ITYOP̣IS vol. 2(2012)5Dereje Feyissa– Markus Virgil Hoehne: Borders and Borderlands asResources in the Horn of Africa. Woodbridge 2010(SZÉLINGER Balázs)140Conference ReportsThe 18th International Conference of Ethiopian Studies in Dirre Dawa: “Movements in Ethiopia, Ethiopia in Movement”, 29 October to 3 November 2012 (Wolbert SMIDT– Chikage OBA-SMIDT)144National Workshop: „Socio-cultural Impact Assessment of the Welqayt Sugar and Irrigation Project”, 6 October 2012, Mekelle University(MITIKU Gabrehiwot)150The Mikael Iyasu Library: Mekelle University Acquires 2,500 Books from theFamily of the Late Mikael Iyasu– Inauguration (AYELE Bekerie)153International Workshop on Documentation and Preservation of Ethiopian Cultural and Art Heritage of the Haddis Alemayehu Cultural and Research Institute, Debre Markos University, 19 May 2012– An Illustrated Conference Report (Manuel RAMOS)155International Workshop on “Culture, Environment and Development” at Mekelle University, 15 March 2012 (Yoko FURUSAKI)160From Ambivalence to Acceptance –International Conference on Azmariin Ethiopia, University of Hildesheim, 6 − 8 January 2012 (Andreas WETTER)164Workshop “On the History and Culture of the Horn of Africa” atMekelle University, 17-18 March 2011 (CarstenHOFFMANN–ZeusWELLNHOFER)16 6Research and Expedition ReportsA Journey to Central and Western Tigray (Dietrich RAUE)169Did the gold of the Aksumites originate in Tigray? A report onongoing research on local traditions of gold mining in Tigray(Wolbert SMIDT, in collaboration with GEBREMICHAEL Nguse)181Research AbstractsSelected abstracts of research projects in social sciences and humanitiesat Mekelle University1936263 The Story of the Translation of the Bible into Tǝgre(1877-1988) by SENAI W. Andemariam1Abstract The members of the Swedish Evangelical Mission who fortuitously were stationed in Eritrea left behind some memorable accomplishments in their more than a century of missionary activities. One of these was the preparation of scriptural works, including the translation of the Bible into four languages. Of these, the Tǝgreversion of the Bible held its vision for over one hundred and eleven years and was carried out by three generations of translators. The strength of the vision, the hurdles its realization had to overcome and the amazing character of the foreign and native translators have not yet been systematically recorded in narrative form. This article attempts to remedy this lacuna. Keywords: Tǝgre – Swedish Evangelical Mission– Bible translation– GäläbIntroduction Exactly 135 years ago (counting from 2012), a 15-year-old Tǝgre shepherd from the Mänsa‘ group in Eritrea was immersed in the Gäläb River for baptism into his newly discovered faith, by a Swedish man twenty-two years older than he. Sometime after his conversion, the young shepherd was joined by a young Tǝgrǝñña man, two years older than himself, who came running to the Gäläb after witnessing the death of his father, grandfather and uncle in a bloody battle near the highland village ofTsä‘azzäga. These two colleagues, in particular the younger, would soon form the core group of workers who laid the foundation for the literature of the Tǝgre language. The work of these two colleagues continued. As the elder of them left for theological training in Sweden, the younger continued the work they had begun. They were later joined by colleagues – locals and foreigners – who helped complete their work after 12 years of continuous revision. Marvelous achievements, albeit with some disagreement, were built upon the foundations laid by the first two colleagues. The handover from these first-generation workers to their successors, which continued for 11 decades, was all about realizing a dream: to produce the Bible in Tǝgre. One particularly captivating story is that of a foreign scholar who mastered the Tǝgre language and singlehandedly translated the Old Testament in less 1 Writer on local scriptural history; Assistant Professor, School of Law, College of Arts and Social Sciences, Asmara, Eritrea.
63ITYOP̣IS vol. 2(2012)5Dereje Feyissa– Markus Virgil Hoehne: Borders and Borderlands asResources in the Horn of Africa. Woodbridge 2010(SZÉLINGER Balázs)140Conference ReportsThe 18th International Conference of Ethiopian Studies in Dirre Dawa: “Movements in Ethiopia, Ethiopia in Movement”, 29 October to 3 November 2012 (Wolbert SMIDT– Chikage OBA-SMIDT)144National Workshop: „Socio-cultural Impact Assessment of the Welqayt Sugar and Irrigation Project”, 6 October 2012, Mekelle University(MITIKU Gabrehiwot)150The Mikael Iyasu Library: Mekelle University Acquires 2,500 Books from theFamily of the Late Mikael Iyasu– Inauguration (AYELE Bekerie)153International Workshop on Documentation and Preservation of Ethiopian Cultural and Art Heritage of the Haddis Alemayehu Cultural and Research Institute, Debre Markos University, 19 May 2012– An Illustrated Conference Report(Manuel RAMOS)155International Workshop on “Culture, Environment and Development” at Mekelle University, 15 March 2012 (Yoko FURUSAKI)160From Ambivalence to Acceptance –International Conference on Azmariin Ethiopia, University of Hildesheim, 6 − 8 January 2012 (Andreas WETTER)164Workshop “On the History and Culture of the Horn of Africa” atMekelle University, 17-18 March 2011 (CarstenHOFFMANN–ZeusWELLNHOFER)16 6Research and Expedition ReportsA Journey to Central and Western Tigray (Dietrich RAUE)169Did the gold of the Aksumites originate in Tigray? A report onongoing research on local traditions of gold mining in Tigray(Wolbert SMIDT, in collaboration with GEBREMICHAEL Nguse)181Research AbstractsSelected abstracts of research projects in social sciences and humanitiesat Mekelle University193Senai W. AndemariamITYOP̣IS vol. 2 (2012)64than 15 years. The vision persisted for more than a century in Eritrea, Sweden, Kenya, the US and Hong Kong, with its last torchbearer passing away in September 2011. If counted from the day of baptism of the shepherd-turned-Bible-translator, the whole process took a total of 111 years (1877–1988) or, to put it more dramatically, nearly 40,515 days. 1. The Inception (c. 1878-1890) Sometime before 1883, the Rev. Bengt Peter Lundahl (1840–1885), the leader of the Ǝm Kullu mission station,2while he “himself continued to use Amharic 2Ǝm Kullu, meaning ‘mother of all’ in Tǝgre, was the name of the station from which major scriptural and missionary works of the Swedish Evangelical Mission (SEM) originated. The name “Ǝm Kullu” is often transcribed in many European sources as Menkullu or Moncullo. Professor Adolf Kolmodin, the Director of the SEM who visited the Ǝm Kullu station in October 1908, called the station the ‘Mother of our East African Mission.’ Karl Johan Lundström and Ezra Gebremedhin, Kenisha: The Roots and Development of the Evangelical Church of Eritrea (1866–1935) (Trenton: The Red Sea Press, 2011), 274. The Rev. Nils Hylander (1861–1929), who was a pastor at the Ǝm Kullu station in 1890 and Gäläb in 1891–1892 and who also was sent as an evangelist and served as a pastor in Ethiopia, once described the Ǝm Kullu station, designed by the architect and composer Wilhelm Stenhammer (1871–1927), as ‘the most beautiful [station] on the whole Red Sea coast.’ Lundström and Ezra Gebremedhin, Kenisha, 274–75, f.n. 481, 475. Following successive and heartbreaking deaths, murders and sicknesses in the Kunama area where they had gone on an evangelical mission from 4 June 1866 until January 1870, the SEM pioneers decided to withdraw from there and came to Massawa on 26 February 1870 to recover. They then established a flourishing congregation in Massawa and built a school in 1871. In 1877, the British general and colonial administrator Charles George Gordon (1833–1885) used his own money to buy a piece of land at Ǝm Kullu already allotted to the SEM by Munzinger, and gave it to the SEM as a gift on New Year’s Day 1878. Here the SEM mission base was built in 1879, a place where many individuals (or their descendants) who would later have an impact on the religious, social, literary, academic and political history of Eritrea and Ethiopia grew up or met each other. Ǝm Kullu served as the headquarters of the SEM until 1891, when it was moved to the highland village of Tsä‘azzäga, the place where the indigenous evangelistic movement had started in the 1860s. The Ǝm Kullu station, the pearl of the SEM in Eritrea, was abandoned after the SEM moved to the highlands following the establishment of the Italian colony in Eritrea. The Italians wanted to purchase the base, but the SEM Board in Sweden hesitated until it finally decided to sell the station in 1913, a decision that was never implemented. In the 1930s the Italians repaired the station and used it as a hospital for their soldiers wounded in the Italo-Ethiopian War. After the war the station was again abandoned and continued to deteriorate throughout the British Military Administration of Eritrea; “in spite of the fact that the British authorities had promised to protect the property on the station, the lawless were leftto plunder the station, bit by bit.” Nowadays nothing remains at the former Ǝm Kullu station except the graveyard in which the tombstone of the hero of the Ǝm Kullu station, Petr Lundahl, can be seen; his engraved name is barely legible. Gustav Arén, Evangelical Pioneers in Ethiopia: Origins of the Evangelical Church Mekane Yesus (Uppsala: Offsetcenter ab, 1978), 130–48, 155–58, 161–62, 164–67, 201–3, 214–25, 273–75 etc.; Lundström and Ezra Gebremedhin, Kenisha, 132–57. For a brief introduction to Ǝm Kullu and its contribution as
ITYOP̣IS vol. 2(2012)5Dereje Feyissa– Markus Virgil Hoehne: Borders and Borderlands asResources in the Horn of Africa. Woodbridge 2010(SZÉLINGER Balázs)140Conference ReportsThe 18th International Conference of Ethiopian Studies in Dirre Dawa: “Movements in Ethiopia, Ethiopia in Movement”, 29 October to 3 November 2012 (Wolbert SMIDT– Chikage OBA-SMIDT)144National Workshop: „Socio-cultural Impact Assessment of the Welqayt Sugar and Irrigation Project”, 6 October 2012, Mekelle University(MITIKU Gabrehiwot)150The Mikael Iyasu Library: Mekelle University Acquires 2,500 Books from theFamily of the Late Mikael Iyasu– Inauguration (AYELE Bekerie)153International Workshop on Documentation and Preservation of Ethiopian Cultural and Art Heritage of the Haddis Alemayehu Cultural and Research Institute, Debre Markos University, 19 May 2012– An Illustrated Conference Report (Manuel RAMOS)155International Workshop on “Culture, Environment and Development” at Mekelle University, 15 March 2012 (Yoko FURUSAKI)160From Ambivalence to Acceptance –International Conference on Azmariin Ethiopia, University of Hildesheim, 6 − 8 January 2012 (Andreas WETTER)164Workshop “On the History and Culture of the Horn of Africa” atMekelle University, 17-18 March 2011 (CarstenHOFFMANN–ZeusWELLNHOFER)16 6Research and Expedition ReportsA Journey to Central and Western Tigray (Dietrich RAUE)169Did the gold of the Aksumites originate in Tigray? A report onongoing research on local traditions of gold mining in Tigray(Wolbert SMIDT, in collaboration with GEBREMICHAEL Nguse)181Research AbstractsSelected abstracts of research projects in social sciences and humanitiesat Mekelle University19364The Story of the Translation of the Bible into Tǝgre (1877-1988)ITYOP̣IS vol. 2(2012)65as a medium for preaching and teaching,”3 had set a young Tǝgre shepherd named qäshiDawit Amanu’el (1862–1944) the task of beginning to translate the Holy Scriptures into the latter’s native language Tǝgre.4 Dawit was the first man from the Mänsa‘ group of the Tǝgre to be converted to Christianity by the Swedish Evangelical Mission (SEM), having been baptized, at the age of 15, by Lundahl in the Gäläb River on 8 July 1877.5Dawit, described by Musa Aron as the father of the Tǝgre language,6 began his work by translating the Gospel of Mark, with the assistance of qäshi (E) Täwäldä-Mädhǝn Gäbrä-Mädhǝn (1860–1930). Täwäldä-Mädhǝn Gäbrä-Mädhǝn, born in ‘Addi Täkkäläzzan, the home village of his mute mother ‘Aǧiǧa7 but with paternal links to the nearby village of Šǝmanǝgus Taḥǝtay, was the son of qäshi (O)8 Gäbrä-Mädhǝn Täsfay (d.1876), the head priest of Tsä‘azzäga and one of the pioneers of the indigenous evangelical movement, and the nephew of qäshi (O) Haylä-ab Täsfay (c.1846–1876) who was undoubtedly the inspirational leader of the movement.9 A deacon of the Orthodox Täwahǝdo Church by the age of 12, Täwäldä-Mädhǝn grew up under the tutelage of his father and his uncle, witnessing the fervent evangelical movement in his family. In 1874, he became a member of the evangelical congregation at Gäläb led by the memorable Finnish missionary Rev. Erik Emil Hedenström (1844–1904), who led the missionary work in the Mänsa‘ region. Following the death of his father, the martyrdom of his uncle and grandfather, as well as the destruction of Tsä‘azzäga, all in the July 1876 battle between the villages of Tsä‘azzäga and Hazzäga, Täwäldä-Mädhǝn fled to an evangelical base in Eritrea, see Wolbert Smidt, “Ǝmkullu”, in Encyclopaedia Aethiopica, vol. 2 (2005), 274–75.3 Lundström and Ezra Gebremedhin, Kenisha, 176. 4 Arén, Evangelical Pioneers in Ethiopia, 303. In his preface to the 1902 New Testament, however, K. G. Rodén states that the translation of the New Testament into Tǝgre was initiated by the Rev. E. E. Hedenström, the pioneer of the SEM mission at Gäläb, who in 1880 set Dawit ’Amanu’el and Täwäldä-Mädhǝn Gäbrä-Mädhǝn, his students at the time, the task of starting to translate the New Testament into Tǝgre. 5 Arén, Evangelical Pioneers in Ethiopia, 215. 6 Musa Aron, A Short Documentation of the History of the Bible in the Tigre Language, 9. 7 Rosa Holmer, Twoldo Medhen, 1938 (based on Täwäldä-Mädhǝn Gäbrä-Mädhǝn’s narrative), translated into English from the original Swedish by Gustav Arén under the title Tewolde-Medhin Gebremedhin (1860–1930), Pastor-Educator-Linguist, a Short Biography (Asmara, reprinted from the Quaderni di Studi Etiopici, No. 6/7, 1985–1986), 113–15. A copy of the English translation is with the author.8The identifier “(O)” has been used throughout this article to distinguish native workers who had already been ordained to priesthood or pastoral services in the Orthodox TäwahdoChurch before they joined the Eritrean Evangelical Church. Similarly, the identifier “(E)” is used to distinguish native workers who had already been ordained to priesthood or pastoral services by the Swedish or Eritrean Evangelical/Lutheran Churches. 9 Arén, Evangelical Pioneers in Ethiopia, 172–82.
65ITYOP̣IS vol. 2(2012)5Dereje Feyissa– Markus Virgil Hoehne: Borders and Borderlands asResources in the Horn of Africa. Woodbridge 2010(SZÉLINGER Balázs)140Conference ReportsThe 18th International Conference of Ethiopian Studies in Dirre Dawa: “Movements in Ethiopia, Ethiopia in Movement”, 29 October to 3 November 2012 (Wolbert SMIDT– Chikage OBA-SMIDT)144National Workshop: „Socio-cultural Impact Assessment of the Welqayt Sugar and Irrigation Project”, 6 October 2012, Mekelle University(MITIKU Gabrehiwot)150The Mikael Iyasu Library: Mekelle University Acquires 2,500 Books from theFamily of the Late Mikael Iyasu– Inauguration (AYELE Bekerie)153International Workshop on Documentation and Preservation of Ethiopian Cultural and Art Heritage of the Haddis Alemayehu Cultural and Research Institute, Debre Markos University, 19 May 2012– An Illustrated Conference Report(Manuel RAMOS)155International Workshop on “Culture, Environment and Development” at Mekelle University, 15 March 2012 (Yoko FURUSAKI)160From Ambivalence to Acceptance –International Conference on Azmariin Ethiopia, University of Hildesheim, 6 − 8 January 2012 (Andreas WETTER)164Workshop “On the History and Culture of the Horn of Africa” atMekelle University, 17-18 March 2011 (CarstenHOFFMANN–ZeusWELLNHOFER)16 6Research and Expedition ReportsA Journey to Central and Western Tigray (Dietrich RAUE)169Did the gold of the Aksumites originate in Tigray? A report onongoing research on local traditions of gold mining in Tigray(Wolbert SMIDT, in collaboration with GEBREMICHAEL Nguse)181Research AbstractsSelected abstracts of research projects in social sciences and humanitiesat Mekelle University193Senai W. AndemariamITYOP̣IS vol. 2 (2012)66Gäläb where he was quickly befriended by Dawit Amanu’el. In 1877 he headed to ‘Aylät, a place of hot springs some 50 km southwest of Massawa where the SEM evangelists had, by the mid-1870s, established a clinic and a school working with the persecuted indigenous evangelical pioneers. At ‘Aylät, he served as an evangelist.10In 1883, he was sent to Sweden for theological training. Upon his return to Eritrea in 1887, he went to Ḥǝrggiggo, a village 10 km south of Ǝm Kullu where, stationed at the house of the Rev. Karl Gustav (Gustaf) Rodén (1860–1943), he worked as an evangelist (replacing the elder qäshi (O) Sälomon ‘Atsqu) and a translator of the Holy Scripture into Tǝgre. In December 1889, he went with his wife Amätä-Tsǝyon (aka Amätu) – the daughter of another indigenous evangelical pioneer qäshi(O) Zär’ä-Tsǝyon Muse – to Gäläb to assist Dawit Amanu’el and others in the Tǝgre translation work. In 1904, Täwäldä-Mädhǝn was recruited to work on the Tǝgrǝñña New Testament translation by the man who was the driving force of the early translation work in Eritrea, Dr. Karl Winqvist (1847–1909).11 Undoubtedly the towering figure of the work, Täwäldä-Mädhǝn had an extraordinary linguistic gift: he mastered Tǝgrǝñña, Tǝgre, Gǝ’ǝz, Amharic, Arabic, Hebrew, Italian, and Swedish, and could tackle texts in English, German, Greek and Latin!12 He was ordained in Asmära by Professor Adolf Kolmodin (1855–1928), father of Professor Johannes Axel Kolmodin (1884–1933), the prominent Swedish Orientalist and advisor to Emperor Haylä-Sǝlasse,13 on 1 January 1909, making him the first native evangelical worker to be ordained on the African continent.14Back to the early meeting between Täwäldä-Mädhǝn and Dawit in Gäläb. Their first work, the translation of the Gospel of Mark into Tǝgre,15 was 10 Lundström and Ezra Gebremedhin, Kenisha, 185. 11 Rosa Holmer, Twoldo Medhen, 117–36, 141–42. 12 Arén, Evangelical Pioneers in Ethiopia, 303,. Dr. Winqvist said that Täwäldä-Mädhǝn had a ‘keen ear and a fine feeling for language’.13 Professor Johannes Kolmodin is probably better known in Eritrea for his illustrious book, Zanta Hazzägan Tsä‘azzägan (Kolmodin 1912, 1914, 1915), a collection of the oral traditions of the Ḥamasén region in the Eritrean highlands. Witold Witakowski, “Kolmodin, Johannes Axel”, in Encyclopaedia Aethiopica, vol. 3 (2007), 415–16. 14 Sophia Dege –Peter Unseth, “Täwäldä-Mädhǝn Gäbrä-Mädhǝn”, in Encyclopaedia Aethiopica, vol. 4 (2010), 877; Rosa Holmer, Twoldo Medhen, 134. 15 Voigt holds that the Gospel of Mark in Tǝgre was the work of Dawit Amanu’el and Täwäldä-Mädhǝn Gäbrä-Mädhǝn. Rainer Voigt, “Bible translation into Tǝgre”, Encyclopaedia Aethiopica, vol. 1 (2003), 577. This is possibly due to the fact that Täwäldä-Mädhǝn Gäbrä-Mädhǝn “assisted” Dawit ’Amanu’el when the latter was assigned by Lundahl to translate the Gospel of Mark into Tǝgre. Arén, Evangelical Pioneers in Ethiopia, 303; Lundström and Ezra Gebremedhin, Kenisha, 176, 226.