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 [...]

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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 [...]

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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), [...]

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 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 [...]

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