Ali II of Yejju

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Ali II of Yejju (c.1819 - c.1866) was a Ras of Begemder and Enderase (Regent) of the Emperor of Ethiopia. He was the son of Alula of Yejju, sometime governor of Damot and then of Gojjam, and Menen Liben Amede, later Empress of Ethiopia, and grandson of Gugsa of Yejju, by his fourth wife, Amata Selassie, daughter of Emperor Tekle Giyorgis.

After the death of his grand-uncle, Marye of Yejju, Ali was appointed Ruler of Begemder and Imperial Regent at the age of 12 in a meeting of the chief nobles of the Yejju Oromo at the dynastic capital of Debre Tabor in July 1831,1 - and for himself, a minor, a council of regents was appointed from these nobles. Ras Ali was officially a Christian, but his contemporaries doubted the sincerity of his faith and suspected that he was a secret Muslim; some modern scholars consider him as indifferent to religion as he was to the problems of ruling his portion of Ethiopia, although Trimingham observes that he attempted to revive the cult of Ahmad Gragn by requiring pilgrimages to his tomb.2 In any case, the morale of the Ethiopian Church reached its lowest point in the 1840s and 1850s.

For much his reign Ras Ali was constantly at war, either putting down rebellions in his core territories, or defending his territory from rival warlords. In one of these continual campaigns, Ras Ali II plundered the imperial capital Gondar in 1838.3

Ras Ali made Sahle Dengel Emperor in 1832, but the clergy of Azazo disapproved of the new Emperor's religious beliefs, and convinced Ras Ali to remove him. Sahle Dengel was sent to Zengaj, and Ras Ali recalled Gebre Krestos from Mesraha, an island in Lake Tana, and restored him as Emperor. However, Gebre Krestos died after three months, and Sahle Dengel convinced Ras Ali to restore him to the throne once again (October, 1832).

Ras Ali married Hirut, the daughter of Dejazmach Wube Haile Maryam, sometime lord of Semien and of Tigray; when he placed her in the church of Mahdere Maryam for her safety before the Battle of Debre Tabor (6 February 1842), his opponents violated the refuge of the church and kidnapped her. Their only daughter Tewabech (1831-58) was married 1848 to Kassa Hailu of Qwara, who in 1854 proclaimed himself a Negus then in 1855, having captured and deposed Emperor Sahle Dengel, was enthroned as Emperor of Ethiopia with the throne name of Tewodros II, whereby Tewabech became his first Empress. They had no surviving issue.

Ali II was decisively defeated by his son-in-law Dejazmach Kassa (who later assumed the throne name of Tewodros II) in the Battle of Ayshal on 29 June 1853. He was deposed of the regentship and his territories. At first he fled to safety at a local church, then a few days later fled to the territories of his kinsmen in Wollo province, where he disappeared to history. However both Protky4 and Trimingham5 give the date of 1866 for his death, without further details.

[edit] Notes

  1. Mordechai Abir, The Era of the Princes: the Challenge of Islam and the Re-unification of the Christian Empire, 1769-1855 (London: Longmans, 1968), p. 38.
  2. J. Spencer Trimingham, Islam in Ethiopia (Oxford: Geoffrey Cumberlege for the University Press, 1952), p. 111
  3. Abir, Era of the Princes, p. 111f
  4. Chris Proutky, Empress Taytu and Menelik II: Ethiopia 1883-1910 (Trenton: The Red Sea Press, 1986), p. 27n
  5. Trimingham, Islam, p. 110
Preceded by
Ras Marye		 Chiefs of the Yejju Oromo Succeeded by
none
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