I. Introduction

The Empire of Ethiopia was founded by a Christian monarchy in 1270, and the nation believed itself to possess the arc of the covenant. The story of the Empire of Ethiopia changes the paradigm of traditional African history — especially in an explorative and religious sense. For instance, Ethiopia sent diplomats to Spain before Spain sent diplomats or missionaries to Ethiopia. A large portion of the discipline of Western history preaches that Africa was heathenish, only receiving salvation after European missionaries ventured into its territory. However, when Roman Catholic Jesuit missionaries arrived in Ethiopia in 1557, the Ethiopians were already Christian. Their versions of Christianity were different, though. While the Ethiopian Orthodox Church shared the reverence of the Catholics for the Virgin Mary, the sects differentiated in their emphasis on holiness and asceticism, and the Jesuits dismissed the Ethiopians as heretical. Yet, the firmly established roots of Ethiopian Christianity helped the kingdom remain one of the only two African countries never colonized.1

The tradition of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church held that “the first Ethiopian convert [was] thought to have been the eunuch in Jerusalem mentioned in The Acts of the Apostles (8:27–40).”2 One of the main tenets of the church is encapsulated by the ancient Ethiopian word tweahedo, which means ‘unity’, reflecting their belief in miaphysitism. Miaphysitism is the belief that the Incarceration of Christ was both fully human and fully God in one single being, and it is also known as a belief in the single nature of Christ.3 Because of their belief in Christ’s human holiness, the Ethiopian Orthodox Church regarded all humans as being able to achieve purity. The church had a strong monastic tradition, wherein persons committed themselves to the church and worked to achieve such levels of purity and holiness. Many women were involved in monastic communities, gaining significant religious and political power through their positions within these institutions. 

This collection focuses on the role of women within the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. Women in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church were allowed to be full congregant members, and while congregations were divided on the basis of gender, which will be explored more in the following collection of sources, they acted in the same manner as men. On the whole, women were similarly situated to men, and they were highly involved in congregational worship, prayer, and faith. Some of these ordinary women were able to become nuns, which gave them a purpose outside of motherhood or marriage — they were able to devote their entire lives to their faith and their church, and they were praised for this choice. Monastic life created the opportunity for movement amidst a traditionally rigid social structure. Some women — nine to be precise — were even revered as Saints within the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, and they, like male saints, were honored through hagiography, which are religious biographies that capture the life of a saint.4  

The practice of veneration was highly important within the church, and one of the most prevalent objects of such veneration was the Virgin Mary. Mary was esteemed as the ideal woman — she was absolutely fertile, pure, and subordinate to God and Man’s will. The influence of Mary is clear in the following sources — many reference her in some way, and many depict women praying to the Virgin Mary. Within the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, women’s lives were based on their faith, which was just as deep as their male counterparts.

 This collection attempts to find ordinary female voices within texts, which were primarily written for and by men. Through historical analyses of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church and its traditions, hagiographies, documentations of European explorers’ encounters with the Ethiopian church, and even through songs, this collection will reveal that while women were socially subordinate to men, they were highly involved and highly faithful members of the church. Their experience was also heavily shaped by the veneration of the Virgin Mary, and the pursuit of purity in many ways defined their faith lives. 

II. Methodology

Originally, I proposed a central focus on women’s involvement in subsistence agriculture and cooking in East Africa in the 19th century. Previous research on English households in the early modern period revealed the importance of food, as it influenced culture and power, and the hidden work and presence of women within power structures, the home, and experimentation. I was very interested to explore a similar topic within African history and understand the role that women played in food production. In my preliminary exploration of the topic, I learned from an Oxford bibliography that between “65 and 80 percent of African women [were] engaged in cultivating food for their families,” which exposed the prevalence of female influence in agriculture and food production.5 Female voices have been largely overlooked and dismissed in the broader study of history, and I wanted to shed light on how critical women’s contributions to history have been — especially in a domestic context, which has been repeatedly belittled. 

In pursuing a broader understanding of this topic, I explored the Oxford Bibliographies on food and food production in Africa and another on Women and African History. I found a few secondary sources within that, but I wanted to find more primary sources. As a student of Wake Forest University, I have access to the physical literary collections on campus, which I decided to explore. This endeavor was slightly successful, as I procured two books on a wider East African history, which covered a comprehensive history up to the 19th century. I also used the Z. Smith Reynolds online database and searched for “Ethiopian women,” “Ethiopian food production,” and “Ethiopian recipes 18th c.” This was fairly unsuccessful, as I found no primary sources. I was able to find secondary sources on staples of the Ethiopian diet and on the transition from hunting-gathering to food production in Southern Ethiopia. I also read through the bibliography of Never Underestimate the Power of Women, and I found the author Carolyn Clark. Her other work was not connected to my research question, but it led me to another work, work titled Inheritance and Women's Labour in Africa. I was frustrated at the lack of African primary sources and the wide scope of the timeline of my studies, so I spoke with Dr. Plageman to get some guidance. 

Dr. Plageman directed me to the DT 365 to DT 450 region of Z. Smith Reynolds Library on Wake Forest’s main campus. This search was much more successful with my new focus, as I found a book Travelers in Ethiopia, which contained a Theological Discussion with the Empress Mantuab. The source inspired me to shift my research focus to focus on women’s involvement in the Ethiopian Church in the premodern era. This field proved much more fruitful, and I was able to develop new research questions to guide my collection.  The more narrow, central questions of my work are as follows: How were women involved or allowed to be involved within the Ethiopian Orthodox Church during this period? How did the reverence of the Virgin Mary affect perceptions of womanhood and femininity within the Ethiopian Orthodox church? 

The account that inspired this shift was from a European perspective, describing Scottish traveler James Bruce’s visit to Ethiopia in 1769 and his discussion with Empress Mantuab on religion. I knew that I had to include this source in my collection, as it gave insight into both the Ethiopian church and the knowledgeability of women on the theology of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. Initially, I used the phrase “Ethiopia + Orthodox church” in my searches, and I found many sources that were not in English, which I could not utilize. Then, I used JSTOR, which is an online database with a wide range of scholarly content, and I focused on the collection’s journal articles. I searched for the phrase “Ethiopian Orthodox Church” + 18th century. I found two books that were housed within Wake Forest’s library (Ethiopian Christianity: history, theology, practice by Philip Francis Esler and The Anaphora of St. Mary by Abba Heryacos). I searched for Ethiopian Orthodox Church nuns, and I was directed to an essay on “The femininity of Ethiopian Orthodox nuns,” which was focused primarily on the modern Ethiopian Orthodox Church. However, JSTOR suggested an essay on Hagiographies of Ethiopian Female Saints, which fit into the time restraints of my research. 

I wanted to explore any art connected to the Ethiopian Orthodox Church because I felt that they had the potential to visualize religious understandings. I went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s website, and I searched for Ethiopian women. I found several pendants and other iconographic goods from the 18th century. Many items predated the scope of this project, such as material goods from the 12th century. Returning to the DT 365 - DT 450 section of Z. Smith Reynolds library on Wake Forest’s main campus, I found several more texts on the Ethiopian church, two of which I heavily considered including or that I included in this collection: Ethiopia: its people its society its culture and The Anaphora of St. Mary, of which I only included the former. 

The final work that I did in curating these sources was in narrowing down my chosen sources from ten to six and picking the most relevant content. I wanted to focus predominantly on women’s experience within the Ethiopian church, which I believe was heavily impacted by the veneration of the Virgin Mary. However, I did not want to over-emphasize Mary to the point that the narratives of women congregants were lost. Therefore, I chose to only include one source that focused on the veneration of Mary. Other sources that I chose to include do examine the importance of Mary but always against the backdrop of the female experience or faith.

III. Curated Collection

Bruce, James. “Discovery of the Source of the Blue Nile: Theological Discussion.” In Travellers in Ethiopia, edited by Richard Pankhurst, 72–75. London: Oxford University Press, 1965.

During a period of exploration and encounter, many European travelers ventured to Africa for expedition, trade, and evangelicalism, alike. One such traveler, James Bruce, went to Africa in an attempt to discover the source of the Blue Nile. Beginning in 1769, when he arrived in Massawa, Bruce detailed his exploration from Massawa to Gondar to the Sudan in 1771. While Bruce’s testimony of his travels has been largely marred by his vanity and bias, his description of his travels has been corroborated. The following excerpt comes from his exploration of Ethiopia, which stands as one of the sole accounts of Ethiopia in the eighteenth century. As a result, the majority of scholarly understanding of Ethiopia from this time comes from his work. When Bruce arrived in Gondar, a city in northern Ethiopia, a ‘serious outbreak of smallpox’ had just arisen in the city, which affected several members of the royal family. Bruce wanted to help the royal family, but before she would entrust the care of her loved ones to this stranger, Empress Mantuab personally conversed with him, interrogating him about his religion. She, herself, was a follower of Ethiopian Orthodox Christianity, while Bruce was some variation of Protestant; he denounced Catholicism in his writings. Most notably, this excerpt exemplifies the knowledgeability of this female ruler on the topic of Christianity — her resolve in her beliefs and her confidence in her faith. She quoted Scriptures, and she was noted to have kept a copy of the Bible in her quarters. Her choice to understand this newcomer’s religious principles as a test of confidence in his character proves the influence of her religion over her heart, her creation of policy, and her ruling style.

“Our first discourse was about Jerusalem, the Holy Sepulchre, Calvary, the city of David, and the mountain of olives, with the situation of which she was perfectly well acquainted. she then asked me to tell her truly if I was not a Frank? ‘Madam,’ said I, ‘If I was a Catholic, which you mean by Frank, there could be no greater folly than my concealing this from you in the beginning, after the assurance Ayto Aylo has just now given; and, and confirmation of the truth I'm now telling (she had a large bible lying on the table before her, upon which I laid my hand), I declare to you, by all the truths contained in this book, that my religion is more different from the Catholic religion than yours is: but there has been more blood shed between the Catholics and us, on account of the difference of religion, than ever was between you and the Catholics of this country; even at this day, when men are become wiser and cooler in many parts of the world, it would be full as safe for a Jesuit to preach in the market-place of Gondar, as for any priest of my religion to present himself as a teacher in the most civilized of Frank or Catholic countries.’ —  ‘How is it then,’ says she, ‘that you don't believe in miracles?’ 

I see Madam said I Ayto Aylo has informed you of a few words that some time ago dropt from me. I do certainly believe the Miracles of Christ and his apostles, otherwise I'm no christian; but I do not believe these miracles of latter times, wrought upon trifling occasions, like sports and jugglers’ tricks,’ — ‘And yet,’ she says, ‘our books are full of them.’ — ‘I know they are,’ said I, ‘and so are those of the Catholics: but I never can believe that a saint converted the devil, who lived, forty years after, a holy life as a monk; nor the story of another saint, who, being sick and hungry, caused a brace of partridges, ready-roasted, to fly upon his plate that he might eat them.’ — ‘He has been reading the Synaxar,’ says Ayto Aylo. ‘I believe so,’ says she, smiling; ‘but is there any harm in believing too much, and is there not great danger in believing too little?’ — ‘Certainly,’ continued I, ‘but what I meant to say to Ayto Aylo was,  that I did not believe laying a picture upon Welled Hawaryat would recover him when delirious in a fever.’  She answered, ‘There is nothing impossible with God.’  I made a bow of assent, wishing hardly the conversation might end there.”

Christine Chaillot, The Role of Images and the Veneration of Icons in the Oriental Orthodox Churches: Syrian, Armenian, Coptic, and Ethiopian Traditions, translated by Dr. Norman Russel (Zweigniederlassung Zürich: Deutsche Nationalbibliothek, 2018), 85–86.

Within the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, the Virgin Mary is one of the most highly venerated icons. The actual process of this veneration appears in the following text, which comes from a book that focuses on a larger exploration of the “presence in…ancient Eastern Churches of religious images of all kinds.” The text focuses on both images, or iconographic depictions of religious objects of importance, but also on literary examples of the veneration. A few gaps exist within the history of iconography veneration in Ethiopia, which is hypothesized to be a result of the destruction of said iconography.  The book discussed several men and their role in the veneration of Ethiopian Orthodox iconography, but only two of the accounts included women. The following excerpt details those two women — Krestos Samra and Walatta Petros — and their experience as nuns, as women, and as persons who revered the Virgin Mary. According to other sources, these two women were not just nuns but also saints. Yet, their accounts should be understood to be reflective of the significance of the Virgin Mary to all women and as reflective of how faith was practiced by women within the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. Monastic culture was highly influential within the Ethiopian Orthodox church, providing structure and a means to acquire power, thereby legitimizing women in their faith. Specifically within this excerpt, Krestos Samra was noted to have adulated the icon of the Virgin Mary. Further, Walatta Petros was described as having a vision of the Virgin Mary interceding within her life after prayer. This source emphasizes prayer and the role of the Virgin Mary. It also gives light to the faith of those involved in monastic life.

“At the beginning of the sixteenth century, a nun originally from Shoa, Krestos Samra, founded the monastery of St Michael of Guangut on an island in Lake Tana. She lived during the first part of the reign of the emperor  Lebna Dengel (1508–40), before the invasion of Gran. She received from Christ at Debre Libanos a board representing the Ancient of Days (Dan 7:9). In the church she venerated an icon of the Virgin.

Under King Susneyos (1607–32) there lived a holy nun, Walatta Petros. In the sanctuary of the island of Sana there was an icon of the Virgin, an ‘Egyptian’ icon, painted in gold, of a shade of colour neither too light nor too dark, as in Ethiopia. Walatta, to whom the Virgin had appeared, found in it a resemblance to her. At the death of Suenyos (1632) his son Fasiladas restored the Orthodox faith in Ethiopia. Walatta then fulfilled her vow to reside for a year in the sanctuary of St Fasiladas in Meselie. There she spent all her nights until dawn in the church and stood before the icon of the Virgin, as erect as a column and without leaning on the walls or the pilasters, and she prayed and begged without rest for the salvation of her soul and the souls of all. Another time, when she was very ill and suffering from a flow of blood, she prayed before the icon of the Virgin to ask for her intercession and the image spoke to her. Standing in front of the icon Walatta was cured of her affliction on account of her faith. At the end of the year Walatta prayed for three weeks with great patience, standing before the same icon of the Virgin and she asked her to reveal where she should go to live and help her understand where would please the Virgin and her Son. Again the icon spoke and told her to go to Zagie. One day Walatta was informed that a deacon had died. She stood right in front of the icon of the Virgin in the church, imploring her. Whereupon a finger came out of the icon to give her mercy. The deacon was called to become a monk: he awoke, was given the habit, and arose and ate. While she was staying with her community of Amba Maryam and did not know whether or not she would return to the monastery of Afar Faras, Walatta prayed standing before the icon of the Virgin on two occasions; the icon extended a hand, took her by her clothing, and told her not to go away.”

Esler, Philip F. “Theology: Sacred Action.” In Ethiopian Christianity: History, Theology, Practice, by Philip F. Esler, 182–183. Waco, Texas: Baylor University Press, 2019

Philip F. Elser, in his book Ethiopian Christianity: History, Theology, Practice, thoroughly explores the entirety of the practice of Christianity within Ethiopia, giving particular preference to the Ethiopian Orthodox Church because of its prevalence within the nation. Specifically in this excerpt, notice how he uses the word ‘adults’ to refer to the entirety of the congregation. This choice emphasizes how men and women were equal participants in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. The discussion in this section of the continuation of the historic practices of the church into the present day reveals the influence and the importance of these traditions. The eucharist service, which celebrates the Last Supper of Christ, was and is equally available to both men and women within the church in Ethiopia. The following excerpt explores the specifics of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church’s observance of the Eucharist, and it also goes into the role of nuns within this practice. This allows us to understand the authority that women were able to gain through this monastic tradition, and it allows us to understand the experience of women who chose to participate in monastic life. Furthermore, this excerpt also discusses the impurity that was associated with menstruating and postpartum women. Purity, especially for women, was a highly important aspect of faith, and so the fact that these normal bodily functions were so deeply associated with impurity that women were not allowed within the church while they menstruated or in the days immediately after giving birth, reveals the subordinate position of women within the Ethiopian Orthodox Church.

“As with other Orthodox Churches and the Roman Catholic Church, the central liturgical rite in Ethiopian Orthodoxy is the eucharistic liturgy. In both Ge’ez and Amharic it is called the qeddase (thanksgiving). The Ethiopian church still uses the ancient service of the early church, and the qeddase is, in fact, equivalent to the ancient Mass of the Catechumens, in which adults receiving instruction in the faith attended Mass until the reading of the Gospel and sermon and were then dismissed (see below), even though these days, there are usually no catechumens under preparation for baptism during the Mass. Yet even among baptized Orthodox Christians there are not many who actually receive the Eucharist. Most “Orthodox Christians do not take the Eucharist throughout most of their adult lives. This is because of the concerns about purity, and especially the assumption that sexually mature adults are generally not in a fit state for communion.” You must fast for eighteen hours, abstain from sexual activity, have no flowing wounds or mucus, and menstruating and postpartum women are not allowed to enter the church at all.

The eucharistic liturgy is celebrated at dawn (but 6 a.m. on Sunday and 7 a.m. on Saturday) and after midday (around 12:30 p.m.) on days of fasting. At Christmas, Epiphany, and Easter it is celebrated at midnight. The ceremony is normally conducted by two priests (the principal celebrant and an assistant celebrant) and three deacons. If clergy are in short supply, one priest and two deacons conduct the service. The eucharistic liturgy the bread and wine are prepared in the beta lahm (house of bread). The bread is unleavened. Nuns spend many hours separating by hand the best grains of wheat for use in the Eucharist. The wine is unfermented, made by squeezing dried grapes. This practice of using unfermented wine troubled the early Jesuit missionaries to the country. Once the bread and wine are prepared, they are taken, under the cover of an open liturgical umbrella (tela), to the sanctuary of the church in a procession led by the assistant priest and accompanied by two deacons, while a third deacon rings a little bell that announces the start of the Eucharistic celebration.”

Lipsky, George A. “Religion.” In Ethiopia: its people its society its culture, by George Lipsky, 108–112. New Haven: Human Relations Area Files, Inc., 1962

As a part of a series of surveys of world cultures, George Lipsky explored Ethiopian society, focusing on everything from language to politics to agriculture to art. The text comprehensively explores the way of life of Ethiopian peoples, but what is especially pertinent to this collection is his writing on the history of religion within Ethiopia. The church in Ethiopia has almost always been predominately Ethiopian Orthodox, which comes with its own unique and specific practices. The following excerpt sheds light on those customs. The makeup of the church inherently divided its congregants — by holiness and by sex. Throughout the sanctuary, in all the levels of holiness, women are segregated from men, which reflects how the Ethiopian Orthodox church believed heavily in gendered differences. Yet, women still fully participated in the activities of congregants. They were allowed to be within the innermost parts of the congregation that were reserved for the most holy and pure. Even though gendered differences existed, the church believed men and women could rise to the same levels of holy purity. Furthermore, while male and female children are taken at different times in their development to the church (boys at forty days old; girls at eighty), they are both allowed to be taken to the church, and both sexes are honored with the markings of the Ethiopian Orthodox church —  through the maktak, which is a special religious necklace. This excerpt proves that while gendered differences existed, men and women had similar standings within the church concerning what action they were able to take, what honors they may have received, the company they were allowed to keep, and the choices they were able to make.

“The innermost ring is the sanctuary (makas) and contains the Holy of Holies, a representation of the Ark of the Covenant. The area is screened off from the second circle of which it actually forms a part. Only the priests and deacons may enter the sanctuary. The second circle (kedest) is reserved for communicants, who receive the Sacrament, the women segregated from the men. Only those who feel pure, have fasted regularly, and have conducted themselves properly take communion, chiefly the very young and very old. 

The rest of the congregation stands in the outer circle (māhelata k’enē), where the women are again segregated from the men. The dabtarās and priests pass around both of the outer two circles during the service, chanting, sometimes dancing. The priests pass among the congregation swinging a metal or clay censer from which rise clouds of incense. Those who feel particularly unclean ritually stand in the churchyard. Often there are as many people, if not more, in the churchyard as in the church…

Every couple upon marriage, chooses a local priest to serve as “soul father” (yanafs abbät), often the same priest who has ministered to other members of the family. He comes and blesses the house. He calls regularly, hears confessions, prescribes penance, and serves as an adviser.

On the fortieth day after birth a boy is taken to church to be “raised up in Christianity” and given a name; a girl is taken on the eightieth day. It is at this time the child is given one of the obvious distinguishing marks of the Orthodox Christian, the maktak—a neckcord of two blue threads…

On his saint’s day a man holds a small feast (zikert) attended by his men friends and confessor. Similar feasts may be held to honor other saints, usually at the suggestion of the confessors. If a man is not among the poorest in the village, he also participates in a communion association (māhbar), one of the few cooperative or mutual aid associations in Amhara-Tigrai society which does not have a kinship base. Membership usually is limited to about a dozen persons and often includes both husbands and wives. Once a month, in turn, the members hold a feast in the home — more elaborate than the zikert. Gifts of food, drink, and money are made to the officiating priests. The more expensive the feasts held by members of a māhbar the more prestige it and its members gain in the community. The māhbar serves on occasion as a mutual aid association much like ek’ub or credit society.”

Mecca, Selamawit. “Hagiographies of Ethiopian Female Saints: With Special Reference to ‘Gädlä Krestos Sämra’ and ‘Gädlä Feqertä Krestos.’” Journal of African Cultural Studies 18, no. 2 (2006): 153–67. http://www.jstor.org/stable/25473366.

Hagiographies are a religious genre, wherein the text details the life and faith of saints. Within the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, nine female saints were venerated through these Ge’ez writings: Krestos Samra, Feqerta Krestos, Zena Maryam, Walatta Petros, Walatta Pawlos, Masqal Kebra, Ehita Kristos, Eheta Petros, and Iyaluta. Although 202 hagiographies exist within Ge’ez, mostly of male saints, it is significant that any hagiographies were dedicated to any women at all. These female saints represent women who excelled out of their subordination within the church, exhibiting the possibility for movement within the structure of the church. The following excerpt was written by Selamawit Mecca, a professor of Ethiopian literature at Addis Ababa University, who has written extensively on the lives of female saints in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. Her essay analyzed the portrayal of female saints within hagiographies, emphasizing how they give light to female voices within the male-dominated genre and realm of the church. The excerpt also grants specific focus to the hagiography of Krestos Samra, who was written to be fervently in prayer. Mecca’s essay emphasizes the importance of purity, fertility, and the Virgin Mary in the life of Ethiopian women in the church. Female saints, just as male saints, were connected to supernatural power, stemming from God. They were thought to be able to access the power of miracle as easily as men, which illustrates their power as saints and the power that all women could hypothetically access.

“…[while] male saints are categorized, for the most part, as virgins, martyrs, priests, administrators, powerful men, confessors of the faith, teachers and so on, women saints are never categorized as virgins, but a mothers who pray a lot and receive revelations from God. Female saints became nuns only after having been married and become mothers. They all have children. It seems that virginity does not play a role in becoming a holy woman; it was unusual for a woman to become a nun without having been married. This kind of discourse presents a real conundrum for Christian women. On the one hand, sexual activity is seen as tainted; (Feqerta Krestos and Krestos Samra did not want to marry for they think that they will become unholy and Zéna Maryam asked God to stop her menstruation so that she would become holy). On the other hand, Christianity presents women's fulfillment in terms of motherhood (see e.g. 1 Tim. 2:15 '... woman will be saved through bearing children, if she continues in faith and love and holiness, with modesty'). Maybe the solution lies in the humanly impossible image of Mary, who is both virgin and mother…

[in discussing the hagiography of Krestos Samra] In another scene, when Krestos Samra was praying fervently in her chamber, Jesus Christ, the King of Glory, appeared before her, clad in fine apparel and accompanied by a great throng of angels and saints. He promised to perform great things for her if she would remain faithful in her love, and when He had disappeared she knew at once that this vision was to be understood in a spiritual sense. From this time on she often received great tasks from him, and in order that she might take comfort in him more fully she consecrated all her time and meditations to prayer. As formerly she had studied most zealously and had become learned, now, she applied herself only to prayer giving to this her attention above all else.

…As noted, miracle stories are scattered widely in all categories of the biographies contained in hagiographic writings about Ethiopian female saints. This seems to indicate that these saints were almost invariably seen as bearers of the holy and possessors of supernatural powers. For example, we are told that the saint Krestos Samra stood with her head under water, and prayed for eight years without food and water. She is also depicted as a mediator between Satan and God. She is certainly described as a human locus of supernatural power.”

Marcus, Cressida. “In Praise of Women: The Veneration of the Virgin Mary in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church.” Journal of Ethiopian Studies 35, no. 1 (2002): 9–26. http://www.jstor.org/stable/41966128.

Music is a powerful tool of religion, allowing subscribers to connect with the Divine, lament their sorrows, raise praises, and join in breath and song. Therefore, music within religious contexts is a reflection of belief. For women in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, the Virgin Mary (Dïngïl Maryam) was the pinnacle of femininity — pure, fertile, motherly, and submissive to the Will of God. Because of the gendered nature of Ethiopian Orthodox church ceremonies, which divided congregants on the basis of sex in many cases, many songs were sung solely by women. Cressida Marcus curated a collection of these songs, proposing that they “represent eschatological and spiritual concerns in unusual representations that are derived from a feminine perspective.” While women within the Ethiopian church were subordinate to men, these songs do not diminish the connection they might have to the Divine. The songs, themselves, are offerings to God. These songs were written by, performed by, and sung by women — they are an encapsulation of the female experience within the Ethiopian church. The following excerpt from Marcus’s broader journal article depicts a song of veneration, a song of praise, and a song about weakness in faith. The songs are framed by Marcus’s own explanation of their significance, most notably describing the position of women within the Ethiopian church and the view of women on Mary, as they so faithfully venerate her — both literally and symbolically. The songs are listed in Ge’ez, as they originally appeared, and they are also translated into English on the right. 

“The selection of lyrics of songs incorporates two broad themes, that of femininity on the one hand, and faith and piety on the other. This section will examine the ethnopoetical relation between these themes. Central to the theme of femininity is fertility, and this is represented by imagery of an arboreal nature. When women sing about her various attributes, the key poetical motif is the miracle of Maryam's immaculate fecundity.

My lady Maryam, you are miraculous, / Your vine has spread, is found burgeoning / on your own juniper tree/ A vine grows on your juniper tree, / On your entryway

The symbolism in this verse is representative of many such songs, in which vines, trees, and flowers figure, and is elemental to the relationship between faith and femininity. The vine is symbolical of fertility, but more than simple fecundity. Here, Maryam's fertility is venerated as miraculous, and the grace bestowed upon her as the mother of God, is associated with the meeting of the natural world with the sacred. Thus, the poetic metaphor of the vine growing in holy places signifies her grace…

The following praise song illustrates the predicament of life and death, and includes an elliptical contrast between the paradisal and the visceral prospect of aging and death. The underlying referent of this praise song is the eschatological concern of how best to live while aspiring to enter heaven.

For what is this world to me? / Life is a journey from dawn ‘til midday / I know my body will remain on earth / I know that my flesh will rot / I am anxious to protect myself on buses and taxis / Please, bee, do not stink, bee do not sting!

A poignant admission of weakness by the songstress expresses the fragility of her faith. An ideal of heavenly promise is modulated in human experience by a quotidian fear of death, illustrated by the danger posed by buses, taxis, and the bee. In terms of the majesty of the cosmos, such fears are minor and perhaps naive, though significant, for they confront the problem of how best to countenance the human condition. The bee is a well-known symbol of kingship, and in this context, the bee is the focus for a subtle allegory, dramatized by the songstress's appeal, and asks indirectly for blessings from a pregnant mercy…

Women are contrite about their habits and scold themselves for spending their time drinking coffee and gossiping, and regard themselves as being easily persuaded to seek cures from magicians, instead of undergoing Christian exorcism and purification. The female body is perceived to be corruptible and weak, and so a pious woman must discipline her body for the sake of her soul…

My soul suffers because of my flesh / By saying let us eat all Friday and Wednesday / Alas! My flesh! Be advised! / Do fast and observe the Sabbath / What kind of a world are you missing / [because] you worry that you won’t get coffee / Please, take the communion! / Oh desist! Arise my sisterly nun

The song alludes to the marginal position of women vis à vis religious practice, 'epitomized by the profane and almost subversive activity of zar spirit possession which is associated with coffee drinking and female performance. Women are considered to be ritually impure, and cannot perform the ministrations of the sacraments. By contrast, Maryam's unique relationship with the male dominated Orthodox Church is highly privileged, reflecting her cosmological presence. Maryam is enthroned on the left hand of the Father in Heaven. She is most holy among women and bestows grace on those who perform the liturgy, sacred rites that are completely forbidden to be viewed by women. Her picture is kept in the sacred chest (mänbärä tabot) that holds the tabot and sacramental vessel, and her name is inscribed on every altar slab (tabot) (Paulos Yohannes, 1988:154-7). It is in her name that many religious books are read, and prayers are said; not least of these is the liturgy composed in her name, and celebrated on the feast days of Saint Mar. Maryam's proximity to the sacred is a source of dignity in women's religious poetice.”

IV. Conclusion

These sources demonstrated the unwavering faith of women within the Ethiopian Orthodox Church — how while they were separated from men within faith practices, they were just as capable of exercising their faith and that they were able to rise within the religious hierarchy to become revered as saints. Their involvement within the church also made them highly knowledgeable of Ethiopian Orthodox theology, as exhibited by the story of Empress Mantuab. The influence of the Virgin Mary within the church shaped the experience and desires of women within Ethiopia, as they pursued both motherhood and faithful purity. 

While many of these sources focused on sainted women, their stories encapsulate a broader story of women’s history. Women’s involvement in the church in the previous sources was monumental in revealing the presence of women within religion and African history on the whole. To truly see women’s power, historians must endeavor to look beyond rulers or the authors of law. Female history has been largely undocumented, which was done perhaps in the pursuit of erasing female involvement in power, in an attempt to label female history as unimportant, or even to dismiss women’s place in history as a whole. Finding the female voice among non-women-centric texts is imperative to giving proper weight to women’s place within history because women have always been present. But they have seldom been seen. As these sources proved, women were highly involved in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church during the early modern period, and their faiths impacted themselves, their homes, and their larger global community.

The story of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church is contrary to every story of Africa pushed by Western history. The country’s future successes in fending off colonialism were in part shaped by the work of the church during the early modern period, as explored by the previous sources. Moreover, the story of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church is contrary to the stories, or rather the lack thereof, of women in history. Indeed, women gained social mobility and purpose through their involvement in the church. The study of women within the Ethiopian Orthodox Church paints a broader picture of African women, which in itself grants a voice to a population that has been silenced by imperialism and patriarchy. The lives of women and their faiths must matter because they, as people, mattered. Although, they have seldom been granted this respect within the field of history. This collection sought to undo some of the inequity within history, and it sought to create an accurate and thorough account of women.