King Lalibela

Extending out at the south of the Bet Maryam (The house of Mary) courtyard is the little chapel of Bet Danaghel 8.6 m. length and 3.6 m. height. It’s one of the rock-hewn church in Lalibela.

This small chapel is linked with one of the most fascinating legends of Lalibela. According to a legend recorded in the Ethiopian Book of Martyrs, the chapel was contracted in honor of 50 Christian maiden nuns murdered by the Roman ruler Julian the Apostate in the 4th century. 

Situated just outside the southern wall of the courtyard proper is the twentieth century memorial to Ras Kassa Darge (Ras Kassa was the ruler of central and northwestern Ethiopia, prior to the Italian occupation).

In the courtyard is a pool that is alleged to heal any infertile woman who is dipped into the water three times on Ethiopian. The water level is about 2m below the courtyard, so the women have to be lowered down on a harnessed rope. 

Keywords: Bet Danaghel, Virgins, Martyrs, Bet Maryam, maidens

Bet Medhane Alem is the largest monolithic rock-hewn church in the world, measuring 11.5m in height and covering an area of almost 800m2.

A plain building, held up by 36 pillars on the inside and another 36 around the outside, Bet Medhane Alem has a classical dignity reminiscent of an Ancient Greek temple, a resemblance that has led some experts to imagine it was modeled on the original St Mary Zion Church built by King Ezana at Axum.

The interior of the church is also plain, and its huge size creates a cathedral-like austerity. Graves have been carved into the rock floor; they are no longer permanently occupied, Bet Medhane Alem has a wide courtyard whose walls are pockmarked with niches that originally served as graves or hermits’ caves.

Approaching the most eastern church of this group, Bet Medhane Alem, you first catch a sight of the roof, decorated with relief crosses connected by blind arcades, and the upper part of the solemn colonnade surrounding the church: The roof demonstrates traces of the plaster remains of the restoration efforts of the early 1930’s.

The tuff, from which the church is carved, blazes a typical deep pink color in striking harmony to the brownish-yellow earth and green-leaved trees of the landscape.

It is a dignified structure, standing on its platform with its pitched roof and surrounding external columns, somewhat reminiscent of ancient Greek temple architecture.

Keywords: St Mary Zion Church, Bet Medhane Alem, rock-hewn church,

The Zagwe dynasty ruled Ethiopia from the end of the Kingdom of Axum at an unsure date in the 9th or 10th century to 1270.

It is noted to derive its name from the Agaw people, meaning “Agaw” or literally “of Agaw” (ze meaning “of” in Ge’ez). Its famous king was Gebre Mesqel Lalibela (King Lalibela), who is accountable for the rock-hewn churches of Lalibela.

David Buxton has affirmed that the area under the direct rule of the Zagwe kings probably embraced:

• the highlands of modern Eritrea 
• the whole of Tigrai
• extending southwards to Waag
• Lasta
• Damot (Wallo province) and 
• westwards towards Lake Tana (Beghemdir)

King D’il Nead (the last Axumite king) was overthrown by one of his generals, Tekle Haymanot, who took the regal name of Zagwe and established the dynasty of the same name.

This tradition doesn’t compute with the most likely dates of Yodit’s rule. It has been thought that the Zagwe Dynasty followed straight from Yodit, and was founded by Jews who later converted to Christianity.

This idea is supported by the fact that the Zagwe based themselves in Lasta, which at the time was a strongly Jewish area and was almost likely the birthplace of Yodit.

Nevertheless, the dating of the Zagwe Dynasty is itself rather ambiguous. Various sources date their usurpation of the throne from as far apart as AD922 and 1150, with the latter date favored by more plausible sources.

Among everal traditional lists of Zagwe rulers only seven kings appear on all versions and, rather improbably, all but the last are said to have ruled for exactly 40 years.

Despite the vagueness surrounding dates, the Zagwe leaders appear to have exercised a new stability and unity in Ethiopia.

It also was under the most famous Zagwe king, Lalibela, that Ethiopian Christianity got to the pinnacle of its physical expression in the form of the cluster of rock-hewn churches carved at the Zagwe capital of Roha.

It is widely agreed that the Zagwe period of rule ended when a Solomonic descendant called Yekuno Amlak took the throne in 1270.

Even here, nevertheless, some sources claim that the last Zagwe monarch abdicate of his own free will, other that he was killed in a battle by his Solomonic successor.

Keywords: Kingdom of Axum, Agaw people, King Lalibela, rock-hewn churches, Tekle Haymanot , Eritrea, Tigrai, Lasta, Damot, Wallo, Lake Tana, Beghemdir, D’il Nead,

 From the time when the first European, Francisco Alvarez (visited the holy city between 1521 and 1525), travelers named the rock churches of Lalibela as:

• A “New Jerusalem”
• A “New Golgotha”
• The “Christian Citadel in the Mountains of Wondrous Ethiopia”

The Zagwe dynasty had come to authority in the eleventh century, one hundred years after Queen Judith (also called Gudit), a woman warrior had led her tribes up from the Semein Mountains to demolish Axum (the capital of the ancient Ethiopian empire in the north).

The legend around the founder of this Holy City says that the Queen of Sheba gave birth to Menelik, who became the first King of Ethiopia. The handmaid of the Queen, too, gave birth to a son whose father was King Solomon, and her son was the ancestor of the Zagwe dynasty.

The Zagwe kings governed the country until the thirteenth century, when a well-known priest, Tekla Haymanot, convinced them to renounce in favor of a descendant of the old Axumite Solomonic dynasty.

Nevertheless, according to legend before the throne of Ethiopia was re-established to its lawful rulers, upon command of God and with the help of angels, Lalibela’s zeal converted the royal residence of the Zagwe in the town of Roha in to a prayer of stone.

The Ethiopian Church afterward consecrated him and changed the name of Roha to Lalibela.

Pilgrims to Lalibela shared the same spiritual blessings as pilgrims to Jerusalem, though the focus of political power drifted to the south, to the region of Shoa.

The legend goes on claiming that Lalibela grew up in Roha, where his brother was king. It is said that bees foretold his future greatness and wealth.

The king (his brother), made jealous by this foretelling, tried to poison Lalibela, but the poison only cast him into a death like sleep for three days.

In those three days of sleep an angel carried his soul to heaven to illustrate him the churches which he was to erect.

Returned to earth he left to the wilderness and got a wife (whose name was Maskal Kebra meaning Exalted Cross) upon God’s will and flew with an angel to Jerusalem.

Anointed king under the throne name Gabre Maskal (meaning servant of the cross) Lalibela, built the construction of the churches. With the help of the angels, the entire church took 24 years to be completed.
Do you have any thing to say on the legends connected with the King’s life and the Holy City?

Keywords: New Jerusalem, New Golgotha, Roha-Lalibela, Lasta, Tekla Haymanot, Zagwe kings, Zagwe dynasty, Maskal Kebra, Gabre Maskal,

Gebre Mesqel Lalibela (also called “Lalibela”, which means “the bees recognize his sovereignty” in Old Agaw language) is the most famous and marveled of all the Zagwe kings reigned in Ethiopia.
 
He is well known for building the eleven famous rock-hewn churches in his capital city, known as Roha. The eleven rock-hewn churches are:

• Madhané Alam
• Maryam
• Denagel
• Sellasé
• Golgotha
• Mika’él
• Amanu’él
• Marquréwos
• Abba Libanos
• Gabr’él-Rufa’él, and
• Giyorgis
King Lalibela was born at either Adefa or Roha (it was later named Lalibela after him). Lalibela’s life is full of legends.

It is alleged that upon his birth, he was surrounded by a cloud of bees. Therefore, his mother gave him the name Lalibela, which means, “the bees are aware of his sovereignty.” Also according to legend, he was told by God “to build ten monolithic churches (Henze 51).”

According to the legend, he went into exile due to the hostility of his uncle Tatadim and his brother king Kedus Harbe, and was almost poisoned to death by his half-sister.

King Lalibela is said to have seen Jerusalem in his dream and then decided to build a new Jerusalem as his capital in response to the capture of old Jerusalem by Muslims in 1187.

Many features of his town have Biblical names - even the town’s river is known as the River Jordan, graves called Adam and Jesus Christ. This effort of the King shows his attempt to recreate Jerusalem, the Holy City, in his city, for Jerusalem had been captured by Muslims and pilgrimage for Ethiopian Christians had become complicated.

Unlike the other Zagwe kings, a considerable amount of written material has endured about his reign, besides the Gadla Lalibela (later Lalibela).

The Italian scholar Carlo Conti Rossini has edited and published some of the land grants that survived from his reign. After his death, Lalibela was buried in Golgotha (Pankhurst 49-52).

Keywords: Roha, King Lalibela, rock-hewn churches, Gebre Mesqel Lalibela, Agaw, Adefa, Kedus Harbe, Tatadim, River Jordan, Jerusalem, Madhané Alam, Maryam, Denagel, Sellasé, Golgotha, Mika’él, Amanu’él, Marquréwos, Abba Libanos, Gabr’él-Rufa’él, and Giyorgis, Golgotha