Ethiopia

Ethiopia

A country of ancient civilization and extraordinary vistas is how one would describe Ethiopia. An ancient monarchical state, Ethiopia is Africa’s oldest nation, which has escaped the clutches of the colonization and always remained an independent state. Situated on what is known as the ‘horn of the Africa’, Ethiopia is a landlocked country-sharing border with Eritrea, Djibouti, Somalia, Kenya south Sudan and North Sudan. A site of pre-historic human settlement, Ethiopia has a rich history, an indigenous culture and its own language (Amharic) and alphabetic structure. It is also one of the world’s most ancient Christian countries.
Judging by the story of the Queen of Sheba and King Solomon recounted in the Old Testament and elaborated at great length in the Ethiopian epic, The Kebre Negest (Glory of the Kings), the rest of the world commonly acknowledges 3000 years of Ethiopian civilization. Comparing the history of most of the countries of the world, a national legacy of even 3000 years is quite remarkable. This is especially so when that means an uninterrupted and independent march of the history of a people, organized as a polity, answering to very much the same set of self-identifying values and symbols, and occupying more or less the same geographical area.

Abyssinia

He was an extra-Biblical son of Cush, son of Ham, said to have founded the city ofAxum. In English, and generally outside of Ethiopia, the country was once historically known as Abyssinia. This toponym was derived from the Latinized form of the ancient Habash.