Rauso

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Rauso was a region in the Horn of Africa in Late Antiquity. [1] [2]

Contents

Geography

The Monumentum Adulitanum is a third-century monumental inscription by an anonymous King of Axum recording his various victories in war. [3] It is lost, but its text was copied down in the 6th century by Cosmas Indicopleustes in his Christian Topography . It describes how he conquered a land and people called Rauso to the west of Aromata. The description of the land is congruous with modern-day Dollo Zone and Haud [4] [5] also translated "Land of Incense" [6] or "Frankincense Country": [7] [8]

I subjugated the peoples of Rauso who live in the midst of incense-gathering barbarians between great waterless plains. [4] [5]

British Anglican priest William Vincent described the region of Rauso as stretching westwards from Aromata all the way to the hinterlands of the hitherto prospective Adal Kingdom. [9] During its extant existence, the contemporary polity to the north of Rauso was Sesea. [10] The region of Rauso could also be congruous with the Nugaal plains of northern Somalia. [11] It may have been located further inland towards the Ethiopian highlands near Raaso. [12] Laurence P. Kirwan identified it with the Danakil Desert, inhabited today by the Afar. [13] [14]

Politics

Frederick Guest Tomlins described Rauso as a kingdom. [15] It also had an alternative toponym by the epithet of Raithus, or as Ptolemy used to call it; Rhaptus. It used to exchange ordained religious ministers with the northern principalities. [16] A predominant religion practised during the Rauso period was Waaqism. [17] During the classical era, through contact with Hadhramaut and Himyarite traders, the Rauso kingdom had contact with Abrahamic religions too, in the form of Christianity in the former and Judaism in the latter, and some of these populations had settled and became Somalized. The pre-Rauso era is largely regarded as corresponding with Lowland East Cushitic history. [18] [19]

Rauso was situated in the vicinity of a major trade route linking the interiors of Ethiopia with the coast; thus it was part of the wider incense and aromatics trade centred in Barbaria. [20] [21] It was bordered to the south by various Horner and Cushitic tribal groupings such as the Northern Azanians, the Ormas, the Bazrangids, the Tunni, and Gabooye. [22] Sometime during the latter half of the 1st millennium, Rauso was replaced by the Jabarta and Ximan civilizations. [23] Concurrently, there also existed a predominantly Christian civilization called Harli towards the north in the Nugaal Valley. [24] [25]

Related Research Articles

Cush or Kush, according to the Hebrew Bible, was the oldest son of Ham and a grandson of Noah. He was the brother of Mizraim, Phut, and Canaan. Cush was the father of Nimrod.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ezana of Axum</span> 4th-century ruler of the Kingdom of Aksum

Ezana, was the ruler of the Kingdom of Aksum. One of the best-documented rulers of Aksum, Ezana is important as he is the country's first king to embrace Christianity and make it the official religion. Tradition states that Ezana succeeded his father Ella Amida (Ousanas) as king while still a child but his mother, Sofya then served as regent until he came of age.

Aromata, also called the Spice Port, was an ancient seaport and emporium in the Horn of Africa, today a part of Somalia. It lay near the tip of Cape Guardafui, which was itself called the "promontory of spices". It was notable for its produce of resins and various herbs.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Adulis</span> Ancient city and port in Red Sea

Adulis was an ancient city along the Red Sea in the Gulf of Zula, about 40 kilometers (25 mi) south of Massawa. Its ruins lie within the modern Eritrean city of Zula. It was the emporium considered part of the D’mt and the Kingdom of Aksum. It was close to Greece and the Byzantine Empire, with its luxury goods and trade routes. Its location can be included in the area known to the ancient Egyptians as the Land of Punt, perhaps coinciding with the locality of Wddt, recorded in the geographical list of the Eighteenth Dynasty of Egypt.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Zagwe dynasty</span> Kingdom in northern Ethiopia and Eritrea (1137–1270)

The Zagwe dynasty was a medieval Agaw monarchy that ruled the northern parts of Ethiopia and Eritrea. The Agaw are a Cushitic ethnic group native to the northern highlands of Ethiopia and neighboring Eritrea. It ruled large parts of the territory from approximately 1137 to 1270 AD, when the last Zagwe King Za-Ilmaknun was killed in battle by the forces of the Amhara King Yekuno Amlak. The Zagwe are most famous for their king Gebre Meskel Lalibela, who is credited with having ordered the construction of the rock-hewn monolithic churches of Lalibela.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Agaw people</span> Cushitic ethnic group native to the Horn of Africa

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sembrouthes</span> King of Aksum

Sembrouthes was a King of the Kingdom of Aksum who most likely reigned sometime in the 3rd century. He is known only from a single inscription in Ancient Greek that was found at Dekemhare, Hamasien in modern-day Eritrea, which is dated to his 24th regnal year. Sembrouthes was the first known ruler in the lands later ruled by the Emperor of Ethiopia to adopt the title "King of Kings". He is a probable candidate for the king who erected the Monumentum Adulitanum.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Israel of Axum</span> King of Aksum

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Aksumite currency</span> Coinage produced and used in the Kingdom of Aksum

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The Monumentum Adulitanum, so named by Leo Allatius, was an ancient inscription written in Greek, depicting the military campaigns of an anonymous king. The original text was inscribed on a throne in Adulis. Although the inscription has never been discovered by archaeologists, it is known about through the copying of the inscription by Cosmas Indicopleustes, a 6th-century Greek traveler-monk. The text narrates the king's military campaigns in the African continent and in the Arabian peninsula. It is thought to be between 200 and 270 AD.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ethiopia in the Middle Ages</span> History of Ethiopia from 7th to 16th centuries

The history of Ethiopia in the Middle Ages roughly spans the period from the decline of the Kingdom of Aksum in the 7th century to the Gondarine period beginning in the 17th century. Aksum had been a powerful empire during late antiquity, appearing in the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea and mentioned by Iranian prophet Mani as one of the "four great kingdoms on earth", along with the Sasanian Empire of Persia, the Roman Empire, and China's Three Kingdoms. The kingdom was an integral part of the trade route between Rome and the Indian subcontinent, had substantial cultural ties to the Greco-Roman world, and was a very early adopter of Christianity under Ezana of Aksum in the mid-4th century. The use of "Ethiopia" to refer to the region dates back to the 4th century. At its height, the kingdom spanned what is now Eritrea, northern Ethiopia, eastern Sudan, Yemen and the southern part of what is now Saudi Arabia. However, by the 7th century, the kingdom had begun a slow decline, for which several possible political, economic, and ecological reasons have been proposed. This decline, which has been termed the "Post-Aksumite Period", saw extreme loss of territory and lasted until the ascension of the Zagwe dynasty.

Abreha and Atsbeha were brothers and Aksumite rulers who were said to have adopted Christianity in the 4th-century, although this claim is dubious. The story of Abreha and Atsbeha is lifted from that of the historical personages King Ezana and his brother Saizana. Stuart Munro-Hay has also speculated that the myth may have emerged from a confusion with two other religious Aksumite figures: Kaleb of Axum, whose throne name was Ella Atsbeha, and Abraha, an Aksumite general who promoted Christianity in Yemen.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ancient Somali city-states</span> Ancient city-states of Somalia

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References

  1. ↑ Munro-Hay, S. C. (Stuart C. ) (2002). Ethiopia, the unknown land : a cultural and historical guide. Internet Archive. London ; New York : I.B. Tauris. p. 235. ISBN   978-1-86064-744-4.
  2. ↑ Shitomi, Yuzo (1997). "A New Interpretation of the Monumentum Adulitanum". Memoirs of the Research Department of the Toyo Bunko (The Oriental Library). 55: 81–102. ISSN   0082-562X.
  3. ↑ Hatke, George (2013-01-07), "3. The Third Century CE: Monumentum Adulitanum II (RIE 277)", Aksum and Nubia, New York University Press, pp. 37–66, doi:10.18574/nyu/9780814760666.003.0003, ISBN   978-0-8147-6278-3
  4. 1 2 Stuart Munro-Hay, Aksum: An African Civilization of Late Antiquity (Edinburgh University Press, 1991), p. 187.
  5. 1 2 Munro-Hay, Ethiopia, the Unknown Land: A Cultural and Historical Guide (I. B. Tauris, 2003), p. 235.
  6. ↑ Y. Shitomi (1997), "A New Interpretation of the Monumentum Adulitanum", Memoirs of the Research Department of the Toyo Bunko55, 81–102.
  7. ↑ Baumgarten, Siegmund Jacob (1756). Übersetzung der algemeinen Welthistorie: die in Engeland durch eine Geselschaft von Gelehrten ausgefertiget worden : nebst den Anmerkungen der holländischen Übersetzung auch vielen neuen Kupfern und Karten (in German). Gebauer. p. 321.
  8. ↑ Mountnorris, George Annesley; Valentia, George Viscount (1809). Voyages and Travels to India, Ceylon, The Red Sea, Abyssinia, and Egypt in the Years 1802, 1803, 1804, 1805, and 1806. Miller. p. 198.
  9. ↑ Vincent, William (1800). The Periplus of the Erythrean Sea. Cadell and Davies. p. 61.
  10. ↑ Vincent, William (1807). The Commerce and Navigation of the Ancients in the Indian Ocean. T. Cadell and W. Davies. p. 548.
  11. ↑ Sources for the History of Arabia (in Arabic). University of Riyadh Press. 1979. p. 95.
  12. ↑ (the Melodian), Saint Cosmas (1992). Topografia cristiana: libri I-V (in Italian). M. D'Auria. p. 68. ISBN   978-88-7092-088-8.
  13. ↑ L. P. Kirwan (1972), "The Christian Topography and the Kingdom of Axum", The Geographical Journal, 138(2), p. 174. doi : 10.2307/1795960
  14. ↑ Kirwan, Laurence (2002). Studies on the History of Late Antique and Christian Nubia. Ashgate Variorum. p. 42. ISBN   978-0-86078-893-5.
  15. ↑ Tomlins, Frederick Guest (1844). A Universal History of the Nations of Antiquity: Comprising a Complete History of the Jews, from the Creation to the Present Time : Likewise an Account of Ancient Syria, Grecian Islands, Persian Empire, Armenia, Numidia, Ethiopia, Arabia, Scythia, the Celtes, &c. &c. &c. : to which are Prefixed the Various Theories of Creation, According to the Most Esteemed Ancient and Modern Writers. W. Milner. p. 846.
  16. ↑ Tomlins, Frederick Guest (1844). A Universal History of the Nations of Antiquity: Comprising a Complete History of the Jews, from the Creation to the Present Time : Likewise an Account of Ancient Syria, Grecian Islands, Persian Empire, Armenia, Numidia, Ethiopia, Arabia, Scythia, the Celtes, &c. &c. &c. : to which are Prefixed the Various Theories of Creation, According to the Most Esteemed Ancient and Modern Writers. W. Milner. p. 846.
  17. ↑ Ahmed, Akbar S. (2013-10-16). Islam in Tribal Societies: From the Atlas to the Indus. Routledge. pp. 127–128. ISBN   978-1-134-56527-6.
  18. ↑ Tindel, Raymond D. "Archaeological Survey of Yemen: The First Season." Current Anthropology 21.1 (1980): 101-102.
  19. ↑ Glen W. Bowersock, The Throne of Adulis: Red Sea Wars on the Eve of Islam (Oxford University Press, 2013), pp. 47, 51–53.
  20. ↑ Henze, Paul B. (2000). Layers of Time: A History of Ethiopia. Hurst & Company. p. 29. ISBN   978-1-85065-393-6.
  21. ↑ Kirwan, Laurence (2002). Studies on the History of Late Antique and Christian Nubia. Ashgate Variorum. p. 42. ISBN   978-0-86078-893-5.
  22. ↑ Martin, E.G. (1974). "Mahdism and Holy Wars in Ethiopia Before 1600". Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies. 4: 106–117. ISSN   0308-8421. JSTOR   41223140.
  23. ↑ Mashhūr, ʻAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Muḥammad (1984). شمس الظهيرة في نسب اهل البيت من بني علوي فروع فاطمة الزهراء وامير المؤمنين علي رضي الله عنه (in Arabic). عالم المعرفة،. p. 112.
  24. ↑ M-Shidad Hussein, S. (2021-04-03). "Ruined towns in Nugaal: a forgotten medieval civilisation in interior Somalia". Azania: Archaeological Research in Africa. 56 (2): 250–271. doi:10.1080/0067270X.2021.1925025. ISSN   0067-270X.
  25. ↑ Society, Royal Geographical. Supplementary Papers Page. p. 551. They called the people " Harli," and said they were there prior to the Gallas. The latter had dug the rocky wells at Kirrid which we saw on first entering the country, and had cut a rude Christian cross in the face of the cave—■ the only ancient sign existing of a rude form of Christianity in the land
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