November 2, 2018

Aksum, the Capital City

By Stuart Munro-Hay

1. The Site

Aksum was built on gently sloping land which rose, north and east of the city, to two flat-topped hills, now called Beta Giyorgis and Mai Qoho respectively. The hills around the town are formed from a granitic rock, nepheline syenite (Littmann 1913: II, 6; Butzer 1981). Between Beta Giyorgis and Mai Qoho runs the course of a stream, the Mai Hejja or Mai Malahso in its upper reaches, which rises on the eastern slopes of Beta Giyorgis. Further west another stream bed, that of the Mai Lahlaha, also descends from the top of Beta Giyorgis. Run-off from the Mai Hejja and down the flanks of Mai Qoho above the town is caught in a large excavated basin, officially called Mai Shum, but often referred locally to as the `Queen of Sheba’s bath’. This is said to have been dug by one of the later metropolitan bishops of Aksum, Samuel, in the reign of king Yeshaq in about 1473 (Salt 1812; Monneret de Villard 1938: 49), but may very well be of Aksumite origin, enlarged or cleared by Samuel, just as it has been again enlarged and cleared recently. The basin lies directly below the north-west side of Mai Qoho, and access to it from above is aided by a series of steps cut into the rock, which may also date back to Aksumite times. Butzer thought that there was evidence for an earth dam some 50 m. below the Mai Shum reservoir (Butzer 1981: 479), and it is possible that much more water was caught or diverted in Aksumite times than today. Water was probably a very important element in the development of Aksum as the capital city of ancient Ethiopia. The name of the town itself is thought to be composed of two words, ak and shum, the first of Cushitic and the second of Semitic origin, meaning water and chieftain respectively (Sergew Hable Sellassie 1972: 68; Tubiana 1958). This name `Chieftain’s Water’ seems to suggest that Aksum could have been the site of a spring or at least a good water supply, and perhaps it early became the seat of an important local ruler.

Illustration 17. A view of Aksum taken from below Mai Qoho hill looking over the Stelea Park towards Beta Giyorgis hill.

The two streams run south, that of the Mai Hejja skirting Mai Qoho hill (in its lower course it takes on different names, such as the Mai Barea, or the Mai Matare), and the Mai Lahlaha running directly through the town. Both lose themselves in the broad plain of Hasabo facing the town to the south and east. The two hills, both reaching to around the 2200 m mark above sea level, rise about 100 m above the town area, enclosing and sheltering it on two sides. Nowadays they are almost bare of trees, except where recent eucalyptus planting has occurred, but in Aksumite times there is the reason to believe that they were probably forested to some extent. The geomorphologist Karl Butzer, exploring the area around Aksum, found that in the plateau of the Shire, of which the Aksum region is part, were remnant stands of trees favoring a more moist climate, whilst the present montane savanna vegetation is the result of intensive human activity (Butzer 1981: 474- 6). Only a few great sycomores still stand, some of which appear on Salt’s aquatint of 1809, which also shows a fair scattering of other trees around the stelae and on the slopes of Beta Giyorgis.

The streams, which are seasonal, may either have run more continually in ancient times when the rainfall was more constant or have been supplemented by permanent springs. Possibly such springs helped to keep the Aksumite Mai Shum filled. In any event, travelers like Bruce (1790: III, 460-1) noted that there were springs functioning relatively recently and that the town was able to maintain gardens, though this was of course in its less populous days. Nathaniel Pearce, who lived in Ethiopia from 1810- 1819, declared

“There is no river within two miles of Axum, but the inhabitants have good well water; there are many wells hidden, and even in the plain have been found, but the people are too lazy to clear them from rubbish. It appears probable that, in ancient times, almost every house had its well, as I have been at the clearing of four, situated at not more than ten yards from each other. The stone of which they are constructed is the same kind of granite of which the obelisks are formed” (Pearce 1831: 162-3).

Illustration 18. The reservoir Mai Shum in its present enlarged state. Photos BIEA.

A well was found near the Tomb of the False Door, probably sunk to serve one of the houses built over the Stele Park in later times (Chittick 1974: fig. 2). Such wells would have been essential for those who lived at a distance from the streams, and also would have helped to make the inhabitants more independent of the behavior of the natural springs and streams available.

Alvares (Beckingham and Huntingford 1961: 155) mentions a “very handsome tank [or lake of spring water] of masonry [at the foot of a hillock where is now a market]” behind the cathedral, “and upon this masonry are as many other chairs of stone such as those in the enclosure of the church”. Since there are thrones along the rock wall (thought by the DAE, who called it Mehsab Dejazmach Wolde Gabre’el, to be a natural formation (Littmann 1913: I, 31), but illustrated by Kobishchanov (1979: 118) as `cross-section of fortification embankment’) on the west side of Mai Qoho, Alvares’ description could possibly refer to this. The rock-wall, whether natural or man-made, could have acted as a retaining wall to waters overflowing from the Mai Hejja, or down the slopes of Mai Qoho, (or even from Mai Shum itself), and thus formed a lake of sorts along the foot of Mai Qoho. The word `mehsab’ means something like `washing-place’, which seems to confirm this idea.