Negus Mikael of Wollo

Mohammed Ali Abba Bula was born on the eighteenth of March 1850 at the Wollo province of north-central Ethiopia, the son of Imam Ali Abba Bula of the Wollo Yejju Oromo Muslim aristocracy — of the Imam Liban line — and Woizero Gete Eshete. He was raised in the principal Wollo Muslim Yejju Oromo aristocracy of the period.

He was captured at sixteen at the principal Wollo campaigns of Emperor Tewodros II (placed in this archive) of 1865 and 1866 — and was converted to Ethiopian Orthodox Christianity in 1867 by the imperial Tewodrosian clergy at the imperial camp at Magdala. He was baptised Mikael at his conversion and adopted the Solomonic imperial name.

He was reinstated to the Wollo lordship under Emperor Yohannes IV (placed in this archive) in 1872 — and consolidated the Wollo provincial administration across the 1870s and 1880s under the protection of the Tigrayan imperial throne.

He transferred his allegiance to Menelik II at the conclusion of the Yohannes IV reign in 1889 — and was named Ras of Wollo by Menelik in March 1890. He held the Wollo Rasship across the consolidation of the Menelik imperial state.

He commanded the principal Wollo column at the Battle of Adwa on the first of March 1896 — and led the assault against the Italian Brigade Albertone on the western flank of the engagement. He was wounded at Adwa.

He was elevated to the Negus of Wollo on the fourth of June 1914 by his grandson Lij Iyasu (placed in this archive) — at the principal post-1913 Wollo-imperial dynastic settlement.

He rebelled against the deposition of his son Lij Iyasu on the twenty-seventh of September 1916 — and led the principal Wollo army against the Solomonic noble coalition at the Battle of Segale of the twenty-seventh of October 1916. He was defeated at Segale and captured.

He was held in imperial custody at Holeta from 1916 to his death in 1918.

He died at Addis Alem near Holeta on the eighth of September 1918 of complications of a long imprisonment, at sixty-eight.

He is honored here as the Negus of Wollo and the father of Iyasu V.