Dec 28 - Axum

An early morning flight took us to Axum in the very north, home of the Axumite civilisation that we are all so familiar with.  Not. One Cambridge professor of archaeology was asked what he knew of Axum and its astonishing history to which he replied 'Axum - where's that?' And yet the town has some of the most remarkable steles and tombs found anywhere in the world, carved out of solid granite.  Archaeologists make a big fuss about the Inca's ability to dovetail granite boulders so that you can't push a credit card between them.  I've never heard them singing the praises of the Axumite masons but my visa card just refused to slip into the cracks between their ten ton blocks. The level of technology required to carve these structures, then move them, then erect them is bewildering.  And all between the first and seventh century AD.

But the best is still to come.  King Remhai, a 3rd century Axumite king, decided to leave behind a small momento, something his people would remember him by.  Weighing in at 500 tonnes, Remhai's needle (stele) is 33 meters long and made from a single lump of granite.  It was carved out of a quarry, dragged 3 miles and hoisted up on end. Where it remained for about ten minutes. Before falling over.  And breaking into pieces. Flattening a few hundred people in the process. (I made that last bit up.  It was more likely 'thousands'.)  Surely that deserves to be in every school history book.

And here it is - King Remhai's stele. Click on the photo to get a
better idea of just how gargantuan this lump of granite was before
the foundations gave way and it toppled over.  I'm going to get my
Year 7 pupils to work out how many people you need to pull a 500
tonne block three miles on wooden rollers.  Then they can figure
out how you persuade such a monster to stand upright. 

Here's two steles that the Axumites made that didn't fall over.
Mind you, the Italians stole the nearest one in 1936 when they
invaded Ethiopia and changed its name to Italian East Africa!
Can you imagine Ethiopia invading Italy and changing its name
to Mediterranean Ethiopia.  It wasn't until 2005 that Italy agreed
to dismantle the stele from a piazza in Rome and give it back.

The stelae field at Axum from the Hotel.





The Trilingual Tablet - 4th Century. The writing on the tablet
(in three languages) promises that anyone moving it will meet
with an untimely death.  The tablet lies in a hut (!) exactly where
it was found. 



Collecting water from the Queen of Sheba's Pool



Traditional houses



Ross unwittingly agrees to enter Emperor Kaleb's tomb while Christine,
satisfied that the sargophagus is the right size, attempts to close the
twenty ton door.

A rather ugly 'cathedral' built by Haile Selassie in 1960.  It's
only saving grace is the series of paintings around the inside.



And to top off an extraordinary day's archaeology, here is the
'church' wherein lies the Ark of the Covenant.  Heaven's knows
(pardon the pun) why Indiana Jones took so long to find it
(around 1 hour 27 minutes) when everyone knows it's here
in Axum, kindly delivered by Menelik, son of King Solomon
and Queen Sheba.  Sadly, we weren't able to verify its existance
in the church mainly due to the armed guards who lie in wait for
nosy tourists.

Axum at night.