Dil Na'od

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Dil Na'od was the last negus of Axum before the Zagwe dynasty of Ethiopia. He lived in either the 9th or 10th centuries. Dil Na'od was the younger son of Ged'a Jan (or Degna Djan), and succeeded his older brother 'Anbasa Wedem as negus.^[1] According to Wallis Budge, "The reign of Delna'ad was short, perhaps about ten years."^[2]

Dil Na'od is recorded as both campaigning in the Ethiopian highlands south of Axum, and sending missionaries into that region. With Abuna Salama I, he helped to build the church of Debre Igziabher overlooking Lake Hayq.^[3]

He was defeated by Mara Takla Haymanot, a prince from Lasta province, who married Dil Na'od's daughter, Masaba Warq. According to tradition, a son of Dil Na'od was carried to Amhara, (possibly to present day Ambassel, near Lake Hayq) where he was harbored, until his descendants overthrew the Zagwe, and reëstablished the Solomonic dynasty.

[edit] References

1. ^ Taddesse Tamrat, Church and State in Ethiopia (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1972), p. 55 n.3.
2. ^ E. A. Walis Budge, A History of Ethiopia: Nubia and Abyssinia, 1928 (Oosterhout, the Netherlands: Anthropological Publications, 1970), p. 276.
3. ^ Paul B. Henze, Layers of Time (New York: Palgrave, 2000), pp. 47f.

[edit] External links

• Biography of Del Na'ad by Belaynesh Michael for The Dictionary of Ethiopian Biography