Did You Know?

                THAT ETHIOPIA  WAS NEVER COLONIZED BY AN EUROPEAN COUNTRY

 

The earliest possible of Ethiopia in records was by the Ancient Egyptians, who may have referred to it as being in the Land of Punt. The Ethiopian Empire (Abyssinia) was first founded by the Habesha people in the Ethiopian Highlands. Due to migration and imperial expansion, it grew to include many other primarily Afro-Asiatic-speaking communities, including Amhara, Tigray, Oromos, Somalis, Afars, Sidama, Gurage, Agaw and Harari, among others.

Ethiopia was never colonized by a European power, but was occupied by Italians in 1936 however, several colonial powers had interests and designs on Ethiopia in the context of the 19th century.

In the 1880s Italy failed to take Abyssinia (as Ethiopia was then known) as a colony. On the 3rd of  October 1935 Mussolini (the Fascist Party leader and Prime Minister of Italy) ordered a new invasion (in order to boost Italian national prestige, which was wounded by Ethiopia's defeat of Italian forces at the Battle of Adowa in1896 which saved Ethiopia from Italian colonization) and on the 9th of May the following year, Abyssinia was annexed by Italy. On 1 June the country was merged with Eritrea and Italian Somalia to form Africa Orientale Italiana (AOI - Italian East Africa).
Emperor Haile Selassie made an impassioned appeal to the League of Nations on 30 June 1936, gaining support from the US and Russia. But many League of Nations members, including Britain and France, recognized Italian colonization. It was not until 5 May 1941, when Selassie was restored to the Ethiopian throne, that independence was regained.