Abyssinia

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Al-Habash
)
For other uses, see Abyssinia (disambiguation).
For the modern country of Ethiopia, see Ethiopia.
Abyssinia
ሐበሠተ (
Ge'ez)
الحبشة (Arabic)
Historical region
1887 Italian map of Abyssinia
1887 Italian map of Abyssinia
Country Ethiopia
 Eritrea

Abyssinia (also known as Abyssinie, Abissinia, Habessinien or Al-Habash) was an ancient region in the Horn of Africa situated in the northern highlands of modern-day Ethiopia and Eritrea.[1] The term was widely used as a synonym for Ethiopia until the mid-20th century and primarily designates the Amhara, Tigrayan and Tigrinya inhabited highlands of Ethiopia and Eritrea.[2][3]

History

The origin of the term might be found in Egyptian hieroglyphic as the designation of a southern region near the Red Sea that produced incense, known as ḫbś.tj.w, "the bearded ones" (i.e Punt). This etymological connection was first pointed out by Wilhelm Max Müller and Eduard Glaser in 1893.[2][3]

In Epigraphic South Arabian texts the name ḤBS²T in various inscriptions.

Zabīd on the coastal plain to the Ḥimyarite capital Ẓafār.[2] Abasēnoi was located by Hermann von Wissman as a region in the Jabal Ḥubaysh mountain in Ibb Governorate,[4] perhaps related in etymology with the ḥbš Semitic root).[5] Modern Western European languages, including English, appear to borrow this term from the post-classical form Abissini in the mid-16th century. (English Abyssin is attested from 1576, and Abissinia and Abyssinia from the 1620s.)[6]

Al-Habash was known in

Barbara, the Habash are recorded in the first century Greek travelogue the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea as engaging in extensive commercial trade with Egypt, among other areas. The document also relates a strong connection with the "Frankincense Country" in the Mahra region of modern Yemen and a symbiotic relationship with the ancient Sabaeans, with whom the Habash were allied.[7]

See also

References

  1. ^ Sven Rubenson, The survival of Ethiopian independence, (Tsehai, 2003), p.30.
  2. ^ a b c d Uhlig, Siegbert, ed. Encyclopaedia Aethiopica: D-Ha. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2005. p. 948.
  3. ^ a b c Breyer, Francis (2016). "The Ancient Egyptian Etymology of Ḥabašāt "Abessinia"". Ityop̣is. Extra Issue II: 8–18.
  4. ^ Jabal Ḩubaysh, Geoview.info, retrieved 2018-01-11
  5. ^ Uhlig, Siegbert, ed. Encyclopaedia Aethiopica;: D-Ha. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2005. pp. 949.
  6. ^ "Abyssin, n. and adj". Oxford English Dictionary. Oxford University Press. Retrieved 25 September 2020.
  7. ^ Wilfred Harvey Schoff, The Periplus of the Erythraean Sea: travel and trade in the Indian Ocean, (Longmans, Green, and Co., 1912) p.62

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