My new BFF, King Menelik II

Why don’t they just say they will buy Abyssinia!
King Menelik II in 1902, referring to a proposed agreement

Tasked with my first paper, I picked the most interesting sounding name on the topic list, Menelik II. Much to my horror, the World Wide Web failed to provide its usual plethora of information. What to do? Thinking back to the distant past, some twenty years ago, I thought about what my parents and others had done. Of course, the Library is where they would have gone.

I marched off to the Balme Library to find something out about Menelik II. After all, I had three pages to fill. The Bradt Guide had a blurb on the Balme Library as a place not to be missed. Since the University of Ghana was founded in 1948 as the University College associated with the University of London and is the eldest University in Ghana, the Balme library is home to an excess of books unrivaled in both Ghana and probably all of West Africa.

Luckily, the catalog is digitalized so a quick search directed me upstairs to the Africana Room. Modern Abyssinia was published in 1901 by British Vice Consul Augustus B. Wylde. Vice Consul is British diplomatic rank dating from the colonial era. He visited the main battle site in Adowa in researching his book. I discovered two other books detailing exactly the focus of my paper.

Essentially, I set out to prove that King Menelik II’s use of diplomacy was the main reason why Ethiopia was the only African country to successfully resist colonization by the Europeans (in this case, the Italians). He used diplomatic notes in the same format and manner that the Europeans used in to communicate to them in a language they understood. After soundly defeating the invading Italian army at Adowa, he negotiated a treaty with the Italians that recognized Ethiopia’s sovereignty and territorial boundaries. Other European powers did the same and send numerous commercial and diplomatic envoys to his capital, Addis Abeba, in attempts to sway this man to do one thing or another. I will try to post the full paper in a new side bar.

It was very interesting to see Menelik do what no other African leader was able to do at the time. Below is a funny anecdote highlighting the man’s character.

After the Italian emissary, Count Antonelli left in a huff after failing to convince King Menelik and Queen Taitu that Ethiopia was unwise to repudiate the treaty, Menelik sent a mule so that the man did not have to walk to his Legation. In anger, Antonelli gave the servant who delivered the mule 100 thalers as he did not want to owe anything to Menelik. When the servant told Menelik the tale and offered him the money, Menelik was supposed to have said. “As a tip it is too much! But as the price of an Imperial mule it is really too little!” Menelik laughed, “It is a tip” he told the servant, “keep it.”