Heritage as image of the nation

The symbolic use of heritage played a crucial role in Ethiopian domestic and international political communication.Visual representations of a strong Ethiopia, embarking into modernity on the foundations of a past that was referred to as the “Great Tradition”, were used to create and promote an image of Ethiopia as a modern country with international reach and impact. The historiographical framework of this Great tradition was the state nationalism of the Ethiopian monarchy and was actuated in the late nineteenth and the first half of the twentieth century, to support and legitimise centralisation, imperial expansion and modernisation of the Ethiopian nation-state. It centres around the legendary biblical encounter of King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, and the relocation of the Arc of the Covenant from Jerusalem to Aksum through their son in the aftermath of the encounter. Documented in writing for the first time in the fourteenth century, this mythology explained the foundation of the Ethiopian monarchy and positions Ethiopia as the new Zion and Ethiopians as the new chosen people of God. The Ethiopian exceptionalism narrated in this mythology ascertained the lineage of the monarchic rule and explained racial differences between highand lowland population and between Christian centres and non-Christian peripheries within Ethiopian state territory. Alongside the “teleological unfolding of such monarchy-centred and divinely orientated history” as the foundation for an Ethiopian national identity, monarchy was presented as the “moulder and the guarantor of this identity”.172

The symbolic use of heritageplayedacrucial role in Ethiopian domestic and international political communication. Visual representations of astrongEthiopia, embarkingi nto modernity on the foundations of ap ast that was referred to as the "Great Tradition",w ereu sed to createa nd promotea ni mageo fE thiopia as amodern country with international reach and impact.The historiographical framework of this Great tradition was the state nationalism of the Ethiopian monarchyand was actuated in the late nineteenth and the first half of the twentieth century, to support and legitimise centralisation, imperial expansion and modernisation of the Ethiopian nation-state. It centres around the legendary biblical encounter of King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, and the relocation of the Arc of the Covenant from Jerusalem to Aksum through their son in the aftermath of the encounter.Documentedinwriting for the first time in the fourteenth century,this mythologyexplainedthe foundation of the Ethiopian monarchyand positions Ethiopia as the new Zion and Ethiopians as the new chosenpeople of God. The Ethiopiane xceptionalism narrated in this mythologya scertained the lineageo ft he monarchic rule and explained raciald ifferencesb etween highand lowland population and between Christian centres and non-Christian peripheriesw ithin Ethiopian state territory.A longside the "teleological unfolding of such monarchy-centred and divinelyo rientated history" as the foundation for an Ethiopiann ationali dentity,m onarchyw as presented as the "moulder and the guarantor of this identity".¹⁷²

Establishing images of Ethiopian exceptionalism during the 1960s and 1970s
The Great tradition playedac entral role in how the Ethiopian nation was imagined and articulated by political and intellectual actors,and by outsiders. Elisabeth Wolde Giorgis has argued that DipeshChakrabarthy'sassumption of amyth that performs as an objective truth and that functionsa sa ni maginary bonding between nation and citizen applies to the analysis of Ethiopian nationalism, too.
Applying am ore complicated approach of Benedict Anderson'sc ategory of "imagination",she makes apoint that "In Ethiopia,the unifying ideologyofnationhood between the rulers and the masses was as uccessful strategyt hatd e-fined the ways the nation was presented not onlyasthe primary sourceofloyalty and solidarity,b ut alsoa st he rallying imagei nt he discourse of modernity."¹⁷³ The historical imaginary derived from the Great tradition wasc entral in how Ethiopianmodernity was narrated and was the social base of Ethiopia'smodern nation building.While for along time the biblical myth of Christian highland enclave was the coreofthis imaginary,the sensational paleontologicaldiscoveries extended this exceptionalism further to the very beginningso fh uman life on earth.¹⁷⁴ Several scholars have recentlyanalysed the intellectual history of the Ethiopian national imagination in scholarship and literature, responding to increasing critical perspectivesfrom anumber of renownedsenior scholars on historiographical practices in Ethiopia and Ethiopian historicals tudies.¹⁷⁵ They have delivered very thorough analysis of written works by Ethiopians. Yet, their analysis doesn'tgodeeper into the influenceofthe Western view of Ethiopian culture and history and the abundant image-production related to the Great tradition. Government publications from various sectors and levels utilised photographs and drawingst oi llustrate the Ethiopian nation and constructed distinct visual imaginaries of Ethiopianp ast,p resent and future. Ancient monuments, natural scenery and wildlife featured very prominentlyi nt his imagep roduction.
From the 1950s on, images of heritagewerepart and parcel of governments' communication strategya nd in line with Haile SelassieI ' se xtensive use of media to createa ni conographya nd image-cult of his leadership.The selected visual representation of heritagea sn ationalm onuments turned into an iconographyofnational success in its own right.¹⁷⁶ When Ethiopia intensified its efforts to obtain technical assistance and development funds, beginning with the first Ethiopianf ive-year development plan in 1959, the Ethiopiang overnment started to produce publications to present and advertiseinvestment opportunities internationally. In this context,E thiopian history,h eritages ites and monuments gained relevancea sn ational brand icons,a nd wereu sedt oi llustrate and symbolise Ethiopia'scontinuity as aform of proof of the highpotential there for success and development.
The book Economic Progress of Ethiopia was published in 1955 as part of the imperial SilverJubileecommemorations by the Ministry of Commerceand Industry.I tw as "intended as an outline of some aspects of the massive progress […] duringt he twenty-five years of the inspired reign of His Imperial MajestyH aile Selassie I".¹⁷⁷ In ac ollection of shorta rticles the sectorald evelopment of financial, agricultural, health, education and communication affairs in Ethiopia between ca. 1925 and 1950 was described, and supported by more than eighty pages of detailed statistics regarding these matters. On the book'sc over,t he title was embossed in gold, together with adrawing of the large Aksum Obelisk. On the first page, the sameo belisk is portrayeda sablack-and-whited rawing, with the surrounding scenery in Aksum, includingo ther monuments, trees and people. The detailed observations of the more recent past werec onnected in the ancient past of the Aksumite empire,locating the modernisation and progress underwayi nE thiopia on ah istoricalt rajectory.
Promotional material,whose principal aim it was to conveythe idea of economic success and successful development to aworldwide audience, frequently came adorned, illustrated with images of heritagesites. As an example, see Patterns of Progress -Ethiopia -Past and Present,¹⁷⁸ published in 1967u nder the auspiceso ft he Ethiopian Ministry of Information. Starting with ab iographical overview of Haile Selassie I'slife and an anchoringofEthiopian history in antiquity,t he moderng overnmenta nd its achievementsi nv arious sectors are then presented, illustrated with images of modern machinery,s potless urban scenes of modern Addis Ababaand neatlydressed people. As will be shown, the images in these governmentpublications circulated widelythrough diplomatic relations and international networks. The imagep roduction of the tourism promotion, built around the same core-portfolio of monumental heritageand highland scenery,i ntensified this circulation.
In the official representation of the socialist government,t he Abyssinian, north-Ethiopian culture was still central. Manyr epresentativeso ft he Amharic elites who had shaped culturalp olitics of the imperial governmentc ontinued in their functionsa nd maintained their status as elite heritage-makers after the revolution. In publicationsl ike the book Ethiopia-ad ecade of revolutionary transformation,p ublished in 1984 by the Ministry of Information, the country's history was utilised as al ead-up to the gloriousr evolutionary present,s pread out over six pages and with photos of the most prominent heritagesites.The introductory section concluded with ap aragraph arguingt he revolution to be the historical moment of fulfilling "the determination of the Ethiopianpeople to defend freedom, independence,h uman dignity and justice",which had been denied them by the old system.¹⁷⁹ Heritage as ap olitical asset took on ap rominent role in foreign policy and diplomacy.The monumental heritagef unctioned as af orm of social as well as culturalc apital thatu nderpinned Ethiopia'sc laim to international recognition and appreciation. The Ethiopiang overnment aimed to maintain and expand the imageofastrong country in order to stabilise political power and enable foreign investment. Accordingtothe elite historiographyofthe "Great Tradition" of the Ethiopiane mpire, Ethiopia was the most advanced civilisation in Africa, an idea thatp layeda ni mportant role in the regional positioning of Ethiopia and beyond.
Ethiopia'sr esistancea gainst colonial occupation was firmlyw oven into the largernarrativeofthe "Great Tradition",ofastrong, continuous and ancient empire which was naturallythe leader of African states and thereforeakeypartner for the United Nations and the West.Inthe context of the Pan-African movement duringt he 1960s, this imageo fE thiopia as Africa'so ldest empire became especiallyr elevant,a nd promotingi tf ormedacentral element in Haile Selassie I's foreign policy.I no rder to strengthenh is domesticp osition, Haile Selassie I placed aparticular emphasis on international relations in his politics. His international political strategywas twofold and combined arepositioningofEthiopia within the African continent and the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), as well as on the international diplomatic stageo ft he UN.I mages of the classic monumental culturalh eritages ites weree mployed in rhetoric and visual representation to support these political strategies to an international audience of politicians and diplomats.
Haile Selassie'sa chievement of succeeding against the Italian occupation, without undergoing al onger existencea sacolony, had turned Ethiopia into an aspirationalsymbolfor the independence struggles of other African countries  Propaganda and Culture Committee of the FoundingC ongress of the Workers' Party of Ethiopia &1 0th Anniversary of the Revolution, ed., Ethiopia:ADecade of RevolutionaryT ransformation, 1974-1984(Addis Ababa: the committee,1984 in the 1950s and 1960s. Politicall eaders of nationalist movements referred to Haile Selassie I'sEthiopia as an important role model for resistanceagainst colonial oppression, and manyo ft hem also expressed their respect for "the one great African kingdom which, except for asingle tragic interlude which onlyenhanced his claim, had stood through two millenia [sic] and had shone,atleast to the intelligentsia, as ab eacon of independence and African civilization [sic] to the rest of ac ontinent held in subjection to Europe."¹⁸⁰ Ethiopianintellectual elites identified readilywith this description delivered by the BritishHistorian Margery Perham in her 1969book on the Ethiopiangovernment and displayed "pridei nt heiro wn history and culturalh eritagew hich had not been rendered inferior by ap rolongedE uropean colonial presence"¹⁸¹. During the 1950s and 1960s, the glorification of Ethiopian history by African nationalist movements shifted the Ethiopian self-perception of not belongingt o Africa.¹⁸² At the same time,Ethiopia started to open up and to orientatepolitically towardst he African continent.The Ethiopianpolitical position claimed superiority in the process of the re-formation of the African continent as ap olitical entity through reference to aparticularEthiopiannational heritage. Haile Selassie Is trategicallye ngaged in the role of African leader awarded to him by the leaders of national liberation movementso fA frican states,a nd used this role to strengthen his political power.H ed irected, at least in an African context, his external politics towards an understanding "that the Ethiopian people belong to the coloured nations of Africa" and Ethiopia was "ac onnectingl ink between Africa and Europe."¹⁸³ Earlyon, he receivedl eaders of African independence movementsa so fficial state guests, and provided support to political refugees. During the peak of decolonisation from around 1960,t he Pan-African idea had experiencedadecisive shift from ad iscourse largely located in the African diasporat oa na pplied movemento nt he ground thatb ecame ever more prominent and relevant as ap olitical concept.¹⁸⁴ The foundation of the OAU seemed to materialise this vision of ac ontinental unity that would aid in overcomingt he damages causedb yc olonial rule and develop competitive strength  Also the emergenceofthe Rastafari movement in connection with the prophetic statements of Marcus Garvey'sb lack nationalism was based on av ersion of the "GreaterE thiopia" image: the imageo f" Ethiopia as as acreds overeign",Giulia Bonacci, "From Pan-Africanism to Rastafari: African American and Caribbean "Returns" to Ethiopia",i nUnderstanding Contemporary Ethiopia:Monarchy,R evolution and the Legacy of Meles Zenawi,ed. GérardPrunier and Éloi Ficquet (London: Hurst,2 015), 151.
Heritage as image of the nation on an international level.¹⁸⁵ Yetthe process of African unification was challenged by apolitical division between more radical democratic demands and more conservative positions, resulting in the formation of different groups in pursuit of African unity.F rom an Ethiopian point of view,d emanding the maintenance of national sovereignty for the newlyc reated African states worked in favour of Ethiopian geopolitical interest,e speciallyw hen the sanctity of colonial borders was invokedduringthe dispute over the Ogaden region. Through diplomatic efforts, Haile SelassieIeventuallysecured aposition in which the Ethiopian approach would seem to represent the interest of the majority of the newlyi ndependent African states,overruling ideas of acontinental integration, acontinental government and anyr edrawing of boundaries.¹⁸⁶ Haile Selassie I'ss trategy included the installation of the headquarters of the OAUinAddis Ababa, officially promotingEthiopia, and more specificallyAddis Ababa, to the centreofinter-African diplomacy.¹⁸⁷ The installation of the OAUheadquarters in Addis Ababawas part of alarger strategybythe Ethiopian government to establish Addis Ababa as amajor location for African and international political conferences,and as adiplomatic hub. The Ethiopiang overnmentw as able to provide as ufficientlyi ndependent infrastructure, includingc onferencea nd office buildings, high-end hotels and the well-connected servicesofEAL.Furthermore, the imageofEthiopia as an African leader and the onlys table African country playedt ot he advantage of Haile Selassie I, who acted as spokesman for Africa on the international stageand managed in 1958 to secureA ddis Ababaa st he site for UNECA. UNECA, as well as several otherU Na gencies, could be convenientlyh ousedi nt he newly built Africa Hall, amodern, representative building, provided at the cost of the Ethiopi- an government.¹⁸⁸ Events such as the hosting of the UNESCO conference on ed-ucationinAfrican states in Addis Ababa in 1961demonstrated the capacities that the Ethiopian government claimedf or the country,a nd that others readilyp rojected onto it.¹⁸⁹ In all these efforts, the representationo fE thiopia as as trong country on the diplomatic and the international stagewas connected to the narrative of the "Great Tradition",enriched by the defeat of colonial rule as further proof of Ethiopian "Greatness".

The foreign imageo fE thiopia
The construction of an imageofthe Ethiopiannation through images of heritage was influenced from the Western imageo fE thiopian heritagea sw ell. From the 1920son, ashift in Ethiopian historiographyemphasised the Ethiopian tradition as aunique and independent development,s haring roots with Western civilisations in ancient empires,s cripture and Christianity. This historic exceptionalism was connected to an arrative thatE thiopian elites had cultivated for centuries and actualised with Western racist concepts and adistinct notionofnot belonging,culturallyspeaking,toAfrica. Ethiopian highland elites and Western diplomats alike did not consider Ethiopians as African. They believed that the larger part of Ethiopia had cultivated an atmosphere of a "splendid isolation",politically as well as culturally, to protect the Christian tradition against uncivilised influences from the African continent.These existing traditionalr acist prejudices towards the supposedlymore "Negroid" population of the rest of Africa resonated with popular Western conceptsofAfrican inferiority.When Ethiopian political relations werer e-routed to the European metropolises of the colonial empires duringthe nineteenth century,intellectual orientation, as aconsequence, shifted towards Europe as well. In education and historiography, African affiliation was playeddown and Ethiopian history was instead rewritten in universal categories that allowed for an easier connection to the history of Western, Eurocentric civilisation.¹⁹⁰ It is worth drawing attention to the imageo fE thiopia held by international and development workers. In afortunate amalgamation of Ethiopian historiographyand heritagepractice with Western representations and projections aspecific imageo fE thiopia was constructed, one that presented Ethiopia as Africa's onlyn on-African country,e ndowed with civilisation,a nd therefore history and heritagea so pposed to just folkloristic art.T his imagea llowed for the perfect matchingo fs elected Ethiopian heritages ites with the markers of authenticity for heritageasdefined by Western expertswhen knowledge about Ethiopiancultural and natural heritagestarted to circulate through the expanding international networks.Publishing activities in particular, facilitated through UNESCO,contributed to the broad reach of the international heritage-expert'sw ork.
Ethiopia'scultural heritage, per the mediation of UNESCO,raised favourable awareness in the broader publica nd was featuredp rominentlys everal timesi n UNESCO publications. The sudden increase of photographic images relating to Ethiopia in these publicationsi sp articularlyn oteworthy. Not onlyw ereU NES-CO'spublicationsinthe Courier or in scientific organs relevant to the promotion of the new imageofEthiopia to aW estern intellectual public, but there was also abroader rangeofpublicationsfrom experts or those declared to be such.¹⁹¹ This was an extensive pool thatreached beyond the sphere of conservation specialists that included diplomats, entrepreneurs, travellers and researchers alike, all of which communicated their findingsand observations to each other,institutions, governments and the general public. The emerging fields of culturaland natural tourism, as well as the travel and exploration activities of foreign experts posted in Ethiopia, resultedinagrowingnumber of publications and reports during the 1960s and 1970s. The most important common feature in these reports of Ethiopia was the presentation of anon-African, ancient empire.Inthis narrative,emphasis was placed on Ethiopia being ac ulture with non-African and Christian roots.This was employed to explain Ethiopian culture'squality as acivilisation, to which one could ascribe ac ertain superiority and even supremacy.
The UNESCO Courier featureda rticles about Ethiopia on several occasions between 1959a nd 1967, all of which focused on Ethiopian antiquity and its historical exceptionalism. In 1959,anarticle titled "The Greatness of Ethiopia" lauded the geographical features of Ethiopia which "call to mind some of Europe's mountains rather than Africa",f urther explaining that the Ethiopianp eople had aunifying kinship to the whiterace "despite theirdark skins" with the result "that long agoacivilisationg rew up which distinguishesE thiopia from the Negro-inhabited parts of Africa, by which it is largely surrounded, and which  Moreg enerallya bout the Courier:M aurel, Histoire de l' UNESCO, givestothe country affinities with the lands of ancient civilisation-Egypt,Syria and Arabia".¹⁹² The article continues in praise of the substantiveage of Ethiopian civilisation, as well as the highs tageo fd evelopmenta nd uninterrupted, untouched continuous preservation, correlating these to Arabian provenance and firm Christian belief. In addition, images of the Aksum Obelisks are featured on the first pageo ft he magazine, declaring Ethiopian history to be "one of the most intriguingc hapters in African history".¹⁹³ Although this entire Courier issue dedicated to "Africa'sLost Past" was not short of articles about other African kingdoms and civilisations, written in the context of the endeavour of the African History project,t he article on Ethiopia stood out because it insisted on the continuity of empire as opposed to the "lost", "unknown" or "forgotten" ones of other African countries.E thiopia wasd istinguishedb ecause,i nt he eyes of the editors and writers of this Courier issue-as opposed to the rest of the African continent-its degree of civilisation had supposedlyallowed it to remain in charge of its own history.
In 1961U NESCO publishedavolume on Ethiopian manuscript paintingsi n the UNESCO World Art Series (UWAS).¹⁹⁴ What is striking about this album is the attitude of discovery in which it is made,which ringsf amiliar with typical Western representations of non-Western cultures. Initially, WHO'sm aternal health specialist,t he GermanO tto Jäger, stationed in Ethiopia from around 1958 onwards,t urned to UNESCO after having seen some ancient manuscripts while traveling in the northern region around Gondar in ap rivatec apacity.H e suggested to UNESCO thatt hey should attend to them.¹⁹⁵ Jäger, togetherw ith the editor of the UWAS Peter Bellew,a nd an Italian photographer,undertook a tour of several weeks to gather the necessary material. The correspondence running in parallel to the production of the book reveals astrongsense of adventurism and entitlement,and an ostensible "us" and "them" perspective on Ethiopian people. Even the more distinguished research experts who were commissioned to write introductory essays for the volume reciprocated their explicit remarking of their "discovery" of the manuscript paintingso ns everal occasions.¹⁹⁶

Heritage as image of the nation
Upon on publication of the completed volume, the Courier dedicated an article to the topic, written by Abbé Jules Leroy,a uthor of one of the book'si ntroductory essays and former director of the "Institut éthiopien d'études et de recherches" (in the following: "Institut"). Again, the article emphasised the uniquequalities of Ethiopian civilisation: "Here, at an elevation of seven to thirteen thousand feet, was created and developed ac ivilisationw hich, from the point of view of political and cultural achievement and from that of the artistic monuments which record its long history,h as no parallel in all Tropical Africa."¹⁹⁷ This article, while generallys imilar in tone and ideas to the 1959o ne, once again explained the concept of a "non-Negroid" race, continuous advanced civilisation and astrongerlink to the Arabian Peninsula thantoAfrica. Additionally,Leroy insisted very stronglythat onlythrough Christianity had a "floweringof art",o np ar with that of the Byzantine world, arriveda nd developed in Ethiopia.¹⁹⁸ Otto Jäger, who wascriticised by the others involved in the book'sproduction for his unsoundinterpretation of the Ethiopian manuscript paintings,¹⁹⁹ was nonetheless allowed to pen his own article on the paintingst hree years later in 1964 in the Courier,and was referred to as "author of several works on Ethiopian painting".²⁰⁰ In atone of popularscience,hefocused on art as a "folk tradition" and his article was devoid of the term "civilisation".However,heinsisted on the continuity and greatness of the culture, and for illustration he chose photos of contemporaryE thiopia resembling scenes from the old paintings, such as religious procedures and clothing habits, aiming to depict alifestyle of the Ethiopian people thath ad remained unchanged throughout the centuries. Thisa rticle pointed out in direct terms thatE thiopia "culturallyb elongst ot he world of the orient",²⁰¹ and was rich in orientalist descriptions and attitudes. It was in this regard not far from the other,m ores ound articles.
Richard Howland's1967mission concerning the establishment of the Ethiopian antiquities administration²⁰² prompted him to write an article for the Courier. Howland,aUS-AmericanArt Historian, introduced his readers to the subject with the impression of ad eserted, uninhabited country,b uilding up to the sur- prising,u nexpected discovery of the "incredible richness of the antiquities of Ethiopia" upon his arrival. Interestingly,H owland stressed this aspect: "This is aland of contrasts, it is so highlydevelopedasaleader in contemporary African affairs, and yets or emotea nd medieval and untouched in its hinterlands.The antiquities are glorious and of international significance to archaeologists and art historians, but one travels to seek them outside the capital."²⁰³ Unlikeformer articles, Ethiopian history was not am ain focus here. Instead it centred on the value of its remains as veritable culturalh eritage, living up to Western notions of the concept.N onetheless,s imilar lines of argumentation reflectingt he mainstream, essentialist ideas of Ethiopian Studies at thattime were emphasised,although in more subtle language, speakingof"asophisticated developmentthat reflects Arab as well as European connexions".²⁰⁴ In tone the article reads likean updated variant of the adventurismo ft he earlier articles, in the style of travel writing,p ointing out the explorativec hallengeo ft he journey to the Ethiopian antiquities, but alsomentioning the nascent touristicefforts and, of course, UN-ESCO'se fforts to unify research and preservation of heritage.

Expatriateh obby-archaeologists
Beginning in the 1950s, Ethiopia'sc ulturalh eritage, especiallyt he sites of early Christian worship such as the rock-hewn churches of Lalibela or the Tigray rockchurches,became known to the growingnumber of foreign experts thatcame to the country as diplomats or development workers and Ethiopia gained reputation as a "happyh unting ground for amateur scholar-adventurers".²⁰⁵ In the same period, natural heritagealso attracted interest,and Ethiopia was becoming known as ac ountry for ornithologists and thosei nterested in smaller rare animals. It alsop romised opportunities to observen ature away from the big game safaris and hunting-oriented tourism that was prevalent in otherA frican countries.T he unique landscape of the highland-plateaua lso attracted mountaineersa nd those interested in the country'sg eographic features.²⁰⁶

Heritage as image of the nation
Most of the first touristsinEthiopia had not travelled purelyfor the purpose of visiting the country itself, but werethere alreadytoserveinthe framework of development cooperation. These foreign experts had ad ecidedlyp ractical advantage in comparison with other tourists and researchers. Outside of the capital and largertowns,mobility in Ethiopia was very limited. Though domestic flights connected the most important townsw ith Addis Ababa, anyt raveli nt he countryside required af our-wheel-drive with an experiencedd river, or horses, mules and guides, duetothe condition of the transport routes and general problems of navigation, especiallyd uringt he rainys eason. Thesec ircumstances rendered traveling in Ethiopia ac ostlya nd time-consuminge nterprise, which required a certain flexibility in terms of schedule, and was difficult to organise from afar if one did not have local contacts.²⁰⁷ Aparticularlygood example of the hobby-archaeologists' part in the production of ahistoricalimaginary of Ethiopia is the so-called discovery of the numerous rock churches in Tigray,n orthern Ethiopia, through an umbero ff oreigners duringt he 1950s and 1960s. These rock churches were located in ar emotea nd secluded part of northern Ethiopia, and had supposedlye xisted as continuous places of worship over several centuries and contained murals as well as Christian manuscripts. Their existenceh ad intrigued some of the international development workers who werepostedtothe region, and wordofthem quicklyspread to Addis Ababa. One of these workers wasOtto Jäger, who was posted on aWHO assignment in Tigray and had started exploring the churches near him.²⁰⁸ Astory similar to that of Otto Jägeristhat of Ivy Pearce,borninGreat Britainand raised in New Zealand, an urse, missionary and teacher at the Haile Selassie IU niversity.²⁰⁹ During her time in Ethiopia, she travelled to the rock-churches of Tigray several times, initiallyinspired by Otto Jäger'sreports. She organised these tours as field trips for herself and other interested foreigners.I n1 972, with Otto Jäger, she published the guide book Antiquities in Northern Ethiopia.²¹⁰ IvyP earcen otablyg lorified the earlyC hristian tradition and its continuous existencei nh er writings, statingt hat her ownC hristian belief had prompted her to spread the  Organised trips (like the one offered from Swan Tours,see ch. 1) weretakingplacebut presenteda nexception. The number of available hotel beds and the general tourist statistics illustrate the extent of tourism: Gaidoni, "Cultural Tourism",5 1 -53;I anus.O rganizzazione per gli studi el er icerche di economia applicata S. p. A., Ethiopian Tourist Development Plan,2 2-24.  See above, he produced the UWAS Album on Ethiopianm anuscript paintings. knowledge about the rock-churches and Ethiopia in general. In terms of more official and institutional research, the "Institut" would onlyembark on its first scientific, systematic mission of the churches in 1970,t en years after Otto Jäger's first tour.²¹¹ At the beginning of the 1960s, barelya ny general introductory literature, travel writing or guidebooks on Ethiopia existed, which is whyw ritingsa nd reports of privatetravels and tours in Ethiopia werereceivedwith great interest by European publishersand magazines.²¹² The earliest book of this kind was the illustrated book Lalibela by Irmgard Bidder,p ublished in 1959a nd containing a report of her travel there, with numerous photographs of the rock-hewn churches, as well as her attempt at periodisation and connectingE thiopian history within the occidental historiography.²¹³ In her foreword, she declared her intention: "This book […]would like to draw the reader'sattention to ahistorical and religious centre of Ethiopia and to stimulate scientific research."²¹⁴ Bidder was the wife of the German ambassador to Ethiopia and for her expedition she was able to relyo nt he official support of the government as well as the church.²¹⁵ Like IvyPearcelater,she was officiallyreceivedbythe governor of Tigray and was equipped by him with mules, guides and armed guardsfor the entire time of her trip.²¹⁶ Between 1964 and 1967, GeorgG erster,aSwiss photographer holding aP hD in philosophy, travelled around Ethiopia and also publishedabook about Lalibela. The essays for his book werec ontributions from scientifice xperts, and he produced high-quality aerial photographs,p ublishing his images in National Geographic and other internationallya cclaimed magazines.²¹⁷ ForG erster,h is stayi nE thiopia represented his personal "search for the holyg rail",which he  N.N., "Unemission scientifique étudie les Eglises-Rocs du Tigre", Ethiopie nouvelles touristiques 2, no. 7( 1973): 1.  R.D. Greenfield, "Ethiopian Itineraries: Some Routes in Northern Ethiopia", Ethiopia Observer 6, no. 4( 1963): 313.  IrmgardB idder, Lalibela (Köln: DuMont,1959).  "Dieses Buch […]möchtedie Aufmerksamkeit der Leser aufein historisches und religiöses Zentrum Äthiopiens lenken und die Forschungder Wissenschaftler anregen",[translationbythe author], ibid., 7.  Enteringt he churches,e speciallyf or the purpose of photographing murals and manuscripts,requirednot onlyanofficial permit and letter of recommendation; it depended ultimately on the final decision of the priest in charge of guarding the site. All of the books and articles discussed hereg iveadetailed account of these difficulties.  Pearce, "An Andrews Adventure";B idder, Lalibela,3 1-33.  GeorgGerster, "Searchingout Medieval Churches in Ethiopia'sWilds", National Geographic 138, no. 6( December 1970): 856 -84. claimed to have found in the isolationand intensity of the earlyC hristian tradition he experienced in Lalibela. Ethiopia was not Gerster'sfirst engagement producingimages for the cause of universal heritage -he had alreadyphotographed some of the most spectacular images for the Nubian Monuments Campaign.²¹⁸ Gerster in fact became one of the most important producers of images for the occidental historicaldiscourse that had evolvedsince the 1960s around the alleged re-discovery of Ethiopia.²¹⁹ Due to their rich and unique images, these new publications werer eceived with vivid interest by the general public and within the field of EthiopianS tudies. The detailed documentation of the churches and religious ceremoniesw ere considered highlyv aluable and appreciated by researchers.T he hypotheses brought forward by the lay-historians, however,faced criticism.²²⁰ Ethiopian cultural and natural heritageh ad by that time surpassed its existencea saniche interest known onlyt oafew experts, and was no longer ah ermetic discourse of insiders. The establishment of these broader international networks, thati ncluded but werenot limited to experts and international organisations,isanimportant factor in the imagea nd knowledge production that formedp art of the making of Ethiopianh eritaged uringt he 1960s and 1970s.
Lavishlyi llustrated publications such as these allow us to trace how Ethiopia'si magea st he country of the "Great Tradition" gainedi nc urrencyf rom the 1950s onward. They further show that knowledge production about Ethiopian heritages ites was not the exclusive domain of experts but,r ather,was open to contributions by manyother actors as well. They are aphenomenon accompanying the "boom years" of Ethiopianheritage-making in the 1960s and '70s. International publications like coffee table books, travel guidesand photo-essays mirrored each other'sr epresentation of Ethiopia as Africa'so nlye mpire. The selection of photographs and drawingsa sw ella st he canon topics centred around the narrative of the monumental remains of an advanced civilisation, the Queen of Shebamyth and the endurance of earlyChristian cultureinanisolated location and unique natural features.T his international coverageh elped  Forexample the photos of the dismantling of the Nubian monuments,letterfrom Conrad A. Beerli to GeorgG erster,3 0.9.63, in: UNESCO 069:72,A14;G eorgG erster, "Savingt he Ancient Temples at AbuS imbel", National Geographic 129,n o. 5( May1 966): 694 -742.  N.N., "Un imagier de l'Ethiopie: le Dr.G eorgG erster", Ethiopie nouvelles touristiques 1, no. 10 (1972): 3.  Especially, IrmgardBidder'sattempt to arguefor apre-Christian origin of the churches was considereduntenable.Nonetheless,the book still presented amilestone for the research on Lalibela because of its detailed photographsand drawings; Sylvia Pankhurst, "Mrs. Bidder on the Trail", Ethiopia Observer 4, no. 7(June 1960): 229 -34. the promotion of Ethiopia through images of national heritageg ain significant momentum.
Heritage-making in Ethiopia was as tate affair, and consequentlyt he image production was controlled through censorship, which applied to all publications and press produced and published in Ethiopia.Haile SelassieI'sand Mengistu's personal support of projects involving the location of culturalh eritage, and the book projects resulting from it,i llustratest he decided importance of heritagemaking and the monopolisation of the related imageand knowledge-production in the Ethiopian political landscape. The booksofIrmgard Bidder on Lalibelaor GeorgG erster on the stone churches, for example, not onlym ake ample reference to the generous support and permission of Haile Selassie I; both books also includeapersonal forward by the emperor,a sw ella sh is portrait.I np ublications addressed to abroader Western audience, aforeword by Haile SelassieI was mandatory for an authorisation for publication by the Ethiopian government.When the UWAS Album on Ethiopian manuscript paintingsw as reaching its final production stages, the publisher was obliged to include ap ortrait and foreword of the emperor in order to receive the final permission for publication.²²¹ This control of imagea nd knowledge-production ensured that images of Ethiopianh eritagew ould onlyc irculatei natightlyd etermined mannera nd in the service of building-up an international Ethiopian national identity. In the book Churches in Rock by GeorgG erster,H aile Selassie I'sw ords were: Ethiopia is proudofits culture, which is without interruption from the fourth century AD to today. This is owed to the Christian faith, which victoriouslywithheld all influencesand disturbances throughout the times and remained firmlya nchored in Ethiopian culture. […] currentlyf oreign researchers from various countries, together with the UnitedN ations and the Institute,a re workingt owards conservingt his heritage and findingo ut as much as possible about the creators of these monuments and their lifes [sic].²²² While the conservation of heritagee ventuallys lowed down under the socialist regime, the use of heritagea satool of representation to produce and holdu p Ethiopia'snational imageinternationallywas still relevant.The socialist government,too, commissioned Western journalists, scholars and other experts to producec offee table books, highlightingE thiopian heritage. Although these books did not usuallyi ncludeg overnmentp romotion in explicit terms,the circulation of images of historical and natural wonders nevertheless promoted the country  Several letters concerningt he finalisingofthe book production, in: UNESCO 7U WAS(63).  GeorgGerster, Churches in Rock:Early ChristianArt in Ethiopia (London: Phaidon, 1970), 1.
Heritage as image of the nation in apositive wayand therefores trengthened the government,particularlygiven the restricted access policy of the government to the heritages ites in the north, the places of main interest to foreigners. Between 1984 and 1988, the Ethiopian government underM engistu Halie Mariam commissioned the British journalist Graham Hancock to produce ar epresentative coffee table book and several other publications, all to promote the country in ap ositive wayt hrough history and culture. Hancock worked together with scholars of EthiopianS tudies on these publications, most notablywith the renowned Ethiopian Studies expert Richard Pankhurst,who served as the director of Addis Ababa University'sInstitute of Ethiopian Studies for manyyears. Forresearching and photographingthe historical sites, they weree quipped with ag overnment permita nd granted special access privileges to the areas in the North, closed off due to war and conflict.²²³ The superlative narrativeso fEthiopia peaked with the discovery of the supposedlyoldest humanoidr emains in 1974.E vent hough paleontological expeditions wereconducted in Ethiopia since 1902( Omo Valley), onlyinthe 1960s did Ethiopiane xcavation sites of earlyh uman stone tools and humanoidr emains gain international attention, inside the scientific community as well as from the general public. In the Omo Valley,aprimary siteo fi nterest with au nique richness of geological and paleontological remains, am ultidisciplinary team of French, Kenyan and US-researchers unearthed, among other things, the skeleton of Lucy,o rdinknesh in Amharic, then the oldest known humanoid remains.²²⁴ Lucy and other fossils quicklys erved as ap owerful images preading and creatingt he idea of Ethiopia as the "cradle of humanity"-an imaget hat fitted well into the existingn arrative of Ethiopia as one of the oldest advanced civilisations in Africa with as upposedlyu nceasing legacy. In the 1984 publication Ethiopia -AD ecade of RevolutionaryT ransformation 1974 -1984,t he Propaganda and CultureCommittee of the Founding Congress of the Workers' Party of Ethiopia wrotet he ten-year history of the new revolutionary government as a Marxist story of advancingthe centuries-old struggle for total freedom from serfdom, listingachievementsineducation, healthand masspolitical organisation. Preceding these praises and theirstatistical illustration wasaneight-page introduction explaining Ethiopian ancienth istory and Ethiopiane xceptionalism as key foundations for the revolutionary success. Ethiopia,t he text explained, was naturallyp ut in control of the surroundingr egions, due to its highland-ge- ography, and was in possession of a "wealth of untapped natural resources".²²⁵ In referringt oa rchaeological studies, the pre-historical findingsa nd the possibility of Ethiopia as the origin of manwereconnected to the history of the Ethiopian civilisation, accompanied by aphotograph of the Lucy-skeleton. On the following pages, photographs of well-known monuments illustrated the historical overview until the twentieth century:t he Aksum obelisks, aL alibela-church, a stela from the South of Ethiopia and the Gondar-castles.

Historicising the national territory
History and heritagewerethe foundations for the construction of aPan-Ethiopian national identity,a nd had as pecial role in the transformation of Ethiopian society.T he nationalq uestion is seen by manya so ne of the corec ontinuities along which the political revolutions and conflicts in Ethiopia during the twentieth century developed.²²⁶ Beginningu nderH aile SelassieIin the 1960s, the construction of national identity was as tate project,e mploying education and historiography to graft ad ominant historical narrative of an Amharic "Greater Ethiopia" onto the existing socio-political realities.Tounderstand this, it is necessary to understand the diverse composition of the Ethiopian society as amultiethnic society populating avast territory,stretching over different climate zones.
Agood starting point to understand the complex and conflictual nature of a united Ethiopian national identity is reviewing the manifold different attempts to categorise the composition of Ethiopians ociety.There is no one common sense model which serves as the starting point to explain modern Ethiopia, but many individual interpretations. Thisi st rue not onlyofm ore directlyp olitical or otherwise propagandistic writings,but alsoinmost works from the field of Ethiopian Studies.²²⁷ As as tarting point,t he people living in the territorial boundaries of the Ethiopianstate could be divided according to four major religious groups:Orthodox-Christian, Muslim, Falasha-Jewishand various pagan traditions. They could also be divided accordingt ot he nine major languageg roups:A mhara, Tigrina, Gurage, Saho, Gada, Somali, Sidama, Afar and Beja. Their classification as ethnic groups,h owever,l eadsd own as lippery slope. Historically, many of today's ethnic identities cannot be traced back long before the nineteenth century,f or onlyafew of them have awritten tradition, and historicallinguistic research indicates layered and complex processesoflanguage-related identity formation.²²⁸ It is the subject of ongoing debate as to how the ethnic groups in the Horn of Africa evolvedo vert ime and along which lines they should be distinguished from one another.²²⁹ And while some works of research calculate over seventy languages, these languages often justv aryt ot he degree of ad ialect from each other.Toequate spoken languagewith ethnicity signals aflawed reasoning.Likewise, ethnicities do not run along the geographical or geological borders,n or along administrativeunits. Save for Falasha-Jewish, religious affiliation is spread across the linguistic groups and the regions.Often, ethnic self-designation of certain groups varied from their political and linguistic categorisations, following a discursive dynamic rather than changes in the socio-culturalrealities of aregion. These categoriesand their delineation playacrucial role in most social and political conflicts in recent Ethiopian history,but they onlymake sense when read against acontext of climate, geographyand administrative and political boundaries. Some scholars have tried to understand the history of Ethiopia through the history of its natural resourcesa nd as environmental history.²³⁰ The variety of geographical and climate zones, rangingf rom mountainous highland regions to lowland deserts and tropical rainforests,a ppears to offer an obvious and more neutralfeature of diversification and the opportunity to grasp the influential historicalt rajectories by looking at the different agricultural traditions. The Semitich ighland communities in the north relied on sedentary ox-plough agricultureo fg rain crops, and the pastoralist,n omadicl ow-land communities in the south cultivated starch crops.This categorising of landscapes,too, however has quitesignificant socio-political implications, as this process is far from being unanimouslyc onducted, or appreciated.²³¹ Communities, government agencies and international expertse ach have varyinginterpretations of the existing categories, and environmental crisis and the exploitation of natural resources influence the value ascribed to different zones.²³² It was within national state politics that these concepts of an environmental determination of Ethiopian society were established alongside cultural identities as defining elements for an Ethiopian historiography.²³³ Several competingi nternational mappingm issions during the 1960s and 1970sc ontributed to ad atabase of maps on Ethiopia that has yett ob ed econstructed, in order to be properlyi nterpreted.²³⁴ The north-south divisiono fE thiopia is best understood as being "not simplyg eographical, nor merelyh istorical"²³⁵ and is first and foremost ah elpful analyticals tarting point,i mportant to understand the socio-political aspects of Ethiopianh istory Heritage as image of the nation in general and indispensable to understanding the history of the Ethiopian World Heritages ites in an ational and local context.
The complex diversity of the Ethiopian society reflected aprofound structural inequality that characterised Ethiopian society at the beginning of the 1960s. The reasons for this inequality have theirroots in anumber of historical-political developments. Throughout the twentieth century,t he evolving hierarchyo ft he different social and ethnic groups in relation to the central government and to the provincial rulerscan be traced in ageographical manifestation of centre-periphery or north-southi nequality.²³⁶ The nation-building process in Ethiopia started at the end of the "Eraofthe Princes",with the re-centralisation of imperial authority under Tewodros II in 1855.Under the reign of Emperor Menelik II at the end of the nineteenth century,the territorial expansion came to ahighpoint. Menelik II established ac entralised government through imperial invasion and diplomacy,b ut the government failed to fullyd evelop its capacities under his reign and was subsequentlyw eakened in the period of Italian colonial occupation. Broadlys peaking, over the course of Menelik II'st wenty years of centralisation efforts, different levels of adaptation to the new bureaucratic and patrimonial imperial structures resulted in varying degrees of assimilation and integration of specific groups into the main transformation processes of Ethiopian society overall.²³⁷ While some of the provinces united under Menelik II maintained relative political power,others were completelyo vertaken and subjectt o resettlement policies. Thep rovinces from the southi np articularw eref orced to take in settlers from the north, and werer uled by imposed governors who were compensated for their political and land-rightlosses in the north by the granting of these positions.²³⁸ The varyingdegrees of soil-fertility in the different regions added as trongg eopolitical aspect to north-southi nequality.The differences in highland and lowland climate and agricultural traditions compelled the imperial regime, as well as the socialist one, to conceptualise the country'sSouth as aresourcetobeexploited in order to meet the needsofthe North which it supplied with food, land or labour power.²³⁹ The uneven distributionofresources was acrucial factor in terms of inequality,n ot onlyd ue to climatic features but also because of traditional systems of land tenureand their rapid transformation throughout the first half of the twentieth century.Exploitative sub-state level organisational structures of society had  Levine, Greater Ethiopia,181.  And also avaryingdegreeofintegration into the leadinghistorical narrative for the nation, Toggia, "History Writing",3 35 -36.  Bahru Zewde, AH istory,8 7 -90.  Gascon and Pourtier, La Grande Éthiopie,180 -82. encouraged and enabled the systematic extraction of surplus value at the expense of peasants over centuries.²⁴⁰ Different land tenuresystems had developed in the North and the South. While in both systems the right of the nobility to collect tribute -gult -existed, peasants in the North wereprotected through aform of privateo wnership,the rist system, in which land-rights werei nheritable, but not sellable on the market. In the process of state modernisationand centralisation of power, gult-holders in the South weree ncouraged and allowed to turn their domains into privatep roperty.T his effectively turned large parts of the peasant population of the southern provinces into wagew orkers with no rights to the land they livedon.²⁴¹ This process, which had startedunder Haile Selassie I'sgovernment,significantlyfuelledthe consolidation and mobilisation of revolutionary forces from the peasantso ft he south duringt he 1974 revolution.²⁴² North-South inequality was ac entral topic in the revolutionary and post-revolutionary socialist propaganda.
Just two months after the outbreak of the revolution, the Dergimplemented a rigorous land reform with the totalnationalisation of all land and completeeradicationo fp rivatel and ownership.A lthough the legal situation of the southern population of tenants and landless peasants improved largely through this reform, in effect the stringent state control of agricultural production, including forced resettlement and collectivisation as well as fixed governmentp rices, put afurther strain on the rural population. The growingdiscontent and anxiety of the rural population, in turn, fuelled the militant oppositional upsurge starting in the north and leadingt ot he overthrow of the Dergi n1 987. ² ⁴ ³ The north-south and the centre-peripherydichotomies werefor alongperiod widelya ccepted among Ethiopians and foreign scholars alike.²⁴⁴ It does not, however,hold up to more recent analysis,which suggests viewing the periphery as aconstructed political entity that would vary over time and did not constitute ahomogeneous entity at anygiven point,nor did an idea of the "historical core zone" of the Ethiopian state. Creating ac entre and ap eriphery began with the Heritage as image of the nation establishment of the new capital, Addis Ababa, around 1900,w hich sat at the conceptualised centre of the imagined totality of Ethiopians pace.²⁴⁵ Nonetheless, it is this constructed centre-periphery and north-south divide that must be understood in order to analyse the politicisation of heritagei nE thiopia. The idea of centrea nd periphery,a nd north and south, became ac entral structuring principle of governance and readilyl ent itself to at eleologyo fn ationbuilding,d eclaring it as essential for national unity that the peripheral regions orientate and subordinatet hemselvesp rogressively to the national coreo ft he central government.The historical narrative of state modernisation as acompletion of the destinyo fa nE thiopian national state in the territory of "Greater Ethiopia" and that had supposedlyevolved naturallyovercenturies was one constructed along these lines, and fruitfullyf ed into these politics.²⁴⁶

Heritage and the claim to Greater Ethiopia
While competinghistorical narrativesf ormedacrucial part of the revolutionary and oppositional movementsi nE thiopia, they all shared ac ommon ground in the historic anchoring of ac ontemporary Ethiopian society to the "Great Tradition".Inanattempt to pursue modernisation by finding atrue tradition, aclaim reiteratedbythe imperial as well as the socialist government,the Aksumite Empire wasreferenced as amodel of success and as an anchoringpoint for the origin as wella st he destinya nd future of the Ethiopian nation in the historic discourse.²⁴⁷ In addition to the culturallya ssimilatedn ational identity,aterritorial  Clapham, "Controlling Space",11.  This is classified as an intellectual tradition of Ethiopiaw hich is based on importingf oreign concepts as Ethiopianinterpretations,resultinginusingEuropean ideas to discover aspecific Ethiopian solution, and to stimulate change,MatteoSalvadore, ""Knowledge Is an Immovable Eternal LawW hich Rules the World":G äbre-Heywät Baykädan'sB lueprint for Ethiopia's SovereignM odernity",i nProceedings of the 16th International Conference of Ethiopian Studies, ed. Svein Egeetal., vol. 1(Trondheim: Department of Social Anthropology,Norwegian University of Sciencea nd Technology,2 009), 131. unity was manifested in the claim to "Greater Ethiopia",i nsisting on ad elineation of the Ethiopian state includingE ritrea and parts of Somalia (the Ogaden).
In away,the Dergcontinued these centralisation efforts in avery radical way by the means of their project of encadrement,ar estructuringo ft he existing provinces as ethnic provinces, completelyr eplacingt he existing administrative units. This meant creatinganational identity through the creation of anew spatial structure and breakinga part the power of existing ones.²⁴⁸ The ethnonationalism of the radicalised political movements was in opposition to the national unity of the claim to a "Greater Ethiopia",a nd the proponents of the various ethnonationalist movements spoke of the Ethiopian empire as an Amhara-dominated colonial enterprise. This rhetoric and approach by these various movements intensified and radicalised drasticallyi nr eaction to the authoritarianism of the Dergr egime.²⁴⁹ Haile Selassie Ia ttempted the project of governing aunified "Greater Ethiopia" as the leader of all ethnic groups united by the framework and the supposedlys hared history of the great Ethiopianh eritage. The revised constitution of 1955 consequentlyc ontained an explicit reference to this narrative and ac laim to direct lineagef or Haile Selassie Ia sadescendant of Menelik Ia nd the Queen of Sheba-he was supposedlythe two hundred and twenty-fifth descendant in this direct line.²⁵⁰ The exhibition of ethnicities and cultures in the museum of the Instituteo fE thiopian Studies supported this colonial strategyofe xpressing aw ide claim to territory and political power through the representation of cultures in am useum.²⁵¹ Complementing these political actions, the "Greater Ethiopia" claim was rigorouslyt ransported as the ideological underpinning of national representation, with most of the imagep roduction related to Ethiopian heritage.
In 1962, the Ministry of Informationpublished alarge-format brochureofone hundred and fifty pages entitled Image of Ethiopia,i ncludingc olour photographs and illustrations and acomprehensive overview of all aspectsofpolitical, social and economic developments.²⁵² Preceded by ab iographyo ft he emperor and portraits of him and the empress,the first chapter of the brochureprovided  Clapham, "Controlling Space",1 4-24.  MessayK ebede, Ideology and Elite Conflicts: Autopsy of the Ethiopian Revolution (Lanham, MD:L exington,2 011), 287-305.H owever,t he primacyo fe thnic over social and economic reasons for the insurgencies is at least questionable todaya nd remains difficultt oa ssess. af our-page historical introduction. Thisc hapter illustrates the enduringr elevancea nd role of monumental heritages ites in the government'ss elf-presentation and self-perception, and reveals the crafting of aruling historicalnarrative: "Ethiopia, one of the oldest countries of the world and the senior independent nation of the African continent,h as al ong and uninterrupted history dating from before the Christian Era.
[…]T he Ethiopian people is of an ancient race […]preserved through investigation and by monuments, stelae and inscriptions, in an areaextendingfrom the Red Sea Coast to the southern lakes." Starting with aparagraph on the Solomonic roots of the Ethiopianimperial dynasty,followed by just as ingle sentence on the "325r ecorded rulers" since then, the main consideration was givent oa ne xtended praise of Menelik II'sc entralisation efforts and Haile Selassie I'sr eforms as the main achievements in modern Ethiopian history.S uch claims about recent events contrasted with photographs of the pre-and earlyC hristian monuments in Aksum and Gondar which accompanied the text.
On the very first pageupon opening the brochure, the readers were presented with an outline-map of Ethiopia, and small drawingsofmonuments,animals, crops and industrial and transporti nfrastructure strewn across the map. This type of outline-map of Ethiopia,d elineatingablank territory on the inside, can be found on publications from all periods. The maps prominentlyf eatured iconic depictions of Ethiopianh eritage, natural and cultural, or ethnic peoples. Most common was am ap showing the "Greater Ethiopia" outline with isolated emblematic depictions of heritagea nd culture, such as in the pamphlet Bird's Eye View of Ethiopia published in the late 1960s by the Ethiopian Tourist Organisation (ETO), which has onlyt he large AksumO belisk hovering over the otherwise blank space of the isolated Ethiopian outline map.
Outline-maps of Ethiopia werecirculatedwidely, to arangeofa udiences.In the national atlas for Ethiopia, which was produced in three editions in 1962, 1981 and 1988, the numerous illustrated maps of Ethiopia did not include neighbouring territories, with the state boundaries surroundedb yt he whiteb ackground of the pages. This establishment of anational geo-bodyasademonstration of national sovereignty over ac ertain territory and people served to delineate the imagined community.²⁵³ On brochures and government publications, currency, stamps and letterheads,t he Ethiopiang eo-bodyw as the logo  Jordana Dym, "Democratizingthe Map:The Geo-Bodyand National Cartography in Guatemala, 1821-2010",i nDecolonizing the Map:C artography from Colony to Nation,e d. James R. Akerman (Chicago:C hicago University Press,2 017), 163s hows this for Guatemala. of the Ethiopian nation and, togetherw ith the iconicd rawingso fm onuments and natural features,b ecame part of al asting nationali nventory.²⁵⁴ The representation of Ethiopian heritage sites on these outline maps conceptuallyd efined, located and evenlyd istributed patrimonial resources across the national landscape.²⁵⁵ The Greater Ethiopia on these maps was presented as the national territory,filled with ac ollage of icons of heritageand culture, leaving no blank space in-between, such as in the 1976 Tourism Review.²⁵⁶ On the cover,w hich states in both English and Amharic the title of the brochurea s well as the fact that it is publishedbythe EthiopianT ourism and Hotel Commission, watercolour paintingso fa ncient monuments, modern churches,the modern town hall of Addis Ababa, wildlife and scenes of rural and religious life are mergedi nto ac olourful array within the outline of Ethiopia,s urrounded by the completelyb lank and monochrome territorieso ft he neighbourings tates.
On the cover of the 1989 publication of the Ethiopian Ministry of Information Ethiopia:ACradle of History are drawingso ft he main monuments of the World Heritage sites in Aksum, Gondar,L alibela, Harar and the pre-historic site of Sidamo, placed within an outline map which is transparent and layered over a panoramic photo of the Ethiopian highlands, filling the entire pagea sabackground imageo nt he cover.This book broughtt ogether an essayont he historic development of Ethiopia and as election of maps illustrating the history of the Ethiopians tate. The actual languageo ft he text and the visual languageo ft he maps suggested Ethiopian state history as the centreo fr egional development, and ac ontinuous, consequent outwards expansion of the Ethiopian empire throughout the past centuries.

Heritage and territorial conflictsi nt he Horn of Africa
The claim to power of the central Ethiopian governmentofthe pre-and post-revolutionary period wasnot onlycontested internally, but more critically in the direct regional surroundings.Ethiopia'sterritorial demands were legitimised, from the official Ethiopian viewpoint,b yt he historicalt radition that was claimed as   national history.Heritageand the establishment of historic claims formed part of apolitical strategy, also in regards to the conflicts at the disputed margins of the "Greater Ethiopian" state territory.
International relations werea ne xternal factor in the formationo fa nE thiopian national state after the end of the Italian occupation in 1941. The recognition and validation of Ethiopian state boundaries by other state powers was a resulto fd iplomatic efforts, and in at ime that notablyf ostered the principle of building the international system as one between sovereign governments, this helped greatlyt oe stablish the central government'sp ower over Ethiopiant erritory.²⁵⁷ Ethiopia was at the heart of several conflicts in the Horn of Africa. As alegacy of arbitrarilydrawn colonial borders,the Horn of Africa, until today, is one of the most conflict-riddenr egions of the world, and borders and borderlands, questions of nationalism and identities, and land claims as well as cross-border movements are at the centre of these conflicts. Ethiopia'sdisputed south-eastern border with Somalia was the cause of the particularlyv iolent Ogaden Wari n 1977,which prompted international involvement and, although ending in 1978, did not immediatelys ucceed in establishing ap eaceful situation in the Ogaden region, which was still claimedb yS omalia until 1980.I nt he north of Ethiopia, the conflict with Eritrea had been broodingeversince the annexation of the former federal state of Eritrea into the Ethiopian empire, and throughout the entire period of the Dergregime until Eritrean independence in 1990.Especiallythe last of these two conflicts fuelled the internal ethno-liberation movementsa nd their provocation of armed conflict,putting manyregions of Ethiopia into the shadow of armed conflict for many decades.²⁵⁸ Ethiopia'sc laim to ar egional hegemonic position was stronglyt ied to the historic narrativeso faGreater Ethiopia and instrumentalised to justify the denunciation of federalism, nationalist movements and the territorial claims of Somalia.Thus, the territorial conflicts and the necessary foreign regional positioning of Ethiopia also perpetuated the establishment of historicaln arratives of Ethiopianhegemony. The imageofEthiopia,constructed with the aid of an internationallyacclaimednational heritage, also has to be interpreted in this context. The "Greater Ethiopia" maps shown abovei llustrate this imagec onstruction, as they simplye xtended, as if naturally, over disputed territories. An outline-map, includingEritrea and the Ogaden as part of "Greater Ethiopia",published during these conflicts,c ertainlyh ad an impact beyond the tourism marketings phere.
There is another aspect that suggests thatf or Haile Selassie Ie stablishing heritagew as part of al argerp olitical strategyt os ustain the state centralisation and consolidation process. International relations were ah ighlyr elevant factor in the formation of the Ethiopiann ational state. The recognition and validation of Ethiopian state boundaries by the largerinternational powers,duringaperiod wheret he international system was being built as as ystem between sovereign national governments, greatlyc ontributed to strengthening the central government'sg rip on the country'sp rovinces.

Monopolising heritage-making through culturala ssimilation
In the political construction of an Ethiopiannational identity,the affiliation and streamliningofc ulturali dentities wasacrucial factor,a nd in order to monopolise heritage-making as astate affair,apolitics of culturalassimilation and censored historiographywas institutionalised. All historic research and historic mediations, such as history schoolbooks and museum exhibitions, wereh ighly censored and adapted accordingt ot he political programme.Claiming the relevant existing heritages ites as national heritage, in particulart he culturalh eritages ites of the historic north, so as to furnish the "Great Tradition" narrative, was astrategytostabilise the central government'spower,both imperial and socialist.Thisd ominant narrativew as built not onlyonp raising the dynastic success,but also on asystematic silencing and devaluingofnon-Christian and non-Amharicgroups,such as the Oromo, who wereoften portrayedasdetrimental to the development and cultureofthe Ethiopian empire in mainstream historiographyb yb oth Western and Ethiopian scholars.²⁵⁹ Haile SelassieIhad introduced ar evised constitution in 1955,w hich, as a part of this stabilising strategy, aimed to achieve national identity by imposing culturala ssimilation on the provinces. With the revised constitution, Amharic was declareda st he official languageo fE thiopia, even though only2 5% of the population werenative speakers.²⁶⁰ The prioritising of Amharic as the lingua franca for the Ethiopian national state reinforcedaculturalassimilation strategy that built on the Abyssinian narrative,essentiallyarguingt hat the imperial heritageo fA xum, Lalibela and Gondar alone had reached "as tandard of cultural development and progress comparable to anya ttained by anyo ther country in the civilised world."²⁶¹ The Amharic and Semitic cultures purportedlyp rovided the onlyv alid historical legacya nd heritageo fE thiopia, usurping all other narrativesinthe official representation. In the historiography, non-Christian groups wererendered into abulk of "Jewish,Arabic and […]Nubian immigrants"²⁶² and sidelined into an egligible influencea tt he margins of the Axumite empire.
An elemento fr evolutionary propaganda was devoted to denouncing Haile Selassie'sculturalassimilationpolitics as part of "feudal" imperial politics.Consequently, the Dergc laimed to disregard the cultural assimilation policy and to strengthen the autonomyofdifferent ethnic groups within the Ethiopian national state. Religious and languaged iversification were installed as official institutions after 1974,todemonstrate that the equality of all cultures and nations within the great Ethiopiann ation had been achieved through the socialist government.Y et,t his official promotion of the "self-determination of cultures" was executed undert he leadership of the central government.This supposedlye mpoweringa nd radical political claim left no doubtt hatt he self-determination was nevertheless to be strictlyconfined to remain within the defined boundaries and authority of the Ethiopiann ational state. Mengistu Haile Mariam'sc all for "unity or death" for the Ethiopian people served as ap ropaganda slogan to some and as at hreat to manyo thers.²⁶³ Religious identity playedacrucial part in the consolidation of the new national identity.H aile Selassie I'sa chievement of the re-nationalisation of the EthiopianO rthodoxc hurch increased his populars uccess and at the same time his position over the church. The reinstallingo fa nE thiopian Patriarcha s head of the church, as opposed to the then-existing tradition of an Egyptian one, further supported his centralisation efforts, as the church became moredependent on the state and the distributed monastic institutions became weaker. Historically, the Orthodoxchurch had been an important landowner in the centralised feudal system, collectingt axes and overseeinge ducation as well as health servicesinmanyareas.Under Haile Selassie I, these functions weretransferred to the governmenta nd the church was givent he role of an "ideologue" within the imperial government, "providing morala nd divine legitimisation of the Solomonic dynasty and imperial dominance."²⁶⁴ Aftert he 1974 revolution, all churchp roperty wass eized and nationalised,a nd was,a ccordingt ot he socialist orientation, written out of nationali dentity.²⁶⁵ From 1980 onwards, religion was once again officiallye ndorsed as part of the Ethiopiann ational identity,t og ain popular support,a nd to establish and strengthen the identity of peaceful religious coexistence in Ethiopia and the existenceo fasuccessfully multi-ethnic state.²⁶⁶ From 1950,h istoriographyw as installeds ystematicallyi nt he nascent academic landscape, when anumberofEthiopianhistorians weresenttobetrained in Western academic institutions in order to produce aversion of Ethiopian history that could be made to competew ith Western history and integrate with it. Ethiopianand non-Ethiopian historians alike "did not question the "Great Tradition" of ac entralising,i ndependent and unitary State rooted in an ancient past and led by an innovative monarchy".²⁶⁷ In effect,Ethiopian historiography,even as it became an academic discipline in the 1950s,did not happen autonomously, but in the service of the national state, and largely relied on existing cultural and ideological constructs as opposed to being an investigative,empirical field. And this was the casefor Ethiopianhistorians and foreign historians of Ethiopian history alike.²⁶⁸ Shortlya fter the first cohort of students had graduated from Haile Selassie IUniversity,they radicalised the discourses of national identity,history and heritage, calling for aq uest for a "true Ethiopian" way, attemptingt og raft Western principles, liberal values and modernisation onto the existing "distant past" and "Great Tradition" narrativesa ssumedb yt he government.²⁶⁹ Through the de facto assimilation of all cultural identities into the Amharic, Christian, north-Ethiopian cultural identity,t he dominant narrative of the national identity was set and so weret he representative uses of heritagea nd the heritagesites.The most effective institutions for enactingthis linguistic and historical politics werethose of education and the military.²⁷⁰ Ethiopian society traditionallylacked amiddle class, afact seen by manyasanimpediment to modernisation and progress.T he military was the onlya vailable path for class mobility, and by imposingAmharic as the onlylanguagefor the military,Amharisation gained significant momentumu nder Haile Selassie I.²⁷¹ After the revolution, the new government was formed of leadinga ctors from the military,i ne ffect putting the socialist government into the hands of the newlyA mharised elites.²⁷² Haile Selassie Ih ad put an emphasis on developing secondary and higher education. After the revolution the official policy shifted towards prioritising alphabetisation of the masses over higher education. This resulted in an steep increase in primary education, with an emphasis on quantity of accessand largest possibler egional coverage. In the zemecha development campaign, all students enrolled in secondary schools and university wered ispatched on am andatory teachingm ission into the rural areas of Ethiopia,s oa st oe nforce revolutionary politics despite the lack of administrativecapacities of the Derg.²⁷³ This strategy aimed at producing ahighbasicfunctional literacy among the population rather than competitively educated candidates suitable for more specialiseda nd advanced training.I nt his process, ad ifferent kind of cultural dominance was introduced through the Amharisation of secondary school education, resulting in a decline of English-speaking students. Consequently, the rising number of high school graduates did not translate into al argern umber of students qualified to enter university, as higher education still largely happened in English. This meant that socialist education policies led to agenerational rift between an educated elite, who had benefited from the imperial educational system, and the following generation of more basically-educated Ethiopians. This educated elite formedacrucial part of the leadership level in post-revolutionary Ethiopia.²⁷⁴ The institutional knowledge production happened intertwined with political turmoil and change. On the one hand, the discourse of national identity during and afterthe revolution also consisted of revealing the decadence and malfunction in the recent empire. However,w hile the imperial state was critically attacked for its feudalistict raits, and held responsible for the inequality in Ethiopia, the socialist government also relied on av ersion of the historicallyr ooted, unitary state in need of strongcentral leadership. In this logic they linked them-selvesb ack to at radition of the "people of Ethiopia" that had to be freed from the chains of feudal repression by the socialist revolution, and broughtt o their true calling.Akey argument of the student movements that transcended revolutionary propaganda into that of the socialist government after the revolution was to frame the Ethiopian imperial times as feudalistic, exploitative and "blood-thirsty",h aving spoiled the country'sg reat past.²⁷⁵ More specifically, the government pledgedt om ake monuments and national heritagea ccessible to the masses, to educatee veryone about the "Great tradition" of Ethiopia to help with the socialist endeavour,and declared the preservation of culturalheritagea sp art of the zemecha development campaign.²⁷⁶ After the 1974 revolution the conservation of natural heritagea nd wildlife, too, was framed as an act of revolutionary liberation. In the official newspaper Ethiopian Herald,aregular series of articles was published to educatethe Ethiopian public about the Ethiopian heritageand the necessitytopreserve "the progressive cultural heritages of the past"²⁷⁷ to advance the socialist revolution and reconstruction of society.T he 1978 brochure Wildlife Conservation in Socialist Ethiopia presents ag ood example: This ancient heritage of forests and wildlife is one of the precious natural resources of Ethiopia.B ut over the centuries the feudal overlords, straddlingt he back of the country, exploited these resources and very tragically depleted them. The vast areas of land, denuded of the giant trees once that coveredi t, bear silent testimonyt ot his mindless cruel destruction.
[…]The feudal regime had, onlyoflately, made some faint attempts at conserving these wildlife resources and the forest.Still the destruction continued. But with the onset of the popular revolution in Ethiopia in 1974 which overthrew the feudal regime, conservation has gained momentum and has become am assive force. From the very beginning of the revolution, the PMAC[Provisional Military Administrative Council] declaredtotal conservation of the wildlife and forest resources of Ethiopia as ap art of its avowed policy.²⁷⁸ In contrast to these images of heritagea nd national identity,t hroughout the 1960s and 1970s, official politics had to competew ith al ivelyi ntellectual tradition and political discourse. Opposition groups and movements made the case for or against assimilation and the historic identitiesofthe major (ethnic) groups wered iscussed in an uanced, yeta gitated and propagandistic manner.The distinct Marxist and nationalist orientation of the student movement formedt he ideological basis for radicalisation and mass-mobilisation leading up to the revolution. Consequently, the aggressive use of historic narratives and heritageasa weapon in the revolution and the subsequent years influenced the political dimension of national heritage. The Ethiopian student movement applied Marxist concepts of feudalism and imperialism and the official historic narrativesofempire weret urned against the government in many of the student writings, justifying its overthrow.This confrontation of traditionalpower structures with modern theory has to be read against atransnational process, and can be compared to campaigns in otherA frican countries,s uch as the demystification campaign of Guinea'sS ekou Touré, during which traditionalr eligious and political practices of secrecyand fetishes werepubliclyrevealedasanactofmodernisation and liberation.²⁷⁹ Denouncing the "Great Tradition" was ak ey slogan of the student movement,c alling instead for the creation of as tate "in which all nationalities participate equallyinstate affairs".Inone of its most influential chants, the student movement proclaimed the goal that no longer "to be an Ethiopian,you will have to wear an Amharamask […]".²⁸⁰ Slogans likethis were responsible for the successfulm assm obilisation of marginalisede thnic/regional identities in the protests.
Contrasting interpretations of history and claims to heritageresulted, during the course of the student movements, not onlyi narevolutionary propaganda that would then reach further into the post-revolutionary government,b ut also in feeding the theoretical background and ideological foundationofthe various national liberation fronts.²⁸¹ The revolution had actualised the question of national identity and with the dimension of culturali dentity had thus turned the question of national heritageand historic narrativesinto aculturalconflict. Heritage, once more,was onlyrepresented by the "Historic North" sites and the ruling elites of the Ethiopian state. The ethnicnational movements rejected the concept of an Ethiopian empire as as uccession to the great,classical tradition that was simplys poiled by imperial feudalism and had to be freed by revolutionary forces. In fact,the post-1974 regimewas confronted by renewed accusations that  Bahru Zewde, The Quest for Socialist Utopia,129 -30;MikeMcGovern, Unmasking the State: Making Guinea Modern (Chicago:The University of Chicago Press,2 013).  Walleligne Mekonnen, "On the Question of Nationalities in Ethiopia",q uoted in: Balsvik, HaileS elassie'sS tudents,2 77;M arzagora, "History",12-13.  Bahru Zewde, The Quest for Socialist Utopia,2 58. it continued the empire in ad ifferent guise and suppressed the distinct ethnic identities.
The Tigrayan People'sL iberation Front in particularb uilt their insurgency on this argument and refused to let the Tigrayan heritage-after all, save for the twop aleontological sites in the deserts of the Lower Valley of the Omo and the Awash, all Ethiopian World Heritage sites werelocated in Tigray-be affiliated with the official promoted Amhara-centric Ethiopian identity.S imilarly, the Eritrean People'sLiberation Front,aswellasthe Oromo and Western Somali Liberation Front,r aised the accusation of colonial continuity by the Ethiopian socialist regime of the Derg, directlyl inking it to the expansionistt endencies of Menelik II and Haile Selassie I, and declaring it an "act of internal colonialism".²⁸² Throughout all the social changes and transformative processes of the revolutionary decade 1970 -1980,history and heritageasaspatial and symbolic representation became acrucial tool in the political opposition for marginalised groups,b asicallyd eriving ac ontrary version, one that rendered the "good empire" into the "bad empire".I nt his climate the questt ol egitimise the political present through the past became ac ontested territory,a nd the imperial state, the revolutionary groups and forces as well as the socialist governmente ach had to make it ap riority to monopoliset he establishment and representation of heritage.
Yet, despite the strongo ppositional voices among intellectuals-especially those of the diaspora-heritage-making in terms of officiallyl abelled national sites remained as tate monopoly, and thus as trategye xclusively available to those holding government power.Fromananalytical viewpoint,the construction and self-designation of ethnic identities of Tigrayans,Oromos, Eritreans,E thiopians, Amharas and others has in itself to be seen as aset of discourses monopolising the dimension of political conflict for the constitution of these ethnic identities. In the context of the revolution, regionalist demands and historiographies attached in the service of them, and the revisionism of exiled Ethiopians, transformed the field of Ethiopianh istoriographyi nto am inefield, on which it became ever more difficult to practice balanced research thatw as impervious to instrumentalisation.²⁸³ The culturalassimilation and establishment of adominant historic narrative and selection of heritagesites became amirror for the social inequalities prevailing and fuelling the civil conflicts of the 1960s and 1970s. Essentially, Ethiopian  Marzagora, "History",2 1.  Triulzi, "Battlingwith the Past",279;this is also clear from the works of Western scholars at this time, e. g. Levine, Greater Ethiopia;Markakis and Ayele, Class and Revolution;Graham Hancocke xplicitlym entionsh is relations with the Dergi nH ancock, TheS ign,8-9, 43. history,i nt he "Greater Ethiopia" narrative,r emained, like manyE uropean histories,ahistory of the upper class or of the elites,n ot the peasants who composed the large majority of the population. This focus of attention on the monuments of antiquity and the medieval period reinforcedt he idea thatE thiopia's history and heritagew as to be found in the northern highlands. This left aside the largerp art of the country,r enderingm oret hanh alf of it into an "Ethiopia without monuments",m arginalised in the narrative of national representation. As with the monuments, historicallys ignificant processes, such as the revolutionary years, weree xclusively located in and associated with the north.²⁸⁴ Because of the revolutionary decade of the 1970sa nd regional conflicts in the Horn of Africa, Ethiopian nation-building cannot be clearlyu nderstood as ac ontinuous process. Despite the ruptures caused by the revolution, however, Ethiopianh istory throughout the twentieth century can be viewed in light of a continuous process of power centralisation. The politicisation of heritagei s best interpreted along these trajectories of centralisation and nationalism. The establishment of national heritagei nE thiopia, and the underlying question of national identity,werer ooted in the changingd ynamics of competition for authority,t erritory and resources outlineda bove.I nt erritorial conflicts,c laims werem ade on the basis of historical narrativesa nd heritage.
In the most recent scholarship of Ethiopian historians, many authorsdefine Haile Selassie I'sa nd Mengistu Haile Mariam'sp olitics as internal colonisation. Often, the view that even with the ideological shift of the 1974 revolution the pattern of hierarchya nd centre-peripheryr elations remained unchanged is the introductory assertion for astudyofthe political systems and social history of marginalised regions and ethnicities, such as Abbas H. Gnamo'ss tudy on the Arsi-Oromo, or TemesgenB aye'sw ork on Muslims in Ethiopia.²⁸⁵ Without lending oneself to the particularh istoriographyofa ny of the distinct national identities in Ethiopia, understanding Ethiopian national history in the twentieth century as imperial history opens up the possibility of interpreting the use of heritagea nd national parks as ap owerful political tool. Heritage as image of the nation