The Eritrean plateau north of the Mareb and Belesa, heir of the old Aksumite north: Tigrinya-speaking Christian farmers of barley, wheat and teff in villages with their churches, under their own petty chiefs.
Since the late seventh or eighth century Beja groups had moved onto the plateau, and the Balaw, of Beja origin and said to be Christian, are remembered as its dominant people before the late thirteenth century. Taddesse Tamrat counts Hamasien and Serae among the northern highlands under Zagwe suzerainty, and a land grant of King Lalibela kept at Debre Libanos of Ham confirms it; Zagwe-period documents name a governor of the lands between the highlands and the sea (maekele bahr). The Bahr Negash ('king of the sea') who later rules this ground from Debarwa is an office of the fifteenth century; the Agaw settlers from Lasta who replaced the Balaw arrive about the end of the thirteenth century (later).
Who holds it
- Title
- Local chiefs of the plateau districts, tributary to the Zagwe king; a governor of the lands towards the sea (maekele bahr) in Zagwe-period documents
- Since
- Not applicable
- Confidence
- low
Overlord
The Zagwe king Gebre Meskel Lalibela (eth sheet). A land grant of Lalibela preserved at the monastery of Debre Libanos (Ham, in Akele Guzai) is the evidence that his rule reached this plateau.
How things stand that morning
No war recorded. North the Beja of the Sahel and the Anseba (nil sheet); east the Saho escarpment and the Dahlak sultan's Massawa; south, across the Mareb, Zagwe Tigray (eth sheet).
Customs
Village and kin land-holding (the later resti system is attested much later); church lands; tribute to the king's governor.
Assemblies
Village elders; details for 1200 not recorded.
Overlord claims
The Zagwe king's suzerainty; tribute and church grants.
Where the sources disagree
- The Medri Bahri article dates the first appearance of a 'sea-king' title variously (a grant of the Zagwe king Tatadim, the early twelfth century, or the fifteenth century under Zara Yaqob); for 1200 only the maekele bahr governor is safe, and even he is not pinned to that year.
Evidence: A Zagwe land grant at Debre Libanos and later tradition; no description of the plateau in 1200.
On the map: The plateau's northern and western edges against the Beja are uncertain.
Primary sources for Zagwe kingdom
Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.
- The Glory of the Kings, Yeshaq of Aksum (compiler) (1314 to 1322 in Ge'ez; the colophon claims an Arabic version of 1225). Nothing on events, but the ideology that unmade the Zagwe: the story that Ethiopia's rightful kings descend from Solomon and Menelik, compiled a century after 1200 to justify Yekuno Amlak's seizure of the throne in 1270 and to brand the Zagwe as usurpers. Read online
- History of the Patriarchs of the Coptic Church of Alexandria, Mawhub ibn Mansur ibn Mufarrij and continuators (Various) (compiled in Arabic 1088 to 1094 from Coptic lives; continued for the patriarchs of 1102 to 1243 and later). The Coptic church's own record. Read online
- The Golden Gospel of Dabra Libanos: Zagwe land grants (the acts were entered on the Gospel's blank leaves from the twelfth century onward; the Zagwe acts date from about 1150 to 1270). The only documents of the Zagwe state: grants of land and rights written into a Gospel book at Dabra Libanos of Ham in Eritrea, in the names of Zagwe kings (Tantawedem, Lalibela with his queen Masqal Kebra, Na'akueto La'ab) and their officers, with lists of estates and titles.
- The History of the Churches and Monasteries of Egypt and some Neighbouring Countries, Abu al-Makarim (formerly attributed to Abu Salih the Armenian) (about 1177 to 1208; the core about 1200). The one Christian text written in Egypt around 1200 that looks south: it describes the kingdom of the Nubians with its king at Dongola, his churches, the eparch of Nobadia, the churches of Qasr Ibrim and the raid of Shams al-Dawla Turanshah in 1173, the kingdom of Alwa (Alodia) with its 400 churches and its capital Soba, and the Abyssinians with their king, their metropolitan sent from Alexandria, the church of Aksum and the Ark, as a Coptic churchman heard of them through the patriarchate. Read online
- The Life of Lalibela (probably the fifteenth century, from earlier material; the date is disputed). The only narrative about the Zagwe king who reigned in 1200: Lalibela's birth at Roha, the persecution by his brother King Harbay (Harbe), his exile and marriage to Masqal Kebra, his vision of Jerusalem, his accession, the building of the rock churches with angelic help, and his abdication in favour of his nephew Na'akueto La'ab. Read online
Sources and studies
- Wikipedia: Medri Bahri (after Taddesse Tamrat and the Debre Libanos documents)
- Taddesse Tamrat, Ethiopia, the Red Sea and the Horn, in Cambridge History of Africa vol. 3 (1977); from the researcher's knowledge and the Wikipedia summaries citing it, not re-read
Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.