Menelik, the Lion of Judah

Credit: Menelik, the Lion of Judah
Photograph by Alfred Ilg, 1896
© Völkerkundemuseum der Universität Zürich, VMZ 805.01.001

Emiye Menelik [“my mother, Menelik”] led Ethiopia into the 20th century.

Menelik II
1844–1913, b. Angolalla, Ethiopia
Reigned 1889–1913 over Ethiopian Empire from Addis Ababa

Ethiopia has need of no one, she stretches her hand unto God.
—Emperor Menelik II, renouncing Italy’s claims to Ethiopia, 1893

• Crowned ruler of the constituent kingdom of Shewa, Menelik claimed descent from the union of King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba. Outmaneuvering rivals, he received the imperial crown on Nov. 3, 1889.
• Menelik decisively rejected an Italian attempt to establish a protectorate over Ethiopia in 1893 and repelled Italy’s military invasion at Adwa in 1896.
• Menelik expanded and consolidated the borders of the Ethiopian state, suppressed the slave trade, established new ministries, built a new imperial capital—Addis Ababa—and introduced a series of new technologies, including the railway, electricity, telephones, automobiles, and indoor plumbing.