Manfred Kropp | Akateeminen Kirjakauppa

Amda-Seyons "chronicle" is in fact a detailed report of a year's (1332 AD) campaign of the king against a coalition of Muslim petty kingdoms in Ethiopia's southeast. It was most probably written by an eye witness of the events who furthermore disposed of some document material. Because of its pure language and elegant style as well as its masterly compostion as a true Christian hero's drama it must be ranged among the best products of Ge'ez medieval literature. Published for the first time more than hundred years ago it proved even in its deficient edition and rather tentative translation to be a principal source for the history of Ethiopia in the 14th century. Other sources for the same period are extremely rare, the historical tradition deriving from the Muslim counterpart included. The new critical edition made of all available mss. provides the long needed sound textual base for further research. The slightly commented translation, as well as the introduction, sums up the results of scholarly discussion so far; comparison is made to fragments of Muslim chronicles in Arabic and a few, partially unpublished documents in Ethiopic texts.
The documentary value of the long list of Muslim contingents and territories in the coalition has been established: a real gazetteer of that region. The second - important from the historical and literary point of view - is that this text stands in a long tradition of Ethiopic historiography, near to hagiography (in the style of Lalibala's the Zagwe king's vita) where the manierated search for authentic and pure Ge'ez expression covers almost the Amharic reality of the time.