than political—factors, it is not implausible that, already in the 3rd century, marginalized groups in the Tihāma saw in Aksum a powerful ally. One final point connected with the portion of text presented above that bears mentioning are the references to women and children among those groups whom the Sabaeans attacked. Despite the lacunae in the inscription and the somewhat ambiguous wording of what text survives, it is likely that the women and children in question were affiliated with all three groups in the coalition, rather than with the Aksumites alone. Insofar as the Aksumites are concerned, two scenarios are possible. One is that the Aksumite soldiers brought their families with them, in which case it would seem that they planned to settle permanently in the Tihāma. Alternatively, such soldiers might have married local women—a not implausible scenario if, as suggested above, Aksumites and local tribal groups
3.1.3 Ja 574
Another relevant inscription from the ʾAwwām Temple, Ja 574, is dedicated by ʾĪlsharaḥ Yaḥḍub and his brother Yaʾzil Bayyin themselves and claims that the Sabaean god ʾĪlmuquh intervened in Sabaean military operations against the Aksumites.
ḫmr w-hws2ʿn ʿbd-hw ʾls2rḥ Yḥḍb mlk S1bʾ w-Ḏ-Rydn b-nqm ʾḥbs2n w-Ḏ-S1hrtm b-ḥrbt ḥrbw b-qr-hmw b-s1rn ḏ-S1hm w-bʿd-hw f-yḍbʾ ʾls2rḥ Yḥḍb mlk S1bʾ w-Ḏ-Rydn w-b-ʿm-hw ḏ-bn ḫms1-hw w-ʾqwl-hw b-ʿly ʾḥzb Ḥbs2t w-ʾʿṣd-hmw ʿdy ʾgnw s1rn S3rdd w-yḥrbw hmt ʾḥbs2n w-Ḏ-S1hrtm b-kdnn ḏ-Wdftn w-Wdyfn w-frs2t Lqḥ w-ḥrbw b-hmyt ʾkdnn ḫms1t w-ʿs2ry ʾdwrm bn ʾdwr ʾks1mn w-Gmdn w-ʿkm w-ḏ-bn ʾdwr Ḏ-S1hrtm. 31
He (i.e. ʾĪlmuquh) bestowed upon and granted to his servant ʾĪlsharaḥ Yaḥḍub, King of Sabaʾ and Dhū-Raydān, the punishment of the Ethiopians and Dhū-Sahratim in a battle which they waged in their village(s) in the valley of Sihām. And after that, ʾĪlsharaḥ Yaḥḍub, King of Sabaʾ and Dhū-Raydān, and with him some of his main army and his tribal leaders, waged war against the armed bands of the Ethiopians and their villages, up to the cultivated area of the valley of Śurdud. And they made war on those Ethiopians and Dhū-Sahratim at the hill of Wadfatān and (at) Wadayf ān and (at) the cultivated field of Liqaḥ. And in those hills they made war on twenty-five villages among the villages of the Aksumites and Gumdān and ʿAkkum, and some of the villages of Dhū-Sahratim.
As with those villages designated ʾʿṣd in Ir 69 and Ja 575, the villages referred to as ʾdwr are associated with Ethiopians, here designated specifically as Aksumites (ʾks
1
m
n
), as well as with local tribes. In this instance a new group, Gumdān, joins the ranks with the by now familiar ʿAkkum and Dhū-Sahratim. Nothing is said of the families of the Aksumites, however, though Gumdān is said to have sent a delegation to Ṣanʿāʾ—at that time a secondary capital of Sabaʾ—where they gave their children as hostages (whbw ʾwld-hmw ʾwṯq
m
).
32
3.2 Ḥimyarite Conflict with Aksum
Our final text that refers to Aksumite settlement in the Tihāma, MAFRAY-al-Miʿsāl 5, is a Sabaic inscription from al-Miʿsāl in southwestern Yemen, dating from the reign of the Ḥimyarite king Yāsirum Yuhanʿim (ca. 265–287). Dedicated in honor of the sun-goddess ʿĀliyat by a military leader named Ḥaẓiyyān ʾAwkan, the inscription documents a military conflict that affected Aksum at the highest level.
wqh-hmw mrʾ-hmw Ys1rm Yhnʿm mlk S1bʾ w-Ḏ-Rydn b-ywm ʿdyw mlky Ḥbs2t Dtwns1 w-Zqrns1 w-Ḏ-Mʿfrm w-ḫms1 Ḥbs2t ʿdy ʾrḍ Ḥmyrm w-hs2rʿw ws3ʿ-hmw b-tḥt Ḏ-Ṣhbm ḏ-b-s1rn Ḫbn w-ts3bbw w-tndfw b-ʿm-hmw ṯlṯt ʾwrḫm ḏ-rtʿw ḥrtm ʿbrn ḥrtm f-s2rgw b-s1rn Bnʾ w-ts3ʿw b-ʿm-hmw b-tḥt Byt ḏ-ʾrtʿ w-ts1bṭw b-ʿm-hmw w-s1bṭw-hmw ʿdy hʿdyw-hmw ḥrt-hmw b-s1ḥtm w-qlmw ḏ-ḫb bn mqtwt w-ʾrgl mlkn w-mns3rtn ḏ-b-ʿm-hmw. 33
Their lord, Yāsirum Yuhanʿim, King of Sabaʾ and Dhū-Raydān, commanded them on the day when the two kings of the Ethiopians, Datwanas and Zaqarnas and Dhū-Maʿāfirim and the main army of the Ethiopians advanced into the land of Ḥimyarum and they prepared to fight them below Dhū-Ṣuḥabim, which is in the valley of Khubān. 34 And they engaged, and exchanged arrow-fire, with them for three months, (during) which they set up one camp against the other. Then they gathered in the valley of Banaʾ and they (i.e. the Ḥimyarites) engaged in battle with them below Bayt Dhū-ʾArtaʿ and fought with them and beat them back until they caused them to fall back to their camp with a routing. And they cut off those who had acted unjustly against the lieutenants and infantry of the king and the vanguard that was with them.
That this was a major conflict is evident from the fact that two Aksumite kings, most likely coregents, got involved. 35 As before, the Aksumites allied themselves with Dhū-Maʿāfirim. Once the Ḥimyarites overcame this combined force, they pursued what remained of the Aksumite force, together with several local tribes that stood in their way.
tʿbdw w-hbrrn b-ʿly bʿbʿt ʾḥbs2n w-ʿly s2ʿbn ʿrybn w-s2ʿbn Ḥbrn w-s2ʿbn Yhgmn w-wḍʿ-hmw w-hs1bʿn w-ʾwlw kl ʾqdm-hmw w-ʾwṯq-hmw w-ʾwlw s3dʿn-hmw w-mdd-hmw w-s2ʿbn Yhgmn f-ʿdyw b-ḫyl-hmw w-ʿdyw w-hbʿln w-dhr kl mṣnʿ-hmw ḫms1 mṣnʿm w-kl ʾlwd-hmw w-bnt-hmw w-ʾqny-hmw w-ʾʿṣd-hmw. 36
They brought to submission and went forth against the roaming bands of Ethiopians and the tribe of ʿArībān and the tribe of Ḥubrān and the tribe of Yuhgamin, and they humiliated them and forced their capitulation. And they brought back all of their leaders and hostages. And they brought back their comrades-in-arms and their military aids and (members of) the tribe of Yuhagmin. Then they advanced and plundered and burned all of their forts—five forts (in total)—and (seized) all of their sons and their daughters and their possessions and their villages.
As with the other inscriptions which we have examined thus far, it is not possible to determine what portion of those taken captive were Aksumites. Judging from the reference to ʾʿṣd, however, it is likely that the Aksumites were represented among the prisoners-of-war. That children were taken captive indicates that some of the Aksumites had started families in South Arabia, whether with Ethiopian spouses who might have accompanied them to their new home or with local women. MAFRAY-al-Miʿsāl 5, it should also be noted, contains the last known 3rd-century reference to the Aksumite presence in South Arabia. Although Ḥimyar maintained relations with Aksum during the 4th century, as we shall see shortly, 37 it is not until the early 6th century that we again find allusions in Sabaic inscriptions to Aksumite settlement in South Arabia. This suggests that Yāsirum Yuhanʿim was the ruler who succeeded in expelling the Aksumites from South Arabia.
3.3 Aksumites in Peripheral Areas of South Arabia
Although the epigraphic material analyzed thus far indicates Aksumite settlement only in the Tihāma during the 3rd century, there are hints of an Aksumite presence in other, more peripheral, parts of South Arabia during the same period.
3.3.1 Ja 576+Ja 577
One indication of this is a passage in Ja 576+Ja 577, a Sabaic inscription on two blocks of stone from the ʾAwwām Temple at Mārib. Like most of the Sabaic inscriptions treated above, it, too, dates from the coregency of ʾĪlsharaḥ Yaḥḍub
ys1mʿw k-nblw hmw ʾgrn b-ʿbr ʾḥzb Ḥbs2t l-hʿnn ʿqb ngs2yn b-hgrn Ngrn w-s2ʿbn Ngrn w-hmw f-nẓrw mwʿd ʾgrn l-tẓryn b-ʿbr ʾmrʾ-hmw ʾmlk S1bʾ w-hḫw-hw b-mwʿd-hmw l-nṣr ʿnt ʾḥbs2n. 38
They (i.e. Sabaeans) had heard that those Najrānīs had sent a mission to the armed bands of the Ethiopians to aid the nagāśīʼs governor in the town of Najrān and the tribe of Najrān. And they were aware of the (Ethiopians’) promise to the Najrānīs to guarantee protection against their lords, the kings of Sabaʾ, but they thwarted it through (their knowledge of) their (i.e. the Najrānīs’) promise to help the contingent of the Ethiopians.
There is much in this passage that remains obscure. If, however, one accepts the interpretation presented here, it would seem that the Aksumites had taken on the Najrānīs as vassals, hence the appointment of a governor who administered the town on behalf of the Aksumite king himself, but that the Sabaeans managed to intervene and reassert control. That this is what happened is evident a few lines later, where we read:
w-ʿqb-hmw Ḥbs2yn S1bqlm s1[… …h]w w-ʾs1d hbʾs1w w-hs2tʾw qs1dtn f-nblw b-ʿm-hw w-whbw bny-hmw w-bnt-hmw ʾwṯqm w-ḥmlw ʿdy hgrn Ẓrbn ʿqb wqh mrʾ-hmw mlkn ʾls2rḥ Yḥḍb l-ʿqb b-hyt hgrn Ẓrbn w-s1ry-hw Ngrn. 39
And as for their Ethiopian governor, Sabqalum [… …h]is […]. And those who had acted wrongfully and had staged the rebellion sent a mission with him and they gave their sons and their daughters as hostages. And they admitted into the town of Ẓirbān a governor whom their lord, the king ʾĪlsharaḥ Yaḥḍub, commanded to govern in that town of Ẓirbān and their two valleys of Najrān.
Here the name of the Ethiopian governor is given, though the nature of his involvement in the events surrounding the reassertion of Sabaean control remain obscure, owing to the lacuna in the text. Regarding the place-names
3.3.2 Geʿez Graffiti from the Grotto of Ḥōq (Soqoṭrā)
To date, the only trace that the Aksumites themselves have left of their presence in South Arabia comes not from the mainland but from the island of Soqoṭrā. The Periplus of the Erythraean Sea refers to the island as Dioskouridēs (Διoσκoυρίδης), a name probably derived from a putative Ḏ-S
3
krd (*
Dh
ū-Sakūrid),
41
and reports that it was a colony of the kingdom of Ḥaḍramawt and was populated by a mixture of Arabs (i.e. South Arabians), Indians, and Greeks who had gone there to trade.
42
This statement is confirmed by the discovery of Roman, Ḥaḍramī and Indian pottery on Soqoṭrā.
43
Although the Periplus says nothing about an Aksumite presence on the island, a Belgian team of speleologists exploring the grotto of Ḥōq at the northern end of Soqoṭrā between December 2000 and January 2001 came across a series of inscriptions and graffiti in not only Palmyrene, Ancient South Arabian, Sanskrit, and Middle Indic, but also Geʿez. Given the timeframe for the corpus, it is clear that the Geʿez graffiti are of Aksumite date. To be sure, only six Geʿez graffiti can be confidently identified, together with two that are probably Geʿez and three that could be either
4 Aksumite Relations with South Arabia in the 4th Century
Following the withdrawal of Aksumite military forces from South Arabia after ca. 270, the kings of Aksum, in particular Ousanas (r. ca. 310–330) and his brother and successor ʿĒzānā (r. ca. 330–370), continued to lay claim to South Arabia in their royal titles, which designate as vassals of Aksum both Ḥimyar and the by now defunct kingdom of Sabaʾ, as well as their respective capitals of Ẓafār and Mārib. The latter are alluded to by the names of their respective royal palaces: Raydān at Ẓafār and Salḥīn at Mārib. These claims of dominion over South Arabia are political fictions through and through, 49 but nevertheless indicate that the memory of past Aksumite occupation of South Arabia retained a certain degree of ideological importance for the kings of Aksum.
It must be emphasized, however, that the cessation of Aksumite occupation in South Arabia in no way implies a cutting of ties between Aksum and Ḥimyar,
5 Aksumite Relations with South Arabia in the 6th Century
The 6th century witnessed a renewal of Aksumite military intervention in South Arabia. Yet the nature of this intervention differed considerably from that of Aksumite intervention during the 2nd and 3rd centuries. Whereas in earlier centuries the Aksumites had for the most part occupied relatively peripheral regions in South Arabia and had formed alliances with such regional powers as were deemed political useful, their intervention in the early 6th century was far more organized and systematic and was driven by a much clearer agenda. This second period of intervention in South Arabia is characterized by a policy of appointing sympathetic Christian members of the local elite to rule Ḥimyar on behalf of Aksum, supported by Aksumite troops and a cadre of Aksumite officials. Ostensibly, Aksum’s intervention in the early 6th century
5.1 Historical Background
While some details remain obscure, the general course of events in 6th-century South Arabia is reasonably clear. During the reign of the Ḥimyarite king Marthadʾīlān Yanūf (r. ca. 500–518?), the Aksumites seem to have established a diplomatic presence at the Ḥimyarite capital of Ẓafār.
55
Although some scholars have gone so far as to posit that Marthadʾīlān Yanūf was actually brought to power by the Aksumites,
56
the extant documentation for his reign does not yield any concrete data bearing on the manner in which he came to the throne.
57
If the presence of Aksumite diplomats at Ẓafār indicates amicable relations between Aksum and Ḥimyar—whatever the religion of king Marthadʾīlān Yanūf might have been—this state of affairs seems not to have lasted for long, for at some point during the second decade of the 6th century a systematic persecution of South Arabia’s Christian community was initiated. In response to this persecution, the Aksumite king Kālēb (r. ca. 510–540) dispatched a punitive campaign to South Arabian under the command of a Ḥimyarite named Ḥayyān ca. 518.
58
In the process, the Aksumites brought to
However, as before, the reign of this Aksumite vassal was not to last long, for at some point between 531 and 540 a new potentate came to power—not a Ḥimyarite Jew this time but in fact a Christian Ethiopian general in the Aksumite army named ʾAbrǝhā, who had come to South Arabia during the invasion in 525 and had stayed on, rising through the ranks until he seized power and declared himself an autonomous king of Ḥimyar. After two punitive campaigns sent by Kālēb failed to remove ʾAbrǝhā from power, Aksum begrudgingly accepted his rule over Ḥimyar on condition that he paid tribute.
61
While there is no indication as to how long he maintained his end of the bargain, ʾAbrǝhā maintained diplomatic relations with Aksum, as well as with the Romans and the Sāsānids, as well as with the Ghassānids and the Lakhmids, who were clients of the Romans and Sāsānids respectively.
62
Like Maʿdīkarib Yaʿfur, ʾAbrǝhā undertook a program of military expansion in the Arabian Peninsula, and managed to extend Ḥimyar’s sphere of political influence as far as the oasis of al-Hufūf in East Arabia and the frontier of the Roman Empire in the
5.2 Gar antichità 9 d
Our first text pertaining to the Aksumite presence in 6th-century South Arabia is the Sabaic inscription Gar antichità 9 d. Originally erected at the Ḥimyarite capital of Ẓafār, it was moved at some point to Bayt al-Ashwāl, where it was reused in the structure of a modern house. The text reads as follows:
1.[b-rdʾ w-]b-ḥmd Rḥmnn bʿl s1myn w-b-2.[nṣr] mrʾ-hmw mlkn Mrṯdʾln Ynwf 3.S2gʿ w-bny-hw Wdfh w-ʾṣbḥh tn4.bltn brʾw w-hqs2bn w-ṯwbn 5.byt-hmw Ws2bʿn bn mwṯr-hw ʿd6.y tfrʿ-hw w-qs2bw b-hw mbhʾtm b-m7.nhmtm w-mwglm b-zkt Rḥmnn wrḫ-h8.w Ḏ-Mʿn ḏ-l-ts1ʿt ʿs2r w-s1ṯ mʾtm. 65
1.[With the aid of, and] with praise to, Raḥmānān, Lord of Heaven, and with 2.[the help] of their lord, King Marthadʾīlān Yanūf: 66 3. Shegāʿ and his sons Wadfā and ʾAṣbeḥā, the am4.bassadors, built, completed, and renovated 5.their house of Washbaʿān from its foundations to 6.its roof, and finished off therein the entrance with polished ma7.sonry and alabaster, by the grace of Raḥmānān; the month 8.of Dhū-Maʿūn of 619 (of the Ḥimyarite Era=March 509).
Since the dedicants of this inscription are described as “ambassadors” (tnblt), it is clear that they had come from abroad.
67
Müller identifies their names as Ethiopian,
68
in which case we can assume that they came from Aksum.
5.3 The Aksumite Invasion of 518
The period between Marthadʾīlān Yanūf’s reign and the Aksumites’ appointment of Maʿdīkarib Yaʿfur as king of Ḥimyar remains obscure, though if the Syriac Book of the Ḥimyarites is to be believed, it witnessed the persecution of South Arabia’s Christian community by Ḥimyarite Jews. Documentation for the Aksumite invasion of South Arabia in 518, which brought Maʿdīkarib Yaʿfur to power, is similarly scant. The chapters that dealt with this invasion in the Book of the Ḥimyarites are missing from the sole extant manuscript of the text and our knowledge that they existed at all is based solely on the surviving table of contents, while RIÉth 191, a Geʿez inscription from Aksum dating from the reign of Kālēb, preserves only a very laconic mention of the invasion and says nothing of the settlement of Aksumites in South Arabia, nor even of the Aksumites’ having brought Maʿdīkarib Yaʿfur to power. 70 Rather, it is in the far more abundant and detailed documentation of the Aksumite invasion of 525 that we find references to the presence of Aksumites in South Arabia at the time when Yūsuf seized power. It can be safely assumed that most members of this community settled in South Arabia following the invasion of 518. They included a military contingent, presumably acting as an armed guard for Maʿdīkarib Yaʿfur, as well as religious leaders and no doubt administrators as well. From the number of Aksumite casualties of Yūsuf’s agressions, as recorded in Syriac and Sabaic sources, it is even possible to gain a rough idea of the size of the Aksumite community of Ẓafār.
5.4 The Aksumite Community in South Arabia in the Early 520s
The Martyrium Arethae, a 6th-century Greek text documenting Yūsuf’s persecution of South Arabian Christians, is, while useful in many regards, not
5.4.1 Simeon of Bēth Arsham
To begin with the Syriac sources, the Miaphysite bishop Simeon of Bēth Arsham (d. 540s) preserves a letter sent to the Lakhmid ruler al-Mundhir iii (r. 503/5–554) from Yūsuf himself in the autumn of 523. In it, the Ḥimyarite king states that the attack on the Aksumites residing in South Arabia constituted the first stage in his anti-Christian campaign.
W-qadmāyaṯ l-kūllhōn Kūšāyē ḏa-šḇīqīn (h)waw b-aṯran d-nāṭrīn (h)waw ʿīttā hāy d-sabbar(w) (h)waw l-hōn da-ḇnaw b-aṯran eštaḵḥeṯ d-ešaggeš w-elbūḵ ennōn w-qeṭleṯ l-kūllhōn d-hāwīn (h)waw māṯēn wa-tmānēn gaḇrē ḇnay qyāmā w-ʿālmāyē. Hāy dēn ʿīḏaṯhōn ʿḇaḏtāh bēṯ knūštā dīlan. 72
First I was able to throw into disorder and seize all those Ethiopians who remained in our country, who were guarding that church which they had published abroad that they had built in our country, and I killed them all, 280 men—monks and laymen. That church of theirs I converted into a synagogue for us.
Based on this passage, we can conclude that the Aksumite invasion of South Arabia in 518 was aimed at more than bringing the Christian Ḥimyarite Maʿdīkarib Yaʿfur to power, for the construction of a church in Ḥimyar
73
and presence there of Aksumite monks (gaḇrē ḇnay qyāmā) indicates an effort to promote Christianity in the country. As for the resident Aksumite laymen (ʿālmāyē), it is likely that this group included an armed contingent as well as administrators and advisers to Maʿdīkarib Yaʿfur. Although the text states that the monks and laymen together numbered 280, it is quite possible that this number does not take into account the wives and children of the laymen, who
5.4.2 Ry 508
Further information on Yūsuf’s attack on the Aksumites took place in Ẓafār is provided by Ry 508, a Sabaic inscription from the site of ʿān-Halkān 1 in the Jabal Kawkab region of southwestern Saudi Arabia, dating from June 523 (Dhū-Qiyāẓān in Year 633 of the Ḥimyarite Era). In this inscription we read:
Qyln S2rḥʾl Yqbl bn S2rḥbʾl Ykml bnw Yzʾn w-Gdnm w-Ḥbm w-Ns1ʾn w-Ġbʾ ts1ṭrw b-ḏn ms1ndn d-s2mw b-s1bʾtm ʾwd-h k-hm ʿm mrʾ-hmw mlkn Ys1f ʾs1ʾr ʿly ʾḥbs2n b-Ẓfr w-dhrw qls1n w-wrd mlkn ʾs2ʿrn w-ḏky-hw b-gys2m w-ḥrb Mḫwn w-hrg 4.kl ḥwr-hw w-dhr qls1n. 79
The tribal leader Sharaḥʾīl Yaqbul bin Shuraḥbiʾīl Yakmul of the Banū Yazan and the Gadanum and Ḥabbum and Nasīʾān and Ghubaʾ wrote in this inscription, which they set up during the campaign against the Ethiopians in Ẓafār with which they were charged, when they were with their lord, the King Yūsuf ʾAsʾar. And they burned the church and the king came down to the ʾAshʿar (tribe) and sent him (i.e. Sharaḥʾīl Yaqbul) with a detachment and he made war on Mukhāwān and he killed all of its inhabitants and he burned the church.
From this portion of the inscription we learn that the attack on the Aksumites in Ẓafār was followed by an attack on southwestern Yemen, targeting the port of al-Mukhāʾ (Sabaic Mḫw
n
*Mu
kh
āw
ān
). Of the enemy forces, some 13,000 are
5.4.3 Ry 507
For further information on Yūsuf’s military campaigns and the manner in which they affected the Aksumite community of South Arabia, we turn to Ry 507 from Biʾr Ḥimā, also located in southwestern Saudi Arabia and dating from July 523 (Dhū-Madhraʾān in Year 633 of the Ḥimyarite Era), which presents certain details relating to the activities of Yūsuf’s forces not included in Ry 508:
4.dhrw qls1n w-hrgw ʾḥbs2n b-Ẓfr w-k-w[rd mlkn ʾs2ʿrn ….]ḍh Rʿwm […] w-hrg-h[m]w ṯlṯ mʾtm [……]mw w-kl-ḏky b-ʿ[l]y [ʾs2ʿr]n 5.w-mṣnʿ S2mr w-Rkbn w-Rmʿ w-M[ḫwn …]bnḥ[…]ny w-mtw b-ʾs2ʿr[n] w-[dh]rw qls1n w-hrgw w-ġ[n]mw [ʾḥbs2n] b-Mḫwn b-[ḥw]r-hw Frs1nytm. 81
4.they burned the church and killed the Ethiopians in Ẓafār, and when the king ca[me down in force upon the ʾAshʿarān ….] Raʿwum […] and he killed 300 of them […]. And when he sent (an expedition) against [ʾAshʿar]ān 5.and the fortresses of Shamīr 82 and Rimaʿ 83 and Mukhāwān … … …] and they died in ʾAshʿar[ān]; and they [bur]ned the church and killed and plundered [the Ethiopians] in Mukhāwān, together with its (other) [inhab]itants, the Farasān. 84
Of particular interest here is the allusion to 300 enemy casualties. Although the identity of this enemy is obscured by the lacunae in the text, the number given here is close enough to the 280 Ethiopian monks and laymen whom Yūsuf boasts of killing in the letter quoted by Simeon of Bēth Arsham to suggest that they were Aksumites. Ry 507 is also of importance for the history of the Aksumite diaspora in South Arabia as it indicates that, in addition to Ẓafār, the Aksumites had by the early 6th century established a presence at the port of al-Mukhāʾ, and that the town had a church, possibly built by the Aksumites. That al-Mukhāʾ attracted Aksumite settlers is undoubtedly due to the port’s location on the Red Sea, which made it an ideal center for trade with Africa, as
5.5 Other Aksumite Communities in 6th-Century South Arabia
Thus far, we have seen that there were Aksumite communities at both Ẓafār and al-Mukhāʾ during the early 6th century. What about elsewhere in South Arabia? As in the 3rd century, there is evidence of an Aksumite presence at Najrān as well as on Soqoṭrā. The Book of the Ḥimyarites states that there was at least one Ethiopian deacon (mšamšānā) named Yōnan in residence at Najrān. 86 He and several other foreign clergymen—two priests from the Lakhmid capital of al-Ḥīra in south-central Mesopotamia, a priest and a deacon of Roman origin, and a priest of Persian origin—are said to have been interrogated by Yūsuf during his occupation of Najrān. 87 What happened in the immediate aftermath of this interrogation is not clear, for an entire leaf is missing from the manuscript. When the text resumes, we find Yūsuf announcing that these foreign clergymen were to be burned alive like the other Christians of Najrān. 88 At this point there follows another large lacuna in the text, and it is not until the beginning of the following chapter that the text can be reconstructed, though by then the narrative has moved on to the unrelated issue of a woman martyr named Ṭrwybʾ (=Ẓarwība?). Textual lacunae aside, it is likely that Yōnan was martyred together with his fellow clergymen. Whether other Aksumites resided in Najrān at this time, as they appear to have during the mid-3rd century, 89 is not clear from what survives of the Book of the Ḥimyarites.
That the Aksumites maintained ties with Soqoṭrā during the 6th century is evident from the account of Cosmas Indicopleustes, a merchant who, during his visit to Ethiopia ca. 518 met Greek-speaking merchants from Soqoṭrā.
90
5.6 The Ethiopian Community under ʾAbrǝhā
With the reign of ʾAbrǝhā (ca. 531/5–560) we come to the final period of the history of the Aksumite diaspora in South Arabia. Where this period differs from those that preceded it is that now the Aksumites residing in South Arabia were the subjects of a regime that had effectively cast off the yoke of Aksumite rule. In fact, it is by no means clear to what extent—if at all—the members of this diaspora continued to self-identify as Aksumite once ʾAbrǝhā had achieved independence from Aksum. For this period, we are primarily dependent on Sabaic inscriptions dating from his reign as well as early medieval Arabic sources, together with a brief summary of his reign supplied by the Roman historian Procopius (d. 554). That Arabic sources show particular interest in ʾAbrǝhā is due primarily to the Islamic tradition of his having led an ill-fated campaign to destroy Mecca’s Kaʿba shrine. 99 Our concern here, however, shall be with the way in which the documentation for ʾAbrǝhā’s reign presents the Ethiopian community in South Arabia at the time.
5.6.1 Sabaic References: cih 541
Only once, in his famous inscription from the dam at Mārib, cih 541, does Sabaic documentation from ʾAbrǝhā’s reign allude to Aksum, and then only indirectly, in connection with the reception of a diplomatic delegation from the nagāśī, i.e. the Aksumite king (mḥs
2
kt ngs
2
y
n
).
100
When the Ethiopian followers of ʾAbrǝhā are mentioned elsewhere in the same inscription, they are referred to as “Ethiopians” (Ḥbs
2
t or ʾḥbs
2n
) rather than as “Aksumites” (ʾks
1
m
n
). Thus in one passage, ʾAbrǝhā’s armed forces are said to have been comprised of both “Ethiopians and Ḥimyarites by the thousands” (Ḥbs
2
t [w-]Ḥmyr
m
b-ʾʾlf
m
).
101
Ethiopians and Ḥimyarites are paired in another passage recording their participation in repair work at the Mārib dam. The passage in question states that, when a plague (ḍll) struck the region and caused deaths among the tribes, ʾAbrǝhā “dismissed them, his Ethiopians and his Ḥimyarites” (ʾḏnw l-hmw l-ʾḥbs
2
-hmw w-ʾḥmr-hmw), until the plague subsided.
102
Apart from ʾAbrǝhā himself, the dam inscription also refers to four other Ethiopians by name. The first was one Gerā Dhū-Zabānir (Grh Ḏ-Zbnr),
103
whose name
Among the Ethiopians mentioned in cih 541 there would no doubt have been those who, like ʾAbrǝhā, had arrived in Ḥimyar with the Aksumite invasion of 525, if not before. Others might have been among the two armed forces which, according to Procopius,
112
Kālēb had sent to Ḥimyar in a vain effort to remove ʾAbrǝhā from power. Unfortunately, neither the extant Sabaic sources nor Procopius give us any sense of the size of the Ethiopian community in
5.6.2 Arabic References: al-Ṭabarī
Turning to the Arabic sources, the most detailed—if perhaps apocryphal—account of ʾAbrǝhā’s coming to power is preserved by Muḥammad bin Jarīr al-Ṭabarī (d. 923) and is based on a tradition related by Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq (d. 767?). According to this account, ʾAbrǝhā seized power as a result of a single-combat encounter with one Aryāṭ, a general in the Aksumite army who remained in authority in South Arabia for several years after what was apparently the invasion of 525. Aryāṭ was rather treacherously put to death by a slave of ʾAbrǝhā’s named ʿAtwada, after which “the army of Aryāṭ flocked to ʾAbrǝhā and all of the Ethiopians in Yemen gathered together (around him)” (inṣarafa jund Aryāṭ ilā Abraha fa-jtamaʿat il-Ḥaba sh a bil-Yaman). 113 Aryāṭ, it should be noted in passing, is known solely from Arabic sources. 114 It is possible that the story of his demise preserves some vague memory of ʾAbrǝhā’s overthrow of Sumūyafaʿ ʾAshwaʿ, an individual who is otherwise unknown to Arabic tradition. Alternatively, it is possible that Aryāṭ was the leader of one of the two punitive campaigns, which Kālēb had sent against ʾAbrǝhā, according to Procopius, but that, with the passage of time, he came to be associated in Arabic tradition with the invasion of 525. The account of Hishām bin Muḥammad al-Kalbī (d. 819), also preserved by al-Ṭabarī, follows more or less the same narrative, but gives a different name to ʾAbrǝhā’s slave, which in the extant manuscripts of al-Ṭabarī appears in the form ʾrnjdh or ʾrbjdh, the vocalization of which is uncertain. 115
Whatever the origins or historicity of the story of the clash between ʾAbrǝhā and Aryāṭ, the regime which ʾAbrǝhā established in South Arabia was not to last for long. According to Arabic sources, it was brought to an end through the combined efforts of disenfranchised Ḥimyarites and their Sāsānid allies ca. 570. Once again, al-Ṭabarī, drawing on earlier sources, preserves the most detailed account. Citing Ibn Isḥāq and Hishām bin Muḥammad, al-Ṭabarī states that a Ḥimyarite nobleman named Sayf bin Dhī Yazan appealed to Kisrā, i.e. the Sāsānid emperor Khusraw Anushiruvān (r. 531–579), for aid in expelling the Ethiopians from his country. Eventually, the emperor sent an invasion force to South Arabia under the command of one Wahriz, 116 which succeeded in killing Masrūq and bringing Sayf to power. 117 Once in power, Sayf launched what amounted to an all-out slaughter of South Arabia’s Ethiopian population.
ʿAdā ʿalā l-Ḥabasha fa-jaʿala yaqtuluhā wa-yabquru l-nisāʾahā ʿammā fī buṭūnihā idhā afnāhā illā baqāyā dhalīla qalīla fa-ttakhadhahum khawalan. 118
He attacked the Ethiopians and began to kill them and ripped out (the fetuses) which their women had in their bellies, until he had annihilated all but a few wretched remnants of them, whom he seized as slaves.
It was not long, however, before a few of these slaves rose up and killed Sayf. Angered by the assassination of his client, Kisrā dispatched Wahriz once more to South Arabia. This time, the punishment meted out to what remained of the Ethiopian community was harsher still.
Ammarahu an lā yatruk bil-Yaman aswada wa-lā walad ʿArabiyyatin min aswad illā qatalahu ṣaghīran aw kabīran wa-lā yadaʿ rajulan jaʿdan qaṭaṭan qad sharika fīhi l-Sūdān. 119
He (i.e. Kisrā) commanded him not to leave in Yemen a black or the child of an Arab woman by a black without killing him, young or old; nor to let live a single curly- or crispy-haired man with whom the blacks had been involved.
It would appear from this passage that there was a certain degree of intermarriage between Ethiopians and local South Arabian women during the 6th century. Whether the women alluded to in connection with the slaughter unleashed by Sayf were also the South Arabian spouses (or concubines) of resident Ethiopians or were themselves of Ethiopian extraction is not clear.
As a caveat, it must be stressed that the Arabic accounts of the fall of the Ethiopian regime in Ḥimyar undoubtedly contain a large amount of spurious material, as a result of the passage of time between the events they describe and the time when they were written down, coupled with the introduction of hyperbolic and legendary elements. Nevertheless, the Sāsānid invasion—and eventual conquest—of Ḥimyar was an event known to late 6th-century Roman historians. This development is treated, if only briefly, by the late 6th-century historians John of Epiphania
120
and Theophanes of Byzantium.
121
Although neither author has anything to say about the fate of South Arabia’s Ethiopian community in the aftermath of the Sāsānid takeover, it is striking that the Arabic accounts of the Muslim wars of conquest in the 7th and early 8th centuries say nothing about the participation of South Arabia-based Ethiopian troops. This is despite the well-documented participation of indigenous South Arabian tribes in these wars,
122
including groups like Mahra,
123
which had been relatively unimportant in the context of late pre-Islamic history. Although it is not impossible that some Ethiopians were subsumed anonymously within the ranks of South Arabian tribes, one would not expect such a scenario had they constituted a large community which cohered as a self-contained block, as the Ethiopians had in South Arabia during the 3rd and 6th centuries. Likewise, while the Meccan tribe of Quraysh is known to have traded with South Arabia,
124
contact with the Ethiopians does not seem to have taken place in the context of trade with South Arabia.
125
More likely, Qurashī merchants encountered Ethiopians either in the course of visits to Ethiopia itself,
126
or through transactions with Ethiopians who had traveled to Mecca.
127
7 Conclusion
Sabaic inscriptions, supplemented by Syriac, Greek, and Arabic texts, provide a record of Aksumite Ethiopian contact with, and settlement in, South Arabia from the late 2nd century down to the mid-sixth. To be sure, there are some noteworthy gaps in this textual record. Thus, only one relevant text, the Sabaic inscription Ir 28, dates from the 4th century, and even this inscription documents diplomatic relations between Aksum and Ḥimyar rather than Aksumite settlement in Ḥimyar. As for the textual record for the 5th century, this remains completely silent on the issue of either a possible Aksumite presence in South Arabia or Ḥimyarite relations with Aksum at that time. The most abundant and detailed documentation of the Aksumite community in South Arabia dates from the 6th century.
It must be stressed that the textual data on which this study is largely based represents what must have been only a portion of the Aksumite expatriate community in South Arabia during late pre-Islamic times. Not surprisingly, those Aksumites who warranted mention by name in the textual sources were almost entirely of elite status, including such individuals as community or religious leaders, governors, ambassadors, and kings. Ceramics from Qāniʾ supplement this record by providing evidence of the (at least seasonal) presence of Aksumite merchants in South Arabia, a group not represented in textual sources. As in medieval and modern Yemen, there would undoubtedly have been Ethiopian slaves and laborers in late pre-Islamic South Arabia though, for obvious reasons, such low-status individuals are absent from both the textual and, so far as we can tell, the archaeological record—barring the case of ʾAbrǝhā’s slave ʿAtwada, who might never have existed.
Despite the incompleteness of the extant data, it can be confidently stated that no country is known to have maintained relations with South Arabia over as long a stretch of time as Ethiopia. This is hardly surprising, given the close geographical proximity of Ethiopia and South Arabia. As observed at the beginning of this study, Aksum was the only sub-Saharan state known to have expanded outside Africa at any point in history. The record of its activities in South Arabia are equally unique in that they provide the only extensive corpus
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Rufinus , The Church History of Rufinus of Aquileia, Books 10 and 11, trans. P.R. Amidon , New York 1997.
Simeon of Bēth Arsham, La lettera di Simeone vescovo di Bêt Arsâm sopra i martiri omeriti, ed. and trans. I. Guidi , Rome 1881.
al-Ṭabarī, Muḥammad bin Jarīr, Annales quos scripsit Abu Djafar Mohammed ibn Djarir at-Tabari = Taʾrīkh al-rusul wal-mulūk, ed. M.J. de Goeje , 15 vols., Beirut 1965.
Theophylact Simocatta, The History of Theophylact Simocatta. An English Translation with Introduction and Notes, trans. M. Whitby /M. Whitby , Oxford and New York 1986.
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Although there is disagreement among scholars as to the chronological limits of “Late Antiquity”—itself a modern concept—the term is, for the purposes of the present study, used to refer to the period from ca. 200 A.D. until the fall of the Umayyad Dynasty in 750. It should be noted that the period within which the Ethiopian kingdom of Aksum held sway only partially overlaps with the timeframe for Late Antiquity adopted here, while the period within which Aksum was active in South Arabia began sometime before 200 and ended nearly two centuries before 750.
Except where otherwise noted, all dates mentioned henceforth refer to years of the Common Era (a.d.).
See §4.
Yule, Late Antique Arabia, pp. 104; 105.
Ja 576+Ja 577/28 (Jamme, Sabaean Inscriptions, pp. 77; 78–79 [line 12]).
Shahid, Martyrs, p. iii (Syriac text).
For an extended discussion of such settlements, see Shitomi, “Note”.
Only once in Syriac literature, in the Ecclesiastical History of John of Ephesus (d. 586/8), are the Aksumites referred to as ʾAḵsīmīṭōn, a calque on Greek Ἀξωμιτῶν (Hatke, Aksum and Nubia, p. 161 [n. 681]). Since the relevant passage deals with a group of Aksumite visitors to the Nubian kingdom of Alodia, it has no bearing on the present discussion.
Hatke, Aksum and Nubia, p. 52.
Murray, “Review: East of Suez”, p. 80.
Hayajneh, “Abessinisches”, p. 505.
The Egyptian historian Aḥmad bin ʿAlī al-Maqrīzī (d. 1442) and the 16th-century Yemeni scholar Shihāb al-Dīn bin ʿAbd al-Qādir ʿArabfaqīh are both aware that Aksum was an ancient city (Hayajneh, “Abessinisches”, pp. 502–503; ʿArabfaqīh, Tuḥfat al-zamān, ed. Shaltūt, p. 322), while Muḥammad bin ʿAbd Allāh al-Azraqī (d. ca. 865) mentions “the land of Aksum” (bilād Aksūm) as the place where the Ethiopian king resided (al-Azraqī, Akhbār makka, ed. al-Ṣāliḥ Malḥas, p. 137).
E.g. al-Aksūm bin Aswad bin Yāsir in the genealogy of the South Arabian tribe of Dhū-Manākh preserved by al-Ḥasan bin Aḥmad al-Hamdānī (d. 950s) in his Kitāb al-Iklīl (Müller, “Aksum”, p. 220).
Robin in Robin/de Maigret, “Grand Temple”, pp. 784–787; Kropp, “Sabäisch”, p. 333.
Maraqten, “Inschrift aus Mārib“, p. 244.
Casson, Periplus, §6.2.23–§6.3.4.
Casson, Periplus, §5.2.16–22.
Phillipson, Foundations, pp. 90; 124–125; 139–157.
Phillipson, Foundations, pp. 49–50; 197–200.
Still useful as a summary of Aksumite activities in South Arabia during the 3rd century is Robin, “Intervention abyssine”.
Robin, “Ḥimyar au ive siècle".
ʿAbadān 1/5.24–7 (Müller, Sabäische Inschriften, pp. 51; 52).
Speidel, “Almaqah".
Speidel, “Außerhalb des Reiches".
Robin-Umm Laylā 1/1–6 (Robin, “Sabaʾ et la Khawlān”, p. 18).
Ir 69/20–24 (Bron, “Nouvelle inscription sabéenne”, pp. 79; 80).
Ir 69/27–32 (Bron, ibid.).
§3.1.3.
Ja 575/4–7 (Jamme, Sabaean Inscriptions, p. 64).
On this, see §5.1.
Ja 574/3–8 (Jamme, Sabaean Inscriptions, p. 60).
Ja 574/10–11 (Jamme, Sabaean Inscriptions, pp. 60–61).
MAFRAY-al-Miʿsāl 5/9–11 (Müller, Sabäische Inschriften, pp. 29–30).
This can be identified with Wādī Khubān, located to the east of Ẓafār.
The vocalization of the names Datwanas and Zaqarnas is hypothetical. That the individuals bearing this name were indeed reigning monarchs rather than simply the sons of kings is evident from the fact that other Sabaic inscriptions specifically designate other individuals as sons of the Aksumite king (wld ngs 2 y n ). For attestations of this phrase, see Ja 576+Ja 577/19.22 (Jamme, Sabaean Inscriptions, pp. 77; 78 [line 3]); Ja 631/21 (Jamme, ibid., pp. 132; 133).
MAFRAY-al-Miʿsāl 5/12–13 (Müller, Sabäische Inschriften, p. 30).
See §4.
Ja 576+Ja 577/26 (Jamme, Sabaean Inscriptions, p, 77 [line 10]).
Ja 576+Ja 577/28–29 (Jamme, Sabaean Inscriptions, p. 77 [lines 12–13]).
Schiettecatte, “Najrān”, pp. 28–29.
Robin 2012: 445.
Casson, Periplus, §30.10.9–11.
Biedermann, Soqotra, p. 33.
Robin, “Sudarabiques et Aksūmite”, p. 439.
See §5.4.4.
Graffito 2:20 (Robin in Strauch, “Catalogue”, pp. 48–49).
Graffito 2:31 (Robin in Strauch, “Catalogue”, p. 60).
Graffito 2:30 (Robin in Strauch, “Catalogue”, p. 59).
Hatke, Aksum and Nubia, pp. 68–69 [n. 276].
Ir 28 (al-Iryānī, Fī Taʾrīkh al-Yaman, p. 147). In his transcription of the inscription, al-Iryānī divides the text into two sections but does not indicate the divisions between the lines of text as they would have appeared in the original inscription. As with the names of Kings Datwanas and Zaqarnas in MAFRAY-al-Miʿsāl 5, the vocalization of the names of the Aksumite diplomats is hypothetical. For a discussion of their names, see Müller, “Abessinier”, pp. 163–164.
Sedov, “Stratigraphy and Development”, p. 375.
Sedov, “Synagogue”, p. 107 (Fig. 46/442, 444–445), 110.
Nestorians, the other major Christian sect represented in South Arabia, appear to have not only been left alone during the persecutions, but are even charged in Miaphysite sources with having acted as collaborators with Ḥimyarite Jews in the persecutions (Arzhanov, “Zeugnisse”).
For a detailed discussion, see Hatke, Africans in Arabia Felix. Although the corpus of 6th-century Geʿez inscriptions found in Yemen (Hatke, ibid., pp. 355–384; Müller, “Äthiopische Inschriftenfragmente”, passim) implies the presence of Aksumites in Ḥimyar, they have been omitted from the present study on the grounds that, in terms of their actual content, they yield little or no information about Aksumite settlement in South Arabia.
See §4.
Robin, “Ḥimyar et Israël”, pp. 871; 873.
That Marthadʾīlān Yanūf did not come to power through royal succession is evident from the fact that he never bears a patronym, as all Ḥimyarite rulers born of a king were in the habit of doing.
Moberg, Book of the Himyarites, p. 3b (Syriac text). This individual’s name appears in the form Ḥywnʾ in the Syriac text. He is most likely to be identified with the Ḥyn who, according to Kālēb’s victory inscription from Aksum, RIÉth 191/35 (Drewes/Schneider,"Inscriptions guèzes”, p. 273) had been sent by the king to Ḥimyar with the Aksumite army. For a detailed discussion of Ḥayyān’s identity, see Hatke, Africans in Arabia Felix, pp. 124–137.
Robin, “Royaume hujride”, pp. 686–691.
See below.
Procopius, History of the Wars, trans. Dewing, §1.20.8.
cih 541/87–92 (Müller, Sabäische Inschriften, p. 115).
Robin/Ṭayrān, “Soixante-dix ans".
See §6.
Müller, Sabäische Inschriften, p. 92.
Here, the use of “lord” (mrʾ) in reference to Marthadʾīlān Yanūf should be understood as a term of respect rather than an expression of political submission. This is paralleled elsewhere in the South Arabian epigraphic corpus by instances in which foreigners dedicating an inscription will invoke the local ruler as “lord”. Thus in res 2999, a Minaic inscription from Barāqish (ancient Yathill), the dedicant, Yishraḥʾīl bin ʾAlbāʾ, himself a Minaean, invokes the names of the Minaean king Waqahʾīl Yithaʿ and his son and coregent ʾĪlyafaʿ Yishūr, as well as the name of the Qatabānian king Shahr Yagill Yuhargib, referring to all three as “lord” (Robin, “Royaume de Maʿīn”, pp. 180–181). Similarly, Ja 931, a Ḥaḍramitic inscription from al-ʿUqla (ancient ʾAnwādum) dedicated by a group of foreign envoys hailing from Palmyra, Chaldaea, and India, invokes the Ḥaḍramī king ʾĪlīʿazz Yaluṭ, referring to him as “their lord” (mrʾ-s 1 m) (Jamme, al-ʿUqlah Texts, pp. 44–45).
For the sake of comparison, it bears mentioning that the Sāsānid diplomatic mission which ʾAbrǝhā had received in the 540s is referred to as tnblt mlk Frs 1 “the ambassadors of the king of Persia” in cih 541/89–90 (Müller, Sabäische Inschriften, p. 115).
Müller, “Abessinier”, pp. 163–164.
These include inscriptions dedicated by men with their wives and children (Gar nuove iscrizioni 4; Ibrahim al-Hudayd 1; res 5094); by a man with his wife, sons, and daughters (ZM 5+8+10); by a man with his brothers, his wife, and his children (res 4109); and by a man with his mother, wife, and children, together with all of the members of his household (cih 543). For the full text of these inscriptions, see the Corpus of Late Sabaic Inscriptions in the University of Pisa’s Digital Archive for the Study of Pre-Islamic Arabian Inscriptions (http://dasi.humnet.unipi.it/).
RIÉth 191/34–6 (Drewes/Schneider, “Inscriptions guèzes”, p. 273).
Martyrium Arethae §3.11–12.
Simeon of Bēth Arsham, Lettera, ed. and trans. Guidi, p. 2 (Syriac text).
The church alluded to in this passage might be the structure which Kālēb claims in RIÉth 191/35 to have built in Ḥimyar (Drewes/Schneider, “Inscriptions guèzes”, p. 273), though this is by no means certain. As we shall see below (§5.4.3), there was at least one other church associated with, and possibly built by, the Aksumites at the port of al-Mukhāʾ during this period.
Moberg, Book of the Himyarites, p. 7a (Syriac text); Shahid, Martyrs, pp. iii–iv (Syriac text).
Müller, “Abessinier”, p. 164.
Shahid, Martyrs, pp. iii–iv (Syriac text).
Shahid, Martyrs, ibid.
Moberg, Book of the Himyarites, p. 7a–b (Syriac text).
Ry 508/1–4 (Müller, Sabäische Inschriften, p. 98).
Ry 508/5 (Müller, Sabäische Inschriften, p. 98).
Müller, Sabäische Inschriften, pp. 103–104.
Present-day Shamīr in the Yemeni Tihāma.
Rimaʿ is regarded by al-Hamdānī as part of the territory of the ʿAkk tribe (al-Hamdānī, Ṣifat jazīrat al-ʿarab, ed. al-Ḥawālī, p. 107).
This tribe appears to have given its name to the Farasān Islands, located off the southern Red Sea coast of Saudi Arabia.
According to the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea (Casson, Periplus, §16.6.8-13), the merchants of Mouza, the name by which the anonymous author designates al-Mukhāʾ, conducted commerce with the port of Rhapta, located somewhere on the coast of what is now Tanzania.
Moberg, Book of the Ḥimyarites, p. 14b (Syriac text).
Moberg, Book of the Ḥimyarites, ibid.
Moberg, Book of the Ḥimyarites, p. 15a.
See §3.3.1.
Cosmas Indicopleustes, Topographie chrétienne, ed. and trans. Wolska-Conus, §3.65.12–13.
Robin, “Sudarabiques et Aksūmite”, p. 440.
Robin in Strauch, “Catalogue”, pp. 54–55.
Robin in Strauch, “Catalogue”, p. 57.
Robin in Strauch, “Catalogue”, p. 64.
Robin in Strauch, “Catalogue”, p. 55.
See §3.3.2.
In his description of Soqoṭrā, Cosmas Indicopleustes, Topographie chrétienne, ed. and trans. Wolska-Conus, § 3.65.6–13, alludes to the presence on the island of clerics ordained in Persia, i.e. the Sāsānid Empire, and a multitude of Christians. Such a community can only have formed over a period of several decades, if not generations, in which case the origins of Soqoṭrī Christianity would date back to at least the 5th century.
On the history of Soqoṭrī Christianity, see Beckingham, “Some Notes”, passim; Biedermann, Soqotra, pp. 39–63. Although the chronicler João de Barros (d. 1570) claims that the Christians of Soqoṭrā belonged to the same sect of Christianity as the Ethiopians, i.e. Miaphysite Christianity (Beckingham, “Some Notes”, p. 174), this idea is likely to have arisen from a lack of awareness on the part of his informants of the doctrinal nuances of eastern Christianity. Of de Barros’ statement that Soqoṭrī Christians chanted in “Chaldaean” (caldeu), Beckingham (ibid., p. 180 [n. 5]) states that “[t]his would normally mean Syriac, but the word is sometimes used by the Portuguese for Geʿez”. Since, however, the Ethiopian Church is not known to have exerted its influence on Soqoṭrā during any period, it is highly unlikely that the indigenous Christians of the island knew Geʿez. The “Chaldaean” in which they chanted is therefore likely to have been either Syriac—regardless of whether or not the locals still understood it—or even, perhaps, the Soqoṭrī language, which the Portuguese categorized as “Chaldaean” for the sake of convenience. That a significant language barrier separated the Portuguese from the indigenous Soqoṭrīs should not be forgotten.
al-Ṭabarī, Annales, ed. de Goeje, vol. 2, pp. 936–945. Traditions about ʾAbrǝhā’s campaign against Mecca are based on Sūrat al-Fīl “The Chapter of the Elephant”, the 105th chapter of the Qurʾān, though that text, which consists of only five verses, contains no mention of ʾAbrǝhā, the Kaʿba, or Mecca.
cih 541/88 (Müller, Sabäische Inschriften, p. 115).
cih 541/25–6 (Müller, Sabäische Inschriften, p. 112).
cih 541/74–5 (Müller, Sabäische Inschriften, p. 114).
cih 541/19 (Müller, Sabäische Inschriften, p. 111).
Müller, “Abessinier”, p. 167.
cih 541/19–20 (Müller, Sabäische Inschriften, p. 111).
cih 541/36–7 (Müller, Sabäische Inschriften, p. 112).
Müller, “Abessinier”, p. 167.
Robin, “Matériaux”, p. 160.
Crone, Slaves on Horses, pp. 49–57 and passim.
cih 541/82–83 (Müller, Sabäische Inschriften, p. 115).
Cf. Amharic Yāmlāk (< *ya + Amlāk), “he of God”, and Yāmrōt (< *ya + amrōt) “he of love/pleasure”. Worthy of note in this regard is a 10th-century Coptic text in which the Queen of Sheba is called Iesaba, a name which Vycichl (“Amharisme”) derives from the Amharic *ya-Sabā “she of Sheba”.
Procopius, History of the Wars, trans. Dewing, §1.20.2.
al-Ṭabarī, Annales, ed. de Goeje, vol. 2, p. 932.
ʿAlī bin al-Ḥusayn al-Masʿūdī (d. 956) gives the full name of Aryāṭ as Aryāṭ bin Aṣḥama (al-Masʿūdī, Murūj, ed. Dāghir, vol. 2, p. 52). It is possible, though, that the Aṣḥama element was borrowed from Arabic traditions about the 7th-century Ethiopian king al-Aṣḥama, who supposedly granted asylum to the Muslims when the latter were faced with persecution by the pagan Quraysh. Accounts of al-Aṣḥama may preserved memory of the seventh-century Aksumite king ʾƎlla-Ṣaḥām (Fiaccadori, “Ǝllä Ṣäḥam“).
al-Ṭabarī, Annales, ed. de Goeje, vol. 2, p. 931.
Wahriz is in fact a title rather than a personal name (Potts, “Sasanian Relationship”, p. 207).
al-Ṭabarī, Annales, ed. de Goeje, vol. 2, pp. 945–957.
al-Ṭabarī, Annales, ed. de Goeje, vol. 2, p. 957.
Ibid.
Theophylact Simocatta, History, trans. Whitby/Whitby, p. 85 (iii.9.3–6).
Photius, Bibliothèque, ed. and trans. Henry, vol. 1, p. 78 (64.15–17).
Al-Medej, Yemeni Relations, pp. 110–139; Smith, “Yemenite History”.
Hence the settlement of Mahra tribes in the conquered provinces following the Muslim invasions (al-Medej, Yemeni Relations, pp. 162; 165; 166).
Crone, Meccan Trade, pp. 120–124; 141–144; 149; 150; 152; 163.
Crone, Meccan Trade, pp. 126–128.
Crone, Meccan Trade, pp. 124–129. The nature of Meccan trade with Ethiopia is unclear, not least because, in contrast to other regions with which Mecca traded in late pre-Islamic times, Arabic sources fail to mention any place-names within Ethiopia (ibid., p. 125).
Crone, Meccan Trade, pp. 125–126.
One could add, of course, the references to Africans, specifically Ethiopians, in pre-Islamic Arabic poetry, though such references tend on the whole to be made only in passing, and there is at times some doubt as to how authentically pre-Islamic this corpus is. Similarly, although early Islamic sources in Arabic allude to the Ethiopian presence in the Ḥijāz in pre-Islamic times, such sources post-date the events they describe by several centuries, in contrast to the Sabaic, Greek, and Syriac sources treated in this study, which are either contemporary with the events they describe or post-date such events by at most a few decades. It should also be noted that, although the Aksumite community of South Arabia is the only African diaspora community in the ancient Near East of which we can meaningfully speak, Graeco-Roman texts and art have left a fairly substantial documentation of a sub-Saharan African presence in the Mediterranean world in Classical Antiquity (Snowden, Blacks in Antiquity). The main difference there, however, is that sub-Saharan Africans were never in a position of political power in the Mediterranean, as the Aksumites were in South Arabia.