Empress Taytu Betul

Taytu Betul was born around 1851 into the Ethiopian nobility, claiming descent from the Solomonic dynasty through both her father's and her mother's lines. She married Menelik II of Shewa in 1883, three years before he ascended the imperial throne. From the moment of her elevation as Empress — Itege — in 1889, she functioned as the most consequential political strategist of the imperial court. The chronicles of her reign record her as the brain of the throne.

Her defining act was the diplomacy that produced the Battle of Adwa. The Treaty of Wuchale, signed in 1889 between Italy and Ethiopia, contained two versions: the Amharic version, which Menelik signed, permitted Ethiopia to communicate with European powers through Italian intermediaries; the Italian version, which Italy ratified, imposed an Italian protectorate over Ethiopia. The discrepancy was deliberate. Taytu Betul detected the deception in late 1889 and pressed her husband to repudiate the treaty. When the Italian envoy attempted to threaten her personally in early 1890, she replied — in words recorded by every Italian dispatch of the period — "You wish Ethiopia to be represented before the other powers as your protectorate. But this will not be. I am a woman. I do not love war. But I prefer war to the dishonor you are proposing to my country."

She accompanied Menelik on the campaign that followed. At the Battle of Adwa on the first of March 1896, she commanded six thousand of her own troops as a distinct contingent within the Ethiopian army and personally directed the supply lines through the rugged Tigray terrain that defeated Italian logistics. The campaign founded Addis Ababa — the city she chose and named, "New Flower" — and established Ethiopia as the only African state to survive the Scramble for Africa as a sovereign power.

After Menelik's incapacitation by strokes in 1908 she served as effective regent until court factions deposed her in 1910. She died in February 1918 at the monastery of Entoto Maryam, where she had retired.

She is honored here as the strategist of Adwa, the founder of Addis Ababa, and the empress who refused the small print.