Library-Of-Tewodros-at-Mekdela-by-Rita-Pankhurst Ethiopia

The Library of Emperor Tewodros II at Mäqdäla (Magdala)
Author(s): Rita Pankhurst

Source: Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, Vol. 36,
No. 1 (1973), pp. 15-42
Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of School of Oriental and African Studies
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THE LIBRARY OF EMPEROR TEWODROS II
AT MAQDALA (MAGDALA)
By RITA PANKHURST
The Emperor Tewodros II (1855-68), although remembered to-day mainly

as an energetic modernizer, was also involved to a significant degree in the
history of traditional Ethiopian libraries.
Tewodros had intended to build a great church dedicated to Madhane Alam
'Saviour of the World', on Christian ground near the natural fortress of
Miqddilawhich had served him as state prison, granary, and family sanctuary
no less than as a storehouse for his accumulated treasures.
Within the precincts of the fortress, which was not considered Christian
ground, the only church was the modest one also dedicated to the Saviour and
described by the geographer, C. R. Markham, as 'a wretched place, without
pictures or even whitewashed walls ',1 and by Major H. A. Leveson, a British
officer and journalist, as 'the hovel called a Church'.1
The Emperor wished to provide the new church with the traditional service-
books and other manuscripts which turned important churches into centres of
study as well as of worship. To this end he had for years been collecting manu-
scripts from churches throughout his domains, and especially from Gondar.
The missionary T. Waldmeier reports, of one of Tewodros's expeditions
against the city in December 1866 : ' The royal army fell with great rapacity
upon the unhappy city ... houses were plundered, hidden treasures sought out
and stolen, churches robbed of their holy relics, their prayer-books, their other
old documents ... and afterwards set on fire '.3
Dr. Gerhard Rohlfs, a German scholar who visited Gondar in 1881, relates
that, in the course of Tewodros's two sackings of the city, he carried away all
books he could seize. ' Of the many books mentioned, for example, by Combes
and Tamisier, none could be procured other than those of a religious nature.
Certainlythis was not due to ill will : I was on very good terms with the Kantiba
and the whole clergy, and they sold me church objects. But whenever I asked
for books they always answered : " Theodore took them all away ". It was the
same in Matraha.'4
1 C. R. Markham, A
history of the Abyssinian expedition, London, 1869, 357-8. A photograph
of the church is reproduced in F. Myatt, The march to Magdala, London, 1970, between pp. 144
and 145. The original photograph is in the Army Museums Ogilby Trust, War Office, London.
One of Tewodros's chroniclers, Aliqa Waldi Maryam, mentions that the Emperor reopened two
churches at Miqdila, the second being Egzetni Maryam. Vide C. Mondon-Vidailhet (ed.),
Chroniquede ThdodorosII, roi des rois d'Ethiopie, Paris, [1905?], translation, 22. The latter church
does not appear to have been in use in 1868.
2 Illustrated London
News, 30 May 1868; vide also H. Blanc, A narrative of captivity in
Abyssinia, London, 1868, 210.
3 T. Waldmeier, Erlebnisse in den Jahren 1858-1868, Basel, 1869, 59.
4 G. Rohlfs, Meine Mission nach Abessinien, Leipzig, 1883, 256-7.
16 RITA PANKHURST
According to the chronicleof the Emperorwritten by Alaqa Wilda Maryam,

Tewodroshad decided to make Dibra Tabor ' a new Gondar'; he had removed
981 manuscripts from Gondar itself before setting fire to its churches. Later
the chronicle records that these manuscripts and other treasures were taken
from Dibra Tabor to Maqdala which had been proclaimed the seat of the royal
treasury.5
The precise manner in which the manuscripts were kept is not known but
it is clear from an account of one of Tewodros's prisoners, the English surgeon
Henry Blanc, that there was no disorder : ' Since about a year before his death
Theodore had been gradually accumulating at Maqdala the few remnants of
his former wealth. Some sheds contained muskets, pistols etc.; others books
and paper .... Once or twice a week the chiefs would meet in consultation in a
small house erected for that purpose in the magazine inclosure to discuss public
affairs, but, above all, to assure themselves by personal inspection that the
"treasures " entrusted to their care were in perfect order and in safe keeping '.6
When, on Easter Monday, 13 April 1868, the British and Indian troops
stormed Maqdala to liberate Tewodros's prisoners, bringing to a climax the
Emperor'slong-drawn-outdispute with the British Government, they found the
manuscripts piled up in huts near the church. ' The treasury ', wrote Markham
' consisted of a small number of huts surroundedby a wall, and was the receptacle
of all the property and plunder collected by the King. Here were ecclesiastical
crowns . .. besides tons of Geez and Amharic manuscript books. '7
H. M. Stanley, special correspondent of the New York Herald who was on
the mountain shortly after the capture, refers to the treasury as being stored
in ' treasure-tents '.8
The capture of the citadel was followed by an evening of looting, 'in the
best traditions of the British Army at the time ', as the military historian,
F. Myatt, observes.9 Markhamnotes that 'the troops dispersed over the amba
in search of plunder. The treasury was soon rifled '.o1 Dr. J. Bechtinger, an
Austrian who was Acting Surgeon in the British-Indian Army, states that
Maqdala was 'volkommen gepltindert' (completely plundered)."
A British officer, Captain H. B. Hayward, who kept a diary during the
campaign, wrote on 13 April: 'The whole division then occupied Magdala
and a general loot took place', but he added with some foresight: 'not that
5 Mondon-Vidailhet, op. cit., 22, 49-50.

8
Blanc, op. cit., 209-10.
7 Markham, op. cit., 357-8.
8 H. M. Stanley, Coomassie and Magdala, London, 1874, 457; a photograph of the treasury
appears as No. 44 in a contemporary album of photographs of the expedition. The album is
No. 204 in the Manuscript Collection, Institute of Ethiopian Studies, Haile Sellassie I University,
Addis Ababa; No. 45 in this album is the photograph reproduced by Myatt and mentioned
on p. 15, n. 1, above.
9 F. Myatt, The march to Magdala, London, 1970, 165.
10 Markham, op. cit., 359.
11J. Bechtinger, Ost Afrilca : Erinnerungen und Miscellen aus dem abessinischen Feldzuge,
Wien, 1870, 234.
THE LIBRARY OF EMPEROR TEWODROS II AT MXQDXLA (MAGDALA) 17
it will be of much use as everything will be collected and a prize committee

formed to value all '.12
Several observers have described the scene, as soldiers and civilians,
including Tewodros's captives, helped themselves to what they fancied from
the Emperor's treasury.
Waldmeier, a prisoner at Mdqdila whose own remaining possessions dis-
appeared during the looting, wrote that 'the soldiers, especially the Hindus,
began robbing and plundering as though they had been Theodore's pupils ....
Many valuable articles were stolen from the royal treasury '.13
Stanley, an acute observer, drew up a more detailed list : ' There were also
an infinite variety of gold, and silver, and brass crosses ... heaps of parchment
royally illuminated; stacks of Amharic bibles; missals, and numberless albums;
ambrotypes and photographs of English, American, French and Italian
scenery .... Over a space growing more and more extended, the thousand
articles were scattered in infinite bewilderment and confusion until they dotted
the whole surface of the rocky citadel, the slopes of the hill, and the entire road
to camp two miles off! '.14 Dr. Rohlfs, who accompanied the expedition as one
of the German representatives, wrote that, during the withdrawal of the British
troops the surroundingsof Maqdala were strewn with torn Amharic books, loose
leaves, and fragments, and that much must have been destroyed at that time.15
One can only speculate on the efficiency of the sentries who were stationed
at the gates to prevent plunder from being taken down to the camp, as it had
been determined that it should be all reclaimed, and eventually sold as prize for
the troops.16
Although Captain Hayward may have been over-pessimistic about the
chances of keeping the plunder-especially of smaller objects, perhaps including
small books and scrolls-it is clear that much of it was in fact recuperated.
There was only one practicable way out of the fortress, through the northern
gate, and this was held by the provost, backed by a guard of the 33rd
Regiment.17
D. G. Chandler, a military historian, confirms that 'every item of booty
that had not actually been captured in combat " at point of sword or bayonet "
was rigorously collected by the Prize-Master for future action-to the dis-
gruntled annoyance of the soldiers '.18 There were, nevertheless, some loop-
holes in the control system, as emerges from a letter to Lord Enfield written in
12H. B. Hayward, ' Extracts from the diary of Major-General,then Captain H. B. Hayward,
during the Abyssinian expedition of 1868 ', The Sherwood Foresters, Nottinghamshireand Derby-
shire Regiment: 1927 Regimental Annual (Derby), [1927 ?], 300.
13 Waldmeier, op. cit., 118; vide also R. Acton, The Abyssinian expedition and the life and
reign of King Theodore,London, 1868, 75 ; H. A. Stern, The captive missionary, London, 1869, 396.
14Stanley, op. cit., 457-9; vide also J. M. Flad, Zw6lf Jahre in Abessinien, Leipzig, 1887,
II, 72.
15 Rohlfs, op. cit., 257.
18 Markham,
op. cit., 359.
17 Myatt, cit., 165.
op.
18B. Bond (ed.), Victorianmilitary campaigns, London, 1967, 149 ; vide also Acton, op. cit., 75.
VOL. XXXVI. PART 1. 2
18 RITA PANKHURST
1872 by Lieutenant-ColonelT. W. Milward,an artilleryofficerwho was appointed

a member of the Prize Committee involved in the collection and sale of loot;
he states that there were some civilians attached to the army who did not
comply with the General Order of the Commander-in-Chief.19That these were
not the only sinners is an inescapable conclusion, with which Myatt agrees,
though in his view only a few easily concealed items were smuggled through.20
More detail about the collection of loot is provided by Milward's diary.
' 14 April 1868. I am put on the Committee for prizes ... it gives a great deal
of trouble ....
15 April 1868. We are collecting the loot, and I am much bothered with it. All
is to be brought to Dalanta and we are to have sale there.
17 April. We are burning large quantities of corn ... which we cannot carry
away, but we are taking a good deal of other loot, for sale for the good of the
men. Being on the Committee gives me very much bother.' 21
By the early afternoon of Friday, 17 April, MaqdSla had been cleared of
its population, estimated at 30,000-50,000,22 and the last of the booty had been
removed. The sappers had proceeded to destroy the remaining guns and
mortars and, when this work had been completed, they set fire to the palace,
prison houses, and temporary huts.23 It had been decided to spare the humble
church, the outhouses of which had sheltered the great manuscript collection,
'lest the priests should say that the common tie of Christianity between con-
querors and conquered had been forgotten'; 24 but it did not survive the
conflagration. The Daily News correspondent, in a graphic description quoted
by the IllustratedLondonNews, reported that ' a pyramid of fire laid hold upon
it [the church] and licked it up, leaving the church bell alone standing '.25
The official history of the expedition, by T. J. Holland and H. M. Hozier,
devotes only one sentence to these events : ' The plunder taken at Magdalawas
sold by auction, and the proceeds of the sale distributed among the troops as
prize money '.26
It appears that Maqdala did not yield as many valuables as was hoped, for
Napier was able to report on 13 May: 'No booty was found at Magdala '.27
As the total amount to be realized was not expected to exceed ?3,000 the
19Milward to Lord Enfield, 27 November 1872, FO 1/29.

20 Myatt, op. cit., 165-6.
21 S. Chojnacki and I. Marshall (ed.), ' Colonel Milward's Abyssinian journal 2 December 1867
to 13 June 1868 ', Journal of Ethiopian Studies, viI, 1, 1969, 107-8. The original diary is in the
Institute of Ethiopian Studies, Haile Sellassie I University.
22Illustrated London News, 13 June 1868; vide also F. Stumm, Meine Erlebnisse bei der
englischen Expedition in Abessinien, Frankfurt am Main, 1868; Bechtinger, op. cit., 234.
23 Illustrated London
News, 13 June 1868; Myatt, op. cit., 168.
24 Illustrated London News, 30 May 1868, report of Major Leveson.
25
ibid., 23 May 1868.
26T. J. Holland and M. H. Hozier, Recordof the expedition to Abyssinia, London, 1870, II, 78.
27Telegram from Sir Robert Napier to Sir Stafford Northcote from Antalo, 13 May 1868.
Quoted in Illustrated London News, 30 May 1868.
commissioned officers relinquished their share of the prize-money.28 To appre-

ciate Napier's understatement and the officers' action it should be noted that
earlier wars, such as the China campaigns or the Spanish wars, yielded consider-
ably more booty. Wellington, for example, received ?120,000 after Waterloo.29
Napier's ' no booty' consisted of miscellaneous articles requiring 15
elephants and nearly 200 mules for the journey from the fortress to the Dalanta
plain, on the northern side of the Bavilo river, where the auction took place.30
Before the sale began, everyone was urged once again to hand over all
objects found or purchased from soldiers.31
As soon as the sale started the 'gentlemen who had either a superfluity of
cash, or who leaned to antiquarian tastes ' 32took a lively part in the bidding.
The entries in Milward's diary read as follows.
'20 April. Halted at Dalanta .... In the afternoon the sale of loot began,
and is realizing very large prices.
21 April. The sale going on all day, some things going fabulously high.' 33
It appears from Milward's letter to Lord Enfield that the books were not
disposed of in the same way as the other trophies and that Lieutenant-Colonel
Dillon, Military Secretary on Napier's personal staff, was involved in dealing
with them.34
According to Graf von Seckendorff, an officer of the Prussian army who
accompanied the expedition, the manuscripts found fewer bidders than did
some other articles because their real value was not known.35 Nevertheless
Stanley confirmsthat, among the 39 field officers,60 captains, and 146 subalterns
of the British force, as well as the foreign officers and accompanying civilians,
there were a number of bidders to struggle against Mr. Holmes of the British
Museum.
'On the third day of our stay in our cantonement upon Dahonte Dalanta
plateau ', Stanley writes, ' the articles for sale were ready for the auctioneer ....
Bidders were not scarce. Every officer and civilian desired some souvenir ...
[there were] richly illuminated bibles and manuscripts .... Mr. Holmes, as the
worthy representative of the British Museum, was in his full glory. Armed with
ample funds, he outdid all in most things but Colonel Frazer ran him hard
because he was buying for a wealthy regimental mess ... and when anything
belonging personally to Theodore was offered for sale, there were private
gentlemen who outbid both ....36 The auction lasted two days. The total
28 ibid. ; G. B. von Seckendorff, Meine Erlebnisse mit demrenglischen Expeditionscorps in

Abessinien 1867-1868, Potsdam, 1869, 178.
29 Von Seckendorff, op. cit., 178.
30 Stanley, op. cit., 467.
31 Stumm, op. cit., 134; Illustrated London News, 30 May 1868.
32Stanley, op. cit., 467.
33Chojnacki and Marshall, art. cit., 108.
34Milward to Enfield, 27 November 1872, FO 1/29.
35Von Seckendorff, op. cit., 177.
36Stanley, op. cit., 470.
20 RITA PANKHURST
receipts amounted to ?5,000 '-much more than had been anticipated by

Napier-' This sum was divided among the non-commissioned officers and men
who were southward of the Bechilo, which gave each man a trifle over four
dollars '.73
The official history relates that Richard R. Holmes, F.S.A., Assistant in the
Department of Manuscripts at the British Museum, was deputed by the
Trustees of the Museum to accompany the expedition on their behalf as
archaeologist. He landed at Zula on 24 January 1868, and joined the head-
quarters at Sinafe. The fruits of his labours on the journey towards Maqdila
were disappointing. 'In only one or two instances, however, was he able to
make any discovery of antiquarian interest. The remains of the libraries, which
to a greater or less extent were in the possession of each religious community
were found to be without exception, modern, and of small interest. No trace of
really ancient MSS could, after careful search, be discovered nor was there in
any case any relic even of ecclesiastical furniture to which an early date could
be assigned. The state of intestine warfare in which the country had for so long
a time been plunged seemed to afford a solution for this dearth of material of
historic interest.' 38 This was largely because it was not considered expedient
for him to deviate from the line of march, which by-passed Aksum.
It is therefore likely that the ?1,000 inserted in the estimates 'to cover the
cost of excavations or collections ' 39 was almost untouched and at Holmes's
disposal during the auction. From Roger Acton's account of the expedition,
it would appear that Holmes was well prepared, having earlier been given an
opportunity of examining the manuscripts, possibly in situ at Maqd5la.40 It
may be deduced from von Seckendorff's remark that the books attracted fewer
bidders, that not all the manuscriptsfrom the Emperor's library were disposed of
at the sale. Napier was thus saddled with the unsold portion of the 'tons' of
manuscripts found at Maqdala-manuscripts which had not been selected by the
British Museumrepresentative and had not interested the officersand gentlemen
present at the auction.
The substance of Napier's decision was recorded by Holland and Hozier as
follows.
'On the capture of Magdala a large number of Ethiopian manuscripts were
found, having been carried there by Theodore from the libraries of Gondar and
the central parts of Abyssinia. On finding that Magdala would have to be
abandoned to the Gallas it became .... necessary to provide for the safety of these
volumes which would otherwise have been destroyed by the Mohammedans.
About 900 volumes were taken as far as Chelikot and there about 600 were
delivered to the priests of the church, one of the most important in
Abyssinia.' 41 in the province of Tigre, was some four miles from the
.dI1qot,
37 ibid., 471. 38 Holland and Hozier, op. cit., 11,371.
39 ibid., 370. 40 Acton, op. cit., 75; vide also Flad, op. cit., ii, 72.
41 Holland and Hozier, op. cit., II, 396.
THE LIBRARY OF EMPEROR TEWODROS II AT MAXQD&ALA(MAGDALA) 21
line of march at Ayqulit camp. It had taken the forces of the expedition about a
month to reach this point.
William Simpson,42 a well-known journalist and illustrator covering the
campaign on behalf of the Illustrated LondonNews provides further details in a
posthumously published autobiography which was in fact a compilation of his
previous writings.
' There was a place called Chelicut, with an important church, that I wished
to see, and on the march back from Antalo to Eikullet, I went by another road
to see Chelicut on the way. An escort of two or three dragoons was sent with
me in case of accidents. A large number of books had been found in Magdala.
Sir Robert arranged to bring home a certain number of these books to place in
museums, and in the libraries of the Universities, and a few for presents. The
books were all written on parchment, and in the old Geez character. Books of
this kind are scarce in Abyssinia because they are expensive, so Sir Robert
considered that it would be unfair to bring out of the country more of them than
was necessary. As they were principally Bibles, gospels, psalters, and books
of devotion, he was giving them as we marched back, to the various churches
we passed. So a message was sent with me-it was given to an Abyssinian
servant I had picked up-to tell the priests at Chelicut to come that day to the
camp and they would receive some of the books.
That evening at Eikullet there was a terrible storm of thunder and rain. The
rain poured, and in the midst of this outburst of nature news came that the
Queen was dead.43 Messengerswere sent off to Chelicut for the priests to come
and perform the funeral services, and our early march in the morning was
ordered to be postponed.' 44
In an article published in London in 1868 which gives substantially the
same account of events, Simpson adds a further justification for this policy of
distributing the manuscripts to Ethiopian churches: 'It was also known that
these books found in Magdalahad been plunderedby Theodrosfrom the churches
of the different provinces which he had conquered, and so it was, to a certain
extent, as if we were returning them again to their rightful owners. Chelicut
being an important place, a good number of books were presented to the
church '.45
As has been pointed out by Professor Chojnacki46 there is some difference
42 For a fuller
description of Simpson's travels at this time vide S. Chojnacki, 'William
Simpson and his journey to Ethiopia ', Journal of Ethiopian Studies, vi, 2, 1968, 7-38.
43 Empress Teruwdrq or Terundii, second wife of Emperor Tewodros, who had declared her
wish to accompany her son, Alhmayyahu, to Bombay, died at Ayquldt on 15 May 1868, of a lung
disease. The funeral ceremonies were performed the next morning and the Empress was buried at
OdlIqot. They are vividly described by Simpson in continuation of the passages quoted above;
vide also Holland and Hozier, op. cit., II, 83; H. M. Hozier, The British expedition to Abyssinia,
London, 1869, 258.
44 W. Simpson, The autobiography of William Simpson, R.I., ed. G. Eyre-Todd, London, 1903,
193-4.
45 idem, ' An artist's jottings in Abyssinia', Good Words, 1 October 1868, 612.
46 Chojnacki, art. cit., 35.
22 RITA PANKHURST
between the official account which states that 'about 600' volumes were all
delivered to the priests of the church of Calaqot and Simpson's version of what
happened, namely that Napier was distributing manuscriptsto various churches
along the route.4' Nevertheless it is clear from Simpson's account that, although
the priests of Qilaqot were originally called to collect 'some of the books'
(Autobiography),'a few of the books' (Good Words, 612), in the event they
were presented with 'a good number' (Good Words, quoted above). Graf von
Seckendorffconfirmsthis interpretation. 'The greater part (of the books ... .) ',
he reports, 'remained in Abyssinia, as GeneralNapier gave them to the Church
of Chelikot.'48
The German missionary, J. M. Flad, who returned from Miiqdailawith the
expedition, offers yet another version of the disposal of these manuscripts.
According to him all books not taken by the British Museum were handed over
to DaijazmadKassa of Tigre for distribution to the churches.49 This story is not
corroboratedfrom any other source; however, CSilqot and the other churches
on this part of the route were situated in territory ruled by Kassa. The deposit of
the manuscripts must have had his approval and may well have been intended to
please the possible future ruler of Ethiopia, who had performedfriendly services
for the expedition. A more significant reward from the British Government was
to follow a few weeks later when Kassa was presented with half a dozen mortars
and as many howitzers, with 200 rounds for each piece, together with 850
muskets, 350,000 rounds of small-arms ammunition, and 28 barrels of gun-
powder.50
The present writer visited the Claiqot Sellase church on 16 May 1970, with
a list of 158 manuscripts which had been registered as the holdings of the church
shortly after the Italo-Ethiopian War. The priests produced 47 volumes for
inspection stating that all in their possession had been shown, with the exception
of four volumes which had been sent to Maqale, for repair.
Of the volumes seen at Calaqot, only one could be clearly identified as having
been in the Maqddlacollection : it was a Soma Degwa 'Hymns for Lent ', which
had belonged to one of the Gondarine kings, Emperor Bakaffa (1721-30). A
second beautifully illustrated manuscript, a Ta'ameraSellase 'Miracles of the
Trinity', depicting scenes from the life of Iyasu I, 'the Great', of Gondar
(1681-1706) may have reached Qalaqot by the same route ; this also applies to
one of the Qiilqot manuscripts seen at Maqale, a Qalementos(Clement, disciple
of Peter). It, too, had belonged to Emperor Iyasu I. Most of the other volumes
seen at (d1aqot were either given by other named donors, especially Ras Waldi
Sellase, or were clearly of recent origin.
47 This account of the disposal of the manuscripts in Ethiopia is repeated by W. Wright in

his Catalogueof the Ethiopic manuscripts in the British Museum acquiredsince 1847, London, 1877,
p. iii.
48 Von Seckendorff, op. cit., 177.
9 Flad, op. cit., II, 72.

Some of the more aged and learned priests had also heard it said that books
from Maqdala had been deposited with the priests of their church at the time
of the British expedition and they pointed out a grave believed to be that of
Tewodros's second wife whose name they had forgotten. However, MalakA
Meherat Yared Germay, Co-Alaqaof Calaqot, told Mr. Roger Cowley in October
1971 that 'some books from MAqdala' had been given to the church by
Tewodros's wife.
The priests offered the writer alternative and somewhat implausible
explanations for the virtual disappearance of the Maqdala manuscripts.
The first was that, whilst carrying the books from Napier's camp to the
church, the priests were waylaid by robbers who stole them all; and second,
that the books were taken away by the Italians. The latter explanation was
rejected by Marigeta Lesana Warq Gabra Giyorgis, keeper of the Miqale palace
museum, who stated that the Italians did not take any books from Qaliqot.
He had been told that in Maiiskaram1876 EC (September-October 1883)
Emperor Yohannes IV had founded seven churches in and around Miiqiile.
Knowing that there were some 500 manuscripts at ?aliqot the Emperor had
ordered that about 100 should be transferred to the newly endowed churches.
It has not, unfortunately, been possible so far to follow up this clue.51
The official record of the expedition continues, after the account of the gift
to the priests of Qalaqot church: ' 359 books were retained for the purpose of
scientific examination in the hope that some light might be thrown by them,
through the labours of the learned men of Europe, on the ancient history of
Ethiopia and on the records of Christianity '.52 How these books came to be
' retained ' has been shown earlier. The books had been selected Holmes with
by
advice from Werner Munzinger, a Swiss national who had been appointed
British Consul at Massawa. Munzingerwas an accomplished scholar; he knew
Tigre very well. He examined each manuscript and, as Holland and Hozier
state, wrote the title inside every volume.53
The subsequent fate of these manuscripts is recorded by William Wright,
who was Assistant Keeper at the British Museum 1862-70, in the preface to his
Catalogueof the Ethiopic manuscriptsin the British Museum published in 1877,
which was largely a catalogue of the Maqdala collection: ' On 28 August 1868
the bulk of the Magdala Collection was handed over to the Trustees of the
British Museum by the Secretary of State for India. Some volumes [the 16
mentioned in his report] were sent to the Royal Library at Windsor of which
Her Majesty [Queen Victoria] was graciously pleased to present ten ... to the
British Museum on 21 January 1869. The entire Magdala Collection consists,
51 The churches mentioned were: Agula'e Kidana Meherit, Arra Mika'el,

Tagogwa Johannes,
Milfa Maryam, Qaqima Maryam, Oeh Kidand Meherdt, Maqale Kidana Meherit. According to
our informant there is now only one manuscript left at Agula'e, but in all the other churches
except the one in Mdqile, which was burned down by the Italians, there are still 'good books '.
52 Holland and Hozier, op. cit., 11, 396-7.
53 ibid., 397.
24 RITA PANKHURST
therefore, of 350 volumes'. The difference between this figure and the 359
manuscripts originally deposited at the British Museum is made up of the six
volumes retained by the Queen plus three acquired by Mr. Holmes on the way
to MaqdAla.54The figure of 350 volumes quoted by Wright includes one volume
which had been returned to Ethiopia in 1872, a Kebrdndigst whose adventures
are recounted later in this paper. The British Museum owned only 349 volumes
of the Maqdala collection at the time the preface was written.
Since the publication of Wright's Catalogueother Ethiopian manuscripts
have been acquired by the British Museum. The catalogue of these, by Stefan
Strelcyn, is in the press. Professor Strelcyn has kindly supplied the writer with
the information that three manuscripts, probably all three from the eighteenth
century, were inscribed as having belonged to the MadhaneAlam church. These
were : Or. 13264, Pauline Epistles, etc. ; Or. 8824, 'Miracles of Jesus Christ ',
and Or. 13309, Arke, a collection of salutations for commemorationsaccordingto
the months of the year.55
Of the volumes which were not acquired by the Museum six, as was noted
above, were retained at Windsor Castle. They are exceptionally fine specimens
of Ethiopian manuscript art and were all the property of the Madhane Alam
church at Maqdala. The catalogue of these manuscripts, by Edward Ullendorff,
was published in the Rassegna di Studi Etiopici.56
The University Libraries at Oxford and Cambridge had acquired other
Maqdala manuscripts. In his Catalogue of Ethiopian manuscripts in the
Bodleian Library, Ullendorff writes : 'On the whole, it is safe to assume that
the majority of the [66] MSS here described, were acquired in Ethiopia by
individual members of Napier's expedition in 1867-8. After the death of their
owners many found their way to auction sales and were then purchased by the
Bodleian Library '.57
Four of the manuscripts described, Nos. 36, 54, 76, and 77, belonged to the
church of Madhane Alam; a fifth, No. 44, appears to have belonged to that
54Wright, op. cit., p. iv. The Wright Catalogue describes 389 MSS in 408 numbers (which
should have been 409 as the number CCCXCIis given in error to two different manuscripts, Or.
818 and Or. 820). Of these, the following do not belong to the Maqdala collection, as is clearly
indicated by Wright, who marks the beginning and end of the collection in the index table
respectively on pp. 329, Or. 480, and 334, Or. 829:
(a) 35 volumes acquired by the Museum 1847-67, commencing with Add. 18993, and ending
with Or. 80, i.e. volumes acquired since the publication of Dillmann's catalogue of 1847;
(b) 3 volumes procured by Mr. Holmes on the way to Mdqdila (Or. 451-3);
(c) 1 volume added to the Department by purchase (Or. 1378).
Vide also S. Zanutto, Bibliografia etiopica, secondo contributo: manoscritti etiopici, Roma, 1932,
67; Wright, op. cit., pp. iii-iv. Ullendorff states that the Maqdila Collection at the British
Museum consists of 373 MSS (' The Ethiopic manuscripts in the Royal Library, Windsor Castle ',
Rassegna di Studi Etiopici, xii, 1953, [pub.] 1954, 72 ; The Ethiopians, second ed., London, 1965,
19). This figure was arrived at by actual counting of the manuscripts at the British Museum in
1953 (letter from E. Ullendorff to the present writer, 9 May 1972).
55Letters from S. Strelcyn to the present writer, 12 and 24 November 1971.
56 Ullendorff, art. cit., 71-2.
57 idem, Catalogueof the Ethiopian manuscripts in the Bodleian Library, ii, Oxford, 1951, p. vi.
collection, according to Ullendorff. A further five manuscripts, Nos. 40, 41,

45, 57, and 63, reached the Library through some member of the Napier expedi-
tion and No. 83, a treatise on the Christianfaith in Amharic and Ge'ez was' sent
from Abyssinia in 1868'.
Thirty-two other manuscripts in the Bodleian could conceivably also have
come from Maqdala although there is no evidence to this effect.
Of the 67 manuscripts in the Ethiopian collection of the CambridgeUniver-
sity Library, Ullendorff writes that their provenance is ' in the main, from two
sources; (a) MSS brought back by individual members of the British Expedition
to Ethiopia in 1867-8 ; and (b) the gift of a number of MSS ... from the Library
of the late C. H. Armbruster'.58 The latter number 20, mostly acquired by
Armbruster in Ethiopia early in this century ; this leaves some 47 of which, in
Ullendorff's view, a good proportion may have been brought to Britain by
members of Napier's expedition. Of these, two manuscripts definitely did:
No. IX, a service-book, was purchased by the artist, William Simpson, 'from
an Abyssinian' on the return march: it is not known who the Abyssinian was,
nor how he obtained it ; the other, No. XL, consisting of homilies, was brought
to England from India where it had been taken by a member of the expedition.
A third manuscript, No. XXXIII, a theological work, was acquired at a sale
in 1878.
William Wright believed that the following manuscripts in the Cambridge
University Library 'no doubt' came from MRqdala: 'A fine copy of the
Gospels, of the latter part of the XVIIth cent.; a manuscript of the XVIIIth
cent., containing the rest of the New Testament ... ; and a splendid copy of the
Old Testament written for the Queen of Sarza Dengel, in the twenty-sixth year
of the king's reign, A.D. 1588 .... Another volume, of the XVIth or XVIIth
cent., contains Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Wisdom. Besides these there are a Kirl6s
and an 'Argdn5na Dingjl, both of the XVIIIth cent.; a couple of Psalters;
the Gospel of St. John (brought from Southern India by Dr. C. Buchanan) of
the XVIIth cent.; the 'AmenstT 'A'mddaMest~irin Amharic; and one or two more
of less note '.59
The catalogue of Ethiopian manuscripts at the John Rylands Library in
Manchester by E. Ullendorff and S. Strelcyn is not yet published, but Professor
Strelcyn has kindly informedthe writer that two eighteenth-century manuscripts
in that collection-a degwa, No. 4, and a Gospel, No. 213-bear inscriptions
in Ge'ez noting that they belonged to the church of Mddhane Alam. Another
volume, No. 18, a lectionary for Holy Week, dating from the late seventeenth
century, probably also belonged to the royal library, according to Professor
Strelcyn. It is inscribed 'G. F. Robertson, Lieut. & Adjutant, 3rd Dragoon
Guards Magdala. 13 April 1868 '.
58
idem, in E. Ullendorff and S. G. Wright, Catalogue of Ethiopian manwuscripts in the Cambridge
University Library, Cambridge, 1961, p. viii.
59Wright, op. cit., p. iv, note.
26 RITAPANKHURST
In his letter Strelcyn adds that a number of other manuscripts in both

libraries as well as six magic scrolls at the Wellcome Institute of the History
of Medicine, London, may have been taken either at Maqdala but from private
individuals or during the expedition but not at Miiqdaila.60
In Edinburgh, the National Museum of Antiquities of Scotland possesses
two Ethiopian manuscripts formerly belonging to the Society of Antiquaries
of Scotland. One of them, an ancient manuscript of the four Gospels, was
'brought from Abyssinia, and presented to the Society (with other MSS) by
Captain CharlesM'Inroy [sic.] '.61 C. M. McInroy, from the Madras Staff Corps,
was Captain of a Division in the transport corps of the Napier expedition.62
The most famous private collection of Ethiopian manuscripts in England
which was associated with the Maqdila library consisted of five valuable
illustrated manuscripts and belonged to the collection of Valerie Susie Bruce,
Lady Meux, of Theobald's Park. They were sold, by an officerwho had served
in the British expedition, to the antiquarian Bernard Quaritch,who offeredthem
to Lady Meux in the spring of 1897, shortly after acquiring them. She immedi-
ately telegraphed to Sir Wallis Budge who describes them and their fate as
follows: 'The oldest of them was a small 4to volume containing a Life of
HIanna,the mother of the Blessed Virgin Mary; it was illustrated with archaic
Ethiopian pictures of and her husband Joachim, the Birth of the Virgin,
&c., and was written in XVth
HI.anna
the century. It was and still is the only copy of the
Life of Hanna in Ethiopic known to me. Two of the manuscripts were large
handsome volumes about 16 inches square, and each containing a good selection
of the Miracles of the Virgin Mary, illustrated with many full-page pictures
painted in bright colours which were intended to illustrate the texts of the
Miracles. The older of these MSS was written in the XVIth century and the
other a century later; each had been made for the use of a royal personage.
Another manuscript contained the Life of Maba'a y86n, a comparatively
modern Ethiopian saint, and the Life of GabraKrest6s, a prince who abandoned
his royal state and home and parents, and became a mendicant monk. These
Lives were illustrated by a large series of coloured pictures, which are of special
interest as they portray events in the daily life of the modern Abyssinians. I
sent to Lady Meux a description of these MSS, pointing out their interest and
importance, and their great value from an artistic point of view. I also told the
Keeper of Oriental Manuscriptsin the British Museum of them, and urged him
to attempt to acquire them for the National Collection. But his officialfinancial
position was such that it was impossible for him to make an offerfor them which
Mr. Quaritch would accept, and so the whole group of MSS, together with a
few smaller works, became the property of Lady Meux, who added them to her
60 Lettersfrom S. Strelcyn to the present writer, 12 and 24 November 1971.

61Zanutto, op. cit., 63; D. Laing, 'A brief notice of an ancient ms. of the four Gospels,
brought from Abyssinia, and presented to the Society (with other mss.), by Cap. CharlesM'Inroy ',
Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, viii, 1871, 52-5.
62 Holland and
Hozier, op. cit., I, 184.
collection of Egyptian and Sftdini antiquities preserved in the museum at

Theobalds Park '.63
Lady Meux subsequently printed for private circulation one of the manu-
scripts, The lives of Mabd' and GabraKrestds,with 92 coloured facsimiles
S.y6n in the summer of 1898 and was followed, two
illustrating the text. It appeared
years later, by the publication of The miraclesof the Virgin and the life of
with over 100 colour reproductions from four of the manuscripts, MSS.Hannd, 2-5.64
J. L. Harrington, British Minister to Emperor Menelik II's 65 Court, presented
the Emperor with a copy from Lady Meux to whom he wrote : ' From the Lion
of the Tribe of Judah, Menyelek, King of the Kings of Ethiopia. I am well.
How are you ? The book which you sent to me with Mr. Harrington has come
to me. I am pleased. And because it is very well done I send you this letter and
my seal '.66
The publication of these manuscripts appears to have been much appreciated
in Ethiopia. When, in the summer of 1902, Ras Makonnencame to England for
the coronation of King Edward VII he visited Theobald's Park, Cheshunt,
one Sunday. Together with three Ethiopian bishops and an Arabic-speaking
secretary he examined carefully both the original manuscripts and the repro-
ductions. Budge related that 'His reverence for the manuscripts was great,
and after bowing several times to the older manuscript of the Miracles of the
Virgin Mary, he knelt on the floor of the Museumand lifting the book on the top
of his head remained in this attitude and prayed for several minutes. A few days
later Lady Meux sent to him by me a set of her publications, and when I
delivered the books at his lodging in Westminster the joy of himself and the
bishops who were with him was unbounded '.67
An article in the Times shortly after Lady Meux's death relates the same
incident much more dramatically: 'The Prince was particularly attracted by
The Miracles of the Virgin Mary, and, when told that it had belonged to one of
his ancestors, knelt down and prayed for their souls. Then he burst into tears.
Never, he said, had he seen any such beautiful manuscripts in the country he
and they had come from, and he would ask the Emperor to buy them back.
63 E. A. W. Budge, Legends of Our Lady Mary the perpetual Virgin and her mother Hanna,
London, 1933, pp. vii-viii. Presumably Budge was convinced that the Meux manuscripts had
belonged to the Imperial collection at MgiqdIla for on the title-page of the Legends it is stated
that they were' translated from the Ethiopic manuscripts collected by King Theodore at Makdala
and now in the British Museum '. The title-page does not mention that the legends are translated
only partly from manuscripts of the Museum. The preface makes this clear and also shows that
Budge believed that the Meux manuscripts had originally been part of that collection. He writes:
' Many scholars ... have wondered how these five MSS become detached from the
great Makdala
Collection '.
"4 MSS 2 and 3 were used as sources in A. Grohmann, Aethiopische Marienhymnen, Leipzig,
1919.
65 Menelik II was Emperor of Ethiopia 1889-1913.
"6 Budge, op. cit., p. xiv.

67 ibid., pp. xiv-xv.
28 RITA PANKHURST
Later in the day his secretary approachedDr. Budge and offeredhim a handsome
bribe if he would induce the owner to sell '.68
Lady Meux, if the Times is to be believed, replied in terms which to this
writer seem enigmatic : 'What a beautiful thing it is for your horrid people to
go about the world stealing these books! What's the good of them ? '.69 One
may wonder who, in her estimation, were the thieves and how she could question
the worth of books for which she must have paid handsomely and which she
had taken such pains to have published. Clearly, however, Lady Meux was
impressed. Her immediate reaction was to ask Budge to present Ras Makonnen
with a whole set of the magnificently printed, translated editions which the
Prince received with much gratitude.70
Her final reaction was even more generous, for in her will, dated 23 January
1910, she bequeathed all her Ethiopian manuscripts to the Emperor Menelik or
his successor. In a report on the will the Times notes that the manuscripts had
been ' understood to have been obtained on the capture of Magdala .... Envoys
from the Emperor were sent over to arrangefor their recovery, and it is believed
that the present bequest is the fulfilment of a promise then given '.71
Lady Meux died on 20 December of the same year. Her will created a
sensation partly because it did not bestow her inheritance in the customary
manner upon her husband's relatives and partly because public opinion appeared
to pine for the retention of the manuscripts in England. An article in the Times
of 7 February 1911 expresses the belief that 'Many persons interested in
Oriental Christianity will view with extreme regret the decision of Lady Meux
to send her valuable MSS once and for all out of the country '.72 In a footnote,
in the preface to his translation of the Legendsof Our Lady Mary published in
1933, Budge notes the bequest of the manuscripts to Menelik, adding 'but he
was dead when she died '.73 He did not in fact die until 1913, although early in
1911 it was rumouredthat he might be dead.74 Budge continues : ' What became
of the manuscripts I do not know '.75 According to W. R. Dawson 'the whole
collection was sold in 1911; many of the objects being bought by William
Randolph Hearst, whose collection was sold at Sotheby's, 11-12 July 1939 '.76
The manuscript, known as 'Lady Meux 3' and referred to by Budge as
MS. 'B ', reappears in Dublin as No. 914 in the collection of Chester Beatty.
He must have purchased it some time between July 1939 and February 1955
when Enrico Cerullipublished his catalogue of the 53 Ethiopian manuscripts in
68 Times, 12 January 1911.

69 ibid.
70 ibid.
71
Times, 11 January 1911.
72 Times, 7
February 1911.
73 Budge, op. cit., p. xv, n. 1.
74H. Marcus 'The last years of the reign of the Emperor Menilek, 1906-13', Journal of
Semitic Studies, Ix, 1, 1964, 232-4.
75 Budge, op. cit., p. xv, n. 1.
76 Dawson, W. R., Who was who in Egyptology, London, 1951, 106-7.
THE LIBRARY OF EMPEROR TEWODROS II AT MAQDXLA (MAGDALA) 29
the Chester Beatty Library."77' Lady Meux 3 ', which was edited and translated
by Budge in 1900,7' is an eighteenth-century collection of miracles of the Virgin
Mary. It is not known what has happened to the other four manuscripts
bequeathed to Emperor Menelik or his successor.
The publication of the Lady Meux manuscripts, which were printed for
private circulation only, was warmly welcomed by European scholars and
learned societies; the volumes were indeed fine achievements in book pro-
duction and stimulated interest in the study of Ethiopian manuscript
painting.79
Scholars and students of the history of Ethiopian religion had urged Lady
Meux to publish a popular edition of the manuscripts; so had Ras Makonnen,
who wanted copies for the monasteries and churches of Ethiopia. However,
financial difficulties prevented her from undertaking this work and she died
having made no provision for this plan, which nevertheless materialized,
through Budge's initiative.80
Supplements to the reproductions of the Meux manuscripts, with additional
material from Ethiopic manuscripts at the British Museum, were published in
1923 in companion volumes edited and translated by Budge: Legends of Our
Lady Mary and One hundredand ten miracles of Our Lady Mary. Both volumes
were reproduced-the former, with additions, in cheaper editions ten years later.
Silvio Zanutto, the Italian librarian who published a world bibliography of
Ethiopian manuscript collections in 1932, records that one additional manu-
script found at Maqdala, was then in undisclosed private hands in England.81
There are probably other collections of Ethiopian manuscripts in Great
Britain as yet uncatalogued. Most of them, Professor Ullendorff believes, were
brought back by members of the Napier expedition. Manuscriptsare known to
be in the British and Foreign Bible Society Library, London, in the Selly Oak
Colleges Library, Birmingham, and in the National Library of Scotland,
Edinburgh.
Professor Ullendorff estimates that ' no fewer than 150-200 were brought to
Britain by individual members of the expeditionary forces. Most of these found
their way into University libraries, notably the Bodleian and the Cambridge
Libraries, but a few remained in private hands and reappear occasionally at
auction sales '.82
77 E. Cerulli, 'I manoscritti etiopici della Chester Beatty Library in Dublino ', Atti della
Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, Memorie, Classe di Scienze morali, storiche e filologiche, Ser.
viII, Vol. xi, 6, 1965, 290-1.
78 E. A. W. Budge, The miracles of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and the life of Hannd (Saint Anne),
and the magical prayers of 'Aheta Mikdl, London, 1900.
79The coloured facsimiles were reproduced in England by W. Griggs and were inserted in the
English text. The Ethiopic texts were printed by the eminent German firm of W. Drugulin of
Leipzig because the necessary fount of type did not exist in England.
80 idem, One hundredand ten miracles Our
of Lady Mary, London, 1933, p.v.
81 Zanutto, op. cit., 74; H. Reade,' An ancient Ethiopic vellum manuscript ', Bibliographer,
1883, 24.
82 E.
Ullendorff, The Ethiopians, second ed., 19.
30 RITA PANKHURST
One other manuscript in the Chester Beatty Library in Dublin may also
have come from Maqdala. It is No. 949, a collection of hymns. On the verso of
folio 46 is the inscription: 'Tho. Eadon, 10th Company, Royal Engineers '.83
This was one of the units which took part in the Napier expedition.
A small number of manuscripts obtained during the expedition found their
way into libraries outside Great Britain.
The Osterreichische Nationalbibliothek possesses one illustrated eighteenth-
century manuscript of the New Testament, Aeth. 25, presented to the Imperial
Palace Library in Vienna by General Napier in 1868.84
In Berlin, in the Deutsche Staatsbibliothek, there are two important
seventeenth-century manuscripts obtained from King Wilhelm, to whom they
had been presented by Graf von Seckendorff. The latter purchased them after
the storming of Maqdala, no doubt at the auction. One, No. 19, is a splendidly
written and illustrated Dawit and the other, No. 42, is a Fetha ndigst.85
In the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris there are two magnificient manu-
scripts which were donated in 1868 by Major Gally-Passebosc, an officer from
the French Navy who followed the expedition: 86 No. 112 in the Zotenberg
catalogue of the Ethiopian manuscripts of this library is a Haymanotaiabaw
' Faith of the fathers ', made in the twelfth
year of the reign of Iyasu the Great,
i.e. 1694, by order of the Queen Mother WilatS Giyorgis; No. 138, a life and
miracles of Saint Takla Haymanot, had belonged to King Hayla Malikot of
Shoa. There is a prima facie case for supposing that these manuscripts from
Gondar and Shoa (Ankober ?) had been taken to Maqdala by Tewodros.
In the Vatican Library, one manuscript which, Zanutto believes, came from
Maqdala is a homily for Saint Michael bearing the following note : ' These two
(?) books were found in an old convent or church in Abyssinia by my nephew,
Captain Thomas Kelly, 2nd Queens Own (Fusiliers) and sent to me 20th Oct.,
1868. Mathias Kenny, 3 Clifton Terrace, Monkstown, Dublin '.87 However,
there is no evidence that the unit mentioned took part in the campaign.
In India two manuscripts from members of the expedition were exhibited at
a meeting of the Bombay Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society in August 1868.
One was a life of St. George with drawings of various Christian martyrs which
belonged to Capt. James of the Bombay Staff Corps and was brought from
Ethiopia, and the other was a copy of the Gospel of St. John presented to Dr.
Wilson, Honorary President of the Society, by Ato Mikael Joseph, one of the
83 Cerulli, art. cit., 310.

84 N. Rhodokanakis, Die dthiopischenHandschriften derk. k. HofbibliothekE zu Wien (Sitzungs-
berichteder k. Akademie der Wissenschaftenin Wien, CLI,Phil.-hist. Klasse, 4), Wien, 1906, 2, 17.
85 A. Dillmann, Die Handschriften-Verzeichnisse der K6niglichen Bibliothee zu Berlin, II.
Bd.: Verzeichniss der abessinischen Handschriften, Berlin, 1878, p. ii.
86 H. Zotenberg, Cataloguedes manuscrits ethiopiens de la BibliothequeNationale, Paris, 1877,
p. iv.
87 S. Grebaut and E. Tisserant (ed.), BybliothecaeApostolicae Vaticanae codices manu scripti
recensiti. CodicesAethiopici Vaticani et Borgiani, Barberinianus Orientalis 2, Rossianus 865. Pars
prior : enarratio codicum. Bybliotheca Vaticana, 1935, 853.
THE LIBRARY OF EMPEROR TEWODROS II AT MXQDALA (MAGDALA) 31
interpreters of the Abyssinian force.88 Because the expedition was organized

from India it may be that other manuscripts from Maqdala will come to light
in the Indian subcontinent.
Two private collections in the United States contained manuscripts from
Maqdala. One was in the collection of WilberforceEames, principally discourses
for the feasts of the angels Michael and Raphael with three paintings, and
belonged to Gally-Passebosc ; the collection was sold and dispersed in 1907.
The other collection is that of Samuel A. B. Mercer; one manuscript in this
collection, the life of Takli Haymanot, comes from Maqdala.89
In the course of the century which has elapsed since the death of Tewodros
a few of the manuscripts from MaqdSla were returned to Ethiopian rulers.
The most renowned of these was a manuscript containing a Kebra niagst
'Glory of the kings ', written during the reign of Emperor Iyasu I. It was the
older of two copies of the Ethiopian national saga acquired, presumably at the
auction, by Mr. Holmes. Having been duly accessioned as Or. 819 it was
briefly described by William Wright in a list of the Maqdala collection published
in 1870 as preliminary information for scholars who were eagerly awaiting the
publication of a full catalogue.90 In the same year a German scholar, F.
Praetorius, wrote his thesis using the volume as a source; 91 and, based on
Wright's list and Praetorius's thesis, Carl Bezold used this source as text D in
his publication on the Kebra nagast.92
It is known that the ' Glory of the kings ' was much esteemed and venerated
in Ethiopia. This particular copy, however, appeared to have been of special
importance to more than one Ethiopian ruler. According to the learned Tigre
scholar Hayla Maryam who mentioned it to the French envoy Hugues Le Roux
in the early years of this century, the manuscript was the personal possession
of Emperor Tewodros." There is no evidence for this report but undoubtedly his
successor, Emperor Yohannes IV (1868-89) not only knew of the existence of
the copy but wished to possess it.94 On 10 August 1872, in letters written from
88Journal of the Bombay Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, Ix, 1867-70, [pub.] 1872,
Appendix, pp. ix-lxi.
89 Zanutto, op. cit., 155-6.
90 W.
Wright, 'List of the Magdala collection', Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenlindischen
Gesellschaft,xxIv, 1870, 614-15.
"' F. Praetorius, Fabula de regina Sabaea apud Aethiopes, Halle, 1870.
92 C. Bezold, Kebra Nagast, die Herrlichkeitder K6nige, Miinchen, 1905.
11H. Le Roux, Chezla Reine de Saba, Paris, 1914, 96-7. Zanutto also believed that the manu-
script belonged personally to Tewodros, vide op. cit., 147.
94Hayla Maryam alleges that his father, who was from Aksum, witnessed an audience given
by Yohannes to an embassy from Britain led by an admiral who presented him with a golden
crown, which gift did not please him. When the admiral asked him for some message for the
Queen, Yohannes is said to have replied : ' Tell your Queen that the soldiers took from Tewodoros's
room the book which is most prized by Ethiopian emperors. It is the history of the Queen of
Sheba, of Solomon and their son: our book. I pray God it will come back'. Vide Le Roux,
op. cit., 97-9. There is no evidence of the return of a golden crown from England to Yohannes.
The crown of Abuna Salama, as well as his chalice, both taken at Miqdlla, are at the Victoria and
Albert Museum; the gold crown of Tewodros was sent back to Ethiopia by King George V in
1925, the bearer being Ras Tafiri Mikonnen. Vide Budge, History of Abyssinia, London, 1928,
32 RITA PANKHURST
Adwa to Queen Victoria and to the British Foreign Secretary, Earl Granville,
dealing with political affairs, he requested the return of the volume.
The letters were taken to England by J. C. Kirkham, an adventurer who had
served as a steward in one of the P & 0 Company steamers and who had risen
to the rank of General in the Emperor's army in which he had at first acted as
an instructor.95 Kirkham arrived in London on 10 October and presented the
letters some time after 31 October.96
Both letters were very inaccurately translated, as has been pointed out by
Edward Ullendorff and Abraham Demoz in their publication of the letters,97
but the English translation was the one seen and acted upon in England. 'I
have another thing to say to you,' runs the official translation of the letter to
Queen Victoria,' there is a picture called Qurata Rezoo,98which is a picture of
Our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, and which was found with many books at
Magdala and is now in England. If it is possible, please to send me this picture ...
also a book called Kivera Negust, containing the whole of the laws of Ethiopia
and the names of the Shums (Chiefs)and Churches,and Provinces.'"99The letter
to Earl Granville, which in the Amharic original, is substantially the same,
contains the following addition, in the English translation, to the final sentence
about the book. It begins ' I pray you will find out who has got this book and
send it to me ', and continues with the mistranslation 'for in my country my
people will not obey my orders without it '.oo Attempts to find the picture
proved abortive but the volume was soon located at the British Museum.
The British Government was at this time anxious to keep on good terms with
Yohannes who had co-operated during the Napier expedition. As Granville
wrote to the British Ambassador at Constantinople, Sir Henry George Elliot,
'Her Majesty's Government have much reason to feel interest in the King of
Abyssinia '.101 The Foreign Secretary therefore applied some gentle pressure
on the Museum. A Foreign Officeofficial was directed to write as follows to the
Principal Librarian of the Museum, John Winter Jones, on 29 November 1872
in a letter marked ' pressing ': ' Lord Granvillethinks that it would be considered
as a gracious and friendly act if the volume which most nearly answers the
11, 516-17; and the royal cap of Tewodros, together with his imperial seal, were returned by
Queen Elizabeth II during her state visit to Ethiopia in 1965.
95 Napier to India Office, 29 October 1869, FO 1/28.
96Kirkham to Granville, 10 and 31 October 1869, FO 1/27b.
97 E. Ullendorff and A. Demoz, 'Two letters from the Emperor Yohannes of Ethiopia to
Queen Victoria and Lord Granville ', BSOAS, xxxII, 1, 1969, 135-42.
98 Kurati Re'esu. This picture was traditionally carried into battle and is mentioned in
several chronicles; vide I. Guidi, Vocabolarioamarico-italiano, Roma, 1901, 760-1. The chronicle
of Iyasu II, 1730-55, mentions that the picture was donated to the church of Qwesqwam, on the
outskirts of Gondar, by Iyasu's mother, Queen Mentewwab; vide I. Guidi (ed. and tr.), Annales
regum Iydsu II et Iyo'as (Corpus Scriptorum Christianorum Orientalium, LXVI. Scriptores
Aethiopici, XLIx), reprinted, Louvain, 1954, 108.
99Yohannes to Victoria, 10 August 1872, FO 95/731. Crown copyright material is quoted by
kind permission of the Controller of HMSO.
100 Yohannes to Granville, 10 August 1872, FO 95/731.
101 Granville to Elliot, 18 December 1872, FO 1/27b.
THE LIBRARY OF EMPEROR TEWODROS II AT MAQDALA (MAGDALA) 33
description given, were restored. His Lordship therefore directs me to request

that you will lay this letter before the Trustees at the earliest opportunity and,
if they concur with him in opinion, that you will move them to be pleased to
send the volume in question to this office, for the purpose of being sent back to
Abyssinia'.102
The next meeting of the Trustees of the Museum was not due until 14
December. Impressed, no doubt by the heart-felt appeal from the distant
monarch and perhaps also by the request for compliance from no less a personage
than the Foreign Secretary they decided to part with the Museum's property-
a most unusual step. On 17 December Jones replied to Earl Granville. Having
first noted that the picture requested by the Emperor was not in the Museum
Jones continued: 'The volume required by King John is, however, in the
Museum and the Trustees have directed me to acquaint Your Lordship that,
under the very exceptional circumstances of the case, they have great pleasure
in acceding to Your Lordship's suggestion that it should be restored to King
John. I have, therefore, the honour to send the volume to your Lordship
herewith '.103
The following day the replies from the Queen and Granville to the Emperor
were ready, signed and sealed. The relevant passage in the Queen's letter from
Windsor Castle begins : 'We have caused enquiry to be made about the Book
and the Picture which you mention in your letter'. The Queen then explains
that no trace could be found of the picture and that it may not have reached
Great Britain; ' But we have discovered a book', the letter continues,' which
appears to be the one which you enquire after, and have directed that it may be
delivered to you with this our letter '.104
Granville's letter emphasizes that 'the book is restored as a proof of the
friendly feeling of the Queen and Her Majesty's Government for your
Highness '.105
The letters and the packet containing the book were forwarded on 20
December to Kirkham, who was waiting in Vienna,o16and he reached Massawa
with them on 15 February 1873.107 He must have accomplished his mission
successfully, for Yohannes replied to the letters on 15 May. Curiously, the
receipt of the book is not mentioned.10s It would seem highly unlikely that
Kirkham failed to deliver the manuscript without this coming to light in the
subsequent correspondence between the monarchs. It might be conjectured
that this book, which Yohannes had probably not seen before, but about which
he had been given exaggerated expectations, did not turn out to be quite as
102 Hammond to Jones, 29 November 1872, FO 1/29.

103 Jones to Granville, 17 December 1872, FO
1/29.
10o Victoria to Yohannes, 18 December 1872, FO 1/27b.
105 Granville to Yohannes, 18 December 1872, FO 1/27b.
106 Granville to Kirkham, 30 November 1872, FO
1/29 ; Granville to Buchanan, 20 December
1872, FO 1/27b.
107J. de Coursac, Le r~gnede Yohannes, Romans, Dr6me, 1926, 118.
108 Yohannes to Victoria, 15
May 1873, FO 1/27b.
34 RITA PANKHURST
informative as he had been led to expect. It is known that the volume did
contain matter other than the Kebra ndagst, and Jones pointed to the possible
significance of this in his letter to Earl Granville accompanying the trans-
mission of the manuscript: 'The Kibra Negust occupies folios 2-130 of this
volume. The additional matter consists of historical notices and other docu-
ments relating mostly to the City of Axum and its church,109which circum-
stance may probably enhance the value of the gift in the eyes of the King of
Ethiopia '.110
Edward Ullendorff and Abraham Demoz have noted, in their commentary
on the translation of Yohannes's request for the book, that the Trustees of the
British Museum might not so easily have complied with the Emperor's appeal
'had they known that the English translation went a good deal beyond the
original phrasing of the Imperial missive '.111 It may be pleaded that the
mistranslation may have been perfectly in keeping with Yohannes's thinking
before he had had the opportunity of seeing the manuscript.
Even if we are right in deducing the Emperor's reasons for not mentioning
the book in his letters, it is clear from its subsequent history that the volume
had almost mystical importance in many Ethiopian eyes.
According to Le Roux's informant, Hayla Maryam, Yohannes kept the
restored Kebrdndgdst with him always; when he died of a Dervish bullet at
Matsmma the book disappeared. Hayla Maryam, surmised that it had been
hidden by his confessor or one of the monks in his entourage so that it should
not fall into the hands of the Muslims.112
The next recorded event in the remarkable history of this volume occurred
in 1904 when Hayla Maryam revealed to Le Roux in the greatest secrecy that
he knew the whereabouts of the volume. Le Roux's curiosity having been
aroused, he set about trying to gain access to it. Eventually, having performed
a useful service for Emperor Menelik, Le Roux was in a position to ask for a
reward. The Emperor had expected him to ask once again for permission to
hunt elephant. Instead, to Menelik's surprise, the envoy asked to be allowed to
see and translate into French the famous Kebrd ndgdst. Le Roux relates the
rest of the interview which took place at Addis Alem, as follows: 'Menelik
thought for a while. Finally he said " I am of the opinion that a people defends
itself not only with its weapons but also with its books. The one you speak of is
the pride of this Kingdom. Beginning with me, the Emperor, right down to the
poorest soldiers walking the roads, all Ethiopians will be happy that the book
should be translated into the French language and brought to the knowledge
of the friends we have in the world. Thus people will see clearly what links join
us to the people of God, what treasures have been entrusted to our safe-keeping.
109 Where Iyasu I was crowned. Vide I. Guidi (ed. and tr.), Annales lohannis I, Iydsu I et
Bakdffd, II (Corp. Script. Christ. Orient., xxv. Script. Aeth., viii), reprinted, Louvain, 1955, 170.
110 Jones to Granville, 18 December 1872, FO 1/29.
111 Ullendorff and Demoz, art. cit., p. 135, n. 4.
112 Le Roux,
op. cit., 101.
THE LIBRARY OF EMPEROR TEWODROS II AT
MXQDILA (MAGDALA) 35
People will understand better why God's help has never failed us against the
enemies who attacked us " '.113 After this clear-sighted speech on the role of the
written word in Ethiopia's struggle for independence Menelik, according to
Le Roux's account, ascertained from Hayla Maryam that the book was in
Addis Ababa.114 This would suggest that the Emperor was unaware of its
location-a somewhat curious supposition in view of the importance he
attached to it. He then ordered that it be made available to Le Roux. The
sovereign brushed aside a request for postponement on the part of the monks,
who pleaded that the manuscript was being recopied and that they would gladly
give Le Roux a fresh copy as soon as the copying had been completed. 'You
will copy it later', Menelik said.115 Within eight days Le Roux had the
satisfaction of holding the precious manuscript in his own hands. There, on
the title page was the note :
OR. 819
PRESENTED BY
THE SECRETARY OF STATE
FOR INDIA
AUG. 1868
393
At the bottom of the second folio, the first inscribed one of the manuscript, in
the empty space between two columns of writing was a seal in red ink of the lion
and unicorn bearing an escutcheon with the words 'British Museum '. On the
verso of the last folio was the following note in cursive script:
' This volume was returned to the
King of Ethiopia
by order of The Trustees of the British Museum
Dec. 14th 1872
J. Winter Jones
Principal Librarian '116
Le Roux's elation was set down in a passage which reflects favourably on

his powers of imagination and warrants quotation: 'There was no longer any
room for doubt : the book which I held in my hands was the very version of the
story of the Queen of Sheba which the Emperors and priests of Ethiopia con-
sidered the most ancient of those which have been scattered in Abyssinian
monasteries or have found their way by chance into the libraries of Europe.
It was the book which Theodorus had placed under his pillow the night when
he killed himself ; the book which the English soldiers had taken with them to
London, which an especial ambassadorhad returned to the EmperorJohn, which
this Emperor had by him in his tent on the very day when he fell under the
113 ibid., 115-16.

114
ibid., 116-17.
115 ibid., 118.
116 ibid., 120. Also quoted, with slight variations, in Le Roux's introduction to Mrs. J. Van
Vorst (tr.), Magda, Queenof Sheba; from the ancient royal Abyssinian manuscript ' The glory of the
kings ', after the French translation of H. Le Roux, New York and London, 1907, 21-2.
36 RITAPANKHURST
scimitars of the Mahdists; which the monks had stolen and which Menelik had
commanded the monks to bring back to light. There was something thrilling
in the touch of the old document, wherein a people of dreams held, closely
guarded, and as if in a precious receptacle, the delicious perfume of their most
cherishedtradition. Those for whom books are sacred things will understand the
feelings I experienced '.117
From Le Roux we obtain the first detailed physical descriptionof the volume.
It was relatively small and almost square-26 cm. x 25 cm.- with a thickness
of 7 cm. The binding was covered in a printed cotton cloth with a design of
yellow flowers and was itself made of two boards in cedar wood 118covered in
red leather. Back and front were decorated in an identical manner. The leaves
were made of goatskin and numbered 164. There were two columns to a page,
each column measuring 7 cm. in height by 8 cm. in width. Each column had 19
lines written in a regular, rather bold hand. The letters were on average 4-5 mm.
high. Changes in chapter were indicated without paragraphingby writing the
first two lines of a chapter entirely in red ink.119
Le Roux, with much help from HaylA Maryam, translated the text of the
Kebrd nigiast into French 120 in a few months, returned the volume to the
Emperor, and left for France, his diplomatic and literary mission completed,
in June of the same year.
The next reference to this manuscript occurs almost 20 years later. The
South African traveller, C. F. Rey reported in UnconqueredAbyssinia: 'It is
now at the Monastery of Debre Libanos where it was seen by a European
traveller who noticed the inscription attached to it stating the conditions under
which the Trustees of the Museum had parted with it '.121
For many years scholars remained uncertain about the fate of the book and
whether it had safely survived the Italo-Ethiopian War. It could not be traced
at DAibr Libanos and indeed it is not certain that it ever reachedthat monastery
as Rey's information may have been incorrect.
Finally, however, Dr. Haylai G*ibre'el Danifie traced it to its new home:
whilst compiling a catalogue of manuscripts in Addis Ababa churches in 1963 he
found the Kebra naigast,Or. 819, in the church of Raguel. His catalogue notes
that there are 164 leaves and that, on folio 163, there are orders concerning the
administration of the church of Aksum and donations by different sovereigns.
Dr. HayldiGaibre'eladds: ' later acquired by EmperorMenelik and deposited in
the Raguel church probably by Aliiqa Gibra Sellassie '.122 This was the great
117 ibid., 22-3.
118 Probably ted, Juniperus procera, or pencil cedar, a tree native to Ethiopia.
119Le Roux, Chez la Reine, 119-20.
A part of the text was published in his Chez la Reine de Saba, quoted above; a fuller
120
translation was entitled Makeda, Reine de Saba. Chronique dthiopienne,Paris, 1914; for the
English translation see above p. 35, n. 116.
121C. F. Rey, UnconqueredAbyssinia, London, 1923, 164.
122Hayla Gabre'el Dafifie, Catalogue of manuscripts in Addis Ababa churches, Addis Ababa,
1963, I, No. 3, Raguel, No. 39. Unpublished manuscript, of which a copy is at the Institute of
Ethiopian Studies, Haile Sellassie I University.
THE LIBRARY OF EMPEROR TEWODROS II AT MXQDALA (MAGDALA) 37
octagonal church, Dabra Hayl Qeddus Raguel, founded by the Emperor at

Entotto in 1885 of which Gibrdi Sellase, the Emperor's chronicler, was the
Alaqa, or head, until his appointment as Minister of the Pen in 1908.123
In September 1955 (Miskardim 1948), the main tabot124and church para-
phernalia, including the books, were moved down from Entotto into a new
church bearing the same name, in the Market area of Addis Ababa.125 This was
the last journey to be recorded in the odyssey of this peripatetic little volume
which the writer was given the privilege of seeing in the precincts of the church,
through the good offices of Ato Alemayehu Mogas, on 28 November 1971.
The volume was covered in a cloth which corresponded exactly to that
described by Le Roux; the manuscript was in excellent condition with the
complete 164 leaves as previously noted.
In addition to the annotations relating to the British Museum the volume
bears the inscription ' Kebra nagast za qeddus Mddhane AlUm ' [Book of the]
glory of the kings belonging to [the church of] the Holy Saviour of the World ',
at the top of the first folio. The small red seal of the British Museum occurs
at intervals throughout.
Near the end of the volume, on the verso of folio 150 was a large gold and
green seal of a lion but the ink had evidently not taken well and the seal was not
distinct. On folio 153, however, was a very clear black ink seal 6 cm. in diameter
easily identified as one of the well-known seals of Emperor Menelik showing a
crowned lion holding a staff with a cross and bearing the legend 'Conquering
lion of Judah, Menelik, King of Kings of Ethiopia '.
A cursory study of the text, all that was possible, revealed that folio 131
onwards, as Winter Jones had observed, were devoted mainly to matters
relating to Aksum and its church. Folio 131 has a plan of Ethiopia with Aksum
shown inside three concentric circles and indicating the provinces of Ethiopia
and the points of the compass. There follow administrative rules for the church
and the public, a king list, details of taxes paid to various Ethiopian kings, and
titles of governors.
The colophon, folio 163, is in another hand and refers to the reign of Adyam
Siggdd, i.e. Iyasu I.
A second manuscript believed to have belonged to Emperor Tewodros was
returned to Ethiopia after the Liberation. According to a letter to the Times
of 11 July 1942, from H. H. Dale, Chairman of the Wellcome Trustees, 'an
Ethiopian manuscript since known as " King Theodore's Bible " authenticated
by a scribe and a body slave of the dead king, was taken from his house in
123
Gabri Sellase, Chronique du rigne de Me'nlik II, Paris, 1930-2, I, 210. See also ibid.,
p. vii. On the same page the editor of this chronicle, M. de Coppet, notes that Gibra Sellase used
a Kebrdndgdst as a source for events preceding this appointment as Sdhafe Te'ezaz in 1880, but it
cannot, of course, be assumed that he was using the copy discussed above.
124 The tablet, usually of wood or stone, placed in the church's ' holy of holies ' to symbolize
the Ark of the Covenant.
125 It was consecrated by His Beatitude Abuna Baselyos on the first day of the Ethiopian
year, 1 Mdskdrim 1948 (11 September 1955).
38 RITA PANKHURST
Magdala and passed into the possession of Major Leveson, who brought it to
England in 1868. The book was in private keeping till 1936, when it was offered
at auction and bought for the late Sir Henry Wellcome-one of many items
having little obvious relevance to the museum and library of the history of
medicine which he had so generously planned. When King Theodore's Bible
thus came recently to the notice of the Wellcome Trustees, it seemed to them
inappropriate that its fate and ownership should again be left to the chance of
the sale rooms, and the Foreign Officeapproved their proposal that it should be
offered to the Emperor of Ethiopia, now restored to his throne by armies of the
British Empire'.
The volume was bound in wooden boards covered with tooled leather and
had a mirror on the inner side of the front cover. The contents included the
Psalms, the Song of Songs, the Gospel according to St. John, and liturgical
items. Bound with them were a number of earlier paintings on vellum.
The book was dispatched to Addis Ababa, and on 15 March 1942 was offered
by the British Minister, Sir Robert Howe, for the acceptance of Emperor Haile
Sellassie.126
Another manuscript, which returned to Ethiopia from Australia in 1968,
was a morning prayer scroll alleged to have been found lying near the Emperor's
body by Petty Officer Barr of the British Navy.127 His grand-daughter Mrs.
Esther Sidney-Smith, to whom he gave it 40 years ago, is presumably the source
of the information, published in the press on the occasion of the scroll's
restoration, that Barr was a 'God-fearing Scot who hid the scroll from dese-
crating hands '.
Mrs. Sydney-Smith asked that the scroll be handed back to its rightful
owner and, on the last day of his visit in Perth, 17 May 1968, Emperor Haile
Sellassie was presented with it by the State Premier of Western Australia,
Mr. David Brand.128
What, then, was the size of the original library which Emperor Tewodros
had assembled for the endowment of the church he had intended to build ?
To attempt an estimate is almost an impossibility because of the number of
imponderables.
On the one hand many manuscripts may have been destroyed altogether. It
is known that some volumes and papers, including, possibly, most of the
imperial correspondence, perished immediately after the storming.129 It may
be assumed that further volumes may have been damaged or lost in transit to
Europe. Other volumes, looted or purchased, may have disappeared whilst
in the hands of members of the expedition, or their families.
126 Times, 11 July 1942.
127
The Royal Naval Rocket Brigade was with the leading troops in the advance on MIqdala;
vide Holland and Hozier, op. cit., 11, 473.
128Ethiopian Herald, 18 May 1968; Ethiopia. Ministry of Information and Tourism, His
Imperial Majesty visits Asia, the Far East and Australia, Addis Ababa, 1968, 75.
129 See above, p. 17, n. 14 and 15.
THE LIBRARY OF EMPEROR TEWODROS II AT MAQDALA (MAGDALA) 39
On the other hand not all the manuscripts which have come to light are
necessarily from the Madhane Alam church or from among Tewodros's personal
possessions. Other literate inhabitants of the fortress including the prisoners
possessed books: members of the expedition may have purchased or looted
these.'13 Books could also have been purchased,131albeit not in large numbers,
on the way to and from Maqdala. Another important consideration is that a
number of manuscripts are probably still in private hands unknown to the
world of scholarship; these are only gradually appearing on the market.
At the risk of incurring the disapproval of all bona fide scholars the present
writer has ventured to tabulate her guesses about volumes which have come to
light outside Ethiopia, adding the 600 officially left behind, plus the three
officially returned.
The table on p. 40 shows that manuscripts from the Madhane Alam church
have travelled to all the five continents, though, outside Ethiopia, by far the
greatest concentration remains, as is to be expected, in Great Britain.
William Wright estimated in 1877 that Tewodros had assembled a library
of about 1000 volumes at Mdqdala.132 In the light of information which has
become available in the century since Wright published his list of the collection,
it would appear that his estimate was sound, though it is possibly somewhat
on the conservative side, taking into account the manuscripts destroyed or
untraced.
The question of the nature and age of the manuscripts collected at MIqdala
is more easily resolved. It can be assumed that the books left behind in Ethiopia
were those which did not interest Mr. Holmes or the officersand gentlemen who
purchased at the auction. Holmes, with Munzinger'sassistance, was attempting
to purchase a representative collection of texts,133 and, in addition, manuscripts
of outstanding quality or antiquity, especially if illustrated. Other buyers were
probably interested only in the latter category. It is therefore probably safe to
assume that, although Holmes and the bidders at the auction picked the better
items, the library at Maqdala did not differ very greatly in its content from the
collection taken to London. This is described by William Wright in the official
history of the expedition as follows.
130 The soldiers looted the homes of the prisoners. Waldmeier, op. cit., 118, specifically
mentions that they took books. Markham, op. cit., 365, mentions that gently nurtured ladies
among the fugitives 'were eager to sell their personal ornaments, their sacred pictures and
books . . . for the means of buying bread'.
131 Flad, op. cit., 11,72, confirms that there was no looting on the way to and from Maqdila.
Orders to pay for everything were strictly enforced, and, indeed, high prices were charged and
paid. Vide Chojnacki, art. cit., 36. Not too much weight need be attached to the account of the
French traveller, A. Girard, who, after visiting Adwa in September 1868, was told that the English
officers had emptied all the church libraries (A. Girard, Souvenirs d'un voyage en Abyssinie,
1868-1869, Le Caire, 1873, 242-3). The opposite is attested by numerous other accounts of the
expedition.
132 Wright,
op. cit., p. iii.
133 Flad, op. cit., II, 72.
40 RITA PANKHURST
TABLE INDICATING THE DISPERSAL OF TEWODROS'S LIBRARY
Collection Possible Probable Certain or

(maximum) highly likely
(minimum)
Great Britain
British Museum, to 1877 350 350 349
, , to 1971 7 5 3
.,, Library, Windsor Castle
Royal 6 6 6
Bodleian Library, Oxford 34 10 5
Cambridge University Library 47 12 10
John Rylands Library, Manchester 4 3 2
Wellcome Institute of the History of Medicine,
London 6
National Museum of Antiquities, Edinburgh 2 2 -
Lady Meux collection (now dispersed) 5 5 5

Unknown private owner 1 1
Total in G.B. 462 394 380
Ireland
Chester Beatty Library (excluding Lady Meux MSS) 1 1
Austria
Osterreichische Nationalbibliothek, Vienna 1 1 1
Germany (German Democratic Republic)

Deutsche Staatsbibliothek, Berlin 2 2 2
France
BibliothBque Nationale, Paris 2 2 2
Vatican City
Vatican Library 1
India
Bombay Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 2 2
U.S.A.
Wilberforce Eames collection, New York 1 1 1
Mercer collection, Grafton, Mass. 1 1 1
Total outside Ethiopia, excluding G. R. 11 10 7
Ethiopia
Left behind at 8ladqot,or distributed to other
churches 600 600 600
Returned: Kebrd ndgdst, from G.B. 1 1 1
'Theodore's Bible ', from G.B. 1 1 1
Prayer scroll, from Australia 1 1
Total in Ethiopia 603 603 602
Grand total 1,075 1,007 989
'The collection of manuscripts deposited in the British Museum by the

order of Sir S. Northcote consists of 359 volumes, one of which is a paper
manuscript, in Coptic and Arabic. The remainder are Aethiopic, with the
exception of about half-a-dozen, which are written in the modern Amharic
dialect.
THE LIBRARY OF EMPEROR TEWODROS II AT MAQDXLA (MAGDALA) 41
Of these manuscripts, four or five are paper, the rest vellum. They are
mostly well bound, and in good preservation, and some of them contain
pictures, representing the state of art in Abyssinia during the last two or three
centuries. The oldest among them Dr. Wright finds to be of the fifteenth and
sixteenth centuries, but the great bulk of the collection belongs to the seven-
teenth and eighteenth, and some were written during the present century, even
in the reign of the late King Theodore. The following are some of the more
important classes:
1. Manuscriptsof the Holy Scriptures, comprisingthe whole of the canonical
books of the Old and New Testaments, as well as the Apocrypha; among the
latter may be specified the Book of Enoch, the Rufate (" Liber Jubilaeorum "
or " Parva Genesis "), and the Ascension of Isaiah.
2. A Lectionary, several missals and other office books, psalters, anti-
phonaries, Hymn-books, and Prayer-books.
3. Collections of homilies and discourses for festivals, saints' days, &c.
Here may be mentioned the Gebra Hemamal or services for Passion week, the
Nagara and Manjane Dersana Mikail, Dersana Gabriel, and Dersana Rufail,
besides the " Miracles of the Virgin Mary " and the " Miracles of Jesus ".
4. The Patristic literature is represented by various translations from the
Greek and Arabic, such as the Ancoratus of Epiphanies, some works of Cyril
of Alexandria, the Commentary of Chrysostom on the Epistle to the Hebrews,
and the works of Mar Isaac. Other ecclesiastical works of importance are the
Dedas Calia Apostolorium, the sinodos or collection of Canons of the Councils,
the treatises ascribed to Clement, the Haimanota Abau, or " Faith of the
Fathers "; the Lena Abau, " History of Paradise of the Fathers ", Tilekseyus
or Philoxenus, Aragani Maufasawi, Faus Maufasawi, the huge compilations
called Hawiand Talmid, and the Fetha Nagast, or " Laws of the Kings ".
5. The department of history is not so well supplied, but the collection
comprises copies of the Jewish history of Joseph ben Gorwon, or Joseppon, the
Kebra Nagast or " Glory. of the Kings "; the Universal History of George
Walda Amid, the Chronology of Abu Shaker, and two Aethiopian chronicles
of considerable value. The History of Alexander the Great is rather to be
regarded as a romance.
6. Finally may be mentioned the Seukesor, or Synascarium, of which there
are several copies ; the Gadla Hawareyat, or acts of the Apostles and Disciples,
and numerous lives of Saints.' 134
It was Wright's opinion that the acquisition of the Maqdala collection made
the British Museum the best library for Ethiopian manuscripts in Europe. In
his report, quoted in Holland and Hozier, he writes:
'Looking to the number and intrinsic value of these manuscripts, this seems
to be the largest and finest collection of Aethiopic literature in Europe. Certainly
it far surpasses in extent that of the French traveller, M. Antoine D'Abbadie,

42 THE LIBRARY OF EMPEROR TEWODROS II AT MXQDALA (MAGDALA)
the printed catalogue of which comprises 234 numbers, and if it were added by
the Trustees to their present collection of about 115 manuscripts, the British
Museum would probably be placed in the first rank in another department of
oriental literature besides the Syriac '.135
Wright feared, however, that some scholars would be somewhat disappointed
with the contents of the collection. Firstly the bulk of the manuscripts were of
comparatively modern date, i.e. from the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nine-
teenth centuries. Manuscripts of the sixteenth century were rare and none
could be dated before 1400. Secondly the collection did not bring to light much
new religious material of Greek or Coptic origin. Thirdly very few manuscripts
were of a non-religious character: only a handful had any direct bearing on
Ethiopian history, and a mere three were concernedwith traditional medicine.136
Despite Wright's fears the haul of manuscripts from Maqdala led to a rebirth
of European interest in Ethiopian culture, and a number of texts were edited
and translated. The most prolific worker in this field was Budge, several of
whose translations have already been mentioned. His edition of the Ethiopic
version of the 'History of Alexander the Great' was based on a manuscript at
the British Museum and was the first Ethiopic text to be published for private
circulation by Lady Meux.a37
She sent Emperor Menelik a copy through Sir Reginald Wingate. Graf
Gleichen, who was present when Menelik received the gift, observed that 'the
king was delighted, and discussed the possibility of having other books similarly
printed '.1as This suggestion was taken up by Lady Meux, as we have seen.
Even to-day over 100 years after Maqdala, it is not unusual to see an
ethiopisant, or in recent years, an Ethiopian of the younger generation, at work
in the British Museum's Oriental Reading Room turning the leaves of one of
the manuscripts which the great Emperor had collected.
Determined in all things, Tewodros succeeded in assembling what Zanutto
considered to be the 'most important' among the collections ever brought
together in Ethiopia.139 Never before, as far as history tells us, had a library of
1000 manuscripts been gathered in the country. Even to-day Ethiopia has not
seen its like.140
135 ibid., II, 397-8.

136 Wright, op. cit., p. iv.
137 E. A. W. Budge (ed. and tr.), The life and exploits of Alexander the Great,Cambridge, 1896.
138 E. Gleichen, With the mission to Menelik 1897, London, 1898, 145.
139Zanutto, op. cit., 144.
paper uses a modified form of the transliteration system devised by Stephen Wright
140 This
and adopted by the Institute of Ethiopian Studies; it recommends that the very well established
names of a few people and places be left in the commonly accepted spelling. This recommendation
has in general been followed here.

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The Library of Emperor Tewodros II at Mäqdäla (Magdala)

Author(s): Rita Pankhurst

The Emperor Tewodros II (1855-68), although remembered to-day mainly

According to the chronicleof the Emperorwritten by Alaqa Wilda Maryam,

5 Mondon-Vidailhet, op. cit., 22, 49-50.

it will be of much use as everything will be collected and a prize committee

1872 by Lieutenant-ColonelT. W. Milward,an artilleryofficerwho was appointed

19Milward to Lord Enfield, 27 November 1872, FO 1/29.

commissioned officers relinquished their share of the prize-money.28 To appre-

28 ibid. ; G. B. von Seckendorff, Meine Erlebnisse mit demrenglischen Expeditionscorps in

receipts amounted to ?5,000 '-much more than had been anticipated by

47 This account of the disposal of the manuscripts in Ethiopia is repeated by W. Wright in

9 Flad, op. cit., II, 72.

51 The churches mentioned were: Agula'e Kidana Meherit, Arra Mika'el,

collection, according to Ullendorff. A further five manuscripts, Nos. 40, 41,

In his letter Strelcyn adds that a number of other manuscripts in both

60 Lettersfrom S. Strelcyn to the present writer, 12 and 24 November 1971.

collection of Egyptian and Sftdini antiquities preserved in the museum at

"6 Budge, op. cit., p. xiv.

68 Times, 12 January 1911.

83 Cerulli, art. cit., 310.

interpreters of the Abyssinian force.88 Because the expedition was organized

description given, were restored. His Lordship therefore directs me to request

102 Hammond to Jones, 29 November 1872, FO 1/29.

Le Roux's elation was set down in a passage which reflects favourably on

113 ibid., 115-16.

octagonal church, Dabra Hayl Qeddus Raguel, founded by the Emperor at

TABLE INDICATING THE DISPERSAL OF TEWODROS'S LIBRARY

Collection Possible Probable Certain or

Lady Meux collection (now dispersed) 5 5 5

Germany (German Democratic Republic)

'The collection of manuscripts deposited in the British Museum by the

134 Holland and Hozier, op. cit., II, 397.

135 ibid., II, 397-8.

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