Royal kin and queens · The Zagwe kingdom of Lalibela · as at first light, 1 January 1200

Masqal Kibra

Lalibela's queen, later venerated as a saint.

In the Gadla Lalibela she fled with him from his brother's attempts on his life and waited for him in a convent closed to men while he was, in the tradition, in Jerusalem. With the king she endowed convents in Shimezana on the Eritrean plateau (Taddesse Tamrat). She stands at the centre of a court party of Bugna: her brother Hirun holds high place, and after about 1205 she presses the metropolitan Mika'el to make him a bishop.

She distrusts Na'akueto La'ab, the son of the deposed king, as a threat to her own son Yetbarak, and has him watched near the capital; tradition makes her the one who persuades Lalibela to abdicate in Na'akueto La'ab's favour and then to take the crown back. Local tradition credits her with the church of Bete Abba Libanos at Roha, built as a memorial after the king's death.

Who he is

Name
Masqal Kibra
Title
Queen
Since
Married before Lalibela's accession: in the Gadla she shared his flight from Harbe's attempts on his life
Born
Not known
Family
Wife of Lalibela; mother of Yetbarak; sister (in an Arabic source) of Hirun, a courtier whom she later has made bishop
Confidence
medium

Taddesse Tamrat 1972, pp. 59-63, 115 (Shimezana grants); Dictionary of Ethiopian Biography, 'Hirun'

Overlord

Lalibela

What it holds

  • Her household at court in Bugna
  • Patronage of convents in Shimezana, endowed with land by the king and queen (Eritrean plateau, outside this area)
  • Influence over church appointments through her brother Hirun

How it was acquired

By marriage.

Allies and rivals

Allies: her brother Hirun and the men of Bugna at court; her son Yetbarak. Rival: Na'akueto La'ab and the partisans of the deposed Harbe; later the metropolitan Mika'el.

How things stand that morning

At court; her son Yetbarak is a child or a young man (age not recorded). Her brother's elevation to bishop is still to come.

Wealth

Not recorded beyond her household and her grants to convents.

Military

None of her own recorded.

Threats

  • The deposed line's claim, carried by Na'akueto La'ab

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

  1. About 1205-1209She induces the new metropolitan Mika'el to make Hirun a bishop; the quarrel that follows ends with Mika'el's flight to Egypt.Depends on: Mika'el's arrival about 1205. Stopped by: A different metropolitan, or the king refusing her.

Where the sources disagree

  • Hirun is the queen's brother only in an Arabic source; other readings of his name are Gabron, Hetron and Gedrun.

Evidence: The Gadla Lalibela and the History of the Patriarchs (via Taddesse Tamrat and the Dictionary of Ethiopian Biography).

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

  1. Taddesse Tamrat, Church and State in Ethiopia 1270-1527 (Oxford 1972), pp. 53-64 (the Zagwe), 98, 121-124
  2. Wikipedia, 'Gebre Mesqel Lalibela' (after Taddesse Tamrat, Getachew Mekonnen Hasen, Sergew Hable Selassie)
  3. Dictionary of Ethiopian Biography (1975), 'Hirun (Gabron)'

Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.