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J.S. Trimingham has famously described Ethiopia as a "beleaguered
fortress in the midst of a sea of Islam," implying Christians in
Ethiopia have consistently been besieged by Muslims, not vice
versa. This thesis challenges this common conception by
demonstrating that throughout Ethiopia's medieval period
(1270-1555), the time of greatest conflict between the Ethiopian
Empire and its Muslim neighbors, Muslim forces did not besiege the
Ethiopian Empire. On the contrary, the Ethiopians militarily
subjugated their neighboring Muslim sultanates, most prominently
Ifat and Adal, and politically divided the sultanates' ruling
families to keep them weak. These tactics, designed to wrest
control of trade from the sultanates, were resoundingly successful
until Muslims unified around military/religious leaders, primary
among them being Imam Gran, who in 1531 conquered the Ethiopian
Empire. Though Imperial forces reversed the conquest by 1543, a
historical focus on this event still feeds the misperception that
Ethiopia's history is that of a Christian kingdom ensconced in a
fortress to protect itself from a beleaguering "Muslim menace."
This thesis concludes to the contrary that the Ethiopian Empire
waded aggressively and purposefully into the sea of Islam to
beleaguer its many Muslim neighbors.
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